Health Care, Again

President Obama came out with his proposal to reform the nation’s health care system today. The president plan uses the Senate bill as a starting point, with some tweaks. Among the new proposals: a Health Insurance Rate Authority, that would have the power to block insurance premium hikes; additional help for lower income Americans to get health care and delaying the onset of the so-called Cadillac tax on expensive policies. The plan does not include a public option and the White House says it will cost $950 billion over ten years. Our guest is Gail Chaddock, congressional reporter for the Christian Science Monitor.

‘Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows’

That’s what our guest social psychologist Melanie Joy sets out to explain in her new book of the same name. She says it’s because of carnism, the belief system which makes us disgusted by the thought of eating golden retrievers, but allows us to eat cows and pigs, even when they are just as intelligent as dogs.

Olympics Update

Canada's Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir perform at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics in Vancouver, Feb. 21, 2010. (AP)

Ice dancing and men’s and women’s hockey are on the program today. We talk about the action on the ice with Los Angeles Times sports reporter Helene Elliot.

Florida Woman Fights Court Order For Bed Rest While Pregnant

Samantha Burton was 26, six months pregnant, a smoker and in premature labor when doctors at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital in Florida last year won a court order keeping her in the hospital on bed rest, against her wishes. Her baby was stillborn. But, backed by advocates for civil liberties, she’s still fighting to overturn the court order. We speak with her attorney David Abrams, and William Meggs, State Attorney for Leon County, Florida, whose office argued the case for the hospital.

Icelandic Singer-Songwriter Takes On Country Music

Lay Low, 2007. (Arnar Ómarsson)

Lovisa Elisabet Sigrunardottir has been called an Icelandic Patsy Cline. Country music’s Lucinda Williams says she’s one of the best new artists in years, and her new album “Farewell Good Night’s Sleep” is being released next month in the U.S. We speak with the artist, known as Lay Low.

Music From The Show

The Lickets, “Meat City”

Nathan Milstein, “Bach: Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin”

Freddie Hubbard, “Gibraltar”

Art Blakey, “C.O.R.E.”Lay Low, “On My Own”

Lay Low, “On My Own”

Patsy Cline, “Crazy”

Lay Low, “Little By Little”

Lay Low, “The Reason Why My Heart’s In Misery”

Lay Low, “My Second Hand Heart”

Lay Low, “By And By”

James Horner and Will Jennings, “My Heart Will Go On” performed by Celine Dion

Jeanne Dolan

I just finished listening to Melanie Joy about pigs, dogs and out views on animals. I was looking forward to hearing something new, but unfortunately Ms. Joy’s arguments seems better suited for high school students. I, along with probably many other public radio listeners, know that pigs are intelligent and they roll in mud to keep cool. Over centuries we bred domesticated animals to provide food and other material goods, while we bred dogs to provide help with hunting and companionship. Also, recently scientist have been rethinking the whole dog/human relationship and coming to the conclusion that it is a symbiotic one where dogs have learned to do things that humans find appealing, like make eye contact, that provide and important emotional link for us humans. Just because I acknowledge that dogs are for companionship and pigs are generally best as food, does not mean I can speak out against abuse or torture of dogs or pigs. Additionally her portrayal of the comments her students make concerning the whole dog/pig issue just makes me think her students are not very well educated or curious.
derek whitaker

I agree completely with the previous poster. It’s obvious that dogs are natural predators, as are humans, but pigs and cows are not. This is the fundamental difference. Over tens of thousands of years we started domesticating and cooperating with dogs rather than competing with them. Yes pigs are intelligent, but in nature they are PREY rather than predator.
Ellen

