a project I did for school...

[Dragonfruit]

Introduction

Today you may have eaten cooked dung mixed with undesirable parts of an animal that have been ground up to look good, or hundreds of different chemicals that combine to make something “tasty”. You probably don’t know that the hamburger was the most undesirable product on the menu just decades ago.
Workers in foreign countries come to America to become happy, prosper, and be secure. Most of them work at fast food joints, or buy a franchise to make money because they cannot get good jobs. America is seen as a good place to be. Large corporations take work from overseas and over the border because they cost less, are not as intelligent as other workers and are happy to work for (considered to be low in America) low pay. Low pay meaning below or minimum wage. Minimum wage is what the big corporate lobby’s want on capital hill.
Some major meatpacking corporations play job advertisements in Mexico. Most poor people in Mexico don’t have jobs that pay. Going to America for free is an opportunity for most. So then the corporation has a new and loyal worker that works for low pay. They go into slaughterhouses and operate dangerous machinery and usually get lacerated by some type of blade. And they don’t get workers benefits because the corporation fires them before they qualify.
The environment in a common slaughterhouse is a very dangerous and very deadly place. Some workers work knee deep in blood. The way the house works is similar to an assembly line. In some, the line moves dangerously fast. A worker must keep up with everyone else at the fast speed of the line. If he/she does not, accidents happen and people get hurt, or he/she gets fired or warned. Workers work long shifts making the same cut, on the same piece of meat, with the same muscles.
Workers get stressed and scared that they will make a mistake and get drugs to help them get calm. Being high while operating dangerous equipment is not good. Especially while being crammed up in a slaughterhouse so close that you can feel the heat radiating from the person next to you. The workers sometimes do not fully understand how the machinery they operate works.
One incident was where a worker shut down a grinder machine because there was a malfunction and he needed to fix it. In the machine, thousands of tiny steel hammers are still spinning silently. It takes some time before the machine comes to a complete stop. The worker proceeds to put his head and hand with the wrench into the opening of the machine not knowing the machine is still spinning. Luckily, someone stopped him before he got his brains pulverized by thousands of deadly hammers that appeared invisible due to their high speed.
The cattle slaughtered at the plant eliminate more than normal because of the non natural feed they’re given to eat. The feces get all over the cattle when they are packed up in the crammed conditions of the truck that takes them to the plant. The workers in the plant don’t think much about contamination and quality, just being able to keep up with the line. Often, cattle feces that contain millions of dangerous fatal microbes such as E. coli 0157:H7, Lysteria, salmonella and so on get through the line into the oven, and if undercooked, can be fatal.

Eating fast food has always been looked down upon by doctors, nutritionists and common society until White Castle gave it a better name. Eating fast food is terribly bad to your health. You can easily get diabetes, brain damage and bad heart conditions, if not fatal.
Fast food has influenced our culture more than most other things. The invention of the franchise spreads this disease all over the world and eliminates small businesses’. Ninety-eight percent of school children know who Ronald McDonald is. Ever been to a suburbia? Rows and rows of identical houses with a certain street with all the different franchises. Franchises like, McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Carl’s Jr., Burger King, and so on.

Radio
Hi, my name is Robert. I have forgotten my last name because I didn’t need it being poor in a rural Mexican town. I live in a tent and am very poor.
I got off the bed and walked out of my home and turned on the radio that lay on the log covered in the shade of a tree. I knew enough English to understand the commercial, “American meatpacking company wants your labor----come to the bus stop on the edge of town, fifteen USD per hour.” America, my friends went there, I’ve never seen them since. I went back into the tent and took my shirt and toiletry.
America is the home of the free, the land of the brave and the country of the rich. Being poor and unemployed and living in a slum isn’t exactly living. I decided to go to the bus stop they mentioned. Today is humid and lots of people are walking around. I see a couple of franchises as I walk through town. I decide to eat at one because I’m hungry, they’re close by, and I only have enough money to buy a table.
The clerk happily takes my order as I grin looking at the pictures of the food items being sold here for such low prices. After I find a table, the clerk yells, “numero viente-seis!” I was surprised at how fast the service was, well, it is after all “fast” food. I start to munch on the seemingly perfect tasting cheeseburger. The “french fries” were nice too.
I left the store and walked to the edge of town towards the bus stop. There was a crowd of people that looked just like me, and looked like they had even less money than me. I sat on one of the many benches waiting for the bus to arrive. “Job in America, fifteen dollars an hour,” I thought as the sun set, “What could be better?”

