Bringing home the bacon
[Frederica Mathewes-Green  03/09 03:02 PM]

As Food Week draws to a close, I'm surprised that "factory farming" of meat hasn't been more of a topic. Oh, there have been a couple of questions about it's being regulated, but what about the reality itself? Was anyone else stricken by the descriptions in Rod's book?

And as I went on to read Scully's Dominion, I was horrified at images, for example, of endless rows of pigs in cages too small for them either to stand or lie down; limbs protruding into adjoining cages get wounded and broken. But this damage is ignored, because it won't affect the production of meat. The pig only has to cling to life long enough to be worth slaughtering. When you bring home the bacon, the label says "Brown's Country Farm" and shows a picture of a cozy farmhouse under an old oak tree. The meat inside was never near such a place.

If CC is a "sensibility," this is exactly the kind of thing that troubles our senses. As conservatives, we find it violates principles of conservation. And it demands a personal response, regardless of whether or not this is a matter amenable to public policy; it affects life at home.

Do regular C's just shrug it off, because factory farming maximizes production? Is it a scrap of litmus paper that tells Crunchys from Regulars?