I just want to mention that blaster and psalex made the best points for the veggie perspective. You both did excellent work and I appreciate it. Though, I’m not vegetarian I understand they are often misunderstood. The majority of vegetarians don’t try to force propaganda down your throat. However, EVERY time my wife, Brei, eats a meal with a non-vegetarian for the first time they ALWAYS question her in a manner that gets more and more incredulous. It’s almost an assault that frequently upsets my vegetarian wife. So many meat eaters (especially in this region) are almost offended at Brei’s veggie principals. So those of you, who are offended by the wild flailing of propaganda by vegetarians, just remember not to berate vegetarians, either. It should be like religion. It’s okay to let other people know your view or ask a question but don’t slam it into people if you eat meat or not.
Blake, your points about monoculture are good points, but applicable to both diets: the massive fields of corn, wheat, grasses, and other fodder grown to support livestock are also treated with the same lack of crop rotation, which requires massive herbicides and pesticides. (Please research Monsanto)
Your cows eat what I eat, but much more and in massive quantities
Field of veggies required to feed 30 vegetarians= rodent and insect death.
Larger field of veggies required to feed 30 head of cattle= rodent death, insect death, and cow death.
The totality of fauna death per diet is still won by omnivores.
Ideally, most vegetarians would prefer oraganic food. Sometimes hard to get, most definitely more expensive. Plants have spent eons evolving their own poisons; their own defenses against insects. We would prefer it if nature be left to its own devices.In other words: we try avoid the use of and the necessity of pesticides and herbicides in order to stop the rape of our soil. Hard to stop the big business of chemicals- Dow Monsanto has the argument that the chemical research conducted will allow the US to feed the homeless, and allow us to grow quantities of food massive enough to feed starving third world countries. Now, who can find fault in that? We do fight an uphill battle, but it is our choice to try to preserve as much life as possible, and we are quite aware that we can not stop the death of all fauna, nor is that our goal. We understand the diversity of life, and we do not want the earth to be overrun by any species. Small farms and hunting to supplement an omnivorous diet: good. Big industry and livestock loaded with antibiotics, steroids, hormones and inhumane treatment of animals: bad.
*To make less of an impact- that is our goal. *
Even in organic fields (my garden) rodents and insects do get killed- last summer I accidently chopped a vole in half while using the hoe around my corn, and I have no idea how many earthworms, beetles, and other burrowing insects and rodents were routinely disturbed as I turned the soil. The deer are not allowed to forage in my garden, and when one occasionally clears the fence it gets pelted with dirt clods until it leaps back over the fence. Any death that occurs in my backyard garden I take full responsibility for.
The point is that we can and sometimes do lessen our negative impact on the earth. I am sure there are many vegetarians new to the diet who think nothing of buying imported fruit, and out of season vegetables trucked across the US. There is a learning process involved, much like the process used to determine if one wants to purchase beef this week, or wait until the CDC and USDA has declared our cattle free of mad cow.
Most of us are reasonable and have done enough research to counter any argument against our diet. But many of us also use emotions in making the decision to avoid meat- no different from using emotion to choose a political or religious affiliation.
If we are asked to support our decision to avoid meat, we have simple and ready answers. But if we are asked to defend our choice, then expect the debate to escalate.
Sources showing the death of mice, rabbits, snakes, skunks, possums, squirrels, gophers and rats as a result of harvesting grain can be found from here
So, are you vegies murderers and planet rapists the same as omni/carni are? or do you grow everything you consume in your backyard?
Some of my input.
I’m not a vegetarian: I eat fish several times a week, and I eat eggs and dairy pretty regularly. Other than that, I have a bite or two of meat off my wife’s plate every six months or so.
That said, I see some real problems in this thread.
If God didn’t want us to eat animals, why are they made of meat? The standard vegetarian answer to this rehashed joke is to look hungrily at the joker and say, “YOU’RE made of meat…”
More animals die in plant-based agriculture than in meat-based agriculture. Only marginally true, if true at all: this would be true for free-ranged cattle, perhaps (I’m not sure what effect cattle waste and diet have on range ecosystems – my understanding is that they eat grass in a manner different from how bison eat, for example, leading to greater erosion in the Western United States). It would NOT be true for the huge numbers of animals raised on crops – most chickens and pigs, for example, and a large number of dairy cattle and even some beef-cattle.
