My faithful reader Gabe recently sent me this article. It's called "In Defense of Meat Eaters." Naturally, I was interested.
Mark, the author of the blog, gives a compelling (and well-researched) argument about how humans evolved eating meat, and uses this, presumably, as a defense for modern-day meat eating. I've been hearing a lot about evolutionary stuff recently. Just yesterday, my boyfriend Eric told me about a girl in his class that used to be vegan but now follows a 'Paleo' diet, meaning she only eats things that were available to ancient man. I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean--is she hunting down sabertooth tigers? How are you supposed to know exactly what was available then anyway? As senseless as I think this is, it's interesting...sort of. It's more just something you would tell someone you're trying to pick up at a bar that's 'unique' about you. And I guess it could be kind of sexy, the whole 'primal' thing. Anyway...
The way Mark started the argument was a huge turn-off. Vegans are always stereotyped as being sentimentalists, and Mark makes the same accusation. If a vegan can control his or her palate for the sake of reason, fairness, and compassion, but an omnivore eats whatever he or she feels like at the moment, who is the sentimentalist? Some of the world's greatest thinkers were vegetarian, such as Albert Einstein and Mohandas Ghandi. Are they overemotional whiners?
From there on, however, Mark makes excellent points. I have to say that I don't know so much about the evolution of man, but he cites his sources and I find him credible. I respect his opinion in that sense.
However, is that really a defense for eating meat today? Ancient humans lived much shorter lives than we do today. Why on Earth should we ever follow their ways of doing things? Should we then abolish hospitals and modern medicine, televisions and credit cards? I doubt anyone would make the same argument that we should revert to ancient human methods for other modern necessities and conveniences in the same way they do about diet.
And, of course, there's no evidence that humans still need to eat meat. In fact, according to the American Dietetic Association, those who lead a meat-free life are at lower risks for certain cancers and other diseases, and tend to have lower body mass index. They also state that a vegetarian diet is completely nutritionally adequate. You can check out their entire position statement here.
I totally respect Mark's argument, and I wouldn't say I oppose him on the evolutionary facts he provides (though I do think the scientific community is quite divided over whether humans were meant to eat meat, based on the research I've done). However, I don't think there is any decent defense for modern, developed-world meat consumption. We can talk all we want about evolution, and people in developing countries (as Kingsolver did), but ultimately everyone is merely trying to justify that whatever they do is morally right. I don't think there can ever be a moral argument for meat consumption in the modern, developed world, whether that meat is from a factory farm or a small farm. There is something inherently wrong with needlessly killing other living beings. As judgmental as that sounds, just think about it for a second. All the justifications might stop making sense.
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