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Why aren't you a vegan!?

[Deleted User]

Cards on the table, I'm not a vegan.

That said, it's very hard to argue against the common vegan. After all, almost nobody argues that there is some positive benefit toward the infliction of suffering on animals.

Nobody would argue in favour of collecting dogs in the back of a truck, and sending them off for slaughter in some local abatoir. But that's precisely what happens with the other sentient animals.

The process is often brutal, but even if it were pain-free, the argument goes that animals shouldn't be killed in the same way we wouldn't recommend it for horses or dogs.

I can't really think of a valid argument against veganism. You'd think, then, that I would convert to veganism, but I haven't - and won't. It's a purely selfish endeavour, then, because I'm being hypocritical about how I would react if I saw dogs treated in the same way as farmed animals.

True, there are evolutionary reasons for eating meat. I think the argument now is that there are sufficient plant alternatives.

So, why aren't you a vegan?

Perhaps you have a valid position I, or others here, haven't thought of.

But thus far, I can't frame a case against it.

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gozunda

Deleted User wrote: »

Cards on the table, I'm not a vegan.That said, it's very hard to argue against the common vegan. After all, almost nobody argues that there is some positive benefit toward the infliction of suffering on animals.
Nobody would argue in favour of collecting dogs in the back of a truck, and sending them off for slaughter in some local abatoir. But that's precisely what happens with the other sentient animals.The process is often brutal, but even if it were pain-free, the argument goes that animals shouldn't be killed in the same way we wouldn't recommend it for horses or dogs. I can't really think of a valid argument against veganism. You'd think, then, that I would convert to veganism, but I haven't - and won't. It's a purely selfish endeavour, then, because I'm being hypocritical about how I would react if I saw dogs treated in the same way as farmed animals. True, there are evolutionary reasons for eating meat. I think the argument now is that there are sufficient plant alternatives.So, why aren't you a vegan? Perhaps you have a valid position I, or others here, haven't thought of. But thus far, I can't frame a case against it.

Ahhh - if I had a coin for every time in which (before a long diatribe about the 'benefits' of veganism with the old 'dogs thou' rubbish hoary chestnut) someone declares neither they nor their wife are "a vegan' - I think I would have a fair pocket ful of change.

Anyhow - it's a much bandied idea already here - theres a very very good discussion on the topic already ...here

Not having a dig at you btw - but I'm really not too sure I believe your opening gambit OP :pac:

Just to clarify - this from a previous post. I think maybe you are just joking no?

eskimohunt wrote:

...I'll choose my own meals, even if they are vegan and tasteless.

So a question for you OP - why are you pushing veganism? Perhaps you have a valid position I, or others here, haven't thought of. But thus far, I can't frame a case for it other than personal preference. But hey they we are

[Deleted User]

[Deleted User] wrote: »

That seems more like an economic argument.

Which is legitimate...but what about the Moral Argument?

If was more a lifestyle argument centered on why I specifically don't want to break a major link to the country I live in, along with deal with the inconvenience of that food not being available in the area of the city I work in.

Moral argument? As in the animals? I grew up around farms and hen houses so maybe I'm desensitised to it.

rhubarbcustard

I grew up on a farm and fully understand and accept the facts about animal production and eat meat for lunch & dinner each day.
I got very annoyed at the targeting of Irish farmers by vegan campaigners, the online abuse and Billboard Campaigns in the last 12 months.

I decided to open my mind after hearing about the health benefits of going veggie / vegan and I watched a number of films & shows on netflix with promoting veganism recently, ( Forks over knives, game changers, What the Health, and the episode of "Explained" that deals with Water) as biased as some of them were, there were a lot of truths that cant be ignored and it has got me thinking a lot about the environmental impact of intensive meat production.
I dont know about Ireland as we graze our cattle & winter fodder would be mainly silage but the amount of water it takes to produce one beef burger in the US for example approx 2,000 litres, (Edited, i had said 3,000 initially, thats incorrect)
I'm having a good rethink about all things meat at the moment but haven't made any changes yet to the amount of meat I consume weekly.
I obviously know it will help me to get healthier if I consume more vegetables and less meat.
Outside of health reasons, its the future of the worlds water supply is what concerns me the most at the minute when it comes to the debate about consumption of meat.

gozunda

ted1 wrote: »

You really want to go there?

https://www.peta.org/features/dairy-industry-cruelty/

Oh yes please I do! Animal husbandy welfare standards are extremely stringent here. And most producers follow those standards not only because they are designated but because its the right thing to do. No we are not the US and no we dont have a veal industry either.

