Why is chicken/duck called poultry, pigs called pork, and cows called beef??

Question

I grew up a meat eater. Do you think they were given these names because people couldn't from the bottom of their hear say "We're having pig tonight for supper!"

I want to become a vegetarian, for animal cruelty, but I think I am having a hard time because growing up; meat was not considered an animal!?! It was just another thing on the plate, like your vegetables! I now have many regrets now (eating ANIMALS). Is this what I have to tell myself every time I smell the BBQ?---That I'm craving ANIMALS? Man, I'm finding this really tough-----it's like quitting smoking!!!

Answer 1

Everyone's got this wrong. Poultry refers to all birds used for food. Chicken, duck, geese, game hen. Pork refers specifically to hog meat. Hog specifically means castrated male pigs. Not females. Did you know the meat of an intact (meaning fertile) male pig is unpalatable? It's nasty. Someone discovered that castrated pigs taste good. After a male pig is castrated - without the benefit of anesthetic, he is called a hog, which means he is food. Beef is the meat of a cow. Not the cow itself. These are all terms invented by farmers. Not the French. Not the Germans. Not the Nords. Just farmers.

If you ask me, it's classic serial killer disassociation. You are no longer Becky, Bob, or Jenny. You are "It."

When you smell the barbeque, it's the sauce you crave. Not the charred cow. If we liked meat so much why would we cover it all up in PLANTS and sauces??? Tomato, spices. It's the "savoriness" of it that you crave. That is, the sauce and spice.

Someday people will realize that meat is like alcohol and cigarettes. While it my taste good, it's toxic to you. We are not meant to eat meat. We have the teeth and digestive tract of an herbivore. Not even an omnivore and certainly not a carnivore. This is science. Not theory.

Due to this, the average person has 8 pound of undigested meat in their colon when they die. You've seen them. Those little old men with their distended bellies sticking out like their carrying an alien baby. Your average vegetarian has maybe two or three remnants of meals still in their colon.

Can you say cancer? Check out the link to colon cancer provided below. Click the link to Causes. You know what America's favorite source of fat is? Animal flesh. 3 ounces of red meat a day is all you need for colon cancer. Do you know how much they pack into an average burger? Using processed meats such as fast food burgers GREATLY increases your chances of colon cancer.

The risk of such cancer is only slightly less than that of obesity. 1 in 5 Americans is obese. 1 in 6 Americans will get colon cancer because of all the red meat they ate.

Answer 2

These are called different names because the Normans from France invaded England in 1066. They used French words for the foods (they didn't really have anything to do with the animals in the yard). Those words mutated into the words we know today.


About your second question, I think about animals the same way I think about humans. We are all beings that are born, live, breath etc. I wouldn't be able to eat an animal because it would be like eating a human. Not as appetizing, even if you smell the BBQ.

Answer 3

However these names may have first come to us, the important question is why do we keep using them? Plain and simple, these words are now euphemisms used to keep people from thinking too much about what they are eating. Very specifically these words help to prevent mental images of the live, sentient creatures that end up on the plate.

Answer 4

actually, these names came about because of the way the English language was changed over history.

in the middle ages, the average English person could not afford to eat meat. They would of course know the names of the common animals, but the meat itself was rare. This is where we get the English words for animals.
The rich could afford meat, and ate it often. But the rich, for the most part, spoke French, which was the language of the noble and educated at the time. This is where we get the English words for the meats, they are derived from the French words for the animals.

Answer 5

This differentiation goes back to the Norman Conquest of England. The names of the domestic animals are all of Anglo-Saxon origin, while the names of the meats derived from them come from Norman French and ultimately Latin. The common explanation for this is that after the conquest, Anglo-Saxons were often restricted to menial roles such as cowherd, swineherd, etc. Their Norman masters were the ones who actually got to eat the viands (Middle French viande). This is a plausible argument. But proven? No.

Answer 6

I am no expert on the origin of words but I think that the names for food animals are derived from the French names, which is a hang over from the time France invaded England, and the poor English peasants reared the animals and the French nobles ate them.

Answer 7

I'd rather not answer this question. I try to be vegan without having to think of meat. It's disgusting!

Answer 8

extremely tough aspect. browse in a search engine. just that can assist!

Answer 9

At least the animals you ate were dead ( I hope )
just think on the living plants your eating ( yes plants are a life form )

Answer 10

Your need to be a sissy is preventing you from being a normal human. You can look at our mouths, our stomach and digestive tract and every part of us says that we're omnivores. Our bodies need meat and it shouldn't be so big of a deal.