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Being vegan is just another fashion statement for most. Condemning others who are different from ourselves too. It's not well thought out most of the time.
I don't believe that to be true. Maybe you think so because those who are the loudest are remembered the most like.
And I also don't believe is a "fashion" statement since not eating animal products takes a lot of effort. Vegans have to live a world where everything is meat based and choose from the limited options they have.
Back to the original topic:
I think the way vegeterians see eating meat is the same way most Americans think about eating a dog, a cat or a rabbit. Most Americans would be repulsed by the idea but it is really not that different. It's not like eating dog or cat meat would make anyone sick and it is very likely that meat won't taste that different if they add a bunch of onions and garlic like most Americans add to their steaks. It is all about whether we feel we think it is acceptable but there are really no logical rules to discriminate some animals. Like it has been said before pigs are very smart so it can't be that we are using intelligence to discriminate.
I think when it comes to eating meat we live a world of denial full of cognitive biases. As long as it is tasty and everybody else is eating it(groupthink), most of us don't care if the animal was tortured all his life. We just sweep it under the rug. Then we see a poor dog being abused and we cry like babies. And even if we only eat organic meat, the amount of meat we eat is so excessive that are harmful to our bodies and to our environment (growing food for cows causes deforestation)
This reminds me of one of my top ten clean jokes - how can you tell a vegan at a party? Don't worry, they will let you know.
I usually shove an extra bacon-wrapped something or other between my lips as they prattle on, for good measure.
I went to a co-worker's barbecue recently (you can barbecue year round in SE Texas) and one of the guests was vegan. I had grilled some corn, asparagus and bell peppers to go with the animal proteins and this girl (ha ha!) told me that she was kind of like a vegetarian and asked if there was anything she could eat. I asked if by "kind of like a vegetarian" she meant vegan and her eyes lit up as she said yes. I pointed out the pyrex full of asparagus, grilled corn and bell peppers and she prepared a plate. After she ate she enthusiastically complimented the food and asked how I prepared it so that she could try the same at home. I told her "It's simple: The trick is to drizzle bacon grease over it while it's on the grill." Man, the look on her face was what you would expect if you told someone that you seasoned their steak with feces. I didn't have to heart to leave her dangling for very long and explained that olive oil, salt and pepper are all you need and cook over high-medium heat long enough for good grill marks.
Why do most people have no problem eating cows, but get repulsed by the thought of eating horse or dog? And what makes cats so special that they can't appear on our dinner plates? And why do some vegetarians eat fish? Are fish not animals? I understand the people who eat no meat, by why do those who do eat meat feel that some animals are ok to eat and others are not?
What you are observing are cultural norms, and they vary a lot depending on what society you look at. It is indeed pretty arbitrary. I had a Somali friend, not religious, who still couldn't bring himself to eat pork. The consumption of pork was considered so horrible in his culture, that he said it struck him like "eating a rat."
Who are you to determine what's "best" or what's "ethical" for anyone other than yourself? You are talking as if you are declaring absolutes.
One hour of hell? Who determines what's "hell?" What about bison living in the frigid harsh winter of Yellowstone freezing to death during winter? That's just nature.
Are you really prepared to determine that an animal's life had pleasure and meaning? How would you assess such a thing?
You can choose to live your life however you choose. Your arguments are not really 100% sound.
ETA: The problem with discussions like this is that people only think in terms of dogs, cats, cows, pigs, and chickens. They forget that the animal kingdom is vast and that nature is BRUTAL. Animals kill other animals all the time. Not for the squeamish but look at this clip. What about all the meaning and pleasure here?
If a human kills and eats a chicken, that's wrong? But if a coyote kills and eats a chicken, that's ignored?
Actually I can tell what is pleasurable and not pleasurable to an animal, through the choices they make. If a dog chooses to live in your house, then it is more pleasurable for the dog to be in your house than other places. So why do they put animals in cages?
About the one hour of hell thing, animals communicate in body language and sound. Just cause they don't use words doesn't mean they don't communicate. I could just as easily argue that I really can't tell if your hurting when you yell "stop, this hurts me!" because you might have different denotations of the word hurt than I do.
Again as I said, the time in which an animal dies is not whats important, its the hours it had while the animal was alive that is important.
But we can't say that the choices one makes considering the dinner plate are all relevant while the choices one makes in human society are not all relevant.
