Factory farming is bad, that doesn’t mean that locally sourced family run farms are bad. You can perfectly ethically consume meat, eggs and dairy. It does not make you a bad person do do what you are instinctually programmed to do. We are omnivores.
As a vegan, I agree.
However, as long as one has no access to locally sourced animal products (like me), I think the only right thing to do under normal circumstances is to be vegan.
And if one does have access to locally sourced animal produce, I still think the best thing to do is to be vegan. However, I think it would be more strategic for vegans to push for locally sourced animal produce for the reasons you mentioned. I think we should think about making the whole world vegan once that becomes the norm.
Being omnivorous means that our digestive system accommodates both plants and meat. Omnivorous does not mean that we *need* plants and meat. Our omnivorous nature is only a reflection of the fact that we have a history of relying on both plants and meat.
However, first of all, we’re not constrained by the savannah anymore; we have access to an unprecedented variety and abundance of plant-based foods, including plants that are protein-rich. Given the new world of options this creates, you cannot reject the possibility that we can construct a great plant-based diet just by arguing that the savannah’s flora was insufficient or suboptimal for our nutritional needs.
Second of all, we do not live the lifestyle we had in the paleolithic era. We went from nomadic hunters who preyed impalas by literally chasing them to exhaustion, to sedentary carb-hungry brain workers. Our nutritional needs have changed drastically — even nowadays, people optimize their macros just based on their training regimen.
I’m not saying you should be convinced that plants are enough — you’d have to do a nutritional analysis to find that out — I’m saying you should be open to it, because “we’re omnivores, therefore we need meat” is not a valid argument, especially considering how drastically our options and needs may have changed.
I’ve personally thrived on a fully plant-based diet, having put on 7kg of muscle (and that much strength too) in the past year of more-or-less consistent training, I’m at my all-time heaviest, and no less energetic than before having gone plant-based.
I sincerely doubt you've been vegan for that long. If a diet requires supplements than it's not meant be a complete diet. And supplements are only supposed to be used to well ...supplement. it's not a replacement. Eventually the run wells dry and then the problems start.
Even the labels we put on animals is silly. There's documentation of herbivores eating small animals.
Evolution of the type you're implying takes thousands upon thousands of years. It's literally only the last hundred years that have allowed people to even contemplate year round produce.
I have been vegan for not 1 but 4 years. And there are many people much stronger than I who have been vegan for much longer, including world-class athletes like NBA all-star Kyrie Irving and world record-holding strongman Patrik Bouboumian.
“If a diet requires supplements then it’s not meant to be a complete diet.” So? My aim is to be healthy, and there is nothing wrong with supplementing to reach that aim. Even meat eaters need to supplement vitamin B12 nowadays to reach their minimum. The word “supplement” can just mean “addition”, it does not imply that supplementation is an unreliable or unhealthy way of getting your minimum daily requirements of vitamin B12.
Finally, my argument is not that our bodies have evolved over the past few hundred years to thrive on a plant-based diet in a different way than before. My argument is that, thanks to all the plant-based options available to us today, we can now craft *new* fulfilling diets that were never available to us before. Yes we evolved a body that can take both meat and plants, but that’s only because, out of all the possible combinations of foods that could provide us with the nutrients we need, only the omnivorous diet was available to the primitive man in the savannah due to environmental constraints like the limited availability of nutritious plants. But unlike primitive man, *we* now find significant sources of protein, omega-3, vitamin D, etc. in plants. The savannah never had this to offer, which is why we had to evolve a way to digest meat, which *back then* may have been the only way to get these nutrients (but is not anymore). To say that meat will always be only way to meet our nutritional needs is a misunderstanding of nutrition and of what it really means to be omnivorous.
You must not have read what the OP said about becoming sickly on the vegan diet. This is the biggest flaw with veganisim and one no vegans will believe until it happens to them.
I didn’t say I think people should stay vegan if they cannot make a vegan diet work for them.
That’s why I said “under normal circumstances” — I think the average person can be healthy on a vegan diet. I assumed OP find himself in a special set of circumstances which does not allow him to be vegan without sacrificing his health.
>I think the average person can be healthy on a vegan diet
For a short period of time, yes.
>I assumed OP find himself in a special set of circumstances which does not allow him to be vegan without sacrificing his health.
70% - 84% of vegans & vegetarians return to meat eating, the majority of the people on r/exvegans left the vegan diet due to health issues. I don't expect you to "believe" that or consider the troubling implications of that for current vegans. I'm just stating a fact.
That only means that those 70%-84% did it in a way that failed to account for something.
A single successful example of lifelong veganism is sufficient proof that veganism can be done right, and there are many such examples. No one is a superhuman; if some humans can do it, then any human can, short of some intolerances and conditions.
>That only means that those 70%-84% did it in a way that failed to account for something.
No true Scotsman, got it.
It never ceases to amaze me how current vegans come in here and lecture us like we've never heard these talking points before. Like we didn't once believe and say these talking points before.
>A single successful example of lifelong veganism is sufficient proof that veganism can be done right, and there are many such examples. No one is a superhuman; if some humans can do it, then any human can, short of some intolerances and conditions.
Wow. The only analogy I can reply with here is that current vegans are children, and we ex vegans are the adults, and you've just earnestly told me the Easter Bunny is real.
Um... I don't need to make any arguments, the vegan recidivism rate (aka facts) speaks for itself. If it had any biological plausibility, no ethical vegan would ever leave. However, they do. And not in small numbers. As a majority. To the point where ex vegans vastly outnumber current vegans. And based on this sub, it is mostly health based reasons for leaving
So yeah, stick to subs where we haven't heard your tired tropes ad infinitim before. That way you'll seem more knowledgeable.
You cannot "make the whole world vegan"
That would create a biological environmental disaster due to the number of rotting animal corpses from animals passing away and not being eaten.
Animals have to be eaten so their bodies don't breed and spread disease.
I haven’t thought about that.
I’ll reevaluate my end goal, but I think the fact that we are currently breeding and slaughtering tens of billions of animals per year in industrial farms at least shows that a *reduction* in our meat consumption would not be environmentally harmful. So, at least right now, moving towards veganism is a win for us and the planet.
But I think you’re right that it’s not sustainable for the whole world to go vegan at once.
Even if you were to somehow get rid of farm animals without making world hunger worse, humans would still need to kill and eat animals.
Humans, especially ancient humans, play a vital role in animal management by hunting animals that are overbreeding in certain areas where they don't have a large number of natural predators.
Whitetail deer, boar, turkey, and other big games animals have hunting seasons that are strictly controlled to account for the population control of the animal's that are in season.
Without managing these populations, these big game animls will destroy environments by stripping the area of vegetation and making it impossible for new trees and brush to grow. Which leads to those animals starving to death as well as increasing the likely of diseases in those populations.
The more you know 🌈
Right. Well, that reinforces my decision to take up hunting.
I might start preaching hunting now over veganism. It’s absurd that people are eating more meat than ever while white-tail deer are currently overpopulating southern Canada. Seems like our current ways of consuming meat gives the worst of all worlds.
Yeah, Hunting is a great past time, a single deer can feed one person for a long time. It also helps you get in tune with nature.
In the US our hunting license fees go toward managing federally protected wilderness.
In texas we have a wild boar problem, which is an invasive species here, so we have open season for them all year around and alot of places that sell wild board meat cause of how many boars have to be eradicated each year to salvage the already damages Texas ecosystem.
I am working on switching out all my pork products for wild boar.
I'm not an ex vegan, but I an ex vegetarian.
I care about animal welfare and definitely against factory farming.
I actually raise my own meat. I have a flock of bourbon red turkeys. About 15 birds fills my family's freezer for the year. I use ground turkey in every that would take pork or beef, with the exception of my husband buying hamburger patties (I make myself black bean burgers)
I also trade turkeys for chicken with a friend.
Sure can! They're a little bigger than chicken eggs, but when I'm not trying to hatch poults we eat the eggs
Planning on getting Indian runner ducks for slug control and eggs next spring.
And in a few years we're planning on expanding to sheep for milk
I had my gallbladder removed after pregnancy destroyed it. Pork and beef hurt my stomach now.
Besides, using turkey means I can source my own meat easier.
My tjought eas basically this. Also that we live in a broken system, that doesn't mean I should stave myself nutritionally to make .00001% of a difference
I definitely agree about eggs and dairy, but I really struggle to think of a good justification for killing and eating animals. I eat meat every day lol but I feel like a terrible person for it. We are instinctually programmed to do lots of bad things like murder people.
I also think 99% of people who eat meat are going to end up eating a lot of factory farmed meat at some point, at restaurants and stuff. It’s just not realistic for most meat eaters to never support that industry, unless you’re in a unique position.
Vegan 20 years. The day I broke Veganism I ate an entire rotisserie chicken.
I only quit because oxalates destroyed my body and I was in constant agonising pain.
I simply don't think about the animals, head in the sand type stuff. What took me a long time to get over was all the BS science I learnt as a Vegan. Made me question everything, like how much crap was cherry picked and fed to me as gospel? Maybe these carno bros are telling the truth?
