Full Debate - Animals Should Be Off The Menu; The St James Ethics & Wheeler Centre | CHN subtitles

well good evening ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the Melbourne Town Hall where for the first of the third series of debates we've managed to have the audience fill up from the floor and start to fill the upper reaches of the hall so it's wonderful to have you here tonight on behalf of st. James ethics centre the wheeler centre the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival the aged the city of Melbourne and the ABC all of whom have worked together to make this event possible I'd like to welcome you here to the Town Hall as I say for the first debate in our third season tonight we are gathered on the traditional lands of the Kulin nation and I wish to acknowledge them as the traditional owners but also like to pay my personal respects to their elders and to the other elders of other communities who might be here tonight my name is Simon Longstaff i'm the executive director of some james ethics centre and I'm delighted to chair tonight's debate now I should mention that later on in the proceedings there'll be an opportunity for you within the audience to contribute to the debate speaking for up to a minute for or against the proposition if you're minded so to do and so you should know that the event is being recorded by the ABC for subsequent broadcast both on ABC one television and on ABC Radio National some of you may be inclined to be tweeting during the course of tonight so if you are let me give you the hash tag it's hash iq2 ozi q2 Oz that's the one you can use and you'll be able to see how you trend now there are some basic rules for this debate and you will have seen them outlined on the order paper provided some of them are just procedural about the time the people are going to speak but others are more important in terms of the spirit in which we undertake this contest of ideas we are strongly encouraging our speakers here and if you speak in the debate itself to be passionately and committed in the views that you might express but we also ask you to respect the intrinsic dignity of the people who are participating whether they're on the stage or in the hall it's about having respectful disagreement even though that might be passionate and tone now hopefully everybody as you entered was asked your opinion about the topic are you for against or undecided and if you were then that will have been recorded what you should have found on your seat when you came in is a ballot paper and that will be cast later on when we have the formal vote those ballot papers are very simple to use if you're for the motion you put in the four side if you're against caste against side but if you're still undecided and I hope that you won't be by the time you cast your ballot they just leave the ballot paper join together and cast it as a whole and will be counted it's still undecided now the form of tonight's debate is as outlined in the order paper the topic is that animals should be off the menu and it's now my intention to introduce each of our speakers and I'll introduce them as a bit of a job lot all of the speakers of the affirmative and then all of the speakers for the negative and after I've introduced them each side I'd ask you to welcome them then as recall the first speaker for the affirmative is Peter singer born in Melbourne educated at the University of Melbourne and the University of Oxford he's taught at the University of Oxford Latrobe University and Monash University since 1999 he's been the IRA w2 camp professor of bioethics at the University Center for human values at Princeton University and from 2005 he's also held the part-time position of laureate professor at the University of Melbourne in the Center for Applied philosophy and public ethics Peter first became well known internationally after the publication of animal liberation that seminal work in 1975 since then he's written many other books including practical ethics the expanding circle how are we to live the ethics of what we eat with Jim Mason and most recently the life you can say he's joined by the second speaker Philip he was formerly vice president of Citibank specializing in corporate finance mergers and acquisitions and at the age of 34 was rated by Australian business magazine in their top 40 Australian headhunted executives but at the age of 40 he witnessed cruelty on such a colossal scale that it affected him profoundly he decided to give away everything he owned with warm hands and a diet break and he says so far he's right on budget today he devotes his life to children animals the environment the terminally ill the homeless and the arts he supports over 500 humanitarian projects in over 40 countries with schools orphanages shelters sanctuaries clinics and scholarships he's received the order of Australia and in 2007 was Australian of the Year in Victoria and finally joining the team to the affirmative is Veronica Ridge a senior editor at the age who's currently editing the Life & Style section of the Saturday age previously Veronica was editor of Epicure the ages weekly food and wine section and in 2010 won the best food journalist award at the cordon bleu world food media Awards for three articles published in Epicure on food ethics and the future of food she's held several senior editing positions involving education the arts literature entertainment cultural and social trends health and lifestyle and property she's got an honours degree from RMIT University in literary journalism and studied philosophy as I discovered during the chat before while she struggled with some of the French philosophers as we all do a proud Melbourne in long after starting out as a cadet reporter Veronica still gets a daily thrill from the publication of beautifully crafted words on newsprint and online pages please welcome them all the team speaking against the motion will be led off by Fiona chambers a lecturer at Marcus Oldham Agricultural College in Geelong she holds a diploma of Applied Science in agriculture specializing in animal health nutrition and genetics and is undertaking a master of animal breeding management at Sydney University Jonah has farmed organically at her Daylesford property since 1990 and began breeding wessex Saddleback pigs in 1995 she's a founding director of the rare breeds Trust of Australia and is a director of the rare breeds international world board she's delivered papers on the subject of sustainable farming and the conservation of farm animal genetic diversity at conferences both here and overseas she's received a number of awards and fellowships in her 20 year farming career most recently the 2011 delicious food heritage award and best bacon the food the foodies guide to Melbourne from 2010 she's been inducted into the Melbourne food Hall of Fame Bruce MacGregor is an animal scientist of international standing in his fields of animal production science his voluntary community environmental work has been acknowledged with a centenary of Federation medal Bruce works at Deakin University and is the author of over 450 research technical and advisory publications and is an associate editor of the international journal small ruminant Research his interest in geography history biodiversity have led him to visit many traditional animal production systems across the globe growing up in rural Victoria and still in Bruce a love of nature and an addiction to Ozzy rules football ascent kilduff supporter he's been involved with many community environmental groups but particularly environmental restoration and protection of the mary creek catchment in melbourne Bruce is a long-term supporter of Oxfam Bush heritage Australia and other philanthropic causes and last but not least Adrianne Richardson head chef at Melbourne Laluna Bistro and a co-host of TENS good chef bad chef television program for many people air travel and good food are mutually exclusive experiences but for Richardson it was one that led him to the other I started working in kitchens he says part-time to pay for my lessons and that's where it sort of kicked off I gave up the flying lessons and went back to school since then he's worked in some of the most prestigious kitchens around the world growing up in a household with a melange of North African Middle Eastern and Italian cuisine Richardson's heritage definitely helps explain his enthusiasm for quality food that's packed with flavor what his Harwich heritage doesn't help explain is his interest in all things blood and guts given one side of his family are in fact strict vegetarians nevertheless when it comes to meat Richardson wrote the book on it literally it's called meat and it was released in 2008 and provided readers with a simplistic guide on how to buy cook and enjoy meat please welcome the speakers for the negative ladies and gentlemen the proposition before this house is that animals should be off the menu I invite Peter Singer to address this house with his arguments for the affirmative thank you very much it's a great pleasure to introduce this topic on behalf of the team that I'm leading I think we will show you convincingly that animals should be off the menu will do this by ranging through a number of different issues briefly will speak about Health will speak about the best use of the food we produce will speak about environmental questions will speak of course about animal ethics and we were also particularly Veronica Ridge will tell you that with animals off the menu it doesn't mean that you can't have delicious food to eat so that is essentially our case and we are to echo what Simon Longstaff just said passionate and committed about this topic so let me just briefly outline the reasons along these lines and I will do it roughly in ascending order of importance in other words I'll leave the most important which for me is the ethical argument to the end so firstly health really all we need to argue given the strength of the other points that we have to make is that we can live a healthy life with animals off the menu and I think the evidence for that conclusion is overwhelming there are of course a lot of lifelong vegetarians in fact second and third-generation vegetarians who are ample evidence of that I'm not one of those myself I've been a vegetarian for about 40 years but I certainly find it a satisfactory healthy diet and there is now accumulating a lot of evidence that indeed the eating meat is likely to be bad for you we're not here to say that any amount of whatever meats you whatever animal you might eat is necessarily going to shorten your life but the evidence is accumulating just last week there was a new study published in the archives of internal medicine led by scientists at Harvard one of the biggest studies a study that has followed more than a hundred thousand people for an average of over 20 years so a very difficult time-consuming study to do and the headline is particularly focused on red meat that even small portions of red meat are likely to increase your chances of dying of a variety of causes including cardiovascular disease and cancer we've known for a long time that particularly bowel cancer or cancer of the colon and colorectal cancer are associated with red meat consumption this study showed that it doesn't take a lot of red meat eating in order to increase your chances of dying of these diseases and red meat consumption also