Mean People Eat Meat

August 31, 2008 | Leave a Comment

The Dexter intro links eggs and meat to serial killing.

More evidence of the links between oppressions. The oppression of women, people of color, animals, and everyone “different” from those in power:

The Social Power Symbolism of Beef Sausage Roll versus a Vegetarian Alternative

Individuals differ in how much they seek to control or dominate people and resources. Schwartz (1994) suggests that people who seek these outcomes as lifelong goals endorse a set of human values, termed social power, which include values such as seeking authority, wealth, social recognition, and preserving one’s public image. The social power domain has consistently emerged in cross-cultural studies of values, and people who support social power values exhibit related behaviors, such as pressuring others to go along with their preferences and opinions (Bardi and Schwartz 2003). Thus, we selected meat for the food taste test because a consensus exists among sociologists and anthropologists that meat symbolizes social power and related values [...]. Fruits, vegetables, and grains symbolize the opposite of red meat (i.e., social equality and rejection of power). Using a sample randomly selected from Australian telephone books, Allen and Ng (2003) found that red meat symbolized inequality more than the other food groups, and consumption of red meat was more strongly correlated with social power values than other value domains. Further, Lea and Worsley (2001) found that heavy meat eaters endorsed social power more than vegetarians. Meat is the central, preeminent food in Western culture (Douglas 1973). Moreover, heavy meat eaters claim that they eat so much meat because it tastes good [...] and thus it would be worthwhile to examine if this impression stems from the objective properties of the food or the cultural meanings it embodies. Given that the human values that vegetables and grains symbolize are the opposite of what red meat symbolizes, the food category that might best resemble red meat in taste but have a symbolism in direct opposition, is a vegetarian alternative to meat products (e.g., vegetarian hotdogs, sausages, burgers). To determine which vegetarian alternative most resembles meat, we performed a pilot study involving 19 volunteers (3 male, 16 female undergraduate students) willing to eat meat and without any food allergies. Each participant ate three types of leading, grain-based meat substitutes (Sanitarium Nutmeat Sauce, Sanitarium Vegetarian Sausage Roll Mix in Canola Puff Pastry, and Longa-life Vegetarian Hotdog in a bread roll). After consuming each product, participants rated the following items: ﬂavorsome, pleasant aroma, tasty, tastes like meat, smells like meat, and looks like meat. Then participants were asked whether or not each food was real meat (yes or no). According to the results, the nutmeat sauce was perceived as looking more like meat than the vegetarian sausage roll and hotdog (M p 6.2 vs. 5.7 and 5.0), but the vegetarian sausage tasted more like meat than the nutmeat sauce and hotdog (M p 5.0 vs. 4.7 and 4.5), and the vegetarian sausage roll smelled more like meat than the nutmeat sauce and hotdog (M p 5.1 vs. 3.9 and 4.8). In addition, 69% of the participants believed that the vegetarian sausage roll was in fact meat, compared to 37% for the nutmeat sauce and 37% for the hotdog. These results indicated that the Sanitarium Vegetarian Sausage Roll Mix in Canola Puff Pastry was believable and credible as a meat product, and thus it was selected for the main study. As the other product in the taste test, we selected a beef sausage roll (Mrs. Quick Premium brand). In the main study, the two foods (Mrs. Quick Premium beef sausage roll and the Sanitarium Vegetarian Sausage Roll) were presented to participants without brand names, simply described as a “beef sausage roll” or a “vegetarian alternative roll.” Given that previous research found that meat symbolizes social power and related values (i.e., inequality) and that fruits, vegetables, and grains symbolize the rejection of power (Adams 1990; Allen and Ng 2003; Fiddes 1991; Heisley 1990; Lea and Worsley 2001; Twigg 1983), we surmised that the beef sausage roll symbolizes the endorsement of social power values (as it is made from red meat), and the vegetarian alternative roll symbolizes the rejection of social power (being made from cereals/grains and vegetables). To conﬁrm this, we performed another pilot study involving 59 undergraduate students and university staff members (males p 27, females p 32). A common technique employed in market research to measure the image of a product is to ask participants to describe the values, traits, and characteristics of the typical product user (Belk, Bahn, and Mayer 1982; Grubb and Hupp 1968; Levy 1959; Rudmin 1991). Hence, participants were given the ingredients of both the sausage roll and the vegetarian alternative roll and then asked to indicate to what to extent they agreed or disagreed that people who prefer each product endorse social power (using a 7-point Likert scale and Schwartz’s [1994] deﬁnition of the social power value). As predicted, the beef sausage roll more strongly symbolized social power than did the vegetarian alternative (M p 3.7 vs. 3.2), ( F(1, 58) p 7.4, p ! .01). In short, the pilot studies showed that the beef sausage roll and the vegetarian alternative roll differ in social power symbolism and that the vegetarian alternative roll tastes like meat.