Are there occasional rogue operators? Yes there are - but they are not the reason to tar and feather all and sundry rather it is a case to deal with each of those incidences to the full extent of the law.

I see you mention PETA - The same lovely lot who have a policy of abducting, killing and dumping peoples pets as garbage in the US yes? All because PETA believe domestic animals are abominations ...

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/killing-animals-petas-open-secret_b_59e78243e4b0e60c4aa36711

Lovely lot altogether...

And interestingly there are those of the same cohort who also wish to wipe out of existence or genetically modify all wild meat eaters/ predators because it doesn't agree with the tenets of their personal ideology. It's a strange world we live in ....

fritzelly

rhubarbcustard wrote: »

I dont know about Ireland as we graze our cattle & winter fodder would be mainly silage but the amount of water it takes to produce one beef burger in the US for example is phenomenal, nearly 3,000 litres, thats crazy!

An egg needs 50+ gallons - give up on the I'm not a vegan and ridiculous water claims, the world isn't running out of water

gozunda

fritzelly wrote: »

An egg needs 50+ gallons - give up on the I'm not a vegan and ridiculous water claims, the world isn't running out of water

Interestingly just googled some figures and taken the top search item which calculates that just 1 almond takes 1.1 gallons of water to grow.

So a litre of almond milk (which they give as an average of 92 almonds per litre) - means 1 litre of almond juice requires 384 litres of water to produce. That's 84 of our gallons of water or 101 US gallons. That's a lot of water and thats before even getting into the carbon footprint of getting this stuff here from California or whatever far flung destination it is coming from ...

The point is that all the figures for water and dairy or beef appear to originate from agriculture in the US - which has bugger all relation to anything we produce here or the rest of the world. So I reckon we can safely drop the bs propaganda from the plant food corporate interests pushing this ****e and similar here ..

rhubarbcustard

fritzelly wrote: »

An egg needs 50+ gallons - give up on the I'm not a vegan and ridiculous water claims, the world isn't running out of water

trust me im the furthest thing away at present from being vegan!
I take your point, i calculated that 3,000 litres based on 660 gallons. I did not know that US and UK Gallons are different, every day is a school day! the figure im basing it on (Based on those few Netflix films! not very scientifically accurate ill admit) is therefore closer to 2,000 litres.
I hope you're right that the world isnt running out of water!

Tony EH

emaherx wrote: »

But in nature the slaughtering is far from humane.

This is the thing I don't get with vegans. I understand their legitimate grievances with regard to how animals are slaughtered in factory farms for the food industry, but do they really believe that turning farmed animals loose will be of benefit to them? Do they understand that the life of a wild animal is a million times more fraught with danger and early death.

Have they ever seen what crows will do to a Ewe when she's giving birth?

Have they ever seen the chaos of a sheep's vagina when it's infected with maggots and there's no farmer to pick them off?

Have they seen what a pine marten will do to a new born lamb?

And they're just small time predators.

Farmed animals, like sheep, pigs and cattle, will be torn apart by a whole host of other creatures, if set to the wild now.

emaherx

rhubarbcustard wrote: »

I dont know about Ireland as we graze our cattle & winter fodder would be mainly silage but the amount of water it takes to produce one beef burger in the US for example approx 2,000 litres, (Edited, i had said 3,000 initially, thats incorrect)
I'm having a good rethink about all things meat at the moment but haven't made any changes yet to the amount of meat I consume weekly.
I obviously know it will help me to get healthier if I consume more vegetables and less meat.
Outside of health reasons, its the future of the worlds water supply is what concerns me the most at the minute when it comes to the debate about consumption of meat.

