The pandemic has thrown into high relief some of the longstanding issues surrounding working conditions in meatpacking facilities. John Oliver explains why g...
Can I ask an question? I grew up in a dirt poor Mormon family that lived on church food. How does someone go vegan when all their food is supplied to them based on charity?
It's about doing as much as you can. If you're not in control of your food it can be harder, especially if you aren't even the one picking the food you get. If one can get enough staples like rice, beans, canned veggies, it can be possible, but one shouldn't sacrifice their own health over it either. Other ways to live closer to a vegan lifestyle would be to avoid purchasing firsthand as much leather, wool, etc. as possible (secondhand thrifting is better since you aren't directly paying a leather producer). There are also places like Food Not Bombs and Sikh temples that provide exclusively vegan/vegetarian food to people in need.
Once you have control over your own food supply, though, its easy to be vegan and frugal. I eat on about $5/6 a day, and that includes vegan breakfast sausage and the occasional vegan cheese splurges. I can give you a sample grocery list after my shift if you're interested
I personally have not been in leftist circles for long and I also grew up with farms around me. Let me tell you there is not many Sikh temples in Hooper, Utah and your social safety net is the Mormon church and that is it. You keep chickens out of necessity in those types of places. I can understand wanting to live a more vegan lifestyle but it seems like something that people choose more out of convenience than circumstances to my family members. Which is why I have always sort of rode it off as an ideology thing, and never really talk to them about it more seriously. This is not even broaching the subject of how their religion says that God created the earth and how they can do with the plants and animals what they want. I personally can be as vegan as I want but like 99% of the people around are not even going to have it on their radar and might even think less of you for it.
Thanks for answering my question and listening to me rant a little bit.
Because I enjoy the flavors of fennel, clove, and maple together with a nice protein source. The point is to move away from the torture and suffering of animals, not to completely alienate oneself from the foods we've come to know and love.
Again, small stuff like terminology isn't what's important. Cue the "no ethical consumption" quote, but one literally requires a cow to go through a brief, painful life, consuming 16x as much food to produce the same amount, and be slaughtered by humans who are also suffering massively from their work environment. The other also has some downfalls of capitalism in its making, but nothing was forced to die for me.
every living thing requires something else to die in order to keep living, it's just how we compartmentalize "death" & rank organisms in the hierarchy of worthy consideration
for instance, Jains in addition to being veggie, do not eat carrots or potatoes & other root vegetables because they believe that such plants have a higher "spirit" than other leafy greens... these ethical concerns are after all not universalizable. but I do agree that animals under human care should not be tortured or unduly harmed
You're right about the ethics, which is why ethics is one of the weaker points to make for veganism, but its only one of many reasons why veganism is the better choice (water scarcity, deforestation, waste pollution, ocean dead zones, methane production, zoonotic illnesses, mass use of antibiotics and antidepressants in livestock, slaughterhouse working conditions, etc.). If you are truly concerned for animal welfare, you should watch some slaughterhouse footage and see for yourself whether you should be supporting it with your money.
the same argument can also be said about wearing shoes or buying gasoline, both of which use petroleum which is itself a concretion of animal-derived material
if you've ever watched footage of humans working in factories or seen humans working in agricultural fields picking lettuce, there is plenty of torture and pain endured just to harvest innocent painless plants
Don't you agree that ethical considerations should center around humans? and then radiate out to our relations with animals & the natural world, but always first within those concentric concerns
I don't see why ethical considerations should centre around humans, if your understanding of ethics is that causing pain for pleasure is bad then there's no discernible difference between the pain response of humans and non-human animals.
In regards to humans working in fields, when you buy meat there's both the exploitation of the farm workers who produce the meat, as well as the farm workers who produce the feed for farm animals so it's an extra layer of exploitation.
no, ethical considerations center around humans because humans are the nexus of ethical behavior & ethical standards... we do not look to non-human animals as models for ethical behavior, nor do animals look to humans, they are separate domains.
animals need other organisms to die in order to sustain themselves, just as humans do... the key is where the lines are drawn for humans' most intense ethical attachments & spiritual affinities. those rest and have always rested solidly with fellow human persons. this is expressed in our legal system as well as in our normative standards for interpersonal & intersubjective conceptions
animals deserve an exceeding amount of respect & care & those under human control should not be subjected to undue pain or torture from humans. legal conventions already protect against animal cruelty, and I agree they don't go far enough
I don't really understand this argument. Humans are animals, the only separation between us is that we know that we are sapient. Many animals show intelligence on a level of toddlers or infants, should our ethical considerations only centre around adults and not children who are insufficiently developed?
