though i have eaten salmon and occasionally other seafood over the past four years (since quitting all other meats and dairy), i have been passive about voicing my opinion to others about their meat consumption. i figure if they want to eat animals, there is nothing i can do about it. everyone wants to strangle the self-righteous vegetarian, and no one likes to know what it is they are actually putting in their mouths.
no one cares! it's so easy not to care.

we grow up thinking it is necessary to eat animals. that it is a sign of prosperity, and that it is delicious.
i used to cook pork chops and steaks for my ex-boyfriend when we lived together. i never liked eating the meat. i ate it because he "needed" it- he felt "weird" when he didn't eat meat with every meal. in my experience, this is not uncommon among men. i have a few girlfriends who love a charcuterie plate more than a good session of pussy eating.

and how judgmental we are of others.
vegetarians and vegans are, in my opinion, not as bad as the meat eaters!
we may hear a guy from alberta say he hates people who don't eat steak: sumthin' wrong with 'em.
my ex mother in law was from wisconsin, the dairy state. she covered everything in arm's length with a pound of butter and cheddar cheese. she was a fat, moody crier.
i grew up on the west coast of canada. i like salmon. it's dark orange-red, clean. these are the associations i have. it makes you feel good, it's "brain food".
it's still... a dead animal.
untreated by antibiotics (wild salmon, anyway), out of the cold waters an hour away. not raised in a stall in the dark, starved, medicated, injected, defeated, untouched, prodded, abused, filled with fear and wildness, before dying in a surge of adrenelin and desperation that fills every cell with the pain of its life before it hits your plate....
...but an animal nonetheless.

i can rationalize any way i want. so can you. but the reality is, we have no excuse anymore. with the availability of information at our fingertips we should be ashamed that to eat an animal is to vote for death. this torture is the very example of luxury, success, good business. globalization. millions of animals slaughtered to feed our fat mouths and the mouths of our children. to be educated about the fuel that powers your body is true power.

steaks, filets, chops, breasts, sausages, casseroles, stews, mince. our intestines clogged with the decaying flesh of any animal that in its natural setting would be grazing, snuffling, running, nudging, breeding, swimming, pecking, frolicking, raising its babies. for what- so we can get cancer in our 40's, even 30's? so we can be sluggish, fat, "tired", medicated, processed, wrapped in cling wrap and frozen?

our heads are  up our own asses. removal would be so easy, but like europeans ignoring the holocaust becuase admitting reality would be too hard to live with, we continue to consume, and vote with our dollars everyday in favour or enslavement, torture and slaughter of innocent animals.