meat is murder

Is killing animals for food ever justifiable?


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mattj

blatant Nintendo fanboy
So Deer Season begins in full this weekend. I have no clue where you live, but Deer Season is ridiculously huge here in the Midwest.

When I told my Dad that Heather and I were planning on getting married in November (2004), he put his hand on my shoulder and said "Son, I'm happy for you two. But make sure it's not on the second weekend in November." My Uncle Steve got married on the second weekend in November. My Grandpa Carter and his 5 brothers all showed up, of course. But they wore their camouflage under their tuxes so they could head straight from the wedding to the deer stand. Dad said you could see it sticking out of the bottom. This kind of stuff is common around here. You want to take a day off of work right after the second weekend in November? You'll have to ask more than a year in advance. Deer Season is big business around here.

So naturally I go too. Some times. I got my hunter certification way back when I was a pre-teen. But I've only gone deer hunting maybe 6 or more times since then. It's not something I'm really into. But I do go some times. It means a lot to my family so I go along when I'm not busy.

I've taken quite a few shots a deer, but I've never hit one. Not even at close range haha! This Friday night I'll be heading out to the family farm. We have tons of deer out there. I'll get up super early Saturday morning and assuming I don't wig out and unload on a deer hunched in the weeds again (whoops) I'll probably get one this year.

But then what? What do I do after I shoot it?

Well, I'll wait and watch it with a bead on its heart. If it gets up again I'll shoot it again. After I'm sure it can't get up, I'll get down from my stand and approach it with the scope still on it. Then, if it's still breathing, I'll put the barrel right between it's eyes, pull the trigger, then pull out a knife and slit it's throat all the way back to its spine. Then comes the gutting.

Funny thing though, I've caught and filleted some pretty large, live fish. Tons of them throughout the years. Flopping all around as I sawed off their heads and scooped out their guts with my bloody fingers. But because I've never actually killed a deer it got me thinking.

Can I really do it?

Can I really look that scared, innocent, living animal right in its still blinking eye, listening to it's painful, labored breathing, quivering in fear, as I slit its throat with my bloody hands, sawing through the sinews?



Yup. Don't think I'll have a problem.

But a lot of people do have a problem with killing animals for food. And I'm not even talking about the PETA nutjobs. Although I easily know hundreds of men and women who hunt and kill deer around here, I know a few people who are vegetarians, or vegans, or who eat meat, but refuse to kill the animals themselves. All kinds of other positions exist between.

So what's your position on killing animals for food? Is it a necessary evil, or completely morally justifiable, or is it never justifiable in any situation because of the available alternatives? Or something else? Should animals have any rights or are they fair game for whatever we feel like doing to them? What about hunting for sport? What about animal products that don't actually kill the animal?

Here's my take.

The Bible and what my grandfathers taught me when I was young largely formed my positions on killing animals. In order to survive, humans must end the lives of other creatures. As far as I know, there's no way around this. Be it a plant or an animal, complex or simple, something has to die for you to continue living. I firmly believe that animals do have certain, basic rights, including the right to not be tortured or experience unnecessary pain. I believe that hunting for sport is wasteful, and therefore wrong. I believe that all precautions and preparations should be taken so that the kill is as quick and painless as possible. I believe that over-hunting is wasteful, and therefore wrong. But at the end of the day, fish and deer and the like is extraordinarily inexpensive, and healthy. It's a good, and justifiable source of food.

I also firmly believe that killing your own food, holding that living animal in your hands and ending it's life, teaches you sobering respect for your food. It reminds you of what has to happen for you to eat. I believe you should teach this to your children when they're young, just like my family did. So many people gasp at the idea of personally wringing the neck off a chicken, but never once choke while stuffing chicken nuggets down their throats.

So what are your thoughts? Are you fine with shooting Bambi? Do you believe, as some scientists have recently concluded, that Dolphins deserve many of the rights we humans enjoy? What about animal products? Could you / have you ended the life of an animal for food before? What about hunting for sport? Is eating meat ever justifiable?

Also, 4000 posts? I could have spent all that time fishing. :(
 
I take a rather deuchy perspective to animal rights: we are at the top of the food chain as animals, so we eat other animals. I really don't have a problem with killing and experimenting on them all we want as long we don't make them extinct. A human life is way more important than an animals.

One might be able to draw a fine line around Elephants, Apes, and Whales / Donphins for sentience, but to be honest they really are not even that big of a problem outside of Japanese fishing and poaching. The Japanese are extremely limited on the amount of whales they are allowed to kill to, they sort of have a whale season.

so yeah, Ill eat my dog
 
see what i don't get is

if vegetarians love animals so much

why do they eat all their food
Top tier post. Congratulations.

