I am greatly upset by this election we just had and have been reading
up on the religious right. Your website came up in one of my searches.
I have read through a lot of the material on your site and I find myself agreeing
with a lot of the information about the bible and religion that you have written
about. I was raised in the UCC church, but struggle with the bible.
I consider the UCC church to be one of the best in terms of a churches acceptance
of all peoples and the willingness to allow questioning and education to occur.
I feel my open mindedness is due in part to the way I was raised, which is
in part due to the UCC church. However, I am no loger a regular church
goer at this time and spend a lot of my time thinking about what it is
that I believe in. I found your writings on the bible similar to thoughts
I have had and have expressed to others.
However, when it comes to the hunting and eating animals it's hard
not to feel like I am reading through information written by one of the bible
thumpers whom you dismiss as being one-sided in their arguments. It
may be wrong for me to assume, but I would assume you believe in evolution
based on what I have read about your thoughts on God and the bible.
If you believe in evolution and subscribe to trends of thought like "survival
of the fittest" then you must believe in the what now is almost a cliche
(thanks to the Lion King movie): the circle of life. If you do believe
in these things then why are these things not taken into account when it comes
to hunting and eating meat - they should be given full attention as well as
your great arguments you list for not eating meat. If you believe in
evolution then I think that would blow apart many of arguments for not
eating meat.
Before the human species was able to reason we hunted and gathered
and there are anthropologists and biologists that now believe if it were not
for us eating animal proteins that come from things like fish then our brains
would not have been able to evolve into the types of organs they are today
(you could say this is the reason why we are different from other primates).
We only recently see eating animals as immoral --now that we can reason
and think about issues with our expanded brains versus just surviving
in this world. Here is a link to a paper discussing similar nutritional
ideas - I just did a quick search to find something that contained
ideas I have heard before about the brain and how it expanded - this
is just an example of the school of thought: http://forum.lowcarber.org/archive/index.php/t-51039
There are still hunter/gatherer societies today that need to rely on hunting.
It seems that maybe we should be thanking our ancestors for eating meat and
actually take up fault with our ancestors that started growing grains domestically.
As for the issue of hunting one could argue that a
true hunter (not a trophy hunter, but one who hunts and eats what he kills),
one who respects the animals he/she hunts (like many native American tribes
are believed to have conducted themselves) is more humane than the way we
slaughter animals today in mass quantities (one could also argue these animals
that are slaughtered wouldn't exist at all if it were not for our needs).
However, we also probably would not have had the time to sit around reasoning
and thinking about ideas like this if it were not for agriculture and
domestication of animals for food. This leading to more free time, leading
to larger populations and a need for larger quantities of grain and animals
to sustain these larger populations as we have today was a blessing and a
curse. And of course people need to make money raising animals
and grain for the rest of us or else no one would do it- this frees up people
who do not want to do this type of work to do something else like working in
the field on computers or education - so it's not fair to expect this not
to be like a business where people earn a living doing it. So if
you are catching my train of thought here it takes us around full circle as
to how what we are as human beings and what we do in regards to raising
the meat today came about (very simplified I know, but still along the lines
of truth). Some of your smaller arguments about cholesterol and
cancer could be explained away not by the fact that we eat meat and this is
bad, but by things like most everything should be done in moderation including
eating meat (in regards to cholesterol and other health problems - one
could say we should eat meat only a couple times a week - it also could be
said that other factors cause these health problems - it's not just one cause
and effect here) and yes chemicals in the meat we eat can cause health problems,
but this argument is not essential to your moral arguement for not eating
meat--it is only an arguement meant to convince people we shouldn't do it
because it's not healthy (I think this clouds the issue of eating
meat as being immoral). Chemicals are necessary due to the need to raise
large quantities of animals for the large populations of humans and is a necessary
thing like blood transfusions until some better way is discovered to
help grow large quantities of food in a quick, cheap and sustainable
way. Honestly, I think it is not necessarilly the eating of meat that
bothers many people, but maybe the GREAT WASTE that goes on - this
is so evident here in the USA because there seems to be a fast food burger joint
on every corner which makes one feel like we are slaves to consumerism --contributing
to our guilt of eating animals. However, if you go to a third world
country where there is a true hunger problem it would seem ridiulous to ask
these people to ignore their great needs in order to survive so that they
could be moral. I think of the great programs like the heifer project
international or other non-church projects that help fight hunger, your idea
of eating meat as immoral could be seen as elitist and convenient. I
think you would be hard pressed to get these people to buy into this idea
of not eating meat when they are faced with pure survival. Their situation is more
like what took place when we were all hunter and gatherers.
