I belong to a golf league through where I work (actually it's more of a drinking league but that's beside the point) and I was talking to some golfing buddies about the fact that I just acquired some baby chickens. They looked at me like I was totally nuts. They couldn't understand why anyone would get chickens when you can just go to the supermarket and get a dozen for a buck fifty. I wasn't really sure how to respond. So I told them that they're good for the kids and that the eggs are much better than what you get at the supermarket.
But it's much more than that. Most of the cheap eggs that you can get on sale at the local supermarket come from factory farms. The chickens are usually kept in little cages their whole short life and many literally never see the light of day. That's no way for an animal to live a life IMO. I think this quote by alternative farmer Joel Salatin says it well.
- Quote :
- ...We should... honor the creation that God made. It’s in respecting and honoring the pigness of the pig (or the chickeness of the chicken) that we create our ethical and moral background for respecting and honoring the Tony-ness of Tony and the Mary-ness of Mary. And so it’s how we respect and honor the “least of these” that creates a theological and philosophical framework for how we respect and honor the creation that God made.
(Joel Salatin, From an interview in Sojourners Magazine, December 2009)
So not only is their a practical component to it, but there's a spiritual and ethical component to it as well. Now don't get me wrong, I understand if raising chickens (or cattle or pigs or whatever) is not for you for one reason or another but don't begrudge others who are trying to do the right thing. Know what I mean?
Subject: Honoring the Pigness of the Pig 
Mon May 30, 2011 10:00 pm
