Growing up, I always liked animals, particularly cute ones like pigs and sheep, but I didn't stop eating them because they blinked, breathed, and made noises. The philosophical heft of my decision didn't approach Moby's. Once, as he describes in the aforementioned New York Times piece, "the most pretentious person [he] has ever met, Moby outlines his reasoning in the introduction. Essentially, he followed the golden rule as extended to animals, with Blaise Pascal's Gambit wading in: "I took the logic of ["betting" on God's existence as opposed to non-existence] and applied it. . .I decided that it's probably a better "bet" to extend compassion as far and wide as possible as opposed to restricting the lengths to which I would extend compassion." Me, I just had a vague aesthetic aversion. Meat seemed heavy, dirty, and unclean. There were just icky inklings, though I soon found facts to back them up. In Gristle, those facts come off as particularly devastating.

Gristle rather delicately avoids directly damning all carnivorous acts. For all its polemics and pamphlet-esque tone, this book is, at its core, optimistic, hinging on the idea that, if people really know the facts about where the meat they eat comes from, they'll change their ways. They'll eat less meat, and make sure that the meat they do eat comes from truly reputable, responsible farms -- even if it's expensive or inconvenient to do so. Maybe they'll even eschew it entirely. In the introduction, Moby writes, "if enough people find out about the hidden ramifications of industrialized farmed animal production, we'll eventually see a shift away from supporting these destructive industries, which would lead to a healthier, cleaner, and more humane world."

I'm not positive that would help. In his chapter, John Mackey suggests that, "the only reason our abuse of animals is still tolerated is because most people aren't aware of it." While the average American may not know the details of how domesticated animals are treated in factory farms, the net of ills cast by the meat industry's participants is too huge, perfect, and ridiculous not to warrant suspicion -- especially considering how much attention a slew of best-sellers have devoted to it. Even with Moby's name attached, a wee volume from a smallish press is going to be read by the same people who already read Diet for a Small Planet, Fast Food Nation, and The Omnivore's Dilemma -- not exactly obscure texts, but not quite Oprah, MTV, and Good Morning America either. In her epilogue, Miyun Park writes:

"[S]omehow industrial animal agribusiness has largely managed to get away with oppressing workers, making us and our children unhealthy, slowly but surely destroying rural communities, contributing to global warming and global hunger, cultivating the emergence of devastating zoonotic diseases, and polluting the water we drink, the air we breathe, and the land on which we all live -- all while getting subsidized by taxpayers."

It's astonishing, and while saying "enough" to the injustice is fine, the problem isn't that the information hasn't at least begun to trickle down. The problem is that a lot of people really don't care that much. It's one thing to read about abused, confined fowl, tortured, manure-smeared stacks of swine, polluted rivers, and drug-resistant bacteria, and be horrified, but it's another thing entirely to implement a dramatic lifestyle shift. It isn't, as Brazier puts it, a "simple change."

Speaking personally, fast food restaurants -- where Americans inhale most of their factory-farmed meat -- are easy to avoid. At the same time, my favorite local ethnic eateries likely source from the same coops and lots. Grease-laden sidewalk tacos, Filipino breakfast silogs, sausages at Lao dives, Shanghai soup dumplings, Cambodian curries, and Korean short ribs don't always come with a Niman Ranch stamp. Enjoying those flavors, supporting those small businesses, and by extension, the communities from which they spring means eating meat that does harm. It's a tough call sometimes. At many area restaurants catering to diners with Slow Food-friendly values, menus proudly name the farms and ranches charged with raising the meat they serve. High-end grocery stores do the same, and they're rewarded with customers from the same relatively moneyed, socially-conscious pool. To put it mildly, the circumstances encourage elitism, and discourage a wider diffusion of responsibly raised animal products.

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Book Review: Gristle (Thinking Twice About the Meat We Eat)