Surviving Civilization

Shad Clark

To cash in on the CBS Survivor sensationalist sham, Tampa•s own 98 Rock decided it would be in good taste to publicly castrate (without anesthetic) and slit the throat of a pig. Not only could the station•s cultured listeners squeal along in delight, they were welcomed to drop by and compete for the privilege of eating porcine testicles.

Times like these bring to mind the uplifting lyrics of Louis Armstrong. “And I think to myself, ‘What a Wonderful World!’”

To think that human use of animals for food originated as a means for primitive people with limited resources to sustain themselves at the expense of “lesser” beasts. Having assumed superiority over all other animals, it was only natural for our primitive ancestors to justify the grim consequences of their dietary decisions by likening themselves to lions and tigers and bears, citing the instinctive hunting habits of such inferior creatures.

Over time, squeamish folk decided it would be less messy to simply pass the knives and sledgehammers to their anti-social friends and neighbors. Although already conspicuously called butchers, modern psychology (unbiased by human perspective) would be forced to label these kind and gentle men “sociopaths.”

This idea caught on like Christmas. Less and less people killed their own cattle, swine, sheep, chicken, etc. Thus was born the institutionalized atrocity of factory farming. To meet the ever-growing demand for meat, (dis)assembly lines were streamlined. Thousands of throats were efficiently slit. Millions of bellies gutted. Farm manuals, like the butchers themselves, reduced animals to raw materials. Butchers were never conditioned to see themselves as killing machines. They were simply processing “meat.” This same psychological tactic has been used to great effect in many wars. American soldiers didn•t murder men, women, and children in Vietnam. They shot and bombed “gooks.”

Today, the overwhelming majority of our meat-eating family and friends continue to remain far removed from the actual act of slaughter. They never see the grimacing faces of their future food, never hear the desperate squeals and squawks. Out of sight, out of mind. When pressed, the overwhelming majority of these omnivores admit their diets would be drastically different were they forced to occasionally take leave of the contemporary comforts of their modern homes to stalk and slaughter their own dinner.

Some may scratch their heads and ask, “How did I get here?”

Well, we’ve all been raised to view ourselves as the only animals with rights. Our forefathers, in their finite wisdom, graced us with the rights to live and pursue happiness so long as it didn’t interfere with the happy lives of other equal human beings. For centuries, of course, this applied only to the respectable white men who had conveniently assumed superiority over all non-white people. In defense of these seemingly racist white patriots, by the way, allow me to point out that they did not discriminate when denying women of all races the right to vote.

Summarily, our great white forefathers failed to bestow a single right upon anyone unfortunate enough not to be born a white man.

Times, like political correctness, change. For roughly half a century now, non-white American people have enjoyed their Civil Rights in good ol’ all-American peace. Never mind the occasional KKK rally. All that hateful rhetoric is just freedom of speech. It hurts no one to hear such venomous slander no more than it perpetuates the tunnel vision of its proud Aryan preachers as they praise Hitler under American flags.

Were the arms of the modern moral majority not opened to equally embrace all people, how would reality television and shock radio have evolved? Instead of a pig or chicken’s death at the hands of a man posing as a survivalist on a game show, would CBS have shamelessly showcased a ragtag group of good ol’ boys as they asserted their manliness by violently forcing themselves upon homosexuals? Would 98 Rock air the hate anthems of white supremacist bands?

I wonder if reality television and shock radio exist in third world and communist countries. While we’d never dream of eating our cats and dogs here in America (we only feed the unwanted ones, the ones routinely euthanized in animal shelters, to the cows and pigs we eat), perhaps the Chinese equivalent of Survivor would compel contestants to stab Weimaraners to death. “Hey, they have no choice!,” avid advocates would say. “They•re surviving a game show!” On the way to work in Egypt or Yemen, perhaps a proud father could enjoy the sounds of his young daughter as her little clitoris is cut off (without anesthetic).

“And I think to myself, ‘What a Wonderful World!’”

Is it ironic to note that pictures from 98 Rock’s celebration of death show only white men gathered to gobble the muscle and testicles torn from the bones of a tortured animal? Is it a coincidence that poor piggy just happens to be black?

Perhaps you•re sitting there, shaking your head, thinking it is wrong to compare people to animals (although people are self-glorified animals). Only those not currently living in countries where women are still regarded as property, bartered for cattle and other “lesser” animals, afford the luxury of such objection.

All oppression stems from the assumed superiority of one being over another. Therefore, I must implore you to examine the origins of your ethics. Are your morals based on an absolute sense of right and wrong? Or are they rooted in where and when you just happened to be born?

“The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for whites or women for men.” – Alice Walker ◼