There are a few things I need to get clear. First, I love animals. Second, I eat meat. So, why would someone who loves animals eat meat?
I do not have anything against anyone who declines meat. I believe that we all walk our own path. Whether that path includes consumption of meat is up to the traveler, not to me. However, I do not believe that people who do not eat meat are somehow more enlightened than those who do. My reasons are based on what would happen if everyone reached that magical stage of enlightenment.
Lets consider the possibilities. Suppose overnight everyone decided to become vegetarian. The whole world is no longer eating meat. What happens next? We’ll take just a small sample of the world’s meat supply and run a few numbers.
There are approximately 93 million cattle in the US. About 8 million of those are dairy cattle. Lets look at those first over a 10 year period, starting in 2010. Many people do not realize that to get a cow to produce milk, she has to give birth to a calf. About half of those calves are heifers and will help to replace the herd as the cows grow older and need to be culled. The other half are bulls and unless specifically raised as a herd bull, would normally be slaughtered for the meat.
So, lets make things simple, be conservative, and say we have about 5 million milk cows in the US. Each cow will most likely have a calf every year. Half of those calves will be heifers and most will go to replace the usual culling of the herd. That leaves 2.5 million young bulls to deal with…per year. Lets then assume we as Americans no longer eat beef. Castrating the little bulls is no problem. I’ve done it myself. The problem is, they eat and they take up a lot of room. In 10 years you have 27.5 million steers from the original cows and 27.5 million heifers.
But, wait. Those little heifers are old enough to breed at a year (calve in 2011). Of course, they will have to produce calves if they are to produce milk, so every year here come another 2.5 million calves. That means 22.5 million calves from these heifers over the 8 year period. And so it goes.
After 10 years it’s starting to look like we’ll be overrun soon with cattle…100,000,000 offspring and the original 5,000,000 puts the total of dairy cattle at over 105 million in the US alone. If we don’t breed them anymore, the dairy industry goes down the toilet when the cows go dry. No milk or cheese for you! But, you’d better start saving your money because there are going to be a lot of animals to feed.
And that’s just the beginning. What about the beef cattle? Multiply the dairy cattle by 15 to get a close (conservative) number for the beef cattle. So, 100 million x 15 = 1,500,000,000. There are just over 300 million people in the US. We’ll never keep up with the cattle. It won’t be long before cattle are dying in the streets, diseases will run rampant because people will not be able to afford medical care for non-productive animals, and the streets will be crawling with cattle. Those cattle will compete for the grains, destroying our ability to feed ourselves. In the meantime, how many jobs will be lost because there will be no more need for farmers, ranchers, slaughterhouses, meat processing plants, butchers, packagers, transporters, and the list goes on. Look at what happens in India where cattle are sacred. People go hungry while emaciated cattle roam the streets.
And, lets don’t forget the chickens! Like eggs? Only the hens lay eggs. If we hatch a dozen eggs, you can expect half to be roosters, and I for one do not want to support all the roosters that would be a byproduct of hen production! I believe these animals were put here on earth to provide protein for people, and we need to give thanks for them instead of rejecting the gifts that they are. Being good stewards of our resources involves being kind and humane to the animals, treating them with respect, and giving thanks. Good stewards do not allow animals to over-produce, nor do they allow a situation to arise where they would not be able to provide appropriate care.
I also believe that when vegetarians start believing they are somehow more enlightened than meat eaters, they’ll have to step back and work on the humility that must come with being an enlightened one. After all, without meat eaters our planet would soon become overrun with starving cattle, deer, horses, chickens and people. The fish would be fine. They eat each other.
