This is an Opinion Piece
I have a dilemma!
I recently read an article about how science is trying to grow meat. It is referred to Cultured meat, Clean meat, Lab grown meat and a few other names. Cultured meat has also been disparagingly described as 'Frankenmeat'
The process is to grow meat in the Lab - also called Cellular Agriculture.
It uses many of the processes that are used in tissue engineering.
Although it is not yet in mainstream production, I am excited about the possibilities!
Cultured meat could have many benefits for us. Of course there are drawbacks to such a process such as growth hormones being added. One of the other drawbacks is the fat and bone. To cook a good roast of beef you need meat with fat and sometimes bone. It adds to the flavor and humans need fat to survive.
It is essentially the same as muscle tissue from a natural animal. If it can maintain the same smell, texture, flavor and appearance I would be more than happy to switch over to cultured meat.
The other benefits it may have is that it could be produced with higher concentrations of Omega 3 fatty acids, reducing exposure to dangerous chemicals like pesticides and fungicides, and reducing the production of methane...important to reducing greenhouse gases. Methane is 74 times worst than CO2 as a greenhouse gas!
It takes a lot of land and energy to grow a cow for food. This land could be put to better use for growing crops.
Conventional farming of meat kills about 10 wildlife animals per hectare of land.
How could you not love those faces?
Humans do not treat there meat animals with much compassion. Pigs are very intelligent animals and are a social animal. They like to be together. What a horror to see a pig barn where as many as 5,000 pigs live in cages where they can barely move and all they can do is eat and crap! This is not a life I would put any living being through. Chickens are in the same boat. Have you ever seen what happens to the male chicks? Males are not important and they are thrown into grinding machines alive.
The problem we have is that we have become disassociated from the food we eat. You go to a supermarket and pick up a piece of meat. We have got to the point where we don't even think about the animal whose life we are taking.
In many ways I respect the farmer or hunter that kills the animal as they see it for what it is. My Inuit friends have hunted and still hunt much of their own food. They waste nothing and they understand more about the spiritual side of animals than most of us.
Animals have feelings and emotions. They know fear, compassion and love. I know I, for one, would only eat my dog if I had nothing else and was starving to death and I know you would too! Except maybe in China?
I have a Chinese friend that told me of a story of when he was a kid living in Hong Kong. His father told him they were going to buy a dog. He was so excited because he thought he was going to have a pet. No. His father bought a dog to eat. That would have fucked me up good!
I am all for eating cultured meat if it is near as good as natural meat. I love animals...all animals and I hate to see the cruel way we treat them without a care about their feelings and fears.
