# Damned Vegans/Vegetarians **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 30, 2002, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530 "2002-04-30T19:13:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Critical1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@Critical1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Critical1)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/21 "2002-05-01T00:51:15Z")
gotta agree with the nuts thing, cause you know they are So easy to digest. I am not a vegan nor a vegitarian, I am someone who believes that meat is not the main course but a supliment adn eat it accordingly. those people are to stupid to live nevermind breed. ---
**Author:** ![OpalCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8edcca/32.png) [@OpalCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OpalCat)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/22 "2002-05-01T01:10:38Z")
As a vegetarian who is raising a vegetarian child, who is totally healthy, I have to say these people are nuts. What they did is NOT typical of the way vegetarians or vegans raise their children. ---
**Author:** ![cercaria](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/87869e/32.png) [@cercaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cercaria)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/23 "2002-05-01T01:25:17Z")
Please forgive me if I don’t make much sense here but I just wanted to address something… > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Scylla \* > \*\* > _snip_ > > The explanatory gap here is that for some reason suffering and death or causing suffering and death is bad. Most people accept this at face value because they have a very strong personal preference against these things, and understand that most other feeling creatures share this preference. > > The truth is that suffering and death are neither good nor bad. They are necessary and useful tools of evolution and life itself. > > But, once you start pretending that personal preferences carry the weight of truth you’re well down the path to irrationality. When you give up that grounding reality there’s really no surprise where it ends. > > Starving the death a child you love becomes a real possibility. \*\* If preventing suffering and death were so important to this couple, wouldn’t they have found a way to keep their baby alive and healthy? Babies drink soy milk all the time. I think the problem here is not that these people were more concerned with preventing the suffering and death of _animals_, so much so that the lives of human beings, specifically, their daughter, became less important. Rational Vegans and Vegetarians know the difference. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Scylla \* > \*\*“It makes me better. It makes me healthier. It’s wrong to kill things so you shouldn’t eat meat either, or wear fur, or experiment on animals. You’re hurting the earth,…” > > and all that bullshit. Congratulations! You’ve just crossed the line into irrationality. \*\* I am a Buddhist. As such, I try as much as possible not to cause harm to living things. This is one reason I don’t eat meat. This is also why I don’t buy leather shoes, eat eggs, and drink milk only when I become sick. I also have a hard time digesting proteins. They sit in my stomach, like a rock, making me very ill, and causing me pain. This is another reason I don’t eat meat. So yes, it does make _me_ better (spiritually.) It does make _me_ healthier. I don’t feel right harming or retroactively harming living things unless I absolutely have to. If I am very ill, of course I’d take medicine that had been tested on an animal. If I were caring for another person, of course I’d give it whatever it needed to survive, including animal products. Allowing myself or another person to fall ill or die violates the “hey idiot, don’t hurt things” rule, too, and of course I’d choose the life of a human over that of an animal. I don’t think anyone, Vegan or not, would fault me for that. If others choose a different lifestyle from mine, I have no objection, and I’d never think less of a person because they ate meat/wore leather/danced in their underwear with live snakes. Heck, you could flame-broil a side of beef in front of me while your pet lion jumps over the grill and your pet chimp buffs your new suade jacket, and I’d still think you a pretty cool guy. But to call me _irrational_ because of my choices? Then I might not like you so much. As long as I’m don’t start writhing on the floor dressed up like a panda smearing red paint all over my butt every time you cooked a steak, I really don’t see what the problem with being a Vegan is. Your beef with Veganism shouldn’t be the concept. It’s the shit that _some_ overly idealistic Vegan idiots do in its name that should piss you off. I know your issue is with the Vegans who take their lifestyle a little to the edge, but I don’t think you can fault the concept of Veganism for that. Wouldn’t that be kind of like faulting Christianity for Fundamentalism, or Islam for the Taliban? Please don’t flame me to a crisp. I am not good at this. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/24 "2002-05-01T02:28:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\* cercaria:\*\* If preventing suffering and death were so important to this couple, wouldn’t they have found a way to keep their baby alive and healthy? Babies drink soy milk all the time. They ought not to - [soymilk is high in phytoestrogens](http://www.google.ca/search?q=cache:5fpNslHFQDcC:www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/files/PSEBM01.doc) and may be associated with developmental difficulties. I suspect that awareness of the importance of breast-feeding is, if anything, somewhat _higher_ amongst vegetarian parents. The lamentable couple in the OP don’t sound like any vegans _I’ve_ ever met - we’re talking about folks who don’t drink beer unless they have the brewer’s written guarantee that they don’t use [isinglass](http://65.66.134.201/cgi-bin/webster/webster.exe?search_for_d:/inetpub/wwwroot/cgi-bin/webster/web1828=isinglass) - not likely to be mucking about with cod-liver oil. ---
