There are alternatives humans are expanding to now i sure you know, but coal yes still largely is the main source of power, but not only kills humans but all living things on the planet, but i never said i was perfect, I changed my life to vegan because its healthy for me and better for animals and the environment. I never stated that i was perfect, but do what i can practically. Been vegan is easy, living in a country that's running almost entirely by electricity is not so easy to abandon until we run mostly on renewable source's.
Ok so you accept that you commit immoral acts. We agree on this one, I always say that one of the few things the christians got right is that we're almost all living in sin. Next up, if you choose to be vegan (because it's easy) but also choose to use electricity (because it's hard not to) does that mean that everyone else gets to decide how immoral they want to be too? You (indirectly) use coal, which results in some poor couple's only child getting cancer and dying horribly at the tender age of 7. You make that choice, knowing that that child will die, and just accept that you are doing wrong but that you want to do so. Effectively, "It's a shame the kid will die, but I want to boil my kettle without starting a fire in the garden.". Seems fairly similar to "It's a shame that fox will die, but I want a snazzy new coat." So my question I suppose is, if we all get to just choose whether to commit immoral acts, should any of us be telling others not to do specific acts? I'm not sure about this, but let's hear your thoughts anyway.
The quick answer, as far as I'm concerned, is that we've been trained within our cultures to find some meats morally acceptable and some not. We criticise Koreans for eating dog-meat and the Chinese for hunting Whale but will happily chop a horse up to feed our own pet dogs and wouldn't dare to kill a 'lesser' human being to fulfil that natural, carnivorous dietary necessity we all apparently have ingrained in us. If you can't kill any life and eat it, then you shouldn't kill one.
In certain cultures, old ladies forcibly hold down young girls and cut their ******** off with a sharp stone, before packing the wound with ash. In other cultures it is considered acceptable to capture members of other groups and ritualistically kill and eat them. You can not justify acts with culture. Culture describes norms for behaviour and action within a given society. It does not justify those behaviours or actions though, just describes the norms.
I was using it to the reverse effect and pointing out that differing cultures highlight the hypocrisy of meat-eaters who seem to justify their actions with culturally-specific values which don't stand up to the test of a moral code when you take their traditions out of the equation.
@specofdust So im still a bad person then, i accept that when you put it like that, but that makes us all bad people? Just my thinking is by me been vegan i help make the world a tiny bit better. I understand that the world will not change overnight, but doing something is better than nothing.
He isn't saying you are a bad person. He is saying you are not a person without wrong doing. Therefore you shouldn't enforce your ideals and opinions on people - when some of it could be considered hypocrisy. And if you are going to do so, potentially your methods are flawed. Granted - you have only cited one method which is to give out free vegan food - but potentially (and implicitly) you have suggested other methods in line with everyone's thoughts and opinions of activists (as a whole, a movement, and their strategy's and methods)
I don't believe such human exists what has done no wrong doing. everyone has in some form.. but saying that, because i use a computer using electricity, that makes it so im not allowed to promote free vegan food? Your saying unless someone is a perfect shinning example of a human that has never done wrong they cannot try to help the world even in a tiny small way?
Every human doesnt go about thrusting their beliefs on others - and doing so in sometimes a less than humane manor - thats the point.
But do i do that? If someone wants to come to the stall i do with others in the street, then they come on there own accord, we say what where about and why we are there, offer the free food for them to try, also ask them if they would like to take an information leaflet that they can take away with them and read at there leisure. Hardly forcing it down there throats.
Someone (I can't remember who) was once quoted as having said: "The tragedy of humanity is that people are forced to do evil wherever they go". We are all basically just trying to negotiate our way through life between our morals and the harsh demands of survival in the real world. Basically, our moral choices and behaviours are relative. They are compromises. Specofdust is pointing that out to you. And if your moral choices and behaviours are compromises, and mine are, and those of the seal hunters and fox hound breeders and whalers are, then who are you or I to tell them that they are making the wrong compromises and we are making the right ones? Because it's all relative, see? Not saying you can't. I feel pretty confident in saying that female circumcision is very much the wrong moral choice. But you have to keep in mind that they are still attempts at compromise with the harsh sociocultural demands in which they happen; in which for example female circumcision is physically enforced and threatened at pain of death; in a culture in which people are scared stupid into doing stupid things for stupid reasons because they have lived in existential terror for generations. Or in which the alternative to seal hunting is watching your family struggle and starve, because you live in a harsh environment with few job opportunities and no social welfare safety net. If you fail to recognise that and label seal hunters as evil, that is not going to win them over.
Thought we was past this... i do not just simply see the hunters as just evil and thats the end of it, but they preform unnecessary suffering (we have already covered what is necessary and what isnt) Tribe remote people that have been killing the odd seal here and there are not the main problem, but the corporate fishermen that wipe out the seal cubs by barbaric methods.. I'm sure we have already covered all this. prioritizing money over unnecessary suffering and/or death is in my opinion, wrong. some people make no compromises, make no effort to recognize how trouble we are in and heading for. If they choose to continue to be ignorant/unaware to life in general, then thats there decision, but im there to help raise that awareness, if they want to take it on board then great, if not, then that's upto them. end of story.
Gah, was keeping out of this particular topic variation but i absolutely have to agree with that statement. Yes, Nexxo's points about compromises are relevant and accurate but the method in which these things are done is is a wrong compromise. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever for the seals to be bludgeoned to death in the way that they are and that is evil and unnecessary. On that particular example it's all about the method. Shoot them or something, hell even using an item like an ice-pick through the head would be a darn site more humane than clubbing. I think, on that subject, that is what Otis is referring to. There really is no need to batter the poor things into oblivion, no need at all. If it's the 'do it or starve' argument then just do it differently, but if they all realised that it was sick to do it in such a manner and refused to then the companies would start taking notice and changing the way things are done.
Unnecessary by your (and arguably my) definition. To someone who makes a living off it, it feels necessary. Most people prioritise money over a lot of things. I prioritise it over having a lie-in in the morning, dressing how I want, doing what I want with my day. Yes they do, they just make unwise ones. Seals are bludgeoned to death, by the way, rather than shot or pick-axed, not to make holes in the fur. A good seal clubber can kill one instantly with a single blow. Unfortunately most of them suck.
Now this is where I disagree with you as I think being vegan is actually bad for animals and the environment and I will explain my feelings on the matter. If we stopped eating meat and animal products overnight all animals currently farmed would become redundant and a drain on our resources. The end result would be a mass slaughter and the extinction of many breeds. Domestic breeds are so far removed from their wild origins that they can not survive with out us so we couldn't release them "into the wild" if we wanted too. Secondly large parts of the world are unsuitable for arable farming but are ideal rough grazing for domesticated animals. By products of animal farming such as wool, leather, milk, cheese and dung etc would no longer be available and alternatives would have to be found. Personally I think we should be eating less meat and ensure that the meat we do eat is high quality and ethically sourced. If we raise an animal for its meat we should ensure that its healthy, well treated, is allowed to perform its natural behaviour and is slaughtered as quickly and humanely as possible. We should then use as much as the animal as we can. For the record I have no problem with people eating dogs so long as they are treated with respect. See above. We object to the eating of Whales fort he same reason we object to people eating blue fin tuna. They are critically endangered.
+1 rude Baboon They'd deem it necessary if people didn't buy animal products, where the animals were abused in one way or another... but I think we're going to need a lot more activists on board... c'mon Nexxo, you know you want to
I understand that point but it seems bizarre to show respect for animals who may well be wiped from existance by nature and yet then justify eating others because we're able to breed them for the sole purpose of slaughtering them when they get big enough.