We eat specific animals (pigs, cows, poultry, etc) because they have a certain cost to produce ratio. For instance, pigs grow very quickly and the cost of feeding them over time to the amount of nutrition they provide is a positive. What the author of this books fails to take into effect is that those attributes were a strategy that the species developed to increase their likelihood of survival. Like plants, specific traits – taste, usefulness, ability to be turned into alcohol or a drug – increases the likelihood that the dominant species would nurture them and spread them across the globe. Animals fall under similar constraints. Consider that if we stopped eating pigs, why would we breed them. Therefore, in all likelihood in a very short span of time, a human generation or two, they would die off. The dog and the cat developed characteristics that also gave them the benefit of human propogation. However, those very qualities have played upon human instincts that discourage their eating. It’s not out-of-sight, out-of-mind that encourages carnivorism. It is the development of genetic traits that create a symbiotic relationship between the carnivore species (humans) and the food (demosticated livestock). Perhaps it would be nice if vegitarians would acknowledge the fact that if humans stop eating meat, then they are dooming many species to doom.
Jon

If you want to see some real brutal killings, check out youtube videos of lions, crodociles, or other predators killing for food in nature. That’s some cruel stuff. Of course, my vote for the most immoral creatures are those nasty spiders that drug their prey, wrap them in a web cocoon, and eat them later at their leisure. That ought to be outlawed!
Debra Garls

Life lives off of death-Joseph Campbell

There are many good reasons to choose to become a vegetarian but “not eating life” or “not killing” anything is not one of them. Most vegetarians fail or refuse to “connect the dots” to the fact that the plants they eat were also once alive. Perhaps this is because they lack the empathy to make this connection or perhaps they simply choose to distance themselves from this reality because they have to eat something and so they pretend that plants are not life. This is problem-how can one live without eating something that was once alive? The truth is that it can’t be done.

I believe this whole issue has to do with the fact that most people have little to no experience with plants, animals or even nature. Put out a bird feeder and it quickly becomes a snack bar for Hawks and the neighborhood cats. Nature is one tough lady and her patterns can make us very uncomfortable. Death is scary and our culture is particularly bad at handling death but all things die. Most animals die as a meal to something else just as most plants die as a meal to some animal. Eating death can be a difficult thing to embrace but the fact of the matter is that a grocery store is in essence nothing more than funeral home. Whether plant, animal or mineral-we take in the energy of what was once life. Instead of placing arbitrary values on different life forms-I prefer to honor the sacrifice that is the food that I eat. I did not put in place the patterns of life and death, I am not always comfortable with these patterns but I do not have the power to change them. However, I can live within these patterns with respect and by honoring all the sacrifices that keep me alive as life. Life that has more purpose than just to feed me. Just as my life has more of a purpose than to feed worms and the soil. Although eventually this is exactly what my life will lead to-a death that feeds new life. When that time comes, I will be honored to give back to all that has supported me.
Quinne

I’m only disappointed the discussion was not taken further. Flesh is flesh, and the distinction is arbitrary. Prey or preditor, pet or livestock, these are just arbitrary words when it comes to flesh as food.

It would have been helpful to include that is absolutely NOT NECESSARY to eat animal flesh to be healthy, and in fact, meat and dairy are the largest contributors to many of our health problems (diabetes, heart disease, cancer, obesity).

There is also growing evidence that the largest contributor to global climate change is animal agriculture.

How about a story on these?
Sally Hoffsommer

Why we eat pigs

I was astounded when I heard Melanie Joy describe the discussion she used with students…describe a dog…describe a pig. She adopted the “Doll Test” used in Brown v. Topeka BOE. This is the end of Black History month and I wonder how many of us are ready to equate civil rights for animals to civil rights for all Americans? Perhaps we will treat animals better when we finally treat humans humanely. Just after the program I heard a news report on NPR describing the Torture Tactics used by the U.S. to combat terror.

Raised on a farm I did l did love my hogs and steers that I raised for 4-H. I petted, groomed and played with them and then on occasion ate them.
Elian Gonzalez

Here we go again: another disciple of the You Need to Eat What I Say Is Okay movement (headed by the two bogus high priests, Michael Pollan and Alice Waters). I have no problem with anyone who changes their diet because they don’t want to eat meat. But human being evolved as meat eaters, for better or worse, so the argument that we vegetarian by nature is entirely specious.

