I was walking through a market today and I saw cages crammed with dogs, cats, and goats. I also saw stalls which were selling the dogs once they had been cooked and quartered. It wasn’t pretty. But I do eat meat and I am aware that the meat I eat has generally come from animals living in no better conditions than these crammed cages and whatnot. My first reaction was to justify the situation, seeing dog served as food is certainly not something I would see at home, but I am a fair distance from home so I am not really in a position to judge or criticise. And it would also be quite arbitrary to sympathise with the cats and dogs rather than the pigs and cows. But I did sympathise. I have a cat at home which I love, so to see cats in cages repulses me. And now I’m faced with a moral dilemma. First, I don’t know exactly how I view animals anymore, are they to be merely subject to human will or do they deserve more? If they are subject to us then can I draw a line between pig and dog? If I were to refuse dog on account of the treatment I saw today then is it important to stay morally consistent with that and refuse to eat pig or chicken because I know they too suffer the same treatment? And so, would this not just lead to becoming vegetarian? Is vegetarianism the moral way?
those with no sympathy for celery in cages are heartless abominations.
-Imp
Sometimes thinking there is a morally correct answer inhibits compassion from manifesting. You’re doing fine, as far as I can tell. It’s a problem, and it doesn’t go away.
We tend to apply compassion more to things closer to us… first family, then clan, then nation, then species, and so on. Most moral “enlightenment” stresses an increase in scope of compassion. Why treat family better than friends, friends better than countrymen, aren’t we all human? And so forth. Jeremy Bentham asked the following on why we restrict compassion to humans:
"Is it the faculty of reason, or, perhaps, the faculty of discourse? But a full-grown horse or dog is beyond comparison a more rational, as well as a more conversable animal, than an infant of a day, or a week, or even a month, old. But suppose the case were otherwise, what would it avail? the question is not, Can they reason? nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer? "
We know that physical pain is tied in to our nerve system, so a logical cut-off point on that criterion would be to not eat things with nerves - vegetarianism. In any case, pigs and sheep are phylogenetically as close to humans as dogs and cats are. The line between pig and dog is cultural, as you saw, and as offended your sensibilities.
Often a line is drawn between working animals (like dogs and horses) and food animals (pigs, sheep, goats)… but not by all cultures. You don’t need to go to Asia to find horse being eaten, that happens in Europe (although more in Latin than Germanic countries). And I think that most people would agree there is a moral difference between an animal that is kept in relatively natural, stress-free conditions and one that is kept in a cage and forcefed meal.
“Is it important to stay morally consistent?” Important to whom?
In all honesty I cannot say that I’ve felt too compromised in my habits to turn vegetarian and so I will continue to eat meat. But I do think that although I eat meat, and animals have to be killed for me to do so I am still able to criticise the conditions that these animals have to live through. And having animals stuffed into cages, or force fed in farms isn’t something that should be tolerated. I remember when I was back home in the UK there was a growing awareness of the conditions the animals we ate lived in and I guess this will, in time, lead to improved regulations regarding this. But it does seem in general here (korea) that there is a distinct lack of animal rights awareness. What we eat is irrelevant (to a degree) but how we treat the animals beforehand is relevant. They should not suffer.
in a way, this is not really pertinent at all to the thread but it reminds of something that i always debate with people and see clearly in my own mind.
there is so much waste in this country. i am now talking about food. we blatantly throw so much away. i utterly refuse to waste any food. i do not put on my plate what i will not eat and will not buy what i would allow to go bad.
there are so many people in the world that go hungry and that are really starving. i realize that my not wasting this food will not put food into the mouths of others and will not solve the problem of world hunger but i utterly refuse to waste food when there are so many going hungry. have you ever seen the food in restaurants that gets thrown away, what is left on the people’s plates? can you image how many people could be fed with the enormous amount of food that we throw away? people laugh at me because of this - it makes no sense they say. but somehow it makes all the sense in the world to me.
As Samuel L. Jackson said in Pulp Fiction, a dog’s got character. The main cause of your reaction, which you probably know yourself, is cultural. Similar probably to a Hindu’s reaction to walking round a slaughter house, albeit we don’t worship dogs.
I generally see it as acceptable to eat meat. Yes I could survive with out it, but a balanced diet, including meat, is healthier. The society I live in, the most readily available meat is cow, sheep, and pig. Other societies it’s dog and cat. But that said, I would eat a cat if it were an option and it tasted good.
I do agree though that deliberately causing harm to an animal, whether it’s to be eaten or not, is wrong. Obviously the final act of killing the animal will cause pain, but until that point what purpose does it have to treat an animal in a harmful way? That doesn’t mean we should give cows caviar and massages every day, but equally we shouldn’t stuff four cows into a space suitable for one.