Bus Ride
It was getting dark, the sun had set. The people I am with are poor like me and heard the same ad; some said it was heaven calling them to America. They say that America is a land where everyone is rich and money is all over the place. They say that the meatpacking company is rescuing them from the bad life they live in Mexico.
Occasional cars pass though here but not much. Only nine cars passed by the bus stop since I arrived. Then what seemed like just another car in the dark shown two huge headlights at us. It was the bus. Suddenly, it stopped and we all went in, like a herd of sheep. The driver greeted us as we came in, I sat in the back.
The bus started to move forward and some people decided to go to sleep. I decide to take a look out the window. I saw some buildings on the side of the road, with women coming out of them looking exhausted walking back home down the road. Sweatshops I think. Another bus with IBP written in bold, one looking the same as ours passes by the opposite direction going to get more workers.
I took a look at the map on the wall, it displayed where the plant was, the higher American plains. We were going to work for a corporation called IBP. They say they have hundreds of thousands of workers and are one of the biggest meatpacking industries.

Welcome To America
We passed a border checkpoint and the driver said on the loudspeaker, “welcome to America!” That woke many people up but after a while they went back to sleep. After a couple more hours, I went to sleep. When I woke up the sun shined and I was in an empty bus, everyone had left for breakfast at the “Denny’s” across the street from the Chevron gas pump the bus was parked at.
I looked out the window and saw rows of houses colored the same color stretching out in all directions from this intersection with a Chevron, Denny’s, McDonalds, and a Taco Bell. Cars zoomed through this suburban maze. I get out of the bus and join the others. The driver continues to pump gas into the bus while I walk across the street.
A group of people walk by wearing Roca wear, and Phat Farm clothes. Then a group of sixteen year old girls walk by wearing shirts that say Roxy girl, or Billabong. The shirt I wore was faded orange with no decorations; my pants were just simple blue jeans. Another group of teens passed by wearing all black, and spiked jewelry with T-shirts that had pictures of people that look like them with Good Charlotte written on them. All of the kids looked as if they were in a gang, punks or surfers. When in fact, you can’t surf in the middle of America, and there aren’t any punkish things around this identical brady bunch maze of houses.
As I walked into Denny’s, the air conditioning made my body go from hot to warm. I found myself a table with the people I sit next to in the bus. The meals here were sausage, potatoes, eggs, hamburgers, omelets and other American breakfast items. I don’t want to try the food at first, but being hungry makes me try it. The eggs were good but the sausage smelled bad so I didn’t eat it. The person that sits across from me in the bus eats the smelly sausage, teasing me for not eating it.

Hello Job
The bus headed for the IBP slaughterhouse was there. Everyone in the bus had been waiting for a couple days now to see their new homes and the workplace. Now, they had arrived. The building they are to work at is what seems is a metal block on the high plains of America.
If you saw this from a satellite, you would see a bus driving down from the plant, getting new workers. Then going from Mexico to America. Stopping for food and gas in the lands of beige and light red roofs. Then arriving at the factory.
At the end of the day, the workers come back from work, looking exhausted, some bleeding, some sick. They go back into their home and sleep well, converse with their friends or other people that have been working at this plant.
Finally we arrive at the plant! The people in the bus shout in joy. As we walk out the bus, we are accompanied by a tour guide that is to show us around. The tour guide yells, “Ok, now let me teach you how to use the equipment for your job.”
The line of workers follows him to the plant. The temperature outside the plant is hot, no clouds. We start to hear the sounds of machinery working away at corpses, and grinding meat. The smell of the
Huge tanks full of cow crap and other waste make my nostrils upset. The tour guide calls these tanks “lagoons”. In the plant, the smell gets better; in the way that smelling like crap goes to smelling like piss. Here many other guides show the new workers how to operate the machinery.
After learning how to use things, we put on our equipment (chain mail, hard hats and chain mail gloves) and take a tour of the plant. The tour goes from the start to the end of the process of cutting meat. We walk down to where the cattle are killed. The ground below us starts to get bloodier if it isn’t bloodiest already. All around us, crowded workers are working a sweat trying to keep up with everything, some of them tremble. The gunshots we heard start to get louder as we progress the walkway. We all stop when the guides hand us new boots. Then we continue on, wondering what these boots are for. The ground starts to accumulate puddles of blood, and what seems like mud, but smells like crap. Now I know why they gave me these long boots.
The puddles get even larger and deeper as we take every step. Soon, the puddles reach our ankles. Then the blood started to get about a foot deep. The gunshot sounds are now loudest, as we look up to see on our right and left, “knockers” in seats manning big guns that shoot out bolts to knock cattle unconscious. Large metal racks pass by us at high speeds carrying heavy bleeding corpses as we leave the walkway, (we have to dodge these as we pass or we get knocked off onto a bloody concrete floor). We line up at the end of the assembly line and watch down below as men with large knifes sever the carotid artery of the incoming cattle, to humanely kill them. The ground here is crimson and brown from all the feces and blood. “This is the start of the line,” says the guide. I watch for a few seconds how a cow gets tranquilized, and then gets a bolt stuck into her skull. The person down with the moaning cow then takes out a knife and starts to make cuts on the cow. The rest of the tour crowd starts to leave when a corpse on one of the racks falls off and engulfs the worker, the worker gets knocked unconscious. The knife he was holding is forced into his body from the weight of the corpse. The handle of the knife lies between the corpse and the newly made corpse. Someone else drags him over to the side and takes his place. It was all too gross for me.
I catch up with the rest of the group and get assigned to a job. I am assigned to go work at the section where they divide steaks into two. I am given a device that looks like an electric serrated pizza cutter. The people next to me call it a “whizzard”. I quickly got to work after the guy behind us yelled at me. I started to make a vertical cut on every steak that passed on the conveyor belt.

