RE: are vegetarians more ethical by not eating meat?
May 21, 2013 at 7:49 am
(This post was last modified: May 21, 2013 at 7:58 am by The Grand Nudger.)
Few points of clarification. Livestock isn't slaughtered in the prime of it's life - it's slaughtered at the most profitable point in it's life. I'm personally very fond of the laws and regulations that surround this procedure - though obviously that's a case by case thing. Captive bolts, stunning - we even spend money hiring consultants to make the holding areas less stressful. I'm sure we could find a great documentary on how brutal some slaughterhouse is. That would be a case of casting an entire industry - or even principle- in the worst light by reference to an organization that doesn't even follow it's own regulations. No argument about suffering has any heft whatsoever with regards to raising or eating meat. It -can be- and -is- done in a way that affords the livestock a good life, and a good death. You and I both would rail against anything else.
As far as our relative land of plenty - and the other guys field where only grass grows. You do realize that our land of plenty is precisely why the other guy can't grow anything but grass, I hope. Firstly, our system of ag relies on a cost in human (and other animal) misery that is difficult to fathom. We turn oil into food. Let that roll around in your head a little bit. Secondly, as a very powerful block of consumers we determine the availability or access that less powerful consumers have to fertility and nutrition. Why would you send, say, fertilizer or grain - to nigeria...when that same fertilizer or grain could command a higher price, by orders of magnitude, if you sent it to the states? This ignores, of course, that there are plenty of people hungry, malnourished, and just otherwise not feeling this whole "land of plenty" business in the first place- even here in the 1st world, because at least some of us can afford to make this choice (or even regard it as such).
These things that you feel you've somehow opted out of, you haven't.
As far as our relative land of plenty - and the other guys field where only grass grows. You do realize that our land of plenty is precisely why the other guy can't grow anything but grass, I hope. Firstly, our system of ag relies on a cost in human (and other animal) misery that is difficult to fathom. We turn oil into food. Let that roll around in your head a little bit. Secondly, as a very powerful block of consumers we determine the availability or access that less powerful consumers have to fertility and nutrition. Why would you send, say, fertilizer or grain - to nigeria...when that same fertilizer or grain could command a higher price, by orders of magnitude, if you sent it to the states? This ignores, of course, that there are plenty of people hungry, malnourished, and just otherwise not feeling this whole "land of plenty" business in the first place- even here in the 1st world, because at least some of us can afford to make this choice (or even regard it as such).
These things that you feel you've somehow opted out of, you haven't.
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