An adult cow drinks 60L of water a day during hot weather. Animals are slaughtered at 3 years.

60Lx365x3=65,700L
There are between 1200 and 2000 burgers in one animal.
65,700/1500 = 43.8L per burger and this is a massive over estimate as it is 3 years being an adult animal in hot weather.

So where is the rest of the water? The water needed to make the grass grow? It's Ireland we don't water our land it rains the same amount with or without cows.

spurious

I could take or leave meat, but am probably too lazy to cook vegan.
I would miss all the other cheese, chocolate stuff. I could probably do veggie, but not full vegan.

stoneill

I don't eat meat, I'm a vaginaterian.

whisky_galore

ted1 wrote: »

You dont love a bit of oat milk?

No.
Oats don't have tits.

_Brian

There’s no need to be a vegan.

Animals raised properly and slaughtered humainly provide quality nutritious food and they contribute positively towards environmental issues.

There is zero evidence that the whole population could live as vegans, it’s a pipe dream that the whole population could do this even if they wanted to. Land grazed by animals often isn’t suitable for any crops meaning the available land would have to be farmed massively intensively which would be detrimental to the land and environment. There would be massive malnutrition and risk of famine. Much of the cool new foods being sold to vegans is hyper processed often from Ingredients with no traceability and little understanding of the implications of their long term consumption. Massively processed foods are bad for humans and the goal should be to reduce these not accelerate their use.

It’s simply unsustainable as humans, that’s why 83% of “vegans” return to eating a regular diet within a year.

I know a number of long term vegans. They are very different to the shouting mouthy activists that are all over social media making a mockery of the principles involved. Normal every day vegans don’t want to be food fascists forcing everyone to conform to their ideals, that’s just a few noisy nutcases.

Humans are omnivores, that’s the facts of what we are. We need to eat a massively wide diet including meat, dairy, fruit, nuts and veg.

is_that_so

ted1 wrote: »

Google will help you.

https://www.google.ie/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/31/avoiding-meat-and-dairy-is-single-biggest-way-to-reduce-your-impact-on-earth

https://www.google.ie/amp/s/time.com/5648082/un-climate-report-less-meat/%3famp=true

Then there's this.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/nov/20/to-eat-or-not-to-eat-10-of-the-worlds-most-controversial-foods

Google can find what you want to see and believe. That's OK as long as you're not using it to prove what you believe is right to anyone else.

is_that_so

Aadhya Happy Register wrote: »

I have chronic anaemia and while I can take or leave meat there's no way I could exclude it. Its easier to get what I need by including meat in my diet on top of the iron and b12 supplements.

Plus eggs and cheese are just delicious.

I was chatting to someone recently who was forced to forego the full vegan diet for this very reason. I respect the choices people make and if your diet is delivering your required nutrients it's right for you.

inforfun

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GXhJPey3i_A

Having to read all the labels to make sure nothing "animal" was used would also mean my hatred for shopping would increase dramatically.

GooglePlus

fritzelly wrote: »

An egg needs 50+ gallons - give up on the I'm not a vegan and ridiculous water claims, the world isn't running out of water

This is true, water cannot leave our planet, it just cycles but we're losing drinkable water.

If you have a quick google, you'll see that there are numerous political standoffs happening across the world over who owns what water source in their regions.

Michael Burry, the guy who made a tonne of money by shorting the housing market crash in 2007, has bought property over an underground lake, as a future investment. He obviously see's that water will hold more value in the future due to limited availability.

rhubarbcustard

So where is the rest of the water? The water needed to make the grass grow? It's Ireland we don't water our land it rains the same amount with or without cows.[/quote]

Water isnt an issue in my opinion when it comes to producing Irish Grass fed Beef, I assume this level of water suggested (660 Gallons per burger) is based on beef coming from US feed lots that are fed crops like soy and corn that use a lot of water to be produced perhaps in areas that dont have a lot of rainfall.

rhubarbcustard

emaherx wrote: »

An adult cow drinks 60L of water a day during hot weather. Animals are slaughtered at 3 years.

