Hurting animals for cultural/religious reasons

[Keoul]

No. I am making counterarguments because your arguments are absolute garbage. I never said eating meat was wrong, I noticed that you had some really bad arguments.

So you have no part in this discussion and just came on to correct me? how am I suppose to react to this? thank you for correcting me?

Prove it is better.
And this seems to go along with your utter lack of consideration before you speak, but their population is increased artificially because we breed them to eat them. So that argument is utter garbage.

You think their population wouldn't boom if we didn't kill them? Animals live to survive and repopulate that's about it. Without us killing so many of them of course there would be a population boom, and a massive one at that. Sure they do have predators but they wouldn't kill to such an extent.
Hey look a government website this will be fun

Spoiler

[link]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21872435[/link]

It's an experiment that showed how people who take a vegetarian diet have less protein and are more susceptible to cardiovascular diseases.

Argument from ignorance much? Science doesn't work with your utter lack of imagination. Here's a really obvious one that you should have been able to think of: In the past there was more scarcity, being able to eat a variety was more useful to survival. Doesn't mean eating meat is better.

Scarcity? so you're saying carnivores and omnivores were made from necessity, if we go back now wouldn't there just be a severe lack of plant life on the planet? your argument makes no sense, it would fix one problem only to make 10 more.
You can see how humans have caused fish to shrink due to over fishing, you think that wouldn't happen with plants? I doubt there's enough sustainable plants for us to consume. The huge variety of animals have a plethora of plants they can digest (e.g. koalas can eat eucalyptus) but we can't. We're in a food crisis right now WITH meat in our diets and now you want to take it away and still believe we can survive?
Also what's with the aggressiveness jeez...

 

[Kpt._Rob]

Much as the lion is associated with the Sun (the mother and bringer of life) in primary religions, the bull [because of its horns, reminiscent of the crescent] is associated with the moon (the symbol of cyclical death and re-birth). When the cow is slaughtered it is so that it might be given unto new life. This sacrifice made by the Brahmins unto the Gods represents recognition of the dilemma we all face, that of our inevitable death. While I personally would not sacrifice an animal, I will say that if such an act is psychologically beneficial to the people, in that it helps them deal with the contemplation of their mortality, then I don't think it's immoral.

 

[Keoul]

My only part is you're using bullshit arguments.

Well thank you, could of done it more nicely but whatever.

Maybe you don't know this, but they're in something we call captivity. We can p r e v e n t them from breeding.

How can you prevent them from breeding without harming them? This WHOLE discussion was about how killing them was inhumane, castrating would be just as bad.

Yes and where's the part that says this is something that can't be corrected as opposed to just bad practice on the part of many vegetarians?

It can be corrected, but I just proved why a normal diet was better. You have a lower chance of cardiovascular diseases and you don't have to trouble yourself with supplements therefore not only is it healthier but cheaper as well.

No, there wouldn't be a severe lack of plant life on the planet. Also, do you know what an argument from ignorance is? Because you have yet to correct that bullshit argument you gave me.

Why wouldn't there be? show some facts and figures, you can't just say how my arguments are all bullshit and just make these random claims yourself

Oh look at that, it's our friend the argument from ignorance back again! That's not a valid argument, why don't you use logic instead of bullshit next time?

Really? just really? wow, I just gave you a real scenario where humans have ate so much meat that animals have suffered, and now you're saying if we went off meat the same thing wouldn't happen but with plants? REALLY?

We're not in a food crisis in first world nations.

Yeah YOU'RE probably not in a crisis since YOU have such a wide variety of food, INCLUDING MEAT. Other nations seem to be having a pretty shitty time with a decent food supply and you couldn't give more of a shit but when animals are killed you're all up in arms? get your priorities straight.

You're not even thinking before you post.

And you're doing much better? all you do is continuously call me ignorant, maybe if you actually outlined why everything I say is wrong then I'd listen, all you're doing is pointlessly insulting me, or have you not noticed your reasoning has no backing and is just as shitty if not more so than mine?

 

[Cyberjester]

We don't even protect babies from having bits of them permanently cut off for religious and cultural purposes, it'd seem to me that looking at how poorly it can lead to animals being treated is jumping the gun (although I entirely agree with you).

I'm not very familiar with the subject, but how are the animals killed inhumanely?

Slitting a cows throat isn't inhumane, inhumane is chopping off it's legs and eviscerating it while it's still alive.