Don’t Get High Near Blades
Hours passed by and I started to feel exhausted, as did the people near me. A worker about seven feet away asked his supervisor for something. The supervisor made some hand gestures and replied. The worker replied and the supervisor gave the worker a pill. He swallowed it. A minute later, he did not look nervous anymore, he was grinning, working with pleasure. While caught up with working, the whizzard he was holding dropped out of his hand, and bounced off the belt. Then the spinning blade lacerated his leg as it fell. The worker screamed as blood spurt out his leg. His blood stained the next thirty steaks of meat I made cuts on before a medic came. No one helped because they didn’t want to fall behind the line speed. Some never looked away. The speed of the belt prevented me from being able to clean the bloody steaks in time.
Sixteen minutes later, a horn blew and we left work. I went to room 67. The smell of the room was much better than the smell of everywhere else I had been. It smelled like citrus juice was sprayed all over the walls and in the air. I looked to the left and saw a spray can labeled “Pine Sol” on the counter next to the refrigerator. I realize that I have never used a refrigerator in my life before. I read the container of Pine Sol and recognize the ingredients section. The first few things are easy to figure out then the next names are very long and seemingly incomprehensible.
“…and then his leg gets,” “yeah yeah yeah, that happens a lot here. Don’t loose yourself, and watch out for others,” says my roommate as I try to explain what happened.
I flash back to the driver yelling, “welcome to America!” Is this really better than Mexico? “Why did you come here?” I ask.
“Got a family to work for in Mexico, no decent jobs down there,” he replies, “you?”
“Had no job, and I was running out of money. You call this a decent job?” I ask
“No, but the pay is much better here and I can live in a much better home,” he explains.
I sigh, then lay in bed. “So far, I’ve earned more money than any job where I used to live,” I think as I look at the bottom of my roommates cushion. My exhausted eyes closed.

Unsuspecting Woman
She was working like everyone else. Then two other workers came behind her. One of them grabbed her breasts. She was scared and screamed, but kept trying to work, for she might fall behind. The supervisor didn’t do anything to help her; he just stood there and laughed. An inspector that was walking through heard her. She yelled at the rapists and they ran. In the end, security caught them, but the men were only fired.

My Knife
My knife, I was given it the first day of work, I proudly put it in the sheath on the back of my pants. It was very sharp and clean that day, now about a month after, it started to get dull. My roommate said to sharpen it daily. “A sharp blade is a necessity,” he said.
I recognized the sound of sharpening metal when I tried it the first time, for it was the sound that sometimes kept me up at night. Everyday I started to find ways to use my knife better, and faster. Without a sharp blade you might not be able to make fast efficient cuts. Not being able to do that hampers your ability to keep up with the line.
I bonded with my knife as the samurai bonds with his sword. Everyday, every minute, every cut, was the same cut, only on a different steak. I spent more time using my knife than anything else until I became uncomfortable without my knife.
I figured out that we get medical benefits after three months of working. I have also heard that the company will try to fire you if your labor isn’t good enough after three months. They do that to save money they would use to help workers with medical issues. They also fire workers who report injuries or medical problems from working, or encourage them to quit by giving them worse jobs.
Workers who join labor unions, unions who are against the company that gave a job away from Mexico that paid better than jobs in Mexico. They get fired because the company doesn’t want to deal with them. I would never join a labor union, because they are against my company.

