Inspired by Cat
I'm glad someone's keeping an eye on Spencer's world-killing outrages while I'm at home. Cat's latest (and very thorough) blog post points out that Spencer is so strapped for cash that he has to buy eggs laid by battery hens, thus saving himself 30p. SPENCER! That's naughty! Didn't you see the signs all over the University showing that each hen gets less than the size of an A4 sheet to live in? Not nice. Not nice at all.
Contrary to popular opinion, I'm not into making myself suffer. I like to do my bit for the environment, but I also like it when going the extra mile has some sort of tangible benefit for me (not just the general feeling of well-being). Free range eggs are one of the products I support not only because I can't morally force chickens to live like that, but also because free range eggs taste better. I don't agree with Spencer that battery eggs are "damn good eggs".
This applies not only to eggs, but to also to chickens themselves. I was shocked when I moved to Wales by how difficult it is to buy free range chicken. I haven't conducted any kind of scientific study into this or anything, but it strikes me that it's far easier to buy free range chicken in Ireland than it is in Britain. Indeed, free range eggs are much more standard in Ireland than in Britain.
Now Spencer himself said the chicken I cooked last week was perfect. Yes, I cooked it nicely, but there's only so much you can do with poor meat. That chicken was not poor. It was a beautiful free range chicken from the butcher on the High Street.
Paying more for meat products is a good idea for three reasons, two of which I've already mentioned:
1) it tends to be reared and slaughtered in a more humane manner
2) it tends to taste nicer
3) producers of cheap meat cut corners everywhere, and the hygiene standards leave an awful lot to be desired in major abbatoirs (see the book I keep citing, Felicity Lawrence's Not On The Label [chapter about chicken particularly] for more on this).
I say 'tends' because there is of course the chance that the meat is just expensive because you're being ripped off, but I think it's worth paying more for meat when these three points are what we're getting in return.
One final point about paying for good quality products. To quote Ms Lawrence,
We spend a much lower proportion of our income on feeding ourselves than previous generations. In the 1930s the average proportion of income spent on food was 35 per cent; today it is less than 10 per cent, although for the poorest fifth of the population the figure is still around one third.
At University I spend about 20% of my income on food; sure, this means I have to make sacrifices elsewhere (I don't go out or eat out very often, for example), but I think it's money well spent. If my tummy's happy, I'm happy.
Thank you to Cat for blogging so interestingly about this.
7 comments:
Why do they need space? What's a chicken going to do with a spacious 3-bedroom apartment?
Maybe we should get them all surround sound DVD getups, and grapes to eat.
They're birds! Whose sole purpose in life is to die so that you can shove lemons and garlic up their back passages!
Why do you need so much space? Surely you don't even live to die and have lemons and garlic shoved up your back passage. Your function, if any, is purely to pro-create. Couldn't you do that in a much smaller space? In fact, now I think of it, I'm all in favour of your office being moved to a much smaller room.
I was going to rant but in the end I thought Its not worth it ..
I agree with Sam.
I'm going to tell David Cameron you said that. He'll be shocked and disappointed. If only there was a suitable photo .. you'll just have to make do with the other David (have I posted this before? I can't remember). Or even better, Tim Curry. I hope that inspires you to be good and care about animals.
I'm a consumer.
I don't buy free range eggs because I think it will make me a better person like most people.
I buy the eggs most people buy because it’s typical consumer behaviour to save as much money as possible on your selected goods.
The free range chicken you cooked last week was delicious, probably because it wasn't pumped full of water to fatten it up!
But I've been brought up on chicken that isn’t free range and seeing as its cheaper I'm quite happy to keep buying it and eating it. You may have had the luxury of eating fresh produce, having lovely home cooked meals when you were younger. I grew up in a single parent family, on a single parent wage where you bought what you could afford in order to live as comfortably as was possible within the monetary boundaries. Because of this I’ve grown up still buying in this way, trying to get the best for as little money as possible and if that means saving 30p on eggs then so be it!!!
There are a lot of moralistic people out there who think that buying free range eggs, free range chickens etc makes them better people than the rest of us.
I have a housemate like that. Only thing is, she may be buying free range chickens once a week (oh and how she brags.)
But she forgets to talk about the chemicals from her hair spray that she uses every day, which damages the environment.. Or the hairdryer she uses for 10 minutes every morning which is the equivalent of turning on 200 light bulbs at the same time, using unnecessary electricity. (What’s wrong with a towel!?)
In an ideal world we would all buy free range eggs, drive protogen cars, and remember to turn off the standby light on our TV before we go to bed.
Unfortunately because of the nature of the human race, Greed, selfishness, laziness etc .. it will never happen.
Do I fall into that category? It’s more than likely I do, as do the majority of the people on this planet, but it’s the way modern society is and there’s very little that can be done to change it in my opinion.
See blog: it's not about people spending more money than they can afford overall, it's about increasing the proportion of expenditure which goes on food, one of the three things you need to survive. As I also pointed out in my blog, I sacrifice other luxuries so I can eat good food (and don't start talking about my haircut: I spent lots of money in the last few weeks because I had finished my degree and wanted to reward myself. In general I don't spend much money at all, and I'm going to be quite broke until the end of July).
So you want us to spend more on food?
Do you want us to spend more on ethical clothing, on an ethical utilities supplier who has embraced renewable energy sources? Do you want us to spend more on hybrid cars that pump less CO2 into the atmosphere? I suppose you can offset that with the money we'll be saving not buying newspapers, or going on holiday by aeroplane ever again.
I would argue that we should be giving more money to those less fortunate before we crusade on behalf of the chickens, to be honest.
Does one person really make a difference? Shouldn't we be pressuring the Government to lean on heavy industries? Are you seriously trying to equate my life to that of a battery chicken?
Nobody would spend £90 making a chicken look nice after it has finished the egg-laying season.
Post a Comment