I visited the Holy Cow Café for the first time this past week. I normally avoid the EMU dining centers, not so much due to a lack of desire as a lack of disposable income. But as I recently found myself the owner of $10 given to me for the sole purpose of having a good time, I wandered into the café and grabbed a smoothie.
One reason for my visit was the pursuit of knowledge: as I work for the paper, so also do I read the paper and have followed the controversy and fallout of the EMU food service’s decision to replace the Holy Cow with Laughing Planet.
The other reason was fascination: given my omnivoric habits, stepping into a restaurant so steeped in vegetarian culture felt like a vacation to exotic lands (with equally exotic cuisine).
One would presume that I – as an omnivore – could care less about whether one vegetarian restaurant takes the place of another, let alone whether a vegetarian restaurant exists at all, but I do care and I do believe the EMU food service made the wrong decision.
I should explain my own position, first, though: I did not choose omnivorism for lack of a different option but because I believe it to be the best for my spiritual leanings.
The main argument I see for vegetarianism hinges on the idea that eating meat is cruel to the animals the meat came from; some argue that no matter how humane the death is, it is still death, and so should be avoided. But eclectic animist that I am, I cannot subscribe to a theory that sets up such an arbitrary distinction between humans and other living beings: should not predators, such as wolves and orca, also be shunned for the simple fact that they feed on other animals? Should not we in eating plants avoid eating those plants that must die to give us sustenance?
That said I believe vegetarianism is important. I could preach all day about the concern we should show animals, even those animals we eat, but it would mean little, because I eat the same as every other omnivore. Everything I say will go right in one ear and out the other. On the other hand, vegetarians, by their very existence, call attention to themselves: they say look at what I do and why I do it. The presence of such a restaurant brings the questions of ethics and sustainability into our daily lives. For that reason alone, I think every campus and every town should have a vegetarian restaurant, even if there are no pure vegetarians present.
So why keep Holy Cow Café? Why not have the Laughing Planet in its place?
Because the Holy Cow in many ways resembles ourselves. Just as I, an omnivore, would have a hard time reaching other omnivores because of our similarities, Laughing Planet has a hard time teaching vegetarian lessons because it is so different. Laughing Planet has the size, the time and the resources to find the best local produce, the freshest crops, the packaging with the least waste and everything else that goes into a sustainable café; but we who are without such size, time and resources might be unable to do the same.
But by virtue of being local and by virtue of being small, the Holy Cow inspires the rest of us to emulate it. We can see a business with about our same means and measures doing great things, and we could do those same things with only a quick question or two of the staff. The difference is as deep as seeing a prize-winning chemist give a speech of thanks and seeing the same chemist at work; in one case, the chemist seems like a demigod, incapable of failure, and in the other, the chemist seems a lot like us.
So, dear reader, if you wish to keep the Holy Cow Café, I urge you to write to the EMU food service, the EMU board, and to the owners of the café expressing your support. And even if you eat some meat, stop by: The smoothies are delicious.
[email protected]
Holy Cow Café inspires even omnivores to emulate it
Daily Emerald
February 27, 2008
0
More to Discover