How we will look back at eating animals | Yaamir Khurana | TEDxQESchool

[Applause] the german philosopher arthur schopenhauer once said that all truths go through three stages first it is ridiculed then it is violently opposed and then it is seen as self-evident now we've seen this throughout history let's go back 100 years ago the idea that women deserve rights was seen as absurd it was ridiculed then it was violently opposed by men at the suffragette protest and now women's rights are seen as self-evident let's go back 200 years ago the idea that black people deserved the right to freedom was seen as absurd it was ridiculed and then it was violently opposed we had an entire civil war over the issue of slavery and now anti-slavery seen as self-evident now we realize that our ancestors had irrational moral blind spots towards certain groups of individuals and of course we look back in shame well this is all obvious and common knowledge but where am i going with this well throughout history there has been one phrase used to describe how victims were treated and that phrases they were treated like animals now it may not seem like much but the reason this phrase is interesting is because we realize that to treat someone like an animal is to treat them harshly and violently and unfairly so the question is if we realize that why are we okay with treating animals like animals partially violently unfairly now i should point out that when i say animals i don't mean dogs and cats because if we threw millions of dogs and cats inside of a gas chamber everyone would lose their minds it would be considered animal cruelty there would be a national outrage there would be protests on the street but here's a little fact not my opinion or a hot take but a fact right now in the uk millions of pigs are thrown into gas chambers alive where they suffocate to death carbon dioxide gas chambers which burns the insides of their throats and for what so we can use their corpse as a sandwich filling or as we'd like to euthanize it as bacon here's another fact mammals only produce milk when they're pregnant and cows are no exception so in order for a cow to produce milk she has to be forcibly impregnated by humans and then when she finally gives birth to a baby that baby wants to drink his mother's milk we can't have that happening because we want to drink his mother's milk so what do we do well we separate the mother and baby which causes the mother immense trauma because cows are very maternal animals we kill the baby for veal another euphemism and then we repeat the process five times till the mother's milk is run dry and then what's the thanks we give her we send her to a slaughterhouse of course and it doesn't end there in the egg industry male chicks are thrown into a giant blender on the first day of life because they don't lay eggs unlike their female counterparts who spend their entire life caged and they're genetically modified to produce 15 times more eggs than they naturally would which takes an immense tone in their bodies and what's the thanks we give them for that well slaughterhouse of course and i can go on and on about the atrocities that happen to animals the worst part is is that it's not even a necessary evil it's a completely unnecessary evil we don't need to exploit animals for any protein calcium vitamins nutrients or minerals we can get them elsewhere rather we do it for taste pleasure now of course i know they taste good who can deny that but since when has taste pleasure matted more than the life and suffering of someone else now you might be thinking well what can i as an individual do about this how can i stop this and some people like to reply will buy humane meat or humane eggs humane dairy humane meat what does the word humane actually mean to you do you think anything humane happens inside a slaughterhouse the word humane means to show compassion and benevolence so i'd like to ask you how can you compassionately kill an animal who does not want to die and does not have to die the solution is simple and you may not like it but it is to live vegan when we live vegan we are actively opposing the exploitation and bloodbath of animals three times a day every single meal because i hate to say it but these industries only exist because you demand it that's the reality of it that's the economics of it supply and demand we buy they die and the less we demand these products the closer we can move to an existence where slaughterhouses are non-existent and ethics aside does anyone here want another pandemic i certainly don't and factory farms and slaughterhouses are breeding grounds for pandemics if we keep exploiting animals covert 19 is just a dress rehearsal and i don't even have time to go on to the climate change and the at the the animal agriculture has on the environment the impacts 86 percent of greenhouse gases manual agriculture according to a recent study if you remember how i started this speech i talked about injustices that were seen as okay during their time but are seen as unacceptable now what i'm asking you today is to consider what side of history do you want to be on because as we've seen none of these injustices last forever there will come a time when we look back at how we treated non-human animals and say wow what were we thinking and i think i know which side of history all of you want to be on because i honestly do believe that most people are good people but like our ancestors we just have moral blind spots but we can do better i know we can do better thank you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 2,642

Keywords: Choice, Diet, English, Ethics, Social Sciences, TEDxTalks

Id: H0RGyk5S4Rc

Length: 6min 43sec (403 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 21 2021