To continue on our series of questions for vegans, today we’re talking about lions. Yes, you heard it right, lions. And if you’re someone who has never heard this one before, it might seem a little out of left field for us to be talking about, but surprisingly, it’s a question that vegans get a lot.
Give us the scenario
Let me set the scene for you. For some reason, someone decides to let someone else know that they are vegan. The nonvegan, in their surprise, asks them why. Now there might be some hemming and hawing about it or maybe not, but often enough, an ethical vegan will answer that they feel it is wrong to eat meat and consume animal products. And if the nonvegan is feeling particularly defensive, the conversation might start to take some odd twists and turns as they try to rationalize their position on eating meat. They might say they don’t eat much or that they only buy humane. But sometimes, they’d prefer to convince you that your position is incorrect or misinformed. And when they try to go down that road, this is where we get to the meat of our conversation today.
“What about lions though? They eat meat. Is that wrong too? Are you going to go tell the lions they can’t eat meat anymore?” Usually, if the conversation is getting tense and someone says this, it’s the vegan’s cue to know that it’s time to step back. You know, that maybe this conversation won’t be helpful right now. And I think that being able to read the room like that is important, because you don’t want to just go around causing more discord without a reason.
However, this is sometimes just an honest question. And for the people who are simply asking this as a question, I believe an honest answer should be delivered. So, if you’ve wondered what vegans truly think about lions, here’s one vegan’s response.
“Are you going to tell the lions they can’t eat meat anymore?”
Well, no, obviously not. We all understand the absurdity behind the premise of this question. Humans and lions can’t talk, haha, it’d be like talking to a brick wall, with the added risk of getting eaten. Yes, I get it. But pardon me for saying so, I think this question does more to derail the conversation than it does to strengthen your position of meat-eating. I think that there are two concepts that people are trying to convey when it comes to this question though, and they’re worth exploring.
Is meat-eating objectively wrong?
I think part of the joke behind this is that vegans tend to say things that imply (or flat out argue) that meat-eating is objectively and inherently wrong. And when you’re trying to call out a vegan about not lecturing lions, it’s an attempt at implying hypocrisy. Because if you think it’s always wrong, then you should be calling it out in every instance it happens. And yes, lions are clearly not vegan.
But I think that misinterprets the actual position of a lot of vegans. In fact, even in the definition of philosophy, it states that it is a practice that avoids the consumption of animal products wherever possible and practicable. And in the case of lions who are obligate carnivores, I don’t believe abstaining from meat is possible or practicable, even if we were able to talk to them.
Not only does it depend on the situation, but not all vegans agree with this idea of objective morality, either. Sure, some do, I’m sure. Considering that vegans also can be of any religion, philosophy, or belief system. But some reject the idea of an objective morality altogether, believing that right and wrong is largely down to the eye of the beholder. I feel that veganism in some ways, actually lends us to this conclusion. Because we see that clearly, most people eat meat. And yet, we as ethical vegans, believe that it’s wrong for us to do so. Not to mention the fact that it clearly has another party that gets the short end of the stick (the animals), and yet in society is is hardly ever seen as immoral or even unfair. This just shows us that obviously different people think differently about right and wrong.
The natural argument
The other part that is underlying this preoccupation with lions is to illustrate that meat eating is natural, I think. Which hey, I’m not going to argue against. Nature is tough. Things kill, die, and it’s a hard-knock life. But the thing is, just because something’s natural, it doesn’t mean that it’s desirable.
Another thing that lions routinely do is when a new male takes over a lion pride, he kills all of the young that were produced by the former male leader. So…infanticide. I mean, that’s not a good, ethical behavior. But lions do it. And sometimes lions (and other animals) kill their own babies, too. It’s not just the offspring of others. This is just an example of behavior that occurs in nature that I think vegan and nonvegans alike can agree; it wouldn’t be okay if we did it as humans.
This idea that we should base our morality on that of lions or other animals in nature is just not relevant or useful for our purposes. We hardly ever look to nature to dictate what should be okay behavior for humans. And I don’t know why eating meat should be any different.
Also, as far as being natural goes, there are plenty of things that we love that are unnatural. Like indoor plumbing, for example. Refrigeration. Washing machines–heck, even clothes. So even if you were to make the argument that not eating meat is unnatural (which it isn’t, but that’s another topic), that wouldn’t make it bad either.
Where do you get your morality from?
To me, it doesn’t make sense to get our example of ethics from lions. Other than the reasons I’ve already mentioned, they live in such a different world from us humans. We have jobs and society, they’ve got the laws of the savannah. We learn things in order to coexist and make our society better. And we do this regardless of whether they can be found elsewhere in the animal kingdom.
When it comes to our sense of ethics and morality, who we really look at is our authorities and peers. Your parents likely weren’t vegan, and you may not know many vegans at all. If more people were, perhaps we would be looking to them to set a moral standard the way we do with so many other things like not murdering people or committing thievery. The fact is, most of us look around us to see what other people are doing to govern what we do. But remember, what’s popular isn’t always right, and what’s right isn’t always popular. Just because nobody else you know is vegan doesn’t mean that it wouldn’t be a good decision for you or that it wouldn’t make a positive impact.
I’m not interested in lions
So here’s the thing, I don’t really care about lions that much, and my veganism isn’t about them anymore than it is about any other animal on the face of this earth. I’m not going to kill or hunt them. I’m not going to use them for my entertainment or consumption of their bodies or byproducts…and that’s it. Lions, other than that, really have no place in my life. I don’t live around any places where lions naturally reside and they do not exist in any of my daily routines. My life is…lionless. But I will say this much about lions: You’re not one.
When it comes down to it, I talk to people, like you, about veganism. Because veganism is for people. Humans are the ones who engage in animal agriculture (as well as many other destructive behaviors that are not great for our planet). Lions may eat meat, but they’re not breeding animals and keeping them alive only to be used, abused and/or eaten. And, as I mentioned before, they are obligate carnivores as well.
But people? People are a different story. People have the ability to survive and thrive eating only plants. We often have more food security than lions due to grocery stores and kitchen gadgets like freezers and refrigerators and basic shelter. People have the ability to understand my words as I say them. And people have bigger brains, that they can make moral and ethical decisions, not just survival based instinct. When it comes down to it, you’ve got a leg up on the lions. And with that leg up, you have the ability to contemplate veganism, if you so choose. That’s why I’m not going to go preach veganism to lions.
As always, thanks for reading my thoughts. If you want to read more vegan content, be sure to subscribe to the blog to get email updates with each new post. And if you want to read more about questions that vegans get asked a lot, check out this post where I have a list of vegan Q&A for you to peruse. Have a lovely day!