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Agrarian Redux
By JBC | May 18, 2005
If there is one political issue which makes most “conservatives” immediately uneasy, it is animal rights. I think we, as Americans, have gone beyond the pale in our treatment of farm animals. Before you click away (if anyone is reading anyway) please realize that I am not talking about the simple issue of putting meat on our tables. I am talking about “animal factories” which are the vilest and most effecient means of meat processing. Chickens, pigs and cows are mercilessly butchered in assembly-line fashion after a life of misery.
While we believe in the “free market” and lack of government intrusion, we, as a God-fearing people, should treat his creations with more respect. I am not saying that we should not eat meat or that we should become PETA-type terrorists. I am simply saying that we should boycott those institutions that are well-known for animal cruelty, and should boycott those institutions (read “fast food”) that are the enablers and “cash cows” of this kind of activity.
I am a great admirer of the “Southern Agrarians” of the early 20th century. I simply cannot imagine people like Donald Davidson, Robert Penn Warren, Allen Tate and intellectual descendants such as Mel Bradford and Clyde Wilson being great admirers of multi-national fast food organizations and their post-modern meat factories.
The time has come for a true re-birth of the small farm and more humane treatment of the animals that give us nourishment. Forget the chicken nuggets, forget the Big Macs, and let us be a little nicer to God’s lesser creatures.
JBC
Topics: Culture Wars, The South, Political Philosophy |
October 1st, 2005 at 1:52 pm
Contemporary Christianity has accepted to easily the practices of Corporate Capitalism, which are driven more by greed than any virtue. We indeed need to consider carefully how we treat God’s creation, and how we use it to get our food. The treatment of animals is just a part of the problem. Current agricultural practices are not sustainable, and they continue to deplete resorces, and polute the enviroment, robbing from our children. The Bible teaches that the earth is the Lord’s, and is intrusted to us only temporarily. We have a responsibility to turn it over to the care of our children in better shape than we got it in. Agrarian practices will allow us to do that. It is high time that Christains begin to consider how they live, and the effect thier lives have on life on the planet.