Earthling Ed: How to Argue with a Meat Eater (Part One)
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Welcome to Intelligence Squared, where great minds meet. I'm producer Mia Cirenti. On the show today, Earthling Ed, the author, vegan activist, and viral sensation. Ed Winters, known to his millions of online followers as Earthling Ed, is an author, vegan activist, and viral sensation.

During his extensive career as an activist and educator, he has made the case for veganism everywhere from university campuses to live on GB News. His compelling and informative content has garnered millions of views and earned him a dedicated following across online platforms. Ed joined us recently on stage at the Kiln Theatre to share his insights on how we can all become better conversationalists and critical thinkers,

How can we productively engage with those who have opposing views? How can emotionally charged conversations become productive?

and how can we engage others to create a more ethical, kind, and sustainable world? This episode is coming to you in two parts. If you want to listen to the live recording in full and ad-free, why not consider becoming an Intelligence Squared Premium subscriber? Head to intelligencesquared.com forward slash membership to find out more, or hit the IQ2 extra button on Apple.

Now let's join our host Dominique Palmer with more. Hi everyone, thank you so much for joining us here at this Intelligence Squared event with Ed Winters on his book How to Argue with a Meat-Eater and Win Every Time. My name is Dominique Palmer, I'm a climate justice activist, writer and vegan and so I am delighted to get into this conversation.

Ed Winters, known as Earthling Ed, is an activist, best-selling author and vegan educator, widely known for his viral online content. His first book, This is Vegan Propaganda, and otherwise The Meat Industry Tells You. He's a prolific public speaker. His two TED Talks have amassed over 2.4 million views online. His viral university speech, You Will Never Look at Your Life in the Same Way Again, has generated over 35 million views online. And to

and he helped me when I was first delving into veganism. And tonight we'll be discussing the latest book, How to Argue with a Meat Eater, which is now out in paperback, and stick around at the end as there will be a book signing. So, warm round of applause for Ed Winters. APPLAUSE

So before we delve into the book, which is brilliant by the way, I'm very excited to get into it. As someone who's been a vegan for a decade, what has been your biggest difficulties and challenges and how has your activism evolved over this time?

That's a great question to start with. By the way, thank you so much for being here. It's really wonderful. So I really appreciate it. And thank you so much for hosting this. It's really nice to meet you and I really appreciate it. It's a great question. I think 10 years is a strange amount of time for vegans because vegan years aren't the same as normal years, right?

Like one year in the vegan world, it feels like five normal years because everything can change so quickly. And I think, so actually I used to live just around the corner from here. I used to live in Kilburn. And I referenced in my first book going to this KFC, this local KFC. I used to go to KFC all the time before I stopped eating animals. And it was this one on Kilburn High Road.

So I used to come to this when it was just a cinema, a tricycle cinema I think it used to be called. So when I first went vegan, I was living around here and it used to just be this situation where vegan options were nowhere and it kind of seems strange to say this now, but I think the biggest challenge at the beginning was really just thinking,

Is anyone else vegan? Where is everyone else? But I think what's interesting is 10 years is a long time in the vegan world because this conversation evolves so quickly.

And people often think of vegans, they think, "Oh wait, what's the most difficult thing about being vegan?" Or, "What are some challenges you face?" And I think people presume that you're going to say protein, or maybe if someone's a little bit more informed, they might think you're going to say B12. And I think that when people think of vegans, they think that that's going to be the hardest thing. That we're all just spending all days looking for DHA fish oil substitutes and such.

And we all know that, you know, for all of us who are vegan at least, we all know that this is not the case. And I think the challenging thing that I've found, and this is going to sound a little bit pessimistic to begin with, but I promise I'll bring it to something a little bit more hopeful by the end. I think the most challenging thing I've found is that I am so disappointed

with the fact that 10 years on, we are still dealing with just the most ridiculous rhetoric and nonsense. And look, I've only been vegan for 10 years. Maybe some of you have been vegan for longer. I've met people who've been vegan for decades.

