February 16, 2013
Carnism in the UK
I just got back from the UK where the big news story over the past week has been the public outrage about the fact that horse meat has been found masquerading as beef in a lot of their frozen foods, like lasagna, pizza, spaghetti sauce, etc. I find this to be a very ironic example of what vegan activist Dr. Melanie Joy calls “carnism.” Carnism points to the strange pathology of confining our emotional connection to animals and our compassion and concern for their wellbeing to certain species and not others. I recently interviewed her about her philosophy. You can watch it below:
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11 Comments
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Andrew Cohen is a spiritual teacher, cultural visionary, founder of EnlightenNext, and the author of 
Excellent description of the ideology behind those who do not wish to eat animals. Why is eating some animals OK and some other animals not OK because we like them or they are like our pets? Of course this is not rational and this is an interesting non-aggressive approach to point out to meat-eaters who often become so defensive on this issue. Everyone has a choice and, I like many others, know people I love who enjoy eating meat. Dr. Joy’s work and voice in the world [beautifully appropriate name by the way
] is a valuable contribution to this important and often emotive topic. Thank you x.
At the risk of being “slaughtered” by vegetarians and vegans with what I am about to ask, I do need to ask this question: I am already aware of studies that purport to show that plants, too, are sentient in that they experience pain. I believe consciousness is present in everything on the earth, human, animal, vegetable, mineral. Is something sentient only because it has eyes or does pain define sentience? If people who are seemingly congruent in their values and conduct were to discover conclusively that plants do indeed suffer when they are harvested, what would they do? Or, is it possible that as sentience evolves to ever higher levels of consciousness that man will evolve to live on light alone or something like that? I know there are people who already believe this. Even as Dr. Joy explains with tremendous clarity how belief works, she cannot extract herself from that equation. Implicit in the notion of evolution is the process of discovery which increases knowledge and awareness. Michael Pollard’s “The Botany of Desire” broaches the topic of plants adapting to humans, and humans adapting to them. I would suggest this may be the direction we’re heading in. I’m curious to know what vegetarians and vegans think about this.
Also, aren’t bacteria life forms as well and wouldn’t they also have some form of consciousness? When we drink water, aren’t we taking in bacteria and doesn’t our own gut flora selectively kill harmful bacteria or proliferate the bacteria it finds useful to survival? I guess I’m having trouble with the idea of sentience and its necessary and inherent limitation to our understanding through science as basis for rational arguments. We’re always so sure we know things until we discover something new that refutes it. I am not so sure that we’re really still not acknowledging our own beliefs as beliefs and not fact.
On the Sentient side of the question, Plant species as opposed to animals, leave seeds for the next generation to sprout while they are being harvested or even consumed. Think crops like Paddy, Wheat, Pulses or Plantain, Mango, Orange, Lemon etc., that germinate from the seeds / kernel that get leftover after the fruit is consumed. Plantain for instance, dies immediately after it yields its first crop of fruit and dies immediately after, leaving a sapling that sprouts by itself. If its fruits are not consumed, they rot live. Check out every plant that lands up on a vegetarian’s table, it lends itself to support the above premise besides complete absence of violent bloodshed. In effect, their harvest or consumption does not end their procreation, in a way, it enables it.
In the case of birds or animals, no bird or animal ever lends itself to procreate from its entrails and the very sight of revolt and bloodshed besides defiling of human body ( whose purpose is to experience the enlightened soul ) with corpses, is indeed condemnable. That makes it unfit for consumption. Left to live, they don’t rot unlike the Plantain.
I’m not quite following your reasoning here, and I’d like to throw some more questions out here. Regarding violent bloodshed, does a surgeon wielding a scalpel and slicing into a person perpetrate violent bloodshed? I would argue that it could be seen as a violent act to slice someone open without context. If the intention is to save a life by means of a surgical operation, it’s downright heroic. Yes, I’m sure there is some emotional numbing that goes on in order to accomplish this. If it is occurs on a battlefield, it could be seen as offensive or defensive depending on which side you were on, but nevertheless violent. Certainly, Hannibal Lecter’s actions would be seen by nearly everyone as pure violence.
