Isn't not eating meat kind of a big thing in India? Anyway, it's not really relevant.
Eating meat is not the ethical issue. It is the suffering involved in obtaining the meat. That suffering should be minimized is a near-universally accepted premise. Therefore, it follows that eating meat should be minimized. The argument is valid, but people don't like the conclusion, which is why goofball assertions like "animals don't suffer!" get thrown out, or alternatively, "only human suffering matters," which leads to the troubling question of "why?." (That human beings happen to be biologically adapted be able to consume both plants and animals is not really relevant. "Is" is not "ought.")
I eat meat myself. A lot. I had a spicy Italian sub just this evening. But I don't go through argumentative leaps of fancy to pretend that I am not participating in the propagation of suffering. I am.
--- On Wed, 4/15/09, John Thornton <jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>
> I don't understand where the idea that eating meat is
> itself an ethical issue.
> Humans are omnivores which means we eat meat.
> Chris is wrong when he states that eating meat is not a
> universal human practice.
> It is and the fact that there is a specific name for those
> who chose to forsake meat but not for those who follow the
> universal practice helps demonstrate this fact.
> What strictly vegetarian society has ever existed? None
> that I know of.
> Certainly some religious/philosophical practitioners don't
> eat meat but those exist as small subsets of their society.
> The fact that some individuals chose to practice celibacy
> doesn't mean a sex drive is not universal among humans.
>
> Complaints about the barbaric treatment of animals under
> capitalism is certainly appropriate in my opinion but that
> complaint applies to all aspects of production under
> capitalism does it not?
>
> John Thornton
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