How Does It Feel To Be Food?
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Over at Crazy, Sexy Life a children’s book author gives advice for how to talk to children about veganism. Then she explains her new book:
My new children’s book, “Garlic-Onion-Beet-Spinach-Mango-Carrot-Grapefruit Juice” aims to raise some basic questions about eating animals. It does not discuss factory farming, or even the animals who are usually consumed as food. The “moral of the story” is intentionally open ended, with the hope that it will spark discussion between parent and child (so the parent can decide how detailed to be and what to focus on). When silly, juice-enthusiast Vikings decide to grind up nutritious snail shells into their juice, their friend Thora asks questions like, “What were the snails doing before the Vikings scooped them up?” and “How does it feel to be food?”
I know that kids are capable of thinking through these questions and living compassionately.
The book is aimed at ages 6 and up and as illustrations it features photos of handmade dolls rather than cartoon drawings. You can download some book themed coloring pages here >>
Read the rest of the article here >>
When I was a child, I was disturbed to see veins in the chicken legs I ate. It didn’t seem right to me to eat animals, even though I liked the taste of SOME animal flesh, such as fried chicken legs and bacon. (I disliked and even DESPISED some other meats, though, especially the dry, gristly, tasteless pot roasts that my mom used to fix on Sundays.) Of course, not only was I discouraged from voicing displeasure over eating meat, I was even made to feel somewhat abnormal for expressing this revulsion. My dad told me that I needed to eat meat, and that eating it would “put hair on my chest.” Nevertheless, the older I got, the more I resolved to abstain from eating animal flesh when I grew up, and, by my late teen years, I did not hesitate to express this intention to my parents.
I’m proud and thankful that I rejected the evil meat-eating example of the majority, and that the insinuations of abnormality only served to strengthen my resolve to do the right thing. Children SHOULD be, of course, encouraged to follow their conscience and eat a plant-based diet as much as possible; and thank goodness, these days, there are a number of parents and others who are willing to offer them such encouragement!