“There’s no ethical consumption under capitalism, after all.”
:capitalist-laugh: .
Why don’t you engage with me in the marketplace of ideas instead of trying to silence my speech?
oh no please don't compare slavery of sentient beings and slavery of sentient beings. You're not allowed to compare similar (but not identical) things
the same? No. Comparable? Yes. Pigs are smarter than 5 year olds, does that make it ok to enslave 5 year olds? What about disabled people?
Nothing is comparable as long as I can shove my index fingers down my ear hole deep enough that I don't have to hear it.
Because enslavement of any sentient being is cruel and unnecessary. Is that something you disagree with?
I don't think you can really say it's not comparable when painting black people as more akin to livestock than like, people, was a significant part of the rhetoric on why slavery was permissible. The comparison was directly used to justify slavery, and the logic of industrial capitalist exploitation and extermination is still lurking in agriculture today.
That's not to say that slavery and industrial animal agriculture are literally the same thing, but it's still extremely concerning as we hurtle towards ecofascism.
i mean, i've seen the omaha child steaks advertising, pretty sure it's humane and besides, children can't feel pain anyway
Nature is an asshole. Huge CW:
spoiler
Do we murder, rape, eat our own children?
Appealing to nature is just lazy, humans aren't part of nature. We live in a society
Do we murder, rape, eat our own children?
No. Those are generally rejected in human relations. I'm talking about the relationship humans have to nature. I'm not saying humans should model their behavior off some species or another.
humans aren’t part of nature
I fucking hate settlers lol
humans aren't a part of nature
Political ecology would like a word with you
children are my property, therefore i may dispose of them as i please because it doesn't violate NAP
Yes, humans very much evolved as a predator. We have always dominated the weak among us and taken from them without remorse. The history of humanity is one of conquest and violence. There is no other way, embrace this reality.
:capitalist:
Chapo Vegans 🤝 Nazis
Darwinism & Social Darwinism are the same thing.
TIL, thanks for clearing that one up.
Humans have evolved as a predator to other species, and other species have evolved to be prey to humans.
"I'm basically a wolf guys."
Me, discovering the concept of "hunting" on an online Leftist forum:
"Wow, so people just LARP as wolves?"
Modern industrial farming is exactly like hunter gatherer tribes. Human society can never progress past that point and consider moral or ethical points that go beyond the level of someone bashing a rock over someone elses head to steal someone elses dead elk.
This is the racism that just keeps bringing me back to Chapo.
"It's racism to suggest moral and ethical considerations might change as human society changes and our understanding of the world changes with it"
You are correct. Cultures which still hunt are just "ooga booga me smash rock." They are incapable of developing a morality or philosophy which incorporates their relationship to prey.
I said that people still hunt in a cooperative way with nature, and I was met with:
Oh, so you think you're a wolf
Human society can never progress past that point and consider moral or ethical points that go beyond the level of someone bashing a rock over someone elses head to steal someone elses dead elk.
These were both incredibly racist & chauvinistic.
an Indian vegetarian says that Americans haven’t progressed to a more enlightened position towards their food
No one said this to me, but I would agree if someone did say this.
They are incapable of developing a morality or philosophy which incorporates their relationship to prey.
And one of those might be vegetarianism or veganism, out of a respect in recognising the sentience of other animals and seeking to reduce their harm, you fucking moron.
The person who thinks veganism and vegetarianism is incapable of being adapted, understood, developed or accepted by indigenous cultures because they're all exclusively so tied up with animal consumption that it would be apparently impossible to suggest it, and that suggesting otherwise is somehow a rejection of darwinism.
The person who thinks veganism and vegetarianism is incapable of being adapted, understood, developed or accepted by indigenous cultures
Cool, go talk to that person.
I don't care whether your opinions on hunting or husbandry are adopted by any culture, and I have said nothing about that.
So you admit you’re a dipshit invoking indigenous culture as a shitty broad shield so as to not be made to personally think about your societies relation to modern farming practices
I have literally said nothing about this. I have said that humans have relationships to animal, which include hunter/prey relations.
because you prioritise not feeling any personal guilt.
I try to avoid animal products I don't hunt or fish myself. The most I spend on animal products is eggs from my neighbor. I grow a decent portion of my own food. I'm not particularly guilty of my consumer choices. This all sounds like projection.
Hence invoking Darwinism, as if modern industrial society is comparable to some “state of nature” which you are clearly using indigenous culture as a stand-in for.
Humans are not divorced from their environment or Darwinistic relations to other animals, even in industrial societies. This is not exclusive to indigenous societies.
I have literally said nothing about this. I have said that humans have relationships to animal, which include hunter/prey relations.
Yes, you are invoking indigenous cultures as a stand-in for state of nature, to imply ethical or moral consideration of the well-being of animals is somehow de facto off the table, which is obviously absurd.
I try to avoid animal products I don’t hunt or fish myself. The most I spend on animal products is eggs from my neighbour. I grow a decent portion of my own food. I’m not particularly guilty of my consumer choices. This all sounds like projection.
Cool, so why are you so absurdly defensive that you keep insisting we can only talk about indigenous cultures when talking about vegetarianism or veganism. That's a bad faith argument that does not at all relate to what vegans or vegetarians argue, even if we were to accept that no indigenous culture has never developed a philosophy that might imply well-being of animals as a consideration, and that therefore invoking indigenous as if it were a homogenous, identical mass that is unthinkable to not have animal consumption.
Humans are not divorced from their environment or Darwinistic relations to other animals, even in industrial societies. This is not exclusive to indigenous societies.
