On Sunday, July 7, 2002, at 02:04 PM, Doug Henwood wrote:
> Jeffrey Fisher wrote:
>
>>> how do radical animal
>>> rights activists think most animals survive?
>>
>> mostly they eat plants.
incidentally, i reiterate my initial point about other primates and their largely non-meat diets. orangutans, the most highly developed along with bonobos, eat only about 1-2% meat in their diets, entirely opportunistically. i'm not an expert on primatology, but this is my understanding.
>
> Ever watch a cat toy with a mouse? Many of the "cute" things cats do,
> like batting around bottlecaps, is just a rehearsal for murder, which
> they seem to take considerable pleasure in.
wolverines, for example, are even worse, being smarter than cats.
i'm not arguing that there aren't carnivorous animals, and i would even argue against trying to feed your pet cat or dog a strictly vegetarian diet. you're quite likely to ruin their health. i'm mainly arguing that the moral issues are different from cats to humans. it's precisely the ability of a cat to "take pleasure" in much of anything (an ability many will dispute, btw) that raises moral issues with eating them. otherwise, what's the difference between a cat, on the one hand, and a pig or a cow--or a human, for that matter--on the other?
>
>>> Aside from eating plants,
>>> do not most animals kill other animals?
>>
>> you want to go hunt for your food? cheetahs don't build big barns to
>> raise their zebra or gazelle meat in, either.
>
> Nope. And they don't build houses, drill for oil, or type on computers
> either.
indeed, they do not.
>
> There was a hilarious spot on O'Reilly the other night (partial
> transcript at <http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,56779,00.html>),
> featuring the hyper-PC NYC ecofeminist Cathleen McGuire (whose twin
> sister Colleen is as down with mother earth as she is - they've got a
> website at <http://eve.enviroweb.org/>). PETA's running an ad campaign
> with nude female celebs who'd rather go naked than wear fur. McGuire
> was outraged at the exploitation of women. Funnier than SNL.
>
the thing that ticks me off about idiots like this is that they provide such straw man fodder for people like o'reilly. jesus christ. at least peter singer will never be accused of being "PC."
j