RESEARCH PROPOSAL

Research proposal

Research proposal

Aims / Objectives

Aim of this paper is to analyze the current popularity of Hong Kong's “low” (vegetarian) cuisine, which includes traditional village food and homestyle eating venues, contributes to understanding how local residents have reacted to cultural, economic, and political change and how they have refashioned identities in the posthandover society.

Research Question

1. What the Hong Kong people think about vegetarianism?

Background

 For the purposes of this research paper, a vegetarian is someone who does not eat meat, including poultry, game and fish. There are all sorts of reasons why someone might adopt a vegetarian diet. Some people in Hong Kong abstain from meat because they do not like its taste, or cannot afford to buy it. Some people do not eat meat for religious reasons, or because they think that a vegetarian diet is healthier than an omnivorous one. And perhaps there are people who avoid meat because it is fashionable to do so, or because they believe that becoming vegetarian will increase their sexual potency. In this research paper, however, I will be interested mainly in the ethical vegetarian — that is, in the person who does not eat meat because she believes that eating meat is wrong. There are two main arguments in support of ethical vegetarianism. The first is the argument from unnecessary suffering. In order to eat meat, we need to raise animals for food. When we raise animals for food, they suffer. They suffer, for instance, when they are kept in cramped conditions, transported long distances, and sometimes when they are slaughtered. None of this suffering is necessary, since we could survive perfectly well on a vegetarian diet. It is never right to be the cause of unnecessary suffering — so eating meat is wrong. The second is the argument from animal rights. Like us, animals have beliefs and desires and a sense of their own past and future. In virtue of this, they have certain basic rights: the right, for instance, to be treated with respect. Raising and slaughtering animals for food involves an unjustifiable violation of these rights — so eating meat is wrong. In addition, an increasing number of ethical vegetarians appeal to social or environmental factors in order to defend their position. About forty percent of the world's grain harvest is fed to animals — just half of this would be enough to feed the hungry of this planet. Animal farming leads to deforestation, overgrazing and overfishing.

Claims like these are used to support the conclusion that we are morally obliged to remove meat from our diets. Many people disagree with the arguments for ethical vegetarianism. Few, however, would claim that the person who abstains from meat is doing something wrong . Instead, the omnivore will typically maintain that an ethical vegetarian adopts a permissible, but misguided position. A parent who decides to raise their child as a vegetarian, however, is much more likely to face criticism. As we shall see, she may be accused of inflicting ...