In the words of Michael Pollan: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” That sage advice may be familiar to those who find meat to be the anti-Christ of edibles, but for most Americans, meat is what’s for dinner. And it’s what’s in the news this week, too. Three stories:
Like your meats antibiotic-free? The FDA just made things a little easier for you. Giving farmed animals antibiotics is a widespread practice. It’s done to ward off illness and promote faster growth. But the rise in mega-viruses including dangerous E. coli strains has led the FDA to rethink this practice. The more drug-resistant microbes grow on the farms, the more they get passed along the food chain to us.
As the New York Times reports, “after decades of debate, the Food and Drug Administration appears poised to issue its strongest guidelines on animal antibiotics yet.” They would end the use of drugs to promote growth and would engage veterinarians to keep better oversight of the animals.
Like fish? Whole Foods is about to clarify your shopping experience. Msnbc.com reports that the store has create a new color-coded rating program that measures the environmental impact of its wild-caught seafood. A green rating means the seafood is relatively abundance and caught in eco-friendly ways. Yellow means there are some issues with the fish and how it was caught. Red means the fish is over-fished and the methods to take it out of the sea were also, fishy.
And finally, for all of us interested in flesh dresses that exist outside our nightmares, Lady Gaga showed up on a red carpet sporting a meat dress designed by Franc Fernandez. PETA went into convulsions, issuing a statement “Meat is the decomposing flesh of a tormented animal who didn’t want to die, and after a few hours under the TV lights, it would smell like the rotting flesh it is and likely be crawling in maggots – not too attractive, really.”
Some of us felt that Her Gaga-ness was wearing her dress an ironic political statement about how female pop stars and their bodies are objectified as meat. The Lady’s response? She told Ellen DeGeneres she wore the fillets as a sign of solidarity with the military’s stance on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Said Lady Gaga, “It is a devastation to me that I know my fans who are gay”¦ feel like they have governmental oppression on them. That’s actually why I wore the meat tonight.”
Image: specialkrb