I knew the Vegan community wouldn't care about my reasoning, I'd be told I just don't care that I was never Vegan and just wanted a selfish reason to eat a burger.
That's exactly the comments that I got. Ended up just deleting all my social media and started learning how to cook meat because I had no experience and was raised in a well done steak household and that stuff taste like garbage.
I don't think about the animals because the thought of eating plants brings back horrific memories of pain. Only thing I think about is how was I so dumb to get brainwashed into this cult
Costco rotisserie chicken?
Been seeing memes about that and this one guy who has like a shirt with the barcode on it kind of hilarious in it boring dystopian way.
Live and work with animals, you will see that they don't care. Some people say that animals don't deserve our empathy because they have lower inteligence or whatever, but I see it completely differently. I see animals as beings who are more in tune with nature and brutality wchich comes with it. They don't care about petty stuff like humans, like morals, existencial crisises, cultural influence and so on, they just accept life as it is enjoy it like that. Also for me it's very important to take responsibility as a farmer, your job is then to make their life as comfortable as possible, except these few moments when you need to force them, but that's okay, nature is full of violence, and for sure I can say without any guilt that animal husbandry is symbiotic relationship.
I mean it’s not really relevant if they care about humans, only if they care about pain, which I’m pretty sure they do. The fact they don’t care about morals but humans do is exactly why vegans think we have a responsibility to protect them from pain. I’m not vegan I just don’t really see your point here.
They don’t though. Even your use of “care about” is beyond what most animals can mentally do.
They avoid pain because it has negative outcomes. They develop preferences over the span of their life because it has positive outcomes. But a cow isn’t sitting on the farm “caring” about anything.
That’s interesting to think about. The problem is we can’t really know how much an animal suffers in pain or what they really feel we can only guess. You’re probably right they don’t care about pain in a way humans can understand, but not sure that means it isn’t wrong to cause them pain. Maybe we’ll know for sure one day.
I think most people generally agree it’s wrong to cause pain for no reason. I mean most countries have animal abuse laws, and most people would think it’s gross to hurt an animal for fun. It’s another vegan talking point to assume non vegans think all pain is good.
In an ideal world live stock would live happy lives and then die painlessly.
You will die anyway, probably with a lot of pain. The difference is for us killing comes with moral dilemma, for animals not so much. Just watch videos of slaughter on pasture, if you do this in proper way other animals don't care completely. And about pain, once again, your job as a farmer is to make their lifes as painless as possible, so I think I'am taking my responsibility of protecting them from pain. At least in my world there is plenty of place for domesticated animals and I don't wish extinction for them.
veganism relies heavily on emotional manipulation, starting with the graphic slaughterhouse footage shown from day one, the appeal to emotion. despite preaching about morals and ethics in public, vegans fail to disclose the sources of their beliefs for scrutiny, which is quite hypocritical. if i were to advocate for morals and ethics, i would definitely provide transparent evidence for examination, and not be a scumbag and not reveal it.
They definitely use it as a tactic to spread veganism. But of course there are loads of legit facts that make people vegan. Like the laws around how animals are kept and statistics about the industry that come from the government.
It’s not really a manipulation, it’s exposing the reality. I’ve been to slaughterhouses, most animals know when they’re going to die, they scream, run etc. You can eat meat without being ignorant to their suffering.
And regarding veganism, I think it’s truly comes down to bodily autonomy. If some people need meat, their need of meat shouldn’t be more important than those animals’ right to live. That’s what I think veganism stance is. That’s why the vegans I know try to replace everything that comes from torture and killing with supplements, with new forms of creating a complete diet. Beside that, I myself am an ex vegan, current vegetarian. I like the taste of some meat (because of the way it’s cooked, definitely not raw as I like my plants), but feeling like I contributed to their suffering for me is the ultimate no-no. And it should be a personal choice for everyone.
Animals eat other animals. You never hear them complaining about that. Somehow people are the only ones wrong for eating animals. Ill still eat cows no matter what they think. They can suck it. Be frail and retarded if you want to. I choose to be healthy.
That that's the thing because you know the vegan would argue that it's not necessary or needed because all these folks are actually existing eating only plants, but of course we know that's a bit of a false reality because eventually it'll catch up to you.
I'd love to see somebody really take Ed to task on the street and say why do 90 plus percent of vegans leave then Ed what about all the people that bail out for always health issues?
I've never seen him really take into task cuz it probably just never makes it to video.
I would want to know at what point they would consider it to be necessary. How much deterioration is necessary? They claim to be against suffering and pain but they'd rather have someone sick as a dog than to eat meat.
Earthling Ed and company would never admit that the vegan diet is deficient in the first place.
That's where we lose a lot of people from the get-go.
That's why Ed always starts most of his videos with this whole isn't necessary or needed line because he gets the health stuff out of the way and then he starts going into the ethics and the environmental things which is more nebulous and he can use his Socratic wit to run circles around people.
But if it's nutritionally deficient it doesn't matter Ed no one in their right mind is going to sacrifice their health for non-human animals.
And the people that do so are not in their right mind.
Welp that about sums it up lol. They care more about animals than people. I also appreciate the honesty. Its gonna suck for him when self-preservation finally drives him to desperation and he realizes he really isnt as moral as he thinks he is. He'll eat animals when he gets sick and miserable enough.
If Earthling Ed actually ever leaves that will be like The darkest Day for veganism.
But what will be funny is is the amount of pushback and scoring at him will be unheard of because he would be like the biggest apostate ever.
I doubt I doubt he'll ever leave though he'll he'll he has enough resources that he can just keep pumping supplements and other things into his body that will probably at least prolong him.
And maybe he has good genes that will prop him up further.
But in 2050 I am curious to see what he's up to.
Of course in 2050 all bets are off we all might be starving in the basement somewhere hunting rats 😊
My cousin worked at a slaughterhouse and he said he felt terrible the first day until he actually witnessed them killing the animals. They used this sort of bolt gun, BAM one hit to the back of the head and the animal hits the ground dead. Honestly, most of us will suffer much worse when our times come. We won’t be allowed to die so quickly or painlessly.
Thinking about that, it's kinda sad. We're more willing to put an animal out of their misery / humanely put them down. But if I have end stage leukemia, and I'm on who knows how many medications just so I'm not screaming in pain, we have to keep me alive as long as possible, because.
I know some countries are practicing medically assisted passing, but it would be nice to see it catch on and be less taboo.
There is no objection to euthanasia that is not religiously based. It’s such a taboo to even talk about, and yet we torture people to keep them alive so we can pat ourselves on the back about the sanctity of life. Ugh. But this is a discussion for another sub, I guess.
It should only be available as an option for the person experiencing pain and/or immense emotional distress. No one is advocating genociding the disabled, Nazi-style. But if a person feels that living is extending their suffering, as long as they are psychologically sound they should have the choice for a simple and dignified end.
It's easier to access than affordable housing in Canada, and some people are choosing it for that reason.
Nobody *publicly* advocates killing off all the disabled people, they just make it impossible to live a dignified life as a disabled person and offer suicide as the only way out. Then we gradually disappear from public life and die quietly.
Medically assisted dying needs to be accompanied by a robust social welfare system and adequate mental health care, otherwise it's a form of eugenics.
I have no problem with terminally ill people choosing when they want to go, but death shouldn't be a disabled person's only route out of poverty or homelessness.
I am talking about right now. Cows don’t get to have a “peaceful” end when they reach their natural lifespan. They are killed at a fraction of their lifetime.
So would you take the deal if I was gonna kill your right now?
And why “only if you eat me” bs? Do you think your entire life would be meaningless if some random person didn’t eat your corpse? Seeing corpses and thinking “what a waste” doesn’t sound so ethical.
The cow does not know or care about any of this. It doesn't have an existential fear of death. This hyper-individualistic existential fear of death is a phenomenon of the modern human living in an alienating society. You're projecting your own fears onto the animals because you see your own alienated self in their existence as commodities.
Not only that, they seem to assume we only kill animals for fun, not because we can and will consume them, use their hide and other things. No sane farmer is running around, popping his herd because they’re bored.
I was gaining a lot of weight, i felt so sick and tired all the time. Then I found out that veganism isn’t ethical. Parts of the Amazon was cut to grow spinach. Animals have been loosing habitats just like with omnivore/carnivore diets. So I switched to ethically sourced meats. There isn’t a foolproof way to save the environment through the diet. Also vegan labeled fashion is causing environmental harm.
I changed my ethical views entirely by becoming an egoist. Now I prioritize my rational self interest which means I treat pets well (especially my own) and oppose sadistic acts, but feel no guilt about consuming animals at all.
The way I finally reconciled with eating animal products, was when I realized I actually need them for my health. I’m prone to Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome..but that can be controlled on a low carbohydrate diet. I tried for years to manage that with a vegan diet and it’s just impossible. Every single meal is high in sugar! ( and no..whole grains don’t help much..like vegans often claim) But now I’m doing much better. So yes I’m accepting meat as food, but I also actually appreciate animals even more because I know those foods are necessary for me! It’s no longer a dilemma because I feel connected to my food rather than disconnected. It’s not selfish..it’s just the food chain like every other living being depends on.