**Author:** ![cercaria](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/87869e/32.png) [@cercaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cercaria)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/25 "2002-05-01T02:48:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Larry Mudd \* > \*\* > > They ought not to - [www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/files/PSEBM01.doc](http://www.google.ca/search?q=cache:5fpNslHFQDcC:%5Burl)"]soymilk is high in phytoestrogens and may be associated with developmental difficulties. > > I suspect that awareness of the importance of breast-feeding is, if anything, somewhat _higher_ amongst vegetarian parents. > > The lamentable couple in the OP don’t sound like any vegans _I’ve_ ever met - we’re talking about folks who don’t drink beer unless they have the brewer’s written guarantee that they don’t use [isinglass](http://65.66.134.201/cgi-bin/webster/webster.exe?search_for_d:/inetpub/wwwroot/cgi-bin/webster/web1828=isinglass) - not likely to be mucking about with cod-liver oil. \*\* Wow, I didn’t know that-- I’ll try to remember that in case I ever babysit my nephew. I really need to learn more about kids. 🙂 I think it’s just really unfortunate that these two nutballs had to endanger their child like this. It sucks for the child, and it sucks for all the vegans/vegetarians who are get typecast as nutjobs because of crap like this. It’s bad enough that PETA goes around dumping horse piss on people. The fish oil thing makes me want to think that this couple weren’t even vegan… maybe they were just a bunch of psychos who wanted to starve their kid, and once they got caught, blaming their wrongdoing on veganism seemed like an easy way out. Who knows. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/26 "2002-05-01T02:51:10Z")
Besides, cod liver oil is a laxative/ipecac, isn’t it? Wouldn’t that harm the child even more? ---
**Author:** ![heptapod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a88e4f/32.png) [@heptapod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/heptapod)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/27 "2002-05-01T02:52:26Z")
Do you vegetarians or vegans ask your kids if they want to follow your way of eating or do you just feed them that way? ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/28 "2002-05-01T02:56:14Z")
I don’t have kids, don’t plan to. I make meat for my husband. ---
**Author:** ![cercaria](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/87869e/32.png) [@cercaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cercaria)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/29 "2002-05-01T03:00:44Z")
Same here. I cook burgers for my boyfriend. If I were going to have kids in the future (I probably won’t,) I’d feed them whatever the doctor told me was healthiest, then let them make their own choice once they were old enough. I’d let them make that choice about their religion, why not what they eat? ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/30 "2002-05-01T03:01:42Z")
Do you ask your kids if they want to speak English? If they want to live with you? If they want to go to school? We make decisions for our kids all the time.- nearly constantly. I’m vegetarian. If I had a kid, I’d raise it vegetarian. It is what i know. I know how to cook healrhy balanced vegetarian meals. I know next to nothing about meat. I’d probably give the tyke trichonosis. It’d be just as absurd to demand that I feed my kid meat as it would for you to demand that a Chinese couple feed their kid McDonald’s, or a carnivore couple feed their kid tofurkeys. But this couple is not vegetarian (or vegan or whatever) they are cruel evil freaks. I’llnever know why the paper labled then as “vegan”, but it certainly does a disserviceto us normal folks. ---
**Author:** ![Myrr21](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e495f1/32.png) [@Myrr21](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Myrr21)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/31 "2002-05-01T03:12:51Z")
> [@](#): > > If I were going to have kids in the future (I probably won’t,) I’d feed them whatever the doctor told me was healthiest, then let them make their own choice once they were old enough. What’s amazing, though, is the number of doctors that don’t understand that a vegetarian diet can be perfectly healthy, for anyone from newborn to adult, as long as some basic level of intelligent thought is put into it. I’ve had doctors tell me that I need to take vitamins, even though my bloodwork was fine, just because I am vegetarian, and have been since birth. My family promptly switched doctors. ---
**Author:** ![yosemite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/3ab097/32.png) [@yosemite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yosemite)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/32 "2002-05-01T04:59:39Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Podkayne \* > \*\*Oh, this should be good. _Pulls up a lawn chair and waits for **yosemitebabe**._ \*\* 😃 You called? heptapod, if you can’t make the distinction between extremist nutjobs and people who choose to eat a certain diet, then you’re beyond hope. If you want to have a problem with vegetarians, go ahead. But please don’t think that most vegetarians give a shit about what you eat, or want to “convert” you, or anything. Most of us just want you to **leave us alone**. When you do happen to meet an annoying, strident veggie who wants to get in your face, by all means, let 'em have it. I have a _problem_ with people who actually CARE about what I do or do not eat. I am bothering no one. Most of us are bothering no one. Leave us alone. I see no reason why you give a shit, unless you own stock in the meat industry and are worried about profits being down. Give me a freaking break. I frickin’ GUARANTEE you, we veggies get pestered, lectured, insulted and annoyed TONS more than the average meat eater. I am sure I will have no trouble soliciting personal testimonies from fellow vegetarians, confirming this. ---
**Author:** ![Testy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c37758/32.png) [@Testy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Testy)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/33 "2002-05-01T05:46:13Z")
A confirmed carnivore checking in here, just to make sure it isn’t a persistant flashback; but did I read that right about vegans/veggies eating placenta? As in afterbirth? Jesus H. Christ that’s disgusting! I’ve eaten just about everything, including snakes and several species of bug but placenta? Ain’t no way! Regards. Testy. ---
