The NYT has a good, and aptly-titled article about the foie gras debate:
Organizing for an Indelicate Fight
Apparently, animal rights groups are now focusing on getting a ban on foie gras in Philly. And Whole Foods has put pressure on one of their suppliers to stop doing business with a producer of foie gras.
In the case of Chicago, I really don't think the government should tell us what to eat, and foie gras producers are looking into the constitutionality of production and sales bans.
To a degree, I understand the California ban on production. The end of the process, known as gravage (the tube down the throat part) certainly looks inhumane. Though foie gras farmers offer the defense that it's just an exploitation of the way a duck or goose feeds in preparation for migration.
My ideal philosophy of being a humane meateater is to buy direct from farmers if you can, raise your own, or just do your research (buy organic, free-range, hormone-free, and consequently expensive stuff). Nothing makes you think harder about what you eat than acquainting yourself with it in its non-supermarket form. Having lived a stone's throw from my grandparents' sheepfarm, chased chickens into coops, and read about animal husbandry, I'm pretty OK with roasting up that rack of lamb, cracking open an egg (even after once cracking open a misplaced-in-the-fridge, fertilized, and days-from-hatching egg), or eating a medium-rare burger. I have made my peace with where I am in the food chain, and I try my level best to consume responsibly.
Of course, I think we should acquaint ourselves with what we eat before it gets polished, waxed, and sent to the supermarket in bright styrofoam packages applies to pretty much everything we eat or drink. We would all think a lot harder about biting into an apple that was sprayed with pesticides by a guy in a HAZMAT suit. Or considered the toll that factory farming takes on the land and on the prevalence of less resource-taxing family farms. We might prefer the Osso Bucco made from a calf who got to see the light of day. Indeed, I much prefer eggs from my grandmother's chickens because I know they get to run around the yard, scratch for bugs in the lawn.
PETA are kidding themselves if they think foie gras bans will eventually make us a nation of vegetarians. We need some smart, sustainable-agriculture-minded meateaters to take up the cause of more resonsible farming overall.
In lieu of that, however, it is absolutely up to you, eater of things, to know what you're getting into and what the consequences are of everything you put in your mouth.
Here's a thorough, interesting article from New York mag on the production of foie gras and surrounding controversy.
3 comments:
"In the eleventh century, the French rabbi Rashi declared that Jews who force-fed birds would have some explaining to do in the afterlife."
-From the New York Mag article.
Well that's good to know, though such a thing as "Kosher" foie gras does exists which is a big controversy, as force feeding ducks is inherently not Kosher.
I only read a little of the NY magazine story, but I'm still conflicted. It's a completely disgusting and inhumane process, but then so is the way most livestock is mass raised. That does make foie gras right, but perhaps people are picking on an easy target here.
The irony is, I now also want to try it, at least once.
I'm sure you've heard of Michael Pollan's book "The Omnivore's Dilemma", but I'd just like to point out if you're interested in the wider topic this is supposed to me a good read. I read the excerpt that ran in the NY Times Magazine. I would read the whole book, but then I getdistracted by the easy lure of Italian detective stories.
I actually have that copy of the NYT Magazine at my desk. I keep getting distracted by other books about food. But I am going to read that excerpt and perhaps also the book.
I agree Josh, now I really want some in spite of my general dietary ban on offal.
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