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Why We Love Some Animals and Eat Others
The simple answer is overlooked speciesism.
If you were anything like me, you would have been raised to love some animals and eat others. It was never a thought or a question. That’s just the way things were. I always thought I loved all animals even though I was eating them. One day, that logic started to become a little bit cloudy. But I loved meat. There was zero chance I would ever give up my lamb chops, medium-well steak, broiled salmon, or baked chicken wings. Sure I liked animals, but those foods were my staples and I couldn’t live without them! Or could I?
I was indoctrinated into a society that made this the norm. I was brainwashed to enjoy farm animals as a kid and genuinely fell in love with them, completely oblivious that their kind was on my dinner table each night.
Then one day in high school, someone challenged my moral integrity by asking me if I saw any harm in my consumption of animals and their products. I didn’t. It was normal and deemed appropriate by society. Then, a friend opened up my eyes to the industry and I was absolutely horrified and refused to believe it to be true.
“I’m a good person—I’m not doing anything wrong. It’s food,” I would think to myself as I experienced cognitive dissonance.
