An Analysis Of Against Meat By Jonathan Safran Foer

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Humans are omnivores, which means that they eat both plants and animals. Ultimately, the human can decide whether or not they are going to consume animal meat. I am analyzing the article “Against Meat” in the They Say I say collection of articles. Jonathan Safran Foer talks about his experiences with his struggles of becoming a vegetarian. He gives the intended audience and inside look on how making dietary choices are often difficult, and how it has positively impacted his life, as well as keeping his morals and values in check. I found this interesting because Foer and I both share some of the same views on the food industry and what we choose to put in our bodies. Humans are very uneducated on the food industry, and should research different …show more content…
Foer uses pathos to create an emotional connection with his intended audience. The use of childhood experiences is what helps shapes his reasoning to why he became a vegetarian. There is a part where he asks his babysitter why she isn’t eating any chicken and she explains that she doesn’t want to hurt anything. He includes this in the article to create an emotional appeal to hurting animals, and how eating meat is considered hurting animals. This comment made by his babysitter didn’t permanently change his eating habits, but it’s what shaped his views on the omnivorous lifestyle. Foer uses his experiences as a young child to connect with his readers that may have had similar times in their lives. “Every factory-farmed animal is, as a practice, treated in ways that would we illegal if it was a dog or a cat.” (457) Foer uses this statement to tug the emotions of pet owners buy making them think about their furry friends being treated like farm animals. The author’s use of pathos is to get his argument across by making readers appeal to the emotion used in his past life …show more content…
This is called anecdote, which is the use of short stories to illustrate a point. The short story the author tells about his experience with his babysitter is an example of Anecdote. “You know chicken is chicken, right?” (Foer 451) The author makes sure to include this quote from the babysitter because it makes the intended audience think about what they are consuming, especially young children who do not have a lot of say in what they eat. The part where he talks about having a mouth of “hurt chickens” is quite comical. This validates that kids do not realize what they are eating. Foer touches briefly on how his family impacted his transition from meat eater to vegetarian. “To remember my values, I need to lose certain tastes and find other handles for the memories that they once helped me carry.” (Foer 456) The author inserted this into this article to explain that becoming a vegetarian is not going to be easy. This is also related to how Foer was unsuccessful with the vegetarian lifestyle in his early twenties. He used this part of the article to explain how switching your dietary values aren’t just physically hard but emotionally and mentally challenging. The use of short stories in Against Meat gives the intended audience a less informal insight on Foer’s experiences on the road to

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