Time to say farewell, and to thank you, Meg, for your great hospitality and generosity in allowing me to post on your blog. It's been a great experience, and has allowed me to explore some ideas I'd never have pursued in traditional media while using a voice that is only appropriate to a blog. I'm very much a believer in the how-do-I-know-what-I-think-till-I-read-what-I-write effect, so the freedom of the blog has helped me to figure some things out. Such as why the foie issue is so troubling to me.
In the end it's not about the foie. Life would be diminished in a very small way without foie gras but not drastically so (they way it would be, say, if pork were outlawed). It's that it represents another way uninformed people are trying to legislate what I am or am not allowed to eat. Government is happy to subsidize corn and encourage horrific treatment of billions of cows, pigs and chickens, to encourage through big business processed food that is bad for us, and then tell me that I'm not allowed to eat a natural product from an animal that has (in my opinion, as of now, though this may change) been humanely raised. When people tell me what I can or cannot eat based on a moral contention of their own, that really pisses me off. It's happening throughout our society. The foie issue embodies this troubling trend in America.
I believe that the issues about food that are discussed on the food blogs are important because how we eat determines how we live, literally and metaphorically. How we eat, and the decisions we make, shape the world. From an evolutionary standpoint, humans are a dangerous species–a wickedly smart predator that has so far managed to avoid the ecological disasters of its own predation. I hope we continue to do so, for my kids' sake, but it's going to get harder and harder. We're trashing our livestock; through genetic engineering and the creation of a monoculture, creating powerful bugs that can kill; we're fishing out our oceans, working our way down the food chain, and we're pretty much at the bottom feeders now; we're creating massive dead zones in our oceans from agricultural pollutants, bankrupting our fossil fuel supply and burning holes in the atmosphere.
So yes, dammit, that's why foie gras is important: because it's NOT important. Does that make sense? It shouldn't be important, but it has become important, and that is the shame of it.
See, there I go. I start out thanking Meg, and I tumble into another rant. But it seems to be the only way to be heard. Flannery O'Connor once explained that all her characters were in effect caricatures because it was the only way to make people see. Blogs seem to be particularly good at this as well. Food is important, arguably the most important thing there is, that and water. And blogging well and intelligently about food is important. Maybe it can change things. I hope.
So many thanks to all the excellent readers who commented on the issues, elevating and enhancing them and giving them perspective and balance. And again, many thanks for the opportunity to hang out for a short time on your excellent blog, Meg. I'll be reading.
Onward.