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"BEYOND BEEF" (JEREMY RIFKIN).   Term Paper ID:25639 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Summary & review of work on adverse role of cattle production & consumption in history, destructive impact on ecology.... More...

6 Pages / 1350 Words 1 sources, 11 Citations, MLA Format $24.00 Return to List of Papers

Paper Abstract: Summary & review of work on adverse role of cattle production & consumption in history, destructive impact on ecology. Paper Introduction: BEYOND BEEF This research paper consists of a summary and review of Jeremy Rifkin's book Beyond Beef. Rifkin traces the changing but nonetheless central role of cattle as civilization evolved. In ancient cultures, such as that of Egypt, and in the later Roman Mithran cult, the bull was revered as a god and as a symbol of fertility and martial/masculine prowess. The great nomadic tribes of Central Asia valued cattle as possessions, as well as a blood sacrifice to the gods. As the European economies developed and their populations cultivated a taste for beef, cattle became a commodity and an important source of wealth and power. First introduced into the New World by the Spanish, cattle ranching dominated the societies of many Central and South American Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. One senses if mankind were to follow thatrecommendation en masse, Rifkin would have others which would lead it backto the imaginary bliss of a pre-industrial age (when people suffered fromother ills and engaged in other forms of cruelty to each other). First introduced into the New World by theSpanish, cattle ranching dominated the societies of many Central and SouthAmerican nations. Their failure to cutdown on their intake of beef is not due to any lack of information, butrather to the power of family and personal habits and the fact that mostpeople in western cultures like to eat beef and associate beef-eating witha high standard of living. Modern man is detached from thegorier side of life. A great deal which is evil goes onbehind closed doors, to prisoners, inmates of mental institutions, etc. World steer and ecological destruction In the modern globalized economy, multinational corporations in thebeef as well as other industries decide where to raise, feed, slaughter,package, distribute, transport and retail their cattle and beef productsbased on considerations of efficiency and profit. Hannah Arendt referred to thisphenomenon and the associated bureaucratic process as the banality of evil,typified by the railroad clerk handling the train routing of Jews sent offto their deaths at Auschwitz. According to Rifkin, "whilethe rich are dying from the diseases of affluence, the poor of the planetlanguish for want the bare essentials of life" (176). Beyond Beef: The Rise and Fall of the Cattle Culture. Rifkin is undoubtedly correct that because of the conditions ofmodern life and the possibilities afforded by high technology, it is mucheasier for "evil [to be] inflicted from a distance" and that, therefore,people become desensitized to it (281). Cattle raising is capital intensive and requires little labor. New York: Penguin Group, 1993.----------------------- 1 BEYOND BEEF This research paper consists of a summary and review of JeremyRifkin's book Beyond Beef. butso long as we do not see it, we can avoid thinking about the problem. High levels of beef consumption are linked with theincreased incidence of diseases such as diabetes, certain types of cancerand coronary maladies. Conclusion Rifkin's book in an unrelenting fashion reveals all the evilsassociated with beef and cattle since time immemorial.Man's fate has been irretrievably linked with that of this dumb hoofedbeast which has been the source of a great deal of grief as well assustenance, spiritual as well as nutritious. In ancient cultures, such as that of Egypt, and inthe later Roman Mithran cult, the bull was revered as a god and as a symbolof fertility and martial/masculine prowess. According toRivkin, the industry had largely co-opted government regulators:"unsanitary practices in the nation's meat-packing plants were widespread,"and there were "abuses throughout the new [Streamlined Inspection System]SIS program" administered by the American Department of Agriculture and"increased health risks to consumers" (134, 139 & 145). Cattle grazing andrelated activities, such as the use of insecticides, destroys other floraand fauna. First,Rifkin describes how "the buffalo and the Indians had to be moved aside tomake room for the great pastoral invasion", which he calls "the most sordidand shameful saga in the history of the American republic" (71 & 64). The effect of the enclosure oflands for grazing in the British Isles was to eject tenant farmers fromtheir ancestral lands and create large numbers of impoverished migratorylaborers who were exploited by the factories which sprang up during theearly stages of the Industrial Revolution. Like many cause-orientedspecial pleaders, Rivkin has difficulty seeing the forest but for thetrees. As the European economies developed and their populationscultivated a taste for beef, cattle became a commodity and an importantsource of wealth and power. The book could do with alittle less vitupertion and a little more balance. Works CitedRifkin, Jeremy. Itwas a little more difficult in colonial times, for example, when prisonerswere placed in stocks in the village square for all to see. Hesays that "today, cattle and other