Bird Of Prey
I can't say I've ever really understood the vegetarian impulse. I'm not judging, though. I don't point and laugh at people who buy Boca Burgers at the supermarket. Anymore. Getting my ass kicked in the parking lot of a Vons by a wheezy 98-pound hemp-clothed vegan is not an experience I'm in any hurry to repeat.

I'm sure I could have outlasted her if I could have hung in there. With no red-meat protein, they tire easily. But that first barrage... well, I was just not prepared for the ferocity. You've seen them at the protests. They're very angry little people. With all the leather and the fur and the McDonald's and the KFC around them 24/7, they're just dying to unleash. God help you if you're in front of them when they do. No body fat makes for some pointy, pointy elbows and knees.

Objectively I guess I can see how it is cruel to, for instance, test cosmetics on animals. Why must they rub the eye-shadow inside the bunny's eye? But then I think: if they don't rub it in the bunny's eye, then they don't know what would happen if it got in Bunny's eye and nobody wants a stripper with a withered eyeball. It's distracting. Yeah, OK, an eyepatch would be hot, but the depth-perception challenge of Bunny staying on that elevated stage would be too stressful to enjoy completely. So the rabbit gets the applicator wand. The American economy depends on it.

PETA's done some interesting things to draw attention, like having famous vegans pose (sort of) nude as a protest against wearing fur. But I never understood that because, if you think about it, human skin is kind of like our pelt (some of us are more pelt-y than others, I admit, but keep up) which is exactly what furs are made out of. So the message is, as far as I can tell, we should wear a human pelt. Very Silence of the Lambs, which is fine I guess, but I don't even have a basement to dig a fat-girl-storing hole in. So where does that leave me?

They also have this thing called Lettuce Ladies where they have girls wrapped up in clothes made out of lettuce which is, again, a confused message. The only thing I know for sure from seeing this is that with the right vinaigrette, I would totally eat Elizabeth Berkley.

Since this is the animal-devouring season, PETA has turned their focus this year away from their traditional message of human-skinning and cannibalism to the plight of the poor, poor turkeys. Apparently turkeys are wonderful, beautiful, elegant creatures with impeccable manners and with lots to say about current events and culture. The whole walking around eating pebbles and sticks thing is just some kind of elaborate cover. And that's the tragedy, that we never get to know what they're like on the inside.

Except it's what's on the inside that interests people like me the most. Drumsticks, breasts, wings, cornbread stuffing, etc. That's more than enough personality for me, thanks. It's so much personality that I generally fall asleep before the pies come out. That tryptophan would be a great predator defense if only it somehow worked before you ate the turkey.

See, even a turkey's self-preservation mechanism is stupid. We were meant by God to eat these things.

But PETA has staff writers who need work, so they rolled out 10 reasons not to eat turkey. Let's look at them one by one.

1) Turkeys are "smart" and have "personality". This is according to a "poultry scientist". Automatically disqualified from being taken seriously. Next.

2) Turkey makes you fat. The argument morphs into "all meat is bad and all meat eaters are fat". Vegans are skinnier, but they're also cranky and starving. Also, eating meat somehow tends to soothe the human sanctimony gene. Don't ask me how.

3) If you eat turkey, you will get bird flu. This is the best one, mostly because it's a lie. Besides, we all already HAVE bird flu. Don't these people watch the news?

4) Something about government. Blah blah blah wonky wonk wonk.

5) A dead turkey is a corpse! And if you leave it sitting out, it will rot! I guess we'd better eat it fast then. And refrigerate the leftovers. Wow, problem solved.

6) Force-fed antibiotics in farm turkeys are bad. This one I sort of agree with. PETA implies it's OK to eat "organic" free-range turkeys. Eat 'em raw if you want. Send pictures.

7) This one has two clauses: a) turkeys poop and b) the slaughtering process is gross. Let me check... nope, still hungry. Sorry.

8) Again, turkeys poop. Noted. Can we move on already? No-meat-eating also makes you forgetful and repetitive.

9) Slaughterhouse work is not as much fun as it sounds.

10) Eat tofurkey instead! I have a strict policy against eating anything you have to put into a mold and artificially color just so it will resemble something edible.

Before I go, I would like to point out that I am writing this post, as I do all my posts, sitting in a leather chair.

Come get me, hippies.



This post on the Narcissus Scale: 3.1


Pops
- posted by Pops @ 9:42 AM