What are your views on this?

[drizzt_fan14]

http://www.firstscience.com/SITE/editor/02...gs_05092003.asp

I'm just curious. I'm not a vegetarian myself, but this article is pretty convincing to make me one

 

[dascoot]

I was a vegetarian for almost 10 years and stuff like that is the exact reason why.

 

[drizzt_fan14]

Why did you stop being one?

 

[dascoot]

A doctor told me the reason I kept miscarrying is because my diet was so poor so I just gave up.

 

[drizzt_fan14]

Oh, I'm sorry I didn't know..

 

[dascoot]

No no it's ok. I just mean that if health wasn't an issue I'd prolly still be a veggie because of reasons like what you were saying.

 

[thesassycynic]

I too was a vegetarian once (for 7 years). I gave it up for a pretty dumb reason. My ex-boyfriend and I were arguing about whether I would gain weight if I started eating meat again. Well, I was right and now we're not together anymore. I'm trying to gain the strength to go veggie again, it's just hard living with people who DO eat meat and trying to cook meals together. The video I linked is one that will surely keep some of you from eating turkey this Thanksgiving. Beware, it's disturbing. I was completely horrified from this video.

Butterball video

 

[drizzt_fan14]

After reading the description, I can't watch it. I made the mistake of watching the one they had up of raccoons and rabbits being skinned alive and almost threw up. I just don't understand how someone can be so cruel. Killing animals for food is fine, but there's no need to torture them in the process; a simple gun shot would do I think.

Didn't we have this problem with KFC a while back?

I filled out the form to congress, I hope it helps...

 

[dascoot]

Originally posted by drizzt_fan14@Nov 18 2006, 07:54 PM
After reading the description, I can't watch it. I made the mistake of watching the one they had up of raccoons and rabbits being skinned alive and almost threw up. I just don't understand how someone can be so cruel. Killing animals for food is fine, but there's no need to torture them in the process; a simple gun shot would do I think.

Didn't we have this problem with KFC a while back?

I filled out the form to congress, I hope it helps...

Naw it's ok you can watch it, I just watched the whole thing with my eyes squinted in case there was anything horrible but it was just a guy talking about the bad stuff, the worst action you see is some birds getting tossed around.

I refused to watch that skinning video though. I don't think I'd be able to handle that.

 

[drizzt_fan14]

good, I might watch it then. And trust me, you don't want to watch the skinning video..it was the most disturbing thing I've ever seen. I became an animals rights activist that day I saw it..

I don't understand though, why aren't there humane laws for birds? That's what it said on PETA's site

 

[dascoot]

Because people scoff at the idea that animals feel pain and deserve humane treatment. It's "hippie crap". And with PETA spearheading any animal rights campaigns, people who might otherwise pay attention just tune out. PETA is like Hillary Clinton, they do a lot of good but they rub people the wrong way.

Yeah it's stupid but that's how things are.

 

[drizzt_fan14]

You're right, I like a lot of the things that PETA supports and stands for, but they're extremists. If you aren't sleeping on the floor and leting your dog have the bed, then you're evil in their eyes. Of course that's an exaggeration, but still. And plus, isn't pamela anderson one of their representatives?

 

[AmelieMellow]

i'm a vegetarian but i just don't like to bother people with that preaching crap.

"it's not that i'm lazy...it's that i just don't care." hahahaha

i have to admit, i do feel sad when i see roadkill or watch how chickens are plucked and prepped, but then again i do have an appreciation for food and culture and i am a daily viewer of the food network. ah but what can i say...

 

[cultclassic]

I became a vegitarian, because I saw chickens being killed in my uncle's backyard. I think I was 6 years old. Now I eat anything that don't bite me back, (including beef, for which I'm sure to go to hell). Being a vegetarian because of the pain did not make sense to me for a couple of reasons:

The contention that pain, not taking a life, is the criteria, sounds so arbitrary. Sounds to me like us mere mortals making god like pronouncements. Vegitarians eat plants, which are liviing things too. How are we to know they don't feel pain? They don't have a central nervous system, yes, but that's OUR concept of pain.... And since when is pain more important than life? Who are WE to make that decision? So unless I have a revelation, I stick with the natural order; Otherwise I wont be able to go to work, because I might step on ants... They might feel pain too...

Now, If pain really bothers you, may be we should figure out a way to kill animals without inflicting pain. Maybe "kill them all softly" with a Kevin Federline song...

 

[a_iver]

well trees actually do have feelings, and can sense when other trees in the nearby area are being damaged. i don't have it anymore, but i posted a link to an article and some experiments based on it. i posted it here i think.. i think i remember staci reading it, she'll back me up.

anyways i'm with you ravi (i think). i'm against pain that isn't necessary, but rocks ain't cool to eat.. and because nature already has a whole predator/prey system worked out.. say if we started getting our food from minerals and other non-living material, maybe algae wouldn't have food anymore.. or maybe some other living thing. if there's 10 billion people constantly consuming the lowest forms of our ecosystem, the whole thing might collapse and everything could die, and it could be a lot more cruel than being a predator.