Pointing at legal systems and normative standards doesn't mean much, most of our legal structure is extremely archaic and as leftists we're constantly calling for overhauling what's considered normal. Veganism is just another avenue of radical social change.
Humans are humans and are capable of making human ethical calculations & Animals show animal intelligence, and their animal ethics are completely of an animal kind. Children have legal personhood & are themselves capable of "rationale" after a certain "Age of Reason", which means they are capable of imputing consciousness into other humans, and are themselves capable of determining that animals are not persons. Children are not animals, though I know that's not what you're trying to say
Pointing at legal systems and normative standards is pretty much the only edifice that means anything. That's because the legal system is the only accountable system amenable to changing human conventions & societal concerns. Most of our legal structure is based in ancient, but evolving, characteristics of political reality, politics that always concerned humans first & foremost, and ecology second. I agree that humanity depends on ecology & that animals shouldn't be tortured or made to suffer unduly
But veganism as an individualist & finger-wagging aesthetic in this way is not radical, it's merely a way to dehumanize first-order human ethics & divert attention away from class considerations... considerations which usually leave the lowest humans beneath the most esteemed animals within these hierarchies
You still haven't made an argument for what distinguishes human and animal intelligence besides legal norms of personhood. Animals like chimps, orcas and dolphins can have very complicated social systems and demonstrate intelligence on the level of young children/early humans. What's the difference in intelligence between a child and a dolphin? If we're not basing the distinction between humans and non-humans on intelligence what material basis are you distinguishing on?
Like I said, humans have a human ethical framework & different animals have their own animal ethical frameworks, mostly unknowable to us. i agree that animals are not profligate destroyers & killers & unguided by any behavioral good sense. Non-humans and humans alike are guided by self-preservation & kin selection & reciprocal altruism. and no, children do not demonstrate animal intelligence at a young age, they exhibit developing human intelligence
The difference between a child & a dolphin on this level is that a child has the ability to make mistakes and be held(or have their guardians be held) ethically & moralistically, and yes legally, accountable by the society. particularly after reaching this "age of reason" or being determined as of sound mind. dolphins that accidentally drown their trainers or "rape" scuba divers are not going to be held ethically or legally accountable ever, no matter how smart you think they are
the material basis is the material outcome. children are scolded & can learn these behaviors in ways that are not always considered base "operant conditioning", but because the child is able over time to make discernible MORAL calculations of right & wrong, not just what gets them scolded/deprived of treats... the intervening factor is recognition of ideals and fleshing out the contours of what constitutes "moral turpitude"
animals & other living things are killed all the time in the production of food both unintentionally and intentionally... killing agricultural pests & removing predators & varmints on farm land are both key to successful harvests
but fantasizing about what choices the consumer can look forward to in the vegan "free market" is itself commodity fetishism, except we are patting ourselves on the back for engaging in it.
There's this scientifically questionable idea that more field mice are hurt than livestock animals. Assuming this is true...
If you eat a pig that had a grain to mean conversation ratio of 8 to 1, or a cow that's like 20 to 1, won't less field mice die if we eat the plants directly? You realize that most grain in the US goes to feed livestock, right?
Edit: "won't less field mice die if we eat the plants directly. OMG I feel dumb
i am not talking specifically or only about plants, but organisms in general. But I am talking specifically about death & sustenance of life & how the two are inextricable... which in this spiritual & ethical sense might, in the most profane way, be the only real liberation for any living thing
veganism when possible and practical. no one should judge someone who actually can't feasibly cut out animal products. it's when you're in a position to be able to that you should take action, in my opinion
If its worth anything I think you are right. Like I would totally would have the world swap over to a system of non-suffering. I am just trying to square the circle of poverty and I never can figure it out on my own short of ripping the whole system down.
Can I ask an question? I grew up in a dirt poor Mormon family that lived on church food. How does someone go vegan when all their food is supplied to them based on charity?
