"Damn I look good in my hamster hat, buffalo wings and bacon earrings. There's nothing as pleasing as knowing that you can wear dead animals and every day, if you please, stuff meat in your mouth. Greens in my plate, no thanks. It's animal protein that humans need. And lots of it!"

In retrospective, I perhaps should have left the sandwich + cold cuts plate on top of the blue half circle and not add the meaningless texts. I thought that the cold cuts, as it's in color, would have taken too much attention from the b&w lady but it wouldn't have. Well, at least I had the sense to take the meatball arm away. But not the sense to say, enough is enough because less could sometimes be better than more. But I do love some ideas in this, the hamster hat and the buffalo wings are spot on.

A collage made from Hjemmet magazine that I used first time in Inktober 2021.

I never threw away the magazines although I did not use them last year because I had a plan. A plan that has been brewing this long. Waiting for a right time. For those who don't understand Finnish or Norwegian here's a little explanation.

The magazine is called Hjemmet which means home. To a Finn the logic what it actually looks and sounds like is pretty simple. Just don't pronounce the j and add one of the really typical Finnish language characters to the end; double consonant and the word ending vowel. Hemmetti. That's an actual Finnish word. And it means damn, dammit and darn.

So I'm doing a series of collages that are the cover images of a fictional magazine called Hemmetti. Darn. There are so many things in life that deserve a special darn mention.

Trophy hunters, people who wear dead animals on them, animals that are bred just for their skin, for the fur but the rest thrown away and excessive meat eaters and claiming that animal protein is the only way to get enough protein deserve a special damn mention.

I'm omnivore. I simply have to have milk in my coffee. My special mention sins are yogurt and cheese. Proper ones. Really creamy and greasy ones. And I love smoked salmon, a good artisan hamburger and I make sure to eat everything from my plate when there's reindeer with mashed potatoes or good old sausage soup available.

But.

I do not eat meat very often. And when I eat it, I try to keep the amount moderate. First of all because there are so many other foods that just taste absolutely amazing. Like fried zucchini with a hint of olive or avocado oil and salt, pickled beetroot, fresh anything like peas, radish, carrots, fruit and berries, you name it and oh my god have you tasted pickled cucumber pieces on top of a pizza? I'm not a fan of beans or lentils but I'll eat them as long as there's something else available too, something that actually tastes good. Nuts and almonds and seeds and lettuces and cabbages, all my favourite. And talking about food makes me so hungry.

Second of all because mostly eating meat is just so wrong. Because of the way we nowadays treat animals. I have nothing against hunting your own food if the species isn't endangered and if you truly use everything from the dead animal. If you have to kill an animal, the least you can do is honor that life taken and not waste any part of the body you have in your bloody hands. Oh gosh that sounds bad but yeah, I say that I have nothing against killing animals when in need, but then again I kinda have, because you take the life of a living, breathing and feeling individual and you can never undo that. That's it for the individual. Finished. Over. Vanished. Gone. And don't give me that bullshit that animals do not feel, do not think, are not intelligent or do not develop deep relations to other animals, including us animals that we call humans. Do your homework, read the publications from scientists and don't say fake news and that you know better because the people who have studied animals for years and worked with them know what they're speaking of. Same goes with the old and tired claim that humans need animal protein and meat is the only source of protein. No. You're wrong if you claim that. Don't try to explain the thing that you like meat with false claims of necessity. We are not cats. Cats need meat to survive.

Is it okay if I now warn you that this post is truly going to be a proper rant? A rantity rant rant rant. A rantage.

But after all that ranting about hunting I do think though that hunting your own food in the wilderness is far more better that raising cattle for the meat industry. But we can't all be hunters or know a hunter who can provide us meat. And as for the reindeer in Finland that are not either wild or domesticated, there's not enough reindeer for all the Finnish carnivores. How reindeer are kept (actually not kept because they don't need keeping, they survive on their own) would be the ideal way of growing meat if one absolutely needs to eat meat and wants to do things easier than hunting one animal at the time. Reindeer, for the most of their lives, live free out in the north and I think twice a year there's a round-up. But there's a downside there too. The more there are reindeer the less there is lichen in the nature and the more you have to feed the reindeer, grow hay and import lichen and also limit the amount of natural predators so that there would be more reindeer meat for humans.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Think of all the animals out there (or actually most inside cages and pens so not at actually out) that are grown for humans to eat or wear. First we people cut the forests to get farmland to grow food for animals which we kill for food for humans. Tons of water needed, mostly miserable conditions where the animals are kept, short livestock lives, animal children taken from their mothers, animals bred to have huge muscles but otherwise may be incredibly sick and also antibiotics pumped to keep them "healthy". Huge monoculture fields so that it's easier for humans to gather all the wheat with big machines and then it's mostly carried to animals that we breed. Heck, I can't eat wheat, oat, barley or rye but most people can and why feed animals with food that could be food for people? This earth just needs more forests and homes for all the animals that can not survive in monoculture fields. And it's not only the food that both humans and the animals that humans eat, can eat. It's the whole monoculture industry. From palm oil to apple or almond trees. It's so mono and full of pesticides because it's so mono that I could die. And soon it'll be true. Us people will ultimately perish to our greed because we are stupid and shortsighted.

But there's more. Double standards.

The way we treat the animals we eat or wear versus our pets. It is simply ridiculous. It's "These animals can't feel anything and if they did, it doesn't matter because we eat them" versus "Oh god look at my precious I've clothed my sweetheart like it's my own child and I give him sugary treats and look how he looks at me, he surely loves me" and both approaches are a little bit sick. Oh okay, let's not lie, nauseating. On other hand we've dehumanized or deanimalized certain group of animals and humanized the other group which are both wrong.

But as I said, we all can't be hunters or even have our own reindeer farm and I do eat meat but I sure would like meat industry to be more like not industrial at all. But it's all about the profits. More money.

I saw a video several years ago. It was about meat industry and pigs. It was horrible. And after that pork started to taste bad. I stopped eating pork for many years. Nowadays I'm not so picky, I usually do not choose pork if there are other options as the thought of me eating pork isn't so disgusting anymore. Which is kinda sad. Because the meat industry has not gotten better. And I'm disappointed in myself and people who could do something about it but don't because they don't want to. I'm not saying that I couldn't go all vegetarian. It would be of course possible but a bit difficult because of certain other food restrictions.

Anyway, it would make me happier if animals would be treated better. And if there would be zero animals raised in a cage for their fur and only their fur. That is simply sickening. As is trophy hunting and bragging about a kill. I mean come on, the hunted animal doesn't have a fair chance. Running after your prey and killing it with a spear, a knife or a hatchet would be fair. Or bare hands. But humans are physically really lame and feeble, no sharp teeth or claws and running speed is ridiculous compared to most four legged animals, that they need extra help. Killing extensions. So now with those extensions humans can kill all other animals to extinction and have done that for several species for centuries. And to other humans. People from other cultures and countries. Humans that we don't need to kill because we don't need to eat them. At least I know I don't and I think none of the people I know do.

What?!? I wen't too far? It's your fault, you should have not read this far.

This became so much of a rant that I think I'm not gonna post this to Alien Art Hive but to Fuckit community. I think my damn fits very well to Fuckit.

I did a quick photoshop (hence the crappyness) and this is sort of the other option that could have been. Is it better? I don't know, perhaps. Should I try to change the collage? I don't know, perhaps. Some day.