A poll.
2-4 in equal amounts. They shouldn’t be mutually exclusive.
I refuse to eat something I couln’t actually kill myself.
Mainly due to the way livestock is treated. I also don’t particularly like the idea of a thinking creature being killed for my inner, and I don’t like meat that much anyway.
You need a ‘something else’ option in the poll.
All of the above, plus
(There are probably more reasons, but I’m tired and unmotivated to list them all out.)
2-4 in varying amounts over the years, add crappy animal raising/treatment practices in most factory farms, plus 1 due to being one for so long that it no longer seems that appealing or interesting. (I have considered eating small amounts of meat only in situations where I’m a guest or at restaurants where it would put someone out to alter an order; IIRC it’s a Buddhist tenet to not turn down meat if you are a guest, since it’s rude.)
My reasons are 1, 3, and 4. This really needs to be a multiple choice poll.
This is my main reason, too.
Mostly 1 for me. I hated eating meat, so once I started buying my own food, I cut it out of my life. I’m a strict lacto-ovo vegetarian (rennet-free cheeses) due to self-discipline, as something which forces me to think about/research what I eat. I had no problems eating things with gelatin, shellac, glycerin, meat extracts, heavily processed stuff like hot dogs, and so on, but I cut them out of my diet.
I chose option 3 but it’s also a number of other things, including health reasons and the fact that I have now been vegetarian for something like 7 or 8 years and could just never go back now.
Every so often I’ll think of how much easier it would be if I could eat a huge fuck-off meat pie or a giant chicken roll (both of which I loved eating back in the day) for lunch but then I remember what it is I’d be eating and I’m immediately put off again. No amount of convenience or tastiness could bring me back to meat.
Another, smaller part of it is that it taught me discipline with what I eat, as Student Driver mentioned above. I feel good that I made a decision despite lots of people around me having opposite beliefs, and that I’ve stuck to it for what’s now a third of my life.
If you’ll excuse me, I need to drive away in a environmentally-friendly car powered by my own sense of self-satisfaction.
[Meat eater here, in the interests of full disclosure.]
What do you mean by resource allocation? Are you referring to the fact that the amount of landspace/resources required to grow vegetarian food is a lot less than the amount required to grow animals?
I eat meat very rarely.
Meat is delicious. I have no problem with the idea of killing and eating another living being.
I voted for number 2.
That’s how I interpreted it when answering.
We’re mostly vegetarian, meaning we usually eat meat once a month or so, on average. We go for months and months without eating any, particularly in spring and summer, and eat more meat in the dark season.
- it’s cheaper to eat vegetarian.
- we’re not comfortable with how most animals are raised for food.
- we used to raise free range chickens, turkeys, geese, guinea fowls and ducks, but it’s a bother and messy to kill and prepare them and you have to watch out for the meat to go bad.
- I know how to cook plenty of tasty vegetarian dishes (we despise the bland and boring brand of vegetarian cooking that is too often seen), whereas with meat I have to really scratch my head to whip something up.
I was a vegetarian for two year, ( I drank milk, ate eggs). I thought I’d feel better and be healthier but I didn’t notice any difference. I don’t eat much meat anyway, so I guess that was part of it.
Right now I eat meat once or twice a week, I don’t dislike meat, but there are just other foods I’d rather eat. I love beans and lentil much more than meat.
I voted #2, but the truth is that it’s mostly habit. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with eating meat in moderation.
I am not a vegetarian, but I haven’t eaten any land animals for years. I very rarely eat fish, maybe once a month at the most but usually less often. However, (supposing I’d be allowed to vote) my answer would have to be “other” which is not supplied here. It would come closest to #3. It’s not the raising and killing of sentient beings for food. Its the way they are raised and killed. Many of these practices in factory farming could be described as torture. Of course, I admit my own hypocrisy in continuing to eat fish, but I’m doing the best that I can for the moment.
I’m a ruminant bovine.