1669:

 Violence

Edited by CJ Tointon

If someone physically assaults you - that's violence. Violence is not usually associated with eating a hamburger, however. But the killing of the animal for the 'meat' in a hamburger, is certainly violent.

The violence to farm animals comes in stages. There's the breeding process (rape by insemination),  the forced incarceration of these animals in cages or behind barbed wire, then the brutal industrial-style execution. This is how humans treat animals! They manipulate their lives and eventually put them to death - by way of violence. Animals are powerless to avoid human attack. They lose their will to resist and only submit in order not to starve or receive further 'punishment'.

It seems that humans will do anything to ensure their own survival and satisfy their need to eat for pleasure. If that involves animal foods, then it must, by definition, involve violence. It seems like a free ride on the face of it. There are no repercussions since the animals can't fight back! The food taken from animal bodies seems to be reliable, satisfying to eat and supposedly 'strengthening'. The animal-eating diet reinforces the feeling of power and human supremacy. And it all comes by way of using extreme physical force.

Humans rely on violence to get a 'quick fix'. It's a habit that appears to work; which is surely why we're so reluctant to give it up. We accept its use against animals to not only provide us with food, but clothing materials too. We shear the sheep of its coat (and let it endure the cold nights and sunburnt days without its body covering) to provide US with warmth. The skin of another animal is turned into shoes, the fur of another into coats; whilst silk shirts come at the expense of a thousand boiled alive silk worms! 

The consumer sees none of this firsthand, so doesn't feel pity for any of the animals kept hidden behind closed doors. As consumers, we're removed from the lives and deaths of these sentient beings. We accept their 'produce' and pretend to know nothing about their treatment. Since most people 'do it'; there seems no one left to make us realise what we're really involved in.

Our acceptance of violence depends upon its normalisation. Our own violence is made to seem lesser by the depiction of greater violence being played out elsewhere. We detach from our own involvement, by making violence seem an almost ordinary and unremarkable feature of daily life. We are familiarised with violence from an early age by reading children's' stories. This continues on into adulthood where it's easy to find violence depicted in movies and on television. The fictional representation of violence is almost impossible to avoid. But most of us enjoy these dramas! It's entertaining! Detective stories which deal with murder,  torture, abduction and sexual assault are the most popular television shows. Much of the enjoyment comes from knowing that our own acts of violence are less than what we see played out on TV. It's salacious and arousing and appeals to our taste of deriving pleasure from others' misfortunes.

These violent television dramas gradually introduce us not just to crime, but to the aggressive interaction between the good guys (cops) and the bad guys (criminals). The good guys are exonerated from being seen as 'violent' on the basis that they have to deal effectively with even tougher guys. The strong characters are brave and pragmatic in contrast to the morally corrupt or mentally imbalanced 'baddies'. The sub-text promotes toughness and standing up for 'right' and 'truth' - something we viewers can positively identify with.

But violence has a way of not knowing where to stop! It's ever thirsty for more extreme examples, more horrifying crimes, more excitement in the struggle between good and evil. And once we are thoroughly convinced that violence has a place in our world (defending ourselves, bringing evil-doers to justice) then we can begin to accept that good violence is valid. It can be linked to safety and strength and a justification for the animal foods we eat and enjoy. As it is with the violence of fictional dramas, so it is with our need for ever more exotic gastronomic thrills; which happen to be ever more harmful to the animals who are put to death to satisfy our needs.

I was watching an old Western movie the other day. Huge herds of cattle were being driven hundreds of miles across the parched plains of America to bring 'fresh meat' to a town that hadn't had proper food (so-called) for a long time. Everyone was going crazy for the want of beefsteak! They thought they'd recover their strength and feel better as soon as they'd eaten what they yearned for - dead animal flesh! That was all the justification they needed for bringing these sentient beings to a violent end.

It's not so surprising that the human brain has developed in the way it has; drawing ever greater advantage to itself at the expense of everything else. However, this same brain could be used to undo the self-interest motive and turn it in another direction. Because of the scale of this sort of change, however, we know it won't come about overnight. It might have to take place over several generations. To start the ball rolling would mean a wholly different sort of motive - wanting to do something now that would only take effect long after any of us are still alive. Can we (or would we) be prepared to make a radical change to our eating habits for the benefit of far-off generations? 

Is it preposterous to think we could adjust 'human nature' to promote a less human-centred driving force than self-interest? Such a change of attitude would surely be based upon a determination to rid our lives of violence, lessen our taste for entertainments involving violence and avoid the use of force in our interactions with each other.