Emphasis added. Source: The Interactive Effect of Cultural Symbols and Human Values on Taste Evaluation

Posted by Elaine Vigneault | Filed Under Miscellaneous
Leave a Comment to "Mean People Eat Meat"

Hey, look!

August 31, 2008 | 3 Comments

It’s Lori Lipman Brown:

She was my adviser for my final Women’s Studies project at UNLV. She’s awesome and truly an inspiration.

Posted by Elaine Vigneault | Filed Under Miscellaneous
3 Comments to "Hey, look!"

Today’s Hate Mail

August 31, 2008 | 7 Comments

Check out this comment I filtered this morning:

Eh… why don’t you get a life, and stop trying to dictate the lives of other people, you psychotic nutjob.

Are you related to Hitler, by any chance?

Everything has to die so something else can live. You encourage the slaughter of vegetables, so get off your moral high-horse, you self-righteous sow. How is, say, a strawberry’s life less important than a cow’s? LOL Everything is alive… you know that, RIGHT?

Fun fact: Many trees have died just so you can wipe your fat, smelly, vegan, lesbian ass. OH! Let’s put YOU on trial for murder! Still feeling morally superior, now?

hahahahahahahaha!

FYI, the originating IP was 4.255.202.230.

Posted by Elaine Vigneault | Filed Under Miscellaneous
7 Comments to "Today’s Hate Mail"

I’m Sorry, Meat-Eaters, But You’re Full Of It

August 29, 2008 | 4 Comments

taste bud

I think this article, “I’m Sorry, Taste Buds” is compelling for those who believe in human supremacy. The author, Kevin Padrez, offers plenty of good reasons to go vegan:

“If the impending heart attack isn’t enough to scare you away, there are the added immoral actions of the meat industry. Twinkies, though more unhealthy than meat, are not jacked up with sickly growth hormones, aren’t raised to be brutally slaughtered and don’t cause an environmental toll that is both grossly underestimated and completely unsustainable.

He doesn’t think it’s right to treat animals the way they’re treated in industrial agriculture. And he believes in God. And he thinks veg*nism is a sacrifice. These are common assumptions for many Americans.

Padrez decided to go vegetarian for Lent and he realizes some things:

“[T]he vegetarian life is growing on me [...] I feel better about myself knowing I am doing something good for my body and soul.”

I share it here because it might be compelling to you or someone you know. He makes some excellent points about how vegetarianism and veganism are good for your health, the environment, and your conscience.

However, this is my blog and this space is essentially about me and my ideas. And well, I disagree with some of his premises.

Of course, I agree with him regarding industrial animal agriculture (aka factory farming). I think it’s terribly cruel and completely immoral. Animals should not be confined in tiny crates, cages or crammed into warehouses. Animals should not be force-fed, forcibly impregnated, pumped full of hormones and antibiotics, or inhumanely slaughtered. Every animal should know the feeling of natural sunlight on their back or belly. Every animal should have access to clean air and water. Every animal should be able to live a long, full life. Every animal should have plenty of room to roam and wander. Every animal should be the beneficiary of human kindness and compassion, not cruelty and greed.