And I can't imagine how frustrated they must feel. But for me, I'm just like, wow, 10 years later, and we still have to try and convince people that harming animals is bad. I mean, just imagine the absurdity of living in a world where just trying to convince people that if we can avoid harming animals, that's the preferable thing to do.

And I think what I find particularly challenging now is how veganism has become part of this culture wars sphere of misinformation and disinformation where it has become just yet another weaponized topic that has become this

this obsession from certain sections of society but in a negative way. And we as vegans are caricatured and we are ridiculed and we are deliberately misunderstood and our intentions are deliberately misinterpreted

And I just find it really strange that 10 years on, I now have to debate people about whether or not blueberries are bad or good for you. And that's one thing I wasn't expecting. When I went vegan 10 years ago, if you told me, hey Ed, just so you know, veganism is going to make huge strides over the next 10 years. But one thing you should know about is that there will be some people that will tell you that blueberries are bad, vegetables are toxic, and we should only eat red meat, right? And I would go, nah, that's never going to happen, right? Because...

Because there's just no way that there will be a group of people existing in the world who think that we should only eat red meat. That's just preposterous. And yet here we are in 2025, and it's not just that it's still preposterous, it's that some of the people who endorse this way of living are not even...

particularly fringe people, I mean my goodness, sort of, you know, Jordan Peterson, one of the world's biggest intellectuals or something, is someone who endorses this diet. You know, Elon Musk talks about eating only red meat now. We have RFK Jr. talking about consuming raw milk and he's head of health in the US talking about raw milk.

And you just think, "My goodness, there's so much misinformation, disinformation." Social media is a wonderful tool, but it amplifies the worst aspects of our species as well, and you know just as well as I do about that. So what are the hardest things that I face or have faced?

I think it's just finding myself constantly frustrated that we can't just engage with people in a genuine, authentic way. And that's not the fault of consumers. It's not the fault of the everyday person. It is the fault of these industries that have these coordinated campaigns of disinformation who are scarily effective at what they do and who utilize social media and utilize

certain people in society who are contrarians, who are maybe a little bit more anti-establishment in their thinking and will co-opt and use these people to push these narratives of disinformation. And I found that so disappointing because I did not expect that we would come up against such a fierce beast of misinformation. Yes, I thought people would argue. Yes, I thought people would not always agree with veganism. But I'm very disappointed about that. That's a challenge. But...

I did say I'd try and make it positive. One thing I do think is really important for all of us vegans to bear in mind is that

Yes, the hardships come from these sensationalist headlines and from these antagonistic characters who are pushing pseudoscience to the detriment of society. And yes, it's so frustrating that we are ignoring climate scientists, nutrition scientists, and of course we're ignoring the plight of animals as a species. That's so frustrating. But beneath all of that does exist something else, which is a growing shift, a growing change. And that is also something that's happening parallel to a lot of these challenges that we face.

And we see sensations headlines and we have friends and family members send us these articles about vegans having weak bones and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And that is a huge part of the problem that we face. But beneath all of that is still this positive shift that's happening. And I think we should draw inspiration from that as well as feeling slightly frustrated by those difficulties.

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I became vegan six years ago, so not as long as you, but from then I honestly thought my biggest problem would be being able to access vegan ice cream at my local store. But actually, like you said, it turned out being...

the kind of misinformation and kind of seeing that misinformation from people I know or really just like explaining why I was vegan and that was kind of the biggest struggle that I had but like you said it's kind of been parallel to the narrative changing as well when this also becoming this conversation becoming more normalized even against the

flurry of raw milk and raw meat brigade. And that has also been a really positive thing to see the welfare and compassion come more into the conversation from people that I haven't seen when I first started this. And as someone who has had your background also in in-person talks and in videos and really

kind of getting this point across and these top arguments about veganism. How have you found that has been different in like a book format? So compared to the last book that you did, like how different has that been to put those arguments into this book? Yeah. Well, there's one thing that's nice about writing a book, which is that you just get to sit on your own and just think and really...

