Er…wrong. Chickens, cows, pigs, etc. that are raised for meat are not treated as pets, nor thought of as pets by the farmers (or corporations) that raise them. I’ll admit that this is based on anecdotal experience only, so if you have a legitimate cite that says otherwise, feel free to quote/link it.
Read Fast Food Nation. I like the book. Due to the fact that there’s a chapter in it about cattle, it can sound kind of Rublicans-Are-Evil, but he goes on to explain that the Democrats control a lot of the poultry farms, so it’s all equal, hehe. There are a lot of eye witness accounts of what goes on in big-time slughterhouses from people who worked in them.
That book made me go out of my way to find free-roam meat (which actually tastes better, mmm).
After doing A LOT of research on the meat industry, I thought about becomming a vegetarian. But, being an Animist, if I were to stop eating everything with a spirit, I’d have to starve to death because plants have spirits, too.
Meat is yummy.
I do wish it was done more humanely. I mean, animals can feel. And big-time slaughterhouses aren’t just cow death traps, but pretty damn dangerous places to work (people getting bits and pieces cut off - including heads). There needs to be some reform done. But I don’t hope for that reform to be done by NOT eating meat. I do my part by supporting LESS CRUEL methods. The more popular those places get, eventually the Big Boys will realize that they’re loosing business due to their cruelty.
And besides, nobody cares what vegetarians think. hehe.
FTR bbeaty when Mrs. Rick was a child they had a cow at Grandma’s named Freddy. Grandma lived across the street BTW. Anyway the kids would pet Freddy as he grew up. When it came tiem they had Freddy butchered and the meat distributed to all the memebers of the family.
My wife ate Freddy bugers for quite a while after that.
What was your point again?
Don’t kill an animal to eat - the alternatives are much healthier. Period. We live (at least I do) in a civilized nation where I can buy a massive amount of tasty vegetarian dishes - without killing an animal. Not to mention, the vast majority of U.S. citizens spend too much damn time eating, so they’ll die before their time.
Oh, and let’s not forget the resources (land, grain, water) used to feed those cows. Ignore it if you will, but meat-eaters are f—ing up the environment big-time.
Merry Christmas!
That was my thought exactly, Kat. The thought of eating pets is abhorrent because we become emotionally attached to the individual animals (and the animals as a group), not because we don’t realize that a standing rib roast was once a cow. No, technically it’s not wrong to kill a cat to eat, but I would be uncomfortable with it because for years we have domesticated cats (and dogs, etc.) to be companion animals.
Here are my personal rules on how I treat animals and/or how I think they should be treated.
**Companion animals: **I would never intentionally harm my (or anyone else’s) pet. If I adopt a pet, I make sure that pet is well-fed, is emotionally nurtured, and receives appropriate medical treatment throughout its life.
Livestock: By this I mean domesticated animals raised for the purpose of generating a product (meat, eggs, milk, hide, etc.). Animals of this type should receive adequate nutrition and medical care while alive. The living conditions should be as good as practically possible. Their deaths should be relatively quick and painless.
Wild animals: I do not hunt, but if I did, I would never hunt for sport, nor would I be purposely wasteful. (That seems to me to take the animal’s life a bit too lightly.) I would not lay traps (such as for rodents, etc.) unless not to do so would endanger people and/or I could do so with little detriment to the animals themselves. I would not try to capture or keep a wild animal, except perhaps for rehabilitation. If I severly injured a wild animal (hitting a deer with a car, for instance), I would put it out of its misery.
My point is that you can be respectful of animal life without being a vegan.
Well, let’s take this one step further - I’ll pose a question about one animal - the cow. Give me a good reason why you have to eat their flesh, WITHOUT using the following arguments:
-
Vegetarians don’t get enough Protein! Bullshit (heh) - I eat dairy products rich in protein, but even if I was a vegan, there is a multitude of non-animal products that contain protein.
-
It just tastes good! Well, some cultures think nothing of roasting your cat or dog because it tastes good. The veggie burgers and bacon on the market are tasty and contain much less fat (read: they won’t make you fat).
-
There’s too many cows, we need to weed them out for their own sake!
OK, #3 was a joke.
I don’t think any of the posters here have said that they have to eat animal flesh. But I will give you some reasons why I do:
-
I believe it is healthier than the alternative. I strive to eat mostly unrefined foods in my diet, including meat, because the evidence I have seen indicates that doing so is beneficial.
-
Corollary to point 1: vegetarianism has its own dangers. For instance, much of the protein that vegetarians (especially vegans) get comes from soy, and there is evidence that soy can cause thyroid and other problems, especially in people with a history of autoimmune disease (that’s me).
-
I feel better. I don’t mind going without meat as far as taste goes, but personally I feel better when I include it in my diet.
-
I don’t believe it is intrinsically wrong. If you (the general “you”) believe that eating meat is wrong because all life is equally sacred, then you must by extension abhor the killing of mosquitoes to control malaria. Also, you shouldn’t take antibiotics.
-
Wrong. Please do not make me pull out all the cites as to the new, improved food recommendations.
-
Bullshit. You’ll die from heart disease and/or obesity before I die of thyroid problems.
-
Great, but does “feeling better” (in your own mind) mean that it’s OK to slaughter cows?
-
I was trying to keep the debate simple: why do you eat cows?
And, I’m still waiting for a good answer.