**Author:** ![Glory](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7cd45c/32.png) [@Glory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Glory)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 5:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/34 "2002-05-01T05:55:51Z")
I have been a vegetarian for nearly 13 years. I originally gave up meat (chicken, beef, pork) in order to lose a little weight and be healthier, it worked and became a habit. After awhile, the thought of eating meat (muscles and veins, etc.) became kinda gross. I also did a little research into how animals are kept before butchering…let’s just say it’s not a happy little chicken running around in the grass eating bugs. Plus, the very unattractive making animals cannibalistic by giving them chopped up bits of each other to eat. Bleh. But anyway, like the above poster, my mom still can’t handle the fact I’m a vegetarian, I think she thinks I eat a plain old salad every night, even though I’ve prepared her elaborate (and tasty!) vegetarian meals. She constantly asks (in reference to me and my also-vegetarian boyfriend) but what do you **EAT**?? No plans for kids, but they would eat vegetarian meals if I were cooking, I have no idea how to prepare meat dishes. I would, of course, let them make their own decisions about eating meat (like choosing a religion, I guess) and they would be free eat meat at a friends house or whatever. I’m super healthy, I have incredibly low cholesterol, an amazing blood pressure and I owe a lot of it to the vegetarian lifestyle (I used to be VERY unhealthy). ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/35 "2002-05-01T06:04:25Z")
Would vegetarians eat human flesh if the humans gave themselves willingly to be eaten? Human flesh given willingly would solve any ethical dilemmas of exploiting animals, and should be very easy to digest. Oh, and if you get over the ethics of cannibalism. ---
**Author:** ![heptapod](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a88e4f/32.png) [@heptapod](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/heptapod)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/36 "2002-05-01T06:19:05Z")
If you saw the original post instead of just the tired “PULLS UP A CHAIR HURF DURF JACKING TO PORN WAITING FOR FLAMES” I said anti-meat people who evangelize their dietary habits. More kneejerk reactions, plz. Thx. ---
**Author:** ![Tsubaki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@Tsubaki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tsubaki)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/37 "2002-05-01T06:31:47Z")
My husband and I don’t feed meat to our kids anymore since the mad cow disease scare. You can’t trust the meat in Japan anymore, AFAIC. And we worry that since this disease occurred in cows, something similar will eventually strike pigs, sheep and chooks too. So yes, we are vegetarian for our children’s health. Basically, if Mr and I are going to get CJD the damage is already done. But we can give our kids a fighting chance. I think we wouldn’t be vegetarian if we lived in Australia, though. ---
**Author:** ![yosemite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/3ab097/32.png) [@yosemite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yosemite)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/38 "2002-05-01T06:42:10Z")
> [@](#): > > If you saw the original post instead of just the tired “PULLS UP A CHAIR HURF DURF JACKING TO PORN WAITING FOR FLAMES” I said anti-meat people who evangelize their dietary habits. More kneejerk reactions, plz. Thx. Then what was your motivation behind this question? > [@](#): > > Do you vegetarians or vegans ask your kids if they want to follow your way of eating or do you just feed them that way What does this have to do with “evangelizing” vegetarians? ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/39 "2002-05-01T15:22:46Z")
Cercaria: Die you Vegan Scum!!! just kidding. You’re talking about personal preference in your vegetarianism. That’s fine by me. The problems occur if and when one starts to believe their personal preferences are universal truth and act accordingly. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2002, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530/40 "2002-05-01T15:30:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by featherlou \* > \*\*Would vegetarians eat human flesh if the humans gave themselves willingly to be eaten? Human flesh given willingly would solve any ethical dilemmas of exploiting animals, and should be very easy to digest. Oh, and if you get over the ethics of cannibalism. \*\* **featherlou** , I would say that would depend on the vegetarian’s feelings and reasons for not eating meat. I have a variety of reasons that I no longer consume meat, not the least of which is that I can no longer digest it without becoming ill because I have not eaten it for many years. One reason to not eat meat is due to concerns about the heavy use of antibiotics used preventatively when raising livestock, and questions about whether that might lead to increased bacterial resistance to these same antibiotics when used in humans. There is also health reasons - though it is quite possible to eat an unhealthy/fatty/high cholesterol/etc. vegetarian diet - for becoming a vegetarian. And of course, there are the cultural reasons for not eating certain meats. As an omnivore, would you eat human meat procured in such a fashion? Dog meat, cat meat? As for the previous comment by someone about eating human placenta - I’ve never heard of _anyone_ doing that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/damned-vegans-vegetarians/106530.md?page=3)