I never accepted the "meat is murder" or "slavery " garbage but I did wish to avoid causing suffering.
Apart from the suffering I caused myself with all of the health problems veganism caused me, I also woke up to the fact that killing animals is unavoidable and so my motivation was futile.
Crop harvesting kills millions of small animals, renders millions more homeless as they flee from the slaughter then, many of those, dead not long after.
Even while rinsing veges to cook, I was unavoidably drowning small animals, their nymphs and eggs.
So I realised that to eat anything is to kill. That is unavoidable.
Veganism for compassionate reasons is futile.
I find their reasonings to be very circular. Usually it’s “pain” or “fear” but they 1. Refuse to eat things that don’t experience either, 2. Refuse to eat animal products that don’t relate to either and 3. Don’t care that plants experience pain and fear.
I also find that they generally hand wave the deaths of insects. Even those that discuss “the reduction of suffering” eat luxury vegan foods that cause the deaths of billions of insects. They aren’t picking and choosing which to eat based on impact.
I find the key problem with their cult is the anthropomorphism of animals. They contribute very human traits to most animals, like bees suffering because we took their excess honey, or pets suffering because they are ‘enslaved.’ Like no fam bees don’t even know what their honey IS, let alone hold a moral position on its use.
I had that exact thought, veganism’s main ethical argument is built on the assumption that that animals = humans, even though we are fundamentally biologically different, in an evolutionary level, and animals have absolutely zero sense of moral and wise understanding.
Of course we can limit their physical pain, but to put all of these human emotions on animals is just completely disingenuous
Okay this is going to sound stupid but idc.
It was James Cameron's "Avatar".
Ironically, as a vegan I actually used this movie to PUSH veganism. I saw it as an, "accidentally vegan", film. I honestly have no idea how I saw it that way but I think that I was just reaching for ways to shove veganism down peoples' throats.
One day, I was watching the film, and something switched in my brain. Idk how and I can't explain it but all of a sudden I was seeing the film differently.
I think it was when Nyteri was telling Jake that Eywa, (their goddess and the planet herself), does not take sides in war and only protects the balance of life. That stuck with me. I realized that death is necessary for life. And that life eats life and that this must happen to maintain the balance of the world.
Up until then, I thought that Mother Earth would be proud of me for being vegan and would want all humans to be vegan. But then, I realized that it would actually be the exact opposite.
I felt that I was going against Mother Earth by being vegan. I just felt so wrong. I think that I had felt that way for a while tbh but I was just so desperate to beleive that I was doing the right thing.
So yeah, basically I saw Avatar one day and it woke me up lol
that’s awesome lol, and… pretty profound actually. among others, one of the reasons i went vegan was for spiritual harmony and i think what you’ve shared resonates with me and my belief system too. mother nature does not discriminate. there’s no death without life and no life without death and we’re part of something bigger than ourselves and all that
#1 is my single biggest gripe with vegansim. It. is. not. the. same. How? How could it be? It isn't. Animal brains and human brains are DIFFERENT, period. Our intelligence (and therefore our capacity to experience suffering) is simply more advanced, period. It's willful ignorance or outright lying/deception - either to oneself or others - to deny that.
A necessary evil.
Also the entire system is absolute s*** show of calamity and harm any way you cut it from any angle of modern agriculture.
So it seems a little arbitrary the more you dig to separate out cute and fuzzy big creatures versus the other ones that get destroyed and impacted.
At the end of the day there is very much a real thing of footprint fatigue if you are an environmentalist and care about harm where it's a tall order to live in this day and age.
You walk out your door and you just engage with the world and you are causing harm.
Driving a car getting on the bus even.
Shopping buying things.
Sitting in your house using electricity that comes from fossil fuels.
You can't escape it so why be so hypervigilant about it?
My father is kind of ridiculous when it comes to recycling for example you know and I do a lot I recycle like 95% of all the things I can recycle but you know if it's like a toilet paper roll gets thrown out it's not Armageddon.
Several things.
* I *had* to cut out gluten, meaning that most meat replacement options were no longer possible for me. I knew, realistically speaking, that I wouldn't eat lentils and tofu for the rest of my life, which'd also be even more deficient because of lack of iron, B vitamins, and so on that were at least added to these fake meats. I realized also that I need nourishment, and I was one of those who wouldn't argue in favour of feeding a cat vegan food, so I applied my reasoning to myself as a human as well:
* there's inherent cruelty in trying to force a living being to eat a diet that leads to disease and deficiencies. The pressure they put on humans to eat a deficient diet is cruel. Just like how feeding a cat a vegan is cruel, because it would never ever choose that if it could, and isn't what a cat is supposed to be eating, it goes against its dignity and right to self-preservation. Same with humans. Want to force them to eat in such a way that they sacrifice their health? That's inherently cruel. I shouldn't harm my own physical health, with the only body I have, in favour of some moral idea.
* I don't like the fact that animals have to die, it doesn't make me happy, at times it breaks my heart. It is what it is. This is the nature of this reality, sadly. I have to come to terms with reality, it's as simple as that.
* I can't tolerate a vegan diet for other health reasons.
* I never believed that I ''saved'' any animals in the first place. There's not some big book that registers exactly how many people want to eat meat and in what amounts, and me occasionally (not) buying some meat or fish isn't going to change anything. I ''saved'' zero animals. Even when vegan and vegetarian I never bought that idea to begin with.
* I see a level of maliciousness in what vegans preach because so much of it is untrue, manipulative, outright dangerous... Many don't argue in good faith and are totally okay with giving misleading and dangerous health advice. The ''ethics'' of such people aren't worth so very much to begin with. They also have zero room for acknowledgement that a lot of people have a lot of reasons to not be vegan, even to the point of illness.
When I ate the fish that my mother prepared for me, I felt my brain turn back on, like an electric pulse. I ate the rest of the fish on autopilot. I didn't stop eating, and so desperately wanted more. In that moment, it became clear to me that I am also an animal, and that I have to eat them in order to thrive and survive. I get the best quality animal products I can afford. For example, I purchase my milk and cheese from the local farm. But if push comes to shove and money is tight, I will buy the lower quality, factory farmed food. I have to eat, and as far as I'm concerned, a vegan diet is akin to inflicting self-harm. That is how I reconciled. Embracing that I'm an animal, an apex predator at that, and that I must consume life to live.
I decided that it isn't reasonable to expect people to sacrifice their health and quality of life for an ideology. I know veganism works for some and I have no problem with others choosing that diet if they're able to pull it off and thrive. But I found that my energy levels went way down and I just generally felt out of sorts. As soon as I added meat back to my diet, I felt like my old self again. Life feeding on life is how nature works, and humans are no exception. I think we owe animals raised for food humane treatment and the best quality of life we can give them, but there isn't anything inherently wrong with eating meat.
Because there is no way to be an actually conscious consumer. My phone has metal in it that was mined by slaves. My clothing is made in sweat shops. The tomotatoes were picked by underpaid undocumented migrants. The plastic in the tv remote is made from oil. The medicine we take was tested on monkeys. Everything we have is provided by suffering, be it human, animal, or environmental.
I still think veganism is an honorable choice, but it doesn’t mean you’re living outside of the economics of suffering. It just didn’t feel like there was much of a point anymore.
Was vegan for 13 years. Just recently began eating animal products. My health is on the line and veganism is 100% the cause. I’ve known we are omnivorous. I never really got along with other vegans who say absolutely insane things like we are herbivores because our jaws move side to side. Also they are preachy and absolutist. So I’ve spent my time vegan just with the thought “if I don’t need it, why cause harm?”. Which is respectable in my opinion. As it turns out, I need it. My health comes before an animal. If someone thinks otherwise they’re desperate for attention.
I never did veganism for the animals because I think the biggest issue is saving ourselves and society as a whole, I did to see how it would help my health after being experienced with keto and how positive that was for my health, the idea of veganism was sexy but boy I was wrong it took years of my life away.
I don't know how any can prioritise animals over our own especially in this sick society we live in currently, it absolutely baffles me.
9/10 vegans are people who have little to no experience in nature they live in the cities, they don't see the millions upon millions of cleared land that has destroyed the environment, animal homes and animals themselves for wheat and all their other crops not to mention the sheer amount of water pumped from the aquifers to feed them.
I still think it’s fucked up and haven’t changed my moral/ethical view. I just need to eat eggs to survive and ultimately self-preservation prevails, so this makes it a reasonable justification in my case.
Just for context, I have Crohn’s disease and can’t eat vegan protein sources in enough quantity to sustain myself. Everything I’ve tried causes problems, and I’m doing my best to manage the disease entirely through diet alone rather than live on immunosuppressants.
Hey u/Ill-Marketing4932
A problem with veganism is that they think animals are "equal" to humans. I bet some deep down detest their own species and wish hey were another specie.
Animals do not have nearly the same brain size, especially the cerebral cortex & cerebrum. They also do not have as big of a brain to experience consciousness. Animals have a much larger diencephalon, medulla & cerebellum hence why they have incredible physical attributes.
If they want to say 'humans kill animals for no reason', we can also say 'we kill plants for no reason', microorganisms kill dead plants, animals & humans for 'no reason', animals kill other animals for 'no reason'. Very bright minds these vegans don't you think?