In these cases, simple thermodynamics means that far more animals are killed by grain-fed animal agriculture than by plant-based agriculture. Roughly 90% of calories are lost each time you move up the food chain, lost as radiant heat. To produce 1 calorie of pork, you feed the pig 10 calories of grain. That’s 10 times as many field mice dying in the production of pork, compared to the production of bread.
Agribusiness has a vested interest in producing tasty meats, and stress reduces tastiness. Again, a half-truth. Agribusiness has a greater interest in producing inexpensive meats, and reducing stress costs money. Which type of beef gets sold more – Angus, or Big Macs? Although I could be wrong, I’m almost certain the fast-food market is larger than the high-end beef market, and I’m almost certain the reason it’s larger isn’t based on tastiness, but is rather based on cost. There’s a huuuuuuge market for nasty-tasting cheap meats.
Nature is cruel, so why shouldn’t we be? This argument is downright disingenuous. Sure, wolves eat sheep. Male ducks rape female ducks by holding them underwater, sometimes until they drown. Some chimpanzees kidnap the babies of other group members and eat them alive. Ants wage wars to gather slaves. Do we use any of these behaviors to justify our own actions towards one another? Of course we don’t: we are, we presume, moral agents, creatures capable of making decisions based on a rational ethos. Chimpanzees, wolves, ducks, and ants are not capable of doing so, so we cannot justify our own behavior based on theirs.
Because chimpanzees etc. aren’t moral agents, does this mean we should not consider them when making moral decisions? If we’re going to be consistent, it means nothing of the sort. Infants, toddlers, the severely mentally impaired, and the comatose are all equally incapable of making moral decisions, yet we factor them into our own moral decisions. Unless we can come up with a rational, non-arbitrary bright line between all humans and all nonhumans, we’ve got to consider the interests of nonhumans when we make our moral decisions.
If a cow has a right not to be eaten, then so does a carrot. This may simply be a misunderstanding of the issue. Do we have any reason, based on biology and behavioral science, to believe that a cow has a desire not to be eaten? Certainly so: they behave in a manner relevantly similar to humans when faced with the prospect of death, and their brains exhibit relevantly similar activity when faced with that prospect, and their nervous systems are relevantly similar to our own. Carrots do not behave in a relevantly similar fashion; they have no nervous system, and nothing relevantly similar to a nervous system. If we tend to respect a desire not to be killed, we may reasonably distinguish between a cow (which exhibits such a desire) and a carrot (which does not exhibit such a desire).
Okay, that’s a brief overview of five arguments; good enough for now!
Daniel
compton_homie, It would appear that the opportunity for attack has passed. Luckily our OP sadnil, returned to the fray long enough to note that his original inquiry has been answered, at least in part. It is unfortunate that this discussion deteriorated into insults and gross-out humour, but it has been a necessary (and amusing) chance to clear the air, for both sides.
I would happily share a meal with any poster here, and with great relief because the preliminary discussion of diet is out of the way.
Left Hand of Dorkness, where were you during all of the flaming insults and defensive posturing? Your post would have ended this argument pages ago. Thank you, Daniel, for taking the time to chime in-
Left Hand of Dorkness: the voice of reason
Thanks, Psalex; I was off enjoying Christmas break. I’m sure that my post won’t end the debate, though, FWIW.
The argument over animal rights is one that I’ve struggled with for a good fifteen years now. I am far from a true believer, but I am at the same time unable to refute some of the philosophy’s central tenets (as expressed by Tom Reagan in The Case for Animal Rights, certainly The Book To Read for anyone interested in really getting their teeth into this issue). I compromise by trying to cut down on the animal suffering I cause, by not preaching at anyone, by telling people my position forthrightly when the subject comes up.
