Is Vegetarianism logically inconsistent?

People have always hunted, and farmed... what's the problem here? The only problem I see is the exploitation of animals as such in the mass farming, and the highly processed and crap quality of meat that is sold on mass. (i.e. water pumped meat from quick fattened cattle).

In general I have no problem eating meat, my body is designed for it. The only problem I see is that we probably over eat meat nowadays.

I have friends that are vegetarian, good luck to them, but I won't be joining them. If we all evolved to be non-meat eating then great.. but currently I'm an omnivore (spl?).

Once again, the only issue is the way animals are treated prior to slaughter.

Eggs? I see where you are coming from, but do you eat nuts? What right do you have to stop the seeding of that tree. Look mate, we have to get sustanance from somewhere, and if that happens to be mud, we would do it. Just for clarification, if you built and wonderful ethical mud hut, it would still contain dead animals. Just think, some of them may even have been *shock* fished.

At the end of the day the terminology is so damn loose that what one vegetarian believes isn't the same as his neighbour. If you start infighting, that's so very sad.

Understand your reasons for doing it, wanting to save the animals and all.. but animals eat animals, and for all intensive purposes we are animals, we just learnt to farm because that's how we roll. What you want to be doing is concentrating on getting those animals decent lives rather than coming on here and asking about vegan vs veggy.
 
IDD.

There are loads of different levels - Pescetarians...so It's not OK to eat an animal but it is OK to eat one that swims?

Weird.

- Pea0n
 
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Freefaller said:
Eating a varied lifestyle WITH meat, and exercise, I would argue is potentially healthier than a purely vegetarian lifestyle. The key is variety in diet and healthy living (i.e. doing some exercise too).

Each to their own though - I can accept people doing it out of choice, what I don't accept is people telling me that humans SHOULDN'T eat meat or that it's not as healthy.
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My issue though isn't that eating meat as part of a healthy lifestyle isn't good for you, I believe that it is, but like I've said before I also believe the same can be said for a balanced vegetarian diet also, which brings into question is eating meat worth all the negatives that the meat industry as a whole has on us and the planet in terms of pollution, deforestation, animal cruelty etc?

Meat eaters say that we vegetarians don't have the right to complain and should respect peoples choice but I actually think we do have the right to complain because this isn't a choice based on equal consequences, one choice has a more negative impact than the other, one that effects us and our planet.

I guess I'm blowing hot air though really because at the end of the day I genuinely think this is part of our evolutionary process, nothing can really change until the demand for meat and in particular 'fast food meats' are slowed down and we change our lifestyles which I believe will happen, already we are seeing more and more people choosing to live on vegetarian diets it just seems a bit of a slow and arduous process at the moment.
 
Lupine Lacuna said:
Not one person has really addressed my question.
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I would have thought that it was pretty obvious. People draw their lines in different places, vegetarians see farming for animal products to be OK, while those that eat meat (we shall catogerise them as "normal people") see farming animals for food to be OK.

There are bound to be other things in life were lines are drawn down to personal attitudes where you end up on the "wrong" side according to others. For example, what are your views on internet piracy? Another area where different people draw their lines in different places.
 
~Don't get me wrong a healthy vegetarian diet IS possible, but it does require quite a bit more effort to get all the nurtients in. :) Furthermore, the benefits that I get from meat far outweight the negative connotations to me. I try and buy my meats from good sources, and defforestation will happen regardless of the meat industry so I don't find that to be much of a guilt factor for me.

I don't believe that the environmental impact is that great - furthermore, so much vegetable produce is shipped by plane/ferries that it creates just as much "waste" - and to get the balance in the vegetarian only diet a lot of foods will be eaten that isn't part of the UK produce.

If a vegetarian can prove that he/she ONLY eats UK produced vegetables, pastas etc... then fine - but irrespective of that, the whole CO2 rubbish means nothing to me I'm afraid.

Don't get me wrong, I'm anti fast food and anti processed and refined foods. I take my health and fitness rather seriously (as you may or may not know) and to me good fresh produce is paramount - I have no refined or processed foods in my home (or at least I try my damnedest to have the bare minimum).

The vegetarian lifestyle will never take over completely, certainly in some parts of the world, you go into a restaurant and there are still no vegetarian options in the majority of restaurants.

Vegetariansim is fine, but it's not a norm for a lot of people - and is only "normal" for some countries owing to the lack of availability of meat or prohibitive prices for purchasing meat.
 
Justin said:
I'm a vegetarian because I don't feel the need to eat meat as I don't particularly enjoy it and never really have and of course I don't think it's fair for them to be killed for us to eat because I love animals. Since I stopped eating it I've gone completely off it and hate the smell/look of it. Everything I cook is from scratch and I know where it all comes from, including dairy products, eggs etc.

I'd like to add that I have no problem cooking/buying meat products for others and have done on many occasions, as long as it's 'proper' meat. Others shouldn't need to miss out because of my decisions.
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I'm exaclty the same as you Justin... wicked. Didn't think there were many of us about!
 
You can have all sorts of diets and be healthy, be that vegan, vegetarian or other. Everyone has there own ethical standards - live and let live.
 
Freefaller said:
I heard it was more akin to pork?
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You'd be right as far as I'm aware, after all in Polynesia human was called long pig for a reason.

Freefaller said:
Anybody know for a fact whether or not our ancestors (i.e. pre-man) did eat one another? I would imagine they did... but we all assume they hunted for other animals?
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I'd imagine they weren't too fussy, if it's an easy source of protein and sustenance then it would do. It's probably not a good idea for building lasting societies to have people eating each other but some places seem to manage with it.

As for the original topic - it's barely worth the effort of typing out a response, the argument has been done before many times. Eat what you want and respect other peoples right to do the same - it's interesting but I'd be pretty certain that I've been told off by people eating meat more often than I've ever tried to tell them what to eat. It's almost as if me choosing not to eat meat is taken as me implicitly criticising them and they start getting defensive - if I could get them to realise that I've got no strong feelings on their choice it would be so much easier.
 
Lupine Lacuna said:
Not one person has really addressed my question.

I am not interested here in the pros and cons of meat eating (though I highly encourage viewing the film 'Earthlings' which is available on their website online, and also a trailer), my question is instead to vegetarians who chose not to eat meat because they believe you should not kill animals, and to ask, why do you eat eggs and diary (since both involve killing).
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Those eggs are not fertilized...hence not alive.

As for milk....are you mad? How is eating diary constitute killing? Are you acusing babies murder when they breast feed..
 
Nitefly said:
You can have all sorts of diets and be healthy, be that vegan, vegetarian or other. Everyone has there own ethical standards - live and let live.
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I'm with you on this one, I'm happy to accomodate other peoples dietary requirements, just don't try and force your morals/ethics down my throat and we'll get along fine.
 
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