Food, Self & "The Natural History of the Chicken" (1/5)

"You are what you eat," says the old adage. We treat chickens as pets and surrogate children, even as we slaughter them by the millions, chew and digest them. We love living things, but we also have to kill and eat them every day in order to stay alive. Like sex, eating is a compulsion: if you skip it, life stops.

The documentary film "The Natural History of the Chicken" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkxO91TLKVg) shows some of the surprising ways people relate to chickens. Kirby Farrell uses the film to illustrate how we use cultural fantasies to manage the deep conflicts that would otherwise tear us apart. Chickens open a window on our attitudes toward intimacy, warfare, religion, and tonight's dinner. Kirby reminds us that every day we turn denial into creative behavior that makes life worth living. Look at the bigger picture, he argues, you'll never see food and your own creaturely existence the same way again.

Kirby Farrell has long been a mainstay of the EBF. He is a professor at the University of Massachusetts and the author of many scholarly books and novels, most recently "Post-Traumatic Culture" and, coming this spring, "Berserk Style in American Culture."

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Ernest Becker Foundation
• Farrell
• Ernest Becker
• Natural History of Chicken

[ernestbecker]

Oh, I see, it's missing the end. That's weird...

[ernestbecker]

It works for me

[infoanalysis]

I attended this lecture in Seattle. It was excellent and I found Kirby Farell accessible and his contributions to the Ernest Becker forum essential. He recommended I read "Homo Aestheticus", which I found less so.

[joejoe74236]

great!

[Cuoin]

@JRBendixen I only addressed suffering a second time as you openly stated that you do not care about the suffering of chickens in factories. This quote... "To, the point, I have no troubble with the chicking factories and thus the suffering, because I like to eat chicken".

[Cuoin]

@JRBendixen It depends on the context. Generally when considering environmental implications and the welfare of the animals in general it is preferable not to impose life on chickens with the singular intention of slaughtering them for the unnecessary indulgence of humans.

[JRBendixen]

@JRBendixen I hope that you now can get yourself to answer my question which I will repeat honestly:

Is it ok to kill chickens beacuse one wants to eat them?

[JRBendixen]

@Cuoin Quote:" Intelligence is an irrelevant factor in determining the intensity of suffering which is inflicted on a sentient organism". Sure thing and I will remind you that I do not mention intelligence once in my comments, because it is quite irrelevant, from where I stand.

Much more important is my question you seemed to have forgotten, so here we go again:

But let me ask, is it ok to kill chickens beacuse one wants to eat them?

[Cuoin]

@JRBendixen If you have no problem with the suffering endured by chickens in inhumane chicken factories even after you have conceded that they suffer just as humans do then you are a bigot. Intelligence is an irrelevant factor in determining the intensity of suffering which is inflicted on a sentient organism. An adult chimpanzee can greatly out-perform a two year old homosapien at various cognitive tasks, is the suffering of the chimpanzee now more *important* than that of young humans?

[JRBendixen]

@JRBendixen Continued..Chicken eaters do not like to eat live chickens so we have build a system to take care of the killings in an effective way. But we do not kill the chickens to get rid of them, quite the contrary, we kill them so we can eat them.

This could not be further from the nazi death camps, which only purpose was to torture and kill for no other reason than to get rid of people. Godwin's Law comes to mind.

But let me ask, is it ok to kill chickens beacuse one wants to eat them?

[JRBendixen]

@Cuoin That had nothing to to do with my point. No matter, let me try again.

The suffering is for all I know is almost the same, besides the fact that we usually do not starve the chickens. In fact we have laws against such a thing in Europa and I would guess it was so in a load of other countries.

To, the point, I have no troubble with the chicking factories and thus the suffering, because I like to eat chicken. continued...