I always get a chuckle when I see that bumper sticker. Obviously, I am not a vegetarian, but I have often wondered what the attraction to it is, and why someone would would make the difficult commitment to being one. In our modern society, it has got to be a very difficult lifestyle to maintain, as the consumption of animal products is so widespread and found in so many different food products.
My assumption is that most people who become vegetarian or vegan (vegetarians eat dairy, vegans do not) do so because they believe that killing and eating animals is wrong for moral reasons, though they tend to tout the "health benefits" of such a diet as well. I am confident that some people cannot eat meat for health reasons, and some people simply don't like the taste. But for most, I think, the attraction is primarily their belief that the farming, slaughtering, butchering, and ultimately the consumption of animals and animal products is morally wrong. Frankly, I don't have a problem with that view, except that it completely lacks any logical foundation. But more on that in a minute.
I did find lots of sources on the web for reasons to become a vegetarian. Here are 101. Based on this list, I suspect most vegetarians are not strong supporters of George Bush, but I could be wrong, of course.
Personally, I couldn't become a vegetarian on moral grounds because for me it is not logical to argue that the killing and consumption of animals is wrong, but the killing and consumption of plants is OK. Just because plants aren't cute and furry doesn't mean they aren't alive. They have 'parents', are born, grow up, have 'children', grow old, and die. They evolve through environmental influences and through breeding. They need food and water and warmth and sunlight and air. Just because they don't run around or fly or swim doesn't mean they have no "feelings" or emotions. Since we can't hear them speak, we don't know if they communicate, but it can't be proven that they don't communicate. In fact, in my back yard there is a tree that was planted recently. A vine from the neighbor's yard keeps trying to bridge the 6 foot gap from the fence to the tree, but only right there where the tree is planted. How does the vine know the tree is there? Can it see it? Can it hear it? Can it smell it?
The point is this: Why is it OK to kill and eat plants, but not OK to kill and eat animals?
A corollary to this issue is "dolphin-safe tuna". So it's OK to kill and eat tuna—a cold-blooded fish—but we are outraged that "intelligent", warm-blooded dolphins are sometimes caught and killed in the same net as the tuna. Why is intelligence the measure of the acceptability of killing and eating? How do we know that tuna aren't as smart as dolphins? Why should their relative intelligence factor at all in which species is more deserving of death and consumption?
People who favor these positions cannot bring any logical argument to support their position, and I for one cannot support a position that cannot withstand a simple test of logic.
UPDATE: Here is an interesting comment string from this post as it appeared in Blogger News Network:
Science shows that plants have no central nervous system, no brain, have no cognition. Contrary to the statement that their is no logic to the position that it is wrong to eat animals on the basis of their intelligence, there is a great deal of logic to such a stance. Human beings are supposed to be very tasty--ask Hannibal Lecter--but we don't generally eat each other because we recognize the babarity of killing . Similarly, most of us in the predominant culture in the US don't eat dogs and cats because we recognize that they do have cognition, feel pain, express affection and joy and so on, and some extend the feeling of disgust that killing and consuming these household pets engenders to horses as well. Where the logical position falters is not with vegetarians but with meat eaters. Why is it okay to eat a cow or a pig but not a horse or dog? Why do we even recognize that there is a difference in kind between mammals and other species? Mammals, including whales and dolphins, are our evolutionary kin. That is why there is indeed a difference between killing and eating such highly evolved animals and killing and eating fish. I myself am a vegetarian but I have no quarrel at all with those who live in harsh climates where the killing of animals is a means of survival--that after all is the first imperative of us all. But for most of us, the consumption of meat is elective and not only not necessary for good health but actually deletorious to it. The environmental pollution it creates, the health problems it engenders, and above all the moral and ethical numbness that it creates all argue against it. I would strongly assert that this is a completely logical proposition.
Comment by Joseph Turner, 6/24/2005 2:34:58 AM
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I'm no vegetarian, but since you "cannot support a position that cannot withstand a simple test of logic" and also attempt to argue absurdity by claiming that we should not distinguish between dolphins and tuna, I wonder what you eat at all? Using your logic, you would not eat anything that is edible (perhaps you would eat rocks and metal - or are they alive on some metaphysical or elemental level?), or you would eat everything that is edible, including humans.
The fact is, there is no "logic" to what anyone eats. The explanations for what people eat include what they have been taught to eat and not to eat, either for means of health and/or conscience, or trial and error (supposing one gets sick when they eat something poisonous).
