10 ms·

How do we justify killing animals, including their young, in giant torture factories where rivers of blood flow amidst the cries and horror of the victims, whil

• StavrosK 10y ago
  I know many people who do think about it, don't justify it, and are quite vocal about all those things being terrible. Not everyone is as indifferent as you describe.
  • greenhatman 10y ago
    Of course not everyone is. The main reason we most people know about these issues is because there are many people that are not indifferent. I wonder what other things we're not seeing.
  • bambax 10y ago
    "Many people", maybe ("some people" would probably be more accurate). But does that make any difference, at the level of society? My point is, the article in reference, seems to be amazed that people could own slaves and live with themselves; but we do much worse than own slaves, and live with ourselves pretty well, so maybe we should start wondering about ourselves first.
    • StavrosK 10y ago
      I agree with you, but there's also another level that I saw mentioned here, namely that, back then, nobody seemed to mind it. Today, at least some people do.
      • falcolas 10y ago
        I figure it's a simple case of what humanity considered to be wrong and right have changed. Our advancements in technology and society have changed what is required just to live; have given us room to re-evaluate the status quo.
      • bambax 10y ago
        Yeah, well it's also not true. Many people in Rome wrote against the barbarity of the games, or even slavery, the most famous being Seneca: > I am glad to learn, through those who come from you, that you live on friendly terms with your slaves. This befits a sensible and well-educated man like yourself. "They are slaves," people declare. Nay, rather they are men. [1] They are men. Nothing more to say. [1] https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Moral_letters_to_Lucilius/Letter_47 https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Moral_letters_to_Lucilius/Let...
• lopatin 10y ago
  Eh I don't think that we're "worse in many respects". We're not perfect, but definitely objectively morally superior to the Romans.
  • 1337biz 10y ago
    It seems to me thay moral standards are relative to the cultural/contemporary context.
    • lopatin 10y ago
      Some things are absolute. Race and gender equality for instance, is absolutely better. No relative cultural context needed to agree with that. Also, life is absolute. The amount of people who are unjustly prevented from living their life is an absolute number, as a percentage of the population. So I guess I don't really see your point. Do you disagree with any of the above?
      • bambax 10y ago
        We don't have race and gender equality anywhere, and the one place that has it less is probably the US (see incarceration rates for blacks for instance). Same for respect for life; we seem to be quite indifferent to the victims of our bombs, while we mourn the loss of one soldier (this has been going on forever, but hasn't changed in recent times). Also, our "way of life" is built on the massacre of trillions of animals, many of which mammals who have feelings very similar to ours; being indifferent to their suffering and death is not an absolute value, nor is it "better" than the opposite.
        • chimeracoder 10y ago
          > We don't have race and gender equality anywhere, and the one place that has it less is probably the US (see incarceration rates for blacks for instance) The US is not a paragon of racial or gender equality (not is any other modern Western society, for that matter), but it is not demonstrably worse than Ancient Rome. Our common perceptions of Roman history are shaped heavily by romanticized contemporary depictions which downplay the exteme aspects of their culture (except in a few cases so as to exoticize it).
• jgalt212 10y ago
  > How do we justify bombing civilians, hospitals, wedding parties in remote countries we're not even at war with? Just War Theory has existed for long time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_war_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just_war_theory
• pjmlp 10y ago
  You forgot the arena like fights transmitted live on TV with little difference from gladiator fights. Just with the difference that people usually don't get killed on the arena, and the subject being some kind of martial arts instead of reproducing past battles.
  • workerIbe 10y ago
    It's notable that they are there of their own free will.
    • falcolas 10y ago
      So were many gladiators. It was a profession then, as it is today.
  • ryanwaggoner 10y ago
    Comparing modern combat sports to slavery and animal torture is ludicrous. The contestants are there of their own free will and the sports are actually pretty safe. You might as well claim that all physical sports are in the same camp as slavery, because its physical competition and people get hurt sometimes.
