New article on cognitive dissonance and explaining the mind-games of meat-eaters

[rainbow]

http://www2.psy.uq.edu.au/~uqbbast1/...in%20press.pdf

A group of volunteers were asked to do a series of psychological tests that, in essence, demonstrated that meat-eaters subconsciously rationalise their behaviour by attributing diminished intellectual resources to animals they are willing to eat. It appears that their willingness to recognise the intellect and emotional capacity of an animal depends less on the actual capacities of the animal in question and more on whether or not they associate the animal with food. If they are asked to think of the animal in a way connected with eating it, they attribute fewer capacities to the animal. Thus, the group asked to eat a sheep thought that sheep were less intelligent than cows. The group asked to eat a cow thought that cows were less intelligent than sheep. The ability to justify abhorrent behaviour through denying agency to the victim is fascinating as it illustrates not only the doublethink behind meat-eating, but also the capacity for things such as genocide. (Most perpetrators of genocide allow themselves to believe that their victims are sub-human and worthy of extermination, in ways that, psychologically speaking, are not so different from the dissonance that allows people to love some animals and murder others.) What confuses me in all of this is how we can claim intellectual and moral superiority over other species when it is clear that humans are capable of such facile delusion and such morally dubious (despicable?) behaviour.

[harpy]

That's really interesting rainbow. It makes me think of a recent thread on the non-vegan section of this forum where someone seemed to be doing exactly what they describe.

[victoriangirl]

What confuses me in all of this is how we can claim intellectual and moral superiority over other species when it is clear that humans are capable of such facile delusion and such morally dubious (despicable?) behaviour.

The whole idea of humans claiming to be intellectually & morally superior has always fascinated me. Even as a child, I used to wonder how on earth we could be so egotistical even though we do know so little about life compared to all the things we could know. (or probably will never know)

The discussions on subjects such as whether an animal suffers when it dies, or whether it has emotions, or feel pain like we do etc. seem all useless discussions to me because unless we can be a cow, a fish, a shrimp or an ant or a lobster for a day in our human life, we can never really know what they can go through. And since we do not know, we should just not take a chance and hurt them the way we know what 'hurt' is.

[Andy_T]

Indeed, those studies mare very interesting reads!

I remember when I learned at school in my English class that in the English language, there are different words for "cow" and "beef" and "pig" and "pork" only because after the conquest of England by the Normans (French) in 1066, the local serfs (English) only knew the cow, whereas the ruling conquerors only knew the meat on their plates, thus naming the meat in French.

While that may be true in the etymological sense, it certainly serves omnivores today to create a distance between the food on their plates and the animals they know (and presumably love).

Best regards,
Andy