Facts from Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer

(Apologies for the lateness of this post. It was posted last night, but was mysteriously replaced with a post by Conor.)

In Jonathan Safran Foer's Eating Animals, the author explores many elements of animal welfare, particularly factory farming and big business fishing. Throughout the novel, he describes, in detail, the conditions in both the catching of marine life for human consumption and the slaughter of animals in the meatpacking industries. Foer begins each of his chapters with an interesting fact about animal welfare, which are listed as follows:

• "Americans choose to eat less than .25% of the known edible food on the planet" (1).
• "Modern industrial fishing lines can be as long as 75 miles--the same distance as from sea level to space" (19).
• "Animal agriculture makes a 40% greater contribution to global warming than all transportation in the world combined; it is the number one cause of climate change" (43).
• "In the typical cage for egg-laying hens, each bird has 67 square inches of space--the size of this rectangle [the size of the page]. Nearly all cage-free birds have approximately the same amount of space" (79).
• "On average, Americans eat the equivalent of 21,000 entire animals in a lifetime--one animal for every letter on the last five pages" (121).
• "Nearly one-third of the land surface of the planet is dedicated to livestock" (149).
• "Less than 1% of the animals killed for meat in America come from family farms" (201).
• "Where will it end?" (245).

Foer makes convincing arguments with sufficient arguments from beginning to end, making his novel a valid source for study on the topic of animal welfare. He presents it in a way where he supports his accusations, yet uses humor to lighten the mood of seriousness that looms over his work. It was a very interesting and informative read that I  suggest to everyone, even those who did not have animal welfare as their blog topic. Sound off in the comments.

Citation Info:
Foer, Jonathan Safran. Eating Animals. 2nd. 1st. New York, NY: Little, Brown and Company, 2009. 1-273. Print.

-DR