The moral argument of eating meat & dairy

[tek-monkey]

Yep, in pages of posts nobody has managed to come up with any substantive argument that goes beyond that.

Why do we need to? We live by our own morals, not yours. I assume you have been vegan since you were able to fend for yourself? I know LS hasn't always been, why is it acceptable to have a period of not being a vegan as long as you've converted by now, yet current meat eaters get flak? Shouldn't everybody arrive at their own moral decision by their own means, rather than be brainwashed by somebody spouting holier than though non-animal derived bull****?

As said by db, people like you make me want to eat meat. You encourage it, because I'm scared if I stop I'll become like you. I'm already an ex smoker, which makes me a cock towards those who still choose to smoke despite happily doing so myself for years. Why would they do it? They are mad, they are poisoning their bodies and those around them yet still they persist! Why can't I get stupidly drunk without the pillocks hanging around beer gardens making me smell funny?

If I told you to believe in Allah, because I believe he is the one true god, would you believe? Of course not, because the only proof available is only there for those in the right mindset. Just like this.

And just to get back to the OP, eating meat has still never been shown to cause obesity just like veganism has never been shown to combat it. Laziness with a sever lack of willpower is what makes people fat, anyone can lose weight if they cut down the calories. If you are still putting on weight then eat less*, and all will be good.


* the x calories a day thing is BS too, some people burn calories (or crap them out?) better than others. Just eat less progressively til the weight starts to shift, its a remarkably simple system.

What if the said iguana (or other animal) was your pet? Would you eat it then...?

No, I already stated that earlier. Possibly twice? I wouldn't eat anyones pet, even a pet chicken or cow, but I would eat the same animal if it was reared for food. Unless it was a life or death situation obviously, then it'd be meal time like a shot!

Well that backfired a bit... LOL

Seriously, I'd try most things. You don't know til you've tried after all, you could be missing out on the best taste ever! This includes veggie meals, I may find something tomorrow that blows a rare steak away, but it just hasn't happened yet. And even then I believe in variety, so I still couldn't go vegan.

 

[Alan B'Stard]

I think most of the arguments for not eating meat have been for eating less meat rather than for not eating meat at all.

Someone will probably put me right, but I think the only argument presented for eating no meat at all is the moral argument.

I spent a few years in my early twenties as a vegetarian, and the reason I did was quite a selfish one.

There was an excellent panorama type program on a couple of years after the BSE crisis that looked at how ineffective the regulations introduced were. It showed diseased cattle, staggering around that by all accounts should not be infected and readily sold at market, it showed how farmers were passing off already dead cattle into an abbatoir with backhanders and how meat inspection stamps could be forged.

I decided to give up meat on the purely selfish basis that diseased meat could all too easily get into the food chain and I didn't want to eat the stuff.

Around the same time I read this book, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_the_Other_Half_Dies which argued about the wasteful production of meat causing world hunger because of the inefficient production of meat. We feed cattle large amounts of grain to feed a (relatively) small amount of people when that grain eaten by itself would feed many, many more.

The two arguments taken together were enough for me, without even considering or arguing with anybody about the moral and ethical side of killing a living, sentient being.

I didn't eat meat for about three years and can't recall why I started eating it again, but I don't eat a great deal of it now.

 

[tek-monkey]

I saw that too, I vividly remember a large abcess on a carcass that had passed inspection.

 

[henryscat]

Why do we need to? We live by our own morals, not yours.

Yes, you live by your own morals which you seem incapable of articulating. If you are going to take a life then the imperative is on you to be able to justify doing so.

Shouldn't everybody arrive at their own moral decision by their own means

It doesn't work like that. If you look at history, big changes have not been brought about by people sat on their backside at home suddenly having some moment of realisation. Society has changed by people getting out there and standing up for what they believe is right. Unless you know otherwise?

I'm already an ex smoker, which makes me a cock towards those who still choose to smoke despite happily doing so myself for years. Why would they do it? They are mad, they are poisoning their bodies and those around them yet still they persist!

