Meat eating ethical?

[The Grand Nudger]

This so far is the only good response but I still see holes in it. If keeping animals captive does reduce their suffering then I see no good reason against that. The problem is still the killing part. I take it that no animal wants to die, correct?

I wouldn't know what they want but would be willing to accept that as a good guess. Unfortunately for animals, none of us has a choice in that matter ultimately.

You're equivocating slaughtering of animals with euthanasia. Euthanasia is done to avoid an inevitably painful death. If you have captive animals that are well cared for, a slow and painful death is not known to be inevitable especially if they're not old yet.

Firstly, no, I'm not trying to make the case for euthanasia at all. I'm addressing livestock for what it is. It's not an ideal situation...but it is a situation in which we lack options. In the case of domesticated animals a swift and painful death is, unfortunately, inevitable (in the absence of a reason to raise them). They will simply starve...and that's as good as it gets. It gets much, much worse.

That said, I'm not proposing that we kill them in order to help them avoid suffering. I'm proposing that we either have to kill them for food, raise them for agricultural inputs (in which case wasting the rest of their byproducts would be poor form), or -for now at least- go full on petrochem (at which point it's ludicrous to talk about ethics and livestock since we'll have consented to killing just about everything by proxy). That they can expect a better life (and death) as livestock is simply an added benefit.

There's also the issue of consent. Euthanasia is thought to be acceptable if the person to be euthanized gives consent. Animals can't give consent. This is why bestiality is immoral. The animal can't give consent to have sex with one of us.

Speaking of consent, I do not consent to starvation, nor do I consent to actions which directly lead to the same. See, I think people get into this without grounding their positions in reality. Unfortunately, we're not autotrophs - so something is going to get the axe everywhere we go. Unfortunately.....agricultural products dont materialize out of thin air and sunbeams - again...things die wherever they go.

So we (cattle and us) have competing interests (in your view). I don't think that those interests are reconcilable as long as you couch the discussion in a vacuum. Or- we have mutual interests (in my view). In which case, we can care for them in the most ethical manner possible, advancing both of our species, until such a time as they are no longer required (in which case we'll still have to raise them...seeing as they're unfit otherwise....or let them all die). The trouble, in my opinion, with your view is consistency. If I took livestock completely off the table..called it unethical (illegal, banned, what have you)....what
would you call the resultant loss of life and hardship (for all parties involved)? Bit too self-defeating for me.

(by the by, about the pigs thinking oink oink....no no no...pigs are obscenely intelligent! - not directed at you tea, posters name escaped me)