60Lx365x3=65,700L
There are between 1200 and 2000 burgers in one animal.
65,700/1500 = 43.8L per burger and this is a massive over estimate as it is 3 years being an adult animal in hot weather.

So where is the rest of the water? The water needed to make the grass grow? It's Ireland we don't water our land it rains the same amount with or without cows.

Water isnt an issue in my opinion when it comes to producing Irish Grass fed Beef, I assume this level of water suggested (660 Gallons per burger) is based on beef coming from US feed lots that are fed crops like soy and corn that use a lot of water to be produced perhaps in areas that dont have a lot of rainfall.

GooglePlus

rhubarbcustard wrote: »

So where is the rest of the water? The water needed to make the grass grow? It's Ireland we don't water our land it rains the same amount with or without cows.

Water isnt an issue in my opinion when it comes to producing Irish Grass fed Beef, I assume this level of water suggested (660 Gallons per burger) is based on beef coming from US feed lots that are fed crops like soy and corn that use a lot of water to be produced perhaps in areas that dont have a lot of rainfall.

Yeah, those water issues arise with beef that isn't grass fed, like in the states.

We've plenty of rain in Ireland, but look at the summer of 2018 and how the reduced rainfall affected farmers, who had to resort to other methods as a result. If summers like that become more common, we could have a problem then.

silverharp

Cows get most of their water from eating grass

Sir Guy who smiles

victor8600 wrote: »

Too expensive to farm those species for meat. Especially cats.

They'd be very hard to catch if they broke out, too.

Sir Guy who smiles

Deleted User wrote: »

Would you be comfortable if dogs or horses or cats were farmed in accordance with the same methods, then, to add more diversity to our menus?

I wouldn't (except horses), but I realise that is an emotional response on my part and that logically I have no right to object to other culture eating dogs and cats in principle.

Now, most countries where dogs and cats are eaten are less concerned with animal welfare than Europeans are, so these animals are treated/slaughtered more cruelly than farm animals here, but then so are farm animals in these countries. The recent greyhound documentary showed a (20 year old) clip of a dog being thrown alive into boiling water; it is the "thrown alive into boiling water" I object to, not the fact that it was a dog.

That's as a meat eater speaking. A vegan of course would have a different view.

uck51js9zml2yt

ted1 wrote: »

Drinking milk intended for young calves isn’t natural!!!

Taking puppies away from their mothers at 8 weeks isn't natural.
Milk is suitable for the human body...just like that poor carrot wrenched from its home in the earth.

Cantona's Collars

Someone here said "we are born to eat plants".

When cave paintings of primitive man were discovered, there's quite a few of them hunting animals,not too many of them growing lettuce.
Also try being vegan if you live in the Arctic circle, you'd be dead in days.
Even the most remote, primitive tribes who have little contact with "the modern world" eat meat,they aren't influenced by advertising or marketing to eat steak or chicken,they eat what they need to live.

Down my way there's 2 big advertising hoardings right across from a farm,Go vegan world keep renting one, currently there's a picture of a sheep on it trying to guilt people into not eating meat,the farm is a sheep farm. That's very deliberate targeting with where the as is placed.
That kind of tactic puts me off a lot of the vegan campaigns.

[Deleted User]

gozunda wrote: »

Ahhh - if I had a coin for every time in which (before a long diatribe about the 'benefits' of veganism with the old 'dogs thou' rubbish hoary chestnut) someone declares neither they nor their wife are "a vegan' - I think I would have a fair pocket ful of change.

Not having a dig at you btw - but I'm really not too sure I believe your opening gambit OP :pac:

Just to clarify - this from a previous post. I think maybe you are just joking no?

So a question for you OP - why are you pushing veganism? Perhaps you have a valid position I, or others here, haven't thought of. But thus far, I can't frame a case for it other than personal preference. But hey they we are

Not pushing it at all!

My OP is an authentic one; a legitimate case of where I understand the vegan arguments, but can't bring myself - nor will I ever - to become a fully, paid-up subscriber to all-things vegan.