At some point, I’m likely to start eating meat again, restricting myself to humanely-raised animals (as determined either by myself or by an organization like the AHA – certainly not as determined by the meat-producers themselves). For now, however, I know that I’d have a lot of trouble killing an animal myself, and so I wouldn’t feel right about eating animals that someone else killed, even if they raised and slaughtered the animal humanely.
I don’t have too much of a problem with proselytizers on this issue. This isn’t like proselytizing about fashion or music: folks who subscribe to an animal-rights theory believe there are strong moral issues involved. I see their proselytizing as being closer to proselytizing against corporal punishment for children: even if they’re wrong, they’re at least looking at a weighty moral issue.
Daniel
What is moral is not always very practical. So you have to ask yourself: do I want to do what is moral always, even if it radically alters my life? Or do I want to do what is moral insofar as is possible with most of my usual life intact. I don’t think anyone can function at either extreme (always doing what is moral, vs. never doing anything that would upset their routine).
I agree. I also think it’s appropriate to engage in a vigorous debate about morality. If Joe thinks that the moral consequence of spanking children is negligible (“Spare the rod and spoil the child,” he says), and Frank thinks it’s a very important issue, it’s appropriate for Frank to confront Joe and try to convince him not to spank his kid.
Similarly, if Sue thinks the moral consequence of eating meat is negligible, and Jean thinks it’s important, it’s appropriate for Jean to confront Sue.
In both cases, Sue and Frank are free to defend their viewpoint, and I’ve got no problem with that, either.
Just as long as we remember that we may be wrong, we can profitably discuss how much weight to give to any moral position we take. Personally I give some significant weight to the desires of animals when I decide what to eat, and it sometimes, but not always, outweighs my own desires of what to eat.
Daniel
That isn’t true. There is grass fed beef available in the US and elsewhere in the world whicg is never fed corn or wheat or grasses from monocultural fields. The problem is that you are drawing a broad brush across ‘meat’ as though it all comes form the same source. If a person wished to purchase only free-range, grass fed beef then they could, and the cost in terms of animal loves would be much lower.
That is not true. In the US much, possibly most, beef is produced on ‘native’ pasture and finished on grain. Most of the protein is produced without any animal deaths at all.
Even within feedlotting establishments the total faunal death rate is much higher using vegetarian protein sources. While cattle use about 1.4 times the amount of protein as that produced under intensive production, the protein is about 1.5 times more available, so the total protein load is slightly better. However the protein the cattle utilise is usually maize, sorghum or wheat, which have low faunal death rates. In contrast to produce the same protein form vegetarian sources requires he production of legumes, which have a very high death rate.
I wouldn’t doubt that grain-fed beef may have a higher death rate when used as an energy source. However it is preferable as a protein source. Moreover most of the protein in beef is produced form native pasture even from cattle finished in feedlots, so the death rate is nil.
A mixed diet with grass- fed beef as the primary protein source comes out miles ahead in terms of faunal deaths.
So if I can demonstrate that a diet with small amounts of free-range beef has fewer negative environmental impacts than your current diet, will you change? If not, why not?
Oh, and Blonde, I suggest you take your own advice. DO some research. Even some very basic research would be good in your case. Something like reading the pages you link to. That page you linked to does not list any extinct tiger species.
Endangered
Siberian tiger (left). Approximately 350 adults, total population about 450. 80% live in the Russian region of Primorski in the Russian Far East, with a few in China and Korea.
Sumatran tiger. 400 to 500 survive in the in the wild. Found only on the Indonesian island of Sumatra.
Bengal (Indian) tiger. 3,000 to 5,000 Bengal tigers in the wild today in Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India and Nepal.
Indochinese tiger. 1,000 to 1,800 remain in the wild. Ranges in Cambodia, China, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam.
South Chinese tiger. 30 to 80 remain in the wild in central and eastern China.
Extinct
Caspian tiger (right). Extinct. Once ranged throughout the forests and grasslands of Afghanistan, Iran, Mongolia, Turkey and the central Asiatic areas of Russia.
Javan tiger. Extinct within the past 25 years. Range was the Indonesian island of Java.
