Birdist Rule #80: Decide How You Feel About Eating Birds
It鈥檚 a topic that鈥檚 kind of hard to avoid on Thanksgiving.
I am going to spend Thanksgiving morning looking for birds near my parent鈥檚 home in coastal Maine. I鈥檒l be looking for New England winter specialties, like Harlequin Ducks and Razorbills, and will stay alert for coveted November 鈥渞arity season鈥 waifs (a White Wagtail was just seen in nearby New Hampshire!). I鈥檒l keep track of every individual bird I can identify, rarity or not, and generally revel in their company. Then, later, I鈥檒l join my family around the dinner table where we鈥檒l take another bird out of the oven, carve it up, and eat it.
It鈥檚 not something I talk about very much with other birders, but it does feel like a fairly deep irony. We plead with neighbors and lawmakers to do something about the fact that domestic cats kill between one and four billion birds in this country each year, and then happily sit down to lunch and support an industry that annually kills chickens, turkeys, and additional multitudes of duck, pheasant, goose, and quail. We fight to protect every possible acre of habitat so that wild birds can live a natural life, but then turn a collective blind eye to the often-terrible conditions experienced by domestic birds.
Of course, not all 鈥渨e.鈥 I鈥檓 sure that there are plenty of vegetarian and non-vegetarian birders out there who care a great deal about the lives of all feathered friends. I鈥檓 just not one of them.
Why this disconnect between conservation and consumption? Social psychologist Melanie Joy has identified the 鈥溾 for eating meat: natural, normal, and necessity. People believe that eating meat is natural, that it鈥檚 something our species craves and has evolved to do. It鈥檚 normal to do in a civilized society, and, more than that, it鈥檚 necessary for a healthy diet.
Justifications don鈥檛 have to line up with facts, of course. It鈥檚 been scientifically disproven that eating meat is necessary for a healthy diet, for example, but that doesn鈥檛 stop people from believing it. Of those three Ns, though, the 鈥渘atural鈥 part resonates with me as a birder. Animals eat other animals, we see it all the time. Oystercatchers catch oysters, flycatchers catch flies. It鈥檚 how nature works. A frequent response from vegetarians to this argument is that humans, unlike wild animals, have a choice in what we eat, and can therefore choose to avoid causing suffering and death in other creatures. I agree with that, in principle, and strongly support efforts to improve living conditions for domestic animals. But I don鈥檛 agree that just because we have the choice we have to take it.
It鈥檚 the wild vs. domestic distinction that makes the difference for birders, I think. At least, it does for me. We care a lot about wild birds, and not so much at all about domestics. We don鈥檛 count domestic birds on our lists, we don鈥檛 pay attention to them when we see them in the field. They鈥檙e not considered part of the world we love. Not defending this thinking, just pointing it out.
Humans make all kinds of odd distinctions when it comes to eating animals. One of the prominent philosophers of our time, Louis CK , pointed out in one of his old stand-up sets the irony of 鈥渄olphin-safe tuna,鈥 which assures us that absolutely none of one kind of creature was harmed and that the tin is filled exclusively with another kind of creature. Why are we okay with eating tuna but not dolphin? I don鈥檛 know, and Louis doesn鈥檛 know either, but he does think that eating meat is wrong: 鈥淚 think it鈥檚 wrong to eat tuna, and dolphin, and cows, and everything. But I eat them. I eat them all.鈥 His reasoning? 鈥淚t tastes good, and I like the way it feels when I eat it.鈥
This logic gets at a that researchers have added to the list of justifications for eating meat: that it鈥檚 鈥渘ice.鈥 Meat tastes good. It鈥檚 tough to deny, especially when so many vegan or vegetarian products try to 鈥溾 instead of the plants they鈥檙e made from. The human weakness for pleasure is at the root of many things we know are bad but do anyway, like drinking, or smoking, or eating an entire bag of Halloween candy and laying around all afternoon on the couch instead of writing your weekly column before the deadline. A, uh, a friend told me about that one.
Look, I can鈥檛 tell you whether it鈥檚 okay to eat birds or not. That鈥檚 a choice you鈥檒l need to make for yourself. I don鈥檛 believe that causing the death of another creature to make food is unnatural or amoral, but I do believe we should afford those creatures a certain quality of life and a painless death. I also don鈥檛 think being an omnivore is necessarily at odds with being a birder or a supporter of the environment. We want to retain a planet that all creatures can thrive on, including those that will be food for others.
Easy for me to say, I suppose: I鈥檓 not the one staring down the business end of a turkey baster, or a pair of fangs. Add it to the list of things I鈥檓 thankful for this year.