Should You Eat Meat?

Boring rant

I read Sapiens cos everyone’s talking about it.

(I also read it’s sequel— homo Deus)

The last thing I expected from these (somewhat history) books was questioning meat eating.

I’ll get to that, but first, why is killing humans bad?

Society accepts the killing of humans as morally wrong and something punishable by law.

Largely society has an agreement not to kill humans, not to kill each other.

Partly because of religious foundations(Christianity) which say humans are made in the image of gods.

And from a secular viewpoint, we don’t kill to maintain order and prevent chaos.

So is killing animals wrong?

Well, it doesn’t create chaos for us, because they can’t really protest.

But just because they can’t communicate is it alright morally?
What if we come in contact with a more intelligent species, will they treat us this way?

It begs several questions.

We don’t call lions bad for eating meat, it’s only their natural design.

From an evolutionary viewpoint, our diet is primarily meat. Killing of animals for food can be considered natural.

Well not the way humans do it, we’ve industrialized it a bit much.

How we do it isn’t how evolution meant us to do it.

Evolution didn’t mean for us to catch tons and tons of fishing, making them go extinct or endangered. Or breed domestic animals (like pigs, cattle, goats, and sheep) so much that their weight is more than the weight of every other animal combined.

But other than just ruining ecosystems and throwing natural balance out of order there are more problems.

Like, they have nervous systems that feel pain, very much like us.

Animal Suffering

In Sapiens I read about how humans have tortured domestic animals throughout history.

The dairy and food industries brutally torture cows.

Cows are also kept in boxes, sometimes so tiny they can’t even turn around.

Their muscles remain jelly-soft without the movement needed to strengthen their muscles so that the meat is nice and tender to eat.

Cows only give milk for a period after birth. So the calves are slaughtered shortly after birth to prevent them from getting any milk. In contrast, the mother is put on machines to suckle out all the milk.

Then after 60-120 days, the cow is made pregnant again and the cycle continues for up to five years after which it’s often slaughtered.

Pigs don’t have it any better.

To prevent them from roaming and sniffing around their eyes are gauged and noses are often mutilated.

Even pigs are social animals like us, but they’re isolated in boxes without being able to move around. Which is depressing.

But it’s the food chain and so we eat them.

But let’s say we were to naturally let pigs live on their own and the only way one was to get it was to hunt for it, would that make it fair?

Is it okay to kill animals if they don’t feel pain and live a happy life?

If we say yes to that, then painlessly killing humans after letting them live a happy life would be justified too wouldn’t it?

Because According to evolution we’re only as precious as pigs.

The only reason we don’t is that humans are our pack, our in-group.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I’m a meat eater, now contemplating whether to become a vegetarian or not. I didn’t think such a day would come when I see veganism as a viable option, but here I am. I think naturally we’re meant to eat meat. Meat is good for us. But I think the farming industry is wicked.

So is eating meat good or bad? I don’t even know.

That’s this week’s peek into my inner confusion.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on this matter.

I’ll see you next week. Bye.