Vegetarianism/Veganism

[mottaloo]

On 07/01/2022 at 17:24, Wainy316 said:

Yep, it's the bollocks and it's served for free as standard with pretty much every meal over there.

Think I'll pass 

[Mic09]

10 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

There is no necessity in having an avocado or in having bananas or pineapples or peppers. You could just eat potatoes and apples. It would be far less damaging to environment, they are a local product, and don't need to be transited thought the entire world to arrive in the UK. In fact, you could sell your car and your phone, and rent an allotment or use your garden to grow them. 

 

I agree. And we should do as much as possible to minimise our impact on the environment. I agree we all draw a line somewhere, but the mass slaughtering of animals just to benefit our taste buds is a very obvious place to start. The environmental argument is a much much harder one to tackle than the moral argument to be honest. The logic that other food is damaging to the environment as well so we may as well kill millions of animals so I can eat a big mac doesn't wash with me.

 

I eat meat, and I prefer to buy meat from a local source where I know that animal led a good life. Game meat such as venison is my favourite. Yeah I pay a bit more for it, but it tastes better and I have a clear(er) conscience.

Do I think a pig that comes in pork chops had a bad death? Sure. Do I think it would have been ripped by wolves if it lived in the wild? It probably would, no animal dies of old age - it usually gets eaten. It's a much more brutal way to die than being killed by a butcher. So maybe that pig shouldn't have lived at all? Maybe so, I don't know. If it's looked after properly, it certainly can enjoy a good life. 

 

What's a good life? Pigs and Cows can live up to 20 years. But pigs are slaughtered when they're a few months old. Cows usually before they're 2 years old. If humans were killed at a couple of years old would we be happy that they'd had a "good life".
And most of these animals don't have a good life. I used to think that way too. But how do I know? Do you check every restaurant you eat at? Every bit of produce you buy? Every jar of mayonnaise? Every plate of fish and chips?

It's impossible. And in my opinion all it does is maintain the demand for meat.

Yeah animals will die in the wild. But that's nature, we can't stop that. "Oh it would have dies in the wild anyway so let's gas it to death when it's 6 months old, boil it's corpse and then eat it". Nah not for me
And yes, that pig shouldn't have lived at all. Breeding a pig just to kill it at 6 months old is horrible. Even if it did have a good life, which it probably didn't. Again if we were breeding humans and killing them at 6 months old the justification that they had a good life woudln't wash. And most people would say it would be kinder to not live at all

 

Does my diet require a good source of protein? Yeah it does.

Are you really suggesting that you can't get protein from anywhere other than meat? Are vegetarians and vegans dropping dead from protein deficiency?
I eat 150g of protein a day, sometimes more. None of it comes from meat.

 

But I think it's a flawed outlook to reduce life to a minimum necessity. And I am sure (I'm guessing) you do not live your life that way and enjoy many 'evil' things. We all do.
 

I absolutely do. And I agree it's a very difficult topic to debate. I definitely enjoy "evil" things. Everyone does, you can't practically avoid them. But eating meat is such a luxury that it's a league above the other things you mentioned. In this day and age we need mobile phones. Ok not literally, but practically speaking you do. You need to take planes to travel. And humans NEED to eat something. 

Your arguments that growing and eating plants and vegetables etc is damaging to the environment is valid. But that's a necessity. If we didn't eat at least plants, we'd die. But we grow and use far far FAR more plants to feed livestock that we then eat, than we do if we just fed ourselves. The land used to feed livestock in north america alone could feed the entire planet. So even that argument is more evidence that eating meat is bad. Because you're right, gorwing and eating plants is damaging to the environment. But the best way to minimise that damage is to eat the plants ourselves.

 

Wow, you did do a thorough job here! I appreciate it.

I shall reply when I have some time, work is calling. *SPOILER ALERT* I disagree with some of it! 

[tomav84]

my 2 pence worth (my mrs is vegan so i have some knowledge/understanding on the subject and had numerous conversations with her about it)

vegans are good. they are doing a good thing. i 100% acknowledge that the world needs to consume less meat/animal products. could the world support a 100% vegan human population? arguably no...not if we want to continue eating soya, avocado etc.

where me and vegans fall out, is where (like in the west ham thread) i, as a meat eater, is lumped in with the same category as those that abuse animals for their fun. the two are entirely separate IMO

[Wainy316]

Vegetarians are the forgotten people at the moment.  I may have said it previously but that McPlant burger needs cheese and Big Mac sauce!