Look at the psychology behind the behaviour of smokers and you may see a parallel with meat eating - addicts tend to know that their behaviour isn't sensible or healthy, so their brains block out any information to that effect.

If I told you to believe in Allah, because I believe he is the one true god, would you believe? Of course not, because the only proof available is only there for those in the right mindset. Just like this.

You keep bringing up the religion analogy, but the irony is that it is actually a reflection of your choices not mine. If you ask a religious person to explain why they believe, they will come up with nothing concrete, because typically it is entrenched behaviour which actually they cannot adequately explain. Ask an athiest why they don't believe and many will be able to refer to there being an explanation backing up their belief (e.g. what science shows). Similarly... as has been borne out on this thread - ask a meat eater to explain their choice and they will come up with nothing more than "erm, I like it", because it is entrenched / learnt behaviour. A veggie or vegan will pretty much always be able to explain the justification for their choice akin to the athiest.

eating meat has still never been shown to cause obesity just like veganism has never been shown to combat it.

The evidence isn't on your side there...

No, I already stated that earlier. Possibly twice? I wouldn't eat anyones pet, even a pet chicken or cow, but I would eat the same animal if it was reared for food.

Why is it acceptable to treat a farm animal differently to a pet?

. And even then I believe in variety, so I still couldn't go vegan.

If you think a vegan diet cannot involve variety then you lack imagination...

 

[Withnail]

Those of you who eat meat - have a read of his article http://www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/1979----.htm. Then... if you disagree with his conclusions, then on what basis...?

Here goes...

Now to declare my interest, in a 'My name's Withnail and I'm a meataholic' kind of way, i must confess that
a) i (obviously) am a meat eater
b) i have no ethical issue with a)

I'm not sure that the basis of my 'justification' really hangs upon any moral argument, but as per the above parameters i will state unequivocally that if i needed to kill and butcher my own meat i would have no problem doing so - i'm as unconvinced as others why this should be a prerequisite, but seeing as it is i present my qualifications.

Now i tend to take both an historical, and biological ,view of this particular issue. An historic perspective is informative because it encompasses the 'because it is what i'm used to doing' sort of response, that you have a problem with, as much as it is an ongoing problem that genuinely needs to be thought about. I'm afraid i cannot be jiggered to try and go through the whole 'reply' process to say what everyone has said, because i tried that with the chimneys and it got me nowhere, but i'm almost sure that Mikington said something about the problem being not with meat consumption per se, but the quantities in question - please forgive my almost pathological pleasure in presenting personal peregrinations in ... er ... alliterative form. I tend to agree that this particular problem, and i have no doubt at all that it is a problem and a serious one at that, is one of degree.

However.

We talk about "The Moral Argument" for eating meat and dairy produce.

Loads of people over goodness knows how many pages have tried to say that they have put forward 'moral arguments' to support their continued consumption of both meat and, have you noticed to a lesser extent (?), dairy products, without any recourse to any kind of a discourse upon the moral implication whatsoever? Despite much exasperation expended, extemporaneous expressions have flooded to the fore.

Now i have no ethical dilemma when i eat meat and i'll tell you why...

I think that the relationship we have with the husbanded animals we keep is far more symbiotic than your Singer bloke above would allow. I concur that it isn't really a true symbiotic relationship, the only one of those is with the dog, which interestingly pre-dates our 'assimilation' of any other species by a millennium... or there abouts.

I understand that our perspective allows us an unenviable distance from our desperate past, and i equally understand that the desperation of our past does not necessarily have any bearing on our easy (is this right, Ed,?) present - or future for that matter - but i would suggest that our past really was desperate. Present comfort should not detract from past necessity, no more than previous necessity should inform present parsimoniousness.

Nonetheless, the animals we 'farm' as food do not lose anything in the contract that has unwrittenly been drawn up between us. The relationship between us cannot, admittedly, truly be described as symbiotic for it is a kind of 'forced' and 'adaptive' symbioticism, as 'twere', but it has conveyed upon the species chosen advantages that 'nature' would not necessarily have bestowed upon them. A particular canard is the oft quoted sheep/man ratio of New Zealand for example - the gap has closed in recent years, but it still stands as somewhere in the order of 1:10 ie ten sheep for every human - one mighty reasonably look at the land of New Zealand and ask 'Which is the more successful animal?" of this island and conclude that the sheep have won.


