SallySmith

I think the aliens should be cows, but not cannibalistic ones.

SallySmith

My Bert story didn't get to you at all?

Mageth

I think the aliens should be cows, but not cannibalistic ones

In that case, they'd probably be really pissed off at us. I wonder if they'd show mercy to vegetarians?

SallySmith

I don't know, vegetarians still consume dairy products. Perhaps our deaths would be quick.

voltaire321

In the immortal words of Greg Proops:

"Animals have only two responsibilities in today's society, to be delicious, and to fit well."

That being said, I have pets and I love them very much. However, I have no doubt (because it is fact) that were I dead and my cat was hungry he would eat me. When animals refrain from eating other animals because it is cruel then so will I. Until that point I don't see why I should have to eat beans while all the other omnivores in the world get to have meat. I'm an animal too damnit! It's the way the world works. The food chain and all that good stuff.

If you want to be a vegetarian that's fine with me. If you want to impose your vegetarianism on me then get the HELL OUT OF MY FACE! The only thing worse than a militant vegetarian is a militant fundie.

I think I'll go have a steak, rare, so that when I bite into it the blood runs down my chin.

UNGAWA!

Koyaanisqatsi

Well, I read the first page and then this one (which was all I needed) and I have two comments to add:

<ol type="1">[*] Only an arrogant, homocentric f*ck would think they could possibly know whether or not plants are conscious, living beings capable of recognizing their own murder or not. How do you know the entire planet isn't conscious on a level you couldn't even begin to contemplate and plants are its limbs or equivalent to sensory input devices like whiskers on a cat?[*] Only a sanctimonious, arrogant, homocentric f*ck would think that a natural process which is innate and older than the hills should be altered in order for personal cause célèbre melodrama to replace legitimate concerns.[/list=a]

As has been no doubt noted, just about every other animal in the entire world eats each other alive and/or injects a slow acting poison which liquifies internal organs while keeping the organism breathing so the food doesn't spoil; fates far more terrifying IMO than Gomer with a blunt force trauma gun.

If you want to pretend that you're on a higher plane of existence than the one you're on, go right ahead. But as with everything else in this society, if you want to preach your unsupportable opinions to anyone else, my vote is, piss up a rope.

[ March 13, 2002: Message edited by: Koyaanisqatsi ]</p>

bonduca

(blows whistle for end of round)

Now for some light entertainment....

Hot dogs, Armour hot dogs
What kind of kids eat Armour hot dogs?
Fat kids, skinny kids, kids who climb on rocks,
Tough kids, sissy kids,
Even kids with chicken pox
Love hot dogs
Armour hot dogs
The dog!
Kids!
Love!
To!
Biiiiiiiite!

SallySmith

These are two things that irritate the hell out of me. First of all, I don't know any vegetarians who want to "impose" vegetarianism on others. And I'm tired of getting compared to a fundie. The only thing more irritating than that is a militant meat-eater. Religious freaks believe in a fairy tale and have ugly hair. Vegetarians don't eat meat. I don't really see the connection.

Second, the bloody meat joke is so overdone. Maybe it was funny the first time. I'm not sure. But after seeing it over and over again, it just seems juvenile. Ooooo, you've really offended me now! You're going to eat a bloody steak! I think I'll go cry!

You really got me with that one.

pepperlandgirl

The problem with making it a moral arguement (from my perspective) is this: morals are different.
For example, some people would never eat their cat/dog even if it means starving to death. I have no such qualms. I would eat my little Willow without a second thought if it meant I could live. Just like I would eat another human being if they died first, and it meant my survival. I'm not going to die over something as stupid as, "But the cat is so cute!"

Also, I have no problems killing my own meat. I actually prefer that to buying meat from the store. Some people see a deer and think Bambi, I think deer stew. For me the best part has always been the kill, gutting, skinning, and curing the meat. I like the hands on aspect of it. And so do a lot of other people. If I could go hunt for my food right now, I would. But since I live in the L.A. area, that's no longer possible.

Finally, I make one simple distinction in deciding what's "ok" to kill for food. Is it a member of Homo sapiens sapiens? No? Well then, it's fair game. One time my Chem teacher related the fact that one student of hers once froze a baby mole and brought it to class. (I can't remember why). Some of the students freaked out, "But that's like killing a baby." My chem teacher replied, "Yeah, except it was a mole."