Balinese tiger. Extinct for 50 years. Habitat was the island of Bali.
**Blake, ** try to keep up. Caspian, Javan, and Balinese tigers no longer exist on Planet Earth. The link I supplied indicated as such.
Blake, not sure which part of the country you are from, but pasture rotation is the exception rather than the norm, at least along the east coast. Grasses do not grow during the winter months from USDA growing zones 2-7 and must be harvested and baled at least twice (in a good year, three cuts are possible: Memorial Day, July 4th, and late September in my zone 6/7 area) Same with corn and other grains: it must be sown, fertilized, plowed for weeds, harvested and stored in order to be fed to cattle as supplements to grasses (grasses alone do not provide enough nutrition for breeding stock; grains must be included in the diet for prime health)
I appreciate the fact that you took the time to note some statistics, but please provide the source. I am only familiar with farming practices along the eastern United States; you may live in a state where cattle are allowed free range year round and require no winter feed at all. Your area may also have grains and corns as native species, if so, you are quite lucky as are your neighboring livestock.
Many cattle are born on grass fed farms in Spring or Fall, then moved to feedlots for fattening. Roaming or any other form of exercise is not allowed at a feedlot; a fat steer will sell at a much higher cost. Corn and other grains, as well as small amounts of animal protein can sometimes be found in the troughs at feedlots.
Thorntree Farm is just a few miles away from me, and the owner and husband work intensive hours each day. The cattle must be moved to new pasture several times per day, must be fed hay (yes, hay- cut and baled twice each summer- harvested as any other vegetable product) during the months of October through April every year. The cattle are also given some supplemental feed (in the form of corn and grain) during very lean months. I had the good fortune to work on this farm as a student a few years ago, and can attest to the humane and healthy condition of the cattle raised there.
If you will read my posts, I have stated that there are sources for meat other than big industry, and noted that small family farms, hunting, and fishing can still provide safe, reliable meat for many in this country. I am also willing to share a list or organic meat sources for anyone along the East Coast if they choose to e-mail me- a list of growers is readily available to me and I would be happy to pass it along.
I am not sure what your stake in this argument is- alternative sources for protein was the original discussion. If you are suggesting that vegetarians consume the mice, grasshoppers, corn ear worms, and other opportunistic species that thrive in vegetable and fruit crops, you are correct. Gross, but true. If you are suggesting that no diet is completely cruelty free, also true. What is your point, exactly? That livestock farming is more sustainable and causes less harm to the environment than vegetable farming? Please provide links to the statistics you quoted- I am curious about your sources.
That’s correct, but the link does not mention any species of tiger which have become extinct.
Do you understand what a species is?
Did you bother to do some research and find out what species Caspian, Javan, and Balinese tigers are?
Obviously not.
That’s true enough, but I’m not sure what your point is here. If cattle are only fed pasture, even harvested pasture, then there is no faunal morality associated with poisoning rats and songbirds and spraying Heliothis.
My point is that eating a diet that utilises grass fed beef as a protein source must resulting fewer animal deaths than a purely vegetarian diet. The point being that a vegatarian diet is worse for the environment and morally less supportable than a diet that contains some beef as a protein source.
That some livestock farming I more sustainable and causes less harm than vegetable farming. And because that is true it behoves any individual who claims to be making dietary choices based on minimisation of harm to maximise their use of those animal products produced in such a manner. A vegetarian diet is not an optimal solution for minimising environmental damage.
Which statistics?
Pardon my ignorance, but are fertilizers and pesticides not ever used on pasture? Are pastures not plowed? Are pastures not harvested using heavy machinery? All of these processes would result in animal death.
At this point, we’re probably splitting hairs, though: I think we can agree that:
-Range-fed beef results in fewer animal deaths than plant-based agriculture, assuming the deaths from ecosystem alteration are negligible (I’m not sure this is a fair assumption, but I have no idea where to begin researching it).
-Grain-fed beef results in more animal deaths than plant-based agriculture, given basic thermodynamics.
-Beef raised using a mixture of range feeding and grain feeding will be somewhere between these extremes.