It's about doing as much as you can. If you're not in control of your food it can be harder, especially if you aren't even the one picking the food you get. If one can get enough staples like rice, beans, canned veggies, it can be possible, but one shouldn't sacrifice their own health over it either. Other ways to live closer to a vegan lifestyle would be to avoid purchasing firsthand as much leather, wool, etc. as possible (secondhand thrifting is better since you aren't directly paying a leather producer). There are also places like Food Not Bombs and Sikh temples that provide exclusively vegan/vegetarian food to people in need.
Once you have control over your own food supply, though, its easy to be vegan and frugal. I eat on about $5/6 a day, and that includes vegan breakfast sausage and the occasional vegan cheese splurges. I can give you a sample grocery list after my shift if you're interested
I personally have not been in leftist circles for long and I also grew up with farms around me. Let me tell you there is not many Sikh temples in Hooper, Utah and your social safety net is the Mormon church and that is it. You keep chickens out of necessity in those types of places. I can understand wanting to live a more vegan lifestyle but it seems like something that people choose more out of convenience than circumstances to my family members. Which is why I have always sort of rode it off as an ideology thing, and never really talk to them about it more seriously. This is not even broaching the subject of how their religion says that God created the earth and how they can do with the plants and animals what they want. I personally can be as vegan as I want but like 99% of the people around are not even going to have it on their radar and might even think less of you for it.
Thanks for answering my question and listening to me rant a little bit.
why does vegan food have to imitate meat & animal-derived shapes & flavors if the point is to move away from such conventions?
Because I enjoy the flavors of fennel, clove, and maple together with a nice protein source. The point is to move away from the torture and suffering of animals, not to completely alienate oneself from the foods we've come to know and love.
fennel and clove & maple flavor can go in lots of things without calling them "sausage" and "cheese"
this seems a lot more about building a better mouse as far as privately-produced commodities & consumerism are concerned
Again, small stuff like terminology isn't what's important. Cue the "no ethical consumption" quote, but one literally requires a cow to go through a brief, painful life, consuming 16x as much food to produce the same amount, and be slaughtered by humans who are also suffering massively from their work environment. The other also has some downfalls of capitalism in its making, but nothing was forced to die for me.
every living thing requires something else to die in order to keep living, it's just how we compartmentalize "death" & rank organisms in the hierarchy of worthy consideration
for instance, Jains in addition to being veggie, do not eat carrots or potatoes & other root vegetables because they believe that such plants have a higher "spirit" than other leafy greens... these ethical concerns are after all not universalizable. but I do agree that animals under human care should not be tortured or unduly harmed
You're right about the ethics, which is why ethics is one of the weaker points to make for veganism, but its only one of many reasons why veganism is the better choice (water scarcity, deforestation, waste pollution, ocean dead zones, methane production, zoonotic illnesses, mass use of antibiotics and antidepressants in livestock, slaughterhouse working conditions, etc.). If you are truly concerned for animal welfare, you should watch some slaughterhouse footage and see for yourself whether you should be supporting it with your money.
the same argument can also be said about wearing shoes or buying gasoline, both of which use petroleum which is itself a concretion of animal-derived material
if you've ever watched footage of humans working in factories or seen humans working in agricultural fields picking lettuce, there is plenty of torture and pain endured just to harvest innocent painless plants
Don't you agree that ethical considerations should center around humans? and then radiate out to our relations with animals & the natural world, but always first within those concentric concerns
I don't see why ethical considerations should centre around humans, if your understanding of ethics is that causing pain for pleasure is bad then there's no discernible difference between the pain response of humans and non-human animals.
In regards to humans working in fields, when you buy meat there's both the exploitation of the farm workers who produce the meat, as well as the farm workers who produce the feed for farm animals so it's an extra layer of exploitation.
no, ethical considerations center around humans because humans are the nexus of ethical behavior & ethical standards... we do not look to non-human animals as models for ethical behavior, nor do animals look to humans, they are separate domains.
animals need other organisms to die in order to sustain themselves, just as humans do... the key is where the lines are drawn for humans' most intense ethical attachments & spiritual affinities. those rest and have always rested solidly with fellow human persons. this is expressed in our legal system as well as in our normative standards for interpersonal & intersubjective conceptions
animals deserve an exceeding amount of respect & care & those under human control should not be subjected to undue pain or torture from humans. legal conventions already protect against animal cruelty, and I agree they don't go far enough
I don't really understand this argument. Humans are animals, the only separation between us is that we know that we are sapient. Many animals show intelligence on a level of toddlers or infants, should our ethical considerations only centre around adults and not children who are insufficiently developed?