And the difference between killing, painfully (yes, they do feel the pain of the hook), a fish, differ from the painful killing of a carrot? Ripping it from the ground, leaving it to take a long time to die from dehydration, starvation, etc… Pain has been long known to register with ‘flora’.
Aren’t all ‘distinctions’ arbitrary, pragmatic, self-validating?
I don’t think that the starving will waste time ‘moralizing’ about the dinner before him! At least not until sated.
‘Morality’ is the drawing of that arbitrary (according to one’s psychological and emotional needs; ego) distinction; us vs them; subject vs object. We draw the line and solidly declare “that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!!!” (Self validation/rationalisation)
Flora respond to outside stimuli but they lack a nervous system. That is generally the sine qua non when it comes to vegitarianism. In many cases, it is a developed CNS as opposed to either an undeveloped CNS or just a PNS.
Jains, on the other hand, don’t make that distinction and will only eat things that are already dead.
There is plenty of evidence that they feel pain. That knowledge is all that is necessary to include them with cows and chickens. They all feel pain. They are all Conecious Perspectives. They are all aware of themselves and environment. Hell, plants have even provided evidence that they can ‘feel’ our ‘intentions’ (such as “I am going to break your branch!”) and respond. And share the response with other flora in the vicinity. Your ‘nervous system’ is arbitrary. Whether they have a ‘nervous ststem’ that matches your particular model, is irrelevent. They ‘respond’, and that lets them in the door as far as I am concerned.
You cannot evade the ‘karma’ with justifications and arbitrary distinctions.
As i said, egoic self-justification, rationalization.
More of the same…
Yet, even Jains kill, and (if not in their egoic blindness/denial) must face the ‘karma’. No one escapes.
Once faced with (aware of) this impenetrable ‘spiritual’ dilemna, one cannot return to the comfort of ignorance. There will be suffering and conflict, or there will find a path through the pain of accepting your role in the deaths of multitudes of beings (of whatever size or shape or color or species or…). What a horror to face; with no excuses, no fingers to point, no dissembling, no denying. Where to go? What to do? Time, perhaps for another ‘chapter’ in our personal evolution?
The bible does offer a (model) solution to the dilemna, it councels that it makes no difference what you eat, just eat it mindfully (respect; pay attention), with ‘prayer’ and thanksgiving.
The only real problem I have with livestock being so closely quartered is the health of the meat. Disease is easily spread in such cages. Most that do so here in the US make sure there is no disease Ok they are supposed to. We have inspectors go to these animal factories to inspect the health of animals, Ok they are supposed to do so but, there is a severe lack of inspectors. Apparently that job is not highly sought after( wonder why 
). Oh and being underfunded does not help either.
Cramming livestock into too small of spaces is often the only feasable way to make a profit. Free ranging just does not feed the masses or the demand. I have 4 goats that have a 1/4 acre we are expanding that acre to a full acre so that we can have a herd of goats for meat milk and biological lawn mowers and weedeaters. I can’t eat these first four boys though. they are too trusting of me. that would be morally wrong. Now once they reproduce I have no issue with munching their occasional kid.
That’s senseless - if demand is too high, then surely the price is too low? Why is it so low? Because animals are kept in too small a space. So that’s the only way to make a profit.
If animals were kept in less cruel conditions, the price would be higher. Beef isn’t a fundamental human right, and it has no nutrients that can’t be found elsewhere. Chuck has to pay more for his Friday night steak.
I believe that intentionally causing unnecessary harm to innocent, uninformed, and unconsenting sentient recipients, irrespective of their race, rank, or species, is prima facie morally wrong. The prima facie clause leaves open the possibility of conditions under which the wrongness of causing harm can be overridden. Some overriding examples would include (i) self-defense, (ii) the inability to meet basic nutritional needs on a meatless diet, (iii) irremedible scarcity of alternative food sources, (iv) you’re an Inuit and need to wear fur.
That said, I don’t think that the principle I have outlined imposes unreasonable moral demands on the majority of people residing in developed countries. It would, of course, deprive them of a dietary preference–and for many, the thought of such a loss is enough to motivate a rejection of the principle. In other words, most people would rather accept the routine and systematic destruction of sentient beings, whose welfare interests are essentially similar to our own, than sustain a negligible dietary sacrifice. We’re such compassionate moral agents, aren’t we?
