Tuesday, November 25, 2008

What Tofurky Day Means for Animal Rights

With Thanksgiving being just around the corner for my American friends, I've been doing some nosing around through some of the articles that have popped up about it -- at least those from an animal-friendly perspective. I found a nicely written piece about the holiday on the Columbia Spectator's student paper's website. Eric Risser talks about what Thanksgiving traditionally means to most -- getting together with family and friends, a chance to look back at the year behind you... Risser, of course, addresses the meat-centric nature of Thanksgiving. More than any other US holiday, it pretty much revolves around eating an animal. That being said, Risser points out that in terms of what it means to animals, it's really not that different from most other days. Sure, around 46 million turkeys are slaughtered every year in the US for Thanksgiving, but around 23 million chickens are slaughtered every other day of the year.

What Risser suggests is to use Thanksgiving to test out vegetarianism and he writes about the annual vegan Thanksgiving dinner that the Columbia Students for Animal Protection put on as having been a great opportunity for people to do this -- to see that all of the other aspects of Thanksgiving can be enjoyed without having to sacrifice having a delicious (in this case vegan) meal.
I wonder how many of you out there are hosting Thanksgiving dinner for family and friends this year and sharing scrumptious animal-free dishes while taking part in this traditional American holiday?

2 comments:

J said...

Great post M! I do hate the meat-centric nature of Thanksgiving, but love the chance to spend time with my family. I will be serving a number of animal-free (and thus quite animal friendly of course) dishes to show them how tasty dairy free vegetarian food can be. I am making butternut squash and apple soup, bringing local ciabatta bread, black bean and brown rice stuffed mushrooms, garlic mashed potatoes, mushroom gravy, and pumpkin walnut bread. It will all be vegan and I am not telling anyone so they will actually eat it. I hate that about people and their preconceived notions. I will tell them afterwards, if they like the food.

M said...

Will you cater my next dinner? :)