Background and context
Most men and women eat meat, although some (mostly in rich countries) eat much more than others. Almost all of this meat is the flesh of domesticated livestock - animals born and raised on farms to be killed and sold for their meat. People who make a choice never to eat meat are vegetarians, although there are different views about what this can mean. Some vegetarians eat fish if it has been caught in the wild, many will not eat flesh of any sort. Some people are vegans, choosing not to eat any animal product, include eggs and dairy (milk) foods such as cheese, butter and yoghurt. Vegans and many vegetarians also refuse to wear leather or fur because it comes from animals.Courtesy - Debatepedia.org
Proposition:
1. Pranay
2. Ninad - Opening
3. Rajat
4. Shashwat
5. Rushabh
Opposition:
1. Ishan
2. Tarun - Opening
3. Mohit
4. Sushant
5. Ravi
Opening - Ninad Kulkarni
This House: 10 rational people
Disallow: discourage
Non veg: Slaughter of livestock for food
1. Survival of the fittest does not apply: Animals killed for pleasure and entertainment. The argument that our dominance over land, air and water allows us to eat inferior beings is false. Eating animals is in no way essential to our survival. We do it for sport and hence abuse our position as guardians of the weak.
2. Species discrimination: Most animals are physically much superior to humans. Just because animals are intellectually inferior to us does not allow us to eat them. If that logic is extended then we should go ahead and eat intellectually inferior human beings too. For eg. A human baby is less intelligent then a chimpanzee. Yet chimp meat is a delicacy in some countries but the act of eating babies is nauseating and barbaric. Why the hypocrisy?
3. Barbaric and cruel treatment: The practice of breeding animals for slaughter is all the more disgusting. All the more these animals are often mistreated and genetically tampered with to make good food. This cheats them of the basic respect a living being deserves.
4. To make my point clearer let us consider that a race of machines/aliens much superior to humans decides to breed us for food and entertainment. I am sure all of us find this to be outrageously unjust. Then why is non vegetarianism any different?
5. Environmental pollution: Deforestation takes place to make space for cattle farms. Fishing is largely indiscriminate and disturbs the ocean’s eco system. This misplaced notion of dominance has led to several problems in the environment.
6. Health concerns: Food borne diseases. Swine Flu, Bird Flu, and a variety of diseases are borne by animals. There are significant health benefits to 'going veggie'; a vegetarian diet contains high quantities of fibre, vitamins, and minerals, and is low in fat. The risk of contracting many forms of cancer is increased by eating meat. Eating meat also increases the risk of heart disease - vegetables contain no cholesterol, which can build up to cause blocked arteries in meat-eaters. A vegetarian diet reduces the risk of serious diseases and, because it is low in fat, also helps to prevent you becoming overweight. There are plenty of vegetarian sources of protein, such as beans and bean curd; and spinach is one of the best sources of iron.
Opposition Opening - Tarun Mathur
Let me give you a few constructive arguments, which I will follow up with rebuttals. A brief introduction to our stance first: Man is biologically omnivorous. Man has been eating non-vegetarian food, sometimes for survival – in cases where there was no other alternative, sometimes as a luxury, sometimes just because he wanted to. The fact that this has continued doesn’t mean that it should continue further, but certainly emphasizes man’s liking to meat. At the outset, let me also concede that in today’s world man doesn’t need non-vegetarian food for survival – to simplify the debate. It may be apt to just term meat as a luxury, which most can afford. Before I move on to my constructives, I have an inherent problem with your definition of vegetarianism. If, according to you, only slaughter is bad, then consider this. Let’s say I have the technology to chop off both limbs of a chicken only to be genetically reproduced later. This should be okay, by your logic. If it is, I assume that your only issue is the killing of animals.