The Dull Blade
The horn that calls us to work didn’t wake me up as I slept in; half a minute later I woke up, and ran to the plant. Remembering that I didn’t sharpen my knife, I fretted, but started to work anyways. I have been working here for about three months already, and I am starting to be competitive with others to get healthcare benefits. This is the worst time of my job to fall behind in work; I just hope this dull blade will do.
The knife is hard to work with, but works nonetheless. I have difficulty making clean cuts, and my supervisor starts to notice. He looks at his clipboard and makes a decision. “Hey you! Robert! Startled, I spin around and my knife falls down, hits a counter and comes right back and severs my right arm. I scream out of pain. The supervisor tears his shirt and makes a tourniquet for me. He straps it on and takes a pin out of his pocket and ties it. “You can go do an easier job for now, don’t tell anyone you got hurt or they’ll make things harder on me, if you do, I’ll assign you a harder job.”
Still feeling my pain and my blood making the tourniquet’s color turn from white to red, I mop the floors while staying a distance from the knives of nervous workers. I could get medical attention, but I fear being sent to a worse job with my severed arm. An injured worker is bad economically, the company will encourage me to quit by giving me hard dangerous jobs if I show my condition. They’ll make me quit because they can get healthy workers just as easy as they can fire me.

FYI
“Every year more than one-quarter of the meatpacking workers in this country --- roughly forty thousand men and women --- suffer an injury or work-related illness that requires medical attention beyond first aid.”--- Fast Food Nation
Most injuries in slaughterhouses are a product of fast lines. About twenty years ago, slaughterhouses slaughtered about fifty cattle to one hundred seventy five an hour. Nowadays, some slaughterhouses slaughter four hundred cattle and hour. Faster line speeds make more profit for the corporation. Competition between meatpacking giants has lead to faster speeds.
Faster line speeds put more tension on workers. Most workers’ blades get dull while working so their labor gets harder. Injuries increase with the disassembly line speed. When labor unions were strong, workers could demand slower line speeds and the company would have to lower the line speeds. Now only a third of meatpackers are in a union. Immigrants are taught to not join unions, because they are “against the company”. Immigrants are told to report unions when the see them so the company can break them down. Most workers are immigrants or illegals. They are workers employed “at will” which means they can be fired easily, for almost any reason. This makes them less likely to complain or report injuries.
Some supervisors offer workers “crank” if they work more. The drug (methamphetamine) makes workers confident and ready. They feel that they are able to work better and are energized. They usually get the opposite of what they wanted.
Late night cleaning crews have the scariest job in the plant. The crews are not from the meatpacking company. They are from other companies that the meatpacking company makes to do its work on another name. They come in after everyone else leaves at midnight. Their job is to clean up the bloody, greasy slaughterhouse before dawn. Some workers don’t turn off their machinery after they go, so some blades and hammers are still moving.
The main tool of the cleaning crews is a hose that shoots out a stream off chlorine-water at one hundred eighty degrees Farinheight. The solution leaves a fog all around the plant that makes it hard for you to see and is harmful to your lungs. It also makes the temperature of the slaughterhouse very hot.
When you need to clean all the machinery in a slaughterhouse. Some of which could still be working, and you are virtually blind, you can get hurt badly or die. Sometimes workers of this job sometimes have to reach their hands into dirty blood filled tubs to drain them. Sometimes there could be a grinding blade still working below the bloody pool, if there is one, your hand could get grinded. Sometimes because of the fog, workers accidentally scald each other with very hot chemical laden water. Some of the workers of these crews are actually grounded into pieces.
The backgrounds of the sanitation crew workers are ones of orphans, people who are illiterate and/or illegal immigrants. These types of people are the most disposable workforce. Since this job is very dangerous, no one really wants it, but it is a job that doesn’t require much training. Workers are recruited from foreign countries, homeless shelters and other poor places. Just imagine that you are a blind nameless custodian, working in a very hot deadly dungeon with chemicals in your lungs.

See Bob
Bob is a homeless person in a homeless shelter in a city that most of the population in the world doesn’t know or care about. Even most of the country doesn’t know what this place is. Bob has forgotten his last name. He hasn’t gone to college and dropped out of high school. He has no family that he knows or loves. He grew up in an orphanage, and is now thirty four years old, even though he doesn’t know that.
Clean House Sanitation has recruited him to be a sanitation worker at a meatpacking plant. He took the job because it provided enough money to buy food and liquor. The sanitation recruits came to his shelter and recruited many others there.