The result of the the domestication of animals that we use for meat, in an historical context, was one i would boldly state of mutual interest.

What your chap above has not taken into consideration is that any animal living a truly wild existence lives a life under constant stress. It is my contention that the contract between man and domesticated beast has been one of diminished stress to the beast, predicated upon the protection of man. As said before it is not a truly symbiotic relationship, because ultimately the price of a life of less stress is death. But it is a death at the end of a life without stress - what stress of death there is must surely be weighed against the stress that derives from living a 'natural' life in a 'natural' environment.

Would you rather be a Gnu living your entire life wondering whether a Pride of Lions lurks round the next corner, constantly scouring the horizon looking for the danger that is contained within - or a cow chewing the cud obliviously, until you're one day herded on to a truck, driven scarily for a couple of hours, unloaded spookily to queue for something that you suspect isn't particularly good?

As far as i'm concerned this is a satisfactory arrangement.

Subject to the caveats outlined below...

The argument for extending the principle of equality beyond our own species is simple, so simple that it amounts to no more than a clear understanding of the nature of the principle of equal consideration of interests.

 

[tek-monkey]

Yes, you live by your own morals which you seem incapable of articulating. If you are going to take a life then the imperative is on you to be able to justify doing so.

No, I have articulated them perfectly based on my own moral compass. Just because that doesn't match what you want to hear doesn't mean I haven't achieved inner peace with my own decision. If I was going to take a human life I'd agree with the above statement, but not an animal one.

Withnail has made an excellent post about the relationship between us and our livestock, yet some meat haters still imagine the lambs would frolick happily in the fields all day long if we didn't eat them. Most of them wouldn't even exist, those that did would often starve to death or get their throats ripped out by other animals. Well, if we hadn't eradicated the wolves specifically to stop them worrying our livestock anyway - maybe we should introduce them to make it more natural? I guess dogs would still take a fair few out, foxes would be a lot happier too as their food source would no longer be protected by humans. Of course they'd have to live in the woods, their fields would be used to grow crops instead. Cows are big enough to stand more of a chance, but I imagine chickens and pigs would have it tough too.

If your idea of a happier future for livestock is one where maybe 1% of them even get born to start with, and then they have to fend for themselves, can you explain how that is a better life for them?

Actually don't bother, as I'm not too fussed. I eat meat because I like eating meat, and just because you think it is wrong will not change my opinion. Any attempt to compare it to crimes against humans will be laughed at and then ignored, as animals are not humans. Bred for food, slaughtered for food, they are food to me.

 

[henryscat]

However.

We talk about "The Moral Argument" for eating meat and dairy produce.

I confess I had to read your post several times, but think I understand where your line of thought is going...

Loads of people over goodness knows how many pages have tried to say that they have put forward 'moral arguments' to support their continued consumption of both meat and, have you noticed to a lesser extent (?), dairy products, without any recourse to any kind of a discourse upon the moral implication whatsoever? Despite much exasperation expended, extemporaneous expressions have flooded to the fore.

Yes it has tended more towards meat than dairy, which is interesting.

Now i have no ethical dilemma when i eat meat and i'll tell you why...

I think that the relationship we have with the husbanded animals we keep is far more symbiotic than your Singer bloke above would allow. I concur that it isn't really a true symbiotic relationship, the only one of those is with the dog, which interestingly pre-dates our 'assimilation' of any other species by a millennium... or there abouts.

I understand that our perspective allows us an unenviable distance from our desperate past, and i equally understand that the desperation of our past does not necessarily have any bearing on our easy (is this right, Ed,?) present - or future for that matter - but i would suggest that our past really was desperate. Present comfort should not detract from past necessity, no more than previous necessity should inform present parsimoniousness.