Hell, they might do that, in which case, correct me. Like I said, I'm not knowledgeable on the subject.

What you described is called, "being an arse hole", it doesn't render a still-slow process a humane one.

I love animals and I hate to see senseless violence done to them. But say a farmer in a 3rd world country needs to kill one of his life stock for food. I'm sure he probably doesn't have a lot of extra money to throw around to buy a gun or that shock thing. The easiest and cheapest solution is to cut the throat. If it's like a big business then yeah they should invest in something that kills fast and effectively.

If it's for a religious reason I don't think I should have a say in it unless I know and understand how that religion works. To each his own is how I look at things.

My point was simply that one being worse doesn't make the other any better. The thread is about cultural and religious reasons, not farming. 3rd world farming is a different topic.

'If it's for a religious reason I don't think I should have a say in it unless I know and understand how that religion works.'

Why does that matter? If they're treating animals cruelly they're treating animals cruelly, doesn't matter what reason they give.

I meant that I don't think I had the right to judge and say "what you're doing is terrible" unless I know why the are doing it. Let's say some religion says that an animal has to be sacrificed at the end of a wedding. (I don't know if this is true for any religion but just using a scenario) Now to an outsider it would probably been seen as inhumane and wrong. But if you haven't grown up in that religion you wouldn't understand why it has to be done. If you were part of it tho you would understand that it's something that has to be done because of culture/religious reasons. I'm not saying you have to like it or agree with it but I think it's always best to research and see why they might sacrifice animals and how long it has been going on.

To me something is inhumane if it is pain/killing that servers no purpose. If someone pushes a cow into a lake to watch it drown it's inhumane. If it is killed during a celebration or other religious/cultural thing then it's killing served a purpose.

I fully agree, and as a faux Aztec descendent, I need your heart to ensure the sun will rise tomorrow. Now stay still...

 

[Lieju]

I don't think 'it's religion' is a sufficient excuse for doing anything. Or in the case of something like bullfighting, 'it's tradition'.

Mistreating an animal for religious purposes is equally wrong as mistreating them for fun or tourism or something.

You think their population wouldn't boom if we didn't kill them? Animals live to survive and repopulate that's about it. Without us killing so many of them of course there would be a population boom, and a massive one at that. Sure they do have predators but they wouldn't kill to such an extent.

Yes, if we don't eat all the cows they will take over the world.

Scarcity? so you're saying carnivores and omnivores were made from necessity, if we go back now wouldn't there just be a severe lack of plant life on the planet? your argument makes no sense, it would fix one problem only to make 10 more.
You can see how humans have caused fish to shrink due to over fishing, you think that wouldn't happen with plants? I doubt there's enough sustainable plants for us to consume.

What do you think the cows and other animals eat?
You need much more plants to feed the amount of animals it takes to feed the people than just having those people directly eat the plant life.

 

[saluraropicrusa]

I'm not against the death of an animal for cultural or religious reasons if it's not made to suffer pointlessly beforehand, and if it's a domestic animal or one that isn't critically endangered. What I have a problem with is when an animal is killed for completely avoidable or pointless reasons (defense of livestock that can be achieved non-lethally, such as with the use of dogs against cheetahs, poaching for a single resource, such as shark finning, or hunting purely for sport where the meat isn't eaten and the only point is a trophy).

I don't view an animal having its throat slit as being cruel. It may take longer to die, but in the end it's dead before it's used as food. That's arguably more humane than the way some predators will literally start eating their prey alive because they can't risk waiting for it to die, lest another predator come and steal their kill (this has been observed happening with hyenas, but it's likely something other predators do as well). Hell, some snakes will swallow their prey alive even if they can kill it (constrictors may do this if the prey isn't big or strong enough to pose a threat, and some frog-eaters will swallow frogs alive). Nature is rarely humane. I don't feel bad unless I'm aware the animal was treated badly while it was alive. That's unfortunately sometimes the case, but it's not always possible to choose organic meat due to price.

 

[Dwarfman]

... Is it fair to slam another culture because it does not align with animal rights (at least in Australia there is great concern about animal rights - the entire cattle trade to India was stopped last year temporarily because of it, but I'm not sure about much of the rest of the world.

If it's what they do in there country then no it isn't fair to slam another culture for what they do. At least not until you've done some research in the matter.

