Why do people hate Vegans?
Personally, I don't hate vegans, and as a culinary enthusiast and inspiring food critic I just find them annoying. But to go as far and say hate is over doing it for me. Although, the philosophy behind being vegan does sound noble, I still find it very illogical.
First let me say being “Vegan” is different than being vegetarian. Being a vegetarian is a dietary lifestyle. Where being Vegan is a ethical and belief based lifestyle similar to Jainism. Motivated by environmental or political change and reform.
I understand your trying to stop animal cruelty by boycotting the industry for it's inhumane slaughtering methods. And bring awareness to the commercialization of killing animals in the masses through automation for profit. Also bring awareness of over consumption, wasting resources and green house effect due to cattle emission (because Cow farts are destroying the world.)
But when you start doing the research the philosophy starts to break down and make less sense. For example, live stock isn’t a main contributor of emissions causing a negative effect on our Ozone layer. Research has shown that removing all livestock in the US will only reduce emissions by less than 1%. And since the 1950 US cattle production has reduced by 1/3.
You have the diet guru trying demonizing meat as the culprit for heart disease, cancer and other health problems. True, it is factor in these statics but it doesn't really justify eliminating meats altogether. Through moderation and better eating habits you can produce the same effect as not eating meat at all.
You have animal cruelty but statics show agricultural kill about 1.5 million native animals like gophers, foxes and other small creatures by agricultural machinery alone. Meaning if you order a salads you still indirectly contribute to a animals death in some way.
Does that mean vegans kill more animals than meat eaters? No.
Is undeniable that slaughter farms kill the most animals without a doubt.
But I do find there protest through veganism very ineffective, for one there is the sensitivity factor.
Food is addicting and very delicious and people are not motivated to care about where there food come from.
Next to alcohol, smoking and drugs, Food is the next feel good drug we as Americans go to. We don't eat to survive, hell we don't even eat to enjoy ourselves. We turn cooking and eating into a competitive pass time. Cooking shows and the obesity rate in our country is testimony of that.
There is the money factor, your fighting against a industry that makes annually $152.5 billion in meat packing and processing and $65.6 billion in poultry slaughter and processin. So you have to take in account how it can effect the nations economy if a radical change was implemented.
Than there is the defamation of Vegans. Is more pronounced by “That Vegan Teacher“ a internet personality on Tik Tok. Now when you hear the word Vegan you imagine a Neo-Nazi vegetarian who shames you for eating a Big Mac and steals your T-bone steak in the middle of the night while you sleep.
So the question is how will being Vegan save the world? Or the very least stop animal cruelty? Are they just catastrophizing to fuel the Vegan movement? Is it even effective to bring any kind of awareness and reform?
“Vegan” Shouldn’t Be The Last Word in Sustainability
https://harvardpolitics.com/more-than-veganism/
The Ethical Arguments Against Ethical Veganism
https://www.ourhenhouse.org/the-ethical-arguments-against-ethical-veganism/
The State of Obesity 2020: Better Policies for a Healthier America
https://www.tfah.org/report-details/state-of-obesity-2020/
The Market Workers
http://www.themarketworks.org/stats
Do “cow farts” cause global warming?
https://www.iowafarmbureau.com/Article/Question-Do-cow-farts-really-contribute-to-global-warming
First let me say being “Vegan” is different than being vegetarian. Being a vegetarian is a dietary lifestyle. Where being Vegan is a ethical and belief based lifestyle similar to Jainism. Motivated by environmental or political change and reform.
I understand your trying to stop animal cruelty by boycotting the industry for it's inhumane slaughtering methods. And bring awareness to the commercialization of killing animals in the masses through automation for profit. Also bring awareness of over consumption, wasting resources and green house effect due to cattle emission (because Cow farts are destroying the world.)
But when you start doing the research the philosophy starts to break down and make less sense. For example, live stock isn’t a main contributor of emissions causing a negative effect on our Ozone layer. Research has shown that removing all livestock in the US will only reduce emissions by less than 1%. And since the 1950 US cattle production has reduced by 1/3.
You have the diet guru trying demonizing meat as the culprit for heart disease, cancer and other health problems. True, it is factor in these statics but it doesn't really justify eliminating meats altogether. Through moderation and better eating habits you can produce the same effect as not eating meat at all.
You have animal cruelty but statics show agricultural kill about 1.5 million native animals like gophers, foxes and other small creatures by agricultural machinery alone. Meaning if you order a salads you still indirectly contribute to a animals death in some way.
Does that mean vegans kill more animals than meat eaters? No.
Is undeniable that slaughter farms kill the most animals without a doubt.
But I do find there protest through veganism very ineffective, for one there is the sensitivity factor.
Food is addicting and very delicious and people are not motivated to care about where there food come from.
Next to alcohol, smoking and drugs, Food is the next feel good drug we as Americans go to. We don't eat to survive, hell we don't even eat to enjoy ourselves. We turn cooking and eating into a competitive pass time. Cooking shows and the obesity rate in our country is testimony of that.
There is the money factor, your fighting against a industry that makes annually $152.5 billion in meat packing and processing and $65.6 billion in poultry slaughter and processin. So you have to take in account how it can effect the nations economy if a radical change was implemented.
Than there is the defamation of Vegans. Is more pronounced by “That Vegan Teacher“ a internet personality on Tik Tok. Now when you hear the word Vegan you imagine a Neo-Nazi vegetarian who shames you for eating a Big Mac and steals your T-bone steak in the middle of the night while you sleep.
So the question is how will being Vegan save the world? Or the very least stop animal cruelty? Are they just catastrophizing to fuel the Vegan movement? Is it even effective to bring any kind of awareness and reform?
