Response to Shelby's "For Whom is Vegetarianism Morally Obligatory?"

Shelby argues that most people in developed countries could afford a vegan/vegetarian lifestyle if they sacrificed other "luxuries". Shelby also argues that food should be a top priority for humans, even more important than shelter. What do you consider a "luxury"? I don't think it's ethical to tell people, including poor people, how to spend their money. I can agree with you that food is very important, but it's not fair to expect everyone to feel the same way. If a poor family decides to spend money on Christmas presents for their children to make them happy instead of high quality food for a few months, then that is their choice. I personally don't know what it's like to live in poverty so I don't feel like I have the right to say what should be the top priority for a poor person, since I have never lived it.

Furthermore, as we briefly discussed in class, one must have access to knowledge about food, health, and the meat industry to make these informed decisions about their diet. So, even if people in poverty were making food a top priority, they still might not be able to maintain a vegan/vegetarian lifestyle. These disadvantages are much more than "inconveniences".

Question: Why have people stopped spending as much money on food?

Preference

We tend to prefer people that are our family or friends over people who aren't. We also tend to favor people who are from our communities over people who aren't. More controversially, humans tend to favor other humans that belong to their race, religion, gender, or country over people outside of these larger communities. These preferences are unfair because people are not more or less valuable based on how similar they are to us. We prefer people who are like ourselves because we can empathize with them more easily than people who are different from us. For example, when there is a news story of a white kid who brought a gun to school, or committed some type of violent crime, it is treated differently than when a young person of color commits a violent crime. When it is a young white person, everyone says "how could this be happening to our children?" When it is a young person of color, it is some "other" type of person that we feel no connection to. This happens because the media is generally controlled by white people, and people feel more empathy towards others that are "like them". This example of preferring beings that are more like oneself is wrong, and so is preferring a species that is more like oneself. Can our species bias be unlearned, or is it natural?