increases your chances of getting diabetes this was a carefully controlled study and I think the evidence for that is now pretty conclusive so there are a lot of other aspects of Health which we don't have time to go into but it does seem that in many respects people who do have animals off their menu are likely to live healthier and longer lives than those who have animals on their menu secondly food use we feed enormous amounts of grain and soybeans to animals and in doing so we waste most of the food value of the grains that we're feeding them depending on the species the animals may return to us somewhere between one tenth and one third of the food value of the grains and soybeans that we put into them some people worry about the use of rain for biofuel that this is raising world food prices and making it harder for the poor to be able to afford the grains that they need to live on but in fact the amount of grain and soybeans that is fed to animals is something like three to four times as much as the grain that is converted to biofuel so this is a huge problem we're talking about something like 750 million tons of grain plus additional quantities of soybeans being fed to animals each year you divide that up among the population of the world it's really enough to feed the world's poor if only we could distribute it properly and get it to them so we are just wasting vast quantities of food in order to produce the large quantities of animal products which are generally speaking at least partly grain fed thirdly the environmental question we all know about factory farms which are locally polluting in many ways producing enormous amounts of manure which are real problems and tend to pollute rivers and waterways but we're now increasingly aware that animal production is a major factor in climate change the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization said it a few years ago in a report called livestock's long shadow that animal production livestock production is a bigger contributor to climate change than all of transport all of the buses trucks trains and cars and aeroplanes and in fact I think that's an underestimate because it doesn't really include the full weight the full damage that methane does to the environment standard studies say that methane is 25 times as damaging to climate change as carbon dioxide that is if you take it over a century because methane breaks down more quickly than carbon dioxide but if you think that we really need to slow climate change not just in the next century but in the next 20 years before we reach what Tim Flannery has called the tipping point when it gets too late to prevent climate catastrophe then methane over 20 years is 72 times as damaging to the environment as is as is carbon dioxide and animals particularly ruminant animals produce large quantities of methane and it doesn't help if they're on grass some people might think that if you have your cattle out on grass they're not grain fed it's environmentally more friendly well as far as climate change is concerned sadly and I say sadly because I do think it's a better life for the cattle but sadly it's actually worse per kilo of beef produced cattle on grass produce at least 50% more methane than cattle fed grain because they need more grass and it's the digestion of the grass by the rumen and system that produces the methane or digestion by the ruminant system and it takes more grass more digestion to produce a kilo of beef so there is no way there was no way of having ecologically sustainable beef unless someone invents something that stops the cattle digestive system producing methane beef and other ruminants generally but beef is certainly the worst offender are contributing massively to climate change finally let me come to the issue that started me a vegetarian more than 40 years ago I don't think that we are justified in treating other sentient beings as things for us to use for our pleasure and convenience and essentially that is what we do in meat production we take we take other sentient beings we use them in ways that are convenient for us of which of course the factory farm is the most egregious example confining them preventing them moving freely just so that the meat gets a little bit cheaper and I think that that is an abuse I think that's a form of speciesism that is it's a prejudice against taking seriously the of beings that are not members of our species we I believe are ethically obliged to give equal consideration to the interests of all sentient beings now I don't say that that means they have equal rights with us they obviously don't have the right to vote they don't have the right to freedom of speech that doesn't make sense but given the interest that they have interest in not feeling pain interest in satisfying their basic instincts and desires then I believe that we should give the same weight to them being able to live that kind of life as we would give to our own interests in living a decent life and that is precisely what commercial meat production never can do thank piano chambers a mere 15 species currently account for over 90% of global livestock production and of these about one-third of cattle pig chicken and breeds already are extinct or currently at risk of extinction to take these animals off the menu would move them from being at risk of extinction to being extinct an extinction is forever this would be an ecological and food security disaster the irony is that in order to save these breeds and species we do have to eat them a paradox that exists because of symbiosis that's an interaction that occurs when different organisms live in close proximity and association together and typically to mutual advantage so for example when a bee takes nectar from a flower in payment for that it transports pollen to other flowers to fertilize them when an hour animal leaves a pile of dung on the ground all the bugs come out from underneath and take that and use that pile of dung have we really come so far that we've forgotten the most basic laws of nature I'm arguing tonight that animals should remain on the menu on an ecological basis and I refute the statement that they should not be off the menu indeed the opposite is true animals are a fundamental part of agricultural biodiversity and must remain on the menu for two prime reasons firstly animals are a vital link in the global ecology and as such are inextricably linked with the environment and the future of our food and secondly because they serve many important social cultural as well as biological functions animal welfare and sentience however not I believe at the center of this debate ecology is and we ignore that at our peril far from being the ecological vandals they're made out to be they fulfill a number of ecological services they work in biologically diverse ecosystems that have evolved over thousands of years of evolution and domestication in partnership with humans and at the heart of this relationship is the building of soil bacteria live in that soil in a single gram of soil there are billions of bacteria and there are estimated 60,000 species alone most of those are yet to be named but what we do know is some of those bacteria and nitrogen lovers and they take nitrogen from the air from the atmosphere and they make that available to plants nitrogen from the atmosphere that would otherwise be unavailable to plants or animals others are methane lovers and this the exclusive source of energy that they take is obtained by taking methane from the atmosphere and it's research undertaken recently at Sydney University has shown that just one hectare of pasture has enough potential for these methane loving bacteria to actually extract methane out of the environment that could be produced by 162 head of cattle now that's more than what you could run on a hectare so it makes it methane neutral other research has shown that that's capable in much higher levels it simply comes back to the management of our soil the environment and the ecosystem which includes the animals what happens as well is you've got fungi in the soil that live at the roots and those fungi transact and interact with with the plants providing they take carbon and they give the plants food and water and this is where the animals come in if you think about a tree a tree has branches above the ground and roots below with a plant when they actually the animals come along and graze that plant they slough off the roots at the bottom and that's what builds soil most simplistic arguments that I've heard to justify vegetarianism often compare the efficiency of just one hectare of land comparing what animals can produce and what plants can produce but this doesn't take into consideration the fact that you cannot crop year after year after year the same bit of ground you take that same bit of ground and you put a pasture phase in an animal's form an intrinsic part of that rotation we need to be farming for the future for our children's future for our children's children's future not just for now because we don't inherit the earth from our ancestors we do borrow it from our children the best way to achieve sustainability is through rotating and alternating arable paddocks between cropping and pastures an animal phase incorporated into the cropping rotation can provide the perfect ecological balance managing the grazing systems by how often and for how long the animal grazers mixing the species of animals that you use sheep and cattle for example a skilled farmer works in harmony with the ecosystems so that the environment does truly stay in balance this is not something that has to occur always on a small scale this can happen on a large scale too and we see examples in Australia with millions of hectares a run in exactly this way with low-impact grazing systems so I disagree that animals cannot be raised in a humane and in an ecologically sustainable way the environment has been created so that it can take up every bit of methane that animals these animals give off in terms of the social and cultural functions of livestock we see examples all over the world where people live in harmony with with animals among people in China working in the terraced rice paddies in the northern part of Vietnam or the southern part of China without the Buffaloes that they live with to plow these terrorists steep terraces for their rice without the pigs that they eat to support them in these high remote villages without ducks and fish to eat the bugs the mosquito larvae that exist in the rice paddies without all of these things these people would not exist and work the land as they do they would not then capture the rainfall in these mountainous areas and stop the erosion that rainfall would go downstream and cause erosion and and the Fertile Delta's downstream would not be able to grow food for their populations ecological farming is the key in 1543 Copernicus first suggested that the earth revolved around the Sun and not the Sun around the earth took 70 years for Galileo to support these same views and he was tried for heresy by the Inquisition sentenced to spend the rest of his life under house arrest because this view questioned the strongly held beliefs about the dominant position of humans and the supremacy of God it only took four hundred years to the Vatican to issue a formal apology to dick Galileo so we now know that the earth does in fact revolve around the Sun but we don't