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The Ethical Dilemma of Teaching Kids How the Sausage Gets Made
I don’t want to tell my kids what to eat — but maybe I should tell them why I’m vegetarian
My daughter and her best friend are in the kitchen rummaging through the cabinets. They find what they’re looking for: gummy bears.
“Those might be old,” I say.
We don’t care.
“Fine, but before you eat them I want you to watch this video.”
I’ve been meaning to show my daughter this video, but the timing never seemed right. When is it ever a good time to get stung in the eye? (“Now that everyone’s finished eating pie, can someone bring in the bee?”) I retrieve my phone and pull up the clip. Midway through, my daughter buries her head and cries. Her friend, motionless, stares at the floor.
My regret is instant and sharp. I am the worst mother ever.
I haven’t shown them anything particularly graphic: This is science; this is how gummy bears are made. The video shows dead pigs strung upside down on a factory conveyer belt. Their skin is being shaved with a butcher’s electric saw. The pigs face an incinerator and begin to melt near the inferno — then the camera cuts away. Surely two sixth graders have seen animals roasted before. There’s a Greek restaurant we frequent where gyro spins on a spit, bacon sizzles on the grill, raw meat is seasoned and mashed into patties. This is dinner. This is life.
I reason with my panicked self: All I’ve done is draw the curtain. I’ve taken them behind the scenes, shown them the props and the prop masters — where the magic happens. I didn’t find the video on the dark web; it’s from a popular Belgian show called Over Eten about how our food is made. The show’s hosts are beautiful model-type people. HuffPost Parents shared the video on its Facebook page. It’s okay, I tell myself, this is hard, but it’s okay.
So why do I feel so bad? Why do I feel I’ve done something I want to undo? Kids her age play Fortnite — the first-person shooter game where players entertain themselves by killing puppies with guns and axes. I’m sorry, did I say puppies? I meant people. (Puppies being shot in the head with an AR-15 wouldn’t fly. Parents would be…
