Veganism/vegetarianism

I have one thing I need to point out: I absolutely HATE it when vegetarians make you feel like crap for eating meat. (And, also, I know this is a select group of people, and not every vegetarian is like this, so nothing against them.)
Like, the other day, at lunch, I was eating a chicken sandwich and this girl, a vegetarian, came up to me and started bashing me and trying to make me feel like shit for eating meat. I just don't see how that's necessary. I mean, I don't bash veggies, so wtf- don't bash me.
And again, I realize most aren't like this.

Bleach:

with meat, it's a form of survival.
you eat meat to get protein. it natural
and also if you lived hundreds of years ago, and you had no other way of warmth, you'd wear animal skins.
thats survival

but vegetarians don't eat meat and still survive. you can get your protein elsewhere.

TOFU...no actually tofu's kind of nasty. I mean, it doesn't taste like anything, but I just hate the way it feels in my mouth....blech. </ramble>

I'm getting really curious about the situation for vegetarians in the US these days. I mean, I left after eighth grade and back then, my friends used to tease my vegetarian-ness and be like "ooooh there's meat in your lunchables sauce" and stuff like that. Just to be assholes. Or they'd keep asking me how come I don't eat meat, things like that.

And when I moved to India, people were really surprised that I was a vegetarian, being a stylish American and all (look at me I'm so fab! ). And my Korean friends here are like "Meat is the joy of life! How can you live without it!!". But I guess its just their culture and way of life. And my Indian friends (basically everyone else) are mostly non-veg's. And they poke fun at us veggies.

Actually...I feel kind of left out at times when everyone's digging into chicken or something. Repulsed, but left out.

lyrical_mess:

Actually...I feel kind of left out at times when everyone's digging into chicken or something. Repulsed, but left out.

I know that feeling.

fancy pants:

Boobmeister:

We were doing a bit about vegitarianism in Philosophy yesterday, and we were reading from this book called "The Pig That Wants To Be Eaten" and basically it gave you a scenario of a man who'd been a vegitarian for a long time, and yet he was about to sit down to a plate of bacon, sausages and chicken. It goes on to say that the pig had been genetically modified to talk and the man had had a conversation with the pig who said that he would be "insulted" if he wasn't eaten, and on the day of the slaughter, he was very excited and went to the slaughter house full of joy. The chicken had the same thing happen to him, and the man thought it'd be disrespectful not to follow their wishes, so he ate the meat.

Obviously, it's not a true story, but I thought you guys might be interested It just throws up a lot of moral dilemas and all that jazz.

Sounds strange. But interesting. I've never heard of it. Maybe I'll check that out next time I'm at a library.

Sounds like that animal out of the HHGTTG books - I think it's Restaurant at the End of the Universe?

I've read that book. It's absurd and hilarious, but insightful too.

Yeah, the title really caught my eye in the book store.

Bleach:

tbh i don't see why people don't eat meat yet they still think its fine that animals such as alligators are getting killed and having their skin made into ugly shoes, bags, etc.

Hence my veganism

Kurtni:

Bleach:

tbh i don't see why people don't eat meat yet they still think its fine that animals such as alligators are getting killed and having their skin made into ugly shoes, bags, etc.

with meat, it's a form of survival.
you eat meat to get protein. it natural
and also if you lived hundreds of years ago, and you had no other way of warmth, you'd wear animal skins.
thats survival

personally I on nom nom nom on any meat I can get
but fuck my alligator-skin trashcan

The majority of people who don't eat meat probably don't use any animal products. I know I don't.

You say "natural", but the way humans eat meat is anything but natural. We breed animals selectively, modify genetics, take animals out of their natural environment and use technology to kill them. I have no problem with eating meat when it's done in a natural way, but the way ,most humans consume animals does not qualify as natural.

I know, but I see many vegetarians walking around with leather products or use products tested on animals.

Oh yeah, I totally agree with that 100%. I guess I kinda forgot to mention it though.

What I meant by natural is that it is a part of human nature, something that they need in order to survive. We eat meat.

