I submitted an entry to the New York Times’ essay contest. The challenge was to write on the subject “Is it ethical to eat meat?” Being the guilt-free omnivore that I am, I decided to enter. After culling through 3000 entries the Times’ judges left mine out of the six finalists’ pile. So I’m including it as a blog because I think it’s worthy of discussion. Here goes…
Public domain photograph of various meats. (Beef, pork, chicken.) Source: http://visualsonline.cancer.gov/details.cfm?imageid=2402 (via http://geekphilosopher.com/bkg/foodMeat.htm) Public domain declaration: http://visualsonline.cancer.gov/about.cfm (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Is it ethical to eat meat? It’s as ethical as it was to be engineered to digest meat. Now we’re questioning the ethics of evolution or creation since we were constructed to be omnivores. Our digestive system is capable of processing meat, absorbing its nutrients and excreting its waste without requiring outside intervention to accomplish it or to stay healthy. Just like the human system can process plants and fruit. Is it ethical to eat those living organisms?
Animals kill each other to consume. The human animal has been eating meat for more than two and a half million years. Back in the days of African hominids there were no meat factories to grow their prehistoric buffalo or marketing to influence their taste buds. They crafted instruments to hunt food because their instincts were to eat meat, plus plants. There were no ethical dilemmas to consider or need to pander to political correctness. They were built to digest meat and that’s what they did.
Plants and fruit are as alive as animals are. Once they die they’re no longer nutritious; they must be consumed as living, breathing organisms. They don’t take oxygen in through their lungs as humans do, but they do exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide through a process called respiration. In fact, in order to maintain human life, we need plants to inhale carbon dioxide and exhale oxygen, our most vital commodity for life. So there’s an argument to be made about the ethics of eating plants that must stay alive in order for the human species to exist.
The real question of ethics pertains to the way humans go about getting our meat.
Our species has a tendency to flaunt our position at the top of the food chain. We hunt animals for sport and cut off their heads to mount on our walls. We fish for sport and often throw the fish, now with a hole through its mouth or gill, back into the water when rules call for “fish and release.” We toss ropes around calves’ necks and hurl them to the ground and cinch a bull’s gonads while hopping on his back to see if he can buck us off. Why? Because some consider it fun. Those arrogant human traits are disrespectful of fellow living beings and unethical activities from a species with supreme reasoning power.
It’s also unethical to “grow meat” in industrial feedlots where cattle are fed grain they can’t digest, hormones to get too fat for their legs to support their bodies (because natural weight gain takes too long and is too lean), and given no room to move around thereby being forced to stand in their own feces. When they get sick they’re given antibiotics to treat the damage caused by eating corn that their bodies can’t digest. There are equally unethical conditions imposed on chickens and pigs raised in feedlots.
It is ethical, though, to raise cattle, pigs, chickens and sheep in their natural environments: pasture on which to graze, room to roam and provide other food their bodies were designed to eat. And when the time comes, to be killed in a humane, respectful fashion.
I eat plants and humanely raised meat. I also don’t hunt or taunt animals for sport. I’m an omnivore and lead an ethical life.
Now it’s your turn. Do you think it’s ethical to eat meat?
Here’s what the six New York Times’ essay finalists had to say.
actthreedotnet 
Timely for me, as I am reading “Food Nation” and have not touched meat since the ‘slaughterhouse’ chapter. Ethics are subjective; to each his own. I’m with Joyce though, there are plenty of farms out there that humanely raise the meat we eat. I am not ready to be a vegetarian, so why not support humane farms? There was an interesting article in Philly.com yesterday about FDA not endorsing the no-antibiotic phase in program that was passed years ago, because meat lobbies are strong and powerful in DC. McDonald’s rules folks. Only we can change that. Good essay Joyce.
Amy, after “Food Nation” try The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan. Really illuminating. Thanks for your input.
The fact that we are capable of doing something (“engineered” to be able to do it) doesn’t make it right. After all, we are able to rob, rape, cheat, lie, torture, etc., and we are able to do these things much better than other creatures can. In fact, morality consists largely in deciding NOT to engage in certain kinds of behaviour that we are able to engage in. To the extent that we can flourish without imposing harm on others, shouldn’t we choose not to impose that harm? Isn’t that the root of morality?
Mijnheer, thanks for your comments. I appreciate the input. I do think that humanely raising and killing animals for consumption is very different than robbing, raping, cheating…etc. others. In the latter you’re actually causing suffering to other sentient beings for the sake of personal narcissistic pleasure. Animals who flourish in a natural environment and die without suffering is a very different matter.
Joyce, I appreciate your logic because it helps me orient my feelings on the subject. I don’t object to eating meat, and i like your idea of humanely raised and – is there a better word than “slaughtered”? – meat.
Like you, I respect if others prefer not to eat meat. However, I despair over examples of short-sighted, maybe even suicidal over-use of antibiotics in our food (Amy’s comment above). Mankind sometimes seems to be in a race to destroy itself.
Lynne, if you’re interested in knowing the comprehensive story of our food and how it’s grown pick up Michael Pollan’s “The Omnivore’s Dilemma.” It’s well written and an easy read. And once you’re finished you’ll be forced to recognize what you eat.
Speaking only for myself, I feel that eating meat is not ethical. I only became a vegetarian a little over a year ago, and have gone vegan since after becoming educated on what goes on in factory farms and the like. I cannot have a clear conscience and ingest anything that came out of suffering any longer but I did for well over 30 years because I was unenlightened and uninformed. I do what I can to inform others but I also respect those who feel differently.
I agree with you Vanvasko, I can’t eat anything that was sacrificed after suffering a tormented life and death either. Not all meat comes out of factory farms, though. There are smaller cattle farmers that allow their cattle to graze and get fat from the land, eating feed their bodies can digest without resorting to antibiotics to fight infection stemming from conditions they’re subjected to. Those animals are humanely raised and killed and it’s that meat we can all buy to provide lean protein and support farmers. I’ve suggested Michael Pollan’s book a couple of times and will to you too to learn about how food is created in this country both from factories and from small farmers. It’s called “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” and it’s a fascinating read.
Thanks for your contribution.
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Thanks for the essay. I didn’t win either 🙂