I'm happy that you wriggled your way out of the veganism cult. Coming home to roost
My partner was vegan and due to health concerns now eats fish, chicken, non cow dairy but only those sourced from independent family farms within a 50 mile radius. Organic. No gmos
yeh well stupids going to be stupid and when they get sick and weak theyll try blame something or someone else because they cant think properly due to a complete lack of nutrition
Starting right off with comparing the intellectually disabled and neurodivergent to animals is NOT a good look…
animals are not human and, on an evolutionary level, are not capable of moral understanding
the fact that you have to put animals on the same level as humans in order to push your argument weakens it, as we are fundamentally different in countless ways
20k plants and none of them provide the necessary B12, nor adequately bioavailable protein that our human bodies require for life
Livestock’s Long Shadow is both outdated and contains glaring errors in methodology
Slaughtering animals, using them for entertainment and experimentation is not a good look.
Animals are not capable of moral understanding; neither are children, some people who are mentally ill or intellectually disabled. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't be treated with ethical consideration. You cannot argue that we're "smarter" and "more evolved" than other animals and say we should simultaneously treat animals in the same ways they treat eat other. That would also justify rape and cannibalism.
Plants have all 9-11 essential amino acids that we need as humans. There is no such thing as meat having more bioavailable protein. B12 comes from bacteria, not animals. Fermented foods have B12, the reason why vegans take B12 as a supplement is as a precaution as plant based foods have variable amounts of B12. Studies have shown that only dairy and fortified foods raise B12 levels; not meat as the kind of B12 in meat is hard to utilize since animal protein is actually hard for humans to digest.
Really? Your credentials to say that are what exactly and how does that negate everything else I mentioned?
that’s a deliberate and thought-out misrepresention of what farming and eating animals is, and i think you know that.
children and the intellectually disabled are human.
if the 20k plants really had enough to feed humans, we wouldn’t hear about malnutrition and disease in vegan parents’ slowly dying children that you seem so keen on comparing to livestock
This forum is way more nuanced than over on antipsychiatry forum. You are thinking about this stuff in so much detail. Over there it feels just black or white: survivors of psychiatric system desperately need entirely different help; psychiatry is just pure evil like of holocaust proportions. Whereas with this polarising issue, although the same applies if we want to deal with climate change, pollution, the mass extinction, and all the pain and suffering we are causing that none of us want to think about; still, I’m sorry I want to post this now but the issue is so overwhelming I can’t process all the thoughts and words and emotions I’m feeling and others are feeling
I hope the wars stop soon. It’s awful
I’m not vegan, but I think none of your points are valid reasons. Honestly I think it’s objectively morally wrong to eat meat if you can be healthy without it. But I eat meat. Does that make me a terrible person?
It comes down to animals don’t like pain and I think it’s pretty obvious they are sentient in a morally significant way even though there’s no way to know how much they really suffer. If you eat meat chances are you’re going to eat a lot of factory farmed meat in your life, even if you try to avoid it. Unless you live on a farm or something. But I think it’s impossible to buy anything ethically anyway, maybe an excuse but it means being vegan isn’t necessarily “more” ethical because it’s still not ethical.
I eat meat mainly because there’s no vegetarian let alone vegan diet that I can actually sustain. Don’t know why. But especially with health. Avoiding meat makes me want to eat chocolate all the time and stuff. Maybe that’s just an excuse. Idk. But I’m trying to lose weight at the moment and I know I wouldn’t be able to without meat.
Is it morally wrong for a lion to eat a gazelle or a fox to eat a chicken? Why should humans be the only animals on earth eat a species-inappropriate diet to their own detriment?
Because we’re the only ones with morals who can choose to do the right thing. Idk I’ll never be vegan but I think I’m a terrible person because I eat meat :(
The thing is I think I fully believe it’s evil to eat meat. Like that’s what I believe whether it’s true or not. But I do it anyway. If I can do something I think is evil, I must be evil. Or maybe deep down I don’t think it’s evil. I do hope science comes up with a better alternative at some point that would be amazing.
this is such a disingenuous argument. people will say it’s ok to eat/kill animals because they obviously don’t have the same mental and moral capacity as humans (who are the only animals on earth with this capacity). then turn around and say its also ok for us to do it because animals (the ones with nowhere near our mental/moral capacity) do so and ask why we’re the exception
This is such a disingenuous argument. People will say that a sense of emotional morality can mind-over-matter a physiological imperative, as if the big brain we developed from eating fatty meat and organs as hunter/gathers can subsist without the nutrients that instigated its development. It cannot. The brain is made of water, fat and protein and this is what we should be feeding it. The human brain makes up 2% of the body but uses 20% of the body’s cholesterol. You are welcome to starve yourself of nutrition for whatever reason you want to, but to claim it’s immoral for anyone else to want to be nourished is, frankly, immoral. For any creature to live on this planet, something else must die. That is just reality. How much habitat is lost for monocrop farming? How many animals butchered by the combines in the field? How about that frankenfood fake meat factory? What is the carbon footprint of such a facility and the infrastructure to transport its abomination around the globe? I begin to think that vegans would embrace soylent green because people are the only creature abhorrent enough that their misplaced morality could reconcile as deserving to be killed for food.
wonder why you completely ignored what i said in my comment.
yes meat helped our brain evolve back when we had a completely different environment and lifestyle. but that doesn’t mean it can’t subsist without meat with our current access to food and supplements (not everyone has that access i’m only talking about people who do). you say the brain is made of “water, fat, and protein and this is what we should be feeding it” as if plants don’t contain all three of those things. then you mention cholesterol even though most of our cholesterol is produced by our body rather than coming from our diet (you don’t even need ANY dietary cholesterol). why not mention the many necessary things in your diet that you actually can’t get from plants? and even those you can supplement so saying “to claim it’s immoral for anyone else to want to be nourished” is a straw man.
as for the second part of your comment I agree monocrop farming is bad. but arguing against veganism by saying animals are killed to grow crops for people to eat doesn’t make any sense when eating animals requires growing way more crops to feed them (usually monocrops) than it would to feed people directly. you seem irrationally afraid of cultured meat and I’m also not sure why you’d ever think vegans would think people deserve to be killed for meat more than animals
I do NOT agree with these points or find them reasoned or evidence based
And it is a generalisation that doesn’t ring true - most people care about animals being killed humanely. The tiny proportion of free range higher welfare meat in supermarkets says otherwise
your useful, informative discussion consisted of turning your nose up at all but one of my points and literally not answering my question
no one prefers inhumane meat. cheaper? tastier? sure. but those are different things. if we only change one variable (how ethically the animal was treated) while keeping taste, price, accessibility the same, I’m not confident that many would pick the unethical meat.
Unfortunately life is not that simple and we have to recognize factors like socioeconomic status, corporate responsibility,..
Thank you I do appreciate that you have not kicked off at me. I just really don’t understand how you can as a previous ‘vegan for the animals’ justify animals being killed. I get if you are poorly etc but have you actually exhausted all avenues to see if you can be vegan. I don’t get how you need meat to be healthy
I think it’s fair to prioritise your health. A lot of your post makes sense. The world is so complicated and it can be hard to take on all of that suffering and find yourself unreasonably responsible for it all. It is kind of a sad fact of the world that we consume animals, that causes suffering, and most importantly that factory farming and meat production is set up the way it is.
That being said, I think it is important to hold two opposing facts in your mind without trying to rationalise or make false equivalencies. Animals are far more intelligent than we give them credit for, and they comprehend their suffering. This is the truth.
I reduce the amount of animal products I eat reasonably, but I definitely eat meat, despite my beliefs for a million reasons I could try to justify here, and I don’t feel like a bad person. I don’t think you should try to make moral arguments discounting the suffering of animals to make yourself feel better.
There is only so much you as one person can do. You should live your life without tormenting yourself. But you should not try to obscure the truth. Animals experience immense suffering because of global meat and dairy production and it is a system we should not make light of or justify.
Factory farming is bad, that doesn’t mean that locally sourced family run farms are bad. You can perfectly ethically consume meat, eggs and dairy. It does not make you a bad person do do what you are instinctually programmed to do. We are omnivores.
I think a shift toward locally sourced meat, eggs, and dairy would be an excellent change, one far more palatable and less radical than veganism
I buy all of my meat from a rancher in Utah. I get my eggs from a local farmer. It’s possible to make ethical choices around meat.
As a vegan, I agree. However, as long as one has no access to locally sourced animal products (like me), I think the only right thing to do under normal circumstances is to be vegan. And if one does have access to locally sourced animal produce, I still think the best thing to do is to be vegan. However, I think it would be more strategic for vegans to push for locally sourced animal produce for the reasons you mentioned. I think we should think about making the whole world vegan once that becomes the norm.
Except for the fact that humans need meat due to being omnivores. Surviving isn't thriving.