My first constructive deals with the right to choice and how the government is trying to manipulate it in this case. How the government has the power to intrude into a person’s everyday nutritional intake, I fail to understand. Neither will not eating non-vegetarian food benefit the State or society in any particular way, nor will eating non-vegetarian food cause any harm. If that is the case, morality remains the only argument to coerce me to change my diet. At this point of time, let me clearly demarcate between individual and collective morality. Collective morality deals with issues that affect every person – killing an innocent man, for example. Taking the life of a human baby and eating it is immoral to every person in society. That’s why we don’t do it. This stand on morality doesn’t change from person to person, assuming all are sane and rational. However, there are certain other issues – what one should or should not eat. There is a clear stand-off in moral positions on this argument, which simply suggests that it is an individual moral stance. There is no loss to society either way. Hence, the right to choice should, in fact, be guaranteed. State-run vegetarianism campaigns will either be fruitless, or take away the freedom of choice from an individual. So it is either a waste, or wrong.
My other constructive follows from my first. Having non-vegetarian food is sometimes a religious ritual. Serious repercussions regarding freedom of religion, apart from freedom of choice, follow if non-vegetarianism is discouraged in public media. Public campaigns may also lead to an identity crisis among the impressionable – having to make a choice between doing what the country demands and what the religion demands. The government has no right to put anyone in this position.
Coming to my rebuttals, one major point raised by the proposition is the abuse of power. If you say humans should not kill deer because deer are weaker (physically or intellectually – immaterial), by your logic, would you ban lions from killing deer? If you’re so concerned about animal welfare, why the hypocrisy? We believe non-vegetarianism is use of power, not abuse. Nature discriminates species, humans don’t. Humans have been given the intelligence to survive and not accept titles such as “Guardians of the weak”; tigers have been given claws, canine teeth and speed. Abuse comes when man pushes some species to extinction, disturbing ecological balance. Certainly, these issues must be dealt with, but not by generalizations of the order of wiping off non-vegetarianism. Similarly, about genetically modifying animals and force-feeding them, either one is okay with eating them or one isn’t. Same logic, freedom of choice. Print it on the packet, and let him decide. Or, shut down those facilities. Why wipe off non-vegetarianism?
Finally, about health concerns, there are equally dangerous problems with vegetarian food, if not worse. Fertilizers, pesticides and contaminated water are more carcinogenic than a life-time supply of Kentucky Fried Chicken. On the other hand, completely organic vegetables are extremely expensive and out of reach of the common man. Even if meat contains cholesterol and vegetables don’t, who are you to decide what my weight should be? As long as I contribute to society equally whether my weight is 60 or 90, how should it matter to you what I should or should not eat? Of course, spinach contains a lot of protein. So does fish. And I like fish, not spinach. Even if you’re my nutritionist, as long as I get my protein intake and I’m healthy, the rest should be immaterial.
Second Affirmative - Pranay Bhatia
Ladies and gentlemen, we on side prop believe this debate is about one simple question. In a world where there it is possible to survive comfortably as a vegetarian, is it permissible for the government to disallow the consumption of non-vegetarian food?
The burden that we take on is to show you that the answer to this question is yes. Why yes? Because it is wrong for humans to grossly mistreat, cause pain to, and kill animals, with no significant cause. Because there are significant macro-level problems with the non-vegetarian culture. Because the government can and in fact, should intervene in such a case. I will integrate most rebuttals into the constructive, and deal with the remaining opp points at the end.
I will be making four major constructives in this speech.
- It is wrong to cause pain to or kill animals
- Non-vegetarianism is inefficient and discriminatory to the world’s poor
- It is unsustainable and leads to the disruption of ecosystems extinction of species
- These issues are of sufficient concern to warrant the government to take action
Moving right on to the first point. Human morality is a phrase loaded with power, and making any absolute statements about what our morality should be and what morality justifies is dangerous. However some things are clear enough. We protect the most basic fundamental rights of human beings with ferocity. Why do we not do the same with animals?
The religious view is that God gave us ‘dominion’ over them, and hence the right to do what we want with them. That is laughable, and if we did have the right to do what we want, should we not feel morally obligated to not cause unnecessary pain to other sentient beings?
