The Bacon Sandwich Dilemma

What to do when morals conflict?

Today I was fixing my lunch in the kitchen at work and saw that there was a leftover platter of sandwiches from a meeting up for grabs. They all had bacon on them, and I'm vegetarian, so I passed. Although it took me an embarrassingly long time to become vegetarian (considering my long-time interest in environmental and animal welfare issues), I haven't had any regrets since I made the switch. There are just so many good reasons not to eat meat - environmental, humane, and health - and I don't really miss meat. I also don't blame people who eat meat. After all, it DID take me many years to make the switch. But I hope they'll think about becoming vegetarian.

Anyway, I realized looking at the sandwiches that no one else was going to eat them either - they were kind of falling apart, and the lettuce was all wilted, and it was the end of the day (yes, I was eating lunch around 5 pm). Plus, 80% of the people at my office are vegetarian. It seemed a shame that the food would go to waste. I thought of the pigs talking to me in their high squealy voices, "Don't waste me!" Cause what's worse than harvesting a resource you shouldn't? Harvesting it and then throwing it out.

It would be easier to just declare, "I don't eat meat!" or "I don't waste food!" and have done with it, but I honestly don't know which is more important, in the grand scheme of things.

I think it's one of the perils of being liberal. The world is full of grays.