30 Reasons to go Vegitarian

[thalestral]

Originally Posted by Alusdra

So I guess it gets me a bit mad that you are implying by the comparison that I should have more feelings for a cavy than a pig. The first time someone accused me of being speciesist I realized I sort of was, and I guess I still am.

Speciesm involves assigning different values or rights to beings on the basis of their species membership. A non-speciest human does not value any one sentient species over another. It is almost impossible to be a true non-speciest, just as it is near impossible to be a true 100% vegan. These are ideals to be strived for. One life should be worth a life, because that is what we are talking about here. Lives.

Originally Posted by Alusdra

I mean, where's the line? Bacteria? Invertebrates? You have to harm something to live- I feel that's sort of the way it goes. There are so many nutrients the human body simply can't make.

The line is drawn at sentient life, that life which can feel pain. The life that seeks to avoid death and wants to live, the life that understands what is happening to it. There are NO nutrients that the human body cannot make that only come from sentient life forms.

The line may be a little blurry at times due to the way the world works at the moment, but that doesn't mean that we can't clearly see what is on the avoidable side of the line. Mammals, birds, fish, amphibians, reptiles, and all avoidable invertebrates.

In fact, eating vegan already saves the lives of many invertebrates as so many times more insects die in the production of the crops for livestock animals to eat over crops grown directly for humans. Eating vegan is also the least taxing on plants themselves for this same reason.


We may have to harm some things in order to live, but that doesn't give us a pass to harm as many things as we like. Needing plant life to live doesn't give us the right to kill a cow. Cows are sentient animals, they feel pain, fear and love. They are social animals that communicate through a herd, mourn the loss of a loved one and cry out for their stolen calves. They suffer.

Anything that can suffer, I do not wish to harm. I will not harm. I will not cause needless suffering for the sake of my tastebuds.



The question is not, Can they reason?, nor Can they talk? but, Can they suffer? - Jeremy Bentham

[Alusdra]

Just to answer the Mad Cow confusion- cows get it from eating cow neural tissue (now illegal), sheep get the related disease (scrapie) from eating sheep neural tissue, possibly deer also (chronic wasting). So- I won't eat something closely related to my genes neural tissue for fear of the same process. Monkeys can pass all sorts of disease onto humans besides that, too.

So bottom line here I suppose is that I'm just trying to not support the meat industry in a different way than most (local meat/animal products humanely collected/slaughtered). Also reverse of most, I guess is that to try not to be speciesist I make everything fair game, versus nothing (I think eventually we will probably see that bacteria can sense trauma and seek to avoid pain).

For the 30 reasons video, Earthlings and other PeTA or animal rights videos- or really anything that has a thesis- I feel that the argument is strengthened by acknowledging contradicting points of view, which rarely happens (if ever) with veg*n propaganda. I usually end up agreeing with you guys on the whole (eventually), but it takes me quite a bit of digging to come up with logical reasons versus philosophical/moral/emotional ones (which can't really be proven and are in the end up to the individual).

I don't have anything to prove that the scenes in the videos are somewhat misrepresentative beyond personal experience. If you can go to a farm and try to see things from the farmer's perspective for a couple days, then I think that would give a more solid foundation for both understanding the situation and your beliefs. Visit a slaughterhouse, even. Anyone can tell you things on the net- show videos. But whether the source be PeTA, a PhD, Joe from next door- I personally will always listen and then see for myself as much as possible. Earthlings isn't wrong- it's just skewed.

A good person to look up with production/slaughterhouse welfare is Temple Grandin, though- she's really amazing and has revolutionized the industry (I know- enemy to AR to have AW... I see your point, but she's a great reference anyway.)

[CF#5]

Originally Posted by Alusdra

Also reverse of most, I guess is that to try not to be speciesist I make everything fair game, versus nothing

Don't take this the wrong way, because I'm not trying to belittle you. Way back when I thought the worst thing in the world to be was a hypocrite, I tried to adjust my beliefs accordingly, as to prevent myself from having inconsistent and hypocritical views. As a perfectionist, I still struggle with it. But as someone who has already had the experience of doing what you're doing, I can see this for what it is. By discriminating against all species instead of only a select few, you're doing the same thing as a racist who decides to be sexist and homophobic as well, even though he doesn't truly have any grievance with women or gays; his only real problem is with black people.