Pointing at legal systems and normative standards doesn't mean much, most of our legal structure is extremely archaic and as leftists we're constantly calling for overhauling what's considered normal. Veganism is just another avenue of radical social change.
Humans are humans and are capable of making human ethical calculations & Animals show animal intelligence, and their animal ethics are completely of an animal kind. Children have legal personhood & are themselves capable of "rationale" after a certain "Age of Reason", which means they are capable of imputing consciousness into other humans, and are themselves capable of determining that animals are not persons. Children are not animals, though I know that's not what you're trying to say
Pointing at legal systems and normative standards is pretty much the only edifice that means anything. That's because the legal system is the only accountable system amenable to changing human conventions & societal concerns. Most of our legal structure is based in ancient, but evolving, characteristics of political reality, politics that always concerned humans first & foremost, and ecology second. I agree that humanity depends on ecology & that animals shouldn't be tortured or made to suffer unduly
But veganism as an individualist & finger-wagging aesthetic in this way is not radical, it's merely a way to dehumanize first-order human ethics & divert attention away from class considerations... considerations which usually leave the lowest humans beneath the most esteemed animals within these hierarchies
You still haven't made an argument for what distinguishes human and animal intelligence besides legal norms of personhood. Animals like chimps, orcas and dolphins can have very complicated social systems and demonstrate intelligence on the level of young children/early humans. What's the difference in intelligence between a child and a dolphin? If we're not basing the distinction between humans and non-humans on intelligence what material basis are you distinguishing on?
Like I said, humans have a human ethical framework & different animals have their own animal ethical frameworks, mostly unknowable to us. i agree that animals are not profligate destroyers & killers & unguided by any behavioral good sense. Non-humans and humans alike are guided by self-preservation & kin selection & reciprocal altruism. and no, children do not demonstrate animal intelligence at a young age, they exhibit developing human intelligence
The difference between a child & a dolphin on this level is that a child has the ability to make mistakes and be held(or have their guardians be held) ethically & moralistically, and yes legally, accountable by the society. particularly after reaching this "age of reason" or being determined as of sound mind. dolphins that accidentally drown their trainers or "rape" scuba divers are not going to be held ethically or legally accountable ever, no matter how smart you think they are
the material basis is the material outcome. children are scolded & can learn these behaviors in ways that are not always considered base "operant conditioning", but because the child is able over time to make discernible MORAL calculations of right & wrong, not just what gets them scolded/deprived of treats... the intervening factor is recognition of ideals and fleshing out the contours of what constitutes "moral turpitude"
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animals & other living things are killed all the time in the production of food both unintentionally and intentionally... killing agricultural pests & removing predators & varmints on farm land are both key to successful harvests
but fantasizing about what choices the consumer can look forward to in the vegan "free market" is itself commodity fetishism, except we are patting ourselves on the back for engaging in it.
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There's this scientifically questionable idea that more field mice are hurt than livestock animals. Assuming this is true...
If you eat a pig that had a grain to mean conversation ratio of 8 to 1, or a cow that's like 20 to 1, won't less field mice die if we eat the plants directly? You realize that most grain in the US goes to feed livestock, right?
Edit: "won't less field mice die if we eat the plants directly. OMG I feel dumb
growing plants kills many animals, as well as the plants
if we're concerned about things dying, then I think the best choice is to not eat
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not killing living things in order to survive is definitely something humans can't do
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i am not talking specifically or only about plants, but organisms in general. But I am talking specifically about death & sustenance of life & how the two are inextricable... which in this spiritual & ethical sense might, in the most profane way, be the only real liberation for any living thing
Congrats, you defeated the strawman vegan. Would you like to face off against a strawman campus SJW next?
defeated? i thought we were only discussing how this isn't about personal aesthetics & individual consumerist flights of fancy
veganism when possible and practical. no one should judge someone who actually can't feasibly cut out animal products. it's when you're in a position to be able to that you should take action, in my opinion
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If its worth anything I think you are right. Like I would totally would have the world swap over to a system of non-suffering. I am just trying to square the circle of poverty and I never can figure it out on my own short of ripping the whole system down.
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