Last week, I mentioned that idea of “if your great-grandmother didn’t eat it, neither should you.” I shared several reasons we can’t eat the same plants our great-grandmothers did, even if we try. Meat. Now meat’s another story, right? I mean, a cow is a cow. Isn’t it?

Not exactly.

Cows, chickens, swine, etc., are all raised and processed far differently than they used to be. Now, ………

Frankly, y’all, I’m not sure I can continue this article or even eat meat anymore.  I’ve just been reading here about slaughter procedures in the US and about how animals are not always dead as they move through the process.  I’m feeling really sick to my stomach right now and will have to come back to this subject later.

In the meantime, I will mention the antibiotics animals are given before slaughter and how bad they are for humans, as reported last week here in the Washington Post.  I will also mention the use of bovine growth hormone used to increase milk production in dairy cows. The American Cancer Society says here that it doesn’t increase cancer rates in humans; however, consumers have shunned the product so thoroughly that most stores no longer carry milk from cows given rBGH.

There is also, of course, the issue of what chickens, cattle and swine are fed – often animal protein.  Animals that are herbivores are made carnivorous and even turned into cannibals by what we feed them. There is evidence to support that the feeding of infected bovine protein to cattle in Europe caused the Mad Cow break out of the last century. At the very least, cattle are overfed with corn in feedlots to increase their weight. Chickens are also overfed to increase weight, putting more fat onto our plates.

I’m still feeling sick about the whole slaughterhouse thing and will leave you with this – we’re not on the farm anymore and these ain’t your great-grandmothers cows.