Learning to love the lentil – Anne Edmonds makes an appeal to socialists to reconsider their attitude to eating meat.
Confucius, Plato, Leonardo da Vinci, Hilary Benn, Gandhi, Tzipi Livni, Einstein, Tolstoy, Byron, Shelley, Kafka, J.M.Coetzee, Prince, Damon Albarn, Paul McCartney, Wagner, Mahler, Yehudi Menuhin, Martina Navratilova, Monty Panesar, Casey Affleck, Woody Harelson, Gwyneth Paltrow, Brigitte Bardot …….no prizes for guessing that what links these examples of intellect, talent, beauty and energy (misapplied in several cases) is the decision of each one not to eat dead animals; this belies the old idea that to be healthy and an achiever a vegetarian diet is a non-starter. Today vegetarianism is increasing – 6% of UK eaters reject meat – and even fit dogs may be veggie.
I am not a vegetarian – while I eat nothing with legs, up to now I have eaten fish, occasionally serving it to non-veggie visitors and choosing fish if eating in a European-style restaurant where the veggie option is usually boring and based on mushrooms, my least favourite vegetable. As a result of what I’ve learned while researching this article, I am likely to give up fish too; I’ve long avoided farmed fish knowing that overcrowded, foul water leads to stress, cannibalism and disease including sea lice which cause lesions open to the bone; chemical additives in fish feed can damage the fish’s immune system. Reading about the horrors of long-line, trawler and purse-seine fishing, all involving real suffering to fish and damage to other species like turtles,- dolphins and albatross, has put me off wild fish too.
I don’t know why each of the people listed chose not to eat meat – possibly some followed the same path as I did: as a child I refused meat (quite convenient for my family during the war when meat was rationed but pulses and vegetables weren’t) but, with the stirring of teenage hormones, carnivorous tastes took over and I went on to enjoy meat until the 1980s. I then noticed deterioration in its quality – it seemed dry, stringy and tasteless. Mad cow disease led to in-depth TV programmes about UK farming methods so I became aware of the cruelty of factory farming where animal welfare is sacrificed to the pursuit of profit – Thatcherism in the farmyard. No wonder meat from stressed, additive-fed and cannibal cattle didn’t taste good. At about this time, I read Upton Sinclair’s early 20th century novel, The Jungle, set in the Chicago stockyards and revealing the appalling conditions suffered by animals and workers. I also watched a documentary about reconstituted meat (used in meat pies) in which every part of the animal (skin, bone, eyes, ears etc) was turned into a gloop which looked like faeces (and probably included a lot) in a process very similar to what is described in Sinclair’s novel.
As a result of these experiences, the last mouthful of meat I ate was at my house-cooling party in 1990. I then moved to my present meat-free zone, soon to become fish-free too. I suffered (appropriately) no cold turkey although I still remember the delicious pork-pies made in traditional butcher-shops in the market towns of North Yorkshire.
It wouldn’t be sensible for everyone to become vegetarian – it would be wasteful in a hungry world to get rid of all the sheep, pigs, goats and cattle not needed for dairy products and for their wool, skins etc.; the landscape would be changed without hill-grazing and a scrub-covered land would be unattractive. But the number of farmed animals needs to be reduced and only land naturally unsuited to arable should be grazed – belches, farts and shit are no longer just producing smirks in the playground; they also produce methane and animal waste harmful to the environment . So there is a strong case for an increase in the number of vegetarians and for the remaining meat eaters to cut their consumption. Socialists in particular might find the following arguments worth consideration.
Environmental
We are all aware of the loss of ecologically valuable rain-forest for cattle grazing – remember the statistics at the McLibel trial: 55 square feet of forest for every Macdonald burger; 70% of Amazon deforestation results from meat-cattle grazing and growing soy for winter feed; it takes 40 calories of fossil fuel to produce one calorie of meat and only two calories for one of tofu, 2,464 gallons of water (in a hot climate) to produce one pound of beef but only 25 gallons for a pound of wheat; 33% of the world’s grain harvest is fed to animals bred for meat (it takes 7 kilos of grain for each kilo of meat produced); meanwhile, starvation affects millions of people: it really would be simpler if more people ate soy beans directly.