Nonetheless, the animals we 'farm' as food do not lose anything in the contract that has unwrittenly been drawn up between us. The relationship between us cannot, admittedly, truly be described as symbiotic for it is a kind of 'forced' and 'adaptive' symbioticism, as 'twere', but it has conveyed upon the species chosen advantages that 'nature' would not necessarily have bestowed upon them. A particular canard is the oft quoted sheep/man ratio of New Zealand for example - the gap has closed in recent years, but it still stands as somewhere in the order of 1:10 ie ten sheep for every human - one mighty reasonably look at the land of New Zealand and ask 'Which is the more successful animal?" of this island and conclude that the sheep have won.

The result of the the domestication of animals that we use for meat, in an historical context, was one i would boldly state of mutual interest.

I'm not convinced (which will not come as a surprise) that domestication has benefitted animals as such. The process of domestication was and continues to be pretty violent with practices like castration being common place. Humans have bred animals for their own advantage which has deprived them of evolutionary freedom and genetic independence. I would say that for "domestication", "enslavement" is probably a more accurate term. Indeed, if you look at the treatment of slaves in history, it directly mirrors the treatment of animals. Slaves were viewed as "animal" and not human - the enslavement of animals was the model for the enslavement of humans.

Much of our treatment of animals translates to our treatment of other people, which I think is often missed.

What your chap above has not taken into consideration is that any animal living a truly wild existence lives a life under constant stress.

There may well be some level of stress if you happen to be a creature that is more prey than predator. I think this comes back to the equal consideration of interests though.

It is my contention that the contract between man and domesticated beast has been one of diminished stress to the beast, predicated upon the protection of man.

As said before it is not a truly symbiotic relationship, because ultimately the price of a life of less stress is death. But it is a death at the end of a life without stress - what stress of death there is must surely be weighed against the stress that derives from living a 'natural' life in a 'natural' environment.
Would you rather be a Gnu living your entire life wondering whether a Pride of Lions lurks round the next corner, constantly scouring the horizon looking for the danger that is contained within - or a cow chewing the cud obliviously, until you're one day herded on to a truck, driven scarily for a couple of hours, unloaded spookily to queue for something that you suspect isn't particularly good?

I'd still argue (another surprise) that farming even in its most free range form inflicts stress upon the animal. For instance, most farming involves castration of male animals. Another example being dairy farming where calves are removed from their mothers, which involves huge and long term stress for the cow concerned.

Then there's factory farming which is becoming increasingly prevalent - with proposals for intensive dairy units starting to come forward too (there was an application for one in Lincolnshire). So while those animals might be protected from predatory danger, they live a life of constant stress to the point that they will exhibit abnormal behaviour and attack each other.

Subject to the caveats outlined below...

A caveat is always handy.

 

[Withnail]

I agree my view is (apart from being a bit rambling...) slightly simplistic. The only caveat i was referring to was that of an emphasis of equal consideration of interests.In my view if you do eat meat you should have a care for the conditions in which the animals were reared. There will be stresses involved in husbandry, but they needn't be as severe as the worst cases that you mention. Best practice will be less stressful, but will necessarily lead to less animals and consequently higher prices for their meat. As far as i'm concerned people should only buy meat that has been reared with a high standard of welfare, they should expect to pay more for it, and should thus be prepared to eat less of it.

I think you, in turn, are also being a little simplistic in your view of the stress that wild animals come under. Even predators get the blues - half of every hunt attempt by a cheetah, for example, is unsuccessful. Which must be a real pisser...

 

[db]

 

[Gramaisc]

But you could eat the pigeon...?

 

[tek-monkey]

I still have a pigeon in the freezer, never did work out how to cook it!