“Vegan” Shouldn’t Be The Last Word in Sustainability
https://harvardpolitics.com/more-than-veganism/
The Ethical Arguments Against Ethical Veganism
https://www.ourhenhouse.org/the-ethical-arguments-against-ethical-veganism/
The State of Obesity 2020: Better Policies for a Healthier America
https://www.tfah.org/report-details/state-of-obesity-2020/
The Market Workers
http://www.themarketworks.org/stats
Do “cow farts” cause global warming?
https://www.iowafarmbureau.com/Article/Question-Do-cow-farts-really-contribute-to-global-warming
Comments (71)
No serious vegan will deny that they also contribute to the suffering of sentient beings by many of their actions, and it does not follow from this uncontroversial fact that purchasing animal products is not bad. Even philosophers like Chomsky use this kind of argument against veganism, not realizing that it is clearly a case of the Tu quoque fallacy
Just because we contribute to suffering, that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to contribute less to suffering and cruelty. Veganism is not about trying to be completely and perfectly moral by means of not causing any suffering, which is a mere chimera, but about showing a way in which we can be more moral and cause less suffering than we would if we purchased animal products.
Imagine a thief or murderer saying to a judge: “why are you convicting me? All of you contribute to the death/suffering of many people as well, just by purchasing those phones you have, or driving to your workplaces”. It is clear that no decent person would accept that as a justification for stealing or murdering, so why should it be any different with contributing to industries which treat animales so cruelly?
Quoting TheQuestion
I'll grant that many protests by vegans are very unpersuasive, such as those where they call others murderers and what not. But I know many vegans who are more respectful and persuasive, and who are more concerned with presenting a clear moral argument in a calm and civilized debate.
As for people not caring enough, well they should care, and you don't need to think too hard to figure out that most of the food most people eat comes from sentient animals, and once they inquire into how these animals are treated, some of them would realize that that is a bad thing.
As for food being delicious, suppose someone found out that human meat tastes really good: would that justify their torturing and exploiting humans to eat them? Of course not, so why should it be any different in the case of other sentient beings?
Quoting TheQuestion
Slave owners could have used exactly the same argument in the past: “you can't abolish slavery, you have no idea how radical a change in the economy that would be!”
Vegans dare to question the status quo. Questioning the status quo is morally reprehensible, for many if not most people.
I didn't say is not possible but consider this analogy of a doctor.
If a Doctor has a patient with gangrene and need to have a limb severed. You don’t rip off the arm, the patient will go into shock and die. Prep work is needed to properly remove the infected limb surgically. So the patient can survive.
Slavery in US history has record of that. Was it the right thing to do, yes obviously but not without struggle.
Quoting Amalac
It doesn't matter if it's cruel or not is an addiction, is like having a moral debate with a meth addict. When a prostitute provides services to get her hit money does she question the morality of her actions, no. She wants that feel good hit, she knows is wrong what she does but again doesn't care.
Then I don't see why the idea of a sudden change worries you, the chance of everybody turning vegan as soon as you do is practically 0%, so the change would be gradual. None of that implies that you are doing nothing wrong if you continue to purchase the products of animal exploitation.
The more people become vegan, the better, even if it's almost certain that not everybody will become vegan at the same time.
Quoting TheQuestion
Not everybody is so close-minded and dogmatic so as to never seriously question their actions. If that was true, neither I nor anybody else would have ever become vegan. So one just has to reach those who are willing to change their mind and their actions.
This applies to murder, stealing, raping, etc as well: some murderers or rapists would say that they don't care about the sufferings of others, or that they know that it is wrong but will continue doing it. But so what? None of that justifies murdering, stealing or raping. So what conclusion are you trying to get to here?
They taste like broccoli.
Do some more research, maybe. The main driver of deforestation in the Amazon is for livestock and feedstock. National statistics can be misleading; cattle production can decline while consumption increases. the environmental costs are thereby outsourced.
But the heart of the environmental argument is that the land usage of a vegan diet is about 10% of that of the high meat diet of the West. It's the simplest way we can have more people and more trees on the same size planet. Going vegan isn't a complete environmental saviour, but it's really easy to do gradually and informally - once a week or twice, or...
People hate vegans because they hate their identity being called into question. "Cowboy fragility", I think it's called. :wink:
Similarly you could make the case that humane farming of animals for food might cause less suffering than animals experience in a state of nature. For example the winter cull is probably kind of brutal for animals that didn't consume sufficient calories during the warmer season. If farmers could manage their farms well enough to assess degrees of suffering and to expertly cull animals that are suffering, this might provide better conditions for animals compared to the state of nature.
Humans are probably the most wretched of animals insofar as we internalize the severity of our own suffering as we project it onto animals. Substantial to human suffering is that we terrorize ourselves over a past and a future. There is so much we have to be aware of compared to animals (ex.climate change, working joyless hours to fill the car with gas, anxious conflicts of moral imperative...).
I actually have two....
1) The more you label something as wrong, more people will do it. I agree with the Vegan cause but people will still eat meat cause it has become taboo and vegans are making this behavior very attractive.
2) Vegans are becoming more of a dogmatic secular group than that of a activist movement and they’re losing creditibility because of it. When you shame meat eaters is no longer about the cause or the environment but about your personal beliefs. What the individual perceives as what is morally right or wrong. And the original message gets lost and is seen as something different.
The title is based on a article I read recently with the same title. The thread is mostly a question of cultural perspective than factual.
There is no right or wrong answer is just exploring how Vegans are perceived by society. If the practice of veganism is an effective strategy to promote change in the world.
Ok. I imagine changing the human diet en masse would make a substantial difference to the world's resources and industrial economies. But so would broadly practiced minimalism or religious asceticism. What we don't know is what the unintended consequences of such choices would be.