Some places just don't have the capabilities or technology to slaughter a beast in what we in the 1st world call humane. Sorry to say but I value human life over an animal's if someone is starving and the only two things around are a baby sheep and a rock, poor baby Lambert is going to find out how practical a human with a rock can be.

As for religious culture I was unaware of ritual sacrifices still taking place - at least among the dominant religions - not counting that one strange ritual in Spain where a village throws a goat off the church steeple...yeah I never quite got that either. Once again though, if it's in THEIR country and part of THEIR culture, then we looking in have no right whatsoever to judge them.

The thing with the embargo on trade to Indonesia - sorry dude the embargo was on Indonesia - Is that the abottoirs have the capabilities to ensure the live cattle are slaughtered quickly and humanly. They weren't. The workers were in fact practically torturing the poor beasts as they were slaughtered and taking home movies and happy snaps. This is clearly unacceptable and worthy of not just your rage, but everybody elses.

 

[manic_depressive13]

morality varies between people your morality is just as correct as mine, give a better reason since so far you've given none besides "it's cruel". Things die, it's inevitable, either the cow dies slowly wasting it's life just digesting grass or it dies a little sooner and gets turned into meat for humans to eat.

Yes, morality is subjective, well done. That's beside the point. The ability to empathise with others and to question whether our actions can be considered right or wrong is something inherently human. Not everyone agrees on what is right or wrong, but the vast majority at least have a concept of what they think is moral. We feel the need to rationalise our actions which is why you are here spouting nonsense at me. If you justify killing animals by saying that animals kill each other, which apparently strips them of their right to life, are you not by that very act negating your own right to life by your own reasoning? If "meh, things die" applies to animals, why should it not apply to humans?

Why should I care about the poor and starving? Why should I care when people injure themselves? There is no good reason for it. I simply do.

If the cow had a "humane" death then it wouldn't even realize it had died. Either way whether we eat meat or not they're going to die we're just doing it sooner and re-using the corpse.

Then it should be fine to kill people as long as they don't realise it?

Besides, it's never actually like that. People make mistakes and things go wrong. If only one in a hundred cattle are made to suffer because the initial blow didn't kill them, how is that justified when you consider that we don't even need to slaughter them to maintain our current quality of life. It's cruel and arbitrary.

But here's a morality question for you. If we only ate meat that came from animals that died from old age would you still condone all meat eaters?

I think you mean "condemn", and no, why would I care what happens to a corpse? It isn't the act of eating meat that I am opposed to. It's the fact that in order to attain the meat, we slaughter sentient creatures.

 

[clutch-monkey]

i like hunting, don't see anything wrong with it (useful pest control too in this country).
but there is a code of ethics for it for a reason; i don't think clubbing and sawing at young whales, like i saw once, just because it's part of your 'culture' shouldn't be allowed.

likewise, deliberately causing pain is just not on imo. like the way the eqyptians would just hack a leg off a cow for use etc maybe they just don't view it as a living, aware creature.

 

[lacktheknack]

Not to be racist or anything, but we need to worry about human cruelty before we worry about animal cruelty.

This is probably the first time I've seen a sentence starting with "Not to be racist" that wasn't actually racist... in fact, it was pure non sequitur.

 

[El Dwarfio]

(at least in Australia there is great concern about animal rights - the entire cattle trade to India was stopped last year temporarily because of it, but I'm not sure about much of the rest of the world.

Wait what???

Indians consider cows sacred, it's against the law to harm a cow in india, in some cities such as calcutta and delhi cows are awarded more rights than the lowest castes of humans.

If a cow walks out in front of your car in india you're not allowed to honk your horn in case you startle it.

Why on earth would the Ozzies accuse them of inhumane treatment? And for that matter I can't find any evidence that they ever did.

OT, It's probably wrong, but I can't think of any widespread or prominent animal cruelty practises endorsed by either religions or cultures. What the yankees do to cows in the Californian dairy farms is fucking atrocious (and I guess it could be considered a cultural practise?) I was genuinely shocked when I drove through the region (and I'm all for human superiority over animals). I'm glad I've always refused to drink the milk here.

But really there are much more pressing concerns facing the world right now, remember that cruelty to humans is likely much more prevalent to cruelty to over animals and not to mention we're in the grips of an unprecedented extinction crisis....

Yeah... I'm not gonna lose any sleep over what some small tribe in the amazon do to some poor monkey or whatever.

EDIT:

But here's a morality question for you. If we only ate meat that came from animals that died from old age would you still condone all meat eaters?