The other reason that may be given is that animals are inferior, because they lack rationality and language, and as such are worthy of less consideration than human beings, or even none. One, that is simply factually wrong. Science has shown us how chickens form social bonds and exhibit cognition that often exceeds even that of human babies, how cows form strong maternal bonds with their children, and how even fish communicate through body movements so intricate that we have still not deciphered how they do so. Two, even if they were inferior, that would justify harming new born babies and retarded adults as well. Three, are we as a species to take the attitude of a playground bully, free to harm anyone weaker for, well, fun?! Indeed, it stands to reason that the weakness of someone else is not a justification for mistreatment but rather a compelling reason to afford him greater protection.
Clearly then, the killing of other living beings, who feel, think, live, is morally wrong when done for no significant reason. This is not to say that animals have rights fully equal to those of humans. But surely, we must agree that their most basic rights should be respected to some degree.
Ladies and gentlemen, a vegetarian diet helps animals. Modern high-pressure agriculture commonly keeps cows, calves, pigs, chickens and other animals in extremely crowded stalls, cages, crates or sheds in which they are often unable to turn around or take even a single step in any direction for their entire lives. Deprived of veterinary care, exercise, sunlight and the feel of grass beneath their feet, these living, breathing, thinking, feeling beings, whose senses are so similar to ours, suffer and die at a rate of millions per day just so that we can eat meat. When we eat, we have a choice between adding to the level of violence in the world or respecting animals and eating vegetarian instead.
Moving on, eating meat harms the environment.
Raising animals for food is grossly inefficient because, while animals eat large quantities of grain, they produce only small amounts of meat, dairy products or eggs in return. According to Worldwatch Institute, “The politics of meat consumption are increasingly heated, since meat production is an inefficient use of grain – the grain is used more efficiently when consumed directly by humans. Continued growth in meat output is dependent on feeding grains to animals, creating competition for grain between affluent meat-eaters and the world’s poor”. In other words, it is discriminatory in the worst possible way – by keeping the poor in hunger.
Moreover, it is unsustainable. Human beings are much too powerful for their own good. Non-vegetarianism has an extremely high propensity to disrupt established ecosystems and lead to the disappearance of species. In the past 50 years, the fishing industry has exterminated 90 per cent of large fish populations, and today, 13 of the world’s 17 major fisheries are depleted or in serious decline. All so that you can have that delicious tuna starter dish. Unless our environmental impact as a species is significantly reduced, we will change nature so fast that we ourselves will struggle to adapt. Sustainability must be a major concern for the government and its entire people.
Finally to the fourth and final point,
A government may make laws and curtail certain non-fundamental privileges of a citizen for any one of two reasons – one, if it is clearly wrong and causing significant distress to someone else so as to outrage the conscience of society – two, if there are significant repercussions to society as a whole, that must be addresses by the only body that has been given the right to do so by society.
Here, we have both.
It is clearly wrong for animals to suffer and most of society would agree. In such a case, a responsible government must stop this needless pain, even if it is unpopular among a set of people. The ‘right to eat meat for pleasure by causing others unbelievable agony’ was never one of the bedrocks of our society. Opp here talks about the ‘right to choice’ and how the government must respect individual morality and ‘religious freedoms’. If that were so, Sati would still be prevalent, and I would be permitted to torture goats for fun.
Egg farmers use hot blades to cut off chicks’ beaks just hours after the birds hatch. The procedure, which requires cutting through tender tissue similar to the flesh under human fingernails, is so painful that many chicks die of shock. Some die of starvation when eating becomes too painful. I’m sorry but your right to choice, your religion and your morality have no place in this situation in any humane society. The government must not pander to the most base morality that exists in society.
Not only this, but given the large-scale repercussions that non-vegetarianism has been shown to have on the environment and ecosystems, on food availability for the poor, on the survival of species, it would be gross neglect on the part of an elected body in charge of citizen’s welfare to not take the proposed step.
Opp says that man has been historically omnivorous. Yes, we have also been historically barbarian, historically discriminatory to women, and historically we have urinated and defacated in the open. Well, even now occasionally. The point remains that situations change, moral codes evolve, and it would be nice if we could move towards a civilized society. When there is no longer any reason to kill animals in such large numbers in such pathetic conditions, save taste, then the time has come to stop it.