Empedocles would have us starve to death! That in itself is a point in favor of nonvegetarianism, no? Food (animal/vegetable) or malnutrition-starvation. Tough call o humans, my brethren! Either us or them! Suddenly, nonvegetarianism and veganism start to make (ethical) sense. Insectivorous plants "grow" in nutritionally deficient soil. They've also learnt to count (vide venus fly trap mechanism), without a brain to boot. What the f**k is going on?
Or basically that some Vegans, not all, have the attitude of actively judging what other humans as omnivores eat. That they feel nauseated of others eating meat and make a huge issue of their veganism sometimes happens. Or think that others are committing murder. I think vegans have this attitude far more than your ordinary vegetarians, who can eat things like cheese made from animal milk.
People of other dietary following don't necessarily have this arrogant haughty attitude and the simply fact is that if you have chosen one diet, you should let other people choose their diet as independently also. Simple manners.
Alpha-gal syndrome
Something to do with ticks (the Lone Star Tick to be precise). Bloodsuckers doing their bit for a good cause. :chin:
The Alpha-gal syndrome is classified as a, get this, disease. All this is very puzzling (to me)!
I am thinking this is a promotional pitch for reincarnation, not food selection.
Nonsense! I love vegans, especially those health-conscious, exercise- and diet-obsessed ones. They taste like high-end gourmet pork.
Your sources leave something to be desired. Meat production produces 60% of the GHGs produced by agriculture, 14.5% of the GHGs produced in total by human activity. This leaves aside the local enviornmental effects of turning huge swaths of North America into a corn and soy ocean, and then blasting it with pesticides and fertilizer every year. When I worked for FEMA, this was a topic for Midwest flooding. Less than 1% of Iowa is native prairie grass. That land absorbs rainwater far better than corn and soy fields. It's no wonder flooding has increased. This also leaves aside the damage all the chemicals used in said agriculture does to the local ecosystem and to people who live near farms.
If you assume you'll just farm all that land currently being used for feed regardless of whether people eat meat, yes, the reduction in GHGs from removing cattle falls, but that's not a valid assumption because that farming would have to be undertaken at a steep loss. The land could instead be returned to open space, which sequesters more carbon and doesn't require industrial output to maintain.
Second, it's pretty disingenuous for them to just look at the total amount of cattle produced. The number of cows has fallen significantly, the amount of beef keeps rising. To be sure, larger cows produces less GHGs than many smaller ones, give the same amount of production, but the ratio is hardly 1:1 between the number of cows and the amount of GHGs, and GHG production from cattle is still rising with production. Not to mention the increased externalities of overproduction forcing meat to be shipped across the world's oceans while refrigerated.
Leaving them in a “state of nature” is not the only alternative to farming them for food or other products, we can place as many as we can in sanctuaries and shelters made to take care of animals.
The overpopulation of animals is due to the fact that people keep demanding the products of their suffering, and so the people of that industry forcibly reproduce them to satisfy that demand. In the case of the demand for eggs, through artificial selection hen are made to lay ridiculous amounts of eggs, not caring at all about the suffering of the hen.
As the demand goes down, the need to forcibly reproduce more animals or artificially select them to fit their needs will also go down, which will diminish the total amount of suffering. And as was pointed out, these changes (if they occur) will be gradual, just as the changes needed to abolish slavery were.
No doubt some people have that irrational and dogmatic reaction [“if they tell me purchasing animal products is wrong, that means it's actually not wrong and they just want to annoy me!” (a criterion which, by the way, they could apply to things like stealing, murdering, having slaves, etc.)], but like I said, those with an open mind will stop doing it. That some people will likely continue doing it in the near future, does not imply that we shouldn't try to persuade as many of the people who are willing to change their mind and actions as we can.
Quoting TheQuestion
Again, not all vegans have such inefficient ways of protesting, though I do agree that the way many of them protest is not the right way if they want to persuade other people to become vegan. The right way is not to accuse people of being evil murderers or boasting about some pretended moral superiority, but rather simply to state the relevant facts clearly, and present a clear moral argument for veganism, so that the interlocutors themselves judge whether what they are doing is right or not.
Veganism is an ethical philosophy, not merely a diet. And if your diet finances an industry which is cruel to animals, then you will have to admit that you care more about tasting some particular flavor than about the suffering of animals.
Also, would you accept the same argument coming from a cannibal who wanted to exploit humans to sell and purchase human meat? After all, it's “their diet”.
So yes, it's your choice, but that doesn't mean your choice should be immune to criticism.
People also don't like vegans that expect everyone around them to change. If you're invited to a party for example, and you insist how vegan they are, and that they won't come if there aren't vegan options, its annoying. If you quietly note you're vegan, and would they mind if you brought your own vegan dish to the party to share with everyone, people won't mind at all.
Finally, if a vegan is offended that they are served non-vegan food, or offended at people who decide not to be vegans. If you're going to dislike people who aren't vegans, they shouldn't be surprised when people dislike them back.
Its really not being vegan per say, its whether you're rude, inconsiderate, or a socially inept person about it.
Disregard all animal production for a moment then and consider wild stocks, like the ocean. Suppose we had access to unlimited sustainable reserves of fish. Does catching fish cause suffering that could otherwise be avoided. Everything dies eventually and some might say that the suffering at the end of life in a state of nature is comparable to the suffering of culling.
Could vegans embrace insects as a food or is there still concern over taking life. I'm not so sure being ethically opposed to eating insects makes much sense from an appeal to suffering.
I already answered that leaving them in a state of nature is not the only alternative to torturing animals for food, there are sanctuaries for fish too. We won't be able to fit all of them there, but we can try to save as many as we can, just as it is good to try to help as many poor people as we can, even knowing that it's not possible to save all of them.
