Here is what I don't get: why do everyone (especially yanks and Aussies) fly completely off the handle against Japan on whaling? I mean, at least Japan PRETENDS they respect the moratorium on whaling, exploiting a "scientific whaling" loophole. Norway and Iceland are still hunting those floating meatballs, and we don't even deign to honor the moratorium with as much as an empty gesture. Good thing too...they're delicious. Yum!
Because it's easier to say "oh, those crazy Japanese". Plus, "dopheen and whare" sounds funnier than any Icelandic accent could. Shittily run farms and festering feedlots, I have issues with. Properly managed farms raising delicious meat from healthy animals, like the one my college operates? Fuck yeah, gnaw that corpse! I often wonder about what the best method of meat production is, but I can't decide between a comfortable life in captivity with a quick death (farm, slaughterhouse), or a free but probably uncomfortable life in the wild followed by a quick death (hunting). I'm thinking hunting would probably be better from an environmental perspective** (culling populations, only taking animals that have had their chances to breed), but I can't see that meeting the demand for meat any time soon. Animal welfare, I'm totally for, cruelty or neglect of something under your care is a dick move. However, what PETA and ilk demand is "Animal Rights"(well, really attention, but in theory animal rights too). I don't exactly see why animals have any more rights than any other living thing. If people accuse meat-eaters of being species-ist* when they say that food animals are below us, can everyone agree that we're all Kingdom-ist* when everyone says that it's totally cool to chomp down on plants and fungi? The only way to get food without something dying is to either gnaw carcasses (that you had no influence in creating) or eat dirt. I prefer to base my consumption choices on how smart they are (and how tasty). I'd probably eat a chimp or dolphin if it was killed for some reason besides food production(no sense in wasting good meat), but I wouldn't support any sort of organized/intentional harvesting of those critters. Dog and cat aren't my personal preferences for meet, but I don't have an issue with others (Chow-)chowing down. I haven't addressed the issue of pain that people often bring up when they discuss the whole "killing animals" thing. If done well, there doesn't really need to be that much pain, if you're doing it right the brain shouldn't be getting blood/signals from the body for very long. Jews and Muslims might complain about the impact that such rulings would have on kosher slaughtering, but I have a sneaking suspicion that religious rules often change over time to accommodate changing societies. *Stupid term **I think more people could be supported if everyone ate only plants, just due to the lower trophic level involved in that; however, I'm pretty sure that would involve a significant loss of biodiversity. I like biodiversity.
Dude, you realize that your argument for why it's okay to squash bugs but not whales is text book speciesism, right? We shouldn't kill whales because they're one of the good species = speciesism. But, I do agree, we should avoid killing whales, and killing bugs is okay. In fact, speciesism is okay. Protect the species that are really special, and factory farm the ones that aren't. The difference between a meat eater and a vegan is where they draw the line for what species are worthy of avoiding the grinder. Both are speciesist.
Let’s not forget that farmed meat is specifically grown to be food whereas a whale is just hanging out in the ocean, being massive and singing annoying tunes when some asshole shoots a ballistic harpoon onto his back and drags him into a ship to be brutally butchered. It would be the same as hunting a panda with a spear gun then dragging it’s haemorrhaging body into a truck and chopping it up with an axe. Fucking uncool.
You know what? Fuck "humane". It's a bullshit term built up over years by browbeating moralists. When it all boils down to it, humans are animals. Except some, they're vegetables. Step outside any given day of the week and you'll find animals killing animals. Take your pick, we've got all sorts of death from quick clean kills right down to parasites that eat their host from the inside out (I even found out about a lovely larvae that eats its host's non-essential organs to prolong to feast). There's even killing for purposes other than food. Forget territoriality, dominance and mating; there's animals like the cuckoo in which some sub-species are brood parasites that lay their eggs in other bird species' nest for them to raise the brat. We've even got animals that farm and propagate other animals. Dolphins will herd and corral fish to eat them. Cats will play with their prey for hours before eating them. Humans are just better, and more co-ordinated, at it. It's in our nature to do the best we can to ensure the survival of ourselves and our species. That's nature for you. Not the hippy, tree hugging bullshit. We're an apex predator. If it tastes good, someone will eat it. Sure, that's bad karma or whatever, but it's the start point of the argument. The PETA-like stance is not that start point. But they sure treat it that way, in that anything removed from their point of view is a deviation. It's not, they're the deviants.
