On Liking the Taste of Steak
There was an interesting comment on my post, "The Eco-Kosher Movement Has a Conscience?" which is about kosher happy meat. Commenter Jim wrote: "I think the main obstacle your movement faces is that nonhuman animals taste so damn good." And you know what? I don’t disagree. When I ate meat, I’d try anything. I’d eat snake, ostrich, bison. In fact, I used to say I’d be happy to eat dog meat, cat meat, or a grilled human leg. Why? Because it was all the same. If you’re going to kill someone and eat that someone, why should species matter? What’s so disgusting or offensive about eating dog meat or a human leg? It’s probably the knowledge that it’s dog meat or a human leg, not the actual taste. It’s the idea that eating a dog or a person is outside the realm of what has always been acceptable to you, according to your culture and your personal history.
I was at brunch with my in-laws when I first got married (to a meat-eater), and my father-in-law ordered a yak burger. Everyone but me ordered some animal dish, and he asked me if I minded that he ordered yak. My response was that it was no different from the chicken his wife ordered, to me. I’ve never seen two people look so perplexed.
People who find the taste of meat nauseating are fortunate. I have not been as lucky. Now, the smell of any kind of raw flesh or any kind of cheese does, indeed, make me feel like I need to empty my stomach of its contents via my mouth. But the taste of grilled steak (only grilled, and only steak, for some reason), was never disgusting to me. In fact, I spent a year, less than a decade ago, after being a vegetarian since age 15 and a vegan for at least a handful of those years, eating grilled filet mignon up and down the eastern seaboard. (This explains how I married a meat-eater–that’s when I met him. The ol’ bait and switch.) And all of this flesh consumption was despite the fact that I’ve been to a slaughterhouse, and steak was the first item I eliminated from my diet. The idea of the consumption was no less anathema to me in 1998 as it was in 1988, yet I did it anyway. The human capacity for compartmentalization is remarkable.
I tell this story because there’s this notion that real vegans must be disgusted by animal products. All animal products, all the time. They must despise the smell of leather (I always did, but I’m not sure why), hate the look of fur (which is beautiful on its original owner, but in my opinion becomes freakish when the head of a human is atop it), and flinch and recoil at the mere sight of a pork chop. If they don’t, they’re not really committed. Not serious about they’re activism.
There’s no argument that not using animals is the ethical thing to do. But people cave in and lose their way for a variety of reasons, and reprimanding them isn’t going to get them back on track. In my experience, tolerance of the path of each person is what gets them, eventually, to veganism, if in fact they feel the need for a personal ethic.
When meat-eaters ask me if I don’t fell tempted to eat a juicy steak, I promptly answer that when a see a steak I feel the same way they would feel if it were a baked dog with an apple in his mouth. However, I wouldn’t mind if someday mock meats tasted exactly the same as their original counterparts. Even if someone has the doubtful idea to reproduce a perfect replica of a pig made of mock meat, no sentient being will be actually used as a way to satisfy some human taste buds.
ya why reprimand them when you can simply remind them of the drugs, the growth hormones, the mercury poisoning, the heart attacks, the cancer, the osteoporosis, the diabetes, mad cow disease, the samonella, the cow pus etc … on the otherhand, the "meat is murder" routine does work quite well on some.
I simply ask people if they would eat animals raw for pleasure,minus the many taste enhancer's used to fool the taste bud's,including washing flesh down with alcohol,pop,etc;
I once read that"taste bud's are dumb",and the rest of our body and our environment will eventually reveal the effect of our eating "habit" (sometimes called an addiction).
I also share that eliminating animal "product's" from my diet was a huge step to eliminating 'Crohn's' ( small intestine decease) 20 year's ago.
"there's this notion that real vegans must be disgusted by animal products. All animal products, all the time. They must despise the smell of leather (I always did, but I'm not sure why), hate the look of fur (which is beautiful on its original owner, but in my opinion becomes freakish when the head of a human is atop it), and flinch and recoil at the mere sight of a pork chop. If they don't, they're not really committed. Not serious about they're activism"
Actually, I see it the other way. If someone likes the taste of meat, and is not bothered with the smell of "leather", and they do not consume these products nonetheless, they're actually more committed and more praiseworthy. The sacrifice adds to their (our) merit.
I referenced you in an entry. Didn't want to use your blog to go off on a tangent. I think most vegans like the way animal products taste. A lot probably falter from time to time too, though it's less discussed. For me, after all these years there's not much I miss any longer. Plus I just eat a lot better as a vegan than I ever did as an omni. Though I have to say that individual people have different responses. Maybe for some a joking reprimand from a friend would make them reconsider, while for another it might alienate them. Hard to say.
I agree that MOST vegans probably like the way animals taste (especially cheese, which I cannot fathom). What I'm referring to, though, is the elitism in the movement, and the people who say that if you still like the taste of meat, you're somehow not a REAL vegan. I heard someone say that, and I was like, "why must you judge? Isn't it enough that I don't eat animals?
Hmmmm …… Sounds like you are all Human haters to me. Humans are at the top of the food chain because we are the most intelligent beings on this planet. A good number of animals on this planet are omnivores…even a bear would not refuse to steal a wild boar killed by wolves, so why shouldn't we refuse a humanely raised free range grass fed Texas cow?
My uncle is a cattle farmer and raises his cattle on the open range, where they can roam wherever they want. They do not suffer the extremes of drought of famine that wild animals suffer… when the environment cannot sustain them my Uncle step in to supplement their diet.
On another note, last night I went to a small town steakhouse in central Texas. I asked the owner if they kill the animal in the back…. and he said yes. Apparently, he buys local free range cattle, kills the animal, and then cuts his own meat. After he ages the meat in cold storage, he cooks up the juicy tender steaks (mine was a rib eye) for all to enjoy.
This is a place where all the meat consumed is produced only a few miles away from the land. Humans have been eating this way for thousands of years.
It is only in the last several hundred years that we have gotten away from eating locally produced food and started eating processed junk.
In conclusion, I believe that if vegetarians were really concerned with human health, they would not promote eating a meatless diet, but would promote eating a whole food, low processed diet that includes free range meat and dairy products.
Thanks for reading
Oh, By the way….. My uncle, and the man who runs the steakhouse mentioned above, only raises/uses free range meat.
They do not give the cattle hormones or other drugs, the cattle are free to roam wherever they want in the pasture, and they are usually consumed only a few miles from where they are produced.
My uncle also keeps a side of beef every year from his own heard to use for his family. I find some who grows his own food (be it for himself or for his restaurant) to be admirable and honorable.
Another thing,
Free range meat producers do not "rob down and soak" their meat in alcohol or other additives. When mu cousin cooks a 10 pound steak for the whole family to enjoy it is fresh off the cow….. not processed or otherwise altered. And the meat is not cut in a gross or "maggot filled" environment.
Do you think people live for the taste of meat and other animals products? If not, why on earth would you think we're "human haters"? Ethical vegetarianism is based on a holistic concern for other sentient living beings, and an understanding that meat eating is not necessary for human health when there are varied and nutritious plant foods available– which means everywhere, except possibly in remote societies.