Can you make a sound, MORAL/ETHICAL argument for NOT being Vegan?
Even if you think you would or could never be a vegan...can you make an ethical argument against the idea that anyone who has the means to be vegan SHOULD be vegan?
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I love those Highland cows. I guess you could argue that being vegan is not an ethical issue. Homo Sapiens are omnivorous and since we cannot photosynthesize for our energy, we must consume living things like plants and animals.
The vegan position is not to eliminate all suffering but to minimize it as much as possible and there is no question that removing the production, processing and slaughter of animals for food and byproducts would result in less suffering.
@Pikachu My issue is not so much with eating meat, it's the industry's treatment of the animals. I did buy an ethically raised turkey this Thanksgiving for twice the price.
I think it's better to consume animals raised ethically (which itself is quite the can of worms) but at the end of the day if you're taking a life just because you like the taste of the animals flesh it's still not particularly ethical.
@Pikachu You are working under the assumption that it is unethical to kill and eat an animal. It could be argued that it is no more unethical than a predator eating its prey in nature.
@JimboSaturn its only an ethical question once we develop compassion and understand that it causes suffering . in this way our behavior cannot be compared with the behavior of animals.
@reflectingmonkey I get it but why should we be different than any other animal? I think part of this may come from living in urban areas where we buy food from grocery stores and we have never learnt to come to grips with our nature. I admire vegans and believe in less consumption of animals
@Pikachu Is our agency relevant? For many people who in the world you actually witness the slaughter of their animals for food consumption, they see death as a natural part of the natural world.
[quote]why should we be different than any other animal?[/quote]
Because we have the ability to sympathize and empathize with suffering and have generally agreed that inflicting unnecessary suffering is not moral. We don't base morality on what is natural.
Of course it is. A tiger is an animal which has no conception of suffering or any means to empathize with the suffering of another. Additionally, it has no means to survive besides killing and whose physiology means that it literally cannot survive without eating meat.
Humans are not constrained by any of those limitations. In the same way that we have moral agency not to steal when we want something that's not ours or agency not to rape just because we feel desire we have moral agency not inflict suffering on animals where we need not inflict suffering.
[quote]One could just accept death is natural and so is pain and suffering.[/quote]
What is natural is not necessarily what is ethical. That's a naturalistic fallacy.
Death is unavoidable but that doesn't mean we get a free pass to hasten it. Suffering is unavoidable but that doesn't mean we're off the hook to reduce it if we can.
@Pikachu One could argue what does a couple of years or months matter in an animals life? Their death is inevitable. Why should be we champions of their ives?
All death is inevitable and yet we still value life. Additionally, this does not address the issue of the cruelty we inflict on animals in their forced breeding, raising, processing and slaughter.
@Pikachu Well I am against the way we raise our animals for sure. Every farmer is different though. I live in a semi-rural area where I can observe some farming practices. Some cows are in the fields munching on grass while other farmers keep them in a muddy pen. Pigs are usually raised very poorly. I get all my eggs straight from a free range farm.
There are definitely better and worse ways to source animal products and i don't want to suggest that your choices in that area are not good ones. But at the end of the day the problem remains that we're taking life where we need not take it.