have four years to get this right animal welfare an animal sentience are important they're important just as the earth and the Sun are important but they are not the central issue without diminishing at all the importance of this the highest animal welfare standards alone do not guarantee us ecologically sustainable farming systems and this must be a highest priority because our future food security depends on it FAO supports this view and has stated the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity Food and Agriculture play a critical role in the fight against hunger by ensuring environmental sustainability while increasing food and agricultural production thank you Philip Wolong King Lear late at night on the cliffs asks the blind Earl of Gloucester how do you see the world and the blind man Gloucester replies I see it feelingly and shouldn't we all animals must be off the menu because tonight they are screaming in terror in the slaughterhouses in crates and in cages vile ignoble gulags of despair you see I heard the screams of my dying father as his body was ravaged by the cancer that killed him and I realized I'd heard those screams before in the slaughterhouse there I stabbed out and their tendons last on the cattle ships to the Middle East and the dying mother whale as a harpoon explodes in her brain as she calls out to her calf they cries were the cries of my father and I discovered that when we suffer we suffer as equals and in their capacity to suffer a dog is a pig is a bear is a boy me today is the newest bestest Moo murderous than tobacco co2 methane and nitrous oxide from the livestock industry are killing our oceans with our siddik by proxy dead zones ninety percent of small fish are ground up into pellets to feed to livestock vegetarian cows today are the world's largest ocean predators the oceans are dying in our time by 2048 all our fisheries will be dead the lungs and the arteries of the earth billions of bouncy little cheeks are ground up alive simply because they are male only 100 billion people have ever lived 7 billion people live today and yet we torture and kill two billion sentient living beings every week 10,000 entire species are wiped out every year because of the actions of one and we're now facing the sixth mass extinction in cosmological history if any other organism did this a biologist would call them a virus it is a crime against humanity of unimaginable proportions but happily the world is changing ten years ago Twitter was a bird sound ww was a stuck keyboard cloud was in the sky 4g was a parking space Google was a babies burp Skype was a typo and al-qaeda was my plumber Victor Hugo said there is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come while animal rights today is now the greatest social justice issue since the abolition of slavery do you know there are over 600 million vegetarians in this world and that is bigger than the United States England France Germany Spain Italy Canada Australia New Zealand all put together if we were one nation we would be bigger than the 27 nations of the European Union can you believe that and despite this massive demographic footprint we are still drowned out by the walkers huntin shootin killin cartels who believe that violence is the answer when it should not even be a question meat kills animals kills us and is killing our economies Medicare has already bankrupted the United States they will need eight trillion dollars invested in Treasury bills just to pay the interest and they have precisely zero they could shut down every school Army Navy Air Force homeland security marine CIA and FBI and they still will not have the money to pay their doctor bills and our Cornell and Harvard say that the optimum amount of meat and a healthy human diet is precisely zero water as you know is the new oil nations will soon be going to war for it underground aquifers that took millions of years to fill are now running dry it takes 50,000 litres of precious drinking water to make one kilo of beef today 1 billion people are hungry 20 million people will die from malnutrition cutting meat by only 10% will feed a hundred million people and eliminating meat will end starvation forever if everyone ate a Western diet we would need to Planet Earth to feed us we've only got one and she is dying greenhouse gas emissions from livestock is 50% greater than transporters Peter said cars trains buses ships lorries the whole lot because I traveled around the world I see poor countries who sell their grain to the West while their own children starve in their arms and the West feeds it to livestock so we can eat a steak am I the only one who sees this as a crime believe me every morsel of meat we eat is slapping the tear-stained face of a hungry child when I look into her eyes do I remain silent the earth can produce enough food for everyone's need but not enough for everyone's greed we are facing the perfect storm if any nation had developed weapons that could wreak such havoc on the planet we would launch a preemptive military strike and bomb it back into the Bronze Age but it's not a rogue state it's an industry the good news is we don't have to bomb it we can just start buying it Sir George Bush was wrong the axis of evil does not run through Iraq Iran or North Korea it runs through our dining tables weapons of mass destruction are our knives and forks our proposition is the Swiss Army knife of the future it solves our environmental water human health problems and ends cruelty forever the Stone Age didn't end because we ran out of stones this cruel disgusting industry will end because we run out of excuses meat is like the one in two cent coins it costs more to make than it's worth and I come from the bush farmers are the ones were the most again farming world and it would boom only the product line will change farmers would make so much money they won't even bother counting it and I'd be the first to a problem governments will love us new industries would emerge and flourish in health insurance premiums would plummet hospital waiting lists would disappear hell we'd be so healthy we'd have to shoot someone just to start a cemetery so tonight I have two challenges for the opposition two challenges meat causes a wide range of cancers and heart disease would they name one disease caused by a vegetarian diet and two i'm funding the earthling astrology if the opposition is so sure of their ground I challenge them to send a copy of the Earthlings DVD to all their colleagues and all their customers go on idea animals are not just other species they are other nations and we murder them at our peril the peace map is drawn on a menu peace is not just the absence of war it is the presence of justice justice must be blind to race color religion or species if she's not blind she will be a weapon of terror and tonight there is unimaginable terror in those ghastly Guantanamo's we call factory farms or slaw houses believe me if slaughterhouses had glass walls we wouldn't be having this debate tonight you see I believe another world is possible and on a quiet night I can hear breathing let's get animals off the menu and out of these torture chambers please vote tonight for those who have no voice thank you Bruce McGregor well am I not hiding - nothing are they but thing isn't kill the support it doesn't really matter there are two main points that I shall put against the proposition that animals should be off the menu and these relate to human society and ecological sustainability it's easy for us all to go and visit places where there are people who have animals on the menu and if you're in any doubt just pick up a wheeler production called the Lonely Planet guides and in the Lonely Planet guide you'll find directions to find Mongolian past lists who milk goats and horses people in the Andes who use the armors to carry their goods at ajik women who cook bread on fires fueled by dung and Japanese and Chinese Fisher's who use cormorants to catch their fish to feed their families every day arguing that animals should be off the menu threatens the food security and livelihood of at least two billion people in relation to human societies there are three points which I wish to make firstly taking animals from the menu will actually remove a vast amount of not only meat but also milk and milk products such as yogurt and cheese often essential items in the diets of vegetarians you may ask how is this possible when the animals don't have to be killed to produce meat you need to remember an important thing half of the progeny are male which do not produce any milk and for efficient milk production systems most males as grown to a suitable size and sold or used for meat and only a very few are kept for breeding the problem is that if you keep all the males and unproductive females you'll have a huge waste of feed resources and over time there will be a steadily declining production of milk or whatever the product it concern is per area of land or feed resources the second issue is that the affirmative position implies that men humanitarian organisations are misguided and morally wrong and so clearly are the people who support them organizations such as the Australian based Oxfam and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization have advocated for years that to improve human welfare we need to improve animal farming practices across the developing world for example the us-based heifer project international has run their women in livestock development program for more than twenty years why have they done this they've done it because women told them that they wanted healthy children in a healthy environment they'll sick of living in places covered in dust storms women told them that they wanted animals and to do this the wild women program provides them with animals and training the women build up their herds and provide milk and meat for their children and they generate income by selling their surplus without the use form of animals for meat there would be many more people trapped in poverty and I'll explain that further as we go the third point is that animals are also very important in many traditional economies as they are used as a bank and represent people's families wealth and inheritance this is underwritten by the value of the animal as meat livestock such as chickens rabbits and goats are sold when these people need cash for cash transactions thus if all markets were removed for meat by the stroke of the affirmative team pen food production will decline food prices will increase and two billion people will head towards devotion probably losing their life savings and inheritance does the affirmative team really think these people are morally wrong have they considered all the implications for a large slice of the world's population by taking animals off the menu I don't think so so I've purchased a small gift from Oxfam to remind them of these issues they include a card about chickens don't and go the goat card says its gruff tough and does heaps of good stuff now the relevance of that writer to the three ecological points our wish to make firstly animals produce a lot of nutritious food for materials that humans cannot eat animals do this in a range of harsh environments such as mountains deserts tropical forests and drought prone savanna places where people live grazing animals convert vegetation of absolutely no nutritional value to people into