I agree that many situations are are cruel - like the people eating
the monkey brains. I have heard of that movie before, but have not watched
it due to my nature of not being able to watch violence in general.
I am not sure what the answer is for the animal being eaten - how do we do
it without some amount of pain. Certainly the monkey example is beyond
cruel and should not occur, but if you believe in evolution then our eating
of meat is something our ancestors did do for survival and should be examined
--not explained away today as immoral - that is too easy. Does the lion
think about it's prey and does the small one-celled organism think before
eating another cell? We do not know with exact certainty what
is going on in these examples, but my guess would be no. Your arguement
of no God also comes into play - if no God then maybe evolution is exactly
what is at work here in which case why shouldn't we do what is natural
and just eat meat. Should we ask the lion not to be a carnivore - this
sounds silly, but it seems like the animals the lion eats are also in pain
while being killed by the lion (even the spider is cruel if you consider the
act of wrapping the fly and then sucking it's blood, there are many examples
from the food chain on all levels)? Are we not part of the food chain
- if evolution is what is taking place here then have we as a species evolved
and figured out how to sustain ourselves without preying on anything.
With our invention of the weapon have we taken out all our natural predators
- the only one that seems to be at work is ourselves in regards to taking
out the weak amongst us (I would also add the reckless and dumb are also being
weeded out). Is there something else besides humans that are taking
us out - we just are not aware of it- in which case we are still part of the
food chain and eating meat would seem to fit with the way the universe works.
What about plants - what if they evolve to have feelings - what then would
we eat if that became a moral issue also? I know this seems farfetched,
but if we believe in evolution at one time we all started out in a similar
fashion and evolved to our current state. I do not believe it is only
"cutural indoctrination" as you put it on the website, I believe
it is all part of evolution. It is not murdering for fun - if one eats
and does not waste then the animal served a purpose and it could be argued
that we do listen to our instincts-- like animals instinctively do what they
do to survive now or act out as their predecessors would have done (like
a fish eating a group of frogs eggs or a cat eating birds eggs from a nest
- how do you get the housecat not to hunt birds when they can eat the food
placed in the dish in the house). I am not saying what is right and
what is wrong, I just think that you need to look at all sides. Not
just the emotional sides, but the practical evolutionary reasons why.
There are also other things to consider --things that need to be addressed
to bring back a balance in nature - like pollution. This to me is a
worth while thing to address and seems to be something outside the evolutionary
course --something completely caused by humans nd far more desctructive than
say hunting. This takes it's toll on animals and humans and will eventually
ruin the earth - it is in my mind a situation that is a state of emergency and
before we are past the point of the earth not being able to re-new itself
we should concentrate on it.
I know you are a smart person just from reading your thoughts on
your website and I probably didn't need these things out to you - you
are probably well read in these areas I mentioned as well (in case you are
wondering I have a BS in biology and also have my MBA). I guess what
I want to point out is that your beliefs on eating meat/hunting seem to have
taken on a role similar to the role religion may have once played in your
life. Be careful when you present your ideas that you do not use the
same tactics that religious zealots do-- of only presenting one side while
ignoring other obvious evidence that pokes holes in their religious doctrine.
