You're thinking "Book + Me = Book + Me" but in the context of me it's...
Me + Food = Me with more nutrients.
Me + Book = Me with more knowledge.
In that context, post-consumption, the state of the book becomes irrelevant (destroyed or not, it doesn't matter, I still got what I wanted from it). I absorbed the knowledge (or nutrients). Brought it into my body and made it part of me.That said, I believe OP is offended at being referred to in an impersonal way. As such, I don't believe there's much to be done for him beyond "don't refer to people by their actions", which is impractical.
"I ingested [The Sandlot]" or "We had 50,000 ingesters of [The Sandlot] this week!"
are, to my mind, faaaaaairly equivalent to
"I consumed [The Sandlot]" or "We had 50,000 consumers of [The Sandlot] this week!"
Not terribly compelling but... "ingest" has a gut association whilst "consume" has a head connotation... so... there's that.
However, there is a fun distinction between the two. "Consuming" a book, to me, just implies you read it. "Digesting" and "ingesting" have implications of /rumination/.