Not that I am a veggie (yet) but I eat very little meat at home anymore.  Dairy though, I'd really struggle with, it's not just milk, butter and cheese it's checking every single sauce you cook with or add to anything.

[tomav84]

12 minutes ago, Wainy316 said:

Vegetarians are the forgotten people at the moment.  I may have said it previously but that McPlant burger needs cheese and Big Mac sauce!

Not that I am a veggie (yet) but I eat very little meat at home anymore.  Dairy though, I'd really struggle with, it's not just milk, butter and cheese it's checking every single sauce you cook with or add to anything.

see, vegans i get. it's not for me, but i get it.

vegetarianism, i really find bizarre. so they don't eat meat, but they have no problem with other animal products, dairy, etc

[Rodders]

1 minute ago, tomav84 said:

see, vegans i get. it's not for me, but i get it.

vegetarianism, i really find bizarre. so they don't eat meat, but they have no problem with other animal products, dairy, etc

they could just not like eating meat and that be it without any moral position attached. But also, probably vegetarianism was considered fine enough until the vegan movement upped the ante with their rigorous code of conduct pushed into puritarianism.

 

 

[Stevo985]

8 minutes ago, tomav84 said:

where me and vegans fall out, is where (like in the west ham thread) i, as a meat eater, is lumped in with the same category as those that abuse animals for their fun. the two are entirely separate IMO

They are separate, I agree with that.

But there is a certain hypocrisy to being against animal cruelty but eating meat, imo.

 

One of the reasons I eventually went veggie was I was talking with a vegan and when I declared that I loved animals, they said "How can you love animals but then eat them?"

And I didn't have an answer. How can you claim to love something but then kill them for food

[Stevo985]

9 minutes ago, tomav84 said:

vegetarianism, i really find bizarre. so they don't eat meat, but they have no problem with other animal products, dairy, etc

Again there's a clear distinction.

Eating meat requires that animal to be slaughtered. Other animal products (certainly not all of them) don't.

[tomav84]

1 minute ago, Stevo985 said:

They are separate, I agree with that.

But there is a certain hypocrisy to being against animal cruelty but eating meat, imo.

 

One of the reasons I eventually went veggie was I was talking with a vegan and when I declared that I loved animals, they said "How can you love animals but then eat them?"

And I didn't have an answer. How can you claim to love something but then kill them for food

you cant. it's speciesism.

therefore i choose my words carefully. i love SOME animals. the ones i don't love, i'm happy to eat

if cats and dogs were farmed and sold as meat in this country in the same way as cows and pigs are, i still wouldn't eat them

in this instance, i'm comfortable with my hypocrisy

where you and i will have to agree to disagree is that i see no hypocrisy in condemning kicking a cat for pure amusement and then going off and eating a burger

[Davkaus]

9 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

Again there's a clear distinction.

Eating meat requires that animal to be slaughtered. Other animal products (certainly not all of them) don't.

I mostly agree. There's a big jump between "it's wrong to kill animals" and "it's wrong the keep animals in captivity". On the face of it, egg production is a much lesser evil than meat, for example.

The problem with both eggs and dairy is the industrialised farming process. If you don't eat meat for ethical reasons, then you can not buy industrially produced eggs, knowing about how chick sexing works (spoiler, big conveyor belt into a grinder to kill the male chicks)  without being a hypocrite.

In principle, if I had the space/time I'd be absolutely fine with having my own chickens as pets and helping myself to their eggs occasionally

Edited February 9, 2022 by Davkaus

[tomav84]

5 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

Again there's a clear distinction.

Eating meat requires that animal to be slaughtered. Other animal products (certainly not all of them) don't.

i'd argue that the dairy industry is more brutal than the slaughter process. cows being repeatedly raped so that they get pregnant and produce milk and their calves taken off them as soon as their born

[Stevo985]

1 minute ago, tomav84 said:

where you and i will have to agree to disagree is that i see no hypocrisy in condemning kicking a cat for pure amusement and then going off and eating a burger

We don't disagree on that

2 minutes ago, tomav84 said:

if cats and dogs were farmed and sold as meat in this country in the same way as cows and pigs are, i still wouldn't eat them

Yeah see this is very strange to me. Some animals we're ok to kill and eat, but some we're not. Just based on your opinion of them. I can't get my head around that

[Stevo985]

1 minute ago, tomav84 said:

i'd argue that the dairy industry is more brutal than the slaughter process. cows being repeatedly raped so that they get pregnant and produce milk and their calves taken off them as soon as their born

I don't disagree, and it's one of the many reasons I will eventually go vegan.

