Hotmega, are you just being dense or can you truly not understand why a vegetarian would be opposed to you eating meat?
To put it in simple terms, vegetarians feel the same way about ******* non-human ******* as they (and most everyone else) do about ******* other humans. In other words, that it is morally defensible to **** someone else to save your own life or the life of someone else, but it is not defensible to **** someone just because you "feel like it" aka. commit ******.
Since that case does not apply to human's meat consumption- as pointed out, you don't need to eat meat to survive, unlike carnivorous non-human's- then they feel it is wrong to **** an ****** that way.
******* have lives and feelings and that is a fact that is not changed because you refuse to consider it.
To put it very simply vegetarians don't have a problem with eating meat- they have a problem with ******* *******.
So by that rational it would be like me saying: I'm not a ********, that's a personal choice, but why should I tell anyone else that they should not go out and **** people? Because if you think that the act of ****** is wrong, then it doesn't matter who is doing it, it's still wrong.
I don't really care if people eat meat or not because I know people are stupid and selfish and nothing will change that. But I have yet to see one intellectually reasonable arguement for eating meat that wasn't narrow-minded and based on one person's perceived comfort at the expense of other humans and ******* and the environment.
As eloquently as you think you put this, you're not making any news. I understand this is part of the position as I have addressed it in different ways within this thread. But I think it's an (another) utterly nonsensical, extremist perspective at odds with the way the overwhelming majority of humans believe and human history.
But like most extremist positions, that one is not well thought either. Aside from the position being hardly practical if taken to it's logical end (since they think it's "******", the establishment of the ******* any ****** by humans as being ******* and punishable), it makes little sense if we project the concept out to all of it's theoretical applications.
You would think some of this would be obvious if people were to do homework on what they actually believe and it's conclusions instead of being knee-jerk reactionaries. But since they don't, here's the rant;
The intellectual argument in favor of humans ******* (other) ******* for consumption is that predation and meat consumption has always been a natural occurrence with natural man to support an omnivorous diet. Now if you want to question whether or not we're inherently omnivores, it is our nutrient need for energy (physical and for brain function) as a species which determine what type of diet is intrinsic to us naturally. We've always (man) used some combination of plant life and ****** hide to clothe our bodies and in some cases to shelter us against the elements. Man as a species would have largely died off if man inherently had a moral opposition to ******* ******* for sustenance and protection.
As with all detritivores, insectivores, herbivores, carnivores and omnivores, man has an ecological responsibility as an omnivore in the ecosystem to consume other ******* for food and/or garment. In so doing, (the important part) in many cases we've shepherded their survival.
Man intelligently makes distinctions between, domesticated, civet, livestock, wild game and other wild ******* because
they're not all the same in terms of their relative sentience or personhood. Because man is not inherently cruel, we discourage cruelty and in some cases make it ******* to be cruel to *******. Why do we do that? It's not because we draw the line on whether these ******* "feel" or not. It's because we believe some ******* are more sentient than others and cruelty them is abjectly inhumane and therefore punishable.
Speaking of the "feelings" aspect of the argument, since we can't interpret what
some ******* think beyond our crude recognition of their responses to things, how do we objectively know they can "feel" (emotion) verses merely feel (sense)? I don't think we can with
some *******
because some are less sentient than others.
If the objection is to "feel" the sense (e.g. "feel pain") where do we draw the line? As all living things with nervous systems and brains do too. All living things intrinsically respond to urgency and threat. It is built into their natural defense mechanisms. If you conclude that needlessly ******* a thing that can feel pain is tantamount to ******, am I committing ****** for gassing pests, trapping rodents or simply not watching where I step and ******* an insect?? Like it or not, those are some of the logical conclusions of that line of thinking.
It's "******" to **** (other) ******* for consumption because it's presumed we don't need to?? How stupid is that position since it's a natural trap door for instant inconsistency.
To square that logic, you'd have to maintain the illogical and nonsensical position that it was okay (or not ******) when mankind needed but that because some
now think we don't need to, it's ******.
What about the people in the world who don't have healthy alternatives to eating meat and
need to **** (other) ******* to support their dietary needs? Are they not ********* and we are? If somehow the world plunges into debacle is it not ****** to eat meat again? Since the subjective word here is "need" how in the world could it be a sensible position to conclude eating meat based on "need" is either ****** or not when "need" is different things to different people??
If I live in the city where access to shipped alternatives are plenty, am I barred from eating meat because the perception by some is I don't "need" to? Or can I choose to not be a ******** by living a spartan lifestyle isolated from modernization where there
is a necessity?
So again, due to the nonsense of it, utter impracticality of it, it being completely at odds with reality and human history, believing that ******* ******* for consumption is "******" is as best, a personal decision.
Frankly, I thought I was doing a service to vegetarians by not highlighting the "meat is ******" theme of their position by instead focusing on some of the more debatable aspects of their argument.