Honestly, I was born and raised with meat, and never was told there was a thing wrong with eating it. I do love dem big juicy cheeseburgers.
The only part of this that somewhat bothers me is parents who want to raise their kids to be vegetarians and will get pissed if they eat meat. Whether some one wants to be vegetarian or not is a decision they should be able to make themselves. I say this because I remember when I was little I had a girl at my birthday party and her mom came to pick her up and flew off the handle when she found out she had a hotdog.



EDIT: 251st post, yaaaaaaaaay
 

UncleSam

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At some point you have to assert your own right to live as you are biologically meant to as compared to any other animal. There is no animal that lives in a manner so obviously contrary to it's biological nature as a human that refuses to eat meat, and when an animal does so with regard to other animals I will consider offering it the same courtesy.

Until then I'm going to stuff my face with protein whenever I feel like it.
 

Myzozoa

to find better ways to say what nobody says
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I've been a vegetarian since I was 10 years old. I think there are many situations in which it is okay to kill for food. However, I don't think it's acceptable to raise animals for slaughter as it is done in the meat industries of nearly every country. The way such animals are treated is unethical and cruel.

It should be noted that it is much cheaper to produce a ton of grain than a ton of beef, and the impact on the environment is also much smaller, mass produced meat consumption doesn't make sense in if you view it in that light. Moving away, the consumption of fish is destroying the ocean rapidly enough that it is conjectured that there will be almost zero life in the ocean in 60 years.

I think hunting animals is fine, those animals aren't raised in factories for slaughter. I also think it would be fine to raise your own chickens or cows or goats or whatever in an ethical way and then eat them, as long as they lived in good conditions and didn't endure a cruel existence prior to consumption.
 
Don't overdo it, animals live for a meaning like humans. We can do it as long as the living animals live in good conditions and are not raised ofr the sole reason to be slaughtered. I totally agree with myzozoa on some points but since we ARE at the the top of the food chain, we could afford to pay ourselves a little luxury to eat some meat. We humans are greedy, and we must control this greed for more. Otherwise, i accept that meat can be eaten.
 

Arcticblast

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I was going to say things but Myzyzoa pretty much spoke my mind better than me (been a vegetarian for almost two years now but don't have a problem with people hunting and eating things).

Hunting because you're on a power trip and just want to display animals in your living room is awful; even though I know people who have done it I don't mind those people (mostly) because they eat most of what they kill though.

also happy 4k
 
It should be noted that it is much cheaper to produce a ton of grain than a ton of beef, and the impact on the environment is also much smaller, mass produced meat consumption doesn't make sense in if you view it in that light. Moving away, the consumption of fish is destroying the ocean rapidly enough that it is conjectured that there will be almost zero life in the ocean in 60 years.
If you go by a purely economic standpoint for feeding the planet and maximizing food production, they you should be advocating that we start farming insects. If we spent the same effort on harvesting meat on insects, then for every ounce of protein you can make in beef, you can make 24 ounces with insects.

If you are for it, so am I, I could get use to eating moths and beetles.
 

PDC

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They are going to be killed anyway, how does it matter? I am not saying that animal cruelty is good but when they are going to be basically made for consumption how does it matter? I go fishing a lot and eat what I catch if my mother will cook it up. As long as the limit is legal it is fine. As long as we don't make them endangered it is fine. There is a line with stuff like whales, apes, lions etc but for animals like that it shouldn't matter much at all.
 

michael

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If you go by a purely economic standpoint for feeding the planet and maximizing food production, they you should be advocating that we start farming insects. If we spent the same effort on harvesting meat on insects, then for every ounce of protein you can make in beef, you can make 24 ounces with insects.

If you are for it, so am I, I could get use to eating moths and beetles.
Humans actually do have an enzyme for dissolving cockroach shells, for what it's worth.

On topic, I agree entirely with Myzozoa's post, although I myself am not vegetarian. I do try to eat free range meat where possible, as well as fish. For nutritional reasons and biochemical reasons, I believe that humans should eat meat, but hunting animals purely for the sake of it is unacceptable.
 

Myzozoa

to find better ways to say what nobody says
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If you go by a purely economic standpoint for feeding the planet and maximizing food production, they you should be advocating that we start farming insects. If we spent the same effort on harvesting meat on insects, then for every ounce of protein you can make in beef, you can make 24 ounces with insects.

If you are for it, so am I, I could get use to eating moths and beetles.
A few things:

1. Show me the numbers, is it cheaper to produce a ton of insects than a ton of vegetables? If not, stop straw-maning me.
2. Externalities are important, is it a reasonable idea to produce tons of insects near densely populated areas?
3. There is little demand for insects at any price, I try to be realistic when I make posts, not just absurd counter examples that are basically strawmen.
 