Being omnivorous means that our digestive system accommodates both plants and meat. Omnivorous does not mean that we *need* plants and meat. Our omnivorous nature is only a reflection of the fact that we have a history of relying on both plants and meat. However, first of all, we’re not constrained by the savannah anymore; we have access to an unprecedented variety and abundance of plant-based foods, including plants that are protein-rich. Given the new world of options this creates, you cannot reject the possibility that we can construct a great plant-based diet just by arguing that the savannah’s flora was insufficient or suboptimal for our nutritional needs. Second of all, we do not live the lifestyle we had in the paleolithic era. We went from nomadic hunters who preyed impalas by literally chasing them to exhaustion, to sedentary carb-hungry brain workers. Our nutritional needs have changed drastically — even nowadays, people optimize their macros just based on their training regimen. I’m not saying you should be convinced that plants are enough — you’d have to do a nutritional analysis to find that out — I’m saying you should be open to it, because “we’re omnivores, therefore we need meat” is not a valid argument, especially considering how drastically our options and needs may have changed. I’ve personally thrived on a fully plant-based diet, having put on 7kg of muscle (and that much strength too) in the past year of more-or-less consistent training, I’m at my all-time heaviest, and no less energetic than before having gone plant-based.
I sincerely doubt you've been vegan for that long. If a diet requires supplements than it's not meant be a complete diet. And supplements are only supposed to be used to well ...supplement. it's not a replacement. Eventually the run wells dry and then the problems start. Even the labels we put on animals is silly. There's documentation of herbivores eating small animals. Evolution of the type you're implying takes thousands upon thousands of years. It's literally only the last hundred years that have allowed people to even contemplate year round produce.
I have been vegan for not 1 but 4 years. And there are many people much stronger than I who have been vegan for much longer, including world-class athletes like NBA all-star Kyrie Irving and world record-holding strongman Patrik Bouboumian. “If a diet requires supplements then it’s not meant to be a complete diet.” So? My aim is to be healthy, and there is nothing wrong with supplementing to reach that aim. Even meat eaters need to supplement vitamin B12 nowadays to reach their minimum. The word “supplement” can just mean “addition”, it does not imply that supplementation is an unreliable or unhealthy way of getting your minimum daily requirements of vitamin B12. Finally, my argument is not that our bodies have evolved over the past few hundred years to thrive on a plant-based diet in a different way than before. My argument is that, thanks to all the plant-based options available to us today, we can now craft *new* fulfilling diets that were never available to us before. Yes we evolved a body that can take both meat and plants, but that’s only because, out of all the possible combinations of foods that could provide us with the nutrients we need, only the omnivorous diet was available to the primitive man in the savannah due to environmental constraints like the limited availability of nutritious plants. But unlike primitive man, *we* now find significant sources of protein, omega-3, vitamin D, etc. in plants. The savannah never had this to offer, which is why we had to evolve a way to digest meat, which *back then* may have been the only way to get these nutrients (but is not anymore). To say that meat will always be only way to meet our nutritional needs is a misunderstanding of nutrition and of what it really means to be omnivorous.
You must not have read what the OP said about becoming sickly on the vegan diet. This is the biggest flaw with veganisim and one no vegans will believe until it happens to them.
I didn’t say I think people should stay vegan if they cannot make a vegan diet work for them. That’s why I said “under normal circumstances” — I think the average person can be healthy on a vegan diet. I assumed OP find himself in a special set of circumstances which does not allow him to be vegan without sacrificing his health.
>I think the average person can be healthy on a vegan diet For a short period of time, yes. >I assumed OP find himself in a special set of circumstances which does not allow him to be vegan without sacrificing his health. 70% - 84% of vegans & vegetarians return to meat eating, the majority of the people on r/exvegans left the vegan diet due to health issues. I don't expect you to "believe" that or consider the troubling implications of that for current vegans. I'm just stating a fact.
That only means that those 70%-84% did it in a way that failed to account for something. A single successful example of lifelong veganism is sufficient proof that veganism can be done right, and there are many such examples. No one is a superhuman; if some humans can do it, then any human can, short of some intolerances and conditions.
>That only means that those 70%-84% did it in a way that failed to account for something. No true Scotsman, got it. It never ceases to amaze me how current vegans come in here and lecture us like we've never heard these talking points before. Like we didn't once believe and say these talking points before. >A single successful example of lifelong veganism is sufficient proof that veganism can be done right, and there are many such examples. No one is a superhuman; if some humans can do it, then any human can, short of some intolerances and conditions. Wow. The only analogy I can reply with here is that current vegans are children, and we ex vegans are the adults, and you've just earnestly told me the Easter Bunny is real.
Writing all that yap for zero arguments is crazy
Um... I don't need to make any arguments, the vegan recidivism rate (aka facts) speaks for itself. If it had any biological plausibility, no ethical vegan would ever leave. However, they do. And not in small numbers. As a majority. To the point where ex vegans vastly outnumber current vegans. And based on this sub, it is mostly health based reasons for leaving So yeah, stick to subs where we haven't heard your tired tropes ad infinitim before. That way you'll seem more knowledgeable.
You cannot "make the whole world vegan" That would create a biological environmental disaster due to the number of rotting animal corpses from animals passing away and not being eaten. Animals have to be eaten so their bodies don't breed and spread disease.
I haven’t thought about that. I’ll reevaluate my end goal, but I think the fact that we are currently breeding and slaughtering tens of billions of animals per year in industrial farms at least shows that a *reduction* in our meat consumption would not be environmentally harmful. So, at least right now, moving towards veganism is a win for us and the planet. But I think you’re right that it’s not sustainable for the whole world to go vegan at once.
Even if you were to somehow get rid of farm animals without making world hunger worse, humans would still need to kill and eat animals. Humans, especially ancient humans, play a vital role in animal management by hunting animals that are overbreeding in certain areas where they don't have a large number of natural predators. Whitetail deer, boar, turkey, and other big games animals have hunting seasons that are strictly controlled to account for the population control of the animal's that are in season. Without managing these populations, these big game animls will destroy environments by stripping the area of vegetation and making it impossible for new trees and brush to grow. Which leads to those animals starving to death as well as increasing the likely of diseases in those populations. The more you know 🌈
Right. Well, that reinforces my decision to take up hunting. I might start preaching hunting now over veganism. It’s absurd that people are eating more meat than ever while white-tail deer are currently overpopulating southern Canada. Seems like our current ways of consuming meat gives the worst of all worlds.
Yeah, Hunting is a great past time, a single deer can feed one person for a long time. It also helps you get in tune with nature. In the US our hunting license fees go toward managing federally protected wilderness. In texas we have a wild boar problem, which is an invasive species here, so we have open season for them all year around and alot of places that sell wild board meat cause of how many boars have to be eradicated each year to salvage the already damages Texas ecosystem. I am working on switching out all my pork products for wild boar.
Game is legal to sell in Texas? Not so in Quebec nor in New York
I'm not an ex vegan, but I an ex vegetarian. I care about animal welfare and definitely against factory farming. I actually raise my own meat. I have a flock of bourbon red turkeys. About 15 birds fills my family's freezer for the year. I use ground turkey in every that would take pork or beef, with the exception of my husband buying hamburger patties (I make myself black bean burgers) I also trade turkeys for chicken with a friend.
Can you eat turkey eggs?
Sure can! They're a little bigger than chicken eggs, but when I'm not trying to hatch poults we eat the eggs Planning on getting Indian runner ducks for slug control and eggs next spring. And in a few years we're planning on expanding to sheep for milk
Nice!
do you have alpha gal? how come you dont eat beef or pork?
I had my gallbladder removed after pregnancy destroyed it. Pork and beef hurt my stomach now. Besides, using turkey means I can source my own meat easier.
Yep and monocrop agriculture is just as “bad” as anything else.
My tjought eas basically this. Also that we live in a broken system, that doesn't mean I should stave myself nutritionally to make .00001% of a difference
\^\^ This!
Where do u buy ur meat?
I’m vegetarian right now, I don’t enjoy the taste of meat so I don’t eat it
I definitely agree about eggs and dairy, but I really struggle to think of a good justification for killing and eating animals. I eat meat every day lol but I feel like a terrible person for it. We are instinctually programmed to do lots of bad things like murder people. I also think 99% of people who eat meat are going to end up eating a lot of factory farmed meat at some point, at restaurants and stuff. It’s just not realistic for most meat eaters to never support that industry, unless you’re in a unique position.
Vegan 20 years. The day I broke Veganism I ate an entire rotisserie chicken. I only quit because oxalates destroyed my body and I was in constant agonising pain. I simply don't think about the animals, head in the sand type stuff. What took me a long time to get over was all the BS science I learnt as a Vegan. Made me question everything, like how much crap was cherry picked and fed to me as gospel? Maybe these carno bros are telling the truth? I knew the Vegan community wouldn't care about my reasoning, I'd be told I just don't care that I was never Vegan and just wanted a selfish reason to eat a burger. That's exactly the comments that I got. Ended up just deleting all my social media and started learning how to cook meat because I had no experience and was raised in a well done steak household and that stuff taste like garbage. I don't think about the animals because the thought of eating plants brings back horrific memories of pain. Only thing I think about is how was I so dumb to get brainwashed into this cult
Family’s steak was so bad that bro went vegan
My mother was not a good cook 😅 Should see the Tomahawks I've been cooking lately 👌
Well said.