sort of ruminate on things and just allow it to kind of go where it wants to go. And I think there's something really nice about a book which is, and this is going to sound super sad, but I don't mean it to be sad, but the solitude of it in a way, it's nice to have that. And also it's nice that when I'm writing about the arguments in the book, I don't have someone sat next to me trying to tell me all the reasons that I'm wrong, which makes a nice change to some of the other forms of activism. But what I find interesting about writing the book is

So in the book, there's like 138 arguments or something that I address. An absolutely astonishing number. And I say astonishing not in a positive way, because I'm like, ah, the book. I mean like astonishing in the sense of, my goodness, we have to face 130 different arguments. And there's probably some that, you know, some particularly creative anti-vegan out there would throw at me that are not in the book. But there's so many arguments. And I thought when I started writing...

What I was intrigued by was the opportunity it presented me to really stress test my arguments, my views, my thoughts, and of course the ethos of veganism more generally. Because I thought, surely there's going to be one in there, surely there's something that people say that's going to have something about it where I pause and go, "Ooh, I wonder."

And even ones that I'd never really sort of delved into too deeply before, such as seed oils or oat milk and blood sugar spikes and these kind of more sort of newer arguments that we start to hear. What surprised me is just how frail they all were. And from the climate arguments and of course the ethical arguments, I'm just going through them thinking,

Is this it? Is this what people that we're using as a species to justify the horrors of animal agriculture and animal exploitation? This is it? And I found myself a bit disappointed in a way, like going through all these arguments and just finding all this scientific literature and just using common sense a lot of the time and just going, well, that doesn't make sense, that doesn't make sense, and that doesn't make sense. And just debunking all these arguments. There was this rewarding feeling where it made me feel

Like I had a lot of conviction. I already had conviction, but it gave me more conviction to go right I've really addressed these head-on and I've actually taken the time to really research what the opposing view is because obviously to Put this book together part of that was going right? What are the arguments against veganism? Not just the ones that I hear from students universities

or on GB News or in right-wing press, but what are the arguments that people are using in all different spheres, from all different demographics, from left-wing to right-wing to outside of politics? What are all these different arguments? So really delving into and looking at what the farmers are saying, looking at what the consumers are saying, the anti-vegans, whoever it may be, and just realizing, wow, this...

There is so much credibility that underpins this. And it's a real shame that the biggest problem we have is not the evidence or the logic or the empathy, none of those things.

The biggest hurdle is just getting people to actually engage meaningfully. And that's the thing that frustrates me about it, which obviously is what the book is about as well. How do we engage with the people in a way that is going to create meaningful impact, hopefully, that is going to lead to more effective outcomes, that is going to give people that we're engaging with the opportunity and space to really consider these ideas and consider this message in a way that they probably won't if they're just scrolling on social media. And obviously that's the ethos of the book as well.

meaningfully engaging. That's one thing I love in how you write that in the book. And there's one part of it where you talk about kind of debunking these arguments and asking, you know, if someone kind of says something which is...

incorrect is asking where did you hear that from like where did you learn that from and actually getting people to kind of challenge where they're hearing this from as we know the animal agriculture industry at large is has very powerful methods of kind of advertising and putting these ideas and thoughts into you know wider society for their own benefit and

As you spoke about this throughout the book, the current industry or animal agriculture in itself doesn't make any sense in that kind of common sense approach that you said. And people call us kind of radical for thinking so. But it's actually quite radical to continue the sheer commercial scale of cruelty, of sky-high emissions, of environmental degradation. And what shouldn't be radical is to actually move to more compassionate relationships with animals.

the beings that we inhabit our earth with and with the planet. And as a climate activist, you know, this is something you've spoken about, you know, we do have to change our food system. And that is something that literally cannot be ignored. And for me, I'm really interested in hearing what is your take on challenging this huge, like capitalistic industrial form of food production in relation to climate? And what is your top argument for that?

