Guiltless Grill – Open Response to Maddox

May, 18, 2004

Maddox’s article attacks the vegetarians’ self-righteousness. He asserts that being a vegetarian is not really compatible with the values we preach for, because we also cause animals killing and pollution, like all humans. He is right. We do not save the world. However, I believe that the world is not divided into black and white, but to a diverse grayscale. One can aspire to be the brightest gray as possible.

When we compare the animals killed in the meat industry to the animals killed by combines in the wheat and soy fields, we can find several differences. First, the animals in the meat industry are born to live enslaved, suffer, and eventually get executed. The animals in the fields live almost naturally (they are after all near humans), and then sometimes get killed, but not deliberately, and do have a chance of survival. The field animals are not killed because of their born destiny and someone’s grid. They are killed in a war for survival. They try to steal our food, the food that the farmers work hard to raise, and get killed doing so. But they do live their life as free living beings. They are not slaves.

While it is true that thanks to the combine and the agricultural process, a vegetarian diet also causes death to animals, we have to remember that the animals raised for meat also eat grain. So our options are whether to eat the grain directly, or eat an animal that is fed with grain, doubling the crime. In my book, killing 20 is worse than killing 10, and killing 1000 is worse than killing 20. I say kill the fewest as possible.

Maddox’s response to the claim that we spend an enormous amount of grain grown to feed animals for slaughter is an insult to intelligence. So what if it’s another type of grain? Without those animals to feed, they’ll be able to grow a grain for humans in those fields. And if they can’t plant potatoes where they grow cows, they can at least raise cows for milk, chickens for eggs and sheep for wool.

The accusation regarding cases were combines aren’t used to harvest the food is ridiculous: “One of the methods they use to get rid of pests is to introduce a high level of predators for each particular prey, which wreaks all sorts of havoc on the natural balance of predator/prey populations”. This method was proven quite harmless, much cleaner than the chemical pesticides, and I am yet to hear about environmental hazards caused by this organic horticulture. This modifies the predator/prey balance in the fields locally, but does not create any havoc. What does create environmental disasters attempting to put animals in a place where they shouldn’t be in order to hunt them for sport or their fur, e.g. the rabbits in Australia and nutria in Israel.

The decent way for vegetarians, according to Maddox, is to grow our own food. However, even if I grow the food in my garden, I will need to make sure no other animal eats it, and might kill animals in order to secure my meals. Moreover, it is not only a matter of convenience. I have always stood against killing for luxuries, and for killing for survival. In order to maintain a diet that can keep me healthy and sustain a decent life expectancy, I need a diversity of products that I just can’t produce on my own. I am not a skilled farmer and chef that can make his own food. In addition, making my own food would force me to manage all my life around my garden, outcast me from society and thus neglect my influence potential on it. In order for the vegetarian vision to become true, the vegetarians have to be in the society so they can recruit. And the lifestyle they offer must be one that an average person can hold.

In contrast to the impossible vision of raising my own food and avoid harming animals for it, giving up meat is not a radical step, but does improve the world. This is something all of us can do and still enjoy good health and tasty diet. Hypocrisy? Yep, if trying to minimize the damage while keeping my lifestyle is hypocrisy.

This article is a response to "Guiltless grill? Is there another kind?", published in Maddox's webpage. It can be found here.

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