To be honest, if I wanted to and had the skill to, I'd hunt down my food. It's disgusting that they treat animals like that. And with technology and genetic engineering. It's just another huge way for humans to fuck up the planet.

awesomecore.:

you dont have to kill a basically defensless animal for food. or clothing ect.
there are some ways of killing animals that are proper. (kosher food).
but you dont need meat to survive. nor do you need real animal fur because thats just disgusting.
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They're only defenseless because we keep them their whole lives and then we chain them down and slaughter them [not for birds nessicarily though.

Animal fur sickens me. I mean, unless you're an eskimo or native american, and thats how you keep warm [and they kill their animals they way they should, and use all of the animal for their benefit]
I mean, if you're a vegetarian, great for you.
I might become a vegetarian, because the way they treat the animals is absurd.

I highly recommend the Linda McCartney veggie range which you can get in most supermarkets or definitly Holland and Barrets, good price and the food tastes amazing.

Being a coeliac and a vegetarian means I can't eat most of the prepared veggie meals - most of the gluten-free sections are meat products (chicken pies, sausages, meat curries, fish fingers) and nearly all the veggie sausages and meat replacements use the gluten in wheat flour to bind the stuff together, but my mum is an amazing cook and I eat a lot of stuffed mushrooms and peppers and veggie lasagne she makes
And I've never worn fur and I haven't worn or bought leather for years. My brother has a leather jacket he wears all the time, and I don't hate it because it's leather, I hate it because it's hideous but I wouldn't wear leather myself. I spent ages trying to find a travel documents booklet that isn't leather but I got a pink plastic A5 pouch thing to keep my stuff in now so it's all good.

I just have a few general thoughts on this issue. What about when animals kill eachother, then? Is that omfgskfksunethical?
My experience of the natural world isn't great but I used to keep pet mice, they were always eating their babies and once, when one of them died, the other two skinned their own mother and ate her from the inside out basically. Strangely, it doesn't bother me that much. They were only doing what was in their nature to do.

I'm just curious as to what 'Peta people' think of animals who kill other animals. Do they think that it's wrong, somehow? Because it can quite clearly be just as cruel, if not more of a slow and painful death, as a human killing an animal. You can't eliminate animal suffering, because animals will always hunt eacother to survive. Or would they say it was perfectly okay for an animal to act so...'unethically' towards another animal? If so, then animals don't exactly deserve the same rights as humans.

idk if that even made sense, but yeah.

Bloodraine:

What about when animals kill eachother, then? Is that omfgskfksunethical?

Seeing as how animals don't selectively breed and develop animals, strip them of their natural habitats and keep them in cruel, unnatural conditions, I would say no. Animals killing animals in nature cannot really be compared to the things some humans do. Not to mention that our thought process is much more developed and we're more intelligent. We know what we do is cruel and puts animals through pain. A tiger doesn't know that when it eats a bunny (well I doubt tigers really eat bunnies but thats the only thing I could think of). It's doing it to survive.

Kurtni:

Bloodraine:

What about when animals kill eachother, then? Is that omfgskfksunethical?

Seeing as how animals don't selectively breed and develop animals, strip them of their natural habitats and keep them in cruel, unnatural conditions, I would say no. Animals killing animals in nature cannot really be compared to the things some humans do. Not to mention that our thought process is much more developed and we're more intelligent. We know what we do is cruel and puts animals through pain. A tiger doesn't know that when it eats a bunny (well I doubt tigers really eat bunnies but thats the only thing I could think of). It's doing it to survive.

'unnatural conditions'
I've just had another thought. All domestic animals live in unnatural conditions, but most people don't really think this is a cruel thing. /random point. I'm just trying to say that 'unnatural' isn't always 'bad'. And also, I don't think that there is anything wrong with selective breeding. If you own a cat or a dog of a particular breed or pedigree, then the chances are, that breed has prevailed because people want to own it.

And what if humans killing animals is actually less cruel/painless than an animal killing an animal? Presumably if I were an animal, I'd rather be killed by having my throat slit and having a rapid death than being picked at and half-eaten-alive like cats do to mice, for example.