Comment by Sammy Larbi, 6/24/2005 9:19:08 AM
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Joseph, thanks for your comments:
"we don't generally eat each other because we recognize the babarity of killing." I disagree completely. Humans have throughout our history found killing each other and other species to be completely acceptable under certain circumstances, with some societies more accepting than others. However, the fact that we don't generally eat humans has nothing at all to do with the "babarity [sic] of killing", but out of respect for our dead, and, I suspect, an inate survival instinct, i.e. if we kill and each each other, then our species' survival is at risk by our own hands (and mouths). Killing for other purposes, however, the protection of our 'tribe', for example, are generally acceptable reasons.
"Why is it okay to eat a cow or a pig but not a horse or dog?" Many societies do eat dogs and horses. Most westerners do not, of course, mainly because we consider them pets or working animals. I also suspect that they are not as tasty as pigs or cows, but haven't tried one to be sure! :)
"Mammals, including whales and dolphins, are our evolutionary kin. That is why there is indeed a difference between killing and eating such highly evolved animals and killing and eating fish." So we agree that the killing and eating of animals (including fish) is acceptable and moral, but your criteria for what is an acceptable species to kill and eat differs from mine.
Sammy, also thanks for your comments. I am a happy carnivore and herbivore. My point about the dolphin-tuna debate was to illustrate the twisted (I'm being kind) logic of those who argue that it is wrong to kill and eat one living being, but not another. I accept the fact that to survive, I MUST kill (even if by proxy) and eat other living beings (plants or animals) to survive. Other than the obvious physical characteristics, I see no less right to life for a blade of grass than a cow. The cow, by the way, is more than happy to eat the grass, it's fellow species. Also, the tuna and the dolphin don't appear to me to care too much about the lower species of fish they kill and eat. How about the 'beautiful and intelligent' grey whale who kills and eats billions of little planctons every day?
To argue that we shouldn't kill and eat animals is not logical, if you also are willing to kill and eat plants.
Comment by James Z. Smith, 6/24/2005 12:04:54 PM
Author "we don't know if they communicate"{ actually, we know that in a way they do. Some species of trees, for example, when infested by insects produce chemicals that are recognized by neighboring trees - which start to produce insect-repellent chemicals before being themselves attacked.
Commentor: "Science shows that plants have no central nervous system, no brain, have no cognition." It is also argued by ichthyoligists that most fish have no cognition or even feel pain. Does an unfertilized egg? A chunk of cheese?
Anyway, the veg-whatevers who want us all to convert are among the most blood-thirsty people about. Consider: if we start eating (domestic raised) meat, what happens to the animals? One word: slaughter. Perhaps by just leaving them to fend for themselves, but slaughter nonetheless - and on an unprecedented scale.
Comment by John Anderson, 6/26/2005 1:15:26 AM
The author of this piece is simply trying to justify their own lack of compassion towards animals. To say that an apple that falls off a tree and is eaten is suffering the same agony that an animal being slaughtered does, is obviously ludicrous. Plants have no need to feel pain (in the sense that we use the word) because they can't do anything to escape the source of it. I fully admit that plants react to harmful stimuli by growing away from them, etc. but this is different than animals' reactions, which are instant, and based on aversion to pain.
The author of this piece seems to think that just because (in his eyes) plants suffer, it's also okay to cause animals suffering. By that logic, it is therefore okay to cause humans suffering too - why not eat humans then?
John Anderson said: "It is also argued by ichthyoligists that most fish have no cognition or even feel pain. Does an unfertilized egg? A chunk of cheese?"
Why would a fish not feel pain? You obviously haven't thought about this very hard (or don't want to, more like). How does a fish feel the current of the river so he/she can swim properly? How does a fish feel the food they are eating? The idea that fish can't feel is patently ludicrous, and laughable. Re your unfertilised eggs and cheese - vegans don't eat them not because an unfertilised egg can feel pain, but because of the pain that the animals these things are taken from feel! What happens to all the male chicks? What happens to all the male calves? Do you care? Obviously not.
James Smith said: "The cow, by the way, is more than happy to eat the grass, it's fellow species."
I'm sure all the biologists in the world will be most pleased that you've managed to redefine the difference betweenn plants and animals as non-existent. How is grass a 'fellow species' of the cow?