Accepting this - the debate then moves to what constitutes “unconsenting sentient recipients” or which animals are sentient I guess?
kp
This is a discussion we can have. I draw the line at sentience because sentient beings have interests of a cognitively experiential sort (as opposed to the kind of interests that, say, a truck would have), and the possession of such welfare interests is the necessary and sufficient condition for membership in the moral community. The most widely-accepted indicator of sentience in a particular species, according to the findings of behaviorial ethologists specializing in animal cognition, is the capacity to experience pain and suffering. Indeed, the majority of animals we consume are sentient on this criterion: cows, pigs, chickens, and ducks, as well as those who serve as companion pets: dogs, cats, birds, etc. Nonhuman animals, like humans, can be harmed, pure and simple.
The inevitable question, of course, is where we draw the species-line with respect to sentience. “Are insects sentient?” is the most common question asked in discussions like these. Are insects conscious beings with minds that experience pain and pleasure? I do not know. But the fact that I do not know exactly where to draw the line, or perhaps find drawing the line difficult, does not relieve me of the obligation to draw the line somewhere or allow me to use animals as I please. Although I may not know whether insects are sentient, I do know that cows, pigs, chickens, chimpanzees, horses, deer, dogs, cats, and mice are sentient. Indeed, it is now widely accepted that fish are sentient. So the fact that I do not know on what side of the line to place insects does not relieve me of my moral obligation to the animals whom I do know are sentient.
This is a very important point to grasp. Why? Well, as a general matter, the “insect-question” is intended to demonstrate that if we do not know where to draw the line in a matter of morality, or if line drawing is difficult, then we ought not to draw the line anywhere. This form of reasoning is invalid. Consider the following example. There is a great deal of disagreement about the scope and extent of human rights. Some people argue that health care and education are fundamental rights that a civilized government should provide to everyone; some people argue that health care and education are commodities like any other, not the subject of rights, and that people ought to pay for them. But we would, I suspect, all agree that whatever our disagreements about human rights–however unsure we are of where to draw the line–we most certainly agree, for instance, that genocide is morally wrong. We do not say that it is morally acceptable to kill off entire populations because we may disagree over whether humans are entitled to health care. Similarly, our uncertainty or disagreement regarding the sentience of insects is no license to ignore the interests of chimpanzees, cows, pigs, chickens, and other animals whom we do know are sentient.
If you have nerves and even a hint of a type of brain you experiance pain. That is not sentience. Plants by that standard experience pain and so must be sentient. Food animals are not developed for intelligence they have been bred and bred and bred for meat. The brains within function in order for them to eat and drink. Emotions do not mean sentience. If it did then there would be no carnivores or omnivores. Those types of creatures would have developed an empathy for their food animals. I figure I will stick by Mother nature’s side and side with edible meat. If its good enough for my fellow omnivores then its good enough for me.
The difference between the animal and the plant involves sentience. That is, nonhumans—or at least the ones we routinely exploit—are clearly conscious of sense perceptions. Sentient beings have minds; they have preferences, desires, or wants. This is not to say that animal minds are like human minds. For example, the minds of humans, who use symbolic language to navigate their world, may be very different from the minds of bats, who use echolocation to navigate theirs. It is difficult to know. But it is irrelevant; the human and the bat are both sentient. They are both the sorts of beings who have interests; they both have preferences, desires, or wants. The human and the bat may think differently about those interests, but there can be no serious doubt that both have interests, including an interest in avoiding pain and suffering.
Plants are qualitatively different from humans and sentient nonhumans in that plants are certainly alive but they are not sentient. Plants do not have interests. There is nothing that a plant desires, or wants, or prefers because there is no mind there to engage in these cognitive activities. When we say that a plant “needs” or “wants” water, we are no more making a statement about the mental status of the plant than we are when we say that a car engine “needs” or “wants” oil. It may be in my interest to put oil in my car. But it is not in my car’s interest; my car has no interests.
A plant may respond to sunlight and other stimuli but that does not mean the plant is sentient. If I run an electrical current through a wire attached to a bell, the bell rings. But that does not mean that the bell is sentient. Plants do not have nervous systems, benzodiazepine receptors, or any of the characteristics that we identify with sentience. And this all makes scientific sense. Why would plants evolve the ability to be sentient when they cannot do anything in response to an act that damages them? Pain is an evolutionary avoidance-mechanism that compels the organism to evade aversive stimuli. If you touch a flame to a plant, the plant cannot run away; it stays right where it is and burns. If you touch a flame to a dog, the dog does exactly what you would do—cries in pain and tries to get away from the flame. Sentience is a characteristic that has evolved in certain beings to enable them to survive by escaping from a noxious stimulus. Sentience would serve no purpose for a plant; plants cannot “escape.”