Bloodraine:

'unnatural conditions'
I've just had another thought. All domestic animals live in unnatural conditions, but most people don't really think this is a cruel thing. /random point. I'm just trying to say that 'unnatural' isn't always 'bad'. And also, I don't think that there is anything wrong with selective breeding. If you own a cat or a dog of a particular breed or pedigree, then the chances are, that breed has prevailed because people want to own it.

And what if humans killing animals is actually less cruel/painless than an animal killing an animal? Presumably if I were an animal, I'd rather be killed by having my throat slit and having a rapid death than being picked at and half-eaten-alive like cats do to mice, for example.

Domesticating animals for the purpose of keeping them as pets and for the purpose of dying aren't really the same thing. Personally, I think the psycho PETA freaks against pets are a bit silly. We live on this planet with animals, we should be able to live with them harmoniously. The unnatural conditions we create for a cat or dog are a bit different than the unnatural conditions created in a slaughterhouse at any rate.

Pain isn't really the issue, it's the lifestyle the animals are forced to lead before they're killed. The animals don't get to live their full, happy life in their natural settings, they're constantly dealing with human interference.

One of the biggest issues in the fight for humane treatement of animals is how can you judge what is right for the animal. Of course animals cannot use effective discourse to inform people of any sort of pain, torture, humility, suffering they endure, likewise feelings of happiness aren't always communicated effectively as well. If you apply human reactions, like a scream associated with pain, well you also scream for joy, but because of Ockham's Razor theory and context, we assume that a squealing pig would be communicating distress and pain at a slaughterhouse. Similarly, a dog wags its tail at the sight of something familiar, like its owner, but it will also wag its tail when threatened. This is the issue addressed by the book mentioned earlier, 'The Pig That Wants to Be Eaten'. How do we know what a 'happy life' is for a duck, or a goat?

Sometimes it seems it's almost human nature to be cruel, but evolution also tells us that this is an animal nature as well, revealed by the clans of bonobo chimpanzees studied showing that they will rape and murder for apparent pleasure, again we can't tell this, but we assume that they act in a Hedonistic fashion. But unfortunately Hedonism has a big gaping loop hole of a paradox which doesn't allow for us to understand anything, or anybody else but ourselves.

Anji:

One of the biggest issues in the fight for humane treatement of animals is how can you judge what is right for the animal.

Humans are animals and we seemed to have defined their rights. I honestly do not think its nearly as complicated as you make it out to be. Don't be cruel, simple as that.

Kurtni:

Anji:

One of the biggest issues in the fight for humane treatement of animals is how can you judge what is right for the animal.

Humans are animals and we seemed to have defined their rights. I honestly do not think its nearly as complicated as you make it out to be. Don't be cruel, simple as that.

I know that I overly analyse every aspect of life, but it has to be done. My point is how do we know what's cruel? It's purely subjective therefore we are only giving animals the right to be treated the way we assume is best for them, since we do not objectively know. On the previous subject with pets, you know, who knows, maybe dogs and cats and fish really do hate to be domesticated.

Well for a start deliberately hurting an animal is cruel. Keeping it in an overly small enclosure, is cruel. Denying it, should it be in your care, a healthy meal each day, is cruel.
I think you and I both know that the chihuahua snuggled up next to me, who bounces around full of the joys of life each day, is not hating every moment of his life.

Anji:

I know that I overly analyse every aspect of life, but it has to be done. My point is how do we know what's cruel? It's purely subjective therefore we are only giving animals the right to be treated the way we assume is best for them, since we do not objectively know. On the previous subject with pets, you know, who knows, maybe dogs and cats and fish really do hate to be domesticated.

We only give humans the right to be treated the way we assume is best for them, that's what rights are. What we think is best. It isn't as of their is a scientific law or formula defining what makes something a right and what doesn't. You're given rights legally, and animals have them.

How is it subjective? We know the nervous system of animals work, we can tell if we're putting them through pain. We know what nutrients their bodies need, we can tell if we're providing them with the correct nutrition. It isn't hard to see if you're pet is happy or not. I'm quite certain my cat enjoys his life to the fullest.