Why I am a Vegetarian

I pride myself in being rational about things – or at least trying to be rational. That philosophy informs the way I view the world, why I don’t believe in the Supernatural and much else besides. However, deep down my reasons for being a veggie are more emotional than rational.

This is the second time I’ve been a vegetarian. The first time lasted about six months. So far this time I’ve been meat-free for about 8-9 years. My family have never been what I would call big meat-eaters. We never had meat with every meal. Probably in the early days it was because we just couldn’t afford it. Later I guess it was a Sunday treat but even then meat was never a big thing in our lives.

What probably started me off as a long term veggie was seeing a Sunday roast defrosting in my Mothers kitchen. As it defrosted it started leaking blood into the kitchen sink and made me realise just what we were about to eat. It turned my stomach and I informed my Mother that I wouldn’t be having any roast that day. After that I couldn’t look at meat in quite the same way. It was as if something had shifted in my mind enabling me to see the trade in animals in a new light.

Animal welfare issues certainly had an impact on my early vegetarianism. They way we treat or food animals is often deeply disturbing and I think that most people are in real denial about the whole issue. That’s why meat is often packaged not to look like lumps of dead flesh. That’s why meat is often pre-prepared so that people don’t have to get their hands dirty and are reminded that the creature they are about to eat was (fairly recently) a living, breathing creature.

The other issue that informed my growing revulsion with meat eating was that of health. I’ve lost count of the number of health scares associated with modern farming practices. The big one for a lot of people was a BSE crisis of course where the disturbing practice of feeding herbivores their dead brethren came to light. The long term effect of this practice on the human population is still unknown.

Stopping eating meat has been pretty easy for me. At the time most of my friend were veggies as was my girlfriend – though I subsequently found out she ate fish from time to time. My Mother had some difficulty understanding my new dietary requirements but after a few misunderstandings adapted to the idea. The range of vegetarian food in the supermarkets helped too of course. I got some fairly gentle ribbing from my meat-eating friends but nothing I couldn’t handle.

I can’t really envisage ever going back to eating meat. Not without a radical shift in my beliefs anyway. Obviously if it was a matter of life and death my choice not to eat meat would come second but apart from that…. It’s strange actually that the longer I’m a vegetarian the more the idea of eating meat disgusts me. I’m not entirely clear why that is so. As I said earlier my vegetarianism is based far more on emotion than on reason. Why that is so I’ve yet to determine.

Though I do feel deeply about the issue I’m certainly not a ‘fundamentalist’ about it. Though I would not cook meat in my house I’ve had no objections to people ordering meat-based pizza during some of the get-togethers I’ve held here. Likewise I’ve been to BBQ’s at peoples houses where the provided a separate BBQ for the attending veggies. I have no problem sitting next to meat-eaters in restaurants and tend to keep my views to myself – unless asked. Funnily my vegetarianism was questioned some time ago when I mentioned that I had a cat. Apparently such a thing invalidated me being a veggie. Sure my cat was a meat eater but it’s not like she had any choice in the matter. Cats need a meat based diet to live. Unlike dogs (which are omnivorous like ourselves) cats are true carnivores and need meat to remain healthy. I know dogs can live quite happily on a vegetarian diet but personally I wouldn’t seek to impose my beliefs onto my pets even if I could. I do not expect friends and family members to hold my views on the subject nor would I even think of cutting them out of my life because of their dietary habits. That’s just silly.

Reading back I’m not sure that I’ve explained myself very well. Maybe it’s because I’m trying to rationalise something which, at least for me, isn’t all that rational. Part of an explanation is possibly a ‘leakage’ of one of my philosophical beliefs about the human realm into the animal one. I believe that people are and should be treated as ends in themselves and not as a means to an end. That means we shouldn’t be using other people to get what we want out of life, that other people should be treated with more respect than that. Likewise I’m increasing coming to the opinion that we shouldn’t be treating animals as objects for our own exclusive use, that just because we can feed them and then eat them doesn’t make it right that we can do so.

As I said in the previous veggie post I never expected this ‘argument’ to be logical, coherent or rational. It does feel very much like a work in progress still. Ask me again in ten years when I’ve had a chance to think about it a bit more.