Kachana

Punker, the issue of whether a country could successfully implement policies in which animals have most if not all of the rights humans have is obviously a very large one covering many different topics. I think it's a topic for many threads rather than one about vegetarianism, and as I don't know your exact position on animal rights (you don't seem to see them totally equal to humans, for instance they'd get less healthcare and no special police protection against being eaten) it's probably not worth going into here. There are many issues and topics that I can see being problematic, such as legislation against killing or harming animals, medical testing, releasing animals, effects on the environment, drain on the economy and so on, that I would really need to see an large article dealing with such issues and setting out what the policies would be and reasons why the new policies would work and how they would be implemented. Perhaps that's something you could do if you don't know of somewhere online that has such information?

Onto the next issue:

I said: what do you think causes the most suffering to an animal, a) dying of natural causes (e.g. eaten by another animal, disease, decline into old age etc.), or b) being killed in a slaughter house that abides by the standards implemented upon it?

To which you replied: In the USA, there are no standards in slaughter houses. Other nations have implemented such laws, but just as the US lagged behind in liberating African humans, it lags behind in liberating non-human animals. Of course, then, it would be obvious that being killed in a slaughter house is incredibly much more suffering. Bulls are dehorned, castrated, beaten, branded, abused, and then slaughtered. Sometimes the meat is taken from the carcass of the animal while it is still conscious and breathing. Other times it is skinned alive. As far as to which causes more suffering, it is really a scientific question -- not moral or philosophical, but nonetheless not out of my grasp. I think living a life of choice and decision would much better than any other life.

Now your response here is not an argument against shutting down slaughterhouses and killing animals per se, it is an argument for better implememtation of standards in slaughterhouses, to which I say, yes, the standards should be improved a lot. If we had permenantly closed down and outlawed all institutions that have had awful standards in the past, we would have no police, hospitals, schools, public transport and so on, the thing to do it to strive to make the standards better.

Take a hypothetical country in which animals are killed pretty much instantly and painlessly in the slaughterhouses, would you now not agree that the pain and suffering they experience in such a country is less than dying naturally? What's wrong with me bying meat of animals killed in such a way? You don't need to convince me that slaughterhouses in America and various other countries have awful standards, I believe you, but you have not convinced me that there is something wrong with killing and ating animals when their suffering is partialled out of the equation. To do this you will have to show that animals are conscious that they are going to die and ipso facto spend their days in the field/ farm in emotional turmoil, or that a large part of their consciousness, like humans, is involved with their long term future aspirations and goals, rather with fluctuating simple instincts.

Finally:

I said: [i]Indeed. And as a DIRECT result of medical research using animals, Punkersluta will be able to protest against meat eating for an extra estimated 20 years!
Punker, do you ever use or intend to use the vast majority of medications for thousands of ailments that have been derived and are currently being derived from animal testing?[/i[


To which you replied: The difference between humans and animals is significant. If we slaughter 70,000 animals by tying them down, and putting ink in their eyes to make new dyes, is this going to help me to live for an estimated 20 years? How about the decapitating of monkeys? Or how about drugging monkeys and then training them to fly airplane simulations, to see how soldiers would fair during such an attack? Or how about burning the skin off a live pig to see what kind of mark it would make? Not to mention that penocillin is TOXIC to non-human animals. If we had tested it, we would have not used it.

Whatever rhetoric you want to bathe your examples in, The fact is that medical research using animals WILL significantly enhance your life, and the life of other animals that are treated by the medicines derived. This isn't just my opinion, its the overwhelming medical consensus. Polio, anaesthetics, diabetes, asthma, high blood pressure, cancer, depression, cystic fibrosis, alzheimers disease, strokes, spinal cord damage, and malaria are all intricately connected with medical research on animals in a way that if alternative methods replaced them, medical advancement would be hugely debilitated.

Secondly, let's say we just discover penicillin now, and we don't test it on animals. We would not then test it on humans (animals) either, and so would use it either. Anyway that is besides the point as you are factually incorrect about penicillin's toxicity, penicillin is not toxic to mice, it was tested on mice by Howard Florey and Ernst Chain in 1940 at Oxfor University, mice were injected (or not) with a deadly bacteria, the given penicillin. The mice injected with penicillin lived, the others died. For these experiments, Folrey and Chain (joint with Fleming) received a Nobel prize.