7 ms·

> Yet I still eat bacon. How do you rationalize that? Not many people admit to being aware of the way food animals are treated. I'm legitimately curious, not

by devb 4y ago

> Yet I still eat bacon. How do you rationalize that? Not many people admit to being aware of the way food animals are treated. I'm legitimately curious, not trolling.

valgor 4y ago
People like that don't rationalize it. You cannot win the ethical argument against eating animals. One simply ignores morals or does not care. And I don't mean this in an attacking way because we all do this to some extent.
- stametseater 4y ago
  > One simply ignores morals or does not care. Third possibility: they have different values which you either don't understand or agree with.
  - jerojero 4y ago
    Under which ethical framework is it possible to justify industrial slaughtering of animals? When you say "some people have different values" you probably mean "some people have simply not thought it through". I really don't think there's an ethical framework that favours industrial meat production. But please surprise me. Now, most people have inconsistent ethics. Which I think is a different thing. I think most people that engage with the industrial meat complex simply ignore the ethical implications, that's actually quite easy to do and even more so when most people are just inconsistent when it comes to ethics. Sometimes people are utilitarians, other times they behave like deontologists and other times they will apply ethics of care. I believe we are constantly building our own personal ethical frameworks. And that's kind of what you're alluding to, but I also think it's important to acknowledge that consistency is important, and I believe if we really tried to accomplish that most people would be faced with a very harsh reality. It's a struggle but we should be more honest with ourselves and the rest.
    - Eisenstein 4y ago
      > Under which ethical framework is it possible to justify industrial slaughtering of animals? The one in which human comfort takes precedence over that of a domesticated species which have been selectively bred over generations to produce meat for consumption. The industrial process is tertiary to the slaughter itself and the economics of meat consumption. You can argue about 'industrialization' of anything -- resource extraction and industrial agriculture at large destroy life on a massive scale. > When you say "some people have different values" you probably mean "some people have simply not thought it through" No, some people don't value animal life that has been domesticate specifically for food production. Not many people want a domestic pig in their house, so why do they exist? Not by natural selection and not for their own sake. We made them and we eat them and we don't care because we also don't care about paramecium and the pigs certainly wouldn't care if you were being fed to it, it would just eat you. > Now, most people have inconsistent ethics. Sure, I will grant you that and go one further -- all people have inconsistent ethics. Why do you care about pigs and not amoebas? Is it because one has a brain? Is it because one is multicellular? Is it because one is cute, or intelligent? What are the criteria? List all of your ethical criteria for food consumption and 'willing to argue that people who do it are bad people' and then list the features of everything you do and the consequences of those things and cross reference -- now, when you find a conflict, highlight it and then stop doing it. I bet you can't without seriously inconveniencing yourself to the point where you justify not following through. > It's a struggle but we should be more honest with ourselves and the rest. Absolutely agree. Self-awareness is the most important trait. I think that the term 'good person' can be roughly defined to mean 'self-aware and willing to correct after reflection'.
      - devb 4y ago
        >> Under which ethical framework is it possible to justify industrial slaughtering of animals? > The one in which human comfort takes precedence over that of a domesticated species which have been selectively bred over generations to produce meat for consumption. The industrial process is tertiary to the slaughter itself and the economics of meat consumption. You can argue about 'industrialization' of anything -- resource extraction and industrial agriculture at large destroy life on a massive scale. How is human comfort an "ethical framework"? I'm not sure you understand what ethics are.
- ip26 4y ago
  It strikes me as more of an ethical dilemma. I've known quite a few devout vegans who resumed eating animals when their health declined and they could not reverse it without abandoning veganism. The dilemma being that despite the harm caused, our species developed to eat animal products, and it's difficult to fully replace that.
  - ornornor 4y ago
    Just to clarify because it’s not obvious in your comment (but not alluded to either): it is very much possible to opt out of animal cruelty for food and eat a vegan diet while being healthy.
  - jerojero 4y ago
    That's an interesting point. Some people might really need to supplement their diets with certain animal products, though as far as I know, a vegetarian diet or a diet that includes very little meat consumption is more than enough for most people in terms of health requirements. Yet that's not really the case, we eat a lot of meat. And red meat as well which really is not necessary in our diets. I believe trying to argue from a naturalist perspective is rather dishonest in that it's by no means the real reason why people consume meat. People consume meat the way they do because it's a cultural expectation as well as a highly pleasurable act for most. So really, to me, the dilemma has much more to do with how much pleasure are we willing to give up as a society and I really don't think that goes very far. I mean, this debate has also ramifications when it comes to the climate; how much are we willing to give up in comfort and pleasure to curtail the ecological disaster we are causing? The answer: not much really. In my opinion these are really failings of our political systems, so in other words, the system that's supposed to help us make decisions for our society as a whole. I'm pretty sure most people would agree that maybe in a reasonable amount of time we'd like to see changes to our diets, it's an interesting discussion to have and there could be long term plans to achieve it that could be very much realistic... but our political system simply does not allow the for the discussion to be had in the first place.
    - jjtheblunt 4y ago
      It's primarily about what livers produce, which determines which chemicals are vitamins (which varies across mammals, for example) and which amino acids (the lego blocks that form proteins) are "essential amino acids" for a species. It's possible as a human to ingest from non animal sources all the essential nutrients, but there's HUGE misdirection in at least american commerce about how to do so. For instance, labels talk about grams of protein, which is inadequate: you could be ingesting a ton of a subset of amino acids in protein, and entirely deficient in an essential amino acid. It seems that eating animals was a heuristic that supplies essential amino acids and vitamins.

