Re: McGuffey Readers and animals

On Thu, Mar 24, 2005 at 04:06:32PM -0800, David J. Peterson wrote:
[...]
> Teoh wrote:
> <<
> As for ducks... these are *food* for the san faran. When they see a
> duck in a pond, their reaction is not "oh how cute", but "look!
> Dinner!" Now, you might think that's rather barbaric, but the san
> faran would call us modern, supposedly-cultured people, equally
> barbaric, especially for eating cattle and other farm-raised animals.
> >>
>
> <opinion>
> What, so cows can't be cute in our culture?  Or chickens?  This is
> just like my girlfriend's family, who are all vegetarian.  They like
> to make fun of me by saying, "Hey, look, there's a cow.  Doesn't
> it make you hungry?"  NO!  I don't look at a cow and think "food",
> even though I eat beef, and I don't think I would think that about
> an animal I had to hunt, either.
[...]

Ah, but the san faran think of hunted meat as a delicacy, you see.
Their normal diet is mostly vegetarian, but meat is a treat. So when
they see ducks in a pond, a very likely reaction would be "look,
ducks! Let's hunt them for a snack!", or "let's catch them and bring
them home for the kids' dinner!". Not exactly the same thing as when
we beef eaters look at cows, you see. Their reaction is more
comparable with, as a random example, when bubble tea lovers see a
bubble tea shop, or when coffee lovers see a Tim Horton's (or
Starbucks for the 'Merrycans), or when (most) children see a candy
store.

I think we lack that kind of reaction about cattle because we aren't
directly involved in the slaughtering and preparation of the meat, and
the meat itself isn't something out of the ordinary so there's nothing
to be excited about. It's rather different with the san faran, in that
meat is a special treat for them, like candy is to (most) children.
The only sense they'd consider ducks 'cute' is in the sense of 'how
delicious it would be', in the same way a child's fascination for
candy isn't to admire and pet it, but to eat it.


T

--
"Uhh, I'm still not here." -- KD, while "away" on ICQ.