Most of Ms. Joy’s statements are those of bourgeoisie bib-dribbling, the result of a wealthy society that has the time and the money to pat itself on the back for its consumer choices. I know exactly where my food comes from; I know it didn’t show up magically on a supermarket shelf in shrink-wrap. As consumers, we make choices precisely because we can. Making this a moral issue (“Do you know that once a living being?!”) is to make people feel stupid and loathsome, not enlightened because utlimately, you want to tell them what to do. And to buy your book.
http://www.newdawnmt.com Montana listener

It is very difficult for most people to challenge their entrenced eating patterns, which is why most reasonable and thoughtful NPR listeners, are defiant, defensive and
will throw out any thoughts to put-down what is obvious.
So, with that being said, I was once a meat-eater. No more, because after realizing the toll upon other animals, I am not a dominator and indifferent to animals. This was before the United Nations Long Shadow report and so many other environmental reality based studies came out too, about the impact of eating animals and animal agri-business. By eating animals, yes you are complicent in horrors that take place routinely. Chew on that!
bking

a carrot dies no easier than a cow.if people are wrong to eat animals..then arent other animals wrong?are tigers and sharks and wolves murderers?how many stomachs do humans have?if the answer is under 2,then humans arent vegatarians.cows are vegatarians,cats are carnavours and humans are omnivorous.we can choose to be vegatarian…which is fine if it is a choice.but when people defame and revile others due to diet(as if that were a better reason than their race or religion or any other traditional form of bigotry)human intellect is getting out of whack.this is why so many people have ‘problems’ with vegatarians.rather than doing their own thing and living their own lives…too many(but thankfully not all)insist on imposing their beliefs and yes, even bigotry on those they feel are beneath them.if you choose to be a vegatarian…good for you.but before you look down on me and wag your finger..expect a finger pointing back at you.
Michael

To the comments above, let me add that, even though we keep rabbits and guinnea pigs as pets, these are not exempt from being eaten. Nor are dogs in some parts of the world. Yes, if you put “Golden Retriever” on the menu, people would balk. That is because it is a “breed” of dog — the result of millenia of targeted breeding for the purpose of human companionship. If someone were to take a dog or cat and breed it for the flavor and quantity of it’s meat — as pigs have been — then I imagine there would be much less objection to consumption.

While I do agree that there are many reasons for becoming vegetarian (or at least drastically cutting back on the amount of meat we consume), from environmental to health to socio-economic, I found Ms. Joy’s reasoning to be flawed beyond any reason. Everything eats to live, and most of them practice selective feeding (consider the relationship between shark and remora). If you want to point out something truly inhuman and grotesque, then consider how we treat our dead, embalming them and sealing them away without any possibility of returning to the natural cycle of eat-and-be-eaten.

Please, find someone who can make an intelligent, well-reasoned argument next time. Just getting a book published is proof of neither validity nor value.
Helena

Some people think vegans are trying to ‘tell people what to eat’ and I say vegans are simply ‘telling people what they are eating’.

If you want to use over half the world’s resources, cause hunger, suffering and encourage high cholesterol, heart disease, cancer etc… then a diet of eggs, dairy and meat are for you.

Many folks on here seemed to promote eating meat just because they can. I say those with a conscience will delve deeper into this subject and realize that acting ethically is a good thing.
George Mitges

Are you looking for professionals who can help you outline, plan, execute, organize, re-organize and manage your business or its different processes? If yes, then George Mitges and Associates Inc. has the right strategic guidance you need.George Mitges agri food industry consulting provides a wide-ranging expertise in agribusiness and personalized consulting service to the production agricultural community over 30 years

Health Care, Again

‘Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows’

More Questions For Toyota

Olympics Update

Florida Woman Fights Court Order For Bed Rest While Pregnant

Icelandic Singer-Songwriter Takes On Country Music

Music From The Show