Should you feel guilty for eating meat?

[The Almighty Aardvark]

So glad to be part of a race that determines their morals by how science books classify their species. How is saying you're an omnivore any sort of excuse? You don't die without meat, that's just the way your species evolved in an environment where non-meat sources of protein were not as available.

Also, saying you like meat too much is really not a reason for whether or not you should feel guilty about eating meat. It's immoral or it isn't, how much you enjoy something doesn't really change that. If you enjoy going on murderous rampages (not equating the two) no one's going to say that you shouldn't feel bad about it because you were having fun.

Do vegetarians feel guilty about raising future health costs for their country by living unhealthy, and do they feel guilty about contributing to the destruction of rainforests at a higher rate than people who stick to the natural human diet?

I'm pretty sure that eating lots of red meat has been connected with way more health issues than being a vegetarian is associated with. On an unrelated note, apparently those who have a vegetarian diet suffer from less obesity and type 2 diabetes.

I'm not a vegetarian and I haven't decided whether or not I'd be able to give up meat for it, but I'm tired of seeing arguments like this saying it's a simple issue because "Meat tastes good and my ancestors used to need it to survive".

Killing an animal and eating its flesh for sustenance, or killing an animal to defend yourself is not immoral, it is natural.
Killing people or animals because you hold a grudge or you find the act fun is immoral.
When it comes to doing something that is a natural process - i.e. eating meat, you should not feel guilty.

Once again, how is it being natural an excuse? Natural and necessary are two terms that I feel are often switched in these arguments. Personally I think any argument using the word natural needs to explain what exactly they mean by it. If by natural they mean the human species has done it for thousands of years, I'd argue that just because something was practiced in a while in the past doesn't mean it needs to be in the future. It WAS natural because it was a necessity. In current times I'd say that it really isn't. It sure makes things easier, and if that's your reason, use that instead of hiding behind the word natural (Err... that wasn't all directed at you, just the overusage of the word natural).

I would never argue that killing an animal in defense is immoral, and nor would any of the vegetarians I know. In fact, one of my vegetarian friends said that if she was stranded on a deserted island with only animals for food, she'd straight up eat it.

When I use natural in this case, I don't mean just our species, but what biologically makes us omnivorous. We are designed to eat both meat and plants - front teeth for tearing, back for grinding. Like a lot of animals in the world, we need both in our diet to make us healthy, taking out one side makes you body lack essential nutrients, like protein and calcium. It is a natural need for meat because it is necessary for us to live.

The problem I'm having with this argument is that it actually isn't necessary to live. Last I checked all of my vegetarian friends are still kicking. A better argument is that it is very difficult to build muscle and fitness without meat, although it's still not impossible. I have a female friend who competed at an international level in climbing, and was a vegetarian (although she did include fish in her diet).

I also don't believe that our biological design should determine our morals. Making a huge stretch here, but if we had some sort of compartment in our body that was designed solely for crushing the heads of our firstborn children I would still be against it despite that appendage. And really, what's the worst that happens if we don't use our oh so precious canines?

Really, I'm not saying that eating meat is wrong, there's still a large hurdle to overcome for someone to switch to excluding it from their diet, it's just the flawed logic in arguments commonly used for eating meat, and the indifference people have for the fact that animals had to die for their food bothers me.

 

[Jaeke]

Does the lioness feel guilty for breaking the gazelle's neck?
Does the wolf feel remorse for shredding the deer?
Does the man feel sad for eating his natural balanced diet?

No. It's natural.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

Meat is tasty. Bacon is the one food makes any other food better just by being in close proximity. My one rule; Never eat a species capable of calculus.

 

[BNguyen]

The problem I'm having with this argument is that it actually isn't necessary to live. Last I checked all of my vegetarian friends are still kicking. A better argument is that it is very difficult to build muscle and fitness without meat, although it's still not impossible. I have a female friend who competed at an international level in climbing, and was a vegetarian (although she did include fish in her diet).

I also don't believe that our biological design should determine our morals. Making a huge stretch here, but if we had some sort of compartment in our body that was designed solely for crushing the heads of our firstborn children I would still be against it despite that appendage. And really, what's the worst that happens if we don't use our oh so precious canines?

Really, I'm not saying that eating meat is wrong, there's still a large hurdle to overcome for someone to switch to excluding it from their diet, it's just the flawed logic in arguments commonly used for eating meat, and the indifference people have for the fact that animals had to die for their food bothers me.

