in some ways, it's simple. if we believe that killing is bad, violence is bad, especially to creatures that have nervous systems, then eating meat is not so good. if we had to kill the animals for every piece of meat we had, we probably wouldn't eat so much of it. of course our ancestors hunted and killed to survive - in fact, research shows that the reason our brains have evolved to be so large, could be due to the excess calories in these dead animals that could sustain our brain, this very energy intensive organ.
so isn't eating animals just a natural cycle of life? it depends if we are viewing it from a life-sustaining perspective or a life-enjoying perspective. we (referring to most of us in the developed world at least) are eating dead animals because their corpses taste good, not because we need them to survive. the traditional cycle of life was to survive and have offspring - now we're doing things way beyond what's necessary for survival, but we still refer to eating animals as "natural"? it was natural, no doubt. today? for one, most of the processed food is far from natural. necessary? no, at least not to the current extent.
all the ethical, environmental and spiritual matters aside, there are probably two main issues that got me on the road to becoming an aspiring vegetarian. (for my own personal reference, i'm having meat every 2 months or so).
the first issue is the nature of consciousness, and how different i am from an animal. am i at the top of the pyramid or am i in a entirely different universe? does the animal on my plate have (or had) consciousness, did it fear death, did it endure pain? after poring over books exploring artificial intelligence, recursive neurons, i am now of the view that consciousness is simply an emergent phenomenon. more neurons, more loops, more consciousness. so yes, a cow has rudimentary consciousness. it feels pain. it fears death.
the second issue is how much i value my enjoyment at the expense of others. this is different from being compassionate - that's way too grand and not appropriate for me. in short, i like to enjoy myself, but does it take away from others' enjoyment? if i make more money than someone else, he might make less as a result, but it's not exactly a zero-sum game and they're too many factors that come into play. it's not a black-and-white conclusion that i have directly been involved in taking away his things. so, i don't feel so bad. in the case of animals, now that i know they feel the things we do, albeit in a different and dulled way, taking their lives for my own personal enjoyment (or convenience) feels pretty direct.
do i feel that eating animals is wrong? honestly, i do not feel the pangs of conscience that some of my other more kindly friends feel. rather than feeling it's wrong, i know it's wrong. when i see a slab of bbq pork, i think about how tasty it is first, and then i think about the pig, and then i remember it might not be so good to enjoy the dead pig. so in my strange case, rational reasoning is how i got here.
years later, when i look back, i wonder, will i see this as a brief period of idealism when i tried to put interests of others above myself? or, is this just the start of a long, bumpy journey?
