The Red and Black

Issue date: 6/24/08 Section: Opinions

TULSI PATEL

There was a relative uproar around campus this past school year when a student was accused of killing a number of puppies and leaving them in a dumpster. There was a similar stir when the Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick was found to be leading a dogfighting ring. Both times, the outrage was the same: this is cruelty to animals.

Cruelty to animals is a felony in 46 states, with penalties of up to 10 years in jail and $500,000 in fines.

We, as a society, are appalled when we hear about puppies being tortured or pandas being mistreated at zoos.

However, I doubt that most of the people who were offended by Vick think twice about animal suffering when they eat their hamburgers. But what is really the difference?

Why do we accept and support the meat industry when we are revolted by any other form of animal cruelty? There isn't much of a distinction to be made between eating meat and killing puppies.

In either case, the intent is the same: that of obtaining pleasure, whether it be a gustatory pleasure that you get when you chew down a steak, or some other perverse kind of pleasure that Vick got when he saw his dogs suffer.

Innumerable animals are bred in cages, brought up in restrictive conditions and slain everyday. And for what end? To feed humans who can easily be fed in multiple other ways that don't require harming innocent animals. Why create all this suffering when we can feed ourselves with foods that don't involve hurting a sentient being?

We don't even have to give up the good tastes; there are plenty of meat substitutes that, I'm told, taste very much like their meat counter parts. And, what's more, they're healthier!

I do not believe the excuse that a vegetarian diet doesn't provide all the nutrition humans need. I'm a long-time vegetarian, and I can't even remember the last time I was seriously sick. In fact, all the vegetarians I know are much healthier than most of the rest of the population. Eating is necessary for our survival, but killing animals for food is not only unnecessary but also harmful to everyone involved.

As humans, we tend to feel special and privileged. We have a conscience, we can tell right from wrong, we have emotions. None of the animals that we hurt daily can do all of these things, but they are still sentient beings. They can feel pain.

They may not have a sense of right and wrong, but they do run away when you try to hurt them. But eating them involves killing them inhumanely and immorally as a matter of daily fact.

We use our conscience and morality to put ourselves above these creatures, but what use is a conscience and a moral code when it doesn't stop us for treating other sentient beings cruelly? Are we really behaving morally if we choose to use our morality only when it pleases us?

I know that most people who eat meat don't actually kill the animals they eat. I have heard this explanation on numerous occasions as a justification for eating animals.

That is truly one of the most pathetic cases of denial I've ever heard to excuse doing what is clearly immoral. Getting someone else to do your dirty work doesn't make you a saint, it only makes you a miscreant who's in denial of his own cruelty.

Moreover, eating meat does no practical good whatsoever. Besides being completely immoral, the meat industry is energy inefficient, a major pollutant of water and the cause of a plethora of heart diseases.

And the government even subsidizes the meat industry, so taxpayers who do not wish to contribute to this depraved industry have no way not to. We could use all of these resources, not the least of which is our tax money, in at least a million better ways.

If not eating meat makes us both more moral and more resourceful, what stops one from adopting that lifestyle? When pain can be avoided, it ought to be avoided. Start ending the unnecessary suffering, become a vegetarian. The animals will love it if you do.

- Tulsi Patel is a junior from Kennesaw majoring in genetics.

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