A friend sent me this article from wikihow.com that lays out ten arguments a meat-eater can use when debating with a vegetarian. I agree with some of them, and others may be good against a raging irrational vegetarian.
Overall, though, I don’t think they are very convincing. Here are the ten arguments, and my thoughts about them:
#1 Question its effectiveness: One popular Utilitarian argument is that even if I, a single individual, were to stop eating meat, this would not reduce the number of animals killed at all. The meat market is far too large for the meat producers to register a single person’s consumption or lack thereof.
Bad argument. Why should I bother voting, when it is just one vote? Because by voting I support the ideal of everyone voting. By living your values with regard to what you eat (and everything else), you encourage all people to do the same. The fact that you are living your values will increase the probability that others will be exposed to information and reasons why they should be vegetarians. Having a growing number of people who are vegetarian will make it more “normal”.
#2 Don’t let emotional appeals sidetrack you. A vegetarian might ask ‘Well, how would you feel if you were slaughtered and eaten?’ How you would feel may not be comparable to how a lower life form feels.
Agreed. Can’t compare exactly, but can probably at least get an idea.
Similarly, using excessively graphic descriptions (‘misleading vividness’) to evoke a negative reaction is a fallacy.
‘Excessive’ is somewhat subjective. A video of cows being slaughters isn’t ‘misleading evidence’, but reality. If you react morally to such graphics, maybe you should treat that as an indication of what you should think about it? We are coddled by social norms to accept mass animal slaughtering and ignore whatever ‘silly’ feelings we get from it. It is fallacious to only appeal to negative reactions to make a decision (they may be ill-founded, like fear of spiders for example), but they can still count as evidence that should validly influence our views.
#3 Don’t let overly-broad generalizations stand.
Agree, of course.
You may be forced to admit that some farms or slaughterhouses treat the animals with unnecessary cruelty. But not all do.
I get the sense from the author that s/he thinks it’s a small portion of nasty slaughterhouses. I doubt that. Even if it’s a low percentage, wouldn’t we still want to get rid of them? “Forty-three percent of the world’s beef is raised on factory feedlots, and more than half of the world’s pork and poultry is raised on factory farms.” [http://www.worldwatch.org/node/1495]
There are plenty of ways to make sure you eat well treated animals. What if you just ate free-range chickens? Why isn’t that okay?
Animal rights arguments aside, I’m totally okay with that.
#4 Consider less extreme measures. This is related to previous step. Consider: It’s widely accepted that most Americans eat more meat than is healthful, but this does not mean the best option is to eat no meat at all.
Agreed. This is determined by health science. Eating too much meat is clearly bad. The middle-ground is less obvious.
What if we just ate half as much? Or a third? Having too much of something doesn’t mean you should have none; just that you should have less.
Again, animal rights aside, I have have no problem eating meat if it’s part of a healthy diet and lifestyle.
#5 Attack tenuous hypothetical arguments. Consider the point that the grain it takes to feed one cow can feed a hundred people. With all the starving people on the planet, it would make sense to have them eat grain and not meat. The problem with this statement is that those people aren’t starving because there isn’t enough food–they’re starving because they don’t have access to the food. When the vegetarian says ‘We could feed all the starving people with the ‘, respond with ‘but would we?’ One recent study found that half of all food in America goes to waste.”
If the vegetarian really thinks that by having grain left over because the cows don’t need it, and that we can just ship that overseas to solve hunger, then yes, they are being silly. But then again, if there was a way to get this food to people, wouldn’t it be incredibly obvious to eat less meat? If the author agreed to that, then why wouldn’t they want to at least try and see what happens, rather than shrug his shoulders and say, “meh, world hunger… probably wouldn’t work.” The scale and scope of the world hunger issue is huge. Failure to imagine helicopters dropping bags of cow-grains to starving people doesn’t mean we shouldn’t let the issue impact our food choices.