Sorry, I can't let this go. I've been drinking, so let me see if I understand you here. Slavery was bad because blacks were seen as nothing more than a means to an end. Because of this lack of respect for black people, they were treated horribly. Nothing mattered as long as we got that cotton. And in the same way, chickens are seen as a means to an end. Because of this viewpoint chickens are treated badly. Nothing matters as long as we get our KFC bucket. So slavery is comparable to the chicken farming we saw in the video. Am I understanding you? I hope that's not your argument because... FUCKING CHICKENS DO NOT DESERVE THE SAME RESPECT AND DIGNITY AS A FUCKING HUMAN. I don't care if chickens are sling shot off the grand canyon for sport and the person who creates the biggest chicken splatter wins. And the loser has to shove his shit down the rest of the live chickens throats while ass fucking it to the musical rhythms of Enya just before it goes feet first into a wood chipper full of super aids. You don't fucking compare that shit to human slavery. Now, I don't like to see animal abuse for the sake of animal abuse. That's just fucked up and twisted. But if it comes down to efficiently killing a bunch of food so humans can eat at a low cost or making sure every animal dies in a PETA approved fashion which will raise food prices for humans by 10 times, I'll take the easy cost effective kill. You know, so people don't starve at the expense of a chicken beak. Here's the thing with PETA. They could bring up a legitimate issue that involves widespread unethical behavior toward animals. I still would blow off their message because they always seem to pick out the worst 1-5% and portray it as the norm. They loose all credibility with me, which is sad, because it would be nice if there were people who gave a shit about animals that weren't huge fucking morons. Maybe it's because I hunt and butcher my own food, but I always find these stories kinda funny. It's almost as if people are so far removed from the source of their meal that the sight of a bloody chicken is enough to disgust them to the whole process. I remember watching some documentary that showed a cow getting butchered. It was a quick and painless death with lots of blood and flesh being hacked from the body. It was meant to show how terrible the process of killing a cow is but all I could think was "how in the fuck else are you going to get meat from an animal?" I think a lot of outrage at animal cruelty comes from people who have lived in a city their whole life and think food gets magiced to the grocery store every few days. Speaking of which...
I didn't say anything about right. And I certainly didn't 'mean' anything about right. Right implies that there's a value decision or a judgment call or moral stand, or whatever you want to call it. I'm talking about what's natural. As far as I know, there's only creature in the world who gives a shit about morals, and that's human beings. Others might, but we can't ascertain that for sure. And to my understanding, humans have only done that over time by building upon their natural state... which was to live in caves, avoid anything that would eat them and eat anything they could catch. Anything built on top of that was initially as a means of protection and for mating (in turn, because they could protect their women and young'uns from others stealing them).
This is a moronic argument, but I'll try to be polite. 'Fuck Humane'? Sure, Okay, next time you run into trouble with the law you won't have a problem with them beating the shit out of you and then throwing you down a well. Becuase, fuck 'humane' right? Our morality and ethical codes are bullshit, we are just animals. And then, I think you go on to try and justify meat eating by saying we should do what's best for our species. Now for starters, I have no problem with meat consumption, it's ethical treatment of animals up to their slaughter I'm concerned with. But anyway, if we wanted to do what's best for our species, we'd cut down on our meat intake drastically. The land used to feed cattle could produce much more over all food if we grew stuff for human consumption. Also the lack of McDonalds and KFC's would do wonders for the average persons health. Either way, your argument, sir, is all one big logical fallacy. I'll let you try and work out which one it is, you might learn something in the process.
That word. I do not think it means what you think it means. Humane refers to courtesy, sympathy, and civility. "Humane" does not mean you're more nonviolent than Gandhi. The idea behind raising animals for meat in a humane way is that you give them a decent/good life and a quick death. You don't need to start sucking off bulls to treat them in a humane way, you just need to not be an asshole. Causing harm for shits and giggles? Not humane. Killing quickly? Might not be very nice to the animal, but it's more humane than most expected natural deaths. What exactly are you losing when you treat animals humanely? Is there a compelling reason to be a dick to animals? Yeah, they do. Nature's like that. However, we have other ways to amuse ourselves than killing critters. "Natural" and "good" are not synonyms, you can eat some green potatoes to learn more about that. If we can do something better than nature can, why not do it? I know my teeth won't bring down an animal quickly, that's what .30-06 and spears are for. I know that killing an animal for my entertainment is unnecessary, I have books and chess and video games.
