preview

A Carnivore's Credo By Roger Scruton Analysis

Decent Essays
Open Document

An intense, aggressive moral scrutiny has sparked interest in the meat eating community. Eating is an activity that we as humans do frequently, and the variety of food is immense. We decide what we are about to eat and how it will affect our bodies. In different societies, controversy has arisen over the morality of eating meat from animals. However, the moral and ethical arguments of eating meat is not a new debate. Roger Scruton’s essay, “A Carnivore’s Credo”, addresses both carnivores and vegetarians by using an appeal to pathos and ethos to persuade people of the need to “remoralize” eating meat, and extrapolating that to mean that human beings have the conscious ability to choose and stand up for moral right and wrong. The …show more content…

After the guilt sets in from eating for the sake of pleasure, Scruton brings forth a multitude of facts and makes an effort to appeal to ethos. To do this, he addresses the benefits of small-scale livestock farming, the use of animals in scientific experimentation, and the actions taken against animals that promote harm. This flood of ethical evidence continues to leave readers wondering if Scruton is a vegetarian himself. Within the battle of opposing opinions about living a carnivorous lifestyle, there’s the underlying battle of judgment in human nature. We, as humans, have the conscious ability to choose a moral right or wrong. According to Scruton, “it is the residue of religion in us all,” that determines what is moral right and wrong (A carnivore’s Credo 259). This causes the essay to become applicable to every area of life where some moral controversy is present. There is no black and white anymore. The argument is not about what Scruton calls eating versus feeding or whether it's virtuous or vicious. There is a definite gray area. This calls for people to reconsider every action before it is even made. There is no need to “abandon habits” when they can simply be “remoralized” (A Carnivore’s Credo 264). In this example of carnivore vs vegetarian, neither one is more correct than the other. There merely is now an open discussion about what is truly moral. Scruton’s essay appeals to the emotions and values of his

Get Access