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I'm not quite a vegetarian, but I understand where OP is coming from. There's a very significant difference between animals behaving like animals and humans tre

I'm not quite a vegetarian, but I understand where OP is coming from. There's a very significant difference between animals behaving like animals and humans treating animals like elements of a factory production line, to be mechanically separated from their lives and "processed." We have no control over what animals do, and part of being a good steward of nature is allowing animals to be animals. But as a human, it's difficult for me to accept that the intensive factory farming of chickens, cows, and pigs is necessary for my welfare. And since I'm aware of other protein sources than meat, I feel that I have a duty to use those protein sources instead of meat. And if I can't use plant proteins, then I also have a duty to minimize the amount of animal protein that I consume, and to ensure that it doesn't end the life of the animal where I can. This doesn't preclude me from hunting or from eating hunted meat if I need to, but hunting is very different from factory farming. My prey has a fighting chance. Rabbits, deer, bears, elk, mountain lions, etc. all have evolved in an environment where they may be hunted. They all have tools at their disposal to counteract my cunning. And to hunt a wild animal also means that I have to butcher the animal myself, meaning that I come face-to-face with the fact that I've ended an animal's life to stay alive.

vharuck 7y ago
>My prey has a fighting chance. Rabbits, deer, bears, elk, mountain lions, etc. all have evolved in an environment where they may be hunted. They all have tools at their disposal to counteract my cunning. Where do you draw the line of what's sporting? I think humanity's cunning is why we have domesticated animals and efficient slaughter houses. >And to hunt a wild animal also means that I have to butcher the animal myself, meaning that I come face-to-face with the fact that I've ended an animal's life to stay alive. I'd bet every slaughtered animal had a person watch it die. Or at least see it alive and know they'd be complicit in the slaughter.
- jschwartzi 7y ago
  > Where do you draw the line of what's sporting? I think humanity's cunning is why we have domesticated animals and efficient slaughter houses. I think it's when I'm having to do the work against the animal to catch it that's sporting. Driving to the grocery store and buying pre-packaged chunks of muscle isn't particularly sporting. It's not really cunning to stick 3000 chickens in a dark room, dump food on the floor periodically, and then vaccuum them all up after X months. It's industrial. > I'd bet every slaughtered animal had a person watch it die. Or at least see it alive and know they'd be complicit in the slaughter. This is true, but it's much easier to be complicit in something when it's as impersonal as watching as chickens which are hung from a gantry conveyor slowly make their way past a set of spinning blades which efficiently separate their head from their neck, and you're watching this process for hours a day.

vharuck 7y ago

>My prey has a fighting chance. Rabbits, deer, bears, elk, mountain lions, etc. all have evolved in an environment where they may be hunted. They all have tools at their disposal to counteract my cunning. Where do you draw the line of what's sporting? I think humanity's cunning is why we have domesticated animals and efficient slaughter houses. >And to hunt a wild animal also means that I have to butcher the animal myself, meaning that I come face-to-face with the fact that I've ended an animal's life to stay alive. I'd bet every slaughtered animal had a person watch it die. Or at least see it alive and know they'd be complicit in the slaughter.

jschwartzi 7y ago
> Where do you draw the line of what's sporting? I think humanity's cunning is why we have domesticated animals and efficient slaughter houses. I think it's when I'm having to do the work against the animal to catch it that's sporting. Driving to the grocery store and buying pre-packaged chunks of muscle isn't particularly sporting. It's not really cunning to stick 3000 chickens in a dark room, dump food on the floor periodically, and then vaccuum them all up after X months. It's industrial. > I'd bet every slaughtered animal had a person watch it die. Or at least see it alive and know they'd be complicit in the slaughter. This is true, but it's much easier to be complicit in something when it's as impersonal as watching as chickens which are hung from a gantry conveyor slowly make their way past a set of spinning blades which efficiently separate their head from their neck, and you're watching this process for hours a day.