Sacred cows

Here's Joaquin Phoenix's acceptance speech for his Academy Award for Best Actor:

We have to continue to use our voice for the voiceless. I've been thinking a lot about some of the distressing issues that we are facing collectively. I think at times we feel, or were made to feel, that we champion different causes, but for me, I see commonality. I think, whether we're talking about gender inequality or racism or queer rights or indigenous rights or animal rights, we're talking about the fight against injustice. We're talking about the fight against the belief that one nation, one people, one race, one gender, or one species has the right to dominate, control, and use and exploit another with impunity.

I think that we've become very disconnected from the natural world, and many of us, what we're guilty of is an egocentric worldview — the belief that we're the center of the universe. We go into the natural world, and we plunder it for its resources. We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow, and when she gives birth, we steal her baby, even though her cries of anguish are unmistakable. Then, we take her milk, that's intended for her calf, and we put it in our coffee and our cereal, and I think we fear the idea of personal change because we think that we have to sacrifice something to give something up. But human beings, at our best, are so inventive and creative and ingenious, and I think that when we use love and compassion as our guiding principles, we can create, develop and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and to the environment.

Now, I have been a scoundrel in my life. I've been selfish. I've been cruel at times, hard to work with and ungrateful, but so many of you in this room have given me a second chance. And I think that's when we're at our best, when we support each other, not when we cancel each other out for past mistakes, but when we help each other to grow, when we educate each other, when we guide each other toward redemption. That is the best of community.

When he was 17, my brother wrote this lyric. It said: "Run to the rescue with love, and peace will follow."

1. For the purposes of this post, I'm going to assume - am I being naive? - that Phoenix is no longer in character as the Joker.

2. So a rich Hollywood celeb argues for speciesism and for veganism. I use "argues" very loosely. Frankly it's more like assuming and asserting rather than arguing. For starters, I didn't see an argument for why it's wrong to eat beef. Or an argument for why it's wrong to drink cow milk.

3. At best, I gather he's supposing "sentience" is somehow the reason not to eat meat. We shouldn't kill and consume cows because they're "sentient" and to kill sentient creatures would be immoral. However, he doesn't define "sentience", nor does he explain how cows are sentient, nor does he argue how a cow's moral status is derived from or relevantly connected to its sentience.

Is sentience indexed to self-consciousness? So would comatose humans be non-sentient? Would humans come in and out of sentience when they're asleep and awake? Is sentience indexed to intelligence? So that less intelligent people are less sentient than more intelligent people? Is sentience indexed to moral decision-making? Can animals like cows reason about morality? Is sentience indexed to the ability to feel emotions like pain? What about humans who have congenital insensitivity to pain? Are they less sentient than normal humans? And so on.

4. In addition, even if we accept Phoenix's argument (such as it is), it could prove too much, for it could apply to some plants as well. After all, there are scholars who argue some plants are sentient. So will Phoenix refuse to eat plants too? If he's not going to eat animals, plants, or their products, what's left? I guess non-sentient creatures like insects? But from what I've seen, there are some who argue insects might be sentient!

5. I notice Phoenix uses emotionally manipulative language like "steal[ing] her baby". In addition to anthropomorphizing animals (e.g. "even though her cries of anguish are unmistakable"). What makes Phoenix think animals feel pain like we do?

6. Of course, I'm not suggesting we should treat animals with cruelty. I'm all for treating animals well. Indeed, Christianity has a theology of creation care. However, why should we treat animals well according to Phoenix's worldview? Which, evidently, is the following:

I don't believe in God. I don't believe in an afterlife. I don't believe in a soul. I don't believe in anything. I think it's totally right for people to have their own beliefs if it makes them happy, but to me it's a pretty preposterous idea.

Nature is red in tooth and claw. Is it immoral for lions to hunt down and eat gazelles? Given Phoenix's speciesism, should lions turn to veganism too? Why only humans?

7. I don't have a problem with inventing novel food sources if necessary. But what does Phoenix have in mind? Vegan burgers like Monty's burgers in Koreatown? Sure, that's fine, and some vegan burgers taste alright, and I've eaten CPK cauliflower pizza crust that tastes like bread, but it's not like the average person has the time and resources to live a vegan lifestyle like Phoenix does. Besides, how far does Phoenix want to go? Does he want people to be able create artificial cows? There are limits even to human ingenuity.

8. As an aside, some might be interested in an earlier post I did on the same topic.