Greening Austin Daily

Book Review–Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer

12th May, 2010 - Posted by carsi - No Comments

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“Most simply put, someone who regularly eats factory-farmed animal products cannot call himself an environmentalist without divorcing that word from its meaning.”

Jonathan Safran Foer, acclaimed author of the novels Everything is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, has written a hard-hitting, well-researched non-fiction book about the animal farming industry. This book is at once a damning look at the horrors of factory farming, a sentimental memoir, and a hesitant approval of smaller, more humane farms. Foer’s motivation for delving into this topic was the birth of his first son, which forced him to think about the morality and health effects of eating animals. Needless to say, he found all sorts of horrifying facts. While the book feels like it’s a bit all over the place, he does a good job of weaving his research into his personal stories and the stories of the many people he interviewed. Also, Foer’s novel-writing talents are helpful in keeping you engaged and interested to see what he will discuss next.

I tried to read this book with an eye for how non-vegetarians might take it, because I feel like selling this kind of book only to vegetarians is a bit like preaching to the choir. It helped me in providing more motivation for the vegetarian diet I am already practicing, but for those who aren’t already committed to it, how would they take this? At first, I felt like Foer’s bias was pretty clear–he’s been a vegetarian on and off since he was a little kid. Obviously, Foer is not your average meat-eating American, and his predisposition is apparent in that respect. But by the end of the book, it is  nearly impossible to see how anyone wouldn’t  find his uncompromising attitude justified. There are just too many mind-boggling facts to ignore, all of them documented in the extensive notes section. Foer explores all the reasons why factory farming is negatively impacting the earth– the drastic contributions to global warming, the horrible working conditions and the sadism it causes in factory farm workers, the scary health effects of the overuse of antibiotics, the disgusting reality and the environmental impact of having all that feces in one place caused by animals being placed in the worst conditions imaginable, and the unfairness of the plight of the small farmer trying to make a more humane system work in a world dominated by huge food industry. All of it is a bit overwhelming but undeniable.

In sum, this is a book that will educate and challenge you, which I understand is uncomfortable for most people, but, as Foer points out, if we turn our heads away from the mistreatment of animals, of workers, of our food, and of the environment, then we are willingly ignoring something that will have drastically negative effects on our future. As Foer puts it, “Just how destructive does a culinary preference have to be before we decide to eat something else? If contributing to the suffering of billions of animals that live miserable lives and (quite often) die in horrific ways isn’t motivating, what would be? If being the number one contributor to the most serious threat facing the planet (global warming) isn’t enough, what is? And if you are tempted to put off these questions of conscience, to say not now, then when?”