Also be careful of the role emotion plays - sometimes it is worth it
to look at the practical side of things too. It reminds me of the situation
we currently have which was brought to light by the election. The religious
right can have their morals, but what good are they if the rest of us live
in cardboard boxes and do not have jobs to go to? I do not write this
to anger you and I hope you are not angered. I suspect you will not
be because of your openess to discuss the possibilities that exist on all
sides of an argument. I also once felt hunting was cruel and have also
considered not eating meat because I was a typlical suburbanite who was
never exposed to these issues first hand. But I married a farmer and
hunter who I discuss these things with and he has made me see that things
are not so black and white for all of us and that there are always three sides
to everything in life: my beliefs, your beliefs, and the truth as it really
exists. Before judging him to be a redneck hick because he is a farmer
and a hunter (and also a realtor) - you need to understand he is as progressive
as I am and has the same questions about the religious topics and is
concerned about similar things that you are concerned about. The farm
his family has is just a small farm that once was a dairy farm that is now
exclusively a farm that produces only hay - it is preserved and can never
be developed something that goes along with conservation and preservation
of this Earth. I feel like I had to share my thoughts because I felt
like your arguments on the religious topics were presented well and I found
them convincing. However, the issue of eating meat and hunting seemed
to be presented in the same way the Catholic church presents it's case on
abortion which turned me off. These are just my thoughts and I do not
profess to be an expert - I just wanted to give you some feedback because
your website was impressive and I learned a lot from it. I now know
what to do when the Jehovah's Witnesses come to my door. Thanks for
taking the time to put up the site and adding some clarity around the issues
- I feel like I learned something and it will help me in my journey in figuing
out and making sense of this world.
Deb S.
Hi Deb,
Thanks for taking the time
to write me your thoughts regarding my website.
I'm not sure what UCC stands
for, but it sounds like it was less oppressive than the Jehovah's Witnesses
organization, and that you were able to move on with a minimum of stress. Good for you!
I'm glad you found some food
for thought in my writings on the Bible, etc.
Of course, two people will
never agree on everything, so now we come to the animal rights issues. We
probably both have strong opinions on the subject, and probably won't sway
each other's beliefs about the topic, but having considered your thoughts,
I felt you'd probably like to know my reactions (for what they're worth).
From what you wrote, I gather
that you didn't look at my transcribed video "Pain on Your Plate" which answers
many of your objections. Another video, which I will soon be in the process
of transcribing, is "Arguments Against Animals" which examines the types of
arguments you put forth. I may be mistaken, but I think most, if not all,
of your points are actually addressed somewhere on my website today. (So,
I must plead "innocent" to the charge of only presenting one side of the issue.)
But since you took the time
to write down your thoughts, I feel I owe it to you to respond directly.
However, when it comes to the hunting and eating animals
it's hard not to feel like I am reading through information written by one
of the bible thumpers whom you dismiss as being one-sided in their arguments.
Ouch! You really know how
to hit where it hurts the most! ;-)
In response I would say that
my experience has been the very opposite. Before I became a "Bible thumper"
("BT") I was a vegetarian. It was the BT's who talked me out of that. After
I left the BT's I began a deep examination of my beliefs, and began to formulate
my own philosophy of life. That's when I gave up the eating of meat for good.
In my experience of BT's, they
do not put forth reasons for anything. They just find a Scripture in the
Bible to point to and do what they think it says.: "It says God gave us meat
to eat, and God knows better than you what you should eat."
In contrast to that, I have
attempted to give reasons based on science, biology, ecology, and ethics for
my stance. You can argue with these reasons, but please don't characterize
them as the equivalent of Bible thumping!
If you believe in evolution then I think that would
blow apart many of arguments for not eating meat.
On the contrary: evolution
puts the human family in the genus of primates, who are by nature herbivores
(i.e. vegetarians). We started out as vegetarians, and when you examine the
structure of our bodies you find that we are not equipped to process meat.
This is borne out by the fact that vegetarians live longer healthier lives
(in every study done on the subject) and meat-eating is one of the principal
causes of cancer and blockage of the arteries (the two leading causes of death
today).
If it were "natural" for us
to eat meat, then it wouldn't be a health hazard for us to do so.
Before the human species was able to reason we hunted
and gathered and there are anthropologists and biologists that now believe
if it were not for us eating animal proteins that come from things like fish
then our brains would not have been able to evolve into the types of organs
they are today (you could say this is the reason why we are different from
other primates). We only recently see eating animals as immoral
--now that we can reason and think about issues with our expanded brains versus
just surviving in this world.
But now that we are able to
reason, it would seem foolish to blindly emulate the actions we took when
we were not able to reason.
It may be true about the fish.