Supposing we put them in sanctuaries, if those fish which we can't help for one reason or another (like sanctuaries being full) which are in the wild would suffer just as much as they would in the fish industry, then I wouldn't object to them being killed quickly and painlessly for food, or even if they had to suffer just as much they would in the wild for the same culinary purpose, if we have no better choice.
Quoting Nils Loc
From what scientific evidence suggests so far, insects probably have very little sentience, so I don't think we should be too concerned about them. It's not taking the life of an animal that is wrong, what's wrong is to make them suffer (to a significant degree) in the process.
And supposing insects did actually have a significant amount of sentience, I'd say it could still probably be okay to kill rats, cockroaches and the like, since they carry many diseases. On this point I more or less follow one of Bentham's utilitarian principles, I think the courses of action (as well as choices of not doing anything) which are more likely to lead to a state of affairs which has the better balance of the total positive mental states (pleasure, joy, peace of mind,...) and total negative mental states (pain, psychological suffering, boredom) are to be preferred.
If leaving cockroaches and rats alive caused a greater total amount of suffering to sentient beings than if we killed them, then most likely the better course of action is to kill them.
But from the fact that killing rats and cockroaches is probably not bad, it doesn't follow that it is also not bad to torture and kill cows, chickens and pigs, since leaving them alive doesn't have the negative consequences that leaving such insects and disease-carrying animals alive has.
I think this is the main point. It's the evangelist attitude, the "your are bad and I'm better" and I'll tell you that. People don't like evangelists, especially arrogant evangelists that are full of themselves and see them as being better, more enlightened, woke, contrary to others. This is a quite general issue with any kind of evangelist: a leftist progressive (looking down on those right-wing fascists), a conspiracy nut (looking at as others as the ignorant sheeple) or the classical right-wing evangelist (looking down at those hedonistic atheists).
Quoting Amalac
And thus you also have vegan evangelists.
Quoting Amalac
Don't predators cause suffering to their prey? And humans have domesticated animals and farmed them from around 11 000 - 9 000 BC, only a thousand or two years after plants were "domesticated" in similar fashion by humans. That this has been a necessity for our present numbers of humans and our society and culture should be considered too.
In fact, the examples of other animals "farming" shows that this basically is a symbiotic relationship which humans as being smart animals have advanced.
Only if you think adopting a philosophy which opposes to theft, torture, slavery, etc, is also to take an “evangelist” attitude.
I, for example, haven't said anything like “I'm better than you because I'm vegan!” to anybody here, what I'd say is rather more like this: I think that if you stop purchasing the products of animal cruelty, you will be a more moral person than if you don't, in a way similar to how a person who stopped murdering and stealing would be more moral than what he'd be if he chose to instead continue doing those things.
Quoting ssu
So now your argument is a fallacious appeal to nature? “predators do it too, therefore it's not bad if we do it”?
Or perhaps you are saying that they would suffer just as badly if left in the wild. But as I answered to another user, that's not the only alternative there is, we can try to fit as many animals as we can in shelters and sanctuaries.
Quoting ssu
And? From the fact that animals have been domesticated for many years, it doesn't follow that they don't suffer horribly with the way they are treated. Anybody can realize this if they see videos of how horrendously animals such as pigs and cows are treated.
Or to use the example of hens, they have been artificially selected to lay a far greater amount of eggs, which causes great suffering to the hen just so they can sell more eggs, showing clearly that domestication doesn't imply that the domesticated animal won't suffer.
Quoting ssu
A necessity? The amount of food required for the survival and good health of our species can be supplied completely through adequately supplemented vegan diets.
What many people don't realize or seem to forget is that many of the plants given to animals so that they can grow to then be killed for food, could be eaten directly by us, thus preserving the energy that is lost when we eat the plant's nutrients through the animal. The reason for this is the 10% law of transfer of energy:
I do not deny that there are some people (a small percentage) who at present need to consume animal products in order to stay healthy, and I don't object to them doing that, but those of us who can stay healthy without consuming them should simply stop purchasing them.
Quoting ssu
By all means, give those examples you have in mind. But keep in mind whatever examples you are thinking of, they don't justify the horrible things people do to other animals such as pigs and cows.
I think it's the part where you tell other adults what they should and shouldn't eat that gives veganism a cringe twitch. The constant equivocation between minimal pain and outright cruelty. Which is wrapped in this subtext of all or nothing when it comes to the subject matter. I do make moral assessments when deciding what's acceptable and I do acknowledge veganism as legit moral stance. I question whether it's modified form of OCD; in the way it's practiced.
Or put another way for illustration. Do people constantly hound you for moral guidance in general? Aside from sandwich construction? If they don't need your assistance in making moral decisions most of the time, then why suppose it's appropriate or invited in this regard.
To be precise it’s not eating meat which I think is wrong, it’s purchasing meat, because when many people purchase animal products, they cause more animals to be treated cruelly. I have no problem if someone wants to eat some dead animal struck by lightning which they found on the street, since that doesn’t increase the demand nor cause any cruelty.
As for what I mean when I say they should do so and so, I already clarified that here:
Quoting Amalac
Also, notice how ridiculous someone who hired a hitman to torture and murder humans for food would sound if someone criticized him and told him he should stop doing that, and he replied: «It gives me a cringe twitch when you tell me what I should and shouldn’t eat»
I don’t see why we should see hiring someone to torture and murder animals as in any relevant way different from that.
Quoting Cheshire
Whose equivocation? I already told someone else that the amount of suffering should be significant, which is obviously true in the case of cows, pigs and the like.
Quoting Cheshire
I only express my view and give advice so that people can think and decide on their own. They can accept my advice or reject it, it's up to them to judge whether they are acting badly or not when they purchase animal products.