UncleSam

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Why is it wrong to raise animals to be killed? I agree that humans shouldn't torture animals and what not but I fail to see why we have to go out and catch them in the wild.

If a company is mass producing and killing cows to be processed for meat I have no problem with it so long as the cows aren't getting tortured or extreme cases like that. I don't understand why anyone who believes it is ever justified to kill an animal in the wild solely for the purpose of eating it can condemn the exact same process, just streamlined and made efficient on a large-scale basis. It's the evolution of technology.
 

mattj

blatant Nintendo fanboy
I don't think they're arguing against the idea of mass-raising animals in-and-of-itself. They're arguing against the common, terrible conditions that those animals live in using our current methods. The idea bothers me too.

Also, while reading this year's hunting rules guide put out by the Missouri Department of Conservation, I noticed in the "New Info" section that for the first year in Missouri's history hunting deer and turkey with the atlatl is legal.

[youtube]Ej3it7Ct76w[/youtube]

that is freaking hardcore
 

Chou Toshio

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I've been a vegetarian since I was 10 years old. I think there are many situations in which it is okay to kill for food. However, I don't think it's acceptable to raise animals for slaughter as it is done in the meat industries of nearly every country. The way such animals are treated is unethical and cruel.
Sure, that's your opinion. Don't agree, but the only difference is from fundamental ethical views; pure value statement on both sides. Agree to disagree I guess.

It should be noted that it is much cheaper to produce a ton of grain than a ton of beef, and the impact on the environment is also much smaller, mass produced meat consumption doesn't make sense in if you view it in that light.
Too bad that Meat gives you the full string of essential amino acids where as grain, doesn't. It also takes a lot more variety of plant foods to create the same group of amino acids... too bad that fresh vegetables, nuts, and other health products are so expensive for the average person in a 1st world country. A $1.00 cheeseburger contains all your essential amino acids... I wonder how many plant based products it takes?

I'm not sure what the market forces at work are; but at the final consumption line, meat products are cheaper than vegetarian ones as of now.

Being a vegetarian, with the food industry as it is, is a wealthy man's luxury.

Moving away, the consumption of fish is destroying the ocean rapidly enough that it is conjectured that there will be almost zero life in the ocean in 60 years.
Okay, come on dude-- you know this statement is ridiculous. I definitely agree that over fishing is a huge problem, and that we are definitely in the process of fishing to extinction many species on the market (and off the market... sharks ((nother big problem)) and species we don't eat that get caught in the nets).

But the ocean having zero life in it? I'm sure you're aware of how laughable this statement is. Humanity doesn't have the power to destroy life on earth, and humanity having the power to destroy life in the ocean is just about as absurd.
I think hunting animals is fine, those animals aren't raised in factories for slaughter. I also think it would be fine to raise your own chickens or cows or goats or whatever in an ethical way and then eat them, as long as they lived in good conditions and didn't endure a cruel existence prior to consumption.
I would disagree with further expansion of meat producing lands (especially more rain forest destruction), but a meat industry is far more efficient and effective for providing meat products to developed society than hunting or personal farm rearing. Please be reasonable man.

How much environmental destruction do you think would occur to provide meat to the population of the world today through hunting? There's a reason the mammoth etc. went extinct. A developed meat industry is something that's definitely desirable.

Now as for the method of the meat industry... kind of on the fence on that one, but making the process more humane has some considerable merit.
 
Damn I saw a great video on animal slaughter which was really horrfic. I've just forgotten the name of it..

I've been waiting for a thread like this. I'm against killing animals in inhumane ways. Chickens are stuffed in a small compartment, barely able to fit with all the other chickens. They never see sunlight. Once they're ready to slaughter, some get their feet ripped out, as all the chicken shit from the past years has been clasping the chicken's foot. Then a blade slits their necks. Some chickens avoid the blade, and get boiled alive instead.

I'm also against Foie Gras, as that's basically a goose's liver which has been forcefed.

I was a pescatarian for two years before I gave in to my love of the taste of meat. I'm quite ashamed I didn't last longer, and also because I wasn't vegetarian. The only reason I eat meat is because you don't want to waste your life not enjoying it to the full. I believe there is no justifiable reason why we're entitled to eat meat.

I hate the people who say stuff like "God created animals like cows so we could eat it". How do you know that?! Cows were created for the same purpose as we were; to reproduce and enjoy life.

Also, congratulations on 4000 posts!

EDIT: Wow, I'm the only person so far who voted no. Huh.
EDIT: MattJ that is priceless. Of course arrows are the main reason behind taxes...
 
Justifiable? Yes. Necessary? No.

Some western countries definitely need to reduce their meat intake because current levels are not feasible as developing nations consume more.

