I try pretty hard to not be a militant (mostly) vegetarian-vegan. There's no way you can be when you occasionally eat meat for a special occasion or because there's really not much else and you didn't plan well that day, and eggs and cheese rotate into your diet here and there. That said, I do care quite a bit about keeping my consumption of animal products, particularly meat, super-low - I'd say I eat meat once every month or two - amidst concerns about my own health, the health of the environment and the health/ treatment of animals.
It's that last point that got me going today, and connecting my thoughts in this arena to what's presently happening at hospitals. What I'm getting at is that it's pretty easy for humans to not have to face what they do not have to see. I recognize that I am far from the first person to think such a thing, it just seems particularly pertinent consideration to me at the moment. While I do keep up on the news day to day in a way that allows me to continue feeling healthy mentally, it's not often that through that, I am asked to really grapple with what's really happening in hospitals.
When I do have to grapple with that, it makes things real in a way that nothing else can. From radio segments with EMTs in New Jersey (NPR's "Up First" program this morning) to vlogs by health care workers (the likes of which I saw last week on the New York Times website and this week on the Rachel Maddow show), seeing what's happening in hospitals makes this thing real in a different way.
While I definitely believe this kind of journalism should be used in responsible doses, as too much of it can cause unnecessary fear that would be counterproductive, I do think offering an amount of it is the responsible thing to do. How can we grapple with something we KNOW is happening but can never see? While I consider myself an atheist when it comes to religious beliefs (while having strong spiritual beliefs with the principle of 'consciousness' as my guide), I CAN understand why belief in something/ someone that cannot be seen is a central tenant to the faiths of many. That said, there is a difference between our present pandemic situation and faith practices.
With faith practices, it is not expected that one would be able to see their theistic figure. With our present pandemic, it is known that acute care is happening all over the world, most of us just cannot see it unless media outlets can and choose to share it with us. I'll come back to the idea that I really do think a responsible amount of "seeing it to believe it" is important here for folks to really grapple with what's going on, from as small of decision-making as how often to go get groceries to as big of decision-making as when to begin holding baseball games again. My own performance work falls somewhere in the middle there, as my decision-making has to do with the gathering of large groups of people.
Back to the topic at hand: seeing it to believe it. How exactly do I link the pandemic with meat production and consumption? Well, the Smithfield meat processing plant in Sioux Falls, South Dakota provided a pretty clear picture this week, one that I'll use to arrive to the crux of my thought process. In a state that STILL has no "stay at home" orders, this meat-packing plant went from detecting 80 cases of Covid-19 one day to over 500 the next. In making an allegory between the pandemic and meat processing plants, there's a concerning connection point in the topic of human welfare.
From hours to compensation to how tightly folks are packed in to do their grueling work, human welfare often seems a scant consideration in the way many of these plants seem to function. In fact, I don't believe it's a stretch to compare how these human workers are often treated to the way the animals they "process" are often treated in these scenarios. Beyond the "tightly packed humans" aspect, I've been thinking about how meat processing and the pandemic are related insofar as, to a certain extend, they have to be "seen to be believed."
We humans who live in countries with highly-developed economies are often spared having to really look at the core of both "meat processing" and acute health care. These things have developed to the point where they are cordoned into specific areas and handled by specific people. I am not saying any of this to suggest that I think we'd be better off if we reverted back to times in which both slaughtering of meat and emergency medical care had to be handled on an individual scale. I am suggesting that by not handling either of these on an individual scale any longer, we've become pretty disconnected from what their realities really look like.
In the case of acute health care and health care in general, the increase in safety and effectiveness due to professionals handling the field has certainly been incredible. I think I just mean to say that the rest of us who do not work in acute medical care could stand to benefit from having to look in on it here and there. Doing so helps us remember why we need to prioritize our health and safety in the first place. And right now, looking in at it here and there serves as a sobering reminder as to why we are continuing to stay at home.
As for "meat processing," also known as the mass slaughtering of animals kept in facilities meeting the bare minimum of what is considered "humane" for the majority of their short existence, there is a correlation here too. Again, we humans who live in countries with highly-developed economies are often spared having to really look at the core of "meat processing," much like how we often don't have to see the core of acute health care. By being spared from actually having to see increasingly massive amounts animals raised quickly just to be pulled apart for us to eat, we don't really have to grapple with what has to happen in order for us to enjoy that chicken breast on the plate.
These animal welfare issues, paired with the extremely detrimental health and environmental issues ignited by high levels of meat consumption are to me excellent reasons for anyone and everyone to keep the amount of meat they eat to a minimum. It's beneficial on an individual and societal scale. Nutritionally, there are many ways to take in protein and the other nutrients that can be gained from meat, so that isn't a great counter to my arguments.
There are also arguments about cultural reasons for eating meat that involve preservation of tradition. I think those arguments definitely hold some weight, and preservation of cultural traditions is important. That said, I'll return to the point that we have become quite divorced from the actual processing of the meat we eat. Most cultural traditions surrounding meat consumption began during times in which meat was not "produced" on an industrial scale like it is today. Meat used for such purposes often had to be hunted for and prepared by those who ate it, and therein it was consumed far less because of how much effort had to be put into actually procuring it.
I'm not suggesting that cultural traditions involving meat should not longer be practiced because the vast majority of us do not hunt and prepare the meat we consume for these purposes. I am suggesting that observation of such cultural traditions is often tied to holidays or particular times of the year meant to be special, significant, different from the everyday. By their nature, they are not daily custom. Nor should be eating meat.
It's about time I come full-circle on all this, so I'll return to the centering idea of "seeing to believe." Much like we need to see meat being processed on an industrial scale to believe the animal welfare aspect of how detrimental it can be to eat a lot of it, we also might need to see what's going on in hospitals right now to believe in the gravity of the pandemic situation we find ourselves in. In the right amounts, seeing to believe can be a powerful thing.
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