See Bob Work
The crew consists of Bob, Luke, Jessie, Mike and Moe. They are cleaning up an IBP slaughterhouse. They have to have it clean by dawn. After the workers leave, they walk into the slaughterhouse some happy, some depressed, some nervous from the stench that hits their noses from the “lagoons” of hazardous slaughterhouse waste.
They walk in the doors looking like the mystery men in medieval times. They wear chain mail; some hold regular cleaning devices and most hold hoses. They proceed into the building; the men with hoses spray equipment with hot chemical laden water. The environment is now humid, most, foggy, harder to breathe in, and even more dangerous. The crew starts to clean up equipment and drain clogged blood drains.
Bob is on the roof, cleaning the vents. The vents are greasy and somewhat clogged; his job is to clean them. Tonight is a very windy night, and Bob can feel the gust almost blowing him off the high, flat roof. Bob is scared; he tries to let the air flow around him, not into him. He falls down and keeps scrubbing the vent, trying to get a blob of grease of a crevice. He gets the job done, and walks carefully and in an aerodynamic way towards the ladder down.
Meanwhile, the rest of the crew is having problems. The plant is foggy and vision is poor. Moe was sprayed accidentally by a crewmate. He is recovering outside. There is a tank that’s clogged. Jessie got in the pool of blood, and tried to pull the fat and the grease off of the drain. He was quickly overcome by the hydrogen sulfide fumes that the tank made. Mike jumped in too in order to save Jessie, but he died too. Their corpses lay over the drain, making it even harder for the others to clean the tank.
Luke, and Bob, didn’t hear anything going on because of the machinery. They look for the rest of the crew, but only find Moe outside. The three men finish up cleaning the place, but never find the rest of their crew. In the end, they are paid their thirteen dollars, the three of them.

Advertising and Ronald McDonald
Advertising is how a company introduces its target customers to their product. It can also be a way to make advertising targets like and be loyal to certain products. Most big fast food corporations spend lots of money, in billions on advertising. Putting up billboards, television ads, net pop ups, and net ads, and mostly every other medium of communication.
Ronald McDonald and other corporate mascots have made children happy, entertained, and made into a perfect customer for the company’s product. There are many reasons for how a mascot looks and acts. The way the mascot looks and acts on ads, is supposed to get customers. The bright colors of Ronald McDonald are interesting to little kids, (toddlers). The sacks with the golden arches look like presents, and toddlers like presents, just as most of us.
Corporations try to market to kids because they are the easiest target, and also because of many other reasons including. If you get a kid to want your product, he gets his or her parents to drive him there. His mom or dad will buy something too if they go to the same store as their kid and they feel hungry. This gives the franchise extra customers for advertising to kids. Another reason, because kids ages seven and below cannot completely tell right from wrong yet. When kids consume a product with their parents while having a good time, they become loyal to the food as a comfort food when they grow up. Comfort foods are foods you eat to feel younger, or happy. If you can convince that a product is cool among kids, you can get many many customers. All buying the food because they think it will make them look cool eating it, just like cigarettes.

The Man In The Big Red Boots
My mom was watching the news as she called it, on television. I didn’t like the news, all they did was talk, and the colors were so dull. Then the commercials came on. I liked commercials; they were colorful, and pretty. Mom didn’t like commercials, she liked the news. Then I saw him, he was very pretty, he was dressed up like a clown, I loved clowns. He wore only red and yellow, and some white here and there. He drove a cool looking colorful car, and always went to a place he called McDonalds. He also played with kids like me in a play structure. Right there, I knew an adventure awaited me at McDonalds!
“Mommy! Can we go to McDonalds?”
“No sweetie, not yet, let me watch the news.”
“Now!” I demanded.
“Oh, ok, whatever,” she said.
The inside of McDonalds was sort of drab. The “hamburgers” they had looked very tasty and surprising and weird and cool and tasty and colorful! I could hear my mom muttering, “should I get this, or that, or this, or…”
“Mommy, I’ll take number one.”
“Ok hun, I think I’ll have number six,” she happily replied, licking her lips. I then did as she did hungrily.