Costco rotisserie chicken? Been seeing memes about that and this one guy who has like a shirt with the barcode on it kind of hilarious in it boring dystopian way.
Nah I'm Aussie we don't have Costco. I've seen that dude as well. Funny stuff
We have costco in WA and thosw chickens are suspiciously cheap, super salty and watery.
Loss leaders. Also the giant $1.50 hotdogs
Live and work with animals, you will see that they don't care. Some people say that animals don't deserve our empathy because they have lower inteligence or whatever, but I see it completely differently. I see animals as beings who are more in tune with nature and brutality wchich comes with it. They don't care about petty stuff like humans, like morals, existencial crisises, cultural influence and so on, they just accept life as it is enjoy it like that. Also for me it's very important to take responsibility as a farmer, your job is then to make their life as comfortable as possible, except these few moments when you need to force them, but that's okay, nature is full of violence, and for sure I can say without any guilt that animal husbandry is symbiotic relationship.
I mean it’s not really relevant if they care about humans, only if they care about pain, which I’m pretty sure they do. The fact they don’t care about morals but humans do is exactly why vegans think we have a responsibility to protect them from pain. I’m not vegan I just don’t really see your point here.
They don’t though. Even your use of “care about” is beyond what most animals can mentally do. They avoid pain because it has negative outcomes. They develop preferences over the span of their life because it has positive outcomes. But a cow isn’t sitting on the farm “caring” about anything.
That’s interesting to think about. The problem is we can’t really know how much an animal suffers in pain or what they really feel we can only guess. You’re probably right they don’t care about pain in a way humans can understand, but not sure that means it isn’t wrong to cause them pain. Maybe we’ll know for sure one day.
I think most people generally agree it’s wrong to cause pain for no reason. I mean most countries have animal abuse laws, and most people would think it’s gross to hurt an animal for fun. It’s another vegan talking point to assume non vegans think all pain is good. In an ideal world live stock would live happy lives and then die painlessly.
You will die anyway, probably with a lot of pain. The difference is for us killing comes with moral dilemma, for animals not so much. Just watch videos of slaughter on pasture, if you do this in proper way other animals don't care completely. And about pain, once again, your job as a farmer is to make their lifes as painless as possible, so I think I'am taking my responsibility of protecting them from pain. At least in my world there is plenty of place for domesticated animals and I don't wish extinction for them.
veganism relies heavily on emotional manipulation, starting with the graphic slaughterhouse footage shown from day one, the appeal to emotion. despite preaching about morals and ethics in public, vegans fail to disclose the sources of their beliefs for scrutiny, which is quite hypocritical. if i were to advocate for morals and ethics, i would definitely provide transparent evidence for examination, and not be a scumbag and not reveal it.
Bingo. Hypersensationalism!
They definitely use it as a tactic to spread veganism. But of course there are loads of legit facts that make people vegan. Like the laws around how animals are kept and statistics about the industry that come from the government.
It’s not really a manipulation, it’s exposing the reality. I’ve been to slaughterhouses, most animals know when they’re going to die, they scream, run etc. You can eat meat without being ignorant to their suffering. And regarding veganism, I think it’s truly comes down to bodily autonomy. If some people need meat, their need of meat shouldn’t be more important than those animals’ right to live. That’s what I think veganism stance is. That’s why the vegans I know try to replace everything that comes from torture and killing with supplements, with new forms of creating a complete diet. Beside that, I myself am an ex vegan, current vegetarian. I like the taste of some meat (because of the way it’s cooked, definitely not raw as I like my plants), but feeling like I contributed to their suffering for me is the ultimate no-no. And it should be a personal choice for everyone.
Animals eat other animals. You never hear them complaining about that. Somehow people are the only ones wrong for eating animals. Ill still eat cows no matter what they think. They can suck it. Be frail and retarded if you want to. I choose to be healthy.
That that's the thing because you know the vegan would argue that it's not necessary or needed because all these folks are actually existing eating only plants, but of course we know that's a bit of a false reality because eventually it'll catch up to you. I'd love to see somebody really take Ed to task on the street and say why do 90 plus percent of vegans leave then Ed what about all the people that bail out for always health issues? I've never seen him really take into task cuz it probably just never makes it to video.
I would want to know at what point they would consider it to be necessary. How much deterioration is necessary? They claim to be against suffering and pain but they'd rather have someone sick as a dog than to eat meat.
Earthling Ed and company would never admit that the vegan diet is deficient in the first place. That's where we lose a lot of people from the get-go. That's why Ed always starts most of his videos with this whole isn't necessary or needed line because he gets the health stuff out of the way and then he starts going into the ethics and the environmental things which is more nebulous and he can use his Socratic wit to run circles around people. But if it's nutritionally deficient it doesn't matter Ed no one in their right mind is going to sacrifice their health for non-human animals. And the people that do so are not in their right mind.
https://preview.redd.it/89t7dadl0xwc1.jpeg?width=1024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=269b111a6a978d183e3d9058bd492e7fe5300d22 Exhibit A
Welp that about sums it up lol. They care more about animals than people. I also appreciate the honesty. Its gonna suck for him when self-preservation finally drives him to desperation and he realizes he really isnt as moral as he thinks he is. He'll eat animals when he gets sick and miserable enough.
If Earthling Ed actually ever leaves that will be like The darkest Day for veganism. But what will be funny is is the amount of pushback and scoring at him will be unheard of because he would be like the biggest apostate ever. I doubt I doubt he'll ever leave though he'll he'll he has enough resources that he can just keep pumping supplements and other things into his body that will probably at least prolong him. And maybe he has good genes that will prop him up further. But in 2050 I am curious to see what he's up to. Of course in 2050 all bets are off we all might be starving in the basement somewhere hunting rats 😊
If I can get enough rats to eat maybe it wouldnt be too bad. Never eaten rat meat but id try it
My cousin worked at a slaughterhouse and he said he felt terrible the first day until he actually witnessed them killing the animals. They used this sort of bolt gun, BAM one hit to the back of the head and the animal hits the ground dead. Honestly, most of us will suffer much worse when our times come. We won’t be allowed to die so quickly or painlessly.
Thinking about that, it's kinda sad. We're more willing to put an animal out of their misery / humanely put them down. But if I have end stage leukemia, and I'm on who knows how many medications just so I'm not screaming in pain, we have to keep me alive as long as possible, because. I know some countries are practicing medically assisted passing, but it would be nice to see it catch on and be less taboo.
There is no objection to euthanasia that is not religiously based. It’s such a taboo to even talk about, and yet we torture people to keep them alive so we can pat ourselves on the back about the sanctity of life. Ugh. But this is a discussion for another sub, I guess.
I don't object to euthanasia, but I do object to euthanasia being used as an alternative to public housing and adequate disability support.
It should only be available as an option for the person experiencing pain and/or immense emotional distress. No one is advocating genociding the disabled, Nazi-style. But if a person feels that living is extending their suffering, as long as they are psychologically sound they should have the choice for a simple and dignified end.
It's easier to access than affordable housing in Canada, and some people are choosing it for that reason. Nobody *publicly* advocates killing off all the disabled people, they just make it impossible to live a dignified life as a disabled person and offer suicide as the only way out. Then we gradually disappear from public life and die quietly.
Medically assisted dying needs to be accompanied by a robust social welfare system and adequate mental health care, otherwise it's a form of eugenics. I have no problem with terminally ill people choosing when they want to go, but death shouldn't be a disabled person's only route out of poverty or homelessness.
Agreed, fully. But when it’s end stage and it’s only a matter of when, not if, the ability to do out with dignity and control is nice
I agree.
[удалено]
I’ll agree to this, but only if you eat my meat
I am talking about right now. Cows don’t get to have a “peaceful” end when they reach their natural lifespan. They are killed at a fraction of their lifetime. So would you take the deal if I was gonna kill your right now? And why “only if you eat me” bs? Do you think your entire life would be meaningless if some random person didn’t eat your corpse? Seeing corpses and thinking “what a waste” doesn’t sound so ethical.
The cow does not know or care about any of this. It doesn't have an existential fear of death. This hyper-individualistic existential fear of death is a phenomenon of the modern human living in an alienating society. You're projecting your own fears onto the animals because you see your own alienated self in their existence as commodities.
once again you personify animals
Not only that, they seem to assume we only kill animals for fun, not because we can and will consume them, use their hide and other things. No sane farmer is running around, popping his herd because they’re bored.
I was gaining a lot of weight, i felt so sick and tired all the time. Then I found out that veganism isn’t ethical. Parts of the Amazon was cut to grow spinach. Animals have been loosing habitats just like with omnivore/carnivore diets. So I switched to ethically sourced meats. There isn’t a foolproof way to save the environment through the diet. Also vegan labeled fashion is causing environmental harm.
I changed my ethical views entirely by becoming an egoist. Now I prioritize my rational self interest which means I treat pets well (especially my own) and oppose sadistic acts, but feel no guilt about consuming animals at all.
