If
you have ever observed an argument in favour of vegetarianism, you
can be sure that somewhere along the line there will be an accusation
of 'emotionality'.
You
will see the 'antis' poise the lance of argument at the 'bleeding
hearts who have watched one too many Disney cartoons, and now
proclaim their love for all beasts!' Vegetarianism is, of course,
just an immature emotional reaction to the grim nature of, well,
nature. Vegetarians haven't quite clocked on yet that animals must be
slaughtered because it is 'the way of things', and if only they were
more 'rational' they would realize that animals being killed for food
is an unchanging law of the cosmos (insert lion hunting gazelle
reference here).
But,
of course, slaughtering animals as part of your cultural practice is
not the result of an emotional attachment. It is an entirely
rational decision to gorge on ever-increasing quantities of meat,
resulting in ever-worsening conditions for the animals slaughtered –
and just about everything else. Therefore, experiencing as much
sensory pleasure and dietary convenience as possible would give one
the rational high-ground, right? The answer from my perspective is an
overwhelming and horribly jaded 'no'.
I
propose a different concept of rational. This is to cause the least
amount of suffering and environmental damage for the maximum output
of nutrition and variety, from here to an indefinite point in time.
It is to consider the future of the earth, rather than just the
present. It is to plan ahead to ensure the continued survival of our
species - not to mention all of the others we might extinguish before
their time. It is not necessarily benevolent, but it certainly is not
domineering and destructive. It is quite simply long-term survival
and well-being!
Mass
violence against harmless animals does not have a rational basis.
Violence is destructive to our well-being, even when it is
justifiable (i.e. in self-defence). If you agree, then you agree that
it is also rational to free people from the barbaric task of animal
slaughter. The meat-eating advocate (that is, anyone who condones or
participates in the practice) is hiding from the fact that someone
else has to do the dirty work. Considering the sheer scale of the
meat industry, that is a lot
of dirty work.
I doubt the happy family at
the table carving a cow-corpse consider the psychological welfare of
the men who were tasked with the killing. Those men are as
objectified (a walking blade and boltgun) as the innocent animal
deemed unworthy of life (walking flesh and food). Even if one cared
nothing for animals, could one say the same for men? The same men who
must be desensitized to the brutal task of transporting, stunning and
killing animals on a factory line. (In the case of halal or kosher
slaughter, literally killing a conscious animal with a blade across
the neck).
The real emotionality is on
the side of the meat-eaters. Sadly, it is the wrong kind of emotion.
It is an emotional need to belong to an archaic cultural practice. It
is the laziness of convenience, to commit the most banal immorality
known to our species. It is to habitually succumb to the darkest of
desires, destroying another life for the sake of fleeting pleasure - or worse, arbitrary traditional nonsense.
This fusion of emotional need to belong, combined with rampant
desiring, is where the irrationality of meat-eating synthesizes.
Fortunately
for meat-eaters, they have a many-layered veil to hide behind. The
meat industry depends on sheer ignorance to continue itself (a
resource reliably supplied by our underachieving species!) It hides
the flesh-consumer from the brutal reality of how animals are raised
and butchered. It hides behind images of happy cows and pleasant
farms, utilizes serpentine language (cage free, free range) or
romantic language (calling the corpse
of
a jungle fowl a 'bird') to disguise the sheer abuse that is
necessitated so that we can continue the highly 'civilized' practice
of animal torture and murder. It is almost as if a large number of
those involved in the slaughter were ashamed of their role in it. But
I won't go so far as to say this definitively!
Vegetarianism has its own
ethical problems with farmed animals, but it does not depend on anywhere near as much
slaughter to continue itself. This makes it an order of magnitude
less violent and self-destructive, and an order of magnitude more
rational. As for any overly emotional vegetarians, can you really
blame them? Even if it is a purely emotional reaction, it is a valid
one, and the right one.
This is the first of many
sledgehammer blows against the animal's chains. The next article will
be asking the question of whether an animal is a moral agent - the
predictable answer from this militant animal rights camp being 'yes,
I do think so'! The basis of this argument will be the rather simple notion that we are not so different from animals - having evolved 'out' of one after all. See you then.
Selim
'Selim' Talat