As for how “appropriate” it is, tell me: is it appropriate to tell a murderer that they should stop murdering other people? Is it appropriate to tell a slave owner that you think what they are doing is wrong and that they should stop doing it? They may not feel like it is, but I think you'll agree with me that that is irrelevant in those cases. So why should it be any different in the case of cruelty to animals?
It's dishonest to label every pain felt by animal for the production of food as "cruelty". It merely serves as shock value to gain a false moral position. People have balanced the notion of using animals and respecting their lifeforce for 10s of thousands of years. It wasn't discovered by vegans.
Quoting Amalac
In our natural state we hunted animals. Pretty sure that process wasn't very pleasant. I do agree that consumer activism has a part to play in society and that part is growing. Do you ensure the fair pay and working conditions of the people picking your vegetables?
Quoting Amalac
Right, you have yet to differentiate between pain, significant pain, and animal cruelty. We can't eat them alive and according to you eating them isn't wrong. So, a minimal amount of pain is inflicted. Calling this cruelty ignores the horror that is true animal cruelty. Putting a lobster in the freezer till it falls asleep is not the same as beating an animal for fun. Confusing the two is dishonest and that should be troubling if veganism is truly morally transcendent.
What would you call what is done to pigs and cows in that industry then? Call it whatever you want, I don't care for debates about semantics. I can just call it suffering if you want.
My points are simply these:
1. I think the things done to many of the animals for the production of meat and other products are wrong because many of those animals undoubtedly suffer a lot.
2. If people keep on increasing the demand for the products of their exploitation, more animals will suffer to a clearly significant degree, so those who value diminishing the total amount of suffering in the world should ponder that and consider changing their actions.
Quoting Cheshire
No, and? I hope you are not just trying to repeat the same Tu quoque fallacy that I already addressed in this thread. Plus I do think they should have good working conditions, so I'm not sure what your point is.
Quoting Cheshire
How exactly did you come to that conclusion? Watch videos showing what they do to pigs and cows, and you'll see that their pain is by no means minimal.
Again, if a vast amount of people continue to demand the products of their exploitation, then obviously more animals will continue to suffer to a very significant degree, and one simple way to diminish that suffering is for many people to stop demanding those products.
Quoting Cheshire
Regardless if it is done for fun, as it's done with bullfighting in some countries, or for food as it's done to cows, pigs, chickens,etc. the amount of suffering caused to animals in both cases is comparable. Those people in the meat industry who don't cause suffering to animals for fun, but rather because they think there's no other way to kill them, and think they have to do it for whatever reason, are causing the same amount of suffering as those who feel a morbid pleasure or amusement out of doing the same thing.
Of course doing something bad for fun is worse than doing something wrong because one isn't aware that it is wrong, or because one thinks it's a necessary evil, but in the latter cases you just need to investigate and be more constantly self-critical of your actions and moral principles to realize your mistake.
Once the person becomes aware that what they are doing is wrong according to their own moral compass, then they have no excuse to continue doing something that they know is wrong, and those who continue doing it despite knowing that it's wrong do so only due to cognitive dissonance.
Here are some possible definitions of the word “cruelty”:
A) “Callous indifference to or pleasure in causing pain and suffering”.
B) “Behavior that causes pain or suffering to a person or animal”.
C) “Behavior which causes physical or mental harm to another, especially a spouse, whether intentionally or not”. (a legal definition)
It is definition B which I had in mind, which only implies that the collective behavior of purchasing animal products causes more suffering to them, which is an observation of fact, with no emotional element mixed in at all.
The only emotional element that I see in what I said is whether one cares about the suffering of animals more than about tasting some particular flavor or not. If you care more about the latter, nothing that I say about this subject will persuade you.
Quoting Cheshire
Seems to me like you didn't understand what I said, I'm not saying that purchasing animal products is just as bad as murdering or stealing, I'm saying that many of the arguments used to justify purchasing animal products are such as we would never admit as a justification of other acts which also cause a significant amount of suffering, such as murdering and stealing. And if those arguments were valid as a justification for causing suffering to animals, then necessarily they would also justify those other actions.
If we determined in an ethical debate that the collective purchasing of animals is morally reprehensible, then to argue that everybody is free to choose whether to do that or not, is as bad to argue that everybody can just choose whether or not they want to murder, steal or have slaves. And that doesn't imply that stealing, murdering and having slaves are all equally bad actions.
Quoting Cheshire
To oppose to all torture is also to take an absolutist position. Does that imply it's unreasonable to oppose to all torture? Of course not.
What's more, I'm not an absolutist since, as I said before, I think purchasing animal products can be justified in some cases for health reasons, when the person has no other choice if they want to stay healthy.
Is "torture" a less loaded word or do you have a novel definition of this as well. Best I can tell is you don't believe you.
I took those definitions from a dictionary, I didn't make them up. Anyhow, think specifically about physically torturing humans for amusement. I don't think it's unreasonable to be opposed to that in all circumstances. That's an absolutist position, and also a perfectly reasonable one.
But like I said, I think purchasing animal products is not bad in all circumstances, so I don't take an absolutist view there.
You definitely are of the evangelist sort, just looking at the loaded terms you use and from the debate with others. I have no desire to debate an issue of faith. It goes absolutely nowhere.
Freedom of religion, I guess.
I commend the reasonableness of your discourse. Some people choose to "double down" on an emotional argument and I can see you're willing to consider both sides, so you have my respect in that regard.
The above represents a couple different directions. To be vegan is to reject animal products as an ideal or a reality. If we're honoring the ideal, then yes you will need prove it's as bad as torturing people for fun. But, that seems untenable. So, the alternative you have presented is the realistic belief that it's 'not bad' in all circumstances. I'd suggest a duality where the ideal moral life is one where nothing is harmed, but understand the reality is one of varying levels of immoral but yet permissible actions. The question remains whether you have the right to judge another person's actions. I think that's the core issue at hand; when a vegan imposes their judgement on others knowing full well they did (and probably still do on occasion) use animals as means to an end.
