Ethical Vegetarianism and Veganism

The protest against meat eating may turn out to be one of the most significant movements of our age. This book argues that vegetarians and vegans are not only protestors, but also moral pioneers. In terms of our relations with animals, it is difficult to think of a more urgent moral problem than the fate of billions of animals killed every year for human consumption. This book will be of interest to human geographers in the fields of animal-studies, and food consumption, and will appeal to animal protectionists, environmentalists, and humanitarians.

Introduction: Vegetarianism as Ethical Protest Part One: Killing Sentient Beings 1.1. Why Foods Derived from Animals are Not Necessary for Human Health 1.2. Against Killing "Happy" Animals 1.3. Food Ethics and Justice Toward Animals 1.4. Animals as Honorary Humans 1.5. Nonhuman Animals' Desires and Their Moral Relevance 1.6. Why Vegetarianism Wasn't on the Menu in Early Greece 1.7. The Ethics of Eating in "Evangelical" Discourse: 1600-1876 1.8. Myth and Meat: C. S. Lewis Sidesteps Genesis 1:29-30 1.9. The Moral Poverty of Pescetarianism 1.10. There is Something Fishy about Eating Fish, Even on Fridays: On Christian Abstinence from Meat, Piscine Sentience, and a Fish Called Jesus Part Two: The Harms or Cruelty Involved in Institutionalized Killing 2.1. "The Cost of Cruelty": Henry Bergh and the Abattoirs 2.2. "All Creation Groans": The Live of Factory Farmed Animals in the United States 2.3. L'enfer, c'est nous autres: Institutionalized Cruelty as Standard Industry Practice in Animal Agriculture in the United States 2.4. Welfare and Productivity in Animal Agriculture 2.5. Taking on the Gaze of Jesus: Perceiving the Factory Farm in a Sacramental World 2.6. "A Lamb As It Had Been Slain": Mortal (Animal) Bodies in the Abrahamic Traditions 2.7. Cattle Husbandry without Slaughtering: A Lifetime of Care is Fair 2.8. Are Insects Animals? The Ethical Position of Insects in Dutch Vegetarian Diets Part Three: The Human and Environmental Costs of Institutionalized Killing 3.1. Our Ambivalent Relations with Animals 3.2. From Devouring to Honouring: A Vaishnava-Hindu Therapeutic Perspective on Human Culinary Choice 3.3. The Other Ghosts in Our Machine: Meat Processing and Slaughterhouse Workers in the United States of America 3.4. Animal Agriculture and Climate Change 3.5. The Intentional Killing of Field Animals and Ethical Veganism 3.6. How Visual Culture Can Promote Ethical Dietary Choices 3.7. Leadership, Partnership and Championship as Drivers for Animal Ethics in the Western Food Industry