Opp asks if we would ‘stop one animal from killing the other’. No, because animals kill for sustenance. No, because to intervene would be ecologically unsustainable. Animals must kill to survive; they have no choice in the matter. We do.
Second Negative - Mohit Sharma
Ladies and Gentlemen, why do we eat non vegetarian food? Because it is tasty, affordable, available and because we need to eat in order to survive. Of course, we can survive on vegetarian food as well. Let’s examine the basic ideology presented by the proposition. Cutting away all the rhetoric, the proposition wants to make you vegetarian because animals are creatures who can feel pain and we do not need to kill them to survive, and this should affect our “morality”. So any creature which feels pain and which we do not need to kill in order to survive must not be killed. If you’d remember from your school text books, an Indian scientist called Jagdish Chandra Bose successfully demonstrated to the world how plants respond to stimuli, have a life, live, die, feel, like any other creature. That in fact they have a system analogous to the animal nervous system and they can feel pain. But no, the government appeals to your “morality” to discount that because they aren’t sentient beings “like us”. They don’t have two eyes, a face and motional abilities. I could very well argue that we could protect all plants and kill animals instead. What’d be the difference? But let this be seen as mere posturing on our part.
I want you to observe, very carefully, how the proposition has put forth a slew of opinions and imposed upon you an artificial morality. They’ve led you to believe that you eat Tandoori Chicken because it gives you a sense, nee, air of dominance over all other life forms. That you eat it because you find discrimination amongst species okay. Never, I’m sure, did you feel, that we are giving them less consideration because they are not equal to us. That we never said it will give you an idea how the proposition is proposing stupid arguments on our parts and rebutting those.
We are giving them less consideration, yes. Why less consideration? Because we do not have a duty towards them, nothing of the sort of “Guardians of the Weak”. We as the opposition don’t consider ourselves superior to everyone else and do not believe that we have any assigned duty to guarantee everyone else rights. We cannot and will not play God. We have a duty towards our own species, yes. Our ultimate aim is to survive and propagate ourselves.
Are we giving them less consideration just because they are “inferior” to us? No, certainly not. And if consideration is your only point, where is your consideration for plants? For all we know, the govt. tomorrow would ban rice and wheat because their farming involves killing off plants and we can survive on fruits in their absence. Nonsense.
We argue for a basic right to choice. Because we have a power to make that choice. What constitutes an abuse of that power? If we carelessly drive a species to extinction. What about the fisheries the government talks about? Yes, that is a problem, and the government should legislate to save these fisheries. How? By earmarking no fishing areas, labelling their packs with something like Save-the-fish, taxing fish products. Let the people decide, rather than being a communist patriarchial prototype.
To ban something(say X), you need two things:
a) X is harmful to the society or its individuals
b) X is immoral to our collective morality
Clearly, eating meat is not harmful to the society or its individuals. You don’t want to eat meat, don’t. Someone else’s consumption of meat doesn’t harm you in any way. Nor does it harm him. Of course, this is speaking realistically, not stretching the case to dizzying extremes where we’ll keep on eating meat even if its an immediate danger to our existence. Even assuming that is plain stupid.
Now for the question of morality. What are morals? There are certain things you label as right or wrong because they are not in accordance with the principles of the society. How could eating non-vegetarian food be immoral? Because killing and eating something which can live and feel and respond is immoral. But, plants can live and feel and respond. But we kill plants to survive(agriculture). So, no, this principle is hypocritical. But we grow these plants on our own, we water them, add fertilisers to them and modify them as per our own needs when required. High yield rice. Boll resistant cotton. Which of society’s principles then stops us from “growing” animals? They say genetically modified animals are unacceptable. What do we do for plants? Quite a few countries label them. Why not let the consumer make the choice in the animal case as well?