Fifty years later…

I walked into the McDonalds. There was only the manager here this morning. I walked up and said, “Number one please.”
“Ok ma’am,” said the manager.
Three minutes later, my number one arrived. I took a big old bite at it. The memories of fifty years back came into my head. I was just a little girl. I had seen Ronald McDonald on television. I begged my mom to go, and she did. We both had a nice time at McDonalds. That was long ago, and the first time of my many trips to McDonalds nationwide. I would settle for no other burger when I was in other states, or other countries. They made the food of my life. Now I am regretting it. Being overweight, not just overweight but obese and diabetic is a constant thought that makes me depressed. I never feel good about myself anymore because I’m fat, and I always feel sick. In pop culture, I’m the person who everyone laughs at, because I eat what pop culture wants me too.

Deadly Meat
Most all meat is deadly nowadays. The new unsanitary workers that do not know or care about food safety are the ones chopping up your meat. The few workers that do care about food safety have no time for it because the line speeds are too fast. Many pieces of meat contain feces in it, or at least fecal bacteria (the same bacteria that lives in feces).
Eating a piece of raw meat is just as dangerous as eating your own poop. Eating undercooked meat is also the same thing as eating your own poop. You get E. coli 0157:H7, Lysteria, salmonella and other dangerous microbes from eating raw or undercooked meat. Animals that are terrified, or stressed, are unhealthy just like humans that are stressed or scared. Eating meat at a fast food restaurant is like chopping up your friend after he swam in a vat of crap then cooking him and eating him. Eating meat that is clean is the same thing as chopping up your friend, cooking him, and then eating him. This makes it even worse to eat meat.


Animals Are Lives Too
The conditions of the animals you eat are terrible, even worse than the conditions the slaves lived in. Most chicken are kept in cages, with thousands of other chickens all crammed together, in cages. We humans forget that animals are living things too, when a woman’s egg is killed, it’s an abortion. When a hen’s egg is killed it’s an omelet.
Just imagine being in a cage, knowing you’ll die. You’re sweating because you’re only about five inches away from another living being. The heat that radiates from every chicken around you makes you feel feverish. A cow’s babies are taken from her before she even sees them. Calves and their moms have very strong bonds, and when they are broken, they both become terribly sad. Pigs are trapped in cages together. Some go mad and eat other pig’s tails off from the conditions. Pigs are happy by nature, and cheerful. The pigs labeled as modern livestock are depressed, insane and/or mutated by their own. If you treated your dog or cat the way the modern livestock are treated you could get arrested for animal cruelty.





///////////////////////////////end of report//////////////////////////////////////


there were some areas I left out =( this project was a HUGE part of my 3rd quarter in 8th grade. got it done a couple weeks ago. I could of put more into artificial flavoring and advertising

[Decavolt]

Flame me all you want, list all the reasons why "meat is murder" and that animals have souls too (what about the poor carrots??)... Sorry, don't care. If people were on the menu I'd eat them too, so it's not about being speciest or cruel to the wittle fuzzy wuzzies. It's about steak being yummy.
Having a nice bloody prime rib tonight, as a matter of fact. Enjoy your tofu.

[scream]

I read the first few paragraphs and learned a few things. As for the animals thing I'll say something that may save your life:

IT'S EITHER THEM OR US, BABY!
If they could, they'd eat us.

Relax, t'was a joke .

[Dragonfruit]

all too true yo. If animals had nukes, they'd kill us all. and thanks decavolt, I wont flame you, but I'll wish you luck that your rib wasnt undercooked. Fer yall who love steak or gormet burgers, ask for your meat to be well cooked dont eat rare steak, or any meat thats rare.

[Decavolt]

Too late. I go medium rare every time, and have for life... and my health is just fine.

It's more about where you get the meat... I don't do fast food (it's not really meat anymore, once it hits your tray), and I don't pick up just any chunk of flesh at any old grocery store (unless she's a cute brunette that's makin eyes at me). Vulgar, yeah.. but it's 4am and the insomnia's makine me fekkin cRaZy!!

[Darth Bootay]

*sigh* Okay, disclaimer time. This is steeped in bitter sarcasm in places. The work you did is good... but the subject matter is offensive to the point that I actually had to go back, delete everything I wrote, then draft a very much kinder and gentler version, bearing in mind you are young and impressionable and don't deserve the kind of smack to the back of the head I'd give an adult who'd expressed the views contained in your school project. If you're brave, please continue. If you're afraid of the biting toungue of a confirmed carnivore... read no further.

When did it become trendy to raise children to spout bleeding-heart sentiments and munch grass? Dragonfruit, please stop drinking the societal kool-aide, hun, before it's too late for you.

Yes, the FDA meat regulations are pretty appalling. Yes, american business will go as cheap as they are allowed. No, non-residents don't get rounded up off the streets of Mexico to be mistreated in american meat plants. That's called "illegal".