livestock are tucked away, out of sightof the public, until they are purchased in the form of prepacked cuts ofbeef at the local supermarket" (279). Rifkin says that "in virtuallyevery nation of the world, in the past half century, rising income levelshave gone hand in hand with increased meat consumption, particularly beefconsumption" (155). People know or atleast repeatedly are told by their physicians that eating too much red meatis likely to lead to high cholesterol and other blood chemistry levelswhich may lead to coronary heart disease and strokes. Cattle complex as a cold evil Rifkin argues that the manifold ills of the cattle and beef businesswhich he describes in his book are somehow more malignant or at least lesssusceptible of a remedy because they are concealed from public view. They are alsomajor sources of organic pollutants. Meanwhile the displacement of farmland from foodgrain to feed grain for cattle is contributing to the malnutrition andpossible starvation of up to a billion people. The world steer like theworld car might be the product of the efforts of many areas, regardless ofthe wishes of local inhabitants. Union power was largely broken. Next,the cattle trails and grazing lands had to be seized or leased oftenthrough force or graft, "one of the biggest land giveaways in modernhistory," (1 6). The resulting meat-packing, distribution and retailing enterprisesbecame very large integrated businesses. Greenhousegases, such as nitrous oxide, which are implicated in global warming, arereleased by the use of petrochemical fertilizers to produce feed grains.The burning of biomass, such as forests, to clean land for grazing, alsoreleases methane, another greenhouse gas. The clearing of forests which has gone on recently in the Amazonregion of Brazil and in Central America is deforesting tropical hardwoodareas and causing what Rifkin calls the "wasting of the Amazon" (198).Cattle feed lots are a dangerous source of water pollution. Rifkin traces the changing but nonetheless central role of cattle ascivilization evolved. Technology permittedbeef to be shipped in precut boxed beef instead of carcasses to largeretail supermarkets which replaced retail butcher shops. Cattle production and consumption: the making of the modern world In the 19th century, large sections of agricultural, pastoral andforest-covered land were devoted to cattle grazing, first in England, thenin Scotland and Ireland and finally in the Western Hemisphere and otherareas suitable for the raising of cattle. This is a debateable conclusion. The natural climate of the American Great Plains made them a logicalplace to graze cattle to satisfy the growing appetite for beef of theWestern world; however, the development of cattle ranching was dependent onthe creation on the necessary pre-conditions for the establishment of amodern system of cattle production, slaughtering and distribution. The great nomadic tribes ofCentral Asia valued cattle as possessions, as well as a blood sacrifice tothe gods. Upton Sinclair in his 19 4 book, The Jungle, described the unsanitaryand dangerous conditions in the nation's slaughterhouses. He does not see the cow slaughtered and disemboweled.Unlike his medieval predecessors, the whole roasted animal does not appearon his dinner table, head and tail included. Finally, the financing had to be raised in America and inGreat Britain to build the slaughterhouses, and the railroads and ships,including refrigerated cars, needed to transport the cattle, and/or thecarcasses, to market. According to Rifkin, "without flora to anchor the soil, absorbwater and recycle nutrients, the land becomes increasingly vulnerable towind and water erosion" as well as soil erosion (2 2). The consumption of beef contributed to the making of the modern worldin another way, by undermining world health. The beef processing business grewfrom $12 million per annum in 185 to $4.2 billion in 192 (113). Ownershipwas very highly concentrated in relatively few companies, the beef trust.Attempts through enforcement of the antitrust laws to break up the trustsdid not end concentration which in the 198 s and 199 s was exercisedthrough an American oligopoly of three companies, Occidental Petroleum,Cargill and Conagra. Theeffect of corporate decisions to convert land to grazing is to removepersons from traditional agricultural pursuits which not only has tragichuman consequences but often upsets the ecosystems in the regions involved.The American Great Plains, for example, have lost much of their fresh watersources. In Ireland, farmers were forcedto rely on the potato, a crop which could be grown in small areas and whosefailure due to disease led to the great famine and mass emigrations of the184 s. The trouble with this type of analysis is that it suggests thatpeople would act differently if the consequences of their actions wereright before their eyes. It does not necessarily follow from that observation that cold evilis any more despicable than any other form of evil nor that the solution tothe problem for all people and all times is the one Rifkin proposes,namely, the Hindu one, that all people stop immediately eating beef "as arevolutionary act, a sign of our willingness to reconstitute ourselves, tomake ourselves whole" (291). Rifkind says that US AID has financed the construction of waterwells in parts of sub-Sahara Africa in an effort to foster cattle herding,the effect of which has been increased desertification. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.