Plenty of foods are delicious.
So ethics aren’t a concern for you. How about the adverse health effects, or environmental impacts of the meat industry? Any considerations there, or is all about how delicious steak is to you?
You know there’s a lot of valid ethical frameworks that do not espouse veganism?
It’s safer to say “YOUR ethics aren’t a concern to him”, or to me. There’s a lot of philosophers who eat meat. And it’s not hypocritical. They just think you’re wrong. You aren’t God (and even if you were, God doesn’t get to decide ethics).
As for adverse health effects, I have known dozens of ex-vegans, one with an degree in nutrition, who left veganism despite their ethics, for health reasons. Generally speaking, it’s easier to “accidentally” have an reasonably ok diet with a full balanced mix of foods than it is for a vegan to intentionally have one.
or environmental impacts of the meat industry?
This is actually an incredibly complicated accusation, and unless you enter the conversation with the conclusion in mind, there’s not enough evidence/arguments out there to show that it’s “the meat industry” that’s the real environmental problem with our food industry. As someone who has shared a table with experts on a few occasions and then done some of my own armchair research, I’m convinced the two real problems are non-local food and factory farming. The former creates polluting logicistical overhead in transport and over-storage of food (fossil fuels for driving, non-recyclable plastics, etc) and the latter in willful destruction of environment to get more output cheaper, when we have plenty of room and plenty of margins to “do it right”
As for “to do it right”, part of doing it right is acknowledging that we have a compost/manure shortfall against crops NOT because we’re not producing enough manure but because we don’t have localized meat farms balanced in each area around their crop farms, and/or that it’s considered acceptable to use fertilizers despite the presence of manure that would better fertilize a crop. So the better answer? Local meat, and transition away from factory farms. And if you’ve got the land and the courage for it, keep some chickens for eggs and goats for meat/manure.
My 2c anyway.
or is all about how delicious steak is to you?
AND it is about how delicious a steak is to me. Have you ever walked a local farm with the people who do all the work? Helped them pick out the pigs for the meal? Known the love that is involved in the whole process, and the fact that the animals have it 100x better than they’d have had it in nature (including the slaughter. Botches are uncommon and wild animals always die far worse deaths).
Nothing like cutting into that pork chop having a REAL appreciation for the pig’s sacrifice, a real appreciation for the work everyone put into it all.
My ethical concerns go beyond raising animals, it’s the unnecessary killing them without their consent where it becomes problematic. Particularly when the “sacrifice” is for the trivial reason to satisfy the killer’s taste buds; when our taste buds can be satisfied in so many ways that don’t involve a victim.
And yes, I grew up on a farm where we raised all our own meat, including pigs. I’ve personally killed more animals than the average person, and I can say with certainty that every animal wants to live. To violently take another’s life “because it tastes good” and then go through such convuluted reasoning to justify it is very puzzling to me. It suggests a lack of empathy that seems to be endemic in our society. To speak of “the love” that is involved in the process doesn’t hold much weight with me. Serial killers love to kill, don’t they?
So ethics aren’t a concern for you
Quite the opposite actually, as a farmer raising my animals ethically is a daily fact concern. I just don’t buy into your supposition that raising them is inherently unethical.
How about the adverse health effects
If I live long enough that eating meat is the primary thing that got me killed, I see that as an absolute win. I like riding motorcycles, I also like beer and sugar and baked goodies. I fully expect something else to get me well before a lifetime of eating meat has the chance. And I’m okay with that, I’d rather live a few years less and get to keep partaking in the things I enjoy. Plenty of people live into their 80s without giving up meat, and living into my 80s sounds plenty long to me.
environmental impacts of the meat industry
I believe that until nuclear is being seriously considered as the solution for clean electricity, then it isn’t worth worrying about which of my habits are supposedly causing the climate crisis.
Any considerations there, or is all about how delicious steak is to you?
I wouldn’t say it’s “all about” how delicious steak is. But I would say that in all of your examples “less steak” doesn’t seem to be the most prudent place to start, or to consider at all.
I’ve watched animals die in nature. Unless I’m talking to an anti-natalist, I cannot fathom how they think the life of a farm animal is worse than the life of a wild animal. To me, it comes back to a colorblind view of the trolley problem: “It only matters if we’re part of decision that leads to pulling the trigger”
I really feel like the preachy vegans have crossed some line and cannot be reasoned with. And the non-preachy vegans don’t go out of their way to have the discussion (more’s the pity, since they’d probabliy have a more balanced view before turning preachy)
I’ve raised quite a few farm animals. They don’t have an urge to live. My goodness do they take every chance to get themselves killed…
