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I don't remember who but someone (Naval?) had this quote that generations 100 years from now will think of us as utterly barbaric for eating animals. When I loo

I don't remember who but someone (Naval?) had this quote that generations 100 years from now will think of us as utterly barbaric for eating animals. When I look around how we treat animals as if they were just sacs of meat, its amazingly heart wrenching. In Alaska I saw a casual 4th of July competitions where you throw dead fish and other person catches it. Sometime fish fall apart and all its guts spread out during these games while audience literally laugh at that scene. I wonder how people get so heartlessly cruel that not only they are killing animals for entertainment but also enjoy when their bodies fall apart? What is their internal justification system? A devout Christian explained to me that its their God given right to be superior to animals and God has instructed them to consume these animals. In a Chinese restaurant I had hard time explaining someone that fish is not really a plant. It seems minds can be programmed to shield away from any cruelty. Perhaps that's how people working in Nazi camps justified cruelty towards Jews: they aren't really living beings like rest of us, they are something else quite lower so no need to take all these to heart.

dmitriid 7y ago
I hate to break it to you, but in general our treatment of animals is way better than a 100 years ago. Animal shelters? Animal cruelty laws? Etc. That fish throwing contest? Oh, it's almost definitely older than 100 years (as are dog fights, dolphin slaughter, goose pulling, cock throwing and other wonderful traditions from around the world).
- 317070 7y ago
  That is one side of the scale. The other side of the scale has the meat industry in it (which is absolutely not like 100 years ago). As someone who used to work in a slaughter house, I am not convinced that today is better. I can see our children looking back in a few generations and think of us as barbaric. I thought of it as barbaric and surreal when working there.
  - dmitriid 7y ago
    The scale? Yeah, the scale is much bigger. Conditions for animals? Not much different than 100 years ago [1]. And I'd argue they are better in many cases (and in many countries). [1] https://io9.gizmodo.com/utterly-disturbing-century-old-photos-of-meat-packing-1579470458 https://io9.gizmodo.com/utterly-disturbing-century-old-photo...
    - LaEc 7y ago
      Those open-air stockyards in Chicago look like crap, and even then still miles better than what pigs go through today. At least they saw the sky for more than the few minutes just before their deaths.
- jcheng 7y ago
  Ugh, I made the mistake of looking up “goose pulling”. WHY.
- LaEc 7y ago
  There isn't extensive documentation on the welfare of animals in large farms in history, but if you knew what goes on today, you wouldn't even dare write that. Chicks sent to the shredder, cramped living conditions for the entirety of their lives, untreated medical conditions, anal rape-assisted insemination, halal and Kosher slaughters. Watch Dominion (2018) or just the trailer and see for yourself.
  - dmitriid 7y ago
    So, not that different than 100 years ago. Unless you count "seeing blue sky for a few minutes before death" as being better. The last time farm animals had marginally better conditions was probably the Middle Ages, and even then I wouldn't be so sure. Especially not around bigger cities.
hkeide 7y ago
It's hard to survive in a healthy way for most of the world without eating animals unfortunately. Animals die in nature all the time, in much worse ways than the clean deaths they would get in a meat processing plant. Death is part of the cycle of life, and it seems we are forgetting that since we've become so far separated from nature these days.
- popped 7y ago
  That's a big call there buddy. There is basically no plant based diet that can be made more healthy with the addition of animal products. If there is let us know. You'll probably get a Nobel prize for the revelation
  - a3n 7y ago
    I suspect that here in "The West" with our immense choices and support, with food that comes from all over the world, with transportation networks that can get all that food into your kitchen within days of processing, any diet could be healthy. But if you don't have all that infrastructure and support, if your region is overrun by locusts or warlords or gangs, then sticking to any "I'm only going to eat these categories" diet is impossible. You eat what you can get, and if you don't happen to have enough plant food today, eating meat (if available) is healthier than starving.
- axguscbklp 7y ago
  >Animals die in nature all the time, in much worse ways than the clean deaths they would get in a meat processing plant. Animals who live in nature might also live more fulfilling lives before they die than animals that live in the average meat processing plant.
kortilla 7y ago
How is your value system not as arbitrary (plants ok to kill, but not animals)? Is it just because it’s impossible to survive without consuming other life given our current technology? In 1000 years perhaps humans will look at our treatment of all life as barbaric because they will be directly powered by the energy of the sun.
- sysbin 7y ago
  I'm surprised your comment is being downvoted. There was an article shared on HN last year and suggesting plants are more aware than what we typically give credit to them. I also don't think its completely out there to assume humanity won't be modifying how the human body consumes energy.
  - jamil7 7y ago
    It's being downvoted because it doesn't really make sense. Plants lack a central nervous system, so vegans tend to draw the line somewhere there. Regardless if we did find out that plants somehow where conscious and could feel pain we need to feed animals a huge amount of plant matter in order for us to eat them. If vegans are trying to minimise harm done then it'd still make sense to eat them directly than eat animals given there is no alternative.
    - sfj 7y ago
      But what if the plants we like to eat are more conscious than the plants that animals like to eat? Or even more conscious than the animals themselves? How do we really know? What if there is a God in every peanut?
      - jamil7 7y ago
        Well why base your actions on anything at all given that line of thinking? Although I do like the idea of a God in a peanut.
        7y ago
bad_user 7y ago
The idea that humans evolve somehow into better beings is an unjustified religion. You shouldn't let technological progress fool you, we are nearly the same as we were 1 million years ago. Raising domesticated animals for slaughter is actually pretty humane. Before agriculture and farming, when people moved to an area it led to the extinction of all large animals and they died in agony. For many of us human life is much more important than the slaughtering of domesticated animals. This isn't about a God. We evolved feelings, morals, the concept of cruelty in order to care about human life. You can choose to care about whatever you want of course, but careful with your priorities. And yes, chickens aren't human and are quite tasty.
- coribuci 7y ago
  > We evolved feelings, morals, the concept of cruelty in order to care about human life. You can choose to care about whatever you want of course, but careful with your priorities. I would not be so sure about feelings and morals. Cruelty yes, has evolved a lot. > And yes, chickens aren't human and are quite tasty. Those grown naturally, yes. Those grown in a plant not so.
infruset 7y ago
Claude Lévi-Strauss said[0]: "A day will come when the idea that for the sake of food the people of the past raised and massacred living beings and with complete equanimity displayed their flesh in bits and pieces in shop windows, will no doubt inspire the same revulsion that the cannibalistic meals of the Americans, Oceanians, or Africans inspired in the travelers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries." [0]: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Claude_L%C3%A9vi-Strauss https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Claude_L%C3%A9vi-Strauss
- sfj 7y ago
  > raised and massacred living beings Plants are also living beings...
  - neotek 7y ago
    What an insipid observation.
    - Infinitesimus 7y ago
      It does highlight the the problem most people have isn't that the beings we consume are living but rather that we have reliable indicators of their suffering before being killed. Most of the moral objection seems to be from the suffering and conscious death