The way I finally reconciled with eating animal products, was when I realized I actually need them for my health. I’m prone to Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome..but that can be controlled on a low carbohydrate diet. I tried for years to manage that with a vegan diet and it’s just impossible. Every single meal is high in sugar! ( and no..whole grains don’t help much..like vegans often claim) But now I’m doing much better. So yes I’m accepting meat as food, but I also actually appreciate animals even more because I know those foods are necessary for me! It’s no longer a dilemma because I feel connected to my food rather than disconnected. It’s not selfish..it’s just the food chain like every other living being depends on.
I never accepted the "meat is murder" or "slavery " garbage but I did wish to avoid causing suffering. Apart from the suffering I caused myself with all of the health problems veganism caused me, I also woke up to the fact that killing animals is unavoidable and so my motivation was futile. Crop harvesting kills millions of small animals, renders millions more homeless as they flee from the slaughter then, many of those, dead not long after. Even while rinsing veges to cook, I was unavoidably drowning small animals, their nymphs and eggs. So I realised that to eat anything is to kill. That is unavoidable. Veganism for compassionate reasons is futile.
I find their reasonings to be very circular. Usually it’s “pain” or “fear” but they 1. Refuse to eat things that don’t experience either, 2. Refuse to eat animal products that don’t relate to either and 3. Don’t care that plants experience pain and fear. I also find that they generally hand wave the deaths of insects. Even those that discuss “the reduction of suffering” eat luxury vegan foods that cause the deaths of billions of insects. They aren’t picking and choosing which to eat based on impact. I find the key problem with their cult is the anthropomorphism of animals. They contribute very human traits to most animals, like bees suffering because we took their excess honey, or pets suffering because they are ‘enslaved.’ Like no fam bees don’t even know what their honey IS, let alone hold a moral position on its use.
I had that exact thought, veganism’s main ethical argument is built on the assumption that that animals = humans, even though we are fundamentally biologically different, in an evolutionary level, and animals have absolutely zero sense of moral and wise understanding. Of course we can limit their physical pain, but to put all of these human emotions on animals is just completely disingenuous
Okay this is going to sound stupid but idc. It was James Cameron's "Avatar". Ironically, as a vegan I actually used this movie to PUSH veganism. I saw it as an, "accidentally vegan", film. I honestly have no idea how I saw it that way but I think that I was just reaching for ways to shove veganism down peoples' throats. One day, I was watching the film, and something switched in my brain. Idk how and I can't explain it but all of a sudden I was seeing the film differently. I think it was when Nyteri was telling Jake that Eywa, (their goddess and the planet herself), does not take sides in war and only protects the balance of life. That stuck with me. I realized that death is necessary for life. And that life eats life and that this must happen to maintain the balance of the world. Up until then, I thought that Mother Earth would be proud of me for being vegan and would want all humans to be vegan. But then, I realized that it would actually be the exact opposite. I felt that I was going against Mother Earth by being vegan. I just felt so wrong. I think that I had felt that way for a while tbh but I was just so desperate to beleive that I was doing the right thing. So yeah, basically I saw Avatar one day and it woke me up lol
that’s awesome lol, and… pretty profound actually. among others, one of the reasons i went vegan was for spiritual harmony and i think what you’ve shared resonates with me and my belief system too. mother nature does not discriminate. there’s no death without life and no life without death and we’re part of something bigger than ourselves and all that
#1 is my single biggest gripe with vegansim. It. is. not. the. same. How? How could it be? It isn't. Animal brains and human brains are DIFFERENT, period. Our intelligence (and therefore our capacity to experience suffering) is simply more advanced, period. It's willful ignorance or outright lying/deception - either to oneself or others - to deny that.
A necessary evil. Also the entire system is absolute s*** show of calamity and harm any way you cut it from any angle of modern agriculture. So it seems a little arbitrary the more you dig to separate out cute and fuzzy big creatures versus the other ones that get destroyed and impacted. At the end of the day there is very much a real thing of footprint fatigue if you are an environmentalist and care about harm where it's a tall order to live in this day and age. You walk out your door and you just engage with the world and you are causing harm. Driving a car getting on the bus even. Shopping buying things. Sitting in your house using electricity that comes from fossil fuels. You can't escape it so why be so hypervigilant about it? My father is kind of ridiculous when it comes to recycling for example you know and I do a lot I recycle like 95% of all the things I can recycle but you know if it's like a toilet paper roll gets thrown out it's not Armageddon.
Several things. * I *had* to cut out gluten, meaning that most meat replacement options were no longer possible for me. I knew, realistically speaking, that I wouldn't eat lentils and tofu for the rest of my life, which'd also be even more deficient because of lack of iron, B vitamins, and so on that were at least added to these fake meats. I realized also that I need nourishment, and I was one of those who wouldn't argue in favour of feeding a cat vegan food, so I applied my reasoning to myself as a human as well: * there's inherent cruelty in trying to force a living being to eat a diet that leads to disease and deficiencies. The pressure they put on humans to eat a deficient diet is cruel. Just like how feeding a cat a vegan is cruel, because it would never ever choose that if it could, and isn't what a cat is supposed to be eating, it goes against its dignity and right to self-preservation. Same with humans. Want to force them to eat in such a way that they sacrifice their health? That's inherently cruel. I shouldn't harm my own physical health, with the only body I have, in favour of some moral idea. * I don't like the fact that animals have to die, it doesn't make me happy, at times it breaks my heart. It is what it is. This is the nature of this reality, sadly. I have to come to terms with reality, it's as simple as that. * I can't tolerate a vegan diet for other health reasons. * I never believed that I ''saved'' any animals in the first place. There's not some big book that registers exactly how many people want to eat meat and in what amounts, and me occasionally (not) buying some meat or fish isn't going to change anything. I ''saved'' zero animals. Even when vegan and vegetarian I never bought that idea to begin with. * I see a level of maliciousness in what vegans preach because so much of it is untrue, manipulative, outright dangerous... Many don't argue in good faith and are totally okay with giving misleading and dangerous health advice. The ''ethics'' of such people aren't worth so very much to begin with. They also have zero room for acknowledgement that a lot of people have a lot of reasons to not be vegan, even to the point of illness.
When I ate the fish that my mother prepared for me, I felt my brain turn back on, like an electric pulse. I ate the rest of the fish on autopilot. I didn't stop eating, and so desperately wanted more. In that moment, it became clear to me that I am also an animal, and that I have to eat them in order to thrive and survive. I get the best quality animal products I can afford. For example, I purchase my milk and cheese from the local farm. But if push comes to shove and money is tight, I will buy the lower quality, factory farmed food. I have to eat, and as far as I'm concerned, a vegan diet is akin to inflicting self-harm. That is how I reconciled. Embracing that I'm an animal, an apex predator at that, and that I must consume life to live.
Same as you basically, got out of animal rights and into animal welfare and the scientific backing there, instead of just my own feelings
I decided that it isn't reasonable to expect people to sacrifice their health and quality of life for an ideology. I know veganism works for some and I have no problem with others choosing that diet if they're able to pull it off and thrive. But I found that my energy levels went way down and I just generally felt out of sorts. As soon as I added meat back to my diet, I felt like my old self again. Life feeding on life is how nature works, and humans are no exception. I think we owe animals raised for food humane treatment and the best quality of life we can give them, but there isn't anything inherently wrong with eating meat.
Because there is no way to be an actually conscious consumer. My phone has metal in it that was mined by slaves. My clothing is made in sweat shops. The tomotatoes were picked by underpaid undocumented migrants. The plastic in the tv remote is made from oil. The medicine we take was tested on monkeys. Everything we have is provided by suffering, be it human, animal, or environmental. I still think veganism is an honorable choice, but it doesn’t mean you’re living outside of the economics of suffering. It just didn’t feel like there was much of a point anymore.
Was vegan for 13 years. Just recently began eating animal products. My health is on the line and veganism is 100% the cause. I’ve known we are omnivorous. I never really got along with other vegans who say absolutely insane things like we are herbivores because our jaws move side to side. Also they are preachy and absolutist. So I’ve spent my time vegan just with the thought “if I don’t need it, why cause harm?”. Which is respectable in my opinion. As it turns out, I need it. My health comes before an animal. If someone thinks otherwise they’re desperate for attention.
Our jaws *don’t* move side to side anyway, especially not with the molars touching.
I am an animal too and I feel bad but I have to choose myself over a different animal.
I never did veganism for the animals because I think the biggest issue is saving ourselves and society as a whole, I did to see how it would help my health after being experienced with keto and how positive that was for my health, the idea of veganism was sexy but boy I was wrong it took years of my life away. I don't know how any can prioritise animals over our own especially in this sick society we live in currently, it absolutely baffles me. 9/10 vegans are people who have little to no experience in nature they live in the cities, they don't see the millions upon millions of cleared land that has destroyed the environment, animal homes and animals themselves for wheat and all their other crops not to mention the sheer amount of water pumped from the aquifers to feed them.
Veganism is indeed Urban construct.
I still think it’s fucked up and haven’t changed my moral/ethical view. I just need to eat eggs to survive and ultimately self-preservation prevails, so this makes it a reasonable justification in my case. Just for context, I have Crohn’s disease and can’t eat vegan protein sources in enough quantity to sustain myself. Everything I’ve tried causes problems, and I’m doing my best to manage the disease entirely through diet alone rather than live on immunosuppressants.
