The Vegetarian Religion

I've said before that I don't want to be called a vegetarian for the same reason that I dislike being referred to as white. Both things are, ostensibly, true. I do not eat meat and I am pale enough that I practically glow in the dark. I do not like to be called white because that word is never attached to the good things that Caucasians have done. You hear white power and white supremacy and you hear that white people came and conquered and that white people subjugated others. If I could avoid that stigma entirely then I would. I'm not saying that all white people are bad- that's obviously not true and I'm not saying that all or even any vegetarians are bad. When I make that comparison I draw it because people have a very solid perception of what they think a vegetarian is and what they think a white person is. Understandably, perception is not going to be the same as reality.

The reason I don't want to be called a vegetarian is because there are a number of the tenets of the Vegetarian religion that I disagree with entirely. Some of them I can agree with and have no problem agreeing with. I can agree that people in modern times eat more meat than they really need and that it would be better for them to eat less. I can agree that CAFOs (that is, Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations) are bad for the environment and bad for animals and almost certainly bad for the consumers of the meat as well. I can agree that humans can live without eating meat. I can agree that raising animals requires more arable land for the same number of calories and proteins and important things like that than if we used plants for those same calories and proteins. I can agree that I am healthier as a person because I do not eat meat. I can agree that there are many people with health conditions that could be managed through a meatless diet instead of with pharmaceuticals.

But one of the tenets of the vegetarian religion is that organic is better. One of the tenets is that all GMOs (Genetically Modified Organisms) are bad. These are things that I do not believe and cannot agree with. Organic produce is better in the sense that since pesticides and fertilizers are not used there will be no pesticides and fertilizers that run off from that land to contribute to the giant algae blooms in the Gulf of Mexico. Better because it means that food will not contain traces of chemicals that will build up in our bodies and poison us slowly or mess up our hormones. But the "organic" label on the food in the supermarket doesn't mean what you might expect it to mean. In essence it does not mean organic. Organic in America at least is a niche market that big corporations know they can charge more for and then spend that money on lobbying efforts to create bills that undermine the values of organic. Organic in the United States is a set of rules set in place and enforced by the government but, like anything else in America, is defined by Capitalism. The way things are presently creates a situation where meaning to do well by buying organic probably isn't helping to do anything but make your wallet lighter. Another thing about organic is that it's still shipped thousands and thousands of miles before it gets to you. If you really wanted to reduce your carbon footprint you'd buy local produce regardless of whether it is organic or not rather than buying "organic" from the supermarket.

The other major tenet I disagree with is about GMOs and that all GMOs are bad. I will say that there are some things that Monsanto has done with genetically-engineered crops that are not particularly wise or good but drawing the conclusion that all GMOs are bad is irrational and irresponsible. For thousands of years humans have been modifying our food. If it were not for people tending it corn, for example, would not exist. Corn comes from a grass. Grass, you know, like the kind you grow on your lawn. It was a very fortuitous moment for one mutant maize stalk that somebody thought to cultivate it. Over the years that one mutant stalk of maize has become all the corn we eat today. Every food that we cultivate has been changed by human hands to be larger, tastier, to grow faster and in worse climates and weather. Growing the part that we happen to eat larger and better-tasting is not something that most plants do naturally unless they rely on having their seeds eaten in order to spread them. Every living thing on earth, at it's base, is comprised of the same thing. We're all written in the same language. So if there is a word that was created by one species and is used to that species' advantage why is it wrong for people to take that word, that gene, and add it to the vocabulary of genes that makes up another species? Why is it okay for us to breed natural genetic mutants to create more mutants but it's not okay for us for us to do it in a laboratory? That is an irrational conclusion to make.

The other thing about finding GMOs unacceptable, putting aside the fact that every food we eat is genetically modified and that finding it not okay to do in a lab is irrational, is that we cannot hope to live in the world we've created and feed the people that live here with us if we try to farm organically and without using GMOs. When you say that GMOs are not okay because they increase crop yield without using fertilizers and allow plants to grow in places that are normally inhospitable you are taking a stand that says that you don't care about humanity as a whole, just about the privileged few that can afford to do things and grow things in a way that, to you, is moral. If you say that you think that it might be better if we all spontaneously decided to cast aside technology and go back to living the way things were hundreds of years ago you, by thinking that, are also giving your blessing to the idea that it's okay that millions of people will die because of this. You are saying "fuck you" to anyone unlucky enough to be born in an inhospitable region of the world. I, myself, don't find that to be acceptable. I do believe that overpopulation is a problem we should be far more concerned with than we are but if we hope to continue living on this planet barring some kind of catastrophic event occurring we are going to need to utilize technology, including the genetic modification of foodstuffs, in order to produce enough food for people to live.

So no, I am not a vegetarian. I am not a vegetarian not because I eat fish or because I do it for health reasons. I don't eat meat because I lack a gallbladder and that lack causes me to have serious acid reflux and indigestion that could lead to other problems if left untreated. I don't eat meat because I am one of the millions of uninsured Americans. I have neither the luxury nor the money to turn off acid pumps in my stomach with Nexium or Prevacid or some other pill. I don't eat meat because if I don't eat meat I don't have heartburn and if I don't have heartburn I wont develop other preventable health complications that can arise because of acid reflux. I am not a vegetarian not because I don't think it's healthier or because I think CAFOs are okay. I am not a vegetarian because vegetarianism is not a diet. Vegetarianism to most people is an ideal, a belief and ongoing practice a person engages in to shape their character or improve traits of their personality. In other words to most people there is no difference between vegetarianism and the Vegetarian Religion. So my problem with being called a vegetarian has little to do with vegetarians themselves or the fact that I technically fit the definition- it has to do with ideological differences.