This sort of thing is why I can't condemn the British back in the day who invested in the East India Trading Company or even simply purchased sugar cubes for their tea, produced at plantations via...
This sort of thing is why I can't condemn the British back in the day who invested in the East India Trading Company or even simply purchased sugar cubes for their tea, produced at plantations via torture and slave labor.
We are the same in modern day, adding layers of redirection in a convoluted global economy so that the wealthy of the world can have plausible deniability whilst enjoying the fruits of suffering.
Chocolate comes to mind, with it's inextricable link to child labor and trafficking on the Ivory Coast. We can try to purchase "fair trade" and "certified" cacao, but at the end of the day kids are still being exploited. Hungry children are plentiful in Africa, and cacao is valuable for export. Until the economics of the situation changes, this is the status quo.
I used to be employed on the laboratory side of the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, testing meat, poultry, and unshelled eggs for microbiological adulteration. I never loved the work,...
I used to be employed on the laboratory side of the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, testing meat, poultry, and unshelled eggs for microbiological adulteration. I never loved the work, especially the testing and smell of warm incubated raw meat.
The worst sample I’ve analyzed was a cow’s raw tongue, still slick with spittle and saliva. I don’t know why the CSI sent that part, as we usually only tested body muscle trim. Prepping a mammal’s tongue for analysis really drove home the grim reality of my work.
I recognize the need for public health oversight of meat production, but always felt a measure of internal conflict at being part of such an unaccountably cruel system. I don’t condemn the consumption of meat, only the disconnected, morally ambiguous means by which we so efficiently harvest it.
I read this years ago and it stayed with me. I knew what it was once I saw the title. It is nothing that I didn't really knew about it, but reading from this perspective made an impact. I don't...
I read this years ago and it stayed with me. I knew what it was once I saw the title.
It is nothing that I didn't really knew about it, but reading from this perspective made an impact.
I don't think this kind of cruelty and denial is ever going to end. It is depressing.
This sort of thing is why I can't condemn the British back in the day who invested in the East India Trading Company or even simply purchased sugar cubes for their tea, produced at plantations via torture and slave labor.
We are the same in modern day, adding layers of redirection in a convoluted global economy so that the wealthy of the world can have plausible deniability whilst enjoying the fruits of suffering.
Chocolate comes to mind, with it's inextricable link to child labor and trafficking on the Ivory Coast. We can try to purchase "fair trade" and "certified" cacao, but at the end of the day kids are still being exploited. Hungry children are plentiful in Africa, and cacao is valuable for export. Until the economics of the situation changes, this is the status quo.
I used to be employed on the laboratory side of the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service, testing meat, poultry, and unshelled eggs for microbiological adulteration. I never loved the work, especially the testing and smell of warm incubated raw meat.
The worst sample I’ve analyzed was a cow’s raw tongue, still slick with spittle and saliva. I don’t know why the CSI sent that part, as we usually only tested body muscle trim. Prepping a mammal’s tongue for analysis really drove home the grim reality of my work.
I recognize the need for public health oversight of meat production, but always felt a measure of internal conflict at being part of such an unaccountably cruel system. I don’t condemn the consumption of meat, only the disconnected, morally ambiguous means by which we so efficiently harvest it.
I left the job, and am unlikely to return.
That's one tough read and a hard reality unknown to most.
I read this years ago and it stayed with me. I knew what it was once I saw the title.
It is nothing that I didn't really knew about it, but reading from this perspective made an impact.
I don't think this kind of cruelty and denial is ever going to end. It is depressing.