high-protein meat animals produce food where crops don't they also convert a whole lot of material that's unaccepted to humans such as crop residues byproducts of processing and unmarketable quantities vegetables fruits and cereals similarly fish eels and other aquatic animals convert water-based foods into high-value meat for humans there are many systems where various wastes and products are fed into ponds thus feeding fish to provide food for humans and animals only 38% of the world's land surface is agricultural land including 11% that's arable used for crops and about 2% for permanent crops like orchards is it the affirmative position that we should cease producing food from the other 25% of land which can support animals but not crops is this true the second ecological issue is that the natural surface in many natural populations can be sustainably harvested for human food humans usually overlooked the fact that natural losses occur in every ecosystem because without natural losses each ecosystem would become overstocked with aging and diseased animals depending on the system a half or more of each generation is naturally lost to disease and predator thus in a well-managed system natural losses can be harvested for me obviously this is only acceptable if the ecosystems are managed carefully and sustainably I'm not here to advocate harvesting endangered species or the exploitation of threatened ecosystems but there is evidence that farming of endangered species can help with their survival an example comes from North America where native North Americans had complex cultures related to the migration of American bison they had cultural limitations on the harvesting of the meat unfortunately the American bison almost became extinct courtesy of the land wars that were waged against native North Americans by the early last century there are only a few thousand bison left but they were saved in large part because of the number of Farm bison which increased rapidly and in recent decades bison have been used for meat and are now helping to restore degraded prairies the critical issue with harvesting natural ecosystems is that too many species are not sustainably harvested this is not evidence that animals should be off the menu it is evidence that there is a need for more biological research into the productivity and resources available for these food stocks and there's need for greater government oversight and enforcement of regulations every time you hear people say that we want less tax that means less oversight and less enforcement the third ecological issue is the environmental problems with cropping irrigated agriculture for example requires the extensive damming of rivers disruption of ecosystems and degradation of land including erosion nutrient depletion salt incursion and exotic weeds all of these things are associated with cropping and land clearing the alternative to cropping a systems of mixed enterprise agriculture which fiona referred to where animals help to break disease cycles in crop systems the effects of climate change over the next 40 years is predicted to reduce crop yields between 10 and 20 percent through the tropics and subtropics and increase the amount of marginal and for cropping there will be little alternative to the people who live there but to use this marginal cropping land for sustainable animal production there is much to learn about these systems the profession I belong to aims to improve the husbandry of animals and the management of production systems research is making these industries better however the investment into scientific research on a global scale is declining every year without appropriate investment there will be little further development thank you very much Veronica Ridge last month at a slick food and design event in Milan the world's top chef Rene Redzepi from Denmark excitedly unveiled his newest epicurean discovery it was simple enough an innocuous looking pine from gleaned from the forests of Scandinavia apparently with a citrus tang to die fall Rene enthused the flavor is like thousands of grapefruits he told those gathered at the chef in called a dented town Milano we did high-fives for a day in the kitchen when we found that now I'm not suggesting that we should all follow a diet of Danish pine fronds juniper berries and mosses and lichens that Redzepi foragers from the forest floor and yes Redzepi also serves me some of it on the extreme side there's poached deer whale penis and you can choose to devour a live wriggling shrimp in brown butter if you so desire the point I'm making is it at the world's top restaurant today you can have a wonderfully entertaining inventive and delicious meal made for you without slaughter there has been a revolution in vegetarian and vegan cooking and eating in the past decade a new generation of cooks are using vegetables spices nuts seeds herbs and all kinds of other seeds and nuts in incredible ways gone are the mung beans and bland wholemeal pies that accompany the whiff of 1970s hip edom in fact much of the pleasure and excitement in eating today is this new wave of vegetarian and vegan food that follows an ingredient led locavore agenda let me share a dish with you from a distinguished European vegetarian restaurant the Cafe Paradiso in Cork Ireland its description creamy feta pistachio and couscous cakes with sweet and hot pepper Jam citrus greens coriander yogurt and spiced chickpeas vegetarian devastations you can get here at Jack Raymond view Demond the Royal Mail at Dunn curled at the lake house Adele's four are among the finest that you will find anywhere Jacques Ramon's latest vegetarian degustation menu has nine courses that build in texture richness flavor and drama as each is served the final savory dish in the lineup is a warm terrine created using lightly steamed nickel and potatoes layered with aged compte cheese and then seed to a golden Christmas top and bottom it's paired with crunchy tempura and oaky mushrooms a clean green sage and nettle puree sharp poached nectarine for contrast and there's a lovely hit of wasabi from granules that are a bit like sand using a molecular gastronomy cooking technique no amount of beef lamb chicken or fish could improve these meals the same goes for vegetarian and vegan food from Melbourne zefnep cuisines Indian Lebanese Japanese Mexican all cultures that celebrate delicious and healthy animal protein free dishes and they have shown us how to do it recipes the most innovative vegetarian recipes today are from the food writer your Tam Otto ling Jie who pens a column in The Guardian called new vegetarian after lengthy sets out he says to create fireworks with vegetables using noisy ingredients lemon pomegranate garlic chili a little tip for a Sunday brunch his green pancakes lime butter and a couple of glasses of Prosecco google his recipes you'll be amazed meat alternatives New York Times columnist mark Pittman recently did a blind taste test comparing chicken and fake chicken made from plants he couldn't tell the difference using the criteria taste texture and chewiness Bittman Road would I rather eat cruelly raised polluting unhealthful chicken or a plant product that's nutritionally similar or superior good enough to fool me and requires no antibiotics cutting off of heads and other nasty things Whole Foods in the United States will be selling it soon at a price cheaper than the chicken that made it on the supermarket shelf after a miserable 6-week existence these people are showing us the way forward in 2012 you can be happily satisfied epicurean and have ethics that's even a word for it and if the Kurian histories great thinkers who advocated a vegetarian diet are too long to list here but their fair is covered religious spiritual philosophical social health environmental themes but one of the most moving arguments was put forward by 18th century English philosopher Jeremy Bentham who said the question regarding animals is not can they reason nor can they talk but can they suffer while animals can't speak in ways we comprehend and their intellect is lacking they are entitled to be treated with care because like us they feel pain the fact that they can't put their suffering into words there's no excuse for ignoring it in fact it puts a higher responsibility on we supposedly enlightened humans to identify their screams and help them and of course the modern landmark book raising awareness of animal rights especially farm animals Peter singers Animal Liberation in 1975 all these advanced thinkers and yet the plight of animals for food hasn't improved much food production methods in the Western world used since the 1950s driven by a demand for ever cheaper food are not only damaging our health and the environment they have led to the inhumane intensive farming of animals Bruce and Fiona have mentioned the mongolians and Chinese who who do use meat in their daily lives but in fact we are defending that animal shall be off the menu here we have the choices some people don't and too many people nowadays have been lulled into a sense of complacency by the thought that animals are slaughtered humanely presumably then therefore removing any possible humanitarian objection to the eating of meat unfortunately nothing could be further from the facts as we have all seen in recent shocking footage including an Australian abattoir there is no such thing as humane slaughter and there is a glaring double standard between the way we treat our pets with care and respect and not the animals we eat Melbourne University academic Siobhan O'Sullivan argues in a new book that the key to understanding this is out of sight out of mind the more visible and animal is within the community the more likely we are to treat it with kindness and respect O'Sullivan points out that animal welfare laws for hens in petting zoos that teach children about caring for animals are more comprehensive than laws for broiler hens raised for meat it's hypocrisy that most parents have had to consider sadly lab and meat animals are out of the public view and industrialized agriculture perpetuates concealment at almost every level of production I conclude that the avoidance of pain and suffering of any living being should be the main consideration when making culinary choices this is the number-one imperative for all human beings and should be the guiding premise when choosing what to eat I don't see an argument to counter this on the basis that you can eat brilliantly without slaughtering animals thank Adrien Richardson thank you very much I love me I love cooking me I love eating me and I love serving meat to other people if it's got a pulse I can cook it and there are plenty of people here tonight that have eaten my moist juicy tender beef if you haven't you could always pop down to my restaurant that lunar Bistro just tell them Adrienne sent you but we did an audience survey earlier on this - tonight and the results showed that 78% of the people here tonight have eaten meat in the last six months so I think that I can speak for the majority of people here but it will be over our cold dead bodies if you take meat or animals off the menu it would be uh Knost rallyin we of course other country that invented the BYO meat barbecue we are meat eaters carnivores we are so close to our mammoth hunting save each ancestors that it's not funny it's in our nature it's natural imagine the days of roasting wild boar over