Look, I get why people go vegan. I really do. Factory farming is awful, no argument there.
But let me give you a real scenario. My grandfather raises a dozen cows on his farm in Vermont. They graze on grass all summer, get hay in winter, and live a pretty good life by any standard. When one of them gets slaughtered, it's quick and done right there on the farm. That cow had a better life than most wild animals, honestly.
Now, is eating that cow really morally wrong? I don't think so. The utilitarian calculus doesn't add up — the cow had a good life and a painless death, and my family gets nutrition from it. From a virtue ethics standpoint, there's nothing cruel about respecting an animal's life while also using it for food. It's part of nature.
The problem isn't meat eating itself. It's industrial farming. So let's fix that instead of pretending all meat is the same.
03:30 PM