Chickens become your life-has this happend to anyone??

[Nichole77]

This is such a good conversation. I am a vegetarian. I would really love to see a world that respected animals. I think that those of you that raise your chickens and eat them are great. I would like to see more of that. I have a problem with the lack of respect that we have for animals. And I feel bad for all the roos that have no value. I would like to see a big comeback of good old fashioned cock-au-van. I have a real problem with being wasteful. My niece has a pet chicken but she eats chicken. she ordered chicken nuggets yesterday then ate her fries and said she was done. I told he no. I said a chicken had to die so you could have that and your not going to throw it away. She ate it. It might sound cruel and she's only 6 but my son is the same age and he will tell off anyone eating meat. But I am trying to break him of that. He's very adamant. And I thought that he would be the meat eater.

 

[meriruka]

I am almost vegetarian. That is to say I will eat fish on occasion and on Thanksgiving I will buy a free range, humanely killed turkey. I stopped eating meat when I found out about the horrible treatment factory animals receive. I don't object to eating meat at all and I for one am glad to be at the top of the food chain. But I believe we have a responsibility to the other animals we eat for food to be as kind as possible and treat them well.
That said, I recommend you don't go "cold turkey" to become vegetarian. Until you learn how to cook and balance meals, just cut your meat portions down to a few bites and eat more of the side dishes. Get a good vegetarian cookbook and twice a week try a new recipe. Beans and grains in your diet make a complete protein which is more easily digestable to your system than meat. If beans & grains are not currently in your diet now, go easily at first, then increase the amounts to give your body time to adjust. Try to avoid "ready-made" vegetarian meals, they usually contain too much fat. Don't eat "fake meat" substitutes, they don't taste like the real thing and will leave you unsatisfied. I'm probably making this sound more complicated than it really is. My point is that you don't have to eat bean sprouts, soy burgers and wheat gluten (Yuck) If you get an uncontrollable urge for a steak, do it & don't beat yourself up. That happens to me even now, but i find when i actually do eat it, it doesn't taste as good as I remember and it gives me a heavy, blah feeling in my stomach. The other option is to buy meat that is locally raised in good conditions and killed humanely. It's more expensive, but it helps send the message to suppliers that we don't want crippled, sickly, abused meat. If you decide to go vegetarian, feel free to PM me, i can give you names of good cookbooks and info.

 

[hooligan]

I'm a vegetarian but not a veggie-nazi like some are LoL. My bf has been a veggie for almost 2 yrs now. He used to work in the meat dept of a supermarket and started having horrible dreams. He work up one morning covered in sweat and said he'd never eat meant again....he did however eat seafood and catfish.
I became a veggie one day while just looking in the eyes of my dog Hooligan who had bone cancer and it clicked that while she was a dog she was no different than a cow or that chiken or pig or whatever. I stopped then and there and haven't eaten any kind of meat since then. Which also prompted my bf to stop all meat as well. I am allergic to milk and eggs so that cuts out a bit there LoL but I do eat cheese, I can not wait til a local dairy starts making cheese again!

 

[chickenannie]

mnm,
do you think it's cruel to own a big dog and keep it in an apartment or cage all day while the owners are at work?
I am not trying to be controversial by bringing this up, but I think the above scenario is very inhumane for dogs and I'd rather have my free-ranging chickens any day in comparison, even if I do put some on the dinner table eventually. My chickens are HAPPY. They run around freely on my farm all day, having fulfilling, interesting chicken lives as far as I can tell. They are living their natural way, out in nature in the sunshine, digging, sunbathing in the dirt, eating grass and bugs whenever they want.

 

[gamebirdsonly]

I cant eat my own birds, but i have no problem eating fried chicken from kentucky fried chicken yummy!!

 

[hooligan]

Some big dogs are great apt. dogs, Mastiffs being one of them, but that is a TOTALLY different subject LoL

While I could never raise and animal and then eat it, or eat any animal I would much rather see people raising food in the way you do ChickenAnnie than in those 'other' methods. It is most important for them to live a healthy natural and happy life before they meet their end.

And yeah I know that wasn't posed towards me

 

[mnm]

Quote:
I know. So why do you end it (their lives) to eat meat, when, in fact, you don't have to???

 

[chickenshadow]

Quote:
That's a joke right?

 

[chickenshadow]

Quote:
I know. So why do you end it (their lives) to eat meat, when, in fact, you don't have to???

mnm, I'd like to ask you to back up a little. YOU say chickenannie DOESN'T need to eat
meat. How do YOU know this? Billions of people on this planet NEED TO EAT MEAT
because it is thier primary food source.

On your signature line you claim to be a tree hugger. I'd love to ask you what that
means to you but that would take this post way off topic. You seem to be letting
your ideology cloud your judgement here.

Your whole post started with a question what is the difference between a dead store
bought chicken and the ones free ranging at a farm. That question has been answered
here in various ways by people with very different beliefs.

This thread has now become about YOU and YOUR BELIEFS about meat. This is a trap
a lot of well meaning people fall into. You asked for answers and you got them but
what you are doing now is questioning someones, in this case Chickenannie's, personal
choices. This is where things go from being a discussion to becoming an arguement.

Like I said before it is YOUR decision to eat meat or not to eat meat. You should be
grateful you have that choice as so many people on this planet simply do not.

 

[goatkeepers]

Hi from one veggie to (almost) another!!

I've been one for over ten years and so has DOH.

Great choice and I'll be here for support! There's enough non-meaty food out there. Check out "morning star farms", you can find their stuff at your local grocery store.