Have your friends recently switched over to plants only or have they been that way their entire lives? Besides, your logic went down the hole when you said your friend ate fish. You can't include meat in your diet and call yourself a vegetarian.
And this line: "I also don't believe that our biological design should determine our morals." It's the same as telling a pack of wolves to not eat you because you are made of meat. When it comes to the natural diet of an omnivorous life form, there are no morals, omnivorous life forms eat meat and plants because they need to do so in order to stay healthy.
To switch over to a entire vegetarian lifestyle would have just as much an environmental impact as maintaining the one we have, why? because we need enormous amounts of land to produce enough crops to feed everyone, whereas a single cow can feed numerous families.
And let's say we did switch over to an entire vegetarian diet, eventually, we would evolve to become rather diminished, like a bunch of spider monkeys who could barely use our limbs to outrun our predators, and even if we did keep our guns for defense, what's going to happen to the animals we kill to survive, we just leave them there, and they rot unless eaten by scavengers. Killing an animal for defense and not using it (like feeding other animals that could help defend us - like dogs) is not as bad as killing an animal for food.

 

[TomWiley]

Eating meat is never wrong.

How the animals are treated and what animals are processed for meat is the questions

I feel many extreme Vegetarians forget this.

I don't know what your definition of an "extreme vegetarian" is, but I think the problem is that more often than not, animals are treated quite poorly. When it comes to animal welfare, the american meat industry is a disaster area and there are little to no regulations.

This is nearly inevitable because it's impossible to grow more than 9 billion animals each year for slaughtering and also offering these animals decent living conditions. It's not profitable for the meat industry to do that when the demand for meat is so high. And in the western world, we eat a lot of meat. Way more than what was ever natural for our diet, and the meat industry must expand aggressively to supply that demand, which is problematic for animals and the environment.

So I can definitely understand why some people would go vegetarian for political reasons, to lower or compensate for the extreme meat production by simply not consuming any meat at all. Of course another solution would be if we all just started eating less meat and a more varied diet, but that's not likely to happen.

 

[Rack]

No, but you should feel guilty for supporting the way it is farmed.

 

[Altorin]

You're ok, but if your religious views find the consumption of meat abhorrent then that's realy on you, and there's nothing anyone else can tell you to make it right or wrong. So if you believe that stuff, stop eating it.

I for one find Meat delicious, and don't see anything morally wrong with consuming it, but if your upbringing taught you that every life is sacred, then I can see you having a problem with it. If you do, then don't eat it, noone is forcing you to. You have to make that choice for yourself.

 

[Riddle78]

I do not. Most animals in the world are prey to humans at this stage,and therefore we are to eat them. It isn;t wrong. It isn't amoral. Some religons have doctrines against it,but to follow those religons is personal choice,as is the choice to be vegan or vegitatian. I don't begrudge people for chosing to not eat meat or products from animals.

What I'm trying to say is...Is it even possible to feel guilt for doing what's natural? Can someone legitimately claim that it's wrong to eat meat? That's my stance. I don't force people to see my reasoning,and only present my line of reasoning when provoked by request or to retaliate against people trying to force me to adopt a meat-free lifestyle.

 

[wintercoat]

My family is poor. Food with meat in it and meat itself is much cheaper than having to buy everything needed in order to not have vitamin and mineral deficiencies, or protein deficiency. I have yet to be shown a good enough reason to stop eating meat that makes it worth the cost.

That and vegetarian alternatives are just plain gross. I've tried several, as my sister is a vegetarian, and not a one tasted good. As I'm not ashamed to eat meat, I'm not going to force myself to eat something that I don't find palatable.

 

[Hagi]

The modern man does not need to kill/hunt for survival as there is abundance of vegetables and fruits available to eat.

The modern man also doesn't need more than a few square meters of living space yet the average house is much, much larger.
The modern man also doesn't need fashionable clothes yet the average closet contains many such items.
The modern man also doesn't need many of the technological devices he possesses yet the average person has multiple.
The modern man also doesn't need a big and fast car yet the average driveway has one or even two cars that are heavier and faster than is really needed.

All of these also harm the environment. All of these also kill animals. Just about everything we do harms the environment. Just about everything we do indirectly kills animals.

It's all about balance. I live in a quite small room (I'm a student), I hardly even buy new clothes (the ones I have are good enough), I cycle everywhere and I don't get frivolous devices I don't really need. But I do eat meat.

I reckon I'm doing much less harm to the environment than the average vegetarian so I don't see any reason at all why I should feel guilty.

