This isn't a post about eating meat - Jacob Kaplan-Moss<br>This isn’t a post about eating meat<br>I think vegetarians are mostly right. Most of their arguments about why we shouldn’t eat meet — environmental impact, treatment of animals, treatment of workers in the industry, health effects of too much meat consumption, climate impact, etc. — I tend to nod along. I’m broadly in agreement with most of their main arguments.<br>And yet, I still eat meat. Why?<br>Partially, it’s because while I agree with most arguments against meat eating, I also think that by and large vegetarians overstate their cases. Most of the environmental and social impacts aren’t really effects of eating meat; they’re results of the choices we’ve made as a society about how we produce meat. Namely, our system of industrialized farming. We don’t have to produce meat in a way that’s environmentally damaging; we’ve chosen to. Likewise, poor health outcomes are a result of eating too much meat (and not enough variety otherwise) — not something inherent in meat itself.<br>My guess, though, is that these arguments aren’t actually that important to most vegetarians: I think that most are probably making the decision on a moral ground. They see killing animals as inexcusable, and sort of back into the other arguments because they’re easier to explain. That’s because “killing animals is wrong” isn’t a scientific/analytical argument. You can’t prove morality with CO2 emission numbers or whatever; it’s something you feel. It’s a matter of faith. And I don’t share that belief. I believe there are moral ways to raise and kill animals for food.<br>I’ll go even further: I eat meat because it tastes good, and I believe it’s OK to make decisions with downsides, even significant downsides, just because they make us feel good. Living a moral life doesn’t mean we have to live a miserable one.<br>But that said — I do believe that eating meat is carries some moral weight, and should be done deliberately and carefully. I the environmental and social impacts are a fact — industrialized agriculture has so many nasty externalities.<br>So while I still eat meat, I apply a harm reduction mindset. I’m not a vegetarian, but I try to eat meat in a way that minimizes the downsides, both moral and physical. Specifically: when I eat out, it’s mostly vegetables and some fish; at home, all of our meat comes from friends and neighbors raising animals in small numbers following sustainable practices. I know this because I can go to their farms and take a look! This means I eat a lot less meat, avoiding the health consequences. And as a nice side bonus, the money I spend on meat goes to people I know and like, instead of soulless multinationals.<br>What I absolutely don’t_do is use my own ethical decisions to judge other people . These are my choices, not a framework to criticize the relative morality of other people. I recognize my privilege in being able to eat the way I do. I can afford to buy a year’s worth of meat up-front, a couple of freezers to store it in, and the electrical bills to keep those freezers running. I have the time and energy to cook from scratch. I have access to good grocery stores to get other sources of protein to supplement that meat. I live in a community that includes farmers raising meat sustainably, and so on.<br>And more importantly, I understand that my own choices come at least in part from a moral philosophy that’s as much a matter of faith as it is science, and I have the humility to recognize that people with different beliefs, or people making different choices, aren’t wrong just because I disagree with them. I’ll very happily discuss my choices with people who are interested, and explain the environmental and social impacts to people who might be receptive to changing their approach to eating meat to minimize those externalities. But I certainly won’t tell anyone who eats meat differently or more often than me that they’re a bad person, or morally compromised, or whatever. Doing that wouldn’t make me more moral — it’d just make me an asshole.<br>In fact, I barely talk about my choices around eating meat — because hearing people spout off about their morality is most of the time annoying and exhausting. It’s all true, but the only reason I’m writing about eating meat at all is because it’s a metaphor. This has really been about AI.
I always welcome feedback on my writing — please feel free to<br>get in touch<br>if you have comments.<br>I also try to help people with job searches, career advice, and other things; see<br>some ways I can help.<br>If you want to find out<br>when I've posted new articles,<br>subscribe for updates.<br>Published June 16th, 2026<br>Tags:<br>Vegetarianism<br>Diet<br>Ai<br>Morality
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