Not to mention the environmental impacts from growing grain period. Growing less, if it was possible, would very likely be a good thing overall in my eyes. Less fertilizers, less soil erosion, less green house gas emission, lower probability of E.coli entering drinking water etc.
If we had twice as much, wouldn’t we simply waste the increase too?
This argument is just awful. “But if our gas tanks were twice as large, wouldn’t we simply fill them up and spend 5 hours per tank drivingaimlessly to use up that extra gas?” I know I would…
#6 Use the “circle of life” argument. When you get down to it, most animals, including humans, are naturally suited for eating other animals. It is clearly possible to have a healthy diet without any meat,
Agreed. Though, the fact that we are able to eat other animals isn’t an argument that we ought to.
but it’s often a lot harder.
Kind of agree. Society is growing more ‘vegetarian-friendly’, but still anti-vegetarians seem to think that to be vegetarian you must struggle day in and day out to find sources of protein, cook all those vegetables, etc. I’ve found it pretty easy, you just have to be willing to try some different foods.
#7 Blow apart the animal rights argument. When a vegetarian claims that you’re violating animal rights, remember them that many researches can prove us that plants have some level of awareness of their environments. How can one argue about animal rights without knowing how much does a single plant can feel(or how much is a plant aware of what it feels) at all?
Uh.. we can be pretty darn certain that plants do not ‘feel’ pain in a way remotely similar to what a higher animal experiences. Moral dillema: if you were forced to choose between killing someone in a coma and someone alive and healthy, which would you choose? Or a rat vs a dolphin? Or a clam vs a monkey? There are obviously degrees of consciousness and ability to ‘experience’ pain. In this regard choosing a plant over a cow seems obvious to me.
Comparing the ‘conscious awareness’ of a plant to a cow is like comparing the technical complexity of a spoon and a space ship. (Maybe too strong of an analogy?)
#8 Point out their use of other animal products. Most vegetarians still use animal products in things like leather, glue, gelatin, and some pharmaceutic capsules. Question their hypocrisy in using some animal products despite claims to the contrary.
Depends on your motivations as a vegetarian. If you are trying to reduce impact by eating less (or no) meat, then yeah, you should at least consider using less glue, gelatin, etc. Just because you’re trying to save money doesn’t mean you should spend money on nothing, not even food. If the vegetarian places a lot of emphasis on the moral issues with eating meat, then they probably should be made aware of where animal products are in their day-to-day lives.
It’s usually about decreasing impact, not eliminating it. The only way to eliminate it is to kill yourself; not a fun option.
#9 Be holistic. Argue that human beings are the dominant species on the Planet Earth and that all of the Earth’s resources are at our disposal for our responsible use and enjoyment. Consider where humanity would be if trees were never cut down for their wood to be utilized in everything from the construction of homes and water vessels to the manufacturing of bookshelves and paper. The responsible thing to do is to ensure that future generations are able to be afforded all of the advantages and luxuries that we currently have access to.
Yeah, of course I agree. That’s why I’m vegetarian. Also, the idea that Earth’s resources are “at our disposal” is a dangerous ideal that must be handled with caution. Yes, we do need to use it responsibly.
#10 Describe the biological case for eating meat. If we were made to eat only plants, wouldn’t we have multiple stomachs, like cows? Our stomach’s production of hydrochloric acid, something not found in herbivores. HCL activates protein-splitting enzymes. Further, the human pancreas manufactures a full range of digestive enzymes to handle a wide variety of foods, both animal and vegetable.
I agree that you would be wrong to say that humans are not naturally meat eaters, or were not ‘made’ to eat meat. As far as I know we definitely did evolve to be able to eat it. However, an argument that we can eat meat is not an argument that, given our circumstances, weshould eat meat.
If we were made to eat only plants, wouldn’t we have multiple stomachs, like cows?
We’re not ‘made’ to do anything. Read up about how evolution works. Also, do all plant eaters have seven stomachs like cows? Don’t think so…
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Thoughts?
