>There's a whole lot of people out there who simply like eating meat, and that it means killing an animal is not particularly a problem.
I'm going to be as neutral as I can be in this comment.
I don't think that's something that should stand in the way; it depends if we're coming from a philosophical perspective, or a political perspective. Arguably, some harms should not be tolerated in civil society - and I think the moral vegetarian case (as expounded by philosophers of all stripes) does some work towards that.
My point is that we can name a variety of behaviour that a large proportion of society engages in which are also harmful. That doesn't mean it's not worth trying to convince them, nor to discourage those behaviours through the softer power the government has available to it - higher taxation on meat agriculture and the end of subsidies for meat agriculture being examples. I have met very, very few moral vegetarians who wish to outright ban meat production, at least immediately.
How did the population in general become acclimatised to other things we now see as immoral[0]? Would that work for moral vegetarianism? I don't have the answers to those questions, but I'm sure someone has discussed it previously. Eating meat is an ancient tradition - even older than that - but so were other moral norms, such as the prohibition of homosexuality.
We very, very frequently shame other people on the basis of their conduct as regards morality - the principle of moral judgements. Most (though not all) philosophers argue this is beneficial to society if morality is worth talking about at all. We still shame adultery for moral reasons. What would it take to bring meat production, or even consumption, to a similar level of disdain?
[0] See any of: slavery, marital rape, revenge porn, CSEM, regulations against abortion, regulations against homosexuality, child marriage, Jim Crow laws - and that's just considering the Western world.
> How did the population in general become acclimatised to other things we now see as immoral[0]?
Pretty much all of our examples in that list of things have direct human victims. Its far easier to get people to realize things are immoral when there are direct human victims. Eating meat usually doesn't have direct human victims, so it is harder to get most people to agree its immoral.
I'm going to be as neutral as I can be in this comment.
I don't think that's something that should stand in the way; it depends if we're coming from a philosophical perspective, or a political perspective. Arguably, some harms should not be tolerated in civil society - and I think the moral vegetarian case (as expounded by philosophers of all stripes) does some work towards that.
My point is that we can name a variety of behaviour that a large proportion of society engages in which are also harmful. That doesn't mean it's not worth trying to convince them, nor to discourage those behaviours through the softer power the government has available to it - higher taxation on meat agriculture and the end of subsidies for meat agriculture being examples. I have met very, very few moral vegetarians who wish to outright ban meat production, at least immediately.
How did the population in general become acclimatised to other things we now see as immoral[0]? Would that work for moral vegetarianism? I don't have the answers to those questions, but I'm sure someone has discussed it previously. Eating meat is an ancient tradition - even older than that - but so were other moral norms, such as the prohibition of homosexuality.
We very, very frequently shame other people on the basis of their conduct as regards morality - the principle of moral judgements. Most (though not all) philosophers argue this is beneficial to society if morality is worth talking about at all. We still shame adultery for moral reasons. What would it take to bring meat production, or even consumption, to a similar level of disdain?
[0] See any of: slavery, marital rape, revenge porn, CSEM, regulations against abortion, regulations against homosexuality, child marriage, Jim Crow laws - and that's just considering the Western world.