Lab-Grown Meat... My Take:

Hello my lovelies! Watch this video about growing meat in a lab and I'll tell you what happened today. 

Okay, I had an interesting conversation with a meat eater today. He is an OCAD art student and he was given the assignment to design packaging and a logo for lab-grown meat. What would it look like, how would he convey it as a meat product that wasn't regular meat, how would it appeal to people... 

Anyway, he said that most meat-eaters he talked to thought it was gross and would not eat it. So said the vegetarians and vegans. I told him that I was vegan and I certainly wouldn't be drawn to put that in my mouth either for several reasons: 


1. When you have been vegan for long enough your sense of taste and smell become much more sensitized, so meat and dairy start to smell really bad (at least in my experience, and that of many other vegans I have talked to). 

2. We do not know what long-term effects this lab-grown meat will have on our health.

3. I would have no idea whether the meat was grown on an animal that suffered terribly, or if it was grown in a lab, except to take the word of whoever was serving it to me... not taking that chance.

 4. There are so many better things to eat! Why the hell would I bother eating the muscle (flesh) of an animal, (even if it's grown in a lab, it is still muscle cells that have come from an original biopsy of a cow), when I could choose from thousands and thousands of colourful, fragrant, delicious fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds? Millions of incredible dishes are made with these vegan ingredients. 

I know PETA has offered one million dollars to whoever develops the first marketable lab-grown meat, and I get it. If it rids the world of factory farms and ends suffering of cows, chickens, pigs, and all of the other animals people like to eat, then I am all for it, but it doesn't mean I would eat it myself. 

The student I was talking to sort of scrunched up his face at the thought of eating lab-grown meat himself because he said it was just a lump of flesh grown in a petri dish and that it was unappetizing. I pointed out that most people don't buy meat with feet or faces still attached, and that a Chicken McNugget was essentially a boneless lump of flesh with fat and eyeballs thrown in, so it's not actually that different. He thought about it for a second and said nothing. I am not against this development, just thinking about what it all means. 

Hope you are having a beautiful day or night, wherever you are in the world!