And yes, I DO eat my meat medium to bloody rare, and have done so my entire life. Guess what? No nasty parasites. No me-killing bacterium. No negative side effect whatsoever. Not even high cholesterol levels.

I'm sure your project will go over very well with your (propagandists) teachers. Your effort is obvious. It looks like you put massive work into it. If the subject matter weren't so (pardon the pun) distasteful, I'd clap you on the back in congratulations. But as it is, I must nod, say "good work" and direct you to the "future members of PITA and Greenpeace" line. Don't be alarmed. It's not really a Soylent Green factory entrance. It just looks that way.

[Dragonfruit]

k

[Boinky]

/me doesn't want to join PITA (Parasites Inside The Angus)

would rather join PETA (Please Eat Tasty 'Amburgers)

[Oddysee]

Me Grimloch, me grush j00 and eat j00!

And if that didn't make it clear, lemme put it this way, yes I eat greens... In my BURGERS! If I was a dinosaur, I'd be a rapter, small of stature, nimble, and the only way I ever eat greens is by eatin' som'n that ate it for me!

That aside, impressive paper dude, you put a lot of work into that! I must say... But dissen the meat, that's bad health bro...

Just to set a few things straight, here are a few examples of how EVIL animals are, and why it is our duty to eat them all!





Tm

[Oddysee]

"But what do I do if these creatures are bent on my destruction?" I hear you ask... Well, fear not! Answers are at hand!

Following these 3 simple steps, you too, can rid yourself of the evil influence that is animals!




Tm

[Dragonfruit]

thanks yall, I wish i get an A (I dont even think ill get a B)

and oddy, what you say is right! nothing makes a panda more pressous than a worm. what makes a human more pressous than a worm? NOTHING! They all shouldnt be killed. but, unlike most stereotypical figures you compare me to, I wouldnt risk my life to save animals. Cause, would a animal risk his/her life for you?

being vegetarian is kind of like drinking spring water compared to tap water. plants get energy from the sun. animals need that energy to live, so vegetarian animals eat plants, carnivores cant eat plants so they get their energy from animals who eat plants, by killing, and eating them. humans were born to be vegetarian. we eated meat in the beggining only because it was all we could get. (we were scavengers) our teeth arent made to eat meat (they're made to eat plants). and our body isnt made to process the toxins from dead animals.

[Darth Bootay]

being vegetarian is kind of like drinking spring water compared to tap water. plants get energy from the sun. animals need that energy to live, so vegetarian animals eat plants, carnivores cant eat plants so they get their energy from animals who eat plants, by killing, and eating them. humans were born to be vegetarian. we eated meat in the beggining only because it was all we could get. (we were scavengers) our teeth arent made to eat meat (they're made to eat plants). and our body isnt made to process the toxins from dead animals.

/flame on

Okay kid, get your facts straight. Humans, despite the AMAZING amount of propaganda you've swallowed to the contrary, are NOT born to be vegetarians. We are NOT herbivores. We were evolved to be OMNIVOROUS (yes, Virginia, we're meant to eat ANYTHING that can't get away). If we were meant to be herbivorous, we would have no canines and a mouth full of grinding teeth as opposed to the magnificent set of rippers, snippers and grinders we possess which allows us to pursue the diet of mixed meat, fruit, grains and other random things we ingest with glee daily. Were we meant to be herbivores, we'd also have a nice big gassy gut like our herbivorous primate cousins rather than the sleek belly of the carnivore that we as modern humans possess.

Not much galls me more than the ignorant "humans are herbivores" arguements vomited up over and over again by a bunch of wussy little ethical vegitarians who try to ram their unnatural dietary dogma down the throats of the masses. It's all good if you don't choose to take your rightful place in the food chain. Don't try to take the rest of us out to your pasture to eat grass and become prey for some fitter predator while you're happily emulating the sheep and cattle you feel so sorry for. Some of us aren't ashamed to eat the poor, mistreated cattle like nature intended. And we don't have to come up with a bunch of circular logic to defend our diets.

Human = Omnivore

See cow. See cow on plate with a potato and a side of greens to give it some color. Yum! Dinner! See how easy that is?

[Dragonfruit]

well at least im being flamed now

god im lost... =\

[Oddysee]

Hehe, dude, here's a lil' tip for the future... Take it easy man... You take life and all the stuff peeps say WAAAAAAY to seriously... And you seem to have very serious oppinions about everything...

