Language is never fully trustworthy, but when it comes to eating animals, words are as often used to misdirect and camouflage as they are to communicate. Some words, like veal, help us forget what we are actually talking about. Some, like free-range, can mislead those whose consciences seek clarification. Some, like happy, mean the opposite of what they would seem. And some, like natural, mean next to nothing.

Our love was the affliction for which only our love was the cure.

Our relationship to the environment matters, our relationship to animals matters, and our relationship to culture matters.

I hated myself for going, why couldn't I be the kind of person who stays?

Factory farming, of course, does not cause all the world's problems, but is is remarkable just how many of them intersect there.

Do you eat chicken because you are familiar with the scientific literature on them and have decided that their suffering doesn't matter, or do you do it because it tastes good?

The word vegetarian, I think, does a disservice because there are a lot of people who care but maybe don't care, or can't care in an ultimate way. If you think about environmentalism, nobody would ask, "Are you an environmentalist or not?" The question doesn't make any sense.