Abstract
I argue that many philosophical arguments for veganism underestimate what is at stake for humans who give up eating animal products. By saying all that’s at stake for humans is taste and characterizing taste in simplistic terms, they underestimate the reasonable resistance that arguments for veganism will meet. Taste, they believe, is trivial. Omnivores, particular those that I label “meaningful omnivores,” disagree. They believe that eating meat provides a more meaningful meal, though just how this works proves elusive. Meaningful omnivores could find little in the philosophical literature to help them clarify and support their position until recently. A few philosophers have argued that our culinary practices involve something more significant than taste. I categorize these arguments into three kinds. They either argue that culinary practices are a form of artistic achievement, that our diet forms part of our identity, or that a specific diet facilitates honest engagement with the world. Each of these arguments connects some aspect of our culinary practices to living a meaningful life. I examine each argument to see if it can defend the meaningful omnivore’s position. In the end, I conclude that it cannot. Nonetheless, this argument has significant implications for the animal welfare movement. Given the intense suffering caused by contemporary animal agriculture, concern for meaning is not sufficient to justify eating meat and often dairy. Concern for meaning does, however, require that we look for ways to preserve and extend culinary traditions while making them more humane.
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Notes
DeGrazia (2009) draws a useful distinction between factory farms and family farms, which I’m using here (150–153).
Davis (2003) argues that a diet including the flesh of large herbivores will cause fewer animal deaths than a vegan diet; however, Andy Lamey raises some serious objections to his argument. While meaningful omnivores often appeal to arguments like Davis’s, I interpret them as offering reasons that eating meat is permissible, thereby removing a significant objection to the meaningful omnivore’s position. Davis, however, argues that eating large herbivores is morally required regardless of whether we accept the meaningful omnivore’s argument or not.
Carolyn Korsmeyer offers an interesting account of this history (Chap. 1 and 2).
From a historical point of view, African-American cooks has offered many more significant contributions. In fact, the entry on “African American Foodways” in The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture doesn’t mention fried chicken at all.
Michael Pollan dismissively describes moral veganism as “parochial,” “urban,” and he describes it’s advocates as people who have “lost contact with the natural world” (“Animal’s Place”).
Thanks to an anonymous reviewer for this journal for pointing out this possibility.
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Acknowledgments
I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers of an earlier version of this paper for their helpful comments.
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Ciocchetti, C. Veganism and Living Well. J Agric Environ Ethics 25, 405–417 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10806-011-9307-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10806-011-9307-5