You said we're not worth more than worms? Then give all the human race has made to worms... I for one would not let a cow sleep in MY bed...
But why not, are you am above animals?
Yup!
Why?
Because I have the power to destroy them! ^^

That's it kiddo, the true definition of power and worth... You don't "controll" anything unless you have the power to force your will upon it, and as such, you only have that power when you can destroy it... If not physically, then mentally.

But isn't that a horrible thing to say?
Yup! Got that right!
So, you're not 100% serious?
Nope, right again!
But is there truth in what you just said never the less?
Yup! My, my, we are catching on today aren't we! ^^

So before you make a very serious reply about right, wrong and worth, and what God will do to me for making a mockery of his heavenly powers of creation, take, for a second, my first point into consideration...

Lighten up bro! Life is not as serious as you'd like to make it!
Sure, bad things happen, but do we need to constantly focus on them? I for one would rather have fun... That said, I'm off to fetch me som'n to eat...

I'm thinkin like Toast, with ham in it... N' tea, collected and packed by underpaid poor people from india, soly for my entertainment and pleasure!




Tm

[Boinky]

/me notices the flame & picks it up. waves it around. Aaaaaghhh - curtains on fire!!!!

OK, here's one thing - don't wann eat meat? Fine - DON'T! Who gives a flyin eff at a rolling donut if you do or not, certainly not I! The problem with all these vegan types out there is they make it sound like eating red meat, or basically anything that might communicate verbaly in any way is tantamount to picking up a hitchhiker when you're looking for a snack.

StBoo's got a point I'll explain in a slightly different way - we are the dominant species on the planet! Sure throw me in a room with a wild tiger and I'm certainly toast, unless ya arm me with an uzi, a flamethrower and a F14! We have long ago reached the top of the food-chain. We are king. We eat whatever suits our fancy and there's not much the rest of the planet's inhabitants can do about it. But I know the biggest arguement against eating meat is how we raise all the animals we slaughter. And I know it ain't pretty most of the time. But certain sacrifices sometimes have to be made. I guess I don't think about it alot, but the real arguement is that we shouldn't subject these animals to this treatment because we wouldn't do it to our fellow man. Well truth to be told we have done far worse to our fellow man at times over the course of history. True, usually not in the same numbers and for a consistent duration as we do to feed ourselves fresh beef & chicken regularly, but a few crazy f*cks came pretty close about 60 years ago.

Well, anyway I think our biggest challenge isn't raising enough food(though so many people are hungry around the world, we could maybe fix that sometime down the road) but ensuring that while we go about our lives we don't eradicate something we'll later find a need for. The number of species of animals & plants in the world is truly staggering, and likewise the number that we've caused to go extinct is also staggering. What if something we squashed out of existence could have been developed into a cure for cancer(see the movie Medicine Man)? What if another species on the planet could possibly achieve sentient consciousness as we did? What if these lifeforms were wiped out cause we wanted another Mini-mall?

That for me is a better arguement, but also a different one.

/me sets flame down away from curtains

[Tacz]

The quote which sums up my whole opinion, "I didn't climb to the top of the food chain to eat tofu!" Peter Griffin, Family Guy

[Mummu]

"Tofu"
that reminds me, at my last larp con i actually eat some of that stuff, and it actually was kinda tasty (we got a realy good cooking crew).


But on the other side i died on that con......

[Jassel]

*makes eyes at Deca*

I'm not much of a meat eater.. but that's cause I don't like the taste. If I'm eating meats its usually chicken.. VERY little fish, and very rarely red meat and when it is its med.well.. Ill cook it if my man wants it, but I won't eat it with him

I see it as.. Eat what you want, believe in what you want.. but why try to make someone else change to your point of view?

[Dragonfruit]

i never wanted to change anyones mine (oh yes, i did) oh well, but why not?

[Darth Bootay]

i never wanted to change anyones mine (oh yes, i did) oh well, but why not?

There are some subjects it isn't safe or polite to debate too strongly. Religion and politics come to mind. There are some stands that are not very wise to try and convert the casual poster on. Abortion, smoking and meat are the big three.

Never tell a woman she can't decide what goes when it comes to her own body.
Never try to take cigarettes from a smoker.
And never, ever tell an omnivore you don't think it should eat flesh.

The older you get, the more severe the consequences of those three mistakes will get. My advice to you, should you wish to make friends and influence people, is to learn the difference between thought provoking, enjoyable debate topics and flamebait. And apply the lesson.

And speaking of lessons... apply yourself in your English classes. Please. Study spelling. HARD.