Factory Farming = Animal Abuse, Are You Okay With That?

Nearly a year ago, I did the only thing I could do to feel empowered after watching "Food, Inc.", I became a vegetarian.  If you haven't watched the documentary "Food, Inc." which explores how our food system has radically changed over the past decade or so..you must.  It's heartbreaking and incensing all at once.  You will never look at meat in your grocery store quite the same way. I hear quite often from friends and coworkers: "Oh, I could never watch that." Why is that?! .....because then you might be forced to do something?  Would you turn a blind eye if a child was getting abused?  I don't think you would. We have a moral obligation to do something. The system wasn't always this way.  We can go back to more humane methods.  We can pass laws that make confinement, drugging up our cows on antibiotics and growth hormones, and feeding our animals foods like corn and soy that they were never meant to eat in the first place, illegal.  You don't even have to be that radical to make changes in the system.  Give up meat one or two days a week.  When you do buy meat, buy organic.  Yes, it's expensive but ask yourself: Do you really want to eat an animal that couldn't move, that didn't see the light of day, an animal that was constantly sick and had to be given a regular course of antibiotics, an animal whose stress hormones went into overdrive in the slaughterhouse?  What do you think that does to your body when it's ingested?  Meditate on that for a bit.  Bottom line: What you buy or don't buy will affect factory farming practices.  And yes, there are other benefits. You may find that your cholesterol comes down, your grocery bill decreases, and some newly discovered notches on your belt.