Vegetarianism: hipster or high-minded?

As I made my daily jaunt down Broadway, en route to Chipotle, the words “Veg Out” caught the corner of my right eye. The plastered words on the once transparent panels of the storefront seemed to be pre-promoting a new vegetarian burger joint. I was jolted into a moment of question: Am I doing something wrong by enjoying my daily “fajita burrito with extra meat, thanks”?

I had thought of the whole animal treatment flare as a mere hipster trend, or as an excuse for self-conscious female teenagers to construct their daily diets around celery and carrots. But since the line at Chipotle was longer than usual, I had some time to sincerely consider if this gastro-fad made sense. Now it is explicit that vegetarianism serves as the ultimate endpoint for those who advocate the ethical treatment of animals. Surely few people in this debate disagree that non-human animals deserve humane treatment. But there is more to the question of farm animal treatment than mere self-interest on the part of the farmer. If modern methods of animal husbandry were the whole of the discussion, relatively few people would engage in the issue philosophically, though many would engage polemically. 

Vegetarians are rightly concerned with the treatment of animals, since it seems most vegetarians eat that way out of their own convictions and not because they believe that everyone else has a duty to do so. Though I am not speaking on behalf of the Peter Singers, Jonathan Safran Foers, or (recent abolitionist) Natalie Portmans of the world. A radical change in society’s eating habits would result in an unacceptable economical outcome—unemployment is already at an astronomical high, and cutting out the meat industry would be of no help. In areas of the world where the land is not arable, for example, people subsist on an animal-based diet. Should humans starve to death instead of harvesting animals? An extreme vegetarian might think so. Would a sane human not inflict suffering on their own species for selfish betterment?

Scientists have discovered how similar we are to animals genetically, but it would be quite paradoxical to pretend that with being an animal comes being void of brutality. If the shared biological status of animals and humans is correct and if this is to be explained further by Darwinian theory—the majority of animals prey on species inferior to them—then it is hard to see how any of these ethical concerns hits one very deeply. Humans are at the top of the Darwinian pyramid as far as intellect, but that does not equate to transcending brutality—it does equate to ceaseless over-contemplation of current circumstances that some times need not to be altered. Travis the chimp mangled Charla Nash without a hint of remorse over the suffering he caused. It is painfully obvious that humans and animals both have the capacity to suffer—this is a fatigued and insipid argument that many uneducated vegetarians rant about when debating the treatment of nonhumans. But they miss the crucial point that humans possess the ability to recognize what suffering is and its ethical importance.

Many, if not all people, can agree that progress toward more humane farming methods are a necessity. What will happen when we achieve this? Select farms are beginning to trend toward free ranging methods instead of caging—animals have a seemingly enjoyable life that can be longer than one sustained in the wild. Instead of being eaten to death, their demise consists of a swift decapitation, and the species is less prone to extinction than in the wild—all courtesy of the human. It seems a better alternative to me. Cattle, for example, are dependent on humans for survival. If they were rational beings with communication skills they would be screaming at humans, “keep eating hamburgers.”

Prevention of suffering is not the only good to be promoted. To think of only this is to miss the fact that there is more to morality than alleviation of suffering. There is also the promotion of other intrinsic moral excellences like keeping the meat industry afloat or allowing animals to live better lives on free-ranging farms than they would in the wild. But only humans can recognize any of this, and if this discussion is of any importance, then treating ourselves as if we humans were only trivially involved in self-consciousness and moral awareness would hardly seem an example of moral progress. And progress is the catalyst of the vegetarian argument after all—as many gastro-fadists argue, it is time to progress past the discrimination against animals just like we have transcended the prejudices of racism and sexism. But until a suitable alternative to allay animal suffering is feasible, I will continue to enjoy my routine burrito at Chipotle.

The author is a Columbia College freshman.