 

[dascoot]

Originally posted by cultclassic@Nov 21 2006, 10:44 PM
I became a vegitarian, because I saw chickens being killed in my uncle's backyard. I think I was 6 years old. Now I eat anything that don't bite me back, (including beef, for which I'm sure to go to hell). Being a vegetarian because of the pain did not make sense to me for a couple of reasons:

The contention that pain, not taking a life, is the criteria, sounds so arbitrary. Sounds to me like us mere mortals making god like pronouncements. Vegitarians eat plants, which are liviing things too. How are we to know they don't feel pain? They don't have a central nervous system, yes, but that's OUR concept of pain.... And since when is pain more important than life? Who are WE to make that decision? So unless I have a revelation, I stick with the natural order; Otherwise I wont be able to go to work, because I might step on ants... They might feel pain too...

Now, If pain really bothers you, may be we should figure out a way to kill animals without inflicting pain. Maybe "kill them all softly" with a Kevin Federline song...

I don't know if anyone's really saying that their reasons for going vegetarian are because of the pain during their deaths, I think the pain they're referring to is the conditions the animals live through until the actual death occurs.

I just always assumed that most animals are either conked on the head (cows) or have their necks snapped first (chickens) so the deaths are relatively quick and [hopefully] pain-free.

But spending their entire lives in a box, being kicked by asshole farmhands, that sort of thing is just going beyond the whole Man Eat Meat For Make Strong dynamic.

We can only process what we perceive, and if we see a cow crying because its legs have atrophied to the point of constant excrutiating pain, and we see a stalk of corn just sittin there chillin in the breeze, we're gonna perceive one as being in pain and the other as not.

I can see what you mean about the plants.. but I don't know if an "all or nothing" viewpoint really is the solution either. A vegetarian who choses to be a vegetarian for animal rights reasons HAS to eat, but chooses to eat the food that didn't used to have a face.

You are right, we don't know that the corn doesn't feel anything.. but we KNOW that the cow DOES. You can either go for the gusto and eat anything, pain or no; you can eat NOTHING in the hopes of causing no harm to no creature; or you can make a judgement call to survive. *shrug*

 

[cultclassic]

Originally posted by dascoot@Nov 22 2006, 01:07 AM
I don't know if anyone's really saying that their reasons for going vegetarian are because of the pain during their deaths, I think the pain they're referring to is the conditions the animals live through until the actual death occurs.

I just always assumed that most animals are either conked on the head (cows) or have their necks snapped first (chickens) so the deaths are relatively quick and [hopefully] pain-free.

But spending their entire lives in a box, being kicked by asshole farmhands, that sort of thing is just going beyond the whole Man Eat Meat For Make Strong dynamic.

We can only process what we perceive, and if we see a cow crying because its legs have atrophied to the point of constant excrutiating pain, and we see a stalk of corn just sittin there chillin in the breeze, we're gonna perceive one as being in pain and the other as not.

I can see what you mean about the plants.. but I don't know if an "all or nothing" viewpoint really is the solution either. A vegetarian who choses to be a vegetarian for animal rights reasons HAS to eat, but chooses to eat the food that didn't used to have a face.

You are right, we don't know that the corn doesn't feel anything.. but we KNOW that the cow DOES. You can either go for the gusto and eat anything, pain or no; you can eat NOTHING in the hopes of causing no harm to no creature; or you can make a judgement call to survive. *shrug*

I understand about the treatment of animals part. It's inhumane. But that's my point: inHUMANE. Locked up in a cage is bad. But then again they dont have to worry about foxes chasing them in the night.... It's all a judgement call. If the treatment is wrong, THAT should be changed; Vegetarianism doesn't seem to be the answer...

And about "food that didn't used to have a face.", you should see some of the veggies that grow in my fridge.. :lol:

 

[dascoot]

Hahah yeah but those are arms and legs, not faces.

I totally agree that vegetarianism isn't the answer for FIXING animal cruelty.. but it can help a person sleep better at night if they know they're not contributing by paying the abusers any money either.

I don't know, there's a million reasons to choose that lifestyle I guess. My own reasons were many. And now that I eat meat again, I eat free-range organic stuff in the hopes of both encouraging reform and preventing internal pickling of my innards.

I guess both lifestyle choices are aimed at doing their own part in their own small way.

 

[cultclassic]

Originally posted by dascoot@Nov 22 2006, 02:46 AM
Hahah yeah but those are arms and legs, not faces.

Oh no! I once had a bell pepper that looked like Carl Malden..

 

[dascoot]

Tee hee gross.

I just tossed out some tuna salad that had grown back its fins and was attempting to swim away.