Of course, if they had eaten flax seeds instead the results would've been
the same (delivering Omega-3 to the brain). But before we learned an agrarian
way of life we were hunter-gatherers. I hope I never implied that hunting
was immoral for cavemen or nomadic tribes of today who rely on it for subsistence.
Morality only comes into play
with choice.
Cavemen and hunter/gatherers
in "primitive" cultures don't have a lot of food choices, and since they don't
usually have Internet access either, my website is not addressed to them.
Unlike the BT's, I don't believe
that morality was cast in stone one time for all times and circumstances.
What is immoral for a modern urbanite with a convenient 24/7 super-market
at his or her disposal is not necessarily what would be immoral for a caveman
or present-day individual in a hunting-gathering tribe.
The same holds true for carnivores
like the lion and the spider. Since their bodies (unlike ours) require meat
to survive, their actions are not immoral.
There are still hunter/gatherer societies today that need
to rely on hunting. It seems that maybe we should be thanking our ancestors
for eating meat and actually take up fault with our ancestors that started
growing grains domestically.
Again: I never suggested that
we should find fault with the Neanderthals who took up eating meat. They
did what they needed to do in their time. But we're no longer cavemen. Given
that, it would be immoral to go back to a lifestyle inappropriate for our
time.
Again: it is arguable that
meat-eating was necessary for the evolution of our brains, since there are
no nutrients in meat that cannot be found in non-meat sources.
Also, it was only when agricultural
societies formed that civilization emerged. Nomads, following the animal's
migrations, have no time to develop culture. So, if we thank the hunters
for our brains, we must also thank the farmers for civilization.
Maybe we should thank the hunters,
but that doesn't mean we should emulate them.
As for the issue of hunting one could argue that a true hunter
(not a trophy hunter, but one who hunts and eats what he kills), one who respects
the animals he/she hunts (like many native American tribes are believed to
have conducted themselves) is more humane than the way we slaughter animals
today in mass quantities (one could also argue these animals that are slaughtered
wouldn't exist at all if it were not for our needs).
I don't think it matters to
the animal who has been shot and who has limped away to hide and slowly bleed
to death, that his killer "respects" him. If you were to shoot me, I wouldn't
find any comfort or relevance in your "respect".
Keep in mind that one who "eats
what he kills" is not necessarily a subsistence hunter. The subsistence hunter
has no real choice but to kill to eat.
Yes, subsistence hunting is
more moral than factory-farming. We are in agreement on this point, and I
have made this statement on my site.
The fact that some individual
animals would not exist if we had not purposely bred them for meat is, of
course true. But what ethical conclusions can we draw from this fact? Does
it somehow give us the right to do whatever we wish to the animal? No. For
example: children wouldn't exist either if women didn't give birth to them,
but that doesn't give them the right to do whatever they wish to their children.
How a sentient being came into existence has no bearing on what constitutes
ethical treatment of that being.
but this argument [concerning health problems] is not essential
to your moral arguement for not eating meat--it is only an arguement meant
to convince people we shouldn't do it because it's not healthy (I think
this clouds the issue of eating meat as being immoral).
But my point is that meat-eating
is immoral because it is unhealthy. If you try to separate these points you
lose the focus of my argument. If we were carnivores (or even omnivores)
meat-eating wouldn't be harmful to us. The fact that it is harmful to us
indicates that we are herbivores by nature (and biology backs this up by showing
us that we are in the genus Primate, whose members are herbivores). If we
are herbivores, then we are not participating in the "circle of life" when
we kill animals for food: we are violently breaking out of the circle and
acting contrary to our nature, and paying the consequences in health problems.
The health concerns, therefore,
aren't clouding the issue: they are part and parcel of the issue, as I see
it.
Chemicals are necessary due to the need to raise large
quantities of animals for the large populations of humans and is a necessary
thing like blood transfusions until some better way is discovered to
help grow large quantities of food in a quick, cheap and sustainable
way.
You are assuming that it is
"necessary" to eat meat. But it definitely is not. So it is not necessary
to raise large quantities of animals, and so it is not necessary to use chemicals.