The C word, right? It always pops up, capitalism, right? To speak to what you just mentioned, just before that question, you said that one of the things I say in the book, a technique that I sometimes use is to ask people where they get their information from. I use this example in the book, but just to kind of put it into perspective of why I think this is such a great question at times, this person I was debating them at the university...

of Arizona, I think. It was in Phoenix. And there were fishermen that sat down and said, well, fish don't feel pain. And I said, oh, how do you know that? Where did you find that out from? And he said, oh, I heard it from other fishermen. LAUGHTER

Which I just thought was brilliant, wasn't it? Just fantastic. The most perfect response I could hear. And I had another person sit down. This was at a different university in Orange County. And his name was Ethan, if I remember. And he got his notes on his phone. And he was going, what about this nutrient? What about that nutrient? And I was like, okay, just...

"Where's all this coming from? "These are nutrients that we can easily "get on a plant-based diet. "Where do you find this from?" He was like, "Oh, well, I've not really looked into it, "but when I saw you, I just did a quick Google "of nutrients that vegans might struggle to get with." And I thought, "That is your research "that you've come to sit down with. "You've seen a vegan, you thought, 'Right, "I'm just gonna do a quick Google. "'I'll see what it says on this anti-vegan blog post "'or something. "'Oh, vitamin K2 or something. "'This is the one I'm gonna sit down. "'He'll never have heard these before.'"

This person who sat down at this university campus inviting people to debate him will have never thought about B12 before. And I just thought the sheer audacity of that, and I just thought it was hilarious. But I think it's a great question to ask people because often we receive information and then we regurgitate that information without necessarily considering where it's come from, and importantly, without checking the sources and the veracity of those sources. And just to reference really quickly,

A recent headline which I think perfectly surmises this point, and there's this headline doing the rounds recently and it wasn't just in the mail or the Telegraph, it was in the Guardian as well, so across the political space from a media perspective. And the headline was along the lines of dairy linked to reduced risk of bowel cancer. And it was doing the rounds, getting shared around a lot. And it's really interesting because the study itself wasn't looking just at dairy, it was looking at calcium.

And what the researchers had shown was that, through the research they'd done, that calcium was linked to a reduced risk of bowel cancer, but calcium from all sources. But the headlines ran with dairy.

And for a lot of people, they'll read the headline, maybe they'll read the first couple of paragraphs, but they might not get down further into the articles if the articles even reference the fact that the study wasn't just looking at dairy, but was looking at calcium in general. But people see that and then they'll take that information on board and they'll think to themselves, well, cow's most good for me because it is...

is linked to reduce risk of bowel cancer. Or they'll see headlines about vegans with weak bones or avocados or bees being used for almonds. And they see these headlines or they see these pieces of information or these sort of viral videos on Instagram and TikTok

And they don't dig any deeper and they don't look beyond that. I think sometimes just asking someone, well, how do you know that? Where did you get that information from? It can be a really powerful way of getting them to think a little bit more introspectively about where their information is coming from. And we can all fall foul of confirmation bias. We can all fall foul of seeking out information that reaffirms our viewpoint and ignoring information that contradicts that viewpoint. That is just a cognitive bias that we as humans have.

have and vegan or not, we can all have those cognitive biases come over us and maybe interfere with us, think a little bit more objectively. So I think asking those questions can be really powerful. Now, to answer the question that you've actually asked. We'll get there eventually. More rewards, more savings. With American Express Business Gold, earn up to $395 back in annual statement credits on eligible purchases at select shipping, food delivery, and retail subscription merchants.

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The idea of the current system that we have and the way that it views animals is clearly problematic because as our current financial economic system does, it's viewing animals and indeed us as consumers from the perspective of exploitation. And the issue of a capitalist food system is obviously if we're viewing animals simply as numbers, metrics through which profit can be extracted from.

then that leads to us ramping up animal farming, intensively farming animals, and as a consequence treating animals worse and worse and worse to drive up profit margins and to make as much money as we can to the detriment of animals and to the planet. Now I'm always a little bit hesitant just to pin the blame on capitalism, let's say, because we also have to remember that the reason that animal farming is even remotely financially possible in this country and indeed in most high-income nations is because of subsidies, which are a left-wing fiscal policy.

