Dare to not finish that book…

Eating Animals — read during 2015 and 2016
by Jonathan Safran Foer

A book about the horrors of factory farming. The imagery is as puke-inducing as possible. When you read this, you never want to eat meat again. Choices are to not care, turn vegan or vegetarian, to eat less meat or make better choices and search for animals raised and slaughtered in a more sustainable way. I am currently going with the last two options. I like to occassionally eat meat. I can see myself becoming a vegetarian at some point in my life, but it’s not high on my list of things to do. Can’t see myself living a vegan life. But that’s neither here nor there, never say never. 

The real question should be if this is a good book or not. Considering that it languished on my currently-reading shelf for over a year, it is defintely not doing it for me. I feel preached at, horrified and bored at the same time. I don’t believe in absolutes and missionaries are not my kind of people, no matter if the topic is religious or nutritional. 

And how relevant is this book‘s perspective for me as a European? How different or similar are the food producing industries on either side of the pond? I am missing a global perspective.

Awareness is definitely important, people should know what they put into their mouth. Too many still don’t care, as long as it is cheap. Which really is the crux of the matter, isn’t it? The bizarre opposite of the equation is the hype of dry-aged beef and endless barbecue shows on TV.

Bottom line, I don’t like the tone of the book and only find it mildly informative, as I have learned many of these facts already from the Internet, documentaries, etc. As a story it holds little entertaining interest for me. The odd anecdote does not make up for the rest of the book and I am mostly bored. 

This is too much non-fiction with too little relevant information for me.