Also, many animals eat other animals through violent bloodshed. Scavengers, on the other hand, still eat animals having committed no bloodshed whatsoever, perhaps not unlike someone who buys meat at a supermarket.
Now, taking your other point about plants reproducing, I wasn’t sure quite what you mean about rotting flesh. Humans, as well as all mammals and other red blooded creatures (you didn’t mention shellfish or seafood which are caught and killed without bloodshed specifically) all come from the planet Earth, just as plants do. As we and every animal die and rot, so do we feed this earth which provides soil in which to grow the vegetables. Are you seriously suggesting that you aren’t in some way ingesting the remains (indirectly) of mammals through the soil created through the centuries? This is all part of the circle of life.
Also, it is clear to me that humans have evolved to have tearing or canine teeth for a reason, and it’s not for corn on the cob. So far, this seems to be backed by science. http://www.nbcnews.com/id/49888012/ns/technology_and_science-science/#.USQmsmfJImw
I would ask you to consider the differences between sympathy, empathy and compassion (and they are different, compassion being the most difficult position to assume) and be clear from an emotional perspective what it is you are feeling and arguing to support regarding your beliefs. It is my contention that Dr. May, although she presented an emotionally coherent argument in favor of her position, I still see it as an emotional argument.
Having said all of this, I certainly appreciate everyone’s belief systems and encourage each individual to live congruently according to their beliefs and values. I believe you are quite satisfied with your lifestyle choice, and that’s as it should be. This is how each of us participates in assisting consciousness to know itself, through individuated experience.
A surgeon wielding a scalpel is attempting to fix something, seeking to extend a healthy life and cannot be compared with predatory instinct. That’s no argument.
Animals eating other animals don’t intellectually evolve or are not iterative as humans are, as opposed to humans that evolve every second based on experience. We make mistakes, realize it and correct through a process of iteration. Our ancestors have used stones as tools first, then graduated to metals as they refined their processes over time, just as they were eating flesh and later recognized the need to preserve and be compassionate using other healthy options they have. Animals preyed on other animals ever since they existed and they haven’t changed because they are not endowed with iterative intellect. The reason is structural. But your ancestors evolved from stone age to cyber age. Are you telling me the superior human intellect that is huristically tuned to learn from experience is comparable with that of a wild boar that merely exists…? Get real.
Except for a pair of canine teeth humans have, the others are flat and blunt ( meant to bite and break) unlike animals that have only sharp canines to tear open flesh. It establishes who is to eat what, if anything.
Compassion, empathy or sympathy are easily comparable to anger, lust, greed in that they are all fleeting emotional content that can switch back and forth, depending on the larger frame of mind in which it operates.
The goal of superior human intellect is to constantly evolve, based on reflections on mind from time to time, from an inferior position to a superior position – as in from the realm of emotion to experience to the transcendental supreme consciousness where the seer becomes one with the scene. But that enlightenment happens meta, above the realm of our five senses, and calls for deeper thinking about the larger pattern of universe of which we are just a minute speck.
That said, I see you using modern science to base your arguments on consciousness which won’t help beyond a point. Because it is the same science that tempts people to spend billions of dollars seeking to explore the origin of universe while staying right inside it – beating the simple logic that to see something (the universe), you need to stay outside it, not inside.
“Compassion, empathy or sympathy are easily comparable to anger, lust, greed in that they are all fleeting emotional content that can switch back and forth, depending on the larger frame of mind in which it operates.” Hmmm…..I have always believed that sympathy is definitely fleeting, while empathy is the beginning of true communion with the other, of seeing and realizing connectedness, while compassion is the meta state of being.
Compassion is fleeting emotional content. You have rendered me utterly speechless.
Jeanie, I believe you just hit the nail about this issue. Where do we stop this line of reasoning? Aren’t we enslaving and slaughtering plants and being empathetic just to those beings that are more like us? Is it “reasoning Ad absurdum”?
