I can't think of a title, but this one is about meat...

I have been accused of hypocrisy because, with all my Liberal philosophizing, I am still a carnivore. Guilty as charged, and apologetically so.

Every once in a while, I get in an argument with someone irrevocably convinced that they are so right that any argument against them, no mater how logical, must immediately fall before their superior intellect and anyone who would make such an argument must be evil incarnate. And sometimes I get accused of the same thing. It’s a situation where neither party is ever going to convince the other, and the best that I can hope for is that I’ll get an article out of it.

The other day I was in a “discussion” (you might call it an argument; I’d call it a fight) over my refusal to embrace a Vegan lifestyle. In this person’s eye, being a Vegetarian was only a short step from being a carnivore, and a carnivore was only marginally superior to a cannibal. The Vegan path was the One True Way.

I should have realized that it’s pointless to debate with a True Believer (in anything) but sometimes I can’t help myself. Predictably, the argument went nowhere for either of us and I have resorted to my blog to make the arguments that this person was entirely disinclined to entertain.

I’m not going to waste any time on the whole Vegetarian vs. Vegan debate; I don’t have a dog in that fight. I am as nature has made me…an Omnivore. Which occasionally means being a carnivore.

I take note of the fact that there are many animals on this Earth that would happily eat me without any moral qualm, and no one would accuse them of any immorality in doing so. Against such an argument is always brought forth the argument that we, as Human Beings, are above all that; as if we were, by virtue of our virtue, above the crass behavior of lesser beasts.

I consider such species-specific elitism to be pure nonsense and unsupportable by logic or reason. It’s a philosophical argument and accepting it requires accepting the philosophy behind it. I don’t.

Nor do I give much credence to the old argument that if I were to see how animals were slaughtered, I would never eat meat again. Leaving aside the fact that many of the hunters I have known do their own butchering as well as killing, I myself have helped butcher cattle and felt no revulsion at the practice. It wasn’t pleasant by any means, but I never had the sense that what I was doing was somehow evil or unnatural.

(I do acknowledge that many commercial slaughterhouses are indeed hellholes. I attribute this to the greed of those who control industrial meet processing, and this is a better argument against human avarice than against the butcher’s trade.)

Neither am I likely to be persuaded by arguments as to the “humanity” of animals, or their “cuteness.” Yes, cats are cute when they’re housecat-sized; when they’re bigger than I am, and looking for a meal, considerably less so. Dogs can be either loyal friends and companions or vicious pack animals. Yes, there are animals that are docile by nature, but how often is it that they are only that way because Humanity has breed them to be so?

Then there is the behavior of Vegetarians/Vegans that argues against them. I have not, to my knowledge, ever met a Vegetarian that did not grow plants and converse with them while they were growing, encouraging them to grow and be strong and to take joy in the Earth and the Sun and the rain. Then kill them and eat them. I note that the personification of vegetable life did not spare it the knife. Or fork.

There’s another argument for Veganism that is a bit more difficult to dismiss, and I have heard it stated like this: “It is immoral to cause any living creature avoidable harm.” That’s a good point, but I have only ever heard that statement made an absolute, and entirely without any argument in support. It is as if the argument itself were of such obvious moral superiority that no counter was possible. Against such arguments I have to ask, “Why?

“Why is it wrong? You seem to think it so obviously true that it requires no supporting argument, but I do not accept that it is so and I am waiting to be convinced.” The people I have known who would make such an argument have seldom (actually “never” thus far) thought that far in advance.

The question of need often comes up. “We don’t need to eat meat since we are no longer a cave-man society and no longer do cave-man things” is how this argument usually runs. I have to give a bit on this point; certainly most of society doesn’t require meat protein as much as our ancestors did. But there the argument sputters; as it happens, the worse off you are, the worse your diet is likely to be. Often, the poor don’t get enough protein. It is a sad irony that the poorer you are, the more you are likely to need to eat more protein and the less likely you are to be able to afford it.

Do I need to remind you that meat is an excellent source of protein?

It comes down to this: All that lives feeds on death. Any argument against a carnivorous lifestyle requires that you value some life forms above others. The inherent elitism and Chauvinism of such an argument belies any of the “moral” arguments that I have ever heard produced in defense of the superiority of either Vegetarianism or Veganism.

Admittedly, now that I have made the above argument there is one counter-argument that I cannot ignore: My point of view requires that I devalue all life to an equal degree. Well, true, but I might say that I value all life to an equal degree (which would be saying that it’s a matter of perspective); but as it happens I don’t make that case.

I consider the argument well reasoned, but that does not mean that I accept its moral superiority. It boils down to an argument of your values vs. my values, and that’s an argument that no one can win.

This is precisely the sort of value-based judgment that each individual must make for him/herself and I am against imposing my own values on anyone else. In short, I cannot command your values and you cannot command mine. We can talk about them, certainly, indeed that’s what I’m doing now, but I recognize that I am not going to convince you that I am right.

The sad fact is that, in the argument that started me on this, my animal-loving acquaintance never understood how I could be so unwilling to alter my behavior or my thinking to be in agreement with his obviously morally superior argument. I get a lot of that.

I realize that none of my arguments will mollify my radically Vegan, animal-rights-activist detractor. In the end, to this person I can only say:

If it doesn’t offend your Vegan sensibilities, bite me.

The Blues Viking
The opinions here expressed are mine and if you don’t like them you can get your own damn blog.