Honestly, I think it is not necessarilly the eating of meat that
bothers many people, but maybe the GREAT WASTE that goes on - this
is so evident here in the USA because there seems to be a fast food burger joint
on every corner which makes one feel like we are slaves to consumerism --contributing
to our guilt of eating animals. However, if you go to a third world
country where there is a true hunger problem it would seem ridiulous to ask
these people to ignore their great needs in order to survive so that they
could be moral. I think of the great programs like the heifer project
international or other non-church projects that help fight hunger, your idea
of eating meat as immoral could be seen as elitist and convenient. I
think you would be hard pressed to get these people to buy into this idea
of not eating meat when they are faced with pure survival. Their situation is more
like what took place when we were all hunter and gatherers.
If waste bothers you, and you
are concerned with human starvation, then you should go vegetarian. The production
of meat is the most wasteful food process of all. It takes 12 times more
land to feed a meat-eater than a vegetarian! This is why the process has
been called a "protein factory in reverse": we put so much more in than we
get back out. If everyone in the world were to adopt the meat-centered diet
of the typical American, we would need two more planets in order to have enough
land to feed us. Conversely, if everyone were to go vegetarian today there
would be more than enough to feed everyone. This is another reason why meat-eating
is immoral: it adds to the problem of starvation by using land to feed cattle
which could otherwise be used to feed 12 times more people. So it is not
my idea of morality that is elitist: it is meat-eating: the diet that only
a few can participate in, to the detriment of so many others.
And if you ever tried to get
a decent vegan entrée at most restaurants you would take back your claim that
it is "convenient"! ;-)
In addition, raising animals
for meat is one of the leading causes of environmental destruction. Talk
about waste! Most rain forest destruction occurs in order to clear land for
cattle grazing (principally to provide cheap fast-food hamburgers for the
American market). Most of the great deserts were once lush, but the over-grazing
of cattle rendered them what we see today. If we continue to rape the rain
forests to satisfy our taste for meat, they will end up the same way.
What about plants - what if they evolve to have feelings
- what then would we eat if that became a moral issue also?
The answer, of course, would
be to go vegetarian. You would kill 12 times fewer plants that way.
I guess what I want to point out is that your beliefs on eating meat/hunting
seem to have taken on a role similar to the role religion may have once played
in your life. Be careful when you present your ideas that you do not
use the same tactics that religious zealots do-- of only presenting one side
while ignoring other obvious evidence that pokes holes in their religious
doctrine. Also be careful of the role emotion plays - sometimes
it is worth it to look at the practical side of things too.
It's ironic: most people accuse
me of being too intellectual and not emotional enough. When you say the above,
I almost wonder if you read someone else's work and not mine. Fact after
fact is given in Pain On Your Plate, giving reasons why meat-eating is a bad
idea: bad for your health, bad for the environment, bad for the starving people
in the world. These facts are what make it immoral, along with the belief
that taking life unnecessarily is immoral. If that makes you feel emotional,
I think that's a healthy sign.
GreenPeace has a motto I like:
"tread lightly upon the earth." Vegetarianism is one important way of doing
that. It leaves a much smaller footprint. My own philosophy of life is that
in living my life I want to cause as little suffering and death to others
as possible. You may call this elitist, but I think it is the very least
any human being can do. Of course what is "possible" will vary from one individual's
circumstance to another's.
Where a person has a choice
on this issue, the choice comes down to this:
- engage in an unhealthy unnatural practice
which causes death, harms the environment, and contributes to human starvation.
Or
To me, it is an obvious choice.
Finally, you had much to say
about evolution. Well, we never evolved to the point that we could handle
meat without incurring eventual health problems. And with people cutting
down on meat-eating (as you say to twice a week) it's doubtful we ever shall
evolve out of being herbivores. What I believe is that our next evolutionary
steps won't be physical, but will be steps in intelligence and morals. We
will gradually set aside religions and come to regard them as quaint stories
similar to Greek mythology. When religion is no longer seen as holding a
monopoly on ethics, people will turn to ethics through empathy. This empathy
will extend beyond our own species, and meat-eating will eventually be gone
forever amongst our species.
Then again, Bush got re-elected,
so now all bets are off. If ever there was a compelling argument for de-evolution,
this is surely it!
--Steve
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