    • falcolas 10y ago
      Not all gladiators were slaves. Many were well regarded for their abilities. We still have trophy hunters today, who hunt not for food or sustenance, but for a pelt or a tusk. > are actually pretty safe We used to think that Boxing and Football were "pretty safe" as well. Then we learned how much impact things like concussions have on a person's life. I can't really imagine that MMA is that much safer when I see people repeatedly being choked out, having joints nearly separated, getting knocked out...
      • ryanwaggoner 10y ago
        Your comparison to trophy hunting makes no sense. One entity killing another unwilling entity for sport is no comparison to two willing participants engaging in a physical contest with rules and a referee where at least one of th goals is to minimize long term damage. Agree on football and boxing, not a fan of either. As for MMA the jury is still out but I hardly think equating it with slavery makes sense because you "can't imagine" it's safe, even though you don't have the data. I mean, comparing that to literally owning another human? All sports have physical risk, even solo sports. Does that mean that when I go rock climbing, I might as well be owning slaves or torturing animals?
• amorphid 10y ago
  >> We don't think about it. I'm a 10,000 BC chieftain. My village of Hutsville is within raiding distance of the northern village of Teepeetown. Teepeetown just a my neighbor of mine. I've never really liked or disliked Teepeetown, as I don't really know them. But I am sure thinking about them now. I'm going to raid Teepeetown before they raid my Hutsville. Whether I like raiding or not, if I don't do the raiding, I'm gonna get raided. Civilization is too hard right now, and someone bigger and stronger than myself will have to figure out how to make that happen. Fast forward to 500-ish BC. My city state of Rome is within raiding distance of...
  • chimeracoder 10y ago
    This is a rather ahistorical claim that presumes colonization to be a historical inevitability. Most historians - yes, even most Western historians - would disagree with that. The fact that this is the direction history happened to take does not mean that it was inherently inevitable or "natural".
    • Para2016 10y ago
      I don't understand what this comment means. A biologist would argue that spread and colonization is inevitable when local resources are exhausted/scarce.
• lucideer 10y ago
  I think StavrosK is largely right in pointing out that most of your points are things many people think about, talk about, write about and are doing things about. Not only are veganism and vegetarianism both on the rise in the developed world, per capita meat consumption is generally either plateauing or declining in most western countries (though this is of course dwarfed by population growth and increase in consumption in developing countries). However, even still, most vegetarians are relatively apologetic about their diet, and definitely consider it unacceptable to enforce it on others, or even to preach. They're essentially entirely accepting of this system of mass torture and killing - and most people will even consider that description of this system to be hyperbole, because it's the status quo.
  • mercer 10y ago
    > They're essentially entirely accepting of this system of mass torture and killing - and most people will even consider that description of this system to be hyperbole, because it's the status quo. Or, alternatively, because they disagree with you.
    • hwillis 10y ago
      Can you explain what you mean by that?
      • mercer 10y ago
        Sorry if I was unclear. What I meant was that 'system of mass torture and killing' is not a fact, but an opinion. I know plenty of people who find torture and killing abhorrent, but honestly don't believe this applies to the animals we eat. Personally I disagree with that point of view, but it's a relatively common one and I do believe it should be acknowledged.
        • lucideer 10y ago
          I don't think you're right though. One may disagree that the system is wrong or morally unjustifiable or whichever general view someone may hold there, but it is very much a fact that the meat industry does subject animals to intense suffering and does kill them in large quantities. My statement is indisputably factual, the only subjective element is whether you believe that system is justifiable.
• zo1 10y ago
  We don't think about it because we don't want the guilt and there is next to 0% chance of actually doing something about it. Well, for most of us anyways. We're stuck with feel-good non-sense such as "Pray For Paris", "Hashtags", "Rainbow-color our profile pics" and "Take a picture making hearts with our hands" type of stuff. Even petitions don't work, because our leaders are not beholden to them and they're the ones with the real power. However. The reality, is that for most of us, we're 100% good towards those around us and those that depend on us. The tragedy is making it seem like that is not good enough. For not caring enough to do something for someone half-way around the world that we never seen or interacted with. That is why the above feel-good nonsense is so widespread: we just want to get rid of the guilt that is being artificially imposed on us.
