I've been trying to decide if it's unethical to eat veal. I'm not a vegetarian, nor do I have a problem with meat. But veal seems a little cruel.
Veal?
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@Sum1hugme
*finishes bucket of fried veal* what do you mean?
mango.
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@Crocodile
Mango mango?
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@MisterChris
Yeah like, it sounds amazing. But the process seems cruel just to get a tender cut of meat
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@Sum1hugme
Not really. Calves are cute and everything, and if that's enough for you to want to pass up on veal, that's your prerogative... but as for me, the order of nature has always been that which is on the top of the food chain eats that which is on the bottom, and I see no reason to show remorse about it. Predation is inherently pro-nature. Predation controls populations of organisms on the lower trophic levels that, given a lack of predation, would be able to reproduce to incalculable levels. And, in that process, they would outcompete other organisms and destroy biodiversity.
As for purely ethical arguments...
humans are capable of culture, innovation, and the sublimation of instinct in order to act in an ethical manner while animals are not, and so are unequal to humans on a moral level. This does not excuse cruelty, but it implies animals are not morally equivalent to humans and do not possess the rights a human has.[50] The precise definition of a moral community is not simple, but Hsiao defines membership by the ability to know one's own good and that of other members, and to be able to grasp this in the abstract. He claims that non-human animals do not meet this standard.[49]Benjamin Franklin describes his conversion to vegetarianism in chapter one of his autobiography, but then he describes why he (periodically) ceased vegetarianism in his later life:...in my first voyage from Boston...our people set about catching cod, and hauled up a great many. Hitherto I had stuck to my resolution of not eating animal food... But I had formerly been a great lover of fish, and, when this came hot out of the frying-pan, it smelt admirably well. I balanc'd some time between principle and inclination, till I recollected that, when the fish were opened, I saw smaller fish taken out of their stomachs; then thought I, "If you eat one another, I don't see why we mayn't eat you." So I din'd upon cod very heartily, and continued to eat with other people, returning only now and then occasionally to a vegetable diet. So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do.[51]
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@Sum1hugme
I think it's ethically wrong.
But then, I figure what a person 'acts on, shows their true view of ethics.
So since I eat meat, though I think it mean, it implies to me that my ethics involve a lot of self interest.
So from a selfish perspective, it's ethically good.
"When your name is Evil, that is good or so you think,
but you're so very wrong.
It's evil!
But being wrong is right, so then you're good again,
which is the evilest thing of all..."
I think if you are not pro-life, you can justify eating veal so long as the animal wasn't abused and the brain was stunned prior to the bleeding out.
Anyone who is pro-life but not vegetarian (especially not with juvenile-animal-meat) is simply a pure hypocrite in my eyes. I am pro-choice up to the third trimester and I believe that so long as no pain is felt and the animal lived a happy enough life, room to move around etc and the kill was mercifully done with a stun gun to the head prior to the bleeding out, the meat industry is not too terrible for now.
Eventually we will truly outgrow meat in the more civilised cultures of the world (this is not a racist remark, it's a remark of the cultures that don't ruthlessly carry themselves towards the vulnerable and which are sophisticated in their protection of sustainable environment). Those that ignore it will either perish over time or simply trade their animal-slaughtering meat between themselves while the rest of the world eats lab-grown substitute, think of Quorn-type products where it's not necessarily soy based.
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@RationalMadman
Anyone who is pro-life but not vegetarian (especially not with juvenile-animal-meat) is simply a pure hypocrite in my eyes. I am pro-choice up to the third trimester and I believe that so long as no pain is felt and the animal lived a happy enough life, room to move around etc and the kill was mercifully done with a stun gun to the head prior to the bleeding out, the meat industry is not too terrible for now.
How does me opposing women having their babies vacuumed to death require me to be vegetarian? One is human, one isn't. I think that just about covers it.
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@MisterChris
The already-born animals are actually more sentient than the fetus prior to the third trimester (arguably throughout if you knew enough about non-insect animals). Your ethics are based on that taking life away is wrong if the entity has the capcity of sentience, are they not?