Okay, let me break this down simply because some people seem to have missed the point. Maybe I didn't explain it enough for some, but I was in a hurry when I posted... and a tad pissed off for ulterior reasons. I referred to the term humane in the way it is often bandied around, at least that I've seen, and not in its strict sense. Like I said, "built up over the years". It's often used as a weapon, and narrowly applied to a particular circumstance without considering the totality. I agree there's many instances where the treatment of animals is inhumane. I'm an animal lover myself. But groups like PETA fire the term all over the place with, what looks like, abandon. I have no problem with being humane, but it's starting to get a bit like the boy who cried wolf. The question of being humane to what level is a separate argument, and it is a judgment call. The second point is that, I feel, there needs to be an acceptance of nature and nurture. Our morality and ethical codes are not bullshit, but they are a product of our nurture (over time). The development of these, from a starting point, was for the protection of our species. At this stage, it's a very complicated situation to unravel, and talking about McDonalds and KFC versus personal protection only speaks to that. But the germination of society and community came from the idea that a group of us had a better chance of survival than one person alone. It is fine and correct to say that the desire to band together is also in our nature. From there, though, mankind has developed in different ways depending on race, creed, geographical location and any number of other factors. Different groups have different values. For example, I love dogs. From what I know, earliest domesticated dogs arose from a symbiotic relationship between man and beast where dogs served as lookout and guard, and man shared his kills. I might be wrong, but that makes sense to me. They're a lovable animal, we share close emotional bonds with them, they're intelligent and they still help protect us. A lot of backwater Koreans see them as a food source and would look at you as if you had two heads if you yelled and screamed at them for their treatment. I'm not bashing these people, or defending them. I'm just saying this is how it is. Personally, I consider it wrong. But their morality and ethical codes do not. It's an isolated example, but an indicative one. And you could come up with an argument to counter it. But, it still happens. We know, for further example, how Japanese see whales. That's just the way they developed. Don't get me started on people milking bears for their bile. I find it abhorrent. The people who do it obviously don't. As a milder and more domestic example, look at the difference of opinion between most city folk and country folk when it comes to animals. City folk see pets first. Country folk see food source or worker first, pet second. I grew up on a small farm, I saw it from both sides. The common denominator, though, is that by nature we're designed to exploit our resources for our own betterment. Moral and ethical codes, where they exist and to what extent, taper and shape how we are prepared to do that. We consider that upholding those values are of utmost importance for the preservation and betterment of society. Possibly, arguably, because resources aren't scarce enough to dismantle those notions. It's inflammatory to say it but I will; morals and ethics don't fill your belly when you're starving to death. Nature isn't good or bad, it's not even really indifferent. It just is. There's not a lot of grey area. You need food to live, no matter how you get it. In the best case scenario, you get it as quickly and easily as you can to avoid wasting energy or getting hurt. We're the ones who added the caveats onto that, not nature. Animals don't give two shits about their food source's feelings on the matter, or how they go down. Really, I'm pissed off at the extremists. They're so fanatical, I tend to get touchy and can go overboard. I see a "meat is murder" or a "fur is murder" bumper sticker and it annoys the hell out of me. It shouldn't, because people have the right to state their views just as I have the right to counter that view. There's a holier than thou attitude that we have to do this and we have to do that. We don't have to; we choose to. Personally, I choose to, to a large degree, as well. But I understand that it's not a requirement.
Here's the difference between humans and animals: humans are moral agents. We can make moral decisions and be held morally accountable for our actions. When you dog shits on the carpet, and you say he's a "bad" dog, what you mean is that he's a poorly trained dog, not that he's a morally bad dog. When a person shits on your carpet, he's poorly trained, but he's also a morally bad person. Moral agency gives us certain rights. I don't know why, but it just does, the same way PETA members think that being in the animal kingdom confers more rights than being a plant or a bacterium. We're in the animal kingdom, but there's something unique about us that lets us distinguish our species from other species. I would prefer that my meat be raised humanely and organically and whatnot, but I also prefer that I can afford to eat meat. Cruelty-free meat is expensive, and if you can afford it, great, but I don't think we should let our high-and-mighty ideals make chicken McNuggets into a luxury item. But, it's still wrong to harm animals for amusement, and it's wrong to hunt whales. Harming animals for the sake of harming them and deriving pleasure from that harm either breeds sociopaths, or simply reveals who's already a sociopath. Either way, we're all better off when our neighbors don't get pleasure from harming things, the same way we're better off when our neighbors aren't vandals, or don't ruin global sporting contests by playing the vuvuzela 90 minutes non-stop. It's not wrong to hunt a whale because it's an animal, it's wrong to hunt them because they're special. They're intelligent, beautiful, magnificent creatures, and there aren't very many of them. It's wrong to hunt them in the same way it's wrong to deface a great work of art, or cut down a giant redwood. Having these things on our planet enriches our lives, and we should preserve them. But, chickens and cows are not fucking special, and we're not likely to farm them into extinction.
