Herzog and Herzog & DFW
- Why is it so difficult to resolve the moral/ethical quandaries that Herzog writes about? What is it like to live in the “troubled middle?”
It is difficult to resolve these moral/ethical quandaries that Herzog discusses, on one hand, because people are compassionate. Many people have a deep love of animals, and to think about inadvertently causing them pain or suffering is very hard for them. In confliction, many people also deeply love meat, so much so that they can’t imagine giving it up. So, people have to decide which love is more important, and that is very hard. I think this is why there are so many misconceptions about our dietary needs (that we absolutely need meat for protein) and so many different versions of vegetarianism, because people are trying to make themselves feel okay about doing something that causes other beings pain. These are coping strategies for many people, and while they might not be completely right one way or the other, it helps allow them to be able to continue living like they want to.
- What does it mean to be human? What can we learn about ourselves by looking at our relationships with animals? What separates us from animals? What do we have in common? Use Herzog and Wallace to support your position.
To me, being human means to act on thought more than instinct, in simple terms. Our thought process is one of the things that separates us from other animals. Herzog agrees, saying in his essay “And while I find some of the logic of animal liberation philosophers convincing, I also believe that our vastly greater capacity for symbolic language, culture, and ethical judgment puts humans on a different moral plane from that of other animals,” (Herzog). This greater capacity for ethical judgement gives us the ability to distinguish right from wrong, although often it is not clear cut what is right and what is wrong, and people often have difficulties making these judgements. Herzog highlights the difficulties people have finding right and wrong when dealing with other species- other species who do not communicate as we do, so determining what’s right falls on the humans. Herzog shows us this struggle when he describes Judith, who became a vegetarian because she thought it was cruel to eat animals, but still ate fish because fish weren’t viewed as animals in her mind. We know fish are animals, but for some reason it was hard for Judith to see that it was just as cruel to eat fish as pigs and chickens. This shows how our judgements for determining right versus wrong can be selfishly motivated, especially when determining what is right or wrong to eat. David Foster Wallace says, “-yet the reason it seems extreme to me appears to be that I believe animals are less morally important than human beings and when it comes to defending such a belief, I have to acknowledge that (a) I have an obvious selfish interest in this belief, since I like to eat certain kinds of animals and want to be able to keep doing it,” (Wallace, 509-510). It is important to recognize how self-interest plays into these choices, while a pig might look and act different from a fish, both species are able to experience pain and suffering just as we do.
- Where do you see agreement between the ideas of DFW and Herzog? Where are they in conflict? Use the texts and draw out specific (quote!) examples that help show how these texts fit into a conversation about animals and eating ethically.
Both Wallace and Herzog seem to be stuck in the “troubled middle”. Herzog describes how he still eats meat, but still draws a line. “I eat meat—but not as much as I used to, and not veal. I oppose testing the toxicity of oven cleaner and eye shadow on animals, but I would sacrifice a lot of mice to find a cure for cancer” (Herzog). Here, we can see how Herzog has made changes to lessen his impact on the suffering of other animals, but still eats meat for his own preferences. This is in agreement with Wallace’s statement about his own preferences (I repeat,) “-yet the reason it seems extreme to me appears to be that I believe animals are less morally important than human beings and when it comes to defending such a belief, I have to acknowledge that (a) I have an obvious selfish interest in this belief, since I like to eat certain kinds of animals and want to be able to keep doing it,” (Wallace, 509-510). Both Herzog and Wallace recognize the ethical conflict of eating animals, yet still decide to consume certain types of meat for the enjoyment they get out of it. For some people, there are certain things that are too hard to give up, and meat is one of those things for many.