Why? I think all I'd have to prove is that it's bad, even if it's not as bad as torturing people. I gave examples of other actions that I consider bad, not to imply that they are all equally bad, but only to imply that I consider them all to be bad to certain different degrees.
Quoting Cheshire
What do you take “imposing” to mean? As I understand the term, I'm not imposing anything, unless you think that stating one's view on a subject and suggesting to others what one thinks they should do is to impose my views on them. They are free to accept or reject my advice. If I tell a thief that I think he should stop stealing, am I “imposing” my life style or ethical philosophy to him? (And no, I'm not saying that one person buying a burger is just as bad as one person stealing someone's car, I just want to understand what you mean by “imposing”).
I've already said that I only want to express my view on the matter so that people can think about the matter for themselves, and according to their own ethical principles. If someone disagrees with my view, then there's nothing else I can do besides asking them for the reason of their rejection (if they want to give it), and if I think their arguments for rejecting my views are fallacious, shouldn't I point out where I think their errors are?
Quoting Cheshire
That's right, for example: I don't think someone who buys animal products because they would have health problems if they didn't, or because they don't have access to the necessary kinds of food to maintain a healthy diet as well as B12 supplements; is doing something bad.
But such cases are not very common, it seems to me that a great number of people don't have such impediments (and many mistakenly think they do, because, it seems to me, they haven't done enough research). So how do those who don't have those problems justify to themselves doing something which collectively causes animals to suffer (supposing they are aware of it)? Besides meat tasting good and the like, I mean.
Quoting Amalac
Imposing or labeling other people's moral choices with your judgement. A person buying a burger has zero effect on your life and the choices you make. You wouldn't want someone telling you right and wrong would you? I agree, bringing up different examples of moral and immoral actions isn't helpful.
It's taking the position of a false authority over when animal pain is permissible that seems so vexing. It creates of subtext of needing to guilt trip people as if they can't make a decision without your approval. Then, assuming they owe you justification for how they live; it's an unpleasant implicit superiority or simply lacking the willingness to respect others right to make their own mistakes. Oddly, none of my objections are about the idea of being vegan; like others have said it's the attitude; like a dietary fascism where there's an ingroup and outgroup. What if I decide to eat simply less meat? Am I good or bad or a torturing-murderous-guiltless thief. Most people don't want to hurt animals. Not a novel idea.
Doesn't free speech allow me to say if I consider someone's actions right or wrong according to my moral compass and giving reasons for my judgement? Am I not even allowed to say that?
Quoting Cheshire
If it was only one person, sure, but when speaking publicly one tries to reach as many people as one can. If many people buy burgers, that will have a direct effect on sentient beings, which will also have an effect on me, when I contemplate the suffering caused by those actions.
Quoting Cheshire
I honestly don't mind people judging my beliefs and actions and telling me what they think is right and wrong, they are free to do it. If I felt mad or annoyed by that, I'd think that's my problem, for why would I feel shaken by their words if I was sure that I'm not doing anything bad?
Quoting Cheshire
You didn't answer my question though, if by telling a thief that I think he should stop stealing, give reasons for making that judgement and criticize the arguments he invokes to justify his actions, I'm “imposing” my worldview on them, then under that interpretation I don't think adopting an “imposing” attitude is necessarily a bad thing to do.
Quoting Cheshire
Some people may infer that, but only because they are putting words in my mouth, since I have never claimed, either explicitly or implicitly, that they must consult me before making moral choices. They don't even have to read my posts if they don't want to.
On the contrary, I've emphatically stated that people should judge the morality of their actions according to their own moral/ethical principles, for like the third time now.
Quoting Cheshire
They don't “owe” me a justification, if they don't want to answer my questions they can simply ignore me and stay silent.
I'm merely suggesting that they should ponder how they justify those actions to themselves, according to their own moral principles. If some people don't want to even think about it, then I can't do anything else besides asking them why they don't want to do it, if they are willing to tell me.
Quoting Cheshire
Again, it seems to me that accusations of “implicit superiority” are often just a way to add claims which the other party has never made, to create a straw man. Not once have I implied that someone who is vegan is a better person than someone who isn't, just because of being vegan, nor have I claimed that purchasing animal products turns someone into a bad person.
For example, I wouldn't think Hitler was a good person just because I found out that he was vegan, because the atrocities that he did far outweigh that. And I know people who are not vegan, but greatly help to diminish the amount of suffering in the world a lot with donations to charity and the like, and I don't think they are morally worse than many vegans. What I do think is that they would be even more morally good, as well as more consistent with their principles of decreasing the suffering in the world, if they stopped buying animal products.
Of course, a single person's abstention probably won't, if at all, make a significant difference to the total amount of suffering, but many people's abstention certainly would, something which can't be achieved if everyone thinks that their individual abstention doesn't change anything, which would have the consequence that animals would continue to suffer.
To my eyes that would be an advance. I do think it's better to, for example, eat a burger per month instead of eating a burger per day, and that not eating any burgers is even better.
If some people don't want to stop buying animal products completely right away, that's fine, they can go at their own pace and start by buying less meat.
I think the false dilemma of people being either completely good or completely bad, with no degrees of goodness in between, should be avoided.
I agree, but does "mainstream" vegan doctrine?
I'm aware that there are many vegans, in Central and South America for instance, who espouse different, more radical views than mine. Those who, for instance, seem to think eating a burger per month is just as bad as eating a burger per day, or that it's bad even to eat some dead animal struck by lightning you find on the street.