But it's not hard to see how people may draw the line between killing and not killing, even if they might be wrong.

[tomav84]

1 minute ago, Stevo985 said:

We don't disagree on that

Yeah see this is very strange to me. Some animals we're ok to kill and eat, but some we're not. Just based on your opinion of them. I can't get my head around that

just society mate. we're brought up to love some animals and eat others. going back many, many years for whatever reason the decision was made to domesticate cats and dogs and not cows and pigs. i'd look up the history of it if i could be bothered. i was brought up in a meat eating household but kept cats as pets. cats are friends, cows are food. most western governments have that distinction legislated. 

[Wainy316]

24 minutes ago, tomav84 said:

see, vegans i get. it's not for me, but i get it.

vegetarianism, i really find bizarre. so they don't eat meat, but they have no problem with other animal products, dairy, etc

I guess it would be the act of killing the animal can be somewhat dissociated from pumping milk out of them.

I'd never even heard of veganism until about 10 years ago.  People just declared themselves veggies (from my experience anyway).

[tomav84]

7 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

I don't disagree, and it's one of the many reasons I will eventually go vegan.

But it's not hard to see how people may draw the line between killing and not killing, even if they might be wrong.

in my experience, you'll be surprised at how many people don't get that mammals do not produce milk unless they are pregnant and assume that it happens naturally for dairy cows

Edited February 9, 2022 by tomav84
grammar

[Ingram85]

I **** hate cows. They are stupid, ugly and just stand there munching grass looking bosseyed and dumb. I love burgers and savour them as I know it’s one less stupid fat black and white lump off the landscape. **** boring things. Plus I don’t drink cows milk either.

I could easily give up pork sausages, ham and bacon and whatnot as I think pigs are absolute quality. They are natures nobheads just creating noise and rolling in shit and mud all care free and they look at you laughing squealing ‘what you looking at? We’re having fun’. Quality buggers. 

Where I do have a ethical/moral stumbling block is chickens. They crack me up and I think they have their own personalities but their downfall is that they are really **** delicious. If I could only eat one meat forever more it would be chicken. That makes me a bit sad but I can’t change it, I really like chicken. 

I realise all this may make me a bellend but I would never intentionally go out of my way to harm animals in the sense that it’s in my power to not go around punching and kicking animals. Zouma is a massive word removed and I hope he gets done for it. 

Edited February 9, 2022 by Ingram85

[Davkaus]

Just now, Wainy316 said:

I'd never even heard of veganism until about 10 years ago.  People just declared themselves veggies (from my experience anyway).

 

5 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

But it's not hard to see how people may draw the line between killing and not killing, even if they might be wrong.

2 related points, IMO.

I remember Paul McCartney saying "If slaughterhouses had glass walls, we would all be vegetarians". Obviously not quite true, but I feel similarly to eggs/dairy. I think a big reason (but certainly not the only one) people are vegetarian but not vegan is that people have been sheltered from the horrors associated with the dairy industry, and it's no surprise that the number of vegans has started to rise as there have been documentaries around what goes on in these places.

[OutByEaster?]

11 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

Yeah see this is very strange to me. Some animals we're ok to kill and eat, but some we're not. Just based on your opinion of them. I can't get my head around that

In fairness, it's based on some reasonably logical principles from our days as hunter gatherers - Is it easy to catch? Does it have a lot of meat on it? Can it do other stuff instead? - that sort of thing.

If Cows could sprint like a bugger and had sharp teeth we'd have let them be.

Of course, we're not hunter gatherers anymore, no matter how much Asda feels like a bit of a scrum.

While we're on that, I'd also say that it's also not a coincidence that hot countries, where keeping meat at safe temperatures is more difficult, tend to have religions that say don't eat pork.

I eat meat, and I appreciate that I live with a cognitive dissonance that for the most part allows me to ignore the morality of that, I can't justify it, it's one of a number of bad things that I do.

 

[ender4]

1 hour ago, tomav84 said:

in my experience, you'll be surprised at how many people don't get that mammals do not produce milk unless they are pregnant and assume that it happens naturally for dairy cows

Whaaaaat????? Is that true? All milk comes from pregnant cows?

How am I just learning that today!

Are they permanently pregnant or do they rotate in different cows when they are pregnant?