Saturday, October 19, 2013

"Chicago, vegetarian capital of America (c. 1905)"

"Mainstream American vegetarianism, like feminism and folk-rock, seems pretty clearly a product of the late 60s and early 70s. And if you think that, Adam D. Shprintzen wants you to know that you're off by only a couple of centuries."

"That history comes back to life in Shprintzen's new book, The Vegetarian Crusade: The Rise of an American Reform Movement 1817-1921, just published by University of North Carolina Press, which shows how the presumed moral superiority of vegetarianism reflected the moral assumptions of each age and evolved with the times as different reasons to abstain from meat came to the fore."

Adam D. Shprintzen: "Vegetarianism starts out as this small religious reform group that imports itself to the United States from England, the Bible Christian Church. They come to the U.S. with this idea that religion can actually be understood through science. Which is sort of a remarkable idea through our modern eyes, but wasn't so strange at the time. Part of their ideology was the notion that vegetarianism—they didn't use that term at the time—but that abstaining from meat can sit at the center of a total reform ideology.* So meat is one way that the body kind of becomes overheated and overexcited and apt to make people act in improper ways. Whether it be violence, or holding slaves, or oppressing women."

Chicago reader dot com , Althouse*

8 comments:

Evi L. Bloggerlady said...

Given how many of my brothers and sisters visited the slaughter houses of Chicago...if only this were true!

Evi L. Bloggerlady said...

Given how many of my brothers and sisters visited the slaughter houses of Chicago...if only this were true!

Evi L. Bloggerlady said...

Well, I know Nick and Troop got fired up over over protein at Marco Polo's!

deborah said...

Purity vs. defilement, one of the five 'poles' of morality, accd. to Jonathon Haidt.

As I understand it, liberals would concentrate more on food purity, and conservatives more on religious purity, eg, sex and drugs.

Birches said...

Interesting that Progressivism and vegetarianism have always gone hand and hand.

deborah said...

I wonder if it is because of a belief in liberals that things can be fixed or perfected?

ndspinelli said...

Evi, Ate one of your youngin' @ Marco Polo. Some of the best veal ever.

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

I've always figured that Buddhists are vegetarians because it's better to have some of something than all of nothing.