I also agree with Padrez about the health benefits of vegetarianism. Both my mother and my husband made major health transformations due to their change in diet from omnivorism to vegetarianism. They became much healthier people as vegetarians. (My own transformation wasn’t nearly as dramatic given that I became vegetarian at age six and hadn’t developed health problems related to meat-eating.) Moreover, I’ve read The China Study, which documents numerous health and nutrition studies and concludes that vegetarianism is indeed much more healthy than omnivorism.

But I disagree with some of his other premises.

For starters, I’m atheist. I think God and religion has been used to justify many horrors in this world and I don’t support any religion or any irrational belief that is destructive to the belief-holder or anyone else. That said, I think many people’s belief in God and attachment to religion is relatively harmless. Moreover, I understand that beliefs formed in early childhood are exceptionally difficult to erase. Therefor, I place no major emphasis on eradicating that particular irrational belief. If someone believes in God, I don’t worry about their cognitive abilities or reasoning skills the way some atheists and agnostics do. I usually simply let them have their belief and try not to offend them too much with my lack of belief.

Next, I don’t agree that veganism is a sacrifice. In fact, I feel that’s it’s a moral baseline. It’s the least we can do. It doesn’t make us better than anyone else. It doesn’t make us superheroes. We aren’t exceptionally generous or compassionate people. Vegans are not “brave” or “heroic” regardless of what some people think. We are merely humans who’ve made the decision to try to live our lives without harming animals.

Furthermore, not only is living as a vegan not a sacrifice, it can be an abundant lifestyle. Vegans tend to have an abundance of health, an abundance of a clear conscience, an abundance of interesting foods, an abundance of energy, and more. The saying that “when you close one door, another door opens” is absolutely true in regards to veganism. The so-called sacrifice of abastaining from harming animals is not a true sacrifice because harming animals is not a true good. Just as ridding ones self of bad habits like smoking cigarettes is not a sacrifice, veganism is ridding ones self of a bad habit and is not a sacrifice.

However, given Padrez’s premises, his logic is valid. If I shared his perspective of the world, I would likely come to similar conclusions about animals and veg*nism.

This is why I focused on the major issue that he used to justify his actions of meat-eating: taste. He claimed that:

“Sure, meat is packed with fat and bare of most vitamins and minerals, but it will always have one thing: flavor. Study after study showing the health benefits of vegetarian diets were not enough for me to sacrifice my favorite food group.”

Padrez may well favor meat, but his taste buds are not independent, unbiased judges. His taste buds are merely extensions of his brain - and all the judgments and biases within that brain.

In fact, studies have shown that taste is so subjective that it belies one’s assumptions. A preference for the taste of meat is a physical manifestation of cultural and philosophical/ religious baggage, not an empirically valid fact.

This also explains why many vegetarians and vegans dislike faux meat products: because the taste reminds them of eating animals. They have a dislike of the idea more than a dislike of the flavors.

One of Padrez’s central premises is untrue, thus his entire argument crumbles. I didn’t even have to attack his belief in God or even his assumption of human supremacy in order to get there, I simply had to use some sociological/ marketing studies.

See why I was interested in going back to school to study Sociology?
;)

Posted by Elaine Vigneault | Filed Under Animals, Environmentalism, Food, Lifestyle, Philosophy and Guidance, veganism, vegetarian, vegetarianism
4 Comments to "I’m Sorry, Meat-Eaters, But You’re Full Of It"

Random Veg Stuff

August 28, 2008 | 7 Comments

I’m going to try to make some treats for Floyd and Lucy. I found this awesome website that lists a bunch of vegan dog treats called Yummy for Dogs. Joey, my nephew, will help me bake the biscuits. I think it’ll be fun.

Speaking of veg stuff, check out this post >>

Update: Here’s a photo from today. Joey is making vegan dog treats.