Well, okay, I have to admit that I found nothing sentimental about chickens. They do not seem to be terribly intelligent, and they'll peck each other to death over territory. My sympathy is low; yet aren't humans so terribly familiar to such behavior? At any rate, chickens received low levels of sympathy from me, as did pigs. It is highly likely that my emotional responses depended on how attractive I found the creature in question.
Cows however yielded a great deal of sympathy from me. The story of Snickers showing love toward his adopter struck home. Why have we decided that dogs and cats (in America) are not to be eaten, yet cows are? Cows are holy in India, the producer of life. Here we put them down when they develop illnesses that we encouraged (the udder swelling and getting infected after too many years of producing too much milk), slaughter baby calves who can't even walk because they were shut up in cages.
Cows are downright spoiled in India, compared to America. We have institutionalized cruelty to animals. Lab rats, cows, pigs, chickens, and much much more! Vegetarian or not, cruelty to animals is not conducive to healthy human emotions (I believe, at any rate. Cruelty to animals has been a sign of criminal escalation, in many [though not all] cases.)
Free-range meat, here we come. Oh but wait! If America went back to free-range meat only, well--there would be a LOT of rainforests in other countries we'd have to wipe out to feed our overpopulated, over-citified nation. It would mean more cowboys, which would please my uncle, but people would probably starve. Clearly, if humans value animals and do not wish to be cruel, should we then not change our system to be less inhumane?
After all: What is the difference between dogs and cows? Why is cruelty to one considered wrong, but the other considered accepted and done on a daily basis en mass?
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