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@RationalMadman
Nope. This is my view summarized in one sentence: “To kill a member of the Homo sapiens without justification is immoral.”
And physical development, in my view, is not a good metric for justification.
The argument I laid out above pretty much shows why I think differently for animals. They are not moral beings, they can not act altruistically nor do they hesitate to feed on the flesh of their animal peers. I see no reason to feel especially remorseful over continuing the natural order.
Within reason of course. Cruelty and inhumane treatment seems unnecessarily vile, and I'm sure there is a special place in hell for those who practice it. (The reason why this is different, is because in the natural order animals kill eachother for food or other means of survival. Torture and cruelty provides no such benefit other than sadistic pleasure.)
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@RationalMadman
Anyway I'm turning in for the night so if you respond I probably won't be getting back to you until tomorrow
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@Sum1hugme
I've been trying to decide if it's unethical to eat veal. I'm not a vegetarian, nor do I have a problem with meat. But veal seems a little cruel.
To me its all one thing or the other. Veal is cruel but raising any lifeform in a factory for meat is also quite cruel. If anything a veal's shortened life suggests less processing which likely results in less cruelty overall. If meat is murder than veal is murder. If meat is fine than than veal is fine. Arguing degrees of cruelty suggests that living one's whole life in a box without any natural interaction ever is somehow not as devastatingly torturous as being eaten as a child.
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@Sum1hugme
It's like the abortion argument.
It's not the killing that's the problem, it's the cuteness or potential cuteness of the victim.
Typically selective human morality.
Mrs Lion will have which ever is easiest to catch......She tends not to over think the situation.
I mean, if you care about how “damaged” the subject would be, then you might as well starve to death.
Or develop artificial food, because it damages no subjects, for all sakes.
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@Intelligence_06
I mean, if you care about how “damaged” the subject would be, then you might as well starve to death.
What an utterly nonsensical statement to make. How do you think vegans don't starve to death?
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@zedvictor4
Mrs Lion will have which ever is easiest to catch......She tends not to over think the situation.
Lions don't have a stomach or knowledge that enables them to survive without killing other animals. Lions are often quicker to kill the creature than most other wild cats, it's leopards and tigers that are the most ruthless with their prey, toying with them and keeping them scared stiff but alive until they decide to feast on the animal.
@Rm
Exactly, they don’t. We should not have the pain of the subject being consumed as a criteria of how good the food is.
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@Intelligence_06
China has absolutely no animal rights, I want to be clear as you have admitted being Chinese (culturally, not just racially so this isn't about prejudice) if you support the total absense of animal rights in a legal system?
The motive for me asking this is what you have been posting in this thread, I want to establish what exactly I'm debating against here.
@Rm
Me being born in a nation doesn’t mean I support a lack of animal rights.
Me being born in a nation doesn’t mean I support a lack of animal rights.
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@Intelligence_06
@RationalMadman
Vegans rely on consuming previously living organic material, just like everyone else.
Just not cute fluffy stuff.
Selective morality.
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@zedvictor4
Animal cruelty laws are there regardless of species. It applies less to insects and molluscs simply out of practicality and also because they do genuinely operate less consciously aware than other animals, they don't even have true brains of any kind just a nervous system with a 'control center' of sorts.
I would agree with you that spiders and several species such as octopodes and other such creatures are wrongly unprotected by animal rights as they are barely ever enforced on animals that aren't well known, it's true.
I am not sure how you can begin to compare plants to animals in ethical terms. I support protecting the environment from an ecological perspective but not based on sympathising with plants anywhere near to what I do with animals.
@RationalMadman
Exactly.....Selective morality.
It's not a criticism, just undeniable and obvious, and I'm no different.
Selective morality = survival of the species....Not just in dietary terms.
Cute and fluffy v green and seemingly expressionless, silent and inert....Easy decision for some, especially as there are suitably nutritional alternatives readily available.
Overthink..... Which is the defining nature of the beast.