But I Like Meat

The Harvard Meat Less Initiative’s widely publicized effort to convince Harvard University Hospitality and Dining Services to serve less meat during meals is solidly grounded in fact and scientific evidence. Studies have consistently shown that individuals who eat less meat—particularly vegetarians—live healthier, longer lives, and the environmental impact of eating less meat could mean a slowdown to the carbon emissions and land degradation that livestock cause. No significant research has shown the benefits of sustaining our ways of meat consumption, so it ought to be easy to convince meat-lovers to change their ways and eat more veggies.

Except that hasn’t happened. At the time of this writing, only 185 individuals have signed the online petition calling upon HUHDS to reduce meat. House email lists have served as a soundboard for numerous pro-meat students to condemn the reasonable measure. For the time being there seems to be little movement on the part of HUHDS to follow through with the requests of the petitioners aside from polite responses.

The problem is that the Meat Less organizers and their supporters have overlooked a critical element of initiating behavior change: they looked to impose a set of values without fully engaging in a dialogue with students beyond the realm of facts and practicality. Instead, members of Meat Less should have looked to reason their way into their community’s own ethics and values, particularly among those resistant to any call to decrease meat servings.

At the core of the Meat Less controversy is the issue of values. What must be understood is that when one is armed with facts and still encounters resistance, the issue is no longer a matter of providing correct information. Instead, it is a far more difficult one of changing minds and behavior, something that cannot be accomplished by citing prominent scholars or offering vague benefits alone. There is a need to appeal beyond logic; the reality is that we base many of our preferences and desires on irrational grounds.

Many people understand the benefits of eating less meat, but simply don’t want to (myself included). We are used to tasting some meat at every one of our meals, and if it were not there, we would miss it on an instinctual level. We are therefore an informed body that remains unconvinced. The crucial component missing for the Meat Less initiative is to make people like me sympathize—perhaps even empathize—to a degree that I don’t feel like I’m being imposed upon.

This is difficult but not impossible. For example, a few years ago it might have been inconceivable that students would willingly forgo trays when dining; it is much easier to carry a plate, two side dishes, and a drink on a tray than it is to make two or more trips to the kitchen. However, when Harvard Houses instituted varying degrees of trayless dining, one recurring reason that students offered for enjoying the program was that it fostered a “warmer, homelier” environment. A more home-style experience is not a major theme of the Undergraduate Resource Efficiency Program and “Green” initiatives but it is the one that struck students as important on an instinctual level. As a result trayless dining is now an institution in Adams and other Houses. While losing food options has a greater impact than losing a tray, the same appeals to emotion should be made to sway us naysayers towards the other end.

Such a subjective measure seems to indicate that the most effective way to get students to sustain the Meat Less proposal is to go beyond facts and petitions, which at this point are divisive and unproductive. Too many flame wars have taken place, and with them come the danger of igniting yet another culture war between two staunchly opposed camps. A compromise like the one Meat Less has proposed does not seem unreasonable, but a continued push to ensure students do not feel slighted means confronting ideals that have been long-held by many. They need to start engaging with us at a deeper level, and that will take more time and work. Meat Less must understand that we have a beef with losing beef, and it is their obligation to convince us otherwise.

Byran M. Dai ’11, a Crimson editorial editor, is a History and Science concentrator in Currier House.