So let’s not delude ourselves: few people really think that plants are the same as sentient nonhumans. If I ate your tomato and your dog, you would not regard these as morally similar acts. As far as we know, plants are not sentient. They are not conscious and able to experience pain. Plants do not have central nervous systems, endorphins, receptors or benzodiazepines, or any other indications of sentience. Plants do not have interests, animals do.
Lastly, if you are still prepared to deny that plants don’t experience pain, even after having read all this, consider: much plant matter can be eaten without killing anything: most vegetarian fare consists of the fruits and flowers of plants which are not killed or are harvested at the end of annual life cycles.
As I see it, there are two types of “rights holders” in a human social context. The first are considered to have rights by virtue of their perceived equality with other members of the social context. Individuals analogize themselves with other individuals,finding them sufficiently “alike” to eachother, and with enough of these connections a social context emerges in the first place. Human societies can’t exist without at least two human beings. Cats can’t form human societies on their own nor dogs. Let’s call these types of right -holders “derived” rights holders, i.e. rights are derived from participation in a social context by members who analogize themselves to other members.
But there’s a second type of right holder. This type is brought into the social context by the actions of the dervied rights holders collectively, in such a way that the derived rights holders as a community and a society owe some form of obligation to them. Derived rights holders do not liken themselves to these creatures or entities completely, but still allow them to partake to some degree of the benefits normally accorded to derived rights holders. Domestic pets or domestic farm animals would be a good example of this second type of rights holder in the American and Europen social contexts. Over the course of 10,000 years human societies have crafted these creatures from wild animals to species whose very existence was built around human societies. This creates some set of moral obligations that derived rights holders must protect, but not all rights that derived rights holders possess. We can call these “conferred” rights holders.
In American society, the analogical reasoning that underpins “derived rights holder” membership is that all human members are morally equal and thus it purports to extend such rights to human members in general. In less democratic societies fewer human members are considered to have derived rights and other humans were actually considered to have conferred rights. In absolute monarchies there was but one derived rights holder who analogized himself with the power of God on Earth.
Of course, this also means that the set of conferred rights holders in a society may also vary, since the extent to which such a right holder is considered to participate in the social context is based on the level of responsibility that society has in brining these members into their society. Dogs have more conferred rights in an American society than in many Muslim countries. Muslim countries shun dogs entirely and consider them among the most despicable of life forms. Even though humanity as a whole made dogs who they are, Muslim countries want no part of that obligation.
All of the above is a descriptive rather than prescriptive explanation of holders of rights in a society. But that’s not to say that there aren’t certain judgments that can’t be made about what is a more moral approach to who should be considered conferred rights holders and who should be considered derived.
But now let’s take this all down to the question of animal rights. Can the level of “likening” between animals and humans in a society be such that they can be considered derived rights holders? I don’t think that will ever happen as there is no way a dog or a cat can participate in human society the same way we can. So dogs and cats are at best conferred rights holders, which means we will always play some form of stewardship role in their lives. After all, humanity as a whole made them who they are.
So although their existence depends upon us, that doesn’t mean we can do whatever we want with them. Because we fashioned them, we also have some obligation toward them, since while the likening of humans to domestic pets is not complete, there are aspsects there that are analogous. We liken their responses to us as similar to we loving other humans, we analogize their feelings of pain to our own, they hunger like us, they perform tasks for us to enrich our own lives . . . all this to me necessarily implies some degree of obligation. The question is how much.
Unfortunately, this is not so much an answer to your question but a way of framing it in a way that makes sense with how morality works. By the reactions you have had, your sense of what should be conferred to a domestic pet or farm animal from your society clashes with the sense another society has. In turn, there are others who see the conferred rights of domestic farm animals to be to such an extent that they think it wrong to consume their flesh. Who is right in all this?
I think there is some rules of thumb to coming to that conclusion, at least for farm animals and vegeterianism. First, it is undeniable that many domestic farm animals are who they are because of the actions humans have taken to prepare them for food consumption. It is difficult to get around that fact. Therefore, I don’t think your empathy can logically lead you to a vegeterian lifestyle. That’s what they’ve been genetically engieneered to be (albeit the genetic engineering took 10,000 years). However, there is a certain obligation from our having done this, and an obligation to the creature as an animal whose original origins were the wild. Undue pain and suffering should be avoided, and acting out on animals purely for cruelty is wrong. That’s where the likening of animal suffering to human suffering is valid. But eating animals cannot reasonably be likened, in my view, to cannibalism.
Could you elaborate on what you mean by undue pain and suffering, and why it should be avoided? These are two crucial points to consider. This clarification would be helpful because it’s not clear from your post whether you are advocating ethical vegetarianism or “happy meat.”
Yea, I dont abuse my animals and I try to kill them quickly before I eat them. We are all food for each other.