How about those people who are directly descended from cultures and climates where veggies are not available. As long as you can provide adequate levels of vitamins and trace elements with your diet, a totally carnivorous diet is fine for humas. If you need examples consider the Inuit, (meat and fish occasional veggies and plants during the short summer), Krgystani and Mongolian nomadic peoples, ( meat, fish, game and rice). There are others but i’m not going to bother listing them here. Point is none of these people exhibit the so-called “Harmful effects” of eating meat. Cholesterol related problems and heart disease are nearly non existent. Cancer rates are low, and people tend to stay quite active into their advanced years. I attribute this to two factors, first and foremost the active lifestyle they engage in; and secondly they have become genetically accustomed to such a diet.
I have Kyrgzstani and russian heritage. I rarely feel any desire to eat veggies or grains, (I do love fruit though). At last check up my weight is fine, body fat low, cholesterol and blood pressure exceptionally low, and I’ve not been ill at all in the last year and a half. I was offered plenty of veggies as a child and rarely made the choice to eat any of them. I crave meat, poultry, dairy and fish when I get hungry. In fact, Ive noticed that I pass most veggies undigested.
A vegetarian diet is neither healthier, nor more practical than any other diet.
http://www.pcrm.org/health/Info_on_Veg_Diets/vegetarian_foods.html
http://www.fda.gov/fdac/features/895_vegdiet.html
http://www.vegetarian-diet.info/obesity-vegetarian-diet.htm
Again, I’ll call bullshit. You have given no reason why it is in your favor (or the favor of the earth’s environment) to kill cows.
If that one was aimed at me BLONDE, Your sources are biased to say the least. As to why it’s in my favor to kill cows? Well let’s see. If was to kill the avarage free range cow ( we’ll assume angus here) that ought to yeild me about 400 lbs of edible meat. That ought to last me for about a year if I freeze it properly. The avarage cow needs about 1/2 acre of grazing land if you supplement with hay. grass is cheap, renewable and doesn’t tax the soil like food crops do. Further, meat is a protein source that is easily digestable (for me at least). I’m allergic to soy alltogether and as posted above veggies pass through my system. You could make up the difference in grains perhaps, but to produce that much pasta or rice/cereals, you would need a full acre devoted to that crop. So on a single person basis, killing cows is more efficient for me. It uses up less land and provides a better food source for me.
No one HAS to eat cow flesh! I mean, it hasn’t been legislated or anything.
Sorry to defy you on #2, but beef DOES taste good. That’s why I eat it. No one is trying to eat my dog; my dog is a pet. In some cultures, dogs are eaten. That’s fine. It’s not my dog.
Veggie burgers and bacon are indeed tasty. I eat them frequently, since they’re better for you than beef. But other times, I eat beef. And man, it just tastes way better.
Leave out the pet aspect and I thing we could do a lot of good if people actually realized where their food comes from, people are too far removed from the source of their food, this opened the door for peta and the like.
Also the point that it takes less resources to raise a ‘lb’ of veg. protien vs animal missed the point that some resources MUST be processed through animals (i.e. grasslands) to be fit for human digestion.
Also I too though the compairison of peta to the nra is laughable, with peta boardering on terrorism.
I’m not a fan of PETA or the NRA.
initech, my point was that if you HAD a viable argument, you could make it without saying “but it tastes better!”
If your pet cat tasted better than bacon, would you roast it? You’re missing the salient point: animals deserve to be on this planet as much as we do - and, come to think of it, exhibit far more intelligence than humans on occasion.
I get asked all the time why I’m a vegetarian: I have 3 answers - 1) love of animals/environment 2) health 3) weight management.
-
It does not bother me a bit. If I lived on a farm I would rasie my own bee,f pigs, and chickens. If I had more time I would hunt.
-
Simple reasons tate, flavor and texture
And beofre you even hit reply try
cite
Cite
cite
If meat did not have better taste, flavor, and texture then why to vegatarians spend so much time trying to make their diet taste like meat? 
In all my years of serious cooking I have never seen a recipe to make a standing rib roast taste like a carrot. :dubious:
We make it taste like meat because we were raised eating it - that should be obvious. If I were a vegetarian from birth, I wouldn’t crave the taste of bacon. Thank goodness Morningstar makes a veggie bacon that tastes delicious and is so much better for you!
Psst. If you have more time, you might want to consider consulting a dictionary, as opposed to hunting, Rick.
I personally disagree that animals deserve to be here as much as we do, and I also disagree that they exhibit intelligence. In my world, animals are food. That is why I choose to eat meat.
What you choose to eat is my food’s food.
If you really in your heart believe that animals have the same right to be here as humans, why aren’t you doing anything to save the prey animals? Why aren’t you fighting to enforce alternative vegan diets for carnivorous animals?
If bears were hunting people in your town, I’m sure you’d be up in arms about it. But based on your position in this thread, when those same bears eat fish, I fully expect you to have the same reaction about the fish as you would your fellow townsfolk.
So…you believe that you have the right to inhabit the planet more than other creatures? Why, exactly, is that so? Shall we just kill off every remaining animal species at your whim? Tigers, lions - ah, what the hell. Our kids can look at pictures in books.
Animals are carnivorous because they HAVE to be to survive. We can survive without eating animal flesh.
Oh, and - so sorry about the following news flash!
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20031226/ap_on_he_me/mad_cow&cid=541&ncid=716
True, but I prefer to get my nutrients by running down my prey, killing it and consuming it, like every other animal on the top of a food chain. If you’d like to be herbivore don’t bitch when that crocodile drags you under; it’s just doing what any creature on the top does. Eat the weaker ones. We happen to dominate due to intelligence and opposable thumbs. So I’m going to due what comes naturally, hunt for meat and fish.
As to your last link, cook your meat, that’s what fire is for.