hot coals underneath the stars that was us people and if you have any doubt as to how close we are to our ancestors you just have to go to any AFL website just click on any link calling one's got a good one now for the other 22% the vegetarians the non meat eaters and their friends the vegans I can see you almost bracing yourself thinking I'm going to take a swipe well that's not happening tonight I have a confession to make in front of all of you I'm actually half vegetarian well half of my family vegetarian dad side my grandparents Peter and Kathleen Richardson brought my father and 9 of his siblings up to be staunch vegetarians they believed that life is sacred and I agree I think that vegetarianism and the act of not eating the flesh of another beast is a most noble cause they made that choice they believed in that choice and for that I have always had a great deal of respect for them but it all comes down to choice if you don't eat meat great bully to you but if you do eat meat which most of the world's population do it's how you choose that meat that's important and that's what this debate should be about now I'll just clarify my half vegetarian bit for the first two and a half years I was at vegetarian that was dad's choice I didn't eat any meat but that all ended one Sunday afternoon I was sitting on my grandmother's name I not on my Italian part of the family they ate meat and the chicken wing magically appeared I suspect a little foul play was at hand but that chicken wing was devoured it was devoured so much that the bones crumbled in my hands and you know what I made the choice from then on I would eat meat I would enjoy meat and I would have respect for the meat but a month later my dad the vegetarian he was seduced by the same cunning beast a whole roast chicken stuffed with rice lemon and parsley and a little garlic butter pushed underneath the skin of the breast that to base the chicken from the inside as it cooks now that's a little tip for you next time you cook a Chuck now I've heard much talk this evening about how eating meat is unhealthy it will cause your cancer and kill you from experts who's talking statistics and studies we all know how well statistics and studies can be manipulated just watch an episode of today tonight I can only talk about my own personal experiences my grandparents my dad's parents the vegetarians ate very well they grew their own fruit and vegetables baked bread and cooked and ate the most amazing vegetarian food they ate a balanced diet a very healthy diet they lived into their 90's healthy and very happy and my grandmother she'll be watching this later she's very she's alive and well today at 92 my mother's grandparents the Italian side the phrase they ate meat they had passed their beans fruit and vegetables much of it grown in their backyard as well what they ate was just as healthy as the vegetarians they cooked and served me the most amazing Mediterranean food and they both lived happily and healthy into their 90's so to hear the argument the eating red meat will kill you just doesn't wash with me I think it's a load of baloney I think it's information manipulation you know what kills you eating too much meat kills you too many chips donuts hotdogs pies all of the processed crap that's offered to us today and even more so our kids that's the stuff that will kill you we need to eat a balanced diet and a balanced diet means that meat doesn't have to be eaten at every meal just by having a few meat free days and leading and eating lots of green vegetables is a fantastic start and by doing only these two things we can have a huge impact on the planet and our bodies I have to also include this for the ladies and my wife chocolate is also part of a balanced diet as far as I'm concerned if you heat a eat a healthy balanced diet there is no health reason for not eating meat and it's up to us to teach our kids sit down eat together as a family talk to each other take the time to set a good example to your kids and this starts by turning the television off if you want to stop factory farming don't buy supermarket meat there's my endorsement deal and stay out of fast-food stores go to your local butcher remember them I'm sure there's a few ladies here that do your local butcher will listen to you tell him I want Victorian grass-fed beef free-range pork from Fiona free-range chicken and Australian lamb we know what the Kiwis did it is believe me a happy animal tastes so much better and I know because that's what I use at home and in my restaurant love in a bistro if you didn't get it before by Fiona's pork we know how pigs are cared for from birth up until that last second and I think if an animal has lived a good life wandering the fields eating green grass and nibbling on daisies and drinking streams in the sunshine as long as the death is fast and painless I don't have a problem with killing animals it's a natural thing to me and I've killed a few Fiona's pigs have all good days and only one bad day and believe me Fiona's pigs are delicious if you make the choice and put the money into the hands of the farmers growers and sellers that are doing the right thing eventually we will see change last night I was watching television and a KFC commercial came on they're using free-range chicken they're listening to us another thing that concerns me a meat eaters that don't want to acknowledge the fact that the filet mignon they're tucking into that so juicy and tender was once a living thing and needs to be respected they're the ones that should be eating the tofu turkey the soy sausages and all those other fake meat products we know meaning eating meat has an impact on the environment everything we do has an impact so if we're eating less meat and using humanely reared sustainably produced meat and the queasy meat eaters have switched to their fun bacon don't you think we're doing our bit to reducing the negative impact for anyone to tell me the animal should be off the menu I think is ridiculous I think if we make the right choice and that's what this whole debate comes down to don't you think we can all enjoy a tender juicy Brassfield steak every now and again remember one thing and this is the thing I want you to go home with tonight eat meat responsibly thank you very much well ladies and gentlemen you've heard the arguments from our six speakers and in a little while you'll be able to cast your vote but before you do there's an opportunity now for people in the audience themselves to contribute to the debate so what I'd like to do is we'd bring the lights up a little bit there are microphones just here here and up the back and what I'd like to do is provide anybody who wants to speak for the motion or against the motion up to a minute to do so perhaps make your way to the microphone if you'd like to have a go at influencing the audience and how it's down to vote before I do they feel you issued a challenge to the other side and I don't think they heard it because you had a bit of a frog in your throat at the time so I just wanna repeat what that challenge was two challenges the first one we know what everyone except the opposition knows of the cancers and heart disease is caused by meat let's accept that now I wanted them to tell me one disease that they can identify that is caused by a vegetarian diet and two if they are so confident about their position about what actually happens on these these animals in these animal factories will they be prepared to um because I'm funding the Earthlings trilogy will they be prepared to give a copy of this DVD to all their friends family and most importantly their customers what's a colony for what is it it's called Earthlings Earthlings right and okay you can google it if you like okay so if anybody want it and we'll come back to you in a moment I'll get you to respond just now but if you believe that the factory farming process is defensible I'm not sure that you've argued that then would you give earthling to others okay let's get to the audience now we'll take it an order of for and against so that there's an equal chance and I'll start over this side first so is there anybody there who would like to speak for the motion yes if you do if you could just give me your name and then you've got for a minute and you'll get the bill like everybody else so away you go great my name's Matthew I'm just was interested in hearing about the soil carbon stuff my understanding is that the the University of Sydney research was underway but there's no peer-reviewed scientific outcome so in other words that research that someone was doing into trying to get carbon into soils to Assad to try and offset the methane production which is terrible from from from the belching of cows and sheep and therefore agriculture is by far the biggest vector of of emissions once you take into account the fact that we currently under account on the multiplier effect for methane in the atmosphere so in fact many things should really be calculated on 105 times basis not a 25 times basis and that's the latest NASA data for the effect of methane so my understanding and if your honor if you can quote which peer-reviewed journal that's come out in because I believe it hasn't and I looked into this about a week or two ago you'll find that that although someone claims are doing some tests they haven't got it published and so it hasn't been agreed with by the scientific community more broadly okay a opportunity Fiona if you'd respond if you're seeing a peer-reviewed journal great comment and no I can't answer that at the moment and I'm more than happy to go away and look into it for you I think what is clearly clearly known is that these bacteria do eat takeout methane and it's that's where the research needs to be further research into that to look at how they can take that up because we're looking at a cycle so it's how we can maximize so the short answer is going on that Sony wants to speak against the motion my name is Wei I happen to be a doctor and I like to UM make some comments about mr. Rollins challenge about the health effects of a vegetarian diet you know I would like to to comment that there has been some research that shows that vegetarians do lead healthier lives than meat-eaters but unfortunately a lot of the meat-eaters in those studies are those who we you know steaks and hot dogs and chips and hamburgers every day what hasn't been adequately studied are people who either balanced healthy diet with small medically recommended amounts of meat he wanted me to mention a number of diseases that can be caused by a vegetarian diet now I would I do agree that a balanced vegetarian diet can result in very good health but unfortunately it's not always easy to get it right and a significant number of people do get it wrong I think in in Western society a vegetarian diet does lead to the increased risks of deficiencies of calcium and iron which can impair brain development in the third world it's almost a death sentence I'd like to mention that mr. Wallen mentions cancers and cardiovascular disease especially now nearly everything causes cancer but one of the most studied and most infamous carcinogens as aflatoxin from plants okay thank you thank you okay so I now take somebody wants to speak yeah you wonder whether dr. white has actually seen the archives of internal medicine study that was published a week or so ago because it is controlling for the variables