Lots of what people eat is because of the Food Laws in Leviticus 11 which includes many I eat such as Pig,Rabbit, Catfish and Shellfish, are unclean. But Carp and Grasshoppers are ok.
Why do most people have no problem eating cows, but get repulsed by the thought of eating horse or dog? And what makes cats so special that they can't appear on our dinner plates? And why do some vegetarians eat fish? Are fish not animals? I understand the people who eat no meat, by why do those who do eat meat feel that some animals are ok to eat and others are not?
Conditioning, culture, availability. Between every culture and region on the planet, collectively, I'm sure there's no animal that's been spared. Humans as a whole eat whatever they want, snakes to eagles, rats to lions, cows to pigs, insects.
It's not until you start splitting up the cultures and regions when they become divided on which should be eaten. Why they choose what they choose has so many variables.
A society that has wild turkeys running around all over the place probably eats turkey. A society far inland likely doesn't eat whale. A society that considers cows to be sacred won't eat them. Cats were considered "sacred" in some regions for generations and "magical" in others so they were left alone.
Societies also tend not to eat things that can greatly benefit them otherwise. If you have a choice between eating a horse or a chicken, you may think, "Hmm, the horse can transport me places and carry things for me or pull plows and it can be trained and the chicken is loud and runs all over the place like a crazy person pi$$ing me off, I think I'll eat it that" lol
It could also depend on what you have the means to eat. A society advanced enough to have the technology/weapons to take down just about anything easily might be more willing to experiment. People won't generally eat what they can't easily and cheaply catch because they can't easily and cheaply catch it, which is probably why a cow is more common to the plate than a cheetah.
The list goes on and on.
Beyond that, if you're delving into the murky territory of the value of life and the question you're really asking is why people feel that some animals deserve to live but not others, the reasons for that could be bent to apply to anything, so it's best not to go there. Meaning...
Some may say, "Why do you think animals don't have the right to live? Just because they don't communicate the same way that you do doesn't mean they don't have thoughts or feelings. They're still living beings!"
Well, the same can be said about plants. Studies have shown that plants can feel and react to pain and positive treatment and they're obviously alive, but they don't communicate the way animals do, they don't have faces that can emote or make sounds that are audible to us, so we have no qualms about chopping down trees to build things and plucking flowers out of the ground because they're pwetty.
We all kill things all the time, sometimes to eat, sometimes for luxury, sometimes for fun, sometimes because we're annoyed. When you start passing moral judgments on which things we deem fit to kill and which things we don't and why, everyone will have an argument that they feel is valid and everyone will draw that line in a different place, so I say we need to stop beating a dead horse. And why are dead horses the only animals we have to stop beating, anyway, huh?
Last edited by cyberphonics; 02-13-2014 at 11:45 AM..
Even in such a small country like Belgium, there are (cultural) differences in what people eat. The people in the Ardennes eat boar, deer, etc and have some great local meat products. Near the beach, seafood is something you HAVE to like and people here know many recipes..I hate seafood and get funny looks from the locals when I say I don't eat shrimp and so on. But anyone born here is a seafood connaiseur...Where I'm from, is a farm region so we eat cows, pigs, chickens, lots of potatoes,...
Cyberphonics, I've said what you say about plants to vegetarians but they shrug it off..I'm just talking crap according to them but it's proven that plants communicate and respond to the way they are treated
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It seems that, and this echoes around the world, that people don't want to eat animals that they have a close attachment to, such as in America dogs and cats, in certain religions lamb, anything that is meat, or on certain days, etc. In areas of the world where people are more likely to be impoverished, such as Asia, people are more likely to eat not only meat but any kind of meat, in fact anything that is edible. Asians also eat jellyfish, kelp, etc., things we might not even think of eating here.
Why do most people have no problem eating cows, but get repulsed by the thought of eating horse or dog? And what makes cats so special that they can't appear on our dinner plates? And why do some vegetarians eat fish? Are fish not animals? I understand the people who eat no meat, by why do those who do eat meat feel that some animals are ok to eat and others are not?
Because people don't usually keep cattle as pets.
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? And what makes cats so special that they can't appear on our dinner plates? And why do some vegetarians eat fish? Are fish not animals? I understand the people who eat no meat, by why do those who do eat meat feel that some animals are ok to eat and others are not?