I think those kinds of tenets are absurd and dogmatic, and if I'm not considered a vegan for not adhering to them, then I don't mind giving up that label. The same applies to someone who fancied himself morally superior to others who buy animal products, merely because they don't.
One person chooses to go vegan, another may visit lonely elders in nursing homes, and yet another donates money to the homeless, etc. What makes one better than the other?
Should people who visit lonely elders in nursing homes go around telling other people that they would live more moral lives if they too visited lonely elders in nursing homes?
My criteria for measuring moral goodness would be how much that person's actions decrease the total amount of suffering of sentient beings, as well as how much they contribute to increase the total amount of joy, pleasure and peace in the world.
Quoting Tzeentch
They could suggest it as one way to be a more moral person, sure, but I think one should ask oneself if visiting lonely elders is truly the best thing one can do, in terms of reducing suffering and increasing happiness in the world, with one's available time and resources. That's one of the main ideas behind effective altruism, as is advocated by Peter Singer among other philosophers.
Singer gave an example to illustrate this: with the same amount of money, you can either train a guide dog to give to a blind man, or you can cure between 400 - 2000 people of blindness by donating to the right charities. It's obvious that although the former is a good action, the latter is a far better one, so that it's better to help those charities instead.
In the case of veganism, once I researched into how to have a healthy vegan diet, and as to the cost of maintaining it, I determined that the better course of action in my circumstances would be to stop purchasing animal products. Notice that unlike the case of giving a guide dog to a blind man, there is no opportunity cost problem here, because I only have to abstain from certain actions.
The question I ask myself to determine the most moral choice or course of action I have at my disposal is the following: which of my choices and actions are more likely to lead to a better total balance of positive mental states (pleasure, happiness, joy, peace of mind, ...) and negative mental states (pain, sadness, boredom, despair, ...) in the world?
Juck.
This argument is weak because livestock feed off agriculture. IOW we grow stuff and thus kill animals in the process of that wing of agriculture to feed livestock who are then eaten. Livestock require more land per ounce of nutritive whatever than an ounce of non-meat foods. So, yes, they contribute, but vegans would contribute less to even agricultural plant deaths and attendant animals deaths.
For what it's worth I think there are several reasons why people hate vegans:
1) some vegans are pedantic smug moralists.
2) many people don't want to think about the effects of their eating and wrestle with any issues there.
What a persuasive argument, you just don't like what I said there. Maybe you could say why that is? Why you dislike effective altruism, I mean.
Is not based on facts is based on cultural perspective. You can tell truth and statistics till " Your blue in the face" you aren't providing enough motivating reason to change societies perspective and life style.
Hence why I said "Meat is an addiction"
Facts and data will not change societies sentiment.
Typical BC crankiness. Veganism has NOTHING to do with flavor profiles or ingredient choice outside of not deliberately contributing to animal suffering by the methods/products used in making the food item.
See this, for instance (though I won't claim that any of these are the best frosting you'll ever eat, just that LOTS of people eat them happily).
What "mainstream" veganism is I couldn't tell you, but you might be interested to know that vegans are keenly aware of the symbolic nature of their veganism and how there are far more impactful ways to reduce animal suffering. Further, vegans are also aware that the increased public food choice that they enjoy comes not from the demand of vegans, but from the push to reduce meat/animal product consumption for health/environmental reasons. Stupidity/ignorance is not a problem of vegans.
Where there is tension around reduced animal suffering for non "vegan" reasons is the extent to which vegans should advocate for or economically support non-vegan solutions/enterprises. Encouraging meat reduction on "meatless Mondays" or going to Burger King to buy an Impossible Whopper are debated, but my suspicion is that a significant percentage (if not majority) of self-identified vegans are glad to have more choice and less animal suffering. Any reduction in animal suffering is better than non and veganism is not about self-denial or "purity."
From inception, veganism has recognized that eliminating animal suffering is aspirational and not possible to do completely. Veganism is, therefore, inherently pragmatic and non-absolutist. The same way that most people suck at knowing things about the doctrine of their groups, most vegans suck at it. Having an encounter with a misinformed evangelizing vegan is no different than having an encounter with a misinformed evangelizing Western secular liberal (especially those that hold the US up as being the best form of government ever).
It's my specialty.
Quoting Ennui Elucidator
Yes, true. However...
Deviant food choices have been a vehicle for personal expression, personal exceptionalism, and personal validation for centuries, but I've only been annoyed by it since the 1970s. 50 years ago there were 'whole foods' (not the Amazon-owned stores). Think dense, heavy bread); think the early food coops, which being amateur operations at the time, had the sorriest looking produce in town. And bins of beans, unmilled wheat, none of it very sanitary. I shopped at them when I was out slumming and as a way of virtue signaling (which wasn't a thing yet).
There are a lot of food fetishes around. Vegetarianism/veganism has a sound pedigree, even if it is fetishistic.
Cruelty to animals. Yes: industrial agriculture results in domestic food animal cruelty. I get that. Our global, industrial, technological, mass culture also results in extensive animal cruelty, visited upon food animals and the much larger population of wild creatures, great and small. Plants too. I don't like it, but there is no real "opt out" other than one's personal demise,
A lot of the food fetishes are inadvertently on the right track: eat less meat and less fat; eat more unprocessed or minimally processed fruits, vegetables, and grains--for whatever reason. Got it.
The problem is this: One doesn't achieve virtue by following a particular menu. An affluent vegan's footprint will be larger than a poor carnivore's. Pillsbury's frosting may be vegan but it is still industrial in every sense of the word.
I don't have a solution to the problem of global, industrial, technological, mass culture. Nobody else does either, as far as I know.