I don't understand this sentiment. I understand that whales are intelligent, some of them are endangered, and some people may find them beautiful. However, the act of killing them is not inherently immoral because of these things. What if whales were the source some incredibly valuable, rare resource? Calling to this thread, what if we discovered that some species of whale, as rare and intelligent as any other, contained a cure for cancer? And not just a speculated cure, like the one found in the articles there, but a tested and proven, all-encompassing, cheap cure for cancer. If we could capture some of these whales, contain them in a farm, and breed them for slaughter, would that still be immoral? If the medicine taken from one whale could save, say, a thousand people from a miserable, painful death, would you oppose this? If not, what if one whale could cure every person on earth who has cancer? Is killing it still inherently wrong, just because it is an "intelligent, beautiful, magnificent creature"? If this is acceptable, and I hope that you would agree that it is, then the simple act of killing a whale is not inherently immoral. Just because you believe that an animal is special doesn't mean that killing it a damnable offense. Whales, like every other creature on Earth, are just animals. If, to humans, the value of an animal dead is greater than the value of it alive, then there is no reason that we should treat it as a sacred cow, and we should exploit the animal like any other resource.
We can't understand other animals. Without relating to them we apply our standards to their life's are valuable based upon rarity, usefulness, cuteness or whatever. We can place them lower than ourselves and it makes it easy. I hate to advocate "ignorance is bliss", but applying moral standards in regards to taking the life of another animal simply isn't worth it. Maybe one day we will understand another species. Maybe we'll empathize, regret our killing of their species and express our apologizes with a heartfelt, "oink". Until then though let's just blindfold ourselves and eat some good food.
Yes, I hold it would most certainly be wrong to kill a whale in most foreseeable circumstances. Again, it's very hard to provide a rationality for this, but they are such amazing, beautiful and intelligent creatures that they really make the cut of 'Animals which should be left the fuck alone'.
I really wish there was a good way to sum up ¨probably not a good idea¨ into something as snappy as ¨illegal¨or ¨immoral¨. I don´t think it is a good idea to make any species extinct until we´re pretty damn sure we won´t be missing anything. As much as I wish mosquitos would stop existing, I know that they play a vital role in the food web, and their DNA might contain something of interest to humans.
My feeling is that resources which are rare/irreplaceable should not be used. Whales are different from chickens because you can't mass-produce whales on a factory farm. There are a relatively small number of them, and they breed and mature rather slowly -- when you hunt whales, you're driving them to extinction. This is also why I think it's immoral to cut down a thousand-year-old redwood while it's perfectly okay to raze acres of other forest. The difference between dogs and chickens? Dogs are fucking awesome and we prefer to have them as pets, rather than food. We're allowed as a society to freely make these decisions. There are some cultures that eat dogs -- I don't agree with it, but I'm not going to rally to stop them (because dogs aren't a rare/irreplaceable resource). Lastly, as moral agents, as Bl1Y puts it, I think it's our responsibility to make animal slaughter as painless as possible. Notice I don't say "totally painless" or advocate that the animals should be allowed to live full lives roaming the fields, because that's simply not possible. We have a population in the U.S. of over 300 million people, and those people need to eat. The only way to manufacture enough food is through mass factory production. The suffering of the animals should be mitigated as much as possible without sacrificing the necessary amount of production.
Truly an excellent post; I don't know how it's possible to disagree with any of your three main points. I will say that it it possible for all humans to subsist on a purely vegetarian diet; however, there are consequences for this. Certain nutrients essential to human brain functions, muscle development, overall mood, and energy can only be found in meat. This is especially true for children, who will often grow up more frail, shorter, and easily fatigued without animal protein and related nutrients. Furthermore, to make up for this deficit, a vegetarian will often have to eat a surprisingly large amount of greens. Thus, it's still possible to over-eat and be fat while being a vegetarian. (I've seen it)
I'm curious how the people who advocate a "caveman diet" square that with being vegetarian. While our bodies aren't designed to run on processed meats and synthetic animal hormones, we are designed to run on animal meat. Are there any intelligent animals that are purely vegetarian? Even chimps eat insects.