-This point is only relevant if you’re a vegetarian for ethical reasons.
The relevant question seems to be, what percentage of beef is raised on grain? My understanding (admittedly old and vague) was that the huge majority of grains and legumes raised in the US were fed to livestock; does anyone have hard figures on this? If this is true, then presumably we could lessen animal deaths by feeding these directly to people instead of feeding them to cows. Thermodynamics, again.
Daniel
Here are some statistics you sited blake:
i’m still undecided as far as weather or not i want to be a vegetarian. clearly the overriding factor is the emotional side of things. my heart has to be in it. do i really feel like i’m helping or not helping anything either way? do i care either way? hm… being agnostic, immature, slightly stubborn, and not really having much of any value system at all really counts against me on this issue. i think my wife and i will end up raising our kids vegetarians, though. it’ll be many years in the future before that happens, so we’ll see.
An interesting point, but ISTM that you have supplied the necessary bright line yourself.
Non-human animals like chimps, and presumably cattle, pigs, and chickens as well, are not members of species that can be moral agents. Infants and the brain-damaged are members of a species that can be moral agents. Therefore it is logically consistent to treat the two groups differently.
Of course, there is a gray area. Some people argue that an unborn fetus should not be treated differently than an infant or someone with brain damage, and others argue that large mammals such as chimps or dolphins should be extended some of the same treatment as humans, but by and large you have a fairly consistent standard that can be used to justify omnivorism.
I include “members of the same species” because it addresses the question of cannibalism, which is, in my view, a straw man. The taboo on cannibalism developed because societies with a strong taboo against eating one another were removed from the temptation of regarding each other as possible sources of food during mild to moderate famines. Thus the weaker members, who tended to be children, were protected and had a better change to survive to reproductive age.
The taboo on cannibalism is violated at times, clearly, but societies who regarded members of their own society as primary food sources are few and far between. I am not talking aobut ritual cannibalism here. An Eskimo reverently nibbling a bit of the cheek meat of a dead grandmother, or the Yanomamo Indians drinking water mixed with the ashes of a family member, is a different matter. There the taboo is being violated in a largely symbolic way, which is not the same as killing your elderly neighbor and butchering him for meat.
A somewhat similar point can be made regarding the eating of pets such as dogs and cats. Eating dogs is not unheard of, but dogs and cats are primarily carnivorous, and therefore held less available calories than herbivores, except during emergencies. In addition, cats were protected in (for instance) ancient Egypt because they ate mice, and thus protected the granaries. It is also true that people have emotional attachments to their pets, and this habit of thinking of them as almost human tends to trigger the very strongly inculcated taboo on cannibalism at the thought of eating Fluffy.
I think species distinctions are useful in these kinds of discussions. An argument that a cow or pig might suffer by “knowing” she was going to be slaughtered would not work nearly as well when applied to a chicken. A veterinarian acquaintance of mine, who is responsible for a chicken farm, referred to chickens as “plants with wings”, and their tendency to drown in rainstorms, peck each other to death, and so forth, makes the idea that free range chickens are “happier” than others more difficult to maintain.
Not that this would excuse unnecessary suffering even for a chicken, but it does affect both what is necessary and what is suffering.
Regards,
Shodan
Shodan, why is the species line relevant? What place does a biological category have in a discussion of ethics?
The severely brain-damaged might have the same genetic makeup as I have, or at least might have a closer genetic makeup to me than to a chimpanzee; what moral relevance does this have?
It seems to me to be logical to treat moral agents differently from moral subjects, and moral subjects differently from moral nonsubjects – but I don’t see the advantage in confusing these groups with irrelevant biological distinctions.
Draw the bright line using moral criteria, not using biological criteria.
Daniel
All this use of the moral word is quite interesting. Let’s see - we have terrorists killing thousands, pedophiles, rapists and brutal killers amongst us. There’s not a lot there to be proud of, folks. Those of you who think we are somehow “morally” above animals should stop and consider the state of the planet we are handing over to our children.
In my opinion, animals do not HAVE to live up to a morality standard, because they are innocent of the evil deeds that humans inflict upon each other.