Comment: You will survive a beef ban

The outcry over the beef ban has been unfounded, silly and, most of all, offensive. Here’s why.

A recent motion to ban beef at LSE has, as somehow all things are, been met with backlash by the beloved right-wing community on campus. It should be made clear that this motion does not even come close to actually constituting a ban yet for some this amounts to serfdom, the grounds for this being that the passing of such a motion reflects the tyranny of a hard left minority who seek to strip all joy and freedom from the LSE. Soon we will all be forced to sustain ourselves on grass and soggy, unseasoned tofu with the smelling of beef being punishable by being sent to the gulag to await the same death that so many cows have been sentenced to. 

The reality, of course, is that the LSE is firmly placed in the capitalist city centre and that there is an abundance of choice, which those from Hayek Society desire so intensely. So even if the SU did manage to get LSE to ban beef, the only effect for those who crave sweet cow flesh would be to have to simply walk a couple minutes outside of campus to get it, or suffer through having to eat a different dead animal that is served on campus. Put simply, the claim that this is tyranny of a minority is absurd. I am a vegetarian who didn’t bother to vote because I couldn’t care less about whether or not beef is banned. And it’s likely that the many others that didn’t vote, meat-eater or not, did not care to vote simply because they put together a mere two brain cells and figured out that they’d survive whether or not beef is served. 

The writer brings forth absurd and extreme ideas on vegetarianism, particularly noting a claim made by an anti-meat activist that the meat industry is comparable to the Chattel Slave Trade. It is clear that the writer, as many do, sees vegetarianism and veganism as an extreme ideology of a hard left white middle class and so takes aim at student activists by attempting to place them in this same category. To even bring up such an abhorrent point as somehow reflecting all who support the motion completely erases the existence of Black vegetarians and vegans as well as the extensive history of such lifestyles amongst various communities of colour. Moreover, it is just a false portrayal of the students at LSE whose freedoms our paternalistic writer worries so dearly about.

Ultimately, in yet another attempt to appear as a victim of the intolerant left, the writer instead dons the costume of a clown. He uses the opinion of one foolish activist to defend the rights of people whose rights are not being threatened in any way. I write, therefore, to ground us in reality where meat eaters remain the vast majority and a simple motion to attempt to ban beef (just one meat) causes no harm whatsoever. The only critique to be made of such a motion is of how substantially this really contributes to action against climate change when the vast majority of our problems are coming from those who hoard wealth and the long-lasting impact of colonialism and unsustainable industrialisation by the West. Regardless, your freedoms are very much safe. There is a world outside of LSE’s few eateries full to the brim with enough beef to fulfil your meat-eater dreams. Get a grip.