dmitriid 7y ago

I hate to break it to you, but in general our treatment of animals is way better than a 100 years ago. Animal shelters? Animal cruelty laws? Etc. That fish throwing contest? Oh, it's almost definitely older than 100 years (as are dog fights, dolphin slaughter, goose pulling, cock throwing and other wonderful traditions from around the world).

317070 7y ago
That is one side of the scale. The other side of the scale has the meat industry in it (which is absolutely not like 100 years ago). As someone who used to work in a slaughter house, I am not convinced that today is better. I can see our children looking back in a few generations and think of us as barbaric. I thought of it as barbaric and surreal when working there.
- dmitriid 7y ago
  The scale? Yeah, the scale is much bigger. Conditions for animals? Not much different than 100 years ago [1]. And I'd argue they are better in many cases (and in many countries). [1] https://io9.gizmodo.com/utterly-disturbing-century-old-photos-of-meat-packing-1579470458 https://io9.gizmodo.com/utterly-disturbing-century-old-photo...
  - LaEc 7y ago
    Those open-air stockyards in Chicago look like crap, and even then still miles better than what pigs go through today. At least they saw the sky for more than the few minutes just before their deaths.
jcheng 7y ago
Ugh, I made the mistake of looking up “goose pulling”. WHY.
LaEc 7y ago
There isn't extensive documentation on the welfare of animals in large farms in history, but if you knew what goes on today, you wouldn't even dare write that. Chicks sent to the shredder, cramped living conditions for the entirety of their lives, untreated medical conditions, anal rape-assisted insemination, halal and Kosher slaughters. Watch Dominion (2018) or just the trailer and see for yourself.
- dmitriid 7y ago
  So, not that different than 100 years ago. Unless you count "seeing blue sky for a few minutes before death" as being better. The last time farm animals had marginally better conditions was probably the Middle Ages, and even then I wouldn't be so sure. Especially not around bigger cities.