you mentioned its controlling for other things like the amount of fat eaten whether people are eating chips it's also relating to what Adrienne said it is both unprocessed and processed red meat it's not only so I do think there is evidence that even modest amounts of red meat contribute to an increased mortality from these diseases but I have a fantastic mind for trivia and I remember learning at school that if you eat 20 kilograms of onions you'll get sickle-cell anemia and that will be the least of your problems right I'll come back down here somebody wants to speak for the motion and Adrian you said that eating meat is a natural thing we have evolved to do it but I want to know what is natural about drinking another animal's breast milk scalloping chickens alive too did feather them force-feeding ducks with tubes down their throats so that we can enjoy raw and systematically separating male and female cow calves so that one can be slaughtered for veal and the other for breeding and what is natural about keeping hundreds and thousands of animals cooped up in cages in which they cannot stand up they cannot turn around and they can barely move Adrian well what'd you pull out is the worst stuff that's going on in the meat industry I don't use Fargo I never have and never will I use free-range chickens that's what I like now it's it's it's about doing the right thing and I don't think I mean you pull out all this emotive language and it's wrong some of this stuff and if you're if you're worried about veal and Jesus it's horrible to cut you know we shouldn't be eating veal and we shouldn't be killing killing baby cows don't eat milk and cheese take it off your menu you're the ones that can control this that's what it's all about if you don't want to eat these things don't buy them and the consider the people who are providing it will stop doing it they'll start making growing soybeans and whatever else you choose okay is there somebody down here who would like to speak against the motion yes you come forward then you take priority my name is Michael O'Neill I am actually raised rare breed cattle in a very ethical manner so much so that Fiona chambers actually sells them through her farm shop my question is for the the fourth team the third speaker highlighted a number of dishes that leading chefs here in internationally all serve and held them up as a paragon of vegetarianism over half of them contain dairy products one of the principal arguments with the the 14 is the cruelty aspect and the ethics of meat production the dairy industry is possibly one of the most unethical industries how can they advocate dishes or that we should eat dairy product when dairy products come from milk milk can only be produced when a female lactates for a female to lactate it has to conceive and deliver a live birth what happens in the dairy industry is that animal progeny is taken from the mother so that the mother can produce obscene amounts of milk I think I think we've got the points I thank you very much for that now would if there's anybody from the dairy industry you can have a say in a moment who wants this is really directed to you wasn't it about your dairy recipe included recipes we don't agree with using dairy products either I could have given you a vegan example or for every example I gave you there we were looking at my argument was was the slaughter of animals and the inhumane treatment of animals if they'd been more time I would certainly have gone into the mistreatment of animals in the milk industry and the dairy industry and I could have given you a thousand recipes that any of these restaurants would have served arguing against dairy with the same the same vehement as you would against the meat industry yes I am okay somebody who wants to speak for the motion from up the back is there anybody up there that's waiting to speak I've just got a couple of points that I want to address from the side speaking against the first one is that I felt like the actual moral issue of the sentience of the animals themselves wasn't really addressed by the side speaking against and when it was it was the last biggest I forgot your name you mentioned that if you do say the moral issues of eating sentient beings then eat less meat but for me that's on the same spectrum as not eating meat at all it's just probably taking less action another issue that I found with your arguments was one of you mentioned human superiority and certain thinkers having different ideas on the kind of species view that that humans have had throughout history I found that kind of ironic considering I think that's the debate that we're having right now is you know how important we are as opposed to the rest of the other beings that we live on earth with and I feel as though the bringing up certain cultures in in other countries is kind of a form of cultural relativism where you kind of remove yourself from the moral dilemma and excuse it because it is a different culture okay thank you just hold that we'll come back to you a bit later we get a few more people but somebody who wants to speak against the motion yes down here and then looks like fun for the motion from over there just putting aside sort of the actual consumption of meat once it's become the consumption of animals after they've been slaughtered if it's no longer an economical situation where we are eating meat then what do you actually imagine happening to those animals would they I mean how do you what is the ethical argument behind that so it's really what's the alternative for animals if they're not going to be eaten in the world of assume again hold that we'll come back to that and I speak of for the motion down here yep I have a question directed at is it Bruce in the middle I all right Bruce I'm a Yank and I was delighted when you mentioned one of my favorite species of animal which was the Great American bison and I think he'd be interested to know that it wasn't that the Great American bison was driven down to a few thousand and number they were driven down to 27 in a number and the reason that the great American bison were driven near extinction was because of the cattle industry and the reason that Native Americans were driven off their land was to make room for the cattle industry and to this day the Montana Department of livestock and I grew up in West Yellowstone Montana continues to slaughter great American bison for the very reason that the cattle industry in the meat industry is afraid that they're going to compete with their cattle over grazing lands I'm very concerned about biodiversity of fill woolen and Peter Singer brought up the very good point that we're facing this great mass extinction and when the greatest threats to species surviving is ocean pollution global warming and deforestation and the meat industry is the largest factor in all three of those things I wonder how meat is good for biodiversity so let's start off with animal sentience you know which I know you wanted to say something about I was going to firstly respond to the speciesism side of things because why limit it to a sentient being if we're not going to be species just my point was that bacteria and fungi are by far the biggest determinants for us going forward and we're just completely ignoring them because we're so human centric and so sentient being centric that that was my argument okay that's something you want to say else about sentience anybody yes first a comment about this because if people need to eat something to live and we're making a choice between eating live plants and other things so the argument that's been put to you is that we shouldn't eat sentient animals but relate to eat plants which are living things so you need to really get your rigs clear here about what you are doing as a biological organ organ ISM which actually you depend on bacteria in your gut actually to digest most of your food anyway so you're going through a different process altogether so we need to be clear what the questions are and the question that we were asked to debate was that animals should be off the menu not for us off all the menus it doesn't say off our menu or you know Peter singers menu it says off the menu thank you now let's go to a couple of things that were put one question was about coming from the floor Philip which I think you wanted to answer it was in relation to how should the animals that are no longer going to be eaten how are they to live and then I want to perhaps Peter wants to come in let's take this is a serious question about whether or not one's ethical concerns should extend beyond those of other sentient beings to other forms of life other orders of being how should we think about that so you have a crack at the first one you ask them what are we going to do with the animals that we've already got sitting on on on earth with us right now those animals came at a being because they were their parents were artificially inseminated they were produced in a factory of an animal Factory all we got to do is turn off the factory what and what about the dinner is talking about the dairy industry how did the cows were actually artificially inseminated so that's a big piece of it in fact of the 70 the billion animals that are killed according to the FAO every year 50 billion of them poultry and a date so it's assumed however they come into existence yes the cages are fine open the pastures are a made free-range and the animals wander the world what happens to them we're not they're not going to overrun us you know let's just give you let's face it how will they fare I'll cut you a bit of slack I'll let you eat all the animals that are already sitting in the factory farms just stop producing anymore ok ok and Peter the question about other orders of being why those with sentience been given privilege I think the fundamental principle here is as I said one of equal consideration of interests now I think to have interests you have to have experiences of some sort we have interests in not feeling pain and in enjoying our lives and so do non-human animals generally certainly birds and mammals I would say all vertebrates I'm not going to go to the wall saying that an oyster is capable of feeling pain and if somebody wants to say well I'm going to leave Easter's on my menu I'm not really going to argue against that and certainly I don't think that bacteria are sentient beings and so I don't think that they have interests so giving equal consideration you can give equal consideration to oysters and bacteria if you like but if I'm right in saying that bacteria anyway have no experiences are not conscious then it's just giving equal consideration to no interest at all so it's like when you try to multiply 12 by zero you still get zero so I think it's the same sort of thing if there are no interest there I don't think that thinking ethically about them for their own sake really makes sense of course they may play a role in the natural ecosystems and they may be instrumentally useful but it only go interests or they can't at the foundation of ethics in the way that's Indian beings do ok let's take a few more coins from the floors speaking for the motion my name is Kaley and I wanted to begin by thanking all the speakers for their contributions this evening I've got more of an observation really and it's been touched upon briefly already so I'll try and be quick I just wanted to say that the fact