There is also the fact that the animals are kept in pens much too small for comfort or health. This serves the purpose of allowing the factory farms to “grow” a maximum number of animals and glean the largest profit from their “harvest” while keeping the meat tender from unused muscles. The animals have poor ventilation and often are left to wallow in their own filth. Chickens, in particular, because of their propensity for pecking each other in tight quarters, are de-beaked and force fed because they cannot feed themselves. Hens are forced to lay eggs until they get osteoporosis (because the calcium depleted through egg laying is not replaced in their diet) and then they are slaughtered.

And like I said, I also question the ethics of eating fish. Many of the ships used to harvest fish from the sea use drag nets which kill everything they come in contact with. Not to mention the reefs it destroys as it drags. And anything which is brought up and not fit for human consumption is let to die, rather than being returned to the sea to live. I’m sure that some methods are better than others, but finding out which methods are used by which companies is the difficult part. Better to eat as little fish as possible. Not to mention the amount of pollution in the seas is rising. Mercury poisoning is the least of what you have to worry about if you eat lots of fish.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I think everyone is entitled to decide what they ingest. I’m not a PETA crazy. We’re omnivores, and we are able to eat both animal and vegetable proteins. I don’t have a problem with people who eat meat. I just think that some people might choose differently if they knew exactly what their food went through before hitting their plate. One way or the other, ethically or for health reasons, eating meat is just not that healthy. In moderation, I don’t think it’s so bad, but I know lots of people who like nothing more than a big heeping plate of meat, a big old meat sandwich on bread so processed it’s nothing more than empty calories, heck we even have the low-no carb diets… all meat, all the time. It’s just not healthy. Not to mention the fact that our digestive system is that of an herbivore. Our intestines are simply too long to properly process the meat. Unless we also ingest large amounts of fiber to make it pass quickly through our digestive tract, the meat will fester and rot in your gut before you finally um, process it and get rid of it.

What I’m saying here is, I don’t think it’s ethical to eat meat unless you know where it comes from and that it was treated right before being killed. Health-wise, you just don’t know what you’re eating if you buy it from the supermarket. Speaking as an empath, the chemicals produced by the animal’s short life of misery and horrific death is something you ingest too. It’s one of the reasons it’s better to reduce or remove meat entirely. I honestly think that our diet contributes to the epidemic of depression people are facing. Drugs are not the answer. A healthier, more balanced diet is.

I haven’t eaten meat from mammals since the 90s. I eat free range poultry about once every other week, and fish about once a week. Like I said, I probably wouldn’t even eat that much if not for my family, but my mother has this thing where if she doesn’t make any meat for me, she says she feels like she’s not feeding me at all. Of course, I do most of the cooking, but that just means they want me to cook meat-heavy dishes for them. :-/