hkeide 7y ago

It's hard to survive in a healthy way for most of the world without eating animals unfortunately. Animals die in nature all the time, in much worse ways than the clean deaths they would get in a meat processing plant. Death is part of the cycle of life, and it seems we are forgetting that since we've become so far separated from nature these days.

popped 7y ago
That's a big call there buddy. There is basically no plant based diet that can be made more healthy with the addition of animal products. If there is let us know. You'll probably get a Nobel prize for the revelation
- a3n 7y ago
  I suspect that here in "The West" with our immense choices and support, with food that comes from all over the world, with transportation networks that can get all that food into your kitchen within days of processing, any diet could be healthy. But if you don't have all that infrastructure and support, if your region is overrun by locusts or warlords or gangs, then sticking to any "I'm only going to eat these categories" diet is impossible. You eat what you can get, and if you don't happen to have enough plant food today, eating meat (if available) is healthier than starving.
axguscbklp 7y ago
>Animals die in nature all the time, in much worse ways than the clean deaths they would get in a meat processing plant. Animals who live in nature might also live more fulfilling lives before they die than animals that live in the average meat processing plant.

kortilla 7y ago

How is your value system not as arbitrary (plants ok to kill, but not animals)? Is it just because it’s impossible to survive without consuming other life given our current technology? In 1000 years perhaps humans will look at our treatment of all life as barbaric because they will be directly powered by the energy of the sun.

sysbin 7y ago
I'm surprised your comment is being downvoted. There was an article shared on HN last year and suggesting plants are more aware than what we typically give credit to them. I also don't think its completely out there to assume humanity won't be modifying how the human body consumes energy.
- jamil7 7y ago
  It's being downvoted because it doesn't really make sense. Plants lack a central nervous system, so vegans tend to draw the line somewhere there. Regardless if we did find out that plants somehow where conscious and could feel pain we need to feed animals a huge amount of plant matter in order for us to eat them. If vegans are trying to minimise harm done then it'd still make sense to eat them directly than eat animals given there is no alternative.
  - sfj 7y ago
    But what if the plants we like to eat are more conscious than the plants that animals like to eat? Or even more conscious than the animals themselves? How do we really know? What if there is a God in every peanut?
    - jamil7 7y ago
      Well why base your actions on anything at all given that line of thinking? Although I do like the idea of a God in a peanut.
      - 7y ago

bad_user 7y ago

The idea that humans evolve somehow into better beings is an unjustified religion. You shouldn't let technological progress fool you, we are nearly the same as we were 1 million years ago. Raising domesticated animals for slaughter is actually pretty humane. Before agriculture and farming, when people moved to an area it led to the extinction of all large animals and they died in agony. For many of us human life is much more important than the slaughtering of domesticated animals. This isn't about a God. We evolved feelings, morals, the concept of cruelty in order to care about human life. You can choose to care about whatever you want of course, but careful with your priorities. And yes, chickens aren't human and are quite tasty.

coribuci 7y ago
> We evolved feelings, morals, the concept of cruelty in order to care about human life. You can choose to care about whatever you want of course, but careful with your priorities. I would not be so sure about feelings and morals. Cruelty yes, has evolved a lot. > And yes, chickens aren't human and are quite tasty. Those grown naturally, yes. Those grown in a plant not so.

infruset 7y ago

Claude Lévi-Strauss said[0]: "A day will come when the idea that for the sake of food the people of the past raised and massacred living beings and with complete equanimity displayed their flesh in bits and pieces in shop windows, will no doubt inspire the same revulsion that the cannibalistic meals of the Americans, Oceanians, or Africans inspired in the travelers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries." [0]: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Claude_L%C3%A9vi-Strauss https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Claude_L%C3%A9vi-Strauss

sfj 7y ago
> raised and massacred living beings Plants are also living beings...
- neotek 7y ago
  What an insipid observation.
  - Infinitesimus 7y ago
    It does highlight the the problem most people have isn't that the beings we consume are living but rather that we have reliable indicators of their suffering before being killed. Most of the moral objection seems to be from the suffering and conscious death