Originally Posted by Alusdra

For the 30 reasons video, Earthlings and other PeTA or animal rights videos- or really anything that has a thesis- I feel that the argument is strengthened by acknowledging contradicting points of view, which rarely happens (if ever) with veg*n propaganda. I usually end up agreeing with you guys on the whole (eventually), but it takes me quite a bit of digging to come up with logical reasons versus philosophical/moral/emotional ones (which can't really be proven and are in the end up to the individual).

You're absolutely right that morality is up to the individual. That's Thoreau in a nutshell. It's precisely because Thoreau's sense of justice is not universal that we have a problem. In other (Paul McCartney's) words, when the broken hearted people living in the world agree, there will be an answer. The most powerful, insightful, and relevant asset of Earthlings as a piece of produced media has nothing to do with images or descriptions of suffering, blood, or death. It is the WRITING and narration during the scenes early in the film that compare speciesism to racism, sexism, etc. Under the First Amendment, anyone is free to disagree with any of the ideas presented. Like it or not, hate speech is protected (or is supposed to be protected) by the U.S. Constitution. Even after having taken an 18-credit political science minor and some sociology classes in college, it has taken me a long time to grasp the true differences between theoretical political ideas and laws and the unwritten (but very real) rules of social expectations. You're free to walk around Harlem with a confederate flag on one sleeve and a swastika on the other. That doesn't make it right. That doesn't mean mainstream society at large is going to accept or acknowledge your opinion as valid "contradicting point of view," nor does it mean you won't be promptly attacked by local residents. Earthlings plays off the idea that racism is wrong, and it's no longer up for debate. It did a great job explaining how racism and speciesism are exactly the same thing. The key difference is not that one discriminates against a group of humans while the other discriminates against all or some groups of non-human animals. In fact, the ONLY key difference is that society has not yet attached a social stigma to speciesism the same way it has done so with racism. Society's misguided failings to stigmatize speciesism doesn't make it any less wrong. In the early 1800s, society's misguided failings to stigmatize slavery didn't make it any less wrong.

Taking it all a step further, one of the biggest criticisms of animal rights advocates comes from the perception that they care more about animal issues than about human issues. Last night, I had written a long post that I threw away because it didn't sit well with me. It wasn't saying what I really wanted it to say. After sleeping on it overnight, I've changed my tune 180 degrees on a human issue as a result of all the critical thinking I've done in the past 12 hours about animal issues.... keep reading and I'll elaborate.

When animal rights activists take a greater interest in animal issues than human issues, it's a form of affirmative action that favors animals over humans. And based on the dire conditions faced by animals everyday, I don't see anything wrong with that. And like you, in order to remain consistent in my beliefs, I've changed my view on affirmative action when it comes to racial minorities, which is something I never thought I'd say. But consistency is not the only reason I changed my position. I realized that despite the progress that has been made in the last 40-45 years, racism is still alive and well (just not politically correct anymore) and the remnants of the institutionalized discrimination that took place prior to 1963 (and through the rest of the 1960s) are still serious obstacles that have to be overcome. This may seem too off-topic for this thread and it may seem too political for this forum, but it's all highly relevant, precisely because Earthlings so beautifully illustrated why racism and speciesism are the EXACT SAME THING. To the most advanced AR thinkers, this concept is absolutely undeniable. And therefore, the discussion of affirmative action, whether the beneficiaries are racial minorities or non-human animals, is very pertinent to the conversation.

Originally Posted by Alusdra

If you can go to a farm and try to see things from the farmer's perspective for a couple days, then I think that would give a more solid foundation for both understanding the situation and your beliefs.

I hope you can understand why asking me to "see things from the farmer's perspective" is like asking Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to take a time machine back to 1799 and see things from the slaveowner's perspective. I'm not comparing myself to Dr. King here, not at all. Rather, I'm comparing my guinea pigs to him. They helped me see the light where there was only darkness before. What I can't accept as coincidence, and I can explain only as a spiritual revelation, is that of all my guinea pigs, the only ones whose birthdates are known to me were born on January 15, 2002. And now, we're having this discussion today. Nobody is ever going to convince me that it's just a simple coincidence, nor is it a coincidence that this is the 44th post in the thread on April 4.

And John Lennon can take that logic and spiritual insight and all of his damn fur coats to the bank and deposit them with all his outspokenness on human rights issues.

