Journal 08

TJ Montgomery
Stephanie Gai
English 100
23 February 2009

Questioning the Text:
Michael Pollan An Animal's Place

Informatively intriguing! Reading this article has allowed me to feel that I know more about what logic falls behind the "animal people's" claims that treating animals inhumanely is wrong. I can't say that I agree with everything that was said, but I did understand it all.

I would have never thought, even for one second, that the justification of animal cruelty could be directly paralleled to the justification of slavery. When I read this analogy it completely blew my mind. On top of that, I agreed. This has to be deserving of the comments by John J. Ruszkiewicz. I was convinced that killing animals was wrong if slavery is wrong. It takes skill to convince anyone of something like this. Michael Pollan proves his genius consistently without fail. Pollan’s insight on animal rights, equality, life privileges, content, and degree of respect was essential to the effectiveness of his words. He gives logical examples and lists activists that support and defenders that justify.

Ruszkiewicz has my full support in his claim that this piece of writing is "powerful." Pollan explains the logic behind the theories of animal "rights" and admits that he has defenses for human behaviors, including his own, he can't back up. (This is simply the way most of the world handles an argument, and I appreciate him for admitting that.) He unveils the real issue keeping vegetarians on the grass. Pollan proclaims the real question isn't about whether we eat or do not eat the meat, but how the meat was treated before it became just a piece of meat... Animal cruelty!

I was so relieved when I read this. I love meat and being told that that isn't the issue was good news for me, and my belly. I do however have to admit I didn't finish the article feeling guilt free. I do purchase food from processing plants that do in fact treat animals in the most barbaric ways, in which case I am only encouraging this sort of behavior.

I didn't know the exact focus of this article at first glance. In fact, I didn't find it until I got to the seventh page. There it was in the 33rd paragraph, clear as day; "Whether our interest in eating animals outweighs their interests in not being eaten... turns on the vexed question of animal suffering." Why Pollan chose to place his thesis so far from the introduction, I do not know, but one might guess that he felt a brief description of what lead to his discovery of the real issue was necessary to the mind of the reader. I appreciated the examples of other writings and explanations and found them to be of great help to my understanding once I was exposed to the main concern.