Let me explain the whole reasoning behind your post more clearly: you are incapable of compassion, and don't want to feel the suffering of animals that you eat. You're not alone, most of the human race is like this. So you try to justify your lack of caring, with a badly thought out argument.
You cannot logically argue against veganism.
Can you chase a pig down and catch it, and then kill it with your bare hands, and eat its uncooked flesh with your bare teeth? I doubt it, and I hope not. Do you suckle from a cow's breasts? A horse's? A dog's? Why not? Yet you drink milk. Do you find raw eggs appealing? Do they taste nice? Would you eat the half formed embryo of a chick in one? Of course not.
So all the animal products you eat are unnatural to you. You eat them for one reason and one reason alone: you were brought up to eat them. You can't think for yourself, and break away from what society has made you, even though it causes huge amounts of suffering to innocent animals.
Tell me how you chose to be born a human, and not an animal, and then we'll get somewhere.
Comment by James Stevens, 6/27/2005 2:54:14 AM
"The author of this piece is simply trying to justify their own lack of compassion towards animals." This isn't about the author, or about you, but for the record, I have a highly developed sense of empathy and compassion for animals. I could never work for a veterinarian, because I would hate to see dead and dying animals suffer. At the same time, I recognize that like all other living beings, to survive I must kill and eat some of my fellow beings.
"The author of this piece seems to think that just because (in his eyes) plants suffer, it's also okay to cause animals suffering. By that logic, it is therefore okay to cause humans suffering too - why not eat humans then?" On the contrary, it is you, and all vegetarians who choose to believe that since plants don't appear to experience pain, nor can you observe them suffering, that it doesn't happen, and you can therefore feel no guilt about killing and eating them, not to mention raising them specifically for that purpose. Your position on the acceptability of eating plants versus animals is arbitrary, selectively applied, and is therefore no logical. My position, however, is completely logical. I accept the idea that to survive, I must kill and eat animals and/or plants. But I see no difference, ethically speaking, between killing plants and killing animals.
"I'm sure all the biologists in the world will be most pleased that you've managed to redefine the difference betweenn plants and animals as non-existent. How is grass a 'fellow species' of the cow?" I used "species" incorrectly. What I meant was that the grass is a living being, as is the cow. Just like the cow, the grass is a living organism, that eats, drinks, goes through stages of life, reproduces, grows old, and dies. I recognize the cows right to life, which includes the right to kill and eat the grass. I also recognize the grass' right to life, which includes the right to choke out other forms of life competiong for the same food source. So I also recognize the right of the lion to life, which includes the right to kill and eat the antelope, and so on, and so on. Likewise, I recognize the right of humans to kill and eat plants and animals as a part of our right to life.
"Let me explain the whole reasoning behind your post more clearly: you are incapable of compassion, and don't want to feel the suffering of animals that you eat. You're not alone, most of the human race is like this. So you try to justify your lack of caring, with a badly thought out argument." First, you're not me, so you cannot possibly explain "my reasoning". Second, since 1), I already discussed my level of compassion, I won't go over that again, and 2) you don't know me, so you can't possibly speak for me. Your presumptions about my motivation undermines your whole argument.
"Can you chase a pig down and catch it, and then kill it with your bare hands, and eat its uncooked flesh with your bare teeth? I doubt it, and I hope not. Do you suckle from a cow's breasts? A horse's? A dog's? Why not? Yet you drink milk. Do you find raw eggs appealing? Do they taste nice? Would you eat the half formed embryo of a chick in one? Of course not.
So all the animal products you eat are unnatural to you. You eat them for one reason and one reason alone: you were brought up to eat them. You can't think for yourself, and break away from what society has made you, even though it causes huge amounts of suffering to innocent animals." While at one time, humans did similar activities to those you describe, we don't need to today. Farmers, ranchers, and the meat processing industry do that for us. I don't have to kill and eat the same way a lion does to have equal claim to legitimacy.
"Tell me how you chose to be born a human, and not an animal, and then we'll get somewhere." I didn't choose, God did. Would you dispute that humans are at the top of the food chain? For us to kill and eat plants and animals is in our nature, and always has been, since the beginning of human existence and before. To try to deny that now is to deny history. If you choose to be a vegetarian, fine with me. Just don't try to convince me that my decision to remain an omnivore is unethical. Being a human is completely ethical and natural.
Comment by James Z. Smith, 6/27/2005 6:53:36 AM
This post also appears on Blogger News Network.
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