They say animals are kept in crowded stalls in slaughterhouses where they can’t move. Plants are made fat and plump on all sorts of pesticides and fertilisers. Alternative? Organic foods, for those who can afford it. Why can’t the government make a similar provision in the case of animals as well?
Quite a few members of society believe that smoking and drinking is bad. Is it immoral? Yes, for some people, for whatever reasons. Are they harmful, yes. Studies have conclusively shown us so. But does the government ban smoking and drinking? No, it tells you that these are bad and lets you make an informed choice.
A point was raised by the govt. about non-vegetarians eating up poor people’s share as well. By that stretch of logic, stop growing strawberries, you could use that land to grow wheat. Ban bottled drinks, it comes from the poor man’s source of water. One litre of beer takes up four and a half litres of water. Clearly in line for a ban as well. The point is, there are certain “luxurious” vegetarian foods which make you eat up the poor man’s share as well. You ban non veg food. What happens? The veg rich will put their dollar votes in other equally luxurious foods which will take up the poor man’s share again. The problem you point out is not going to be solved by banning non-veg foods.
So, the case against non vegetarianism falls flat on morality, sustainability and harm caused to humans. What else does the proposition have?
Third Affirmative - Shashwat Gandhi
I’ll start this debate with the most amusing and appalling justification of the meat eaters here –‘even plants feel pain.’ This shows how easily the opposition distorts facts to win over arguments. J.C. Bose didn’t prove that plants have a nervous system. He just claimed that the nature of impulses transmitted when a stimulus occurred were electric in nature, not purely chemical as it was earlier believed. But still, it is a common knowledge that their response to stimuli is purely a result of physiological changes or stress and not emotional ones. Plants have no emotions! So plants cannot ‘feel’ pain, in the same sense that the word is used for animals. The opposition is merely stating Bose’s philosophical beliefs. The entire rebuttal of second speech on morality was based on the assumption that plants feel which is ridiculous in itself; still I have spared time researching on it. And since we now know that plants don’t feel all the analogies of animals to plants, like justifications for cultivating animals and killing them just like plants, fall flat.
Now just in case, even if some weird plant which “feels” pain appears on the planet, still the non-vegetarians would be killing over 10 times more plants to feed their pigs and cows and in addition slaughter mercilessly the animals which they have bred unnaturally under pathetic torturous conditions. So does that sound, more moral or more sustainable? That brings me conveniently to my only yet most important constructive thought for the day.
The Constructive:
Why the current food and farming systems are unsustainable?
1) We are feeding more farm animals than people!
Today, the growing human population - already in excess of 6 billion - shares the planet and its resources at any one time with nearly 1 billion pigs, 1.3 billion cattle, 1.8 billion sheep and goats and 15.4 billion chickens! Consumption of dairy produce, eggs and seafood has also increased rapidly.
Ladies and Gentlemen, food shortage is a reality. So we have to increase our capacity to feed the worlds population. Animal products diminish the possibility of doing so. The attached graph shows how inefficient meat is to supply the body building proteins. It’s a simple logic. Vegetarians get energy directly from plants whereas non-vegetarians get it from animals who feed on plants and most of the plant energy is used for their life processes and less than 10% is passed on to the non-vegetarians. So non vegetarian food is over 10 times less efficient, implying that if we continue these food habits, it will lead to a world food deficit OVER 10 times faster! As you can see from the graph, protein from Soya is over 16 times more efficient than beef made from cows who feed on Soya.
“If present trends of meat-eating continue, then by 2050 the world’s livestock will be consuming as much as 4 billion people do: an increase equivalent to the total world population of around 1970, when many were doubting whether such human numbers could be fed at all.” says Colin Tudge, zoologist, author of ‘So Shall We Reap’ (Penguin 2003)
Source: USDA; FAO/WHO/UNICEF Protein Advisory Group.
2) Environmental impact!
The unsustainably large livestock population has a devastating environmental effect. Livestock contributes to 10% of all greenhouse gases including 25% of the most potent methane. All thanks to so many of these animals and so much of their crap! Their waste is estimated at 13 billion tones per annum! These combined with the excessive use of fertilizers to grow their own feed, causes high levels of ammonia and nitrate pollution of land, water and air.