And so if we lived, and I don't want to by the way, but if we lived in a true free market capitalist society, the vast majority of people would be eating far fewer animals than they currently do because it is not a financially viable industry without huge amounts of bailouts and subsidies.

and handouts from governments that are funded by taxpayers. And there's this complete irony when you look in the US, for example, and you look at farmers who vote Republican, and you think, well, hang on a minute. If you actually had to face true conservative financial legislation, that would severely impact what you're doing. You survive because of left-wing fiscal policies, and it's the same here. And I think that's sometimes an omission that is missed from...

from farmers themselves, but also maybe from activists. And I think that if you encounter people who maybe espouse conservative values or right-wing values, ask them, well, you don't believe, therefore, that farmers should be receiving any subsidies. And we see people like Nigel Farage at these farming protests that have been taking place. He was there yesterday, I think, right? Outside Downing Street with the farmers. And I'm thinking, someone should just ask him about whether or not he thinks that all these farmers should lose all of their subsidies. Because if he doesn't think that, then that sounds...

That's pretty woke, right? If he thinks that... Right? So I am a little bit hesitant. Capitalism is extremely problematic for a number of reasons and it's problematic for animals and animal well-being because it reduces them to numbers, to objects, to livestock. This hideous term that essentially removes individuality from animals and reduces them to what is essentially stock which, inconveniently for us, happen to be alive.

And I find that so deeply troubling the the commodification of animals But the the true problem I think is a little bit deeper in the sense of it's also about the mentality that we have towards animals and I think even if we were to to shift to More left-wing fiscal policies generally if we still have this mentality that animal exploitation is something that can be condoned It will continue nonetheless and so I think that's why

When I think about the economic systems that we have, while we should absolutely change that for the betterment of our species, particularly when it comes to changing how we distribute funds and such, there is also the risk that if we don't fundamentally challenge the mindset that condones animal exploitation, we will simply continue with some slight alterations here and there. And that's why I think that veganism has clear political alignments, but it also transcends politics in many ways.

And that's one thing that also brings me great sadness around the culture wars issues that veganism is dragged into. I mean, the culture wars stuff is so reductive, so pointless, so cynical, so tedious. It is such an indictment of our species that we bicker over these subjects.

And we find ways to polarize ourselves and create division when we are so intelligent and have so much ability to create so much good and positivity and yet we become bogged down in in trivial conversations that obfuscate the truth and overlook some of the biggest core fundamental problems that we should be facing existential problems that we should be facing unified not not not with the division that we have and

And I think what frustrates me about the vegan thing is how when we boil any meaningful social justice issue, and they're all meaningful, but when we boil it down and then use thought-terminating cliches like "woke" to try and disregard some of those important issues that our species is facing,

It does a disservice to our own species and the intellect that we have, let alone the other species who are suffering as a consequence of this absolutely pathetic discourse which plagues our species right now, and indeed probably has forever, really.

And so that's why I think challenging mindsets is also key and looking beyond just political spectrums because it's through I think encouraging people to think more radically about their own view of animals beyond just a political binary that we can hopefully move forward in a way that politically is different but also encapsulates the rights of animals regardless of the political direction that we ultimately go in and we all hope it probably changes the trajectory, you know, is a different trajectory than the one we're currently on.

I don't know if that answered your question at all. - It did. Definitely answered my question. Getting to the root of it, like you said, and at the root of that are these mindsets. It's something that has been baked into society and not questioned for so long. And at the heart of that is compassion, really. When you look at it and looking at our relationship with animals and with our ecosystem,

Thanks for listening to Intelligence Squared. This episode was produced by myself, Mia Cirenti, and it was edited by B Duncan. Don't forget, Intelligence Squared Premium subscribers can listen to the event in full and ad-free. Head to intelligencesquared.com forward slash membership to find out more, or hit the IQ2 extra button on Apple for a free trial.

And if you'd like to come along to one of our live events, you can visit intelligencesquared.com forward slash attend to see what we have coming up. You've been listening to Intelligence Squared. Thanks for joining us.

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