Greenblade - creation - faith - justice

In case you missed it...

This article provides nice data on behalf of some of the challenges to "localism" that I've been raising in earlier posts. 

It is starting to look as though whether or not something is "local" is more or less ethically irrelevant.  Of course, it might still taste better, and it's nice to get to know farmers at the market! But that was never at issue...


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petfood

One of the best parts of Jonathan Foer's book Eating Animals is a long discussion of why and whether we should eat dogs.  Foer's rhetorical point is clear: Americans and Europeans love their dogs, they express outrage at and severely punish dog-abusers like Michael Vick, and yet there are lots of reasons to think that (a) dog meat would be quite tasty and (b) at least some farm animals are as smart, sensitive, and vulnerable to pain and suffering as our furry friends.

Now the line between pets and food is being blurred even further as cats come in for the same treatment over at Slate, and pigs, or mini-pigs anyway, are becoming the new pet du jour. 

Perhaps "pig in a blanket" will someday refer to a thing on our beds, rather than a thing on our plates.
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Fracking and the 99's

Returning to this blog from our summer book discussion over on "Extending the Table"...

This is off the topic of "Just Eating" but related to the debates we've had here on Greenblade about fracking and other industries that are pushing to come into our part of the Marcellus Shale region.  It's easy to find Great Recession data about the ongoing effects of poverty and joblessness in the US, but this story seems particularly provocative.  The "99's" are people who have used up their allotted 99 weeks of unemployment pay from the government and still haven't found a job.  If this piece is to be believed, these are not the work allergic (stereo)types that Fox News often suggests.  And they have started to take their protests all the way to Wall Street.

I am attracted to a kind of New Testament-inflected version of Marxism.  But until the revolution (or second coming) occurs, can we ... MORE