Deontology, Rights, and Meat Consumption

In his article, "Vegetarianism, Causation and Ethical Theory", Russ Shafer-Landau argues that consequentialism and deontological ethics both fail to explain why one should not consume meat. He notes the shift from arguments against factory farming practices to ones that argue against meat consumption, but in his opinion, these issues are "separable", and so the latter deserves its own set of arguments (Shafer-Landau, 85). After arguing against the consequentialist view, Shafer-Landau asks: "if we do not tie moral imperatives to benefits or harms, what are they tied to?" (92). For a deontologist, the answer to this may be that moral imperatives are tied to rights. The author states that there are two views as to why this is so. The first view, which Shafer-Landau calls the "interest view" states that our rights exist as protection of our interests, and that rights violations translate to a "setback" of our interests (92). The second view, called the "autonomy view", states that rights allow us to do as we choose, and that violations of our rights is an infringement of our autonomy (92). The author states that if we believe that permanently comatose individuals have rights, then one may have valid doubts about the autonomy view (93). Obviously, this is because these individuals have lost the ability to do as they choose which goes against the definition of the autonomy view.