Humanitarian
I’ve already touched on this but will give more details. Socialists presumably reject the Genesis based arrogance which gives man dominion over every creature on the face of the earth and which, in the past, has affected the attitude of humans to animals; while regulations in the UK have curbed some of the worst cruelty resulting from this attitude, plenty still goes on as the profit motive remains strong. Although free-range eggs and chicken sales have increased recently, there are still 800 million factory-farmed pigs and poultry in the UK (more than ten for every person) which account for 95% of home produced pork and poultry products. Meat imported into Britain (25% of UK sales) is often produced under inhumane conditions including the penning of sows and castration of boars without anaesthetic; filthy, overcrowded battery sheds exist here and all over Europe. In British abattoirs, increased production-line speeds, unskilled workers and inadequate inspection mean that animals remain conscious after so-called stunning – in a few cases, right up to the start of the skinning process. I remember the old Edinburgh slaughter-house at Chesser and hearing the panic-stricken bleating of sheep penned outside – however well regulations are applied, we cannot prevent animals smelling blood and being aware of something terrifying in the atmosphere.
Health
Meat is bad for human health: it is high in saturated fat so increases cholesterol levels which may lead to strokes and heart attacks; roasting meat creates methyl-colantherene which causes cancer in mice so might also harm humans; antibiotics in animal feed may diminish their effectiveness if prescribed for human meat-eaters; growth hormones and steroids fed to animals may also affect humans.
Lentils (my favourite meat substitute) are low in fat, high in protein, iron, fibre and all but two of the essential amino acids, as are the other pulses. Lentils will grow in almost every part of the world and are a staple food in the Middle East and India (dhal is the Hindi word for lentil). Pulses provide a much healthier diet than meat.
Cooking and cost
I know the DGS web-site is not a household hints magazine but have included this section because some people are put off vegetarianism because they think it relies on time-consuming dishes like nut cutlets. People in work are busy but a veggie diet need not mean less time for campaigning. I’ve also commented on food costs as most socialists are not as wealthy as the people in my opening list.
There are many varieties of bean and pea and several different types of lentil. The red lentil cooks in about ten minutes – it softens and disintegrates into the stock so is particularly good at absorbing the flavour of any herbs, spices and vegetables cooked with it. As every Scot knows it makes excellent soup but is also a great basic ingredient in pasta sauces and stews to be served with rice, couscous or potatoes. Brown lentils take longer to cook and remain firm so are useful for pies based on pastry, veggie suet-crust or potatoes – they look just like mince in a shepherd’s pie but, of course, taste better. All beans make good soups and stews – red kidney beans can be used for chile sin carne. Chick peas (the base for humous), according to recipe books take hours to cook but add a spoonful of baking soda and they cook in about twenty five minutes – they too make good pasta sauces and stews. Any of these pulses may be cooked in bulk and stored in small potions in the freezer for a quick meal. They can also be bought tinned although this makes them a bit pricier.
The cost of these proteins is low – a kilo of red lentils can be bought for under £2 – a lot less than a kilo of beef, lamb or pork. Artificial protein (erg quorn) is also available but lentils achieve a similar result while being natural with their own flavour. Nuts are much more expensive but useful for salads, snacks and sprinkling on vegetables.
If you do cut down on meat, you can major on dishes that vegetarians can’t provide like roast and grilled steak or chops – but watch out for the methylcolantherene – while going over to pulses if you fancy pasta with sauce.
To conclude – I hope that what I have written will encourage some of you to cut down on meat consumption in the interests of the environment, animal welfare and your bank balance. When my sons were hungry teenagers and my finances were often in crisis, I used to add red lentils to spaghetti bolognaise and to tatties and mince to eke out the more expensive meat – no-one ever seemed to notice. My younger son is now a vegetarian.
DGS would like to know what our readers think. Is vegetarianism a political issue or simply a lifestyle choice? Does Anne have a point or is there nothing quite as appetising as a nice juicy steak? What’s your view?
In Anne Edmonds article on vegetarianism she begins with a list of fine upstanding people (maybe) who also happen to be vegetarians. The clear implication, however, is that vegetarians are somehow morally superior. Why no mention then of Pol Pot, Charles Manson, Ghengis Khan or Adolph Hitler, and other less savoury figures from history who were all renowned vegetarians?
Of course, the idea that you can tell anything about anyone’s ethics from their diet is just plain silly, as is the idea that we should all give up eating meat.
Firstly, billions of animals would have to slaughtered and their bodies burnt, before they bred and spread over usable arable land creating a food crisis within a generation. Secondly, the human animal is naturally omnivorous. To ask most people not to eat meat is to ask them to go against their evolved nature. It would be like asking people to imitate Anne Widdicombe and remain virgins all their life. Thirdly, from a historical materialist perspective, the domestication of animals is hugely important in the development of civilisation. Without it we would all – quite literally – still be hunter gatherers.
I have nothing against vegetarians and I myself try to limit my eating of red meat to once or twice a week for sound dietary, scientific and environmental reasons, but vegetarianism is a lifestyle choice, nothing more and nothing less.