Ultimately, the best I can come up with is that we should sideline the emotional case for purely pragmatic reasons.

As for the post you quoted, that was part of a wider political analogy, and in it, I used vegan and bland food interchangeably to make a point.

Still no answer to this, any takers:

Deleted User wrote: »

Are there any circumstances in which you would consume human meat?

I mean, imagine circumstances in which a human dies naturally, and its body is used for meat - would you be willing to eat the meat? In theory.

Of course, it's purely a hypothetical, but the idea is to tease out why we believe what we believe, and why we act out what we act out.

If animals are animals - and humans are animals - and we have no problem "eating animals", this question is probably worth asking.

silverharp

Cantona's Collars wrote: »

Someone here said "we are born to eat plants".

When cave paintings of primitive man were discovered, there's quite a few of them hunting animals,not too many of them growing lettuce.
Also try being vegan if you live in the Arctic circle, you'd be dead in days.
Even the most remote, primitive tribes who have little contact with "the modern world" eat meat,they aren't influenced by advertising or marketing to eat steak or chicken,they eat what they need to live.

Down my way there's 2 big advertising hoardings right across from a farm,Go vegan world keep renting one, currently there's a picture of a sheep on it trying to guilt people into not eating meat,the farm is a sheep farm. That's very deliberate targeting with where the as is placed.
That kind of tactic puts me off a lot of the vegan campaigns.

It turns out all those cave paintings with men with spears was them keeping the animals off their vegetable gardens

emaherx

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Not pushing it at all!

My OP is an authentic one; a legitimate case of where I understand the vegan arguments, but can't bring myself - nor will I ever - to become a fully, paid-up subscriber to all-things vegan.

Ultimately, the best I can come up with is that we should sideline the emotional case for purely pragmatic reasons.

As for the post you quoted, that was part of a wider political analogy, and in it, I used vegan and bland food interchangeably to make a point.

Still no answer to this, any takers:

Are there any circumstances in which you would consume human meat?

I mean, imagine circumstances in which a human dies naturally, and its body is used for meat - would you be willing to eat the meat? In theory.

Of course, it's purely a hypothetical, but the idea is to tease out why we believe what we believe, and why we act out what we act out.

If animals are animals - and humans are animals - and we have no problem "eating animals", this question is probably worth asking.

Before looking at any moral reason, the risk of disease would be immense so the obvious easy answer is no not unless it involves a plane crash on a remote snowy mountain.

Xcellor

It's bloody easy to be vegan nowadays. There are plenty of meat alternatives too.

I've been vegan for 2 years now and I went from the stereotypical red blooded male who ate steaks with gravy and considered the peppercorns my vegetable intake

Does it take adjustment yeah but seriously isn't as hard as people make out and doesn't require anyone to become a master chef. Example of a simple 5 minute dinner.

Pasta - Pesto (free from tesco one is lovely) - mix - add some chickpeas or meat ball alternative. Mix up. Super easy super quick. 10 mins.

Bean burrito. Beans are all cooked and just need heated up. Mix in some old el paso or seasoning. Some avocado. 10 mins.

dartboardio

Xcellor wrote: »

It's bloody easy to be vegan nowadays. There are plenty of meat alternatives too.

I've been vegan for 2 years now and I went from the stereotypical red blooded male who ate steaks with gravy and considered the peppercorns my vegetable intake

Does it take adjustment yeah but seriously isn't as hard as people make out and doesn't require anyone to become a master chef. Example of a simple 5 minute dinner.

Pasta - Pesto (free from tesco one is lovely) - mix - add some chickpeas or meat ball alternative. Mix up. Super easy super quick. 10 mins.

Bean burrito. Beans are all cooked and just need heated up. Mix in some old el paso or seasoning. Some avocado. 10 mins.

I know but it's not like I or many others won't turn vegan because of how 'difficult' or easy it is, we (I) just don't want to.

Im happy to eat meat and dairy. Yes I'd often have plenty of veg based meals with no meat, but that's out of preference, its not a case of oh no it'll be too hard to change, there's no need for a happy meat or dairy eater to change.