You may remember Howard Lyman as the guest that caused a number of texas cattle ranchers to sue Oprah for making disparaging comments about beef. Oprah won, by the way.

I saw him when he spoke as part of the Spitfire tour when it came to MTSU. I couldn't bring myself to eat red meat for weeks. And I should have given it up for good then. I've certainly given it up now.

I am not a vegetarian. I probably never will be (though who knows). But I have the biology and chemistry background to know exactly how disgusting and harmful factory farm practices are. Antibiotics and growth hormones do not belong in food.

The question we must ask ourselves as a culture is whether we want to embrace the change that must come, or resist it. Are we so attached to the dietary fallacies with which we were raised, so afraid to counter the arbitrary laws of eating taught to us in childhood by our misinformed parents, that we cannot alter the course they set us on, even if it leads to our own ruin? Does the prospect of standing apart or encounttering ridicule scare us even from saving ourselves?

Howard Lyman: MAD COWBOY