 

[The Almighty Aardvark]

The problem I'm having with this argument is that it actually isn't necessary to live. Last I checked all of my vegetarian friends are still kicking. A better argument is that it is very difficult to build muscle and fitness without meat, although it's still not impossible. I have a female friend who competed at an international level in climbing, and was a vegetarian (although she did include fish in her diet).

I also don't believe that our biological design should determine our morals. Making a huge stretch here, but if we had some sort of compartment in our body that was designed solely for crushing the heads of our firstborn children I would still be against it despite that appendage. And really, what's the worst that happens if we don't use our oh so precious canines?

Really, I'm not saying that eating meat is wrong, there's still a large hurdle to overcome for someone to switch to excluding it from their diet, it's just the flawed logic in arguments commonly used for eating meat, and the indifference people have for the fact that animals had to die for their food bothers me.

Have your friends recently switched over to plants only or have they been that way their entire lives? Besides, your logic went down the hole when you said your friend ate fish. You can't include meat in your diet and call yourself a vegetarian.

What person convinced you that vegetarians eat only plants? They just don't eat meat. I think you're confusing them with vegans. Anyways, the friend I was referring to only ate fish during the year that she ended up making it to worlds, I should have specified that. Before that she was still a very capable athlete, just not as much as she could have been without the extra protein. Which I did say, not eating meat does make it very difficult to build muscle. Yeah, and I would agree she wasn't a vegetarian at that point, but it's not like she was crippled physically by not eating meat all those years.

Both of them have been doing it for most of their lives, but neither was brought up vegetarian.

And this line: "I also don't believe that our biological design should determine our morals." It's the same as telling a pack of wolves to not eat you because you are made of meat. When it comes to the natural diet of an omnivorous life form, there are no morals, omnivorous life forms eat meat and plants because they need to do so in order to stay healthy.

Thing is, we aren't a pack of wolves, like most people have been mentioning on this thread. Most people have been arguing that we're more intelligent than animals, which I'd definitely agree with. Also, I like to pride myself on not having the moral capacity of a pack of wolves. Don't play the "We can eat them because we're better than them" card and then follow it with saying we should follow their rules.

And "When it comes to the natural diet of an omnivorous life form, there are no morals"? We don't eat meat indiscriminantly. I would never even consider eating someone's cat just because it's meat and I'm hungry. There are clearly morals besides "We eat meat"

To switch over to a entire vegetarian lifestyle would have just as much an environmental impact as maintaining the one we have, why? because we need enormous amounts of land to produce enough crops to feed everyone, whereas a single cow can feed numerous families.
And let's say we did switch over to an entire vegetarian diet, eventually, we would evolve to become rather diminished, like a bunch of spider monkeys who could barely use our limbs to outrun our predators, and even if we did keep our guns for defense, what's going to happen to the animals we kill to survive, we just leave them there, and they rot unless eaten by scavengers. Killing an animal for defense and not using it (like feeding other animals that could help defend us - like dogs) is not as bad as killing an animal for food.

Believe it or not we need to feed all of those animals that we eat, if mass production of animals was no longer occurring there'd be huge reserves of food not being used. That doesn't really matter though because I am not saying we should halt all meat production and all start munching down on corn. Remember that I said that I still eat meat, and that I wasn't saying that it was wrong to do it. I'd say what I'm trying to do again, but I already said it in the last paragraph of my last response.

Also, I can assure you that is not at all how evolution works. Evolution is dependent on natural selection, and there's no way that stronger people are going to be killed off in your strange dystopian vegetarian apocalypse scenario. All that would happen (assuming that there weren't sources of protein developed to accommodate, which I highly doubt would be the case) is people would probably be thinner (a positive), in general a fair bit less muscular (a negative) and there'd probably be a difficult period while the entire world adjusted to the changing jobs and market. But in the long run you wouldn't have to worry about us turning into spider monkeys (another positive). But anyways, I didn't say this was what I was supporting.

 

[Death God]

My basic thought is that if some wild animal is willing eat me to live, then I am willing as well. If I died and my family had to eat me to survive, then so be it. Do what you can to live another day... within reason of course.

 

[Extragorey]

I don't think it's wrong to eat meat. We're omnivores, and we need protein to maintain good health. The best source of protein is meat, and I've never really been a fan of soy products.
Also, as a Christian I know that animals don't have souls (sorry, but your dog isn't going to heaven), so killing them is not the same as killing another human being.
Besides that, meat tastes good! And I'd have to eat some pretty horrible-tasting things to balance my diet if I didn't eat meat.