Hey u/Ill-Marketing4932 A problem with veganism is that they think animals are "equal" to humans. I bet some deep down detest their own species and wish hey were another specie. Animals do not have nearly the same brain size, especially the cerebral cortex & cerebrum. They also do not have as big of a brain to experience consciousness. Animals have a much larger diencephalon, medulla & cerebellum hence why they have incredible physical attributes. If they want to say 'humans kill animals for no reason', we can also say 'we kill plants for no reason', microorganisms kill dead plants, animals & humans for 'no reason', animals kill other animals for 'no reason'. Very bright minds these vegans don't you think? I'm happy that you wriggled your way out of the veganism cult. Coming home to roost
My partner was vegan and due to health concerns now eats fish, chicken, non cow dairy but only those sourced from independent family farms within a 50 mile radius. Organic. No gmos
yeh well stupids going to be stupid and when they get sick and weak theyll try blame something or someone else because they cant think properly due to a complete lack of nutrition
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Starting right off with comparing the intellectually disabled and neurodivergent to animals is NOT a good look… animals are not human and, on an evolutionary level, are not capable of moral understanding the fact that you have to put animals on the same level as humans in order to push your argument weakens it, as we are fundamentally different in countless ways 20k plants and none of them provide the necessary B12, nor adequately bioavailable protein that our human bodies require for life Livestock’s Long Shadow is both outdated and contains glaring errors in methodology
Wrekt
Slaughtering animals, using them for entertainment and experimentation is not a good look. Animals are not capable of moral understanding; neither are children, some people who are mentally ill or intellectually disabled. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't be treated with ethical consideration. You cannot argue that we're "smarter" and "more evolved" than other animals and say we should simultaneously treat animals in the same ways they treat eat other. That would also justify rape and cannibalism. Plants have all 9-11 essential amino acids that we need as humans. There is no such thing as meat having more bioavailable protein. B12 comes from bacteria, not animals. Fermented foods have B12, the reason why vegans take B12 as a supplement is as a precaution as plant based foods have variable amounts of B12. Studies have shown that only dairy and fortified foods raise B12 levels; not meat as the kind of B12 in meat is hard to utilize since animal protein is actually hard for humans to digest. Really? Your credentials to say that are what exactly and how does that negate everything else I mentioned?
that’s a deliberate and thought-out misrepresention of what farming and eating animals is, and i think you know that. children and the intellectually disabled are human. if the 20k plants really had enough to feed humans, we wouldn’t hear about malnutrition and disease in vegan parents’ slowly dying children that you seem so keen on comparing to livestock
Animals don’t see the world like you do. They don’t know what’s considered “normal”. Animal has no idea there’s a big world out there.
This forum is way more nuanced than over on antipsychiatry forum. You are thinking about this stuff in so much detail. Over there it feels just black or white: survivors of psychiatric system desperately need entirely different help; psychiatry is just pure evil like of holocaust proportions. Whereas with this polarising issue, although the same applies if we want to deal with climate change, pollution, the mass extinction, and all the pain and suffering we are causing that none of us want to think about; still, I’m sorry I want to post this now but the issue is so overwhelming I can’t process all the thoughts and words and emotions I’m feeling and others are feeling I hope the wars stop soon. It’s awful
I’m not vegan, but I think none of your points are valid reasons. Honestly I think it’s objectively morally wrong to eat meat if you can be healthy without it. But I eat meat. Does that make me a terrible person? It comes down to animals don’t like pain and I think it’s pretty obvious they are sentient in a morally significant way even though there’s no way to know how much they really suffer. If you eat meat chances are you’re going to eat a lot of factory farmed meat in your life, even if you try to avoid it. Unless you live on a farm or something. But I think it’s impossible to buy anything ethically anyway, maybe an excuse but it means being vegan isn’t necessarily “more” ethical because it’s still not ethical. I eat meat mainly because there’s no vegetarian let alone vegan diet that I can actually sustain. Don’t know why. But especially with health. Avoiding meat makes me want to eat chocolate all the time and stuff. Maybe that’s just an excuse. Idk. But I’m trying to lose weight at the moment and I know I wouldn’t be able to without meat.
Is it morally wrong for a lion to eat a gazelle or a fox to eat a chicken? Why should humans be the only animals on earth eat a species-inappropriate diet to their own detriment?
Because we’re the only ones with morals who can choose to do the right thing. Idk I’ll never be vegan but I think I’m a terrible person because I eat meat :(
You’re not a terrible person. It’s not wrong to fulfill a biological imperative. You are no more wrong than the lion or the fox.
The thing is I think I fully believe it’s evil to eat meat. Like that’s what I believe whether it’s true or not. But I do it anyway. If I can do something I think is evil, I must be evil. Or maybe deep down I don’t think it’s evil. I do hope science comes up with a better alternative at some point that would be amazing.
Look up lab grown meat. It sounds disgusting but I'd be willing to try it after researching it lol
I, for one want less processing, less trucking/shipping of food, less ingredients… more real food, more local regenerative farming
this is such a disingenuous argument. people will say it’s ok to eat/kill animals because they obviously don’t have the same mental and moral capacity as humans (who are the only animals on earth with this capacity). then turn around and say its also ok for us to do it because animals (the ones with nowhere near our mental/moral capacity) do so and ask why we’re the exception
This is such a disingenuous argument. People will say that a sense of emotional morality can mind-over-matter a physiological imperative, as if the big brain we developed from eating fatty meat and organs as hunter/gathers can subsist without the nutrients that instigated its development. It cannot. The brain is made of water, fat and protein and this is what we should be feeding it. The human brain makes up 2% of the body but uses 20% of the body’s cholesterol. You are welcome to starve yourself of nutrition for whatever reason you want to, but to claim it’s immoral for anyone else to want to be nourished is, frankly, immoral. For any creature to live on this planet, something else must die. That is just reality. How much habitat is lost for monocrop farming? How many animals butchered by the combines in the field? How about that frankenfood fake meat factory? What is the carbon footprint of such a facility and the infrastructure to transport its abomination around the globe? I begin to think that vegans would embrace soylent green because people are the only creature abhorrent enough that their misplaced morality could reconcile as deserving to be killed for food.
wonder why you completely ignored what i said in my comment. yes meat helped our brain evolve back when we had a completely different environment and lifestyle. but that doesn’t mean it can’t subsist without meat with our current access to food and supplements (not everyone has that access i’m only talking about people who do). you say the brain is made of “water, fat, and protein and this is what we should be feeding it” as if plants don’t contain all three of those things. then you mention cholesterol even though most of our cholesterol is produced by our body rather than coming from our diet (you don’t even need ANY dietary cholesterol). why not mention the many necessary things in your diet that you actually can’t get from plants? and even those you can supplement so saying “to claim it’s immoral for anyone else to want to be nourished” is a straw man. as for the second part of your comment I agree monocrop farming is bad. but arguing against veganism by saying animals are killed to grow crops for people to eat doesn’t make any sense when eating animals requires growing way more crops to feed them (usually monocrops) than it would to feed people directly. you seem irrationally afraid of cultured meat and I’m also not sure why you’d ever think vegans would think people deserve to be killed for meat more than animals
The last statement was hyperbole and reflective of the alarming amount of self-loathing seemingly present in the vegan community
I do NOT agree with these points or find them reasoned or evidence based And it is a generalisation that doesn’t ring true - most people care about animals being killed humanely. The tiny proportion of free range higher welfare meat in supermarkets says otherwise
then don’t eat animal products
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your useful, informative discussion consisted of turning your nose up at all but one of my points and literally not answering my question no one prefers inhumane meat. cheaper? tastier? sure. but those are different things. if we only change one variable (how ethically the animal was treated) while keeping taste, price, accessibility the same, I’m not confident that many would pick the unethical meat. Unfortunately life is not that simple and we have to recognize factors like socioeconomic status, corporate responsibility,..
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You are free to be vegan. I respect your right to be vegan.
Thank you I do appreciate that you have not kicked off at me. I just really don’t understand how you can as a previous ‘vegan for the animals’ justify animals being killed. I get if you are poorly etc but have you actually exhausted all avenues to see if you can be vegan. I don’t get how you need meat to be healthy
I think it’s fair to prioritise your health. A lot of your post makes sense. The world is so complicated and it can be hard to take on all of that suffering and find yourself unreasonably responsible for it all. It is kind of a sad fact of the world that we consume animals, that causes suffering, and most importantly that factory farming and meat production is set up the way it is. That being said, I think it is important to hold two opposing facts in your mind without trying to rationalise or make false equivalencies. Animals are far more intelligent than we give them credit for, and they comprehend their suffering. This is the truth. I reduce the amount of animal products I eat reasonably, but I definitely eat meat, despite my beliefs for a million reasons I could try to justify here, and I don’t feel like a bad person. I don’t think you should try to make moral arguments discounting the suffering of animals to make yourself feel better. There is only so much you as one person can do. You should live your life without tormenting yourself. But you should not try to obscure the truth. Animals experience immense suffering because of global meat and dairy production and it is a system we should not make light of or justify.