Vegetarianism

[Name of the Institute]Vegetarianism

Introduction

While green living is associated by some almost exclusively with vegetarianism, as Kathy Rudy suggests, in "Locavores, Feminism, and the Question of Meat," the "locavore" movement in the U. S. instead offers a more valuable and ecological model for human health, animals' well-being, and humans' relations with nonhuman nature. The locavore movement is one that stresses the vital character of local, sustainably grown foods, including meats, rather than foods produced by the now dominant (and domineering) system of industrial agriculture and meat production. Rudy offers an overview of the locavore movement and then provides a feminist analysis of the ecological validity of locally grown (pasture raised, sustainable, grass-fed, free-range) meat. Using theoretical perspectives from philosophers Val Plumwood and Donna Haraway, Rudy finds a thoughtful feminist green consciousness to be one that demands that animals "be raised well" and that an environmental ethic does not demand that humans never kill animals. Rather, as she sees it, instituting a practice of ethically and judiciously killing animals for food is not only possible, but from some perspectives, necessary to an ecological system.

Elsewhere I have argued that in a green or ecological perspective, we would not speak so blithely of the "life force," but rather, more realistically, recognize and respect a twinned life/death force.3 Nature is derived from a Latin word, nasci, meaning "to be born." This derivation points to the basic force of (Mother) Nature as one of continuous rebirth or regeneration. This process necessarily includes not only continuous birth, but, concomitantly, continuous death and change (Talk on Vegetarianism, 2007).

Thesis Statement

Vegetarianism: Leading towards a Healthier Lifestyle

Discussion

In a number of articles a quintessential green point is made that in order to have a truly ecological culture there must be a radical revision of ideas about, and practices around, human death. She asks us to reconsider how profoundly "the dead body - as matter - matters to nature." In her analysis, the dead body must be understood not as a dead end, epitomized by the embalmed (carcinogenic chemically-laden corpse) of modern funeral practices, but as productive matter, a kind of "gift" to the land as its elements break down and are then are used in the reconstitution of land and life. American death care, though, for the last 150 years, has positioned human death as somehow above or "outside of the cycles of nature." Kelly ultimately argues not only for a transformation of attitudes and values, but also the institution of natural or green burial as "not just a way to make death 'greener,'" but as a way of spiritually /philosophically "integrating death back into life" and recognizing humans as part of nature.

Birth is the paradigmatic action of a female body that patriarchal cultures have aligned with "nature," which has then been defined as mere matter that requires the direction of male experts. Nail draws upon the ecofeminist framework of Val Plumwood to argue that medicalized childbirth acts as a ritual, expressing not only masculine-identified domination of the birthing mother, ...