4 ms·

Cruelty is, of course, despicable and should be stopped. The vast majority of growers are decent and moral. It's easy for activists to find and focus on bad a

Cruelty is, of course, despicable and should be stopped. The vast majority of growers are decent and moral. It's easy for activists to find and focus on bad apples and make it seem like all meat suppliers are criminal monsters. This is simply not true. This would be like meat eating activists finding bad actors in the farming industry to then acuse the entirety of that industry with criminal behaviour. Ridiculous. As for vegan vs. meat. Well, few things in life have more evidence than the support provided by millions of years and thousands of species who would not have survived had they not used other species' meat for food, for energy and nutrition. The species that did evolve to survive on plants (cows, for example) have radically different anatomy and mechanisms evolved over millions of years of adaptation to that diet. We are meat eaters. More accurately, we are omnivores. The only reason one could even consider going vegan is that we've industrialized food production and distribution. Drop two people on an island. One of them is constrained to eating plants while the other is able to eat anything, including any animal, plant and even his left foot. Over time the vegan will either get horribly sick and maybe even die. In addition to that, he would have to devote huge chuncks of the day to finding vegan food. The omnivore could easily ingest all the energy and nutrients needed to function at a high level of exertion for a full day during one meal. One could focus most of his time trying to get off the island while the other has to focus on eating constantly. Here's another way to look at it. Veganism can be hypocritical in that one's ability to choose this approach would not exist without millions of years of eating meat. You are who you are and you exist because our ancestors, including your parents, grandparents, etc. killed and ate meat. A vegan is only possible because of millions of years of eating meat. Our species would not exist without eating meat. Yet another view is that millions of meat eaters make veganism possible. The vast majority of the people in a vegan's food supply chain are almost guaranteed to be meat eaters. How much of a hypocrite does someone have to be to rationalize eating vegan when tens of thousands of meat eaters --killing and eating hundreds of thousands of animals-- are quite literally feeding them their vegan diet. A vegan who makes sure their entire food supply chain is vegan is, of course, being absolutely honest in support of their choice.

vlod 13y ago
> The vast majority of growers are decent and moral. Really? I think a lot of these decent/moral farmers are getting replaced by huge corporations that are only interested in profit. >Drop two people on an island. Sigh This point is taking it to an extreme. Yes, I'm a veggie/vegan becz of the environment I'm in. Put people on an island and most likely everyone will turn into a raving beast (aka Lord of the Flies). >The omnivore could easily ingest all the energy and nutrients needed to function Are you some crazy survivalist? I would guess not. Also most of the (let's say US) population couldn't survive. Most people get their meat from fast food restaurants or else packaged in a supermarket. Scenario, you land on a desert island. You don't have a gun or a knife. You think the mass population could trap and kill a wild pig? You need training to do something like that. Even something smaller like a wild bird or some sort of rodent is not easy. Then there's the question of having to cook it. Do you think most of the population can start a fire without matches?
- robomartin 13y ago
  It's hypothetical. Don't over-think it. Still, both people would be handicapped in different respects. How many vegans can climb trees and identify the various edible species of plant life on an island. I'll tell you one thing, the idea of having to live off plants in the wild scares me. Unless you happen to come upon something like an apple, orange, fig or other recognizable tree you are screwed. The guy in the Survivorman show makes it look easy, but he has an army of consultants preparing him before each trip. That's how he knows that a specific grass is edible and that the root of a given plant is good food. Without that most city dwellers would not know what to do with most vegetation on an island. You could easily kill yourself if you eat the wrong plant. In that sense meat is easy. So long as the animal doesn't kill you first and you clean and cook it you are generally pretty safe. An omnivore can eat anything, ants, grubs, bugs of all kinds, worms, snakes, lizards, crabs, rabbits, rats, etc. You just have to be smart enough to make a trap and a fire. Find a reasonably flat rock, heat it up and use it to cook. I think most people who have watched a little television can figure out how to do that, particularly when coupled with the intense need to survive. Making fire isn't easy. I've done it. I failed miserably a bunch of times before I got it. My hands were shredded, but I did it. If you are not injured and persevere it isn't impossible. It can be painfully hard, but not impossible.

vlod 13y ago

> The vast majority of growers are decent and moral. Really? I think a lot of these decent/moral farmers are getting replaced by huge corporations that are only interested in profit. >Drop two people on an island. Sigh This point is taking it to an extreme. Yes, I'm a veggie/vegan becz of the environment I'm in. Put people on an island and most likely everyone will turn into a raving beast (aka Lord of the Flies). >The omnivore could easily ingest all the energy and nutrients needed to function Are you some crazy survivalist? I would guess not. Also most of the (let's say US) population couldn't survive. Most people get their meat from fast food restaurants or else packaged in a supermarket. Scenario, you land on a desert island. You don't have a gun or a knife. You think the mass population could trap and kill a wild pig? You need training to do something like that. Even something smaller like a wild bird or some sort of rodent is not easy. Then there's the question of having to cook it. Do you think most of the population can start a fire without matches?

robomartin 13y ago
It's hypothetical. Don't over-think it. Still, both people would be handicapped in different respects. How many vegans can climb trees and identify the various edible species of plant life on an island. I'll tell you one thing, the idea of having to live off plants in the wild scares me. Unless you happen to come upon something like an apple, orange, fig or other recognizable tree you are screwed. The guy in the Survivorman show makes it look easy, but he has an army of consultants preparing him before each trip. That's how he knows that a specific grass is edible and that the root of a given plant is good food. Without that most city dwellers would not know what to do with most vegetation on an island. You could easily kill yourself if you eat the wrong plant. In that sense meat is easy. So long as the animal doesn't kill you first and you clean and cook it you are generally pretty safe. An omnivore can eat anything, ants, grubs, bugs of all kinds, worms, snakes, lizards, crabs, rabbits, rats, etc. You just have to be smart enough to make a trap and a fire. Find a reasonably flat rock, heat it up and use it to cook. I think most people who have watched a little television can figure out how to do that, particularly when coupled with the intense need to survive. Making fire isn't easy. I've done it. I failed miserably a bunch of times before I got it. My hands were shredded, but I did it. If you are not injured and persevere it isn't impossible. It can be painfully hard, but not impossible.