I think you mean "condemn", and no, why would I care what happens to a corpse? It isn't the act of eating meat that I am opposed to. It's the fact that in order to attain the meat, we slaughter sentient creatures.

Boohoo? Other creatures slaughter each other and no one condemns that.

We're just better at it.

 

[clutch-monkey]

(at least in Australia there is great concern about animal rights - the entire cattle trade to India was stopped last year temporarily because of it, but I'm not sure about much of the rest of the world.

Wait what???

Indians consider cows sacred, it's against the law to harm a cow in india, in some cities such as calcutta and delhi cows are awarded more rights than the lowest castes of humans.

don't worry dude.

he confused india with indonesia..

 

[ninjaRiv]

We don't like it when aliens mutilate and sacrifice us so why should we do it to animals?

Joking aside, it's just not very nice and there's no point to it. Unless it makes meat more delicious. Does it?

 

[Trippy Turtle]

Doing things for religion or culture I already find a bit stupid. Do a bad thing for those reasons makes me wish they have it done to them.
And historically speaking a lot of things done for religion or culture are bad.

 

[El Dwarfio]

(at least in Australia there is great concern about animal rights - the entire cattle trade to India was stopped last year temporarily because of it, but I'm not sure about much of the rest of the world.

Wait what???

Indians consider cows sacred, it's against the law to harm a cow in india, in some cities such as calcutta and delhi cows are awarded more rights than the lowest castes of humans.

don't worry dude.

he confused india with indonesia..

lmao fair enough, easy enough mistake I guess

 

[Rumpsteak]

I think the problem here is that what is considered humane changes from culture to culture. So in fact, what we're talking about is in fact humane.

 

[Starik20X6]

Stupid. Sure I'm all for people having their beliefs and whatnot, but when your religion/culture demands you hurt anything, I'm sorry, but you're stupid for following it. What could you possibly expect to gain from it? Don't be dragging innocent parties into your arcane beliefs.

 

[madster11]

I think you mean "condemn", and no, why would I care what happens to a corpse? It isn't the act of eating meat that I am opposed to. It's the fact that in order to attain the meat, we slaughter sentient creatures.

You slaughter a 'Sentient' creature pretty much several times every minute just by living and moving around.
Those little insects you step on knew pain, that mosquito or spider you squished had a family, all those moths you hit with your car/face had life.

They all die.

This is called 'being on top of a food chain'.
Humans went for brains and thumbs instead of claws and teeth, and we won. We now have to actively regulate the amount of killing we do for fear that we will wipe other species out, simply for fun.

Now you're trying to tell humans that the cheapest and easiest source of food to obtain - meat - shouldn't be eaten?
Nobility early in our time line were the only ones that ate vegetables and fruits, because meat is the easiest source of food to obtain no matter where you are on the planet. If you're in the middle of the desert, lizard meat is all you will find. South pole? Pick your food - fish, seal, maybe even a bear.

Those reasons and more are why humans are omnivores, and why to this day we still breed creatures and kill them to sustain ourselves.

Do i wish we could change this? No. Meat tastes good and is very essential to human health. Someone who has a balanced diet who eats a nice steak every couple of days will be infinitely more stronger and healthy than a person who eats nothing but plant life.
Do i wish we could treat the animals more humanely before we kill them? Yes.
We have enough space and resources on this planet to give the animals we breed to slaughter at least a quasi-decent life before we kill them. Farmers who keep pigs and chickens and such in places so small they cannot move for their brief life are close to that thin line between 'necessity' and 'antichrist' that they should be worried.

I also don't approve of killing animals simply for sport. If there's an overpopulation problem, they're a pest or it's for food, i have absolutely no problem with hunting. But if you just want to shoot other creatures for the sake of killing, go to a prison and take out some murderers or something. God knows there's enough bad humans on this earth, instead of innocent little bambis.

 

[m72_ar]

Depends,

If you're going to kill it and eat it. No problem.

If you mutilate it and throw it back alive (Shark finning), not cool.
If you hurting it for shit and giggles, super not cool

 

[manic_depressive13]

Boohoo? Other creatures slaughter each other and no one condemns that.

We're just better at it.

Creatures also rape each other and no one condemns it, but they do when humans rape animals.

So yes, boohoo. I think prematurely ending a life is cruel and unnecessary. Boohoo, waaaaah, sob, sniffle.