Can vegetarianism change the world?

November 3, 1999
Issue 

By Ema Corro and Marina Carman

Many people the world over make a choice not to eat meat — because they don't like it, because it makes them feel sick or because they can't afford it. While not all vegetarians hold this view, some argue that vegetarianism is the only environmentally justifiable and "moral" choice. While the destruction caused by the meat industry and unnecessary cruelty to animals are abhorrent to most people, is political vegetarianism the way to change the world?

Environmental destruction

A main argument for political vegetarianism is that meat production harms the environment. This is true.

Under capitalism, meat production uses excessive resources and causes pollution. In an article in the University of Tasmania newspaper Togatus, Rodney William points out:

"Ten percent of methane in Australia comes from our cows, each of which also put out 5,000 kg of shit (which then finds its way into our rivers). Deforestation is another reason to give up meat in that forests are cleared for grazing ... For example 50,000 pounds of tomatoes or 20,000 pounds of apples can be grown on an acre of land compared to 250 pounds of beef."

However, under capitalism, production of plant food also comes at great environmental cost. Pesticides used in vegetable production are just one example.

The individual choice not to eat meat is not going to solve environmental destruction, or world hunger. It is unlikely even to get rid of the meat industry.

In capitalism, decisions about production are made by corporations on the basis of what will make the most profit. People's needs, including the need for a sustainable environment, are secondary.

Capitalism creates the illusion that we have power through the choices we make as consumers. But our choices are limited by what is on offer. People choose to drive cars because public transport is inadequate. People choose to drink coffee out of disposable plastic cups because it is sold in disposable plastic cups.

While society is run in the interests of the owners of large corporations, the ability of people to "buy out" of the system is very limited. Some people may be able to live on solar power, organic vegies and a bike. But this is not an option available to the poor in the industrialised countries and particularly not in the Third World.

A strategy for change that involves such a small group of people is doomed to failure.

People can halt environmental destruction only by winning democratic control over production, not through consumer choice.

Individual or moral choice

The other main argument in favour of political vegetarianism is that it is a "moral" choice. One person choosing not to eat meat is an example to others, the argument goes. Eventually all people will catch on that this is the only choice for a humane society.

Asserting that being a vegetarian is a "moral" choice means asserting that it is the "right" choice for everyone. This assumption is fundamentally based on the idea that animals feel, think and deserve to be liberated just like people.

While animals can feel pain and show some emotion, consciousness is something specific to humans and is a product of society. This means that animals are not oppressed and cannot be liberated just like people.

Humans carry out labour — i.e. the use and creation of tools. This involves the ability to think about more than just what is happening at the moment, an ability animals don't have. When making or using a tool, a human thinks about the future ("What am I trying to do?"), the past ("What worked last time?") and about comparison.

Human society and language evolved from the ability to labour. Herd or pack animals group together instinctively to protect themselves from predators or to hunt more effectively. Human society involves a conscious division of labour.

Each member of the group is set a certain task in order for the whole group of people to get what they need to survive — instead of each person going out and trying to find their own food and shelter individually.

From this division of labour comes the necessity for language. Humans need to communicate with each other in order to divide up the tasks and do them more effectively.

From labour and society comes humans' awareness of the world around them, their ability to reflect on the past and set goals for the future, their self-consciousness (the ability to see themselves in relation to the rest of the world and society). These things are what makes humans — unlike animals — capable of changing not only their environment but also themselves. This is what makes humans different from animals.

Oppression, just like consciousness, is a product of society. If oppression just meant pain or being used for something, then all animals would not only be oppressed but oppressing each other. Do lions oppress zebras? Do germs oppress humans? Do cows ask for consent to sex?

Oppression is something that arises from class society, where one group of people oppresses another in order to maintain their status as the ruling class.

Animals cannot be "oppressed" or "liberated" in the same way as people. Liberation is not something that can be imposed or handed down from above. Rights must be fought for and won. Humans are capable of struggling against their oppression. Animals aren't.

Political vegetarianism is based on false assumptions, and is just as flawed as a strategy for social change as "buying green".

Real change

It is true that change is needed. Unnecessary cruelty to animals, and the environmental destruction perpetrated by the meat industry, should be opposed. But so should lots of other things.

It is understandable that many people feel horror at the sort of cruelty inflicted on animals. But the fact that the same, if not worse, is done by humans to each other shows that the problem is bigger than that.

In a world based on the drive for profit, in which the rich exploit the poor and will defend their interests by killing if necessary, people are slaughtered, maimed and experimented on.

For many young people, it is easier to confront and oppose cruelty to animals. There also seems to be a simpler solution: just advocate vegetarianism. This can often be a distraction from the need to work with others to change the way that human society works.

In a different sort of society, a socialist society where the majority of people decided what is produced and how, what would happen to meat-eating? We can only speculate, but undoubtedly there would be no meat industry like it functions today. People (in the First World at least) would probably eat less meat.

Much more research could be done on the dietary advantages and disadvantages of a vegetarian diet. Dietary supplements, or synthetic products, might replace meat. Environmentally sustainable and humane ways of farming and killing animals might be developed. For example, in Cuba pigs are used to dispose of municipal garbage and then their manure is used as fertiliser. Methane has also been used as a power source.

But eating meat would be an individual choice, because there is no moral imperative that would justify enforcing vegetarianism.

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