 

[db]

ironic that henry scat was always moaning about "stafford points", which have now been replaced by "likes" - and lunar feels the need to log-on every day and systematically "like" every one of his posts, regardless of content lol..

i just had a lovely anti-vegan sandwich.. breaded chicken breast*, red onion, tomato relish, mayonnaise, strong cheddar.. my justification? similar to the justification that you use for owning a mobile phone/drinking alcohol/other things you don't find the need to get a bee in your bonnet about, i would imagine

* (bernard matthews, so mass-produced and the animal was probably horribly treated.. tastily)

 

[tek-monkey]

Animals dont lose their lives to make mobile phones, they stick to child labour in slave-like conditions instead.

 

[db]

Animals dont lose their lives to make mobile phones, they stick to child labour in slave-like conditions instead.

don't you get it, man - animals are better than people!

 

[RoadRunner]

Been reading through some of this thread, and it's very interesting. Some animals are of course reared under better conditions than others, which is a factor as far as I'm concerned.

I'd like to throw a question in if that's OK? Do the moral arguments extend to looking after our environment?

I'll declare myself a meat eater , what I try to do is eat meat less often, less of it, and less carbon intensive options, the reasons are to do with climate change.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/apr/13/less-meat-prevent-climate-change

 

[henryscat]

Been reading through some of this thread, and it's very interesting. Some animals are of course reared under better conditions than others, which is a factor as far as I'm concerned.

I'd like to throw a question in if that's OK? Do the moral arguments extend to looking after our environment?

I'll declare myself a meat eater , what I try to do is eat meat less often, less of it, and less carbon intensive options, the reasons are to do with climate change.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/apr/13/less-meat-prevent-climate-change

Yes the environmental impact of meat consumption globally is huge. Both in terms of the impact of growing crops that feed animals (that would be better off fed directly to humans) and the methane emissions from a couple of billion cattle, which people may think funny but is a serious problem.

 

[henryscat]

Animals dont lose their lives to make mobile phones, they stick to child labour in slave-like conditions instead.

You can't neatly put treatment of animals and treatment of humans into two different compartments. One follows the other. How we treat animals affects how we treat people. Enslavement of humans is no different to enslavement of animals. The only difference is species, which is not grounds to discriminate. Historically, the slave trade took many of its practices from how animals were treated. If you'd like another example, a lot of criminals who abuse animals typically go on to commit violent crime (often domestic violence) against other people.

 

[tek-monkey]

You can't neatly put treatment of animals and treatment of humans into two different compartments. One follows the other. The only difference is species, which is not grounds to discriminate.

I can, it doesn't, and I believe it is.

As for the slave stuff, I've not only never enslaved a person I also don't even like people pulling my chair out at restaurants - I can do it myself! If you treat people how you treat animals then I'm glad you are a vegan, but please don't say your beliefs are indicative of my actions.

The last sentence merely shows most criminals like to work their way up, so to speak. Unless you can follow this with statistics showing abattoir workers also usually beat up women it doesn't really do anything for me, as you are talking about criminals not butchers.

 

[henryscat]

I can, it doesn't, and I believe it is.

On what basis can you? On what basis doesn't it? On what basis don't you believe it is?

As for the slave stuff, I've not only never enslaved a person I also don't even like people pulling my chair out at restaurants - I can do it myself! If you treat people how you treat animals then I'm glad you are a vegan, but please don't say your beliefs are indicative of my actions.

I haven't. If I have, then provide a direct quote. However, how society in general treats animals also translates to how society in general treats humans. Individual decisions and actions do contribute to how society acts though. You posted about child labour in the context of slave like conditions. I pointed out that enslavement of animals and humans is the same thing. In your posting, the only basis on which you appear to discriminate is species, but you have provided no discernable explanation for that. So, the point still stands - you haven't provided any backing to your rejection of what I originally said that how we treat animals directly affects how we treat people. I'll give you another example - if you look at history, sexual subjugation of women followed from "domestication" of animals and direct links can be drawn.

The last sentence merely shows most criminals like to work their way up, so to speak.

The whole thing is a lot more fundamental than that.... But it does require being a bit open minded, considering the facts and thinking it through.

 

[Withnail]

if you look at history, sexual subjugation of women followed from "domestication" of animals and direct links can be drawn.

I'd be very interested to see what this statement is based upon - any chance of a link/source?