"Is It Wrong to Eat Meat?," Part IV: Drawing the Line

Which living things are we comfortable eating and which are we not? That’s the question that each human being must answer for herself. Carnivorous non-human animals never have the chance to ask themselves this question since they live and eat by instinct and necessity, and so we have no model to look to in the animal kingdom.

If human beings were forced to eat meat in order to survive, then there would be no moral question here. But in fact our species can survive and thrive by eating a variety of living things. We can consume and derive nourishment from living things as diverse as carrots, buffalo, wheat, chickens, or even other human beings. And since unlike other animals we are not forced by instinct or necessity to eat any of these particular things, we must choose what we feel comfortable putting into our body. Unless we are morally comfortable eating all living things, including other people (which some ancient societies were but no one that I know is), we must draw a line in the sand: “I will eat X, but I will not eat Y.” But where should we draw the line? And what will our criterion be?

The carnivore likes to accuse the vegetarian of a contradiction here: “You won’t eat chickens, but you will eat carrots. Aren’t carrots living too?” The major problem with the carnivore’s argument at this point is that he doesn’t realize that it is also directed back at himself. Yes, vegetarians have to ‘draw the line’ somewhere, and this is going to be fairly arbitrary. But the carnivore has the exact same duty to ‘draw the line!’ Most people in the West have no problem eating cows, but they refuse on moral grounds to eat dogs. They will eat pigs, but cats are strictly off limits. And of course it would be a grave injustice to eat another human being. But what do dogs, cats, and human beings have that cows, pigs, and chickens do not have?

Take for example a carnivore who draws the line this way: “I will eat any animal, but I will not eat other human beings.” OK, but why in the world did you draw the line right below humans? Because they are rational? Because they are self-conscious? Well, there are some monkeys that are more rational and self-conscious then some humans born with developmental disabilities or in a coma. Surely you don’t propose that it’s morally justifiable to eat someone just because their I.Q. is too low! Or perhaps you take a religious route and propose that humans are off-limits for food because humans, unlike other animals, were made in the image of God. OK, but is that the reason that you do not eat people – just because of that verse in Genesis? If you were not aware of that verse, you would happily slaughter and eat your neighbor? No, I think that there are some undiagnosed moral intuitions underneath the surface that the carnivore has not seriously addressed.

"Is It Wrong to Eat Meat?" Part III: The Argument from Evolution

There are two basic arguments I hear for the carnivorous diet, the first of which is the mono-theistic one that I discussed last week. This is the basic line of thinking that God created animals for human consumption, which turns out to be false, according to the creation text for Christians, Jews, and Muslims. Instead, God actually gave humans a vegetarian diet, and only later permitted us to eat meat.

The other argument does not rely on any kind of religious belief at all, but a scientific one. The best summary comes from a former doctor of mine: “Well, humans didn’t fight their way to the top of the food chain only to eat vegetables!” The idea, of course, is that humans are the (current) end of a long line of organisms which evolved and survived at least in part by eating the species below it. From this perspective, it seems bizarre to turn from our habitual meat-eating ways for moral reasons.

But to argue that something is morally justified because it is ground into us by evolution doesn’t have much weight behind it. It doesn’t take a genius to make a long list of things that are natural but that we consider immoral. Remember, one of Darwin’s basic ideas was that the strong exploit the weak in order to survive, whether we are talking about genes, monkeys, or people. So unless you are ready to argue that murder is morally justified because it is natural, you shouldn’t say the same about eating meat.

From my experience, it seems that these are really the only two arguments for the carnivorous diet. I don’t think that either of them are compelling arguments, and although that does not yet mean that we should be vegetarians, I hope that this will make the future discussion more interesting.

"Is It Wrong to Eat Meat?," Part II

Christians, Jews, and even Muslims in a limited way all accept the truth (whether literal or metaphorical) of Genesis, and therefore they are particularly scandalized by Christians like me who question meat-eating on moral grounds. “After all,” they say, “Genesis tells us that God created animals for food.” Well, that turns out to be false. God first created plants, then animals, and then people (at least in the Genesis 1 version). God then told Adam and Eve about the relationship of those three segments of the created order: “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of the earth…You shall have them for food” (v. 29). Notice that at this point humans were not permitted to eat animals – only plants. Surprisingly, God gave the same diet to land and air animals: “And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens…I have given every green plant for food” (v. 30).

So plants were to be eaten by humans and animals, and humans and animals were not supposed to eat each other. This means that the ideal Judeo-Islamic-Christian diet is vegetarian, since Genesis is thought to describe an ideal set of living conditions and God issued a strict vegetarian diet in the Garden. So it seems false that God’s original intention for animals was as sustenance for people. God seemed to think that people would do best by just sticking to plants.

Now, in Genesis 9:2-3, God finally permitted Noah and his family to eat animals. So it’s clear that killing animals is not wrong, at least not in the same way that killing people is wrong. But that does not imply that there are no moral considerations to make when considering diet. Remember, this change happened after the Fall – that is, after things got messed up. So it is clear to me that the carnivorous diet is still not the ideal; the ideal diet is given in the Garden. And of course, being permitted to do something is not the same as it being ideal, as Paul points out. Just because something is permitted does not mean that it is beneficial. There are plenty of good reasons for a Christian to make a moral decision about an issue that is permissible, but not ideal. This is called conviction.