However I don't see a problem in raising animals for meat or testing purposes. There are plenty of perfectly good reasons for being a vegetarian, but all of these ethical issues are pretty ridiculous. Neither plants nor animals want to die, but we have to eat something.
 

Myzozoa

to find better ways to say what nobody says
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Okay, come on dude-- you know this statement is ridiculous. I definitely agree that over fishing is a huge problem, and that we are definitely in the process of fishing to extinction many species on the market (and off the market... sharks ((nother big problem)) and species we don't eat that get caught in the nets).

But the ocean having zero life in it? I'm sure you're aware of how laughable this statement is. Humanity doesn't have the power to destroy life on earth, and humanity having the power to destroy life in the ocean is just about as absurd.
It is biological fact, as the diversity of life in the ocean decays, ecosystems will collapse as important species will be extinct. If you want me to modify my statement: there will be no pretty or edible life in the oceans in 60 years due to pollution and overfishing. There will still be bacteria and micro organisms and maybe a few other things. Biomass, however, will be but a tiny fraction of what it is now.

Humanity has the power to due a lot of destructive things, your proposition is ridiculous in the face of nuclear bombs, so I'm not interested in discussing it.



The type of thinking that insists on consumption of meat is precisely why the food industry has created a situation where vegetables are more expensive. There is not sufficient demand for massive increase in vegetable consumption of all forms, which would lower the price of vegetables in conjunction with a decrease in consumption of meat. If there were such conditions, we could simply convert land to vegetable farms and produce a shit ton of vegetables some of which could be sold fresh and others of which could be preserved effortlessly through canning (cans can be recycled so this is sustainable). This huge glut of vegetables would reduce the price of vegetables to a point where it would be cheaper for the average person to consume them than meat, even given the same desired nutrients. Many combinations of vegetables yield complete protein the way meat does. Beans and rice are complete protein, and very cheap for example. Soy fermentation, etc. I actually think soy is the food of the future, though it is also a common allergen, it has so many flavor and nutritional possibilities.

Also your assertion that people eat cheeseburgers for complete protein is way more ridiculous than my claims about life in the ocean in 60 years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_fishing

see the second paragraph^
 

Ace Emerald

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Too bad that Meat gives you the full string of essential amino acids where as grain, doesn't. It also takes a lot more variety of plant foods to create the same group of amino acids... too bad that fresh vegetables, nuts, and other health products are so expensive for the average person in a 1st world country. A $1.00 cheeseburger contains all your essential amino acids... I wonder how many plant based products it takes?

I'm not sure what the market forces at work are; but at the final consumption line, meat products are cheaper than vegetarian ones as of now.

Being a vegetarian, with the food industry as it is, is a wealthy man's luxury.
I wonder how much difference there is in eating $1 cheeseburgers everyday, and not getting all your amino acids. I know that you need those to survive, and I'm being a little facetious, but seriously that $1 cheeseburger is not something to live on. I guess living healthy is a wealthy man's luxury?
 
I'm a vegetarian, but completely ok with sustainable meat production/consumption.

What irritates me is that people seem to think the current situation is sustainable.
 

New World Order

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Plants have rights too. I mean, they're so cute! How can we as a civilize species have the heart to kill such vibrant life forms? We should all become "meatitarian" and stop murdering little bundles of joy such as the carrot.



Instead, we should feast on the barbarians who murder these wonderful plants, and *I feel nauseated just thinking about it" have the audacity to consider them part of their diet.

 
I love the taste of meat. And if humans weren't supposed to eat meat we wouldn't have developed an omnivorous digestive system. So yes killing animals for food is completely justifiable. You don't begrudge a lion his wilder-beast.

I dislike farming of animals in inhumane ways, that said I don't really care otherwise I'd actually be researching where my meat comes from. Kosher definitely has its piece of mind perks.

Anyway, as to the main question of the OP. I doubt I could kill an animal myself. I've watched a fish I caught gutted and prepared and I doubt I could do it myself, I'm pretty sure I'd have some sort of "why am I doing this to this animal" epiphany and seeing how much I love a good steak that wouldn't mix well. Getting a balanced diet is hard enough being ceoliac, I doubt I could deal with being any level of vegetarian.

my 2c
 

Adamant Zoroark

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Meat is awesome; the most delicious food category of them all. In my view on the world, hunting is fine because really, people started hunting for a reason. I honestly could kill an animal myself, but that's more influenced by the fact that I have pretty much no emotion, causing me to have no feelings taking a wild animal's life if it were necessary. My dad and I used to go fishing a lot while I was a child, and I am not against the idea of fishing to get food for the same reason I think hunting wild animals is okay.
 
i think all living beings have a purpose in life and that it would be wrong to deny them their purpose

the purpose of animals is to be eaten yum yum
 
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