And while I can respect people who DO feel guilty about eating meat and thus choose not to, I really can't understand why people who don't care about the morality side don't eat meat due to "health reasons". I have a friend who claims that's the case, and I don't believe a word of it. Eating meat is definitely healthier. Though I suspect my friend is a vegetarian more because he was brought up that way, and has never bothered setting his eyes on the greener grass on the other side of the fence.

 

[The Almighty Aardvark]

Eating meat is never wrong.

How the animals are treated and what animals are processed for meat is the questions

I feel many extreme Vegetarians forget this.

I don't know what your definition of an "extreme vegetarian" is, but I think the problem is that more often than not, animals are treated quite poorly. When it comes to animal welfare, the american meat industry is a disaster area and there are little to no regulations.

This is nearly inevitable because it's impossible to grow more than 9 billion animals each year for slaughtering and also offering these animals decent living conditions. It's not profitable for the meat industry to do that when the demand for meat is so high. And in the western world, we eat a lot of meat. Way more than what was ever natural for our diet, and the meat industry must expand aggressively to supply that demand, which is problematic for animals and the environment.

So I can definitely understand why some people would go vegetarian for political reasons, to lower or compensate for the extreme meat production by simply not consuming any meat at all. Of course another solution would be if we all just started eating less meat and a more varied diet, but that's not likely to happen.

I agree with you on this, if I ever became a vegetarian (which I somewhat doubt) this would be the reason. The biggest thing is people just need tone down their meat consumption. And really, there's nothing bad that comes of that, less disease and obesity would definitely be benefits. My hopes are on lab-grown meat reaching a level where it can be switched in with regular meat and no one noticing.

EDIT: I'm optimistic

 

[The Almighty Aardvark]

My basic thought is that if some wild animal is willing eat me to live, then I am willing as well. If I died and my family had to eat me to survive, then so be it. Do what you can to live another day... within reason of course.

Those damn chickens and their vicious hunting parties! Believe you me, if we weren't eating them they'd be all over us.

 

[Extragorey]

My basic thought is that if some wild animal is willing eat me to live, then I am willing as well. If I died and my family had to eat me to survive, then so be it. Do what you can to live another day... within reason of course.

Those damn chickens and their vicious hunting parties! Believe you me, if we weren't eating them they'd be all over us.

Hehe, well I see that your name is a tribute to all those small vicious mammals that would devour us in a second if we weren't culling their numbers for food... (Okay, I don't know anyone who eats aardvarks, and chickens are fowls not mammals, but still.)

 

[malestrithe]

No.

To avoid getting in trouble for one world posts, there is nothing wrong with eating meat of any kind. It is how we evolved over the millennia. Our bodies have adapted to eating both meat and vegetables. Unless you come from a culture that has figured out how to do vegetarian properly, choosing one over the other tends to be disastrous to the body.

Unlike a lot of people in this culture, I've dispatched animals before. I don't like doing it.

 

[rob_simple]

Plants are alive, technically. They grow and can die if not cared for properly, so anyone against eating a living thing better drop plant matter from their diet too.

Or is it acceptable to eat a living thing so long as it doesn't have 'feelings' or a face?

 

[PrinceFortinbras]

I am a vegetarian so I will outline the reasons why, while dealing with some of the arguments that have come up in this thread.

The argument I find the most problematic is the "it is natural therefore it is morally permissible" -argument, but The Almighty Aardvark has already debunked this argument convincingly.

I am a vegetarian because I think minimizing the suffering in the world is of moral value (I could also explain the reasoning behind this if someone is interested). That means that everything that has the capacity to suffer has moral relevance. I.e. we should care about how we treat those things. Modern science has shown that it is very likely that a lot of animals (mammals, birds, whales etc.) have this capacity for suffering. We also know that a lot of the animals we eat suffer a lot before they are killed and eaten. Therefore it seems logical to me, in a market economy where buying something incentivizes further or increased production, to not eat meat. Almost all the vegetarians I know think like this.

With this in mind the argument that "plants are also alive" is not valid. Yes they are alive, but they are not capable of suffering.
For those discussing nutrition I would like to point out that there are almost more vegetarians in India then there are people in the United States. Most of them are doing just fine. One of the groups called, the Jian, are one of the wealthier and more modern minorities in India. If they can do it, it is no reason why people in the western world cannot.

Finally, for people that have a particular interest in this subject (the writer of OP perhaps?), I would like to point you in the direction of a philosopher called Peter Singer who is famous for his well argued vegetarian position. His book "Animal Liberation" (don?t get put off by the title) is very good.

 

[Appleshampoo]

I think I'll let Mufasa tell you my thoughts on the matter...

Spoiler

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW7PlTaawfQ[/youtube]