The Meat Experiment

I love my personal experiments. I had a great time with the no-buying-clothes year and the no-sugar year. Each has been a fun project and has enhanced my awareness of a particular area of how I live my life and has helped inform decisions after the experiment is over.

Now the background and details for this year’s experiment:

I’ve always been a conflicted meat eater. For a number of years I was vegetarian. I stopped when I was traveling and realized I would be relying on Kosher meals from strangers and didn’t want to put them out. Over the years I have also discovered that I like meat and I’m willing to respect that the Torah says it’s OK to eat meat despite the fact that I feel terrible about killing an animal to do so.

I’m not okay with the blind and shrink-wrapped way in which so many people eat meat, unaware of what they are doing – I include myself in this. I’m not okay with the uncomfortable lives the animals lead before their slaughter. I’m not okay with the antibiotics and so on injected into them. I’m not okay with how frequently we eat meat. I’m not okay with the environmental impact of so much cattle being raised for consumption.

I’ve considered eating only free range Kosher meat such as that from Grow and Behold, but I know I can’t rely on that all of the time. Sometimes I just want a hot dog when it’s handed to me.

So, as I’ve written about before, I’m part of a Hazon CSA through the Tenafly JCC. A few weeks ago we heard Nigel Savage of national Hazon speak. He spoke about many things, but one in particular really affected me. He said “We’ve all been part of fruitless conversations between vegetarians and non-vegetarians,” and went on to tell of how he introduced the topic to a group of people at a food conference. He asked for a show of hands from people who were meat eaters but who would not eat meat if they had to see the animal killed. He also asked for a show of hands of vegetarians who would eat meat if they could be part of the process.

The following conference led to them bringing in a shochet and actually slaughtering the goat they would use for their meal. Anyone who wanted to watch could. Many meat eaters wouldn’t touch it, and many vegetarians did.

He went on to talk about how that experience helped him really increase his appreciation for eating meat, and reduce the number of times he does it.

So my plan, quite simply, is to eat meat a limited amount this year. I want to begin this week because this is when we have our first CSA distribution. I want the amount to be 25 times. That allows an average of once almost every two weeks. I know I will eat more at Pesach and can abstain more during other times. Now I can still eat junky meat like hot dogs if I choose, but know that I have used of one of my times for the year.

That’s it. Simple. Care to join me?