The Mentality
of Meat

By Melanie Joy, Ph.D., Ed.M

I don’t [think of animals raised for meat as individuals]. I wouldn’t be able to do my job if I got that personal with them. When you say “individuals,” you mean as a unique person, as a unique thing with its own name and its own characteristics, its own little games it plays? Yeah? Yeah, I’d really rather not know that. I’m sure it has it, but I’d rather not know it. -31-year-old butcher and meat eater. more>

 

Clinton Health Crisis -
A Teachable Moment Lost

By Vance Lehmkuhl

When President Bill Clinton suffered discomfort recently and had an operation to clear a blockage to his heart, mainstream press outlets made it a teachable moment about heart disease. And the lesson they taught was: Coronary heart disease is a death sentence. There's nothing you can do to stop it. After all, Clinton was a perfect example of someone who had "done all the right things" in terms of diet and lifestyle and yet his heart disease, after one intervention in 2004, was still progressing. The headline of one of the most widely read stories summed up the approach of the mainstream media: "No cure for heart disease, Clinton's case shows."

If "cure" is taken literally, this may be true - there's no miracle pill or procedure that unblocks the coronary arteries. But there are multiple studies showing that heart disease can be reversed - that its seemingly inevitable progression can be stopped and turned back - by changes in diet and lifestyle. For people suffering from heart disease, that's of great importance; yet the notion is all but invisible in the coverage of this case. more>