  • TillE 10y ago
    > for most of us, we're 100% good towards those around us and those that depend on us. This really isn't true, even in the narrowest sense. Domestic violence is extremely common!
• Terr_ 10y ago
  We talk about all of those things. If you really want something we're blind to, it needs to sound a little nuts. For example, cruelty to fungi, or music as a manipulative weapon.
• coldtea 10y ago
  >How do we justify killing animals, including their young, in giant torture factories where rivers of blood flow amidst the cries and horror of the victims, while the killers laugh and laugh, as spy videos show repeatedly? We don't think about it. For bombings yes, but for eating animals that's not the case. Modern city dwelling folks might not "think about it", but for millenia people not only knew all about it, but also do it themselves, with their bare hands, skinning the animal and all, with no problems. In rural places they still do it, including where the majority of the world's population lives.
  • pmyjavec 10y ago
    What evidence do you have to support the idea that people "did it with 'no problems'"? Why does the profession of a "Butcher" exist ? How about Hindu's, Buddhists etc? Maybe people used to enjoy a a more symbiotic relationship with their livestock / prey which doesn't exist now with advent of factory farming, it's just pure exploitation and obviously. I'm sure not everyone in the middle ages or ancient hunter gathered societies would've been fine with that. Also, the world's population doesn't live in rural areas according to the UN: http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/news/population/world-urbanization-prospects-2014.html http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/news/population/world-...
    • coldtea 10y ago
      >What evidence do you have to support the idea that people "did it with 'no problems'"? Familiarity with history and humans? Being from a rural area myself, and having seen tons of people (including my grandparents) do it, and having travelled all around the world? Really, you'll contest that the majority of people killed and ate animals themselves (without some specialist to package them for them) for most of recorded history and still do in tons of places? >Why does the profession of a "Butcher" exist? For the same reason that the profession of a cook exists, even though people cook themselves all the time too, and used to cook even more so back in the day. As with tons of other professions, because cities and towns first and foremost. Note that the "profession of a butcher" in most rural areas around the world either didn't exist at all as something specialized, or was a place one rarely visited, and only if they didn't have land and/or animals of their own. Because almost everybody (and surely many more than actual framers, cattle raisers etc) had their own animals, for eggs and wool and occasionally (as it was quite expensive and a treat) meat, not everybody did. >How about Hindu's, Buddhists etc? These have sacred animals (and some of them, not all), or religious diets. Those have existed since forever (also fasting certain foods for certain times). But since you've asked: A vast majority of Indians ate meat regularly and meat eating was never prohibited in ancient India. Certain sections of society and some ascetic traditions practiced vegetarianism both for religious and spiritual purposes, but it is not true that they constituted the majority. Meat-eating is strictly prohibited in Jainism, whereas it is conditionally allowed in Hinduism and Buddhism. In all three religions, the rules regarding meat eating are established according to their beliefs regarding karma and virtue such as nonviolence and compassion Hindu law books prescribe rules for meat eating for the four castes and specify which type of meat is allowed for human consumption and under what circumstances. Buddhist texts also lay down rules for meat eating by the monks. However, as time went by, meat-eating became a more restrictive practice in both Hinduism and Buddhism. Presently, vegetarianism is a fashion and a vanity among the elite and the middle class Hindus. They may not perform sacrifices, worship gods, or practice virtues such as honesty, compassion towards fellow human beings, charity, etc., but would make sure that everyone knows about their preference for vegetarian food because it is the current trend and gives them an aura of superiority in a community that has taken to the filmy practices of pseudo culture and hybrid lifestyles. http://www.hinduwebsite.com/hinduism/concepts/meat-eating.asp http://www.hinduwebsite.com/hinduism/concepts/meat-eating.as...
• treehau5_ 10y ago
  How do we justify pulling a fetus out of a womb, piece by piece, or by submerging it in poison and then sucking it out, a fetus who without this intervention, 99% of the time would have been a life. We don't think about it.