What do I tell people who think that eating meat is not in line with the non-aggression principle?
I’m a vegetarian myself, though I’ve never considered that part of my moral code. I do it because a meatless diet has made me healthier. But these people argue that, since animals have to be killed for food, if you eat meat, you’re “encouraging” aggression against animals. Please enlighten me. Tell me what you think. My roommate is libertarian and vegan, and she believes eating animals violates the non-aggression axiom.
when people eat meat they aren’t just “encouraging” the mistreatment and slaughter of animals (which i think is pretty bad in itself), they’re actively engaging in a system that profits from the death and, often, torture of animals. if this is permitted by the non-aggression axiom, then it seems like a pretty aggressive principle of non-aggression.
a lot of people like to think that humans are different from other animals in an essential way. we are more “intelligent” than most, if not all, known organisms, but why does that mean it’s okay to kill those less “intelligent”? “well, animals eat other animals too,” i often hear, but this hardly helps the original point that humans are somehow more special than other animals (if in no way other than that the NAP applies to them and not other animals). furthermore, if intelligence is to act as this essential difference between humans and other animals, why reject a healthy, cruelty free, and delicious eating preference (remember, that’s all this is guys; it’s just an eating preference) made possible by human ingenuity?
now, if we forget axioms and other rationalizations people offer for eating meat (i already have), it boils down to people just not wanting to not eat meat. it’s something that they like, and they’d rather not go without it. fine. but don’t cloak this [revolting] preference in the smokey veils of morality or ideology. the same goes for the faithful of all Dieties.