by devb 4y ago

> Yet I still eat bacon. How do you rationalize that? Not many people admit to being aware of the way food animals are treated. I'm legitimately curious, not trolling.

valgor 4y ago

People like that don't rationalize it. You cannot win the ethical argument against eating animals. One simply ignores morals or does not care. And I don't mean this in an attacking way because we all do this to some extent.

stametseater 4y ago
> One simply ignores morals or does not care. Third possibility: they have different values which you either don't understand or agree with.
- jerojero 4y ago
  Under which ethical framework is it possible to justify industrial slaughtering of animals? When you say "some people have different values" you probably mean "some people have simply not thought it through". I really don't think there's an ethical framework that favours industrial meat production. But please surprise me. Now, most people have inconsistent ethics. Which I think is a different thing. I think most people that engage with the industrial meat complex simply ignore the ethical implications, that's actually quite easy to do and even more so when most people are just inconsistent when it comes to ethics. Sometimes people are utilitarians, other times they behave like deontologists and other times they will apply ethics of care. I believe we are constantly building our own personal ethical frameworks. And that's kind of what you're alluding to, but I also think it's important to acknowledge that consistency is important, and I believe if we really tried to accomplish that most people would be faced with a very harsh reality. It's a struggle but we should be more honest with ourselves and the rest.
  - Eisenstein 4y ago
    > Under which ethical framework is it possible to justify industrial slaughtering of animals? The one in which human comfort takes precedence over that of a domesticated species which have been selectively bred over generations to produce meat for consumption. The industrial process is tertiary to the slaughter itself and the economics of meat consumption. You can argue about 'industrialization' of anything -- resource extraction and industrial agriculture at large destroy life on a massive scale. > When you say "some people have different values" you probably mean "some people have simply not thought it through" No, some people don't value animal life that has been domesticate specifically for food production. Not many people want a domestic pig in their house, so why do they exist? Not by natural selection and not for their own sake. We made them and we eat them and we don't care because we also don't care about paramecium and the pigs certainly wouldn't care if you were being fed to it, it would just eat you. > Now, most people have inconsistent ethics. Sure, I will grant you that and go one further -- all people have inconsistent ethics. Why do you care about pigs and not amoebas? Is it because one has a brain? Is it because one is multicellular? Is it because one is cute, or intelligent? What are the criteria? List all of your ethical criteria for food consumption and 'willing to argue that people who do it are bad people' and then list the features of everything you do and the consequences of those things and cross reference -- now, when you find a conflict, highlight it and then stop doing it. I bet you can't without seriously inconveniencing yourself to the point where you justify not following through. > It's a struggle but we should be more honest with ourselves and the rest. Absolutely agree. Self-awareness is the most important trait. I think that the term 'good person' can be roughly defined to mean 'self-aware and willing to correct after reflection'.
    - devb 4y ago
      >> Under which ethical framework is it possible to justify industrial slaughtering of animals? > The one in which human comfort takes precedence over that of a domesticated species which have been selectively bred over generations to produce meat for consumption. The industrial process is tertiary to the slaughter itself and the economics of meat consumption. You can argue about 'industrialization' of anything -- resource extraction and industrial agriculture at large destroy life on a massive scale. How is human comfort an "ethical framework"? I'm not sure you understand what ethics are.
ip26 4y ago
It strikes me as more of an ethical dilemma. I've known quite a few devout vegans who resumed eating animals when their health declined and they could not reverse it without abandoning veganism. The dilemma being that despite the harm caused, our species developed to eat animal products, and it's difficult to fully replace that.
- ornornor 4y ago
  Just to clarify because it’s not obvious in your comment (but not alluded to either): it is very much possible to opt out of animal cruelty for food and eat a vegan diet while being healthy.
- jerojero 4y ago
  That's an interesting point. Some people might really need to supplement their diets with certain animal products, though as far as I know, a vegetarian diet or a diet that includes very little meat consumption is more than enough for most people in terms of health requirements. Yet that's not really the case, we eat a lot of meat. And red meat as well which really is not necessary in our diets. I believe trying to argue from a naturalist perspective is rather dishonest in that it's by no means the real reason why people consume meat. People consume meat the way they do because it's a cultural expectation as well as a highly pleasurable act for most. So really, to me, the dilemma has much more to do with how much pleasure are we willing to give up as a society and I really don't think that goes very far. I mean, this debate has also ramifications when it comes to the climate; how much are we willing to give up in comfort and pleasure to curtail the ecological disaster we are causing? The answer: not much really. In my opinion these are really failings of our political systems, so in other words, the system that's supposed to help us make decisions for our society as a whole. I'm pretty sure most people would agree that maybe in a reasonable amount of time we'd like to see changes to our diets, it's an interesting discussion to have and there could be long term plans to achieve it that could be very much realistic... but our political system simply does not allow the for the discussion to be had in the first place.
  - jjtheblunt 4y ago
    It's primarily about what livers produce, which determines which chemicals are vitamins (which varies across mammals, for example) and which amino acids (the lego blocks that form proteins) are "essential amino acids" for a species. It's possible as a human to ingest from non animal sources all the essential nutrients, but there's HUGE misdirection in at least american commerce about how to do so. For instance, labels talk about grams of protein, which is inadequate: you could be ingesting a ton of a subset of amino acids in protein, and entirely deficient in an essential amino acid. It seems that eating animals was a heuristic that supplies essential amino acids and vitamins.