Veganism is not a diet, but a lifestyle informed by a relatively simple ethic: “[t]he principle of the emancipation of animals from exploitation by man." Although the discussion frequently gets caught up in suffering, pain, rights theory, etc., that isn't what veganism is about. Discussions of specieism is closer to the mark. To the extent that people think of veganism as being about food primarily, it is because eating is the most frequent forum in which people encounter animal exploitation. Vegans are not anti-industry. They are not anti-science. They are not concerned with "vitalism" or any particular take on nutrition and what is "most" healthy for humans.
Don't exploit animals - all the rest is commentary.
https://theveganreview.com/why-people-get-angry-vegan-hate-discrimination/
"Why do people get angry towards vegans?" - Lisa Gawthorne
That's why I am not a vegan. The exploitation of animals is an essential human trait that extends back into era of Homo erectus and earlier. We evolved as an exploiter of the available resources. Some animals were bred into beasts of burden and traction. Others for fiber, meat, milk, and eggs. Without resource exploitation, we ourselves would have died out long ago. We learned how to exploit plants (and minerals).
Does the horse and the ox dislike pulling plows, wagons, and chariots? Probably no more than people dislike a lot of the jobs they have to do. Does a sheep mourn the loss of its wool? Probably not. It might feel good, like getting an overdue haircut.
We may well be exceeding the tolerable level of exploitation of our planet. We should have been more careful, and we had best get more careful pretty damn quickly if we want a future. We should eat less meat and milk because of its burden on resources, even as we continue to exploit cattle. Wool? Perhaps more sustainable than polyester. They fertilize the soil on which their grass grows. Same for cattle, if grass fed.
I like meat. Converting a pig into a pork chop does not have to be a horrifying process. Profits and cheap meat pretty much require it. Same for any other animal product.
I am not sure whether people "hate vegans" as much as find them annoying. I think it rude to show up at carnivore social event and demand animal-free food. It would be equally rude for a carnivore to show up at a vegan social event and demand meat.
Vegans count as "picky eaters" because they exclude everyday foods that cost people eat. I understand how people with celeriac disease really have to exclude gluten from their diet, but then there are people who don't have any degree of celeriac disease but think gluten free is cool, and expect others to accommodate them. Same for people who insist on organic foods.
When I prepare a meal for a local homeless shelter, I am happy to make vegan food that is attractive, flavorful, and nutritious. I exclude pork (usually) because there are sometimes homeless Moslems there. If someone just happens to not like pork, well... tough. Just eat what's on your plate. [I'll eat cilantro / coriander without making an issue of it, even though I think it is disgusting.]
Granted, learning to replace daily meat servings with vegetables, beans, and grains takes learning, technique, and practice.
Another approach to reduced meat consumption is to use meat as an ingredient rather than the main course. That's what pizza or spaghetti does.
So because we were horrible before we should go on being horrible forever? Expanding our scope of moral regard is generally thought to be a sign of progress, not of justifying the status quo. Sure, once upon a time our survival was enhanced by the things we did. Were they necessary? Who knows. History would have gone differently had they done otherwise, but counterfactuals aren't very useful. What we can say is that we did what we did.
Without a doubt, people that have limited diets for ethical reasons make communal eating events harder, but then so did serving people who refused to eat sugar. Ending exploitation by way of consumption choices is not the invention of vegans. You can, however, just not invite the vegans or fail to accommodate them. It isn't like vegans don't expect to get the short end of the food stick.
OK, then. Just take that delicious vegan risotto back to the kitchen. We'll have it tomorrow.
Quoting Ennui Elucidator
Sure. But as you know, morality and ethics are not simple issues. Does having the same moral regard for an elegant horse and a shrimp make sense? Does an ox pulling a plow deserve the same regard that the man pushing and guiding the plow deserves? I don't think so.
The connection between the cow and the Big Mac has been made very tenuous through the mechanisms of commerce. Is it moral to demand that a person eating at McDonalds feel guilt for exploiting an animal so far removed from his or her existence? No.
I believe that eating meat is in and of itself a moral act. Can bad practices on farms and in slaughter-houses rise to the level of immorality? They can. They have. I have chopped off the heads of chickens and I did not feel guilty. It was a quick death--"a quick chippy choppy on a big black block". These chickens were genuine free-range birds.
I recognize a continuum between the man and worms. We share in "life" but we are not equal. As an animal's complexity of existence rises, we grow closer. A chicken and a parrot probably don't have to much in common either. So a chicken and a man have much, much less in common than a dog and a man have in common. Pigs and man have all too much in common.
I like your answer.
It makes sense to me and I admire your generosity to volunteer for the homeless. And utilizing your cooking skills to spread joy to the less fortunate.
As a passionate Chef and Food critic I do acknowledge Veganism as a challenge to me since cooking is like art to me. I do find it disturbing something as simple as eating a ham sandwich can be politicalized in such extreme way.
A nice principle, achievable only by ending the practice of factory farming. Otherwise there will always be $1/lb wholesale slop.
But you are absolutely right -- they weren't eating factory raised meat 100 years ago and more. Food was pretty much all organic, range or grass fed, and fairly lean up until the 20th century. Range fed beef has a distinct flavor that is noticeably different than feed-lot fed. I'm not sure whether free range chicken tastes better than shed raised birds. One can only free-range a small number of chickens; spreading 30,000 chickens out on the ground is possible, of course, but chickens like to roost indoors at night. I suppose border collies could be raised to manage the flocks and keep foxes and coyotes away. Not much one can do about hawks and eagles.
Food has been politicized for an awfully long time - be it in the context of class or nation (religion, if you must).
One day two cannibals are eating a clown. After a little while, the first cannibal turns to the second and says, "Hey, does this guy taste funny to you?"
What passes for acceptable food choices around the world is not nearly as uniform as a secular-Christian nation might suggest.