Killing More Food

As a former vegetarian, I shocked a lot of my urban friends in Miami and Guadalajara with this picture of me with this young buck that I killed the second to last day of the gun season here in Michigan. They couldn't understand how I could transform from being a vegetarian into someone who not only eats meat, but someone who would kill an animal with a shotgun. I want to dedicate this blog post to explain that the change was not as radical as it appears. 

First, I'll talk about assumptions. People love to (need to) label other people. There's nothing wrong with it. It helps us understand the world, but it can also lead us astray if we start assuming our assumptions are facts rather than possibilities. When someone hears that you're a vegetarian, they automatically start making assumptions about you. They think you're a member of PETA, probably a liberal, and an anti-hunter. I'm not any of those things (unless you're talking about a classical liberal, but that's a different blog post, on a different blog, on a different day). What I am is someone who thinks our daily diet choices have physical, mental, and spiritual implications. I was that way when I was a vegetarian, and I'm that way now. 

I became a vegetarian, because I was interested in Eastern Spirituality and Yoga, and I was trying to live a more peaceful life in harmony with the world. I also thought, what's good for the body is good for the mind is good for the soul (I still do). It wasn't all about me though. My primary political objections to eating meat were directed at industrial scale agriculture. I still think it's horrible that animals are turned into just another consumer product, and they live their short miserable lives in cramped spaces, eating too much, and taking drugs to stay healthy. 

My two primary reasons for being vegetarian still fit with my current paleo influenced diet. The problem is that my first reason is actually two reasons (living in peace and harmony) that aren't necessarily compatible. I do want to live in harmony with the world, but the world is not a peaceful place. Are the gazelle and cheetah not living in natural harmony? In order to reach my full potential as a human, I also have to be in touch with the darker, more violent aspects of my nature. I don't think eating meat by itself is enough to take me there. Many people eat meat in complete oblivion to the pain and suffering they cause, but I wanted to feel it, to see, and to take responsibility for it. On the other hand, eating industrially produced meat is not living in harmony. That's a corruption of nature. Those farmers have stolen the spirit of those animals, so what ends up being fed to us is a shadow of an animal. A processed meat-like substance that lacks the nutrition and flavor of an animal that lives a real life.

The buck that I killed lived the life he was born to live. He lived in the woods next to the creek; He stole farmers' corn and soybeans; He did his best to fight and fuck until a predator killed him. It would be a crime against nature if we protected a wild beast like him and turned him into prey without a predator. He couldn't fulfill his role in nature, and neither could I. 

Indian Creek on Dwellable

Killing my Food

It's easy to insulate ourselves from the brutality of the natural world. We pay for bombs that fall on the other side of the earth, we shop in malls that were once habitat of wild animals, and we stuff ourselves with meat that was once a living being that desperately wanted to stay alive. Our actions cause death and destruction. Even vegetarians should know that many animals (deer, rabbits, mice, pheasants, fox...) are killed and their habitat destroyed each year beneath $500,000 combines while wheat, soy, and corn are being harvested. Now, I have no problem with vegetarianism or veganism. I've probably spent a total of 3 years of my life as a vegetarian off and on, and I would consider experimenting with a vegan diet in the future, but I just want to make it clear that life feeds on life, and we all have to make partners with death, if we want to continue sucking in sweet blue air, and keep our futures open to all the possibilities that it entails.

It's so easy, so convenient to forget about these brutal facts of life when we're buying neat packages of meat from overcrowded supermarkets, but I won't let myself forget. That's why I killed a deer this year. I shot a doe dead from 60 yards away, right in front of her 3 fauns. I continue living, but I had to destroy something beautiful in order to do so. It was exhilarating and heart-wrenching. I believe there are a lot of hunters and non-hunters alike who do not appreciate that dichotomy. Non-hunters prefer to let other people do their dirty work for them, and they avoid the feelings of sadness and guilt, because they have chosen to believe a supermarket created illusion rather than the bloody reality. Hunters also suppress or brush off the feelings of sadness that come with killing a deer, and they focus on the adrenaline rush and/or the trophy. They're afraid only sissies let themselves feel that sadness that comes from taking a life. Macho-men kill and boast and leave the crying for the women. Not me, I think it's essential to open ourselves up to the sadness of this cruel world, not ignore it or hide from it. I killed a deer. I'm a killer, and so are you.

Indian Creek on Dwellable