Finally, let me add that regardless of how anyone interprets this discussion, regardless of all the possible outcomes of it and other discussions like it, I've become even more certain of something I was already sure of: trying to use reason, logic, and rational thought to persuade unreasonable, illogical, and irrational creatures hardly ever works. I'm speaking in the most general terms here, and this comment is absolutely not directed at any individual. I used to think human beings were inherently evil. Then I saw some good things from humanity, so I thought, well maybe they're not all evil, but they're all still inherently selfish. As I get older and I see and hear more things, I've reached one simple conclusion that says it much, much better than any of the abrasive generalizations I've used in the past, and I most definitely include myself in this group. In fact, it's partially based on my experiences dealing with my own irrationality. HUMAN BEINGS ARE INHERENTLY STUPID.

For though they may be parted, there is still a chance that they will see.

[Alusdra]

I think it is hard to relate the animal issues that are seen today to human issues like slavery and racism. Not because animals are different than humans. We are all, of course, animals. But for example with the slavery- it didn't start out as a race issue- Africans were selling each other, after all, as well as being abducted by Europeans. It became a race issue in America as a justification for the continuation of the institution. And that, actually, might be a better way of comparing the AR cause to slavery. Since when we dehumanize, or in the case of animals, try to downplay their ability to feel pain, have needs, emotions, etc- that is a justification for their continued use in just the same way that it was/ is for slaves. The cultural problem of considering African people as being stupid, unable to care for themselves, etc. (interesting factoid I learned the other day- but melanin can increase cognitive capabilities- so scientifically, the darker your skin the smarter you should be) is just a coping mechanism for us, culturally (I think anyway). That parallels nicely with the idea that animals have the same rights as do we, but culturally we have downplayed their equality and their closeness to us in all ways.

Discussing these issues always makes me think- a reason I keep coming back to this site for sure- and I have been ruminating a bit again on my reasons and morals. And I admit, part of my current views has been trying to adjust what I think with what I do like you describe. But part, too, is logic. I really don't see becoming a vegetarian as the solution- speciesism aside.

Vegetarians still eat milk and eggs. In order to have female cows and chickens there are equal numbers of males of both species that are killed to get those producing animals. So why not eat them? Is my question. So say that we perfect the sperm sorting method. Even so eventually the egg laying or milk production level will drop, and those animals will be culled. Again- why not eat them? In addition in order for a dairy cow to be lactating she needs to be bred every year. Some calves will become milk producers- but not near all of them. Same question- the meat is already there, why waste it?

So is the answer veganism? Well ignoring the B12 and any other deficiencies in there - it's not like farming is so eco-friendly either. More so? Maybe, but will farming organic plant matter be able to feed our human population that is exploding, with the climate change that is going on and considering all of the places in the world where having a cow can mean the difference between malnutrition and survival? I doubt it.

So why go to such lengths, it seems to me, if only veganism might accomplish something. It doesn't seem like it will really work all that well when I try to look at it practically. The issues seem bigger, more cultural. And if I started down such a path, though- like you I think my 'perfectionism' as you say, would lead me to slowly starve to death. There is nothing I could consume that would not be harmed. Having animal rights views to me is almost against life. Life means death. Though I don't have any more right to it than any other animal on the planet (or plant, or fungi, or bacteria) neither do I have any less.

And actually- it might be a great idea if we could somehow get Dr. King to go back in time to meet with slave owners. Perhaps the course of history could be changed with the knowledge and ethics that he could bring to that world. Perhaps he could counsel the Africans on different ways to have managed their resources, or slave owners to stop the 'stupid black person' stereotype before it caught on. I don't know enough history to get more in depth than that- but I believe that Dr. King was a brilliant man when it came to all sorts of cultural issues and would not necessarily have as much of an ethical problem as you are implying. No one tries to be evil, after all. Everyone thinks that what they are doing is what is right- even if they are deluding themselves. Granted, I have not been wronged as Africans have been in this country, or animals, either, I suppose- but I would like to think that in such a position I could still have compassion for other lives, even as their actions harm me.


Oh- and to catzeye21138- I wouldn't let you skip the meat, either. Bread and corn is not even close to a healthy meal. Try suggesting more nutritious sides so you have a leg to stand on when you don't eat them meat- like something with beans and various vitamin rich veggies or a nice salad with different lettuces and nuts or something. One they see how tasty and cheap it is, they might keep eating more vegetarian even after you leave the house.

[CF#5]

You're confusing and complicating the racism and slavery issues.

Getting back to basics, racism and speciesism share as much in common as racism and sexism or sexism and homophobia. They're all the same.