that the team the- chooses to focus on primarily the ecological side of the debate only and to reduce animals to me units of production two items on a menu and two their usefulness in terms of a means to human ends i think it shows the reluctance and perhaps a fear to engage on the ethical issues that arise from eating animals and since my first observation and secondly in response to it to the idea of choice and that we choose to eat vegetarian or vegan or we choose to eat meat whereas the choice in this debate for the animal that is factory farmed and that is produced thank you is there somebody who would like up the top there who'd like to speak against the motion yes up the top first of all I think that the straw man argument about factory farming is a bit boring at an intelligent debate because I can't think that there'd be anybody in this room who would actually be in favor of factory farming and you know stand up if you are I think that that's not what we came to debate though it's about whether meat should be on the menu or off the menu and the questions about moral relativism and cultural relativism that we've all heard just now have also alighted the role although it's been canvassed briefly alighted the role of meat in the global south and for us to sit here in icon of luxurious first world lives and have a choice about vegetarianism which I respect is I think is unconscionable to apply to others who don't have the same choices and so if you're going to take the moral position you need to be very careful about whether you're taking that position for others whose best source of nutrition might be the family Pig that's in the field nearby that's part of their agro ecological system speaking for the motion yes I'd like to make explicit I think a point that I think is implicit in what the animal ethicists have already said that is that we're not carnivores we eat meat by choice why would you choose to kill another animal and eat its flesh when you could choose not so I think meat feeds much more than our body I think eating meat feeds our ego because by choosing to eat meat we're demonstrating that we are powerful enough to dominate and kill other animals for reasons other than survival we demonstrated through technology on a farm where animals are kept in cages no matter how big or small we demonstrated through technology in an abattoir where animals are killed systematically by machines last thing and most importantly we've demonstrated with our wallets where we pay top dollar prime steak as a display of wealth we are not carnivores we eat meat by choice and we choose to eat it to feed our anybody then who wants to speak against the motion first I guess a question for Veronica and did you know that Yotam actually also eats meat in is a is a meaty turn that and his second book plenty was you know all about vegetarianism but in the sort of the forward of the book he actually talks about and the fact that he enjoys eating meat and that perhaps some people here aren't aware that one of your pinup chefs etc is actually a carnivore exactly aware of that fact very aware of it he's made it very clear for many years that in fact he is a meat eater but but he's also a very inventive food writer and that's why he was employed by the Guardian at a time when the readers wanted clever exciting vegetarian food but I'm certainly aware that he is he does eat meat it's at the point I'm making his that is that his vegetarian recipes are really clever and creative and well worth looking at okay so thirty four thirty two seconds to 30 seconds okay and gets question for all those on the on the fourth side and have any of you bought a wallet or wear leather shoes now in the last sort of six of you know six months I'd like to answer that for me yep many years ago when I was a merchant banker I jet around the world like some bigshot and my favorite food was filling mignon and lobster a fact which I'm so profoundly ashamed today I don't consume any animal plant products the shoes that I wear my belt even my watch band have no animal products in it and I can now look in the mirror in the morning with a clear conscience is there somebody at the top who wanted to speak for the motion yes and then we'll take so I guess that I feel like there were two two arguments raised that I think were flawed and I think are often used in different moral debates I think the first one is the idea that if something is natural and humans have done it historically then it makes it okay well this is maybe an intuitive thing that people like to nod their heads to I think that I mean you can take for example the idea that women I mean naturally are supposed to raise their young kids just by the fact of breastfeeding but today we have ways to go around that in the 21st century and it allows women to enter the workforce that allows women to do a whole range of things so I think that just because something is natural if we can choose to transcend it and that gives people or sentient beings a better life then I think that we should I think the other important issue is that it often it's talked about the fact that people lose their jobs if something's changed or the implications that that will have on workers and I think as you can see with things like with the slavery industry when that was first proposed to be banned the amount of jobs lost was something considered and I think that that should never really be a factor or a large factor because ultimately a society changes jobs in different areas will be lost but for massive things like billions of animals a day that shouldn't that shouldn't influence our actions more than the billions of animals that are killed thank you okay just to be because people been waiting I'll take one the first speaker on each side here you'll be the last two speakers so I'm sorry for those who've missed out but we need two so one speaker each on this side and this side and you can sort out of extra cells the rest I'm afraid we'll have missed so yes I do not believe that it is appropriate to kill animals and put them on a grill and then smother BBQ sauce all over them because how do you feel if that was you or your child or your sibling or even your mother how would you feel if that was you it's just treating animals a different way because they cannot talk and their only defense is simply the people who are vegetarian and the final floor speaker will be this gentleman I was to respond to many claims made by those saying those who on the against side but I think it always summed up by the fact that in many things in life we have a win-win situation this is one of them there's really nothing to be weighed up and the idea that there is somebody wait up usually it's generated by those who profit from the thing that is causing the suffering and that is certainly the case here in terms of being natural like meat well I'd advise someone to try if they can to attack and bite a cow or another animal using only what they have now their so-called eye teeth without tools you can't do it with our tools you can't fly and you can't do a whole lot of other things that humans are not naturally capable of doing in terms of bacteria well the total weight of bacteria exceeds the weight of all other living things they're not going to disappear without some cows the and it's worth noting that animals in the wild also produce excrement and needless to say in terms of biodiversity cutting down trees and breaking up the top soil as salinated the soil then killing animals on the so of another model causing heart disease to the humans who eat the animals needless to say kills more animals than being a vegetarian or preferably vegan thank you but not right now all right two things are going to happen now because of the time one is that people with ballot boxes are going to be coming forward to collect your votes it's really important that you find your voting ticket because what you cast now by way of your ballot will determine the result of this argument if you are still undecided then leave it join together and put it in the ballot box otherwise tear it in half for if you were this side or against now as people are summing up you'll hear the speakers each being given two minutes to make some closing remarks because of the way which Adrienne needed to speak I let him go first and we'll go in reverse order so that you can address issues which means Peter will be finishing up so please vote quietly listening to what people having to say Adrienne Richardson your two minutes begins now for me this is a personal choice I have no problem with the winner when I've done this before I've killed an animal in fact when I was 12 years old my father the vegetarian he was a vegetarian took me out to the back paddock of the farm we were living on and I shot my first sheep we scan it we gutted it and we hung it in the cellar for a couple of days wrapped in cloth that's why that's the way you tenderize it my father set me down a couple of days later when we ate the meat and he said to me Adrian this is where meat comes from an animal dies so that you can eat meat it's your job to make sure you use every part of it and treat that animal risk with with respect and that's the way I've lived my life and that's what I do that's why I eat meat I have no problem with it the gentleman over there said that we can't kill an animal with our bare hands well I've killed a few chickens and a few rabbits with my bare hands you know and if I was out in the wall that's what I would do but I have no problem with it and I'm sure there's a lot of people who don't have that problem at all and if you have a problem with the death of an animal then don't eat meat I think it's a it's a most noble thing that's what I'm thinking Veronica you'll be next you've got two minutes I'd also be interested Philip just to give you some warning one of the arguments that was put on the thing that you got from the floor is that this is not about factory farming and if I'd like if you could when you make your comments to remark on if there was no factory farming with that in all in any way change your view so just to have that on notice Veronica you're two notes begin there okay I was the editor of Epicure for four years and that time I watched the expectations of readers and the quality of vegetarian and vegan food increased to the point where it became exciting and clever these days vegetarian food is delicious whether we're talking about more sophisticated epicurean dishes or staples that can be flavored with plant-based proteins pulses seeds nuts spices and herbs plant products I believe provide us with the necessary nutrients a human needs and research certainly shows that conclusively that it's healthier than a meat-based diet and better for the planet the demand for ever cheaper food has led to the inhumane factory farming of animals with this is the basis of my argument I believe the avoidance of pain and suffering of any living being should be the main consideration we're making culinary choices food should be a celebration it unites families and nourishes the soul it is one of the ways we can tell people we care about them before sitting down to our next meal perhaps we should all consider acting on the knowledge that no being has to suffer and die for us to live and thrive dr. Bruce McGregor yes I think it's important to remind members of the audience that crop production which involves the