That was fabulous reporting about some fascinating creatures. Much more so than many humans I meet on a daily basis. It was informative and tastier than bacon any way you slice it.

Waiting for your next in-depth animal report.

All of us from Californian's for Humane Treatment of Farm Animals are trying to bring awareness of the pain, anguish filth and abuse these live creatures suffer from birth to death. Put yourself in their hooves for a few days and see if you can bear it. You would scream bloody murder. That is what this is all about behind the AGRI-BUSINESS IRON CURTAIN. It is so ugly that they won't tell the truth to society. After 10 years of raising a flock of 600 sheep in the highest of moral standards, they are the poison of society. They are cruel and manipulative deceptive murderers and it's all for the 2 cent profit margin. They have it all backwards though. The more animals they raise, the more deaths through filth, anguish and over-crowding there are so the more anti-biotics go into the beasts to keep them alive and hence onto your plates because I gave up meat many years ago and at 47 and 115 lbs am healthier than ever. I won't eat them for moral reasons. It's purely inhumane to eat animals from factory farms no matter how "cheap" they are sold. Eat from organic farms or eat grains, vegetables and other products. Meat is harmful to the animals' health and yours. They are creating havoc to the environment via filth and waste from their farms and poisoning the air and the water and the earth. This is wrong. There is no right way to do something wrong. They must be STOPPED from damaging animals, and the planet immediately. Where is our common sense when it is needed?

Your remarks about raising this funny, smart and TASTY animal brought back memories. And made me realize why Southern barbecue pork is so rarely as good now as I remember it was as a child. My grandad raised a small number of hogs for many years on our family farm in south Georgia. There we never more than two or three sows at a time. They had freedom of movement in a pecan grove. He would add to their diet peanut hulls and watermelon and other farm produce. Even as a young boy the eyes of the pigs seemed to me canny somehow, a real intellegence behind them. And the 'mama pig' would respond to grandaddy's commands. A cousin once said of him, "He talked to them and they understood; named them and cried when he took them to market." And man, that was GOOD barbecue!!

Thanks for the thoughful article and fine work.

He cried because he knew that these pigs weren't just meat. He knew they were intelligent, sensitive beings that trusted him, and he knew that he was betraying their trust when he sent them to be slaughtered. If people like your grandad followed their hearts, then this world would be a much kinder place.

I agree with those who think that this Pork Week strikes an odd note on the part of Salon's Editorial Board. I am a vegan with ethical objections to eating meat, although I doubt that the ethical argument alone could ever convince a majority of meat-eaters to switch to a plant-based diet. But in addition to the refined cruelties of factory farms and the health dangers posed by industry practices such as indiscriminate use of antibiotics and growth hormones, what about the research demonstrating the myriad health dangers posed by more than nominal amounts of dietary meat protein and saturated fat consumption, including cardiovascular disease, cancer, and degenerative illnesses? And then the broader ecological arguments against the pattern of meat consumption typical in the western diet?

Given the number and frequency of articles about environmental concerns and global warming in Salon, reading this pork porn is a bit like coming across an article extolling the pleasures of driving an S.U.V. in the Utne Reader. It's not surprising that vegetarian readers are angered and disappointed about the one-sided commentary, or by the view expressed by some posters here that they should simply 'go elsewhere' rather than express their discontent. We don't and shouldn't pick and choose our ethical views cafeteria-style, or be made to accept an anything-goes relativism. It's legitimate to raise issues about meat consumption, even of 'ethical' pork. And Salon has always presented itself as a forum for liberal and progressive views. I think the magazine can do much better than this. In a time of global food shortages, it's not funny or cute, it's curiously out-dated and out of touch.