Objectivity

I received a comment about this blog that, "...it (unsurprisingly) doesn't come across as very objective". This is an issue for me and has always been a sticking point for the potential book. Do I aim to be totally objective or concede to having a pro-foie gras standpoint? Because I personally like eating foie gras and creating foie gras recipes, and because I am arguing that its production isn't always inhumane, it's inevitable that I come across as pro-foie gras.

Maybe I need to accept that I am pro-foie gras, in that I really don't want this ancient industry to die out, when it is so much more wholesome than most meat production.

However, the purpose of this blog (and book) are not to convince people to eat foie gras, but to show that current media coverage of foie gras production is prejudicial. Most people don't know the truth and are basing their views about foie gras on - frankly - lies. I sincerely want people to be able to make informed decisions, and this necessitates informing them.

When I began my research I tried hard to be completely objective, and I think I did quite well. But I was working from the opposite perspective. I was expecting to be upset by what I found and was not looking forward to having to give up foie gras on ethical grounds.

I have had times when I've been disgusted and horrified at the animals' treatment (e.g. at an abattoir and force-feeding units for industrial production), but these made me realise how horrible factory farming is, and were not aspects unique to foie gras or required to produce it.

A stack of scared, cramped, filthy ducks,
just arrived at the abattoir.

Even when I first thought, "foie gras isn't soooo bad, due to the free-range aspect", I still thought you couldn't escape the fact that foie gras entails force-feeding, which is cruel.

Over time, I began to realise that even the dreaded force-feeding was not cruel in itself - see my force-feeding post. Nowadays I feel much happier eating artisan foie gras than factory farmed chicken.

So when I'm countering anti-foie gras arguments, I naturally sound pro-foie gras, even though I am simply offering the alternative viewpoint. I would say that I'm not particularly pro-foie gras, but pro-choice. No-one can make choices about foie gras based on only one perspective, but until now there was mainly only anti-foie gras information to go on.

Consumers' choices are not limited to foie gras vs no foie gras: If you don't mind the force-feeding but don't want to support the use of cages in its production, then seek out the kinder stuff and push local retailers to stock it. Provenance is the watchword in food, and packaging states 'free-range', 'barn eggs', 'grain fed', 'outdoor bred', 'organic' etc, so why shouldn't we be given information on how our foie gras is produced?

...and out the other side: The abattoir's
on-site shop