plowing of ground completely destroys biodiversity but take note that when the place has been plowed up for years and years to produce any crop there is no biodiversity left it's also important to remember that irrigation systems destroyed biodiversity and river systems so that again using irrigation for crop production is a problem an example of another sort of production system is soybean production in Brazil with large areas of the Amazon rainforest are being destroyed to produce soybeans doesn't there are at least two billion people who depend on animals for their food and livelihoods which is underwritten it's to some extent by the valuers meat it's important to consider the welfare and ethics involved in this otherwise one could be regarded as being purely selfish and perhaps myth anthropic many species of animal will benefit from proper studies of the management and biodiversity at the moment there's very little investment on a world scale in proper sustainable food production systems in natural and farm systems there's a huge investment in military expenditure it has been estimated 60% of the investment is in military issues and not into the things that we're concerned about today so the future really of this debate is linked inextricably to human population pressures I mean there's going to be nine billion people producing methane every day 150 years ago was less than 2 billion the issues with farmed animal production and methane need to be put in the context of the huge numbers of native animals that have been wiped out as one of the speakers mentioned earlier cattle have been replaced have been replacing native ecosystems Philip woollen Simon I'll answer your question as long as it doesn't come into my my response time okay Lily take me a couple of seconds I completely disagree with factory farming most of the animals the meat that we consume today comes out of factory farms plain and simple anyone who tells you otherwise is disingenuous to say the very least and I'm just surprised but if but if there was no factory farming in the world yes none at all yes would it change your attitude to the eating of meat it would not change my attitude in the slightest right I can't order to be okay your statement I'd like everyone here - just imagine another world a clean peaceful environment healthy people no cruelty no killing no screams what type of person bright spark would come up and say let's capture cage impregnate torture and kill all the animals let's eat their rotting corpses and make our bodies a graveyard for murder victims would any what what would you say to someone who came up with that brilliant idea well if no one here would invent such an industry what kind of person would defend it I guess I know the answer Upton Sinclair said it's difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on him not understanding it now during this debate while we've been having this debate 30 million animals have been murdered so as I say I was a meat-eater until I saw the atrocities committed against these prowess animals cruelty if inflicted on a puppy or a kitten would have landed in the offender in prison for a long time but if it's on a factory farm it's okay see I've traveled around the world many years ago I realized there were hundreds of animals I didn't eat dogs or cats bears or bats horses or hamsters Rahzel as a rat sight none of them so I simply added five animals to the list cows sheep chickens pigs and fish I've never felt better so I would say feeding a child meat is tantamount to tossing him a pack of Marlboros the last sentence of Scots of Gerald's book reads so we beat on boats against the tide drawn back ceaselessly into the past I ask you are we to live forever in a six mug and cruel past the brutes and the bullies have been Goliath but David is coming maybe he's in this room maybe is one of you and if not you who and if not now when ya know chambers there's not one of us on this panel that is here that has tried to defend a factory farming that's not been what the arguments been about you are not correct in saying that just about all meat is from factory farming in Australia in Australia the situation is different and we've only got 6 percent of arable land and the vast majority of that is extensively grazed on low impact environmentally sustainable systems not all of it and I'm not defending the part that's not sustainable but it's not true to say that most livestock is for intensive situations here in the beef situation in terms of humane slaughter it's been said that it's not possible to slaughter animals humanely and that's not true it's not true because I've seen and witnessed I've seen bad slaughters and I've seen good slaughters and animals can be slaughtered they can be slaughtered without pain and without suffering and it's our absolute responsibility to ensure that that happens every time if we're going to be slaughtering animals nothing less than that is acceptable and I'm the first to agree with that but this debate was not about whether or not it's possible to keep slaughter animals humanely because that in itself is not a reason for why animals should not be on the menu or whether they should be on the menu just to say it's possible to kill them humanely is not reason enough but to use animals in a sustainable system to build soil is a reason to keep animals on the menu okay Peter if you could a question that was asked from up the back which you might address on just before you use your two minutes was to do with whether or not adequate consideration has been given to people from other parts of the world and other cultures where the eating of animals for them may be their best source of sustenance so is this a precious argument amongst people who are affluent to the extreme in in comparison to them well certainly I think that I interpret the question as a choice for us and we have choices I did not think we were talking about whether animals should be off the menu for for example hunter-gatherer people in the Amazon or people living in arid grasslands in Africa where they graze cattle and that's basically their major source of food I'm certainly not going to stand here and say you have to put animals off your menu even though that means that you and your children will starve I think the ethical issue is one for us we can walk into a store and either buy meat or buy some equally or more nutritious plant-based foods I think that's the case where I would argue that animals should be off the menu I do you want one or two minutes now to do your summary okay thank you so firstly let me say on this point about are we talking about factory farming or not if we're not talking about factory farming then animals will be largely off the menu because we won't be able to supply the amount of meat that people are eating now from the kinds of farms that we're talking about I mean I think Adrienne said that people should buy Fiona chambers pork well how many I don't know if you can feed even this audience let alone all the people out there and there are other there may be other organic farmers who are trying to do the right thing by their animals but it is still a very small niche market I'd like to see it expand I suppose at the cost of the factory farms that would be certainly better than the factory farms continuing I'd welcome that to that extent but really we can't sustain the kind of meat-eating that we have in the society from these small organic farms that's sad but it's the truth of the matter now Bruce talked about crop production but the fact is and the damage it can do to the environment but the fact is that we would need much less of it if we were not feeding crops to animals he mentioned the brazilian soybean production but the I think seventy or eighty percent of that is fed to animals so that's exactly the problem and and even even with beef in Australia 80% of the beef sold in supermarkets has ended ended its life in feedlots so we are feeding grain we don't do as quite as much of it as the United States is true but we are still feeding grain to the cattle to the beef that is the majority of the beef that is produced in Australia finally I want to say something about this issue of slaughter I welcome the fact that Fiona chambers is concerned about the suffering and cruelty she says that it should be humane every time the problem is that in a commercial slaughterhouse you make money by processing more animals there's a book called every 12 seconds that's how long in a particular slaughterhouse where this man worked every 12 seconds and other animal was being killed you just cannot keep up the humane standards reliably when you're under constant pressure to kill more animals faster so if we want commercial slaughter that are going to be cases of Cruelty you'll never make sure that it's all your mine well I have the tally of the pre-debate poll and the votes you just cast there but before I open up the envelope and see what's happened I just like to thank a few people to our partners here the people from the wheeler Center who have brought us all together fantastic people from the Melbourne Food & Wine Festival I'm sure many of you are here because of their advocacy for a discussion about this topic the staff and management of the Town Hall the volunteers have conducted this ballot all of them out there busily counting the editor and management of the age who are partner we've had now for three years the mayor or lamented officers of the city of Melbourne the managing director and staff of the ABC and our supporters a MP the next debate just is on the topic and it's on the 8th of May that freedom of speech is overrated and I suppose it's a hard argument to advance given what we've been doing tonight but before I even give you the results whatever the result is would you join with me in thanking Peter singer Fiona chambers Philip wall and Bruce McGregor Veronica Ridge and Adrian Richards it's whatever you think about this it's amazing to think that I don't think we would have got this many people 15 or 20 years ago for a topic about this it's extraordinary the way in which the consciousness of this issue has been changed over the last few years but you're not interested in my rambling reflections on that are you it's what happened in a debate well here are the figures when you were surveyed coming in the results were that there were 65 percent of people for the motion 22.5% against and 12.5 percent of you were undecided at the end of the debate the undecided has reduced to six point nine percent the against side has declined to 19.3% which means it's been won with a whopping margin of 73 percent point six percent by the affirmative finally thank you to all of you for coming along tonight for your support and I now declare the debate to be closed

Channel: Kindness Trust

Views: 247,423

Rating: 4.8803034 out of 5

Keywords: KindnessTrust, Meat, Should, be, off, the, menu, wheelercentre, debate, kindess, house, animal, conservation, environment, children, wildlife, australia, love, kindness, ahimsa, kindnesstrust, wheeler, centre, meat, meat industry, agriculture, Peter Singer, Philip Wollen, Veronica Ridge, Adrian Richardson, Fiona Chambers, Bruce McGregor, Cooking, Food

Id: mNED7GJLY7I

Length: 111min 19sec (6679 seconds)

Published: Wed May 30 2012

Reddit Comments

[u/veganicrunner]

Philip Wollen has such powerful delivery! Great debate.

[u/[deleted]]

This was brilliant!