[slightwinder]

> It’s not like the body can tell if something was smooshed by a machine or by my mouth.

One obvious difference is time and fineness. The machine will grind it significant smaller than your teethes. And processed meat from machines has far longer time to sit and change.

Some other reasons are that processed food is usually not just the meat itself. but a mass that is mixed and enriched with several other elements. And in the money-driven food-industry they are usually not the most healthy things.