From the point of view of the pig, isn't being ritually unclean a pretty good deal?

[Boojatta]

As a pig might say, "Sticks and stones will break my bones, but ... "

[dkf]

1. Maybe someone figured out they are pretty smart.

And decided they ought not to be eaten.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. Depends if you want humans to bring you food or not

and if non-pork eating cultures just let you alone, or regard you as pests to be eradicated.

[alex cross]

3. I saw that one too, that guy was hilarious

What was his name though? I want to check the You-Tube and see if they have any of his stuff there.

[WorseBeforeBetter]

4. Not if said pig is in North Carolina. (n/t)

[Dorian Gray]

5. It's not a good deal

for many pigs. Crispy pork belly is the food of non-kosher gods.

[madrchsod]

8. i like mine with toasted bread,slice of tomato ,and a slice of cheese.....

good eat`n

opps! forgot the lettuce

[aquart]

6. Ritually unclean is actually too sacred to eat.

Except once a year at the big pig festival. It went under a lot of names and transformations. When my people say Sukkos means "booths"....maybe it does in good old Hebrew...but our major holidays have indoeuropean roots. And that word means "pig."

We've come a long way, baby.

[madrchsod]

7. wallowing in the mud and having worms is pretty good defense...

course today they do`t wallow and they do`t have worms.

[Igel]

9. Perhaps at the individual level.

If you get born, you manage to scrape by a living before you die--unless you're exterminated as a nuisance.

Then again, as your territory's infringed by humans, you have to move out of the way. You have less and less room. Some hunt you for sport. Predators hunt you for food.

Then you consider the clean sheep, kept parasite free, treated for illness, taken from pasture to pasture and protected from predators. If you're one of the masses, you live a shorter, but infinitely less worry-free, life. If you're one of the select, you live a fairly long (probably longer than in the wild) worry-free life with lots and lots of sex. Until modern times with factory farms--then your life may not be so pleasant, but there are still certain advantages. There may still be major pogroms--hoof & mouth disease and the consequent extermination of all of your kind for miles around--but overall there are more of your species than the wild could support.

In any event, far more of your offspring are likely survive to have offspring (if you have offspring), and instead of being the lone pig or part of a small herd that fends for itself you're in a large herd. If you have the math chops before you're reduced to mutton chops you realize that instead of one of a few hundred thousand you're one out of many millions.

As a survival strategy for the species, domestication of chickens, sheep, pigs and cows was the gold ring.

[YankeyMCC]

10. "You know, if chickens had government and church and history,

"You know, if chickens had government and church and history, they would take a distant and distasteful view of human joy. Let any gay and hopeful thing happen to a man, and some chicken goes howling to the block." Sam Hammilton talking as Lee butchers a couple of hens for Caleb and Aaron's naming