B12 deficiency is not a legitimate concern. It's available in vegan tablet form, not to mention it's supplemented in countless vegan foods such as Silk soy milk and Naked Juice. The amount necessary to prevent deficiency is so small that people can go years after they stop eating meat without supplementing it and never suffer any ill effects.

As for the rest... I just don't think it's possible to reach you. I give up.

[Susan9608]

So is the answer veganism? Well ignoring the B12 and any other deficiencies in there - it's not like farming is so eco-friendly either. More so? Maybe, but will farming organic plant matter be able to feed our human population that is exploding, with the climate change that is going on and considering all of the places in the world where having a cow can mean the difference between malnutrition and survival? I doubt it.

Actually, in the US at least, it is very uncommon to have a B12 deficiency strictly related to diet. Most B12 deficiencies are in relation to having a lack of intrinsic factor - that is, the substance that allows you to absorb it from your gut. If you do happen to be missing the intrinsic factor, you'll have to get B12 through IM injections for the rest of your life, so veganism becomes a moot point for you anyways.

Most processed foods now days are required to be so fortified with all vitamins and minerals that even the strictest of vegans don't even have to take a basic multi-vitamin.

I hate to see concerns like these - which I consider basically frivolous and which seem to come from a large number of people who no greater education in and understanding of nutrition - discourage people from vegetarianism and/or veganism.

Also, farming plants is significantly more eco-friendly than farming animals. For one thing, it saves a tremendous amount of water, which can then be utilized for human consumption ... not to mention all the grain that is raised to feed animals that could be used for human consumption.

How do you not understand that farming plant life is not the same as farming non human animals from an environmental stand-point?

Certainly some climates and areas are not ideal for growing food suitable to sustain life; however, given that this is a mobile world, I have no doubt that with the money saved and the increase of available food, there would be some way of shipping food where it needs to go. (of course, political climates in war torn areas would have to be addressed, but this is a totally separate issue.)

[thalestral]

B12 is available from bacteria and yeast, you don't need to take any fortified or supplemented food to get it. I get all the B12 I need from eating marmite now and then and adding some nutritional yeast flakes to some of my dishes (yummy!).

There are many studies also showing that a vegan diet is the best one for the environment and would be sustainable for the whole world.

Turning your back on veganism because it still wouldn't be perfect (at this time in the world) is just wrong. So because some wildlife still dies at the hands of the farm machines (though much less given how little crops need harvested for humans compared to livestock animals) means it's okay to eat sentient beings?

I highly recommend reading over the Vegan Society website before commenting on veganism as a lot of your statements about it are highly erroneous, not to mention quite frustrating for those of us who seek to live a life with as little suffering as possible

Facts

[Susan9608]

Just to clarify - I wasn't saying anyone *has* to eat fortified or processed foods in order to sustain proper levels of B12; rather, I was saying that since almost every processed food is now required to be fortified with B12, the chances of developing a deficiency (as a vegetarian/vegan), as long as you still have the intrinsic factor for proper absorption, is unlikely.

[Brittnie]

[FONT=Comic Sans MS]im vegan BUT!

most slaughter houses do make the
killing process quick,
with the least amount of pain.
they don't kick them in there
heads until they stop moving.

please dont jump on me for saying that.
i SUPPORT everyone that is vegan/vegetarian.
tofu is delicious anyways.

[/FONT]

[Susan9608]

[FONT=Comic Sans MS]

[FONT=Comic Sans MS]most slaughter houses do make the
killing process quick,
with the least amount of pain.
they don't kick them in there
heads until they stop moving[/FONT]

I'd absolutely *love* to see the evidence you have to support this. Surely you're not just pulling statements like this out of your ass, right?[/FONT]

[Sammy and Peanut]

[FONT=Courier New][FONT=Century Gothic]I agree with Susan. Maybe you should try YouTube. Type in things such as, slaughter house cruelty, or Meet your Meat. Then, you will see that your statement was wrong, and if you don't, you should really browse the kitchen and the in the news forums[/FONT].[/FONT]

[Sammy and Peanut]

Sorry, double post.

[Brittnie]

Originally Posted by Susan9608

[FONT=Comic Sans MS]

I'd absolutely *love* to see the evidence you have to support this. Surely you're not just pulling statements like this out of your ass, right?[/FONT]

MOST was the key word in that.
the Humane Slaughter Law.
According to the law, animals should be stunned into unconsciousness prior to their slaughter to ensure a quick, relatively painless death.
But im not saying that everybody abides that law either.

[love my pigs]

I just now signed... We will have to see how it goes!!!