To me the value of Dr. Joy`s ideas lies more in the fact that we have (in our modern societies) a very low level of consciousness about everything we do day to day, animal consumption being just one of them. On the other hand (in my very humble opinion her ideas lack understanding about the “nature of nature” and the role we play in it. All animals consume other beings for their survival and we are animals, we evolved like this and this is our nature and I believe there is nothing to “satanize” about it. Of course as we increase our level of consciousness we (as a species) have to find better and less destructive ways to satisfy our needs and this will be achieved by first gaining understanding and consciousness about our actions and the options that lay ahead but never by being paranoid to the grade of feeling tortured by everything we do.
Thanks,Jeanie, for articulating the many possible levels of sentience! The questions you expressed are some of mine on this topic.
Anything that is perceived by your senses (that includes Mind, Ego and Intellect) can never be Meta, because all things sensual are fleeting. Compassion is something that is felt in the mind and is certainly fleeting. That as well explains why people covet pets like dogs and cat while they have no qualms in carving up fish, cow and sheep…!
I’m still listening to the video, however, on the face of the issue is the undeniable fact that we, as human beings are omnivores, not herbivores or carnivores. We have been eating meat, fish, eggs, honey, greens, berries and tubers for over a million and a half years approximately. Wheat didn’t even show up on the radar until about 11000 years ago and for the most part, did not become mainstream until 5000 years ago, corn I think 1500 years ago… we do not have two stomachs to digest it. We do have teeth that are designed for tearing meat. As human beings we are designed to eat meat, period. Although I understand and respect the choice of vegetarians and vegans to eat the way that they do for ethical reasons, I believe that if we only choose to eat meat that has been ethically raised and not boxed in, drugged up, tortured or wild meat and fish, we can still honour those ethics. I used to make the argument that people no longer needed to wear leather or fur to keep warm because we have synthetic fabrics that are able to do the job. Now, after understanding more completely what the environmental impact is of actually producing those fabrics, I have changed my tune. Wear deer skin if you have an objection to wearing skins from farmed animals. On the issue of carnism, which is what this topic is actually about, I would not eat a cow that was a person’s pet. I would also not eat a pig or a chicken who was a person’s domestic pet or one of the fish from their fish tank. It is not about the species for me. My issue has nothing to do with the species. I have two dogs who I adore. In China they eat dog meat and it horrifies me when I see the pictures of them hanging up and being sold for meat. That, however, has nothing at all to do with the species. It’s to do with my automatic inclination to think of that dog as a person’s domestic pet. If you hunted a wild dog and no, I don’t mean a domestic dog that was neglected and allowed to go wild, I mean wild, like as in a fox or wolf or dingo, etc. I would eat it. It isn’t someone’s pet. I might eat a wild horse, I’m not sure. If a person had a pet bear or a pet bison, I would not eat it. I’m not sure if I am making myself clear. Would I torture any of those animals or pump them full of hormones and antibiotics and not allow them to roam free or graze naturally on the food that THEY were designed to eat? Never. I think the real issue is not that we are eating meat, it is that we have stopped being conscious of the gift that the animal is providing to us. We all have to eat. Be grateful for the sacrifice that the animals have made to offer us the sustenance of their bodies. Soy products are estrogenetic and are almost exclusively GMO. Corn is almost all GMO. Too much of our food is GMO but grains seem to be the worst offenders. The focus should not be on boycotting the foods that our bodies are designed to eat and have been surviving on for over a million years, but on demanding organic produce, non-GMO foods, NON cruelly raised animals et al.
I am not bigoted against any animal that will allow my family or I to survive and be healthy. I AM bigoted against how these animals are being treated and the utter disrespect towards life.
And, as I said, regardless of the species, whether it be fish, lizard, frog, mammal or bird, if they have been domesticated for the purpose of being a beloved family pet, then I would not eat them. It would be unthinkable for THAT reason, not because of their species.
What about animal sacrifice in the old testament?