Few eloquent examples of the devastating effects have been the rainforest destruction of south and
3) Welfare of farm animals!
One of the major arguments of the opposition was man is naturally omnivorous so respecting nature he should be given a free choice. But respecting nature is exactly what the non vegetarian hasn’t done! The increasing consumption of meat has lead to a ‘factory farming’ system which in itself insults nature by overcrowding the animals and restricting their natural habitat. The animals have suffered and developed various endemic health issues like leg deformities and heart problems.
Intensively farmed pigs.
The rebuttals:
Mohit, I think you grossly misunderstood Pranay’s point on non veggies eating up poor people share. He literally meant -‘eating up’. Not in any other sense. More meat consumed will lead faster to a definite food scarcity like I showed above, thus prices of all foods will soar and the poor man will not be able to have his share, which would be easily available had there been no meat eaters. You can’t bring me the same analogy with strawberries. Strawberry, with the amount it is in cultivation, isn’t leading to any scarcity of food. By the way, soft drinks use several times lesser water than meat of the same weight takes to be produced. Anyway, the point isn’t that, the point is that if non vegetarian food items are economically or environmentally unsustainable, then it is in good mind to discourage or even ban its use. CFC using appliances have been banned because they were harmful to the environment and therefore to us. So also, meat consumption as it stands today is unsustainable since it is so wasteful of resources that it is leading to a world food deficit and is environmentally hazardous.
Also this issue is not like smoking where the smoker can decide his fate. Your choice cannot be left to you here. The system of food decides the fate of the coming generations not just your own. I very much agree with the opposition that we are here to ‘live and propagate.’ We are not here to play God but just to save our selves from the wrath of nature and keep living. This basic purpose of life itself will become tough for our future generations if we are to deplete food capacity by wasting it to feed farm animals which we ourselves create just to slaughter them. For that it is necessary to have a sustainable food habit.
I think the opposition followed a curious strategy of simply justifying all things done for animals by saying they are done with plants. There was a point arisen about selective breeding of plants being done to increase yield and thus justifying the selective breeding of animals. I would look upon the selective breeding of plants as an indicator of food shortage and a necessary evil to feed so many farm animals and also the world’s population in accordance with our ‘live and propagate’ principle. Selective breeding of animals is an evil which the unsustainable non vegetarian food habits have led to. It is an avoidable unnecessary evil disrupting ecosystems by creating imbalance in nature.
The opposition blamed the government for the crowded conditions in the factory farming system but agreed that it is unnatural. It is impossible to have a land for the over 20 billion animals that could even compare with their natural habitat. The point here being that it is already wasteful on natural resources to have those animals in the first place, and then the opposition expects the government to waste more land resources for the animals! What do the non-veggies want to do? To create a show of how much they care for animal rights till the day they are brutally murdered and that too with the government’s money!
Also rebutting what the opposition had suggested, just framing policies like- ‘No fishing in endangered areas’, isn’t a sustainable solution. It is like ‘Since USA is much polluted let me go and pollute
The Conclusion:
Towards the end, let me tell you when you should ban something. You should ban anything if it is unsustainable practice which may lead to devastating effects. Non-vegetarian food consumption has lead to a food and farming system which is so unsustainable that it is going to lead to a world food deficit over 10 times faster than otherwise and also it is environmentally hazardous creating land, water and air pollution. Why do we unnecessary want to push this catastrophe on us when it has been proved that vegetarian food already provides a complete and nourishing diet? Just for a little more taste?
Ladies and Gentlemen, the entire case of the opposition is based on the assumption that non-vegetarian food does no harm to the society and so it shouldn’t be banned. Both the opposition speakers suggest to you that the society suffers no loss when non-vegetarian food is allowed in consumption just as today but I have proved to you that that cannot be further from the truth. Since the current farming and food practices cannot be sustainable, we as 10 rational men should look out for a sustainable solution which definitely involves banning non vegetarian food.
