This assumes suffering. Why is it assumed?
I disagree. I think that eating meat is obviously “wrong on some level”. I say this as an avowed carnivore. And I think that’s why meat eaters are defensive, and vegans are (often) obnoxious.
Anyone who has spent any time around meat animals can tell that most of the mammals we eat are capable of feeling pain and fear. And that’s likely true of the birds we eat. And it may well be true of vertebrate fish and shellfish and cephalopods. And all those creatures strive to avoid things that will kill them. Or at least, things they evolved to recognize as threats. Eating meat is at least likely to cause suffering.
But, unlike murder or rape, we are designed to eat meat. Most people prefer sex with an enthusiastic partner. Iirc, the army had a lot of trouble in Vietnam because soldiers who saw the enemy were reluctant to shoot. Penn Gillette speaks for most when he says that he rapes and murders exactly as much as wants to, which is never. But even confirmed vegans like to eat things that taste meaty and have a nutritional profile similar to meat.
So we are left in the awkward position that something most people want to do is morally dicey.
Meat eaters are defensive when attacked, like anybody else who isn’t dead by now. Vegans and vegetarians also get defensive when someone attacks their eating habits. And gamers when someone says “OMG how can YOU like that?” And the religious when someone says “religion is all a bunch of crap”. And…
How? Are you saying that cows anticipate and somehow understand that the ramp they are walking up ends in a bolt to the head?
In a perfectly run meat production, perhaps not. I believe most US meat production involves fear and pain in the animals.
I gonna need a cite for that. Remembering that you said “most”.
Regards,
Shodan
I guess I don’t understand why meat eaters take it as a personal attack. It’s just a thought exercise.
If I start a thread saying “I don’t think Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a good game, if you disagree please justify your opinion”, you wouldn’t get 20 replies from Zelda fans saying " I don’t have to justify why I like it, I don’t answer to you, I’m going to play it tonight, and for every time you say you don’t like it, I’m going to play it more!"
Why are you quoting my post indicating that everybody (not just meat eaters) gets defensive when their personal habits get attacked, but go back to focusing on meat eaters as if they were the only ones who get defensive in that situation?
And the OP is more along the lines of
Given that there are superb games such as Zelda: Breath of the Wild, what justification is there for consuming any other kind of entertainment, other than “I find it entertaining?” Should we allow disgraceful working conditions to continue in the entertainment industry just in order to produce something which most people happen to enjoy?
My cite is post 185. I said “I believe”. I am the international expert on what I believe.
Regards,
Puzzlegal
I quoted your post because I was still thinking about the string of posts above that address the idea that in threads about eating meat there seems to be a lot more vitriol and defensiveness than a thread about any other moral discussion.
Further, I think that even with an OP as you suggest, you would get no where near the level of defensiveness and unwillingness to engage as in a thread about meat eating.
Maybe everyone else moved on from that line of the discussion, but it still sticks with me as an interesting phenomenon.
That’s an argument from authority, and you haven’t established your credentials.
Regards,
Shodan
It’s better for the environment to eat a moderate amount of meat. It’s better productivity, we can feed more people. Altho indeed, for example cattle are often fattened on grain (and this can be argued to be wasteful) they can be grazed 100% on land which is more or less useless to agriculture. Pigs and chickens can be feed waste. Sheep and goats are almost always grazec.
It can be, if cattle are fed grain.
But first of all, you dont have to .
Next feed corn has a yield of about ten times that of sweet corn. So, yes, you have a waste factor there abut since you can grow ten times as much feed corn than sweet corn, the difference is not high.
Omnivores, actually and Gorillas are pretty much vegans.
Not to mention many millions starve.
Cite?
I guess you have never been on a farm. Now true, some animals are raised in “filthy, deplorable, crowded conditions”. But many arent. In our family farms up in Canada, the cattle are grazed and are pretty happy, as cattle go. The milk cows are almost treated as family. And so forth.
and we have shown it isnt wasteful.
And yes we object to eating* sapient species.* We dont eat dolphin or chimp here in America and most of the Western world and we condemn those who do.
nm
So are soybeans. Soybeans are alive also.
How about humans having kids so those kids can take care of them when they get old?
There has been some effort to reduce pain and fear in meat animals when taken to slaughter for purely practical reasons: a meat animal like a cow or full size pig is a big, potentially dangerous animal and keeping them calm reduces the risk of injury to slaughterhouse staff; calm animals are easier and therefore less expensive to handle; less pushback from the public; and less loss due to “downer” animals that can’t be sold at premium prices for human food.
Temple Grandin is a designer of stock handling systems that encourage circling movements, which are instinctive to cattle, and managing what the animals see/hear, to minimize stress and fear until the moment they’re killed.
Is US meat production perfect? Of course not. But it’s better than it was 50 years ago.
Now if they could just come up with a good solution for the mountains/seas of animal shit at the holding and slaughtering sites…