Not addressing the point. Invoking broad generalities does not deal with the specifics, which is human society today does not broadly exist in some small scale state where it has no option but to eat meat out of sheer desperation. In continually invoking indigenous societies, you are reducing them to a single identical mass, and also avoiding the actual point of discussion of most vegans and vegetarians, which is industrial society that envelops most of the world. It is also fetishising indigenous cultures to present them as if they are beyond discussion or critique, as if we were to invoke certain historical cultures to defend e.g. human sacrifice.
You keep invoking Darwinism as if this puts moral or ethical considerations out of consideration and therefore ends the discussion. It is quite right to point out that therefore you are making an absurd, reductive argument. There are many things that happen or could happen that could be deemed necessary in a "state of nature" or a claim to desperation or a claim to some society that does not have affordance we have. That does not make a position flatly wrong, as is the case in any ethical or moral claim e.g. murder is generally wrong, even if I could be pushed into a situation where it might be deemed acceptable out of desperation, defence, etc.
Yes, you are invoking indigenous cultures as a stand-in for state of nature, to imply ethical or moral consideration of the well-being of animals is somehow de facto off the table, which is obviously absurd.
I haven't said anything about "indigenous culture."
I grew up in a rural settler society. We recognize that invasion fish, brought by international trade, are extremely detrimental to our ecosystem. We need more people fishing & consuming these fish to slow down ecological collapse.
We also recognize that human activity is causing the extinction of vulnerable species & predators, the rapid boom white-tailed deer population. We need to intervene to protect vulnerable species, which includes more hunting white-tailed deer to slow down their dominance over all natural food sources.
These are examples of humans, in industrial societies, needing to perform the role of predator in the ecosystem. And I haven't even gotten into husbandry relations.
why are you so absurdly defensive that you keep insisting we can only talk about indigenous cultures when talking about vegetarianism or veganism
I have not limited this to indigenous cultures. The problem is that veganism does not make much sense outside the context of mass industrially produced animal products. And the root of the problem there is our alienation from nature.
"Trust me my high powered rifle and camouflage make me just like a natural predator when I'm hunting"
a 5 year old's notion of freedom does not extend further than its immediate living conditions, does that make enslaving them ok?
ok lemme sell my five year old for money if that makes you more comfortable
You don't think a pig or a cow have the concept of freedom? And the cow doesn't resist the killing?
You say whales suffer from being enclosed but maintain a cow doesn't if it is forcibly impregnated once a year, having its child taken from it days after birth, milked for ten months until dry? The strain that puts on its body, that isn't suffering? Would taking a whale's child away from it cause suffering?
If you can watch the standardized process by which these products are made, and then conclude there is no suffering, please do. Watching Dominion was a big part of convincing me of the things I believe now and didn't before.
Here's the part specific to Cows -- https://youtu.be/LQRAfJyEsko?t=3183
You haven't yet defined why cattle are not slaves, you said it was their inability to conceive of freedom, their inability to suffer, but you seem to now concede those.
If it's funny to you that the two might be compared, ask why. It's definitely not something traditional society discusses, so maybe that's why it's so foreign of a concept to you.
So wage slaves, who do work of their own volition, are more valid slaves than other sentient beings kept in cages and exploited for their reproductive systems and eventually, flesh? If slavery is not defined by suffering, what is it defined by, the absence of free will?
It's very easy to write ethical questions off as nonsense. That's what the right does when discussion of trans identity come up, that's what they do when discussion of black reparations come up. They're conversations that lack logic to them because they have never been made to consider them before, not in school, not by their peers.
I would challenge that the battery cages that house five chickens in a square meter for their entire lives are a bit more than loose restrictions on their freedom. I think it would be a struggle to find and manage a system that places greater restriction, since capitalism would have been incentivized to do it.
This comes back to just having the knowledge of what I'm talking about here, look at this clip of what a battery cage is: https://youtu.be/LQRAfJyEsko?t=1583
And then let me know if you consider this loose restriction on freedom. I think the cages are the main reason for their suffering here.
You need to ask yourself what thinking is behind the thought that humans have the inherent right to not be enslaved over an animal. It certainly wasn't always that way, and isn't in many places still. That's what we're talking about, so to reference it as a forgone conclusion without justifying it skips over the point of the discussion and the question.
Laws define ethics now? I'm certain that police brutality has a legal definition, but doesn't actually define it properly in our legal system, does it? Definitions are defined at some point by people, they are not immutable. The person who had to define it before you had to have reasoning, and that's the same reasoning you need to explain here to justify the definition.
If you're acknowledging that eating meat and dairy is cruelty, and wrong, then what argument is there left to have? We agree.
Everyone, including the two of us, should stop creating the demand for those products.
Did you think I was arguing "putting the cheese in the mouth" was the ethical issue? You're right of course, at that point it's just cheese.
But purchasing those things creates the demand that someone somewhere has to put a living being through torture, a horrible life in a warehouse having child after child stripped away. And if you value the capacity for empathy of a whale, it's the same for a cow.
Other animals don't need to have the same concept of sexuality as people in order to be raped, I hope that's clear enough. We have animal cruelty laws against our pets for a reason. It may not be a sexual violation to them, but it is still physical harm. It is exploitation of another being that suffers.
If you did watch the standardized process of how we produce these things, which I've linked twice now, I think that more than sufficiently demonstrates harm. If the harm shocks you, maybe that says something about you, because there's no other way to present it. The machine lines of individual animals having their throats slit, dipped alive into boiling water, the cows struggling in the pens to avoid another bolt shot into their skulls.
And for what? A meat we can mimic with soy or pea protein? A cheese we can mimic with cashews? There's no rationalizing it.
I have a strong feeling you didn't watch it, and I can't make you, but it would give your arguments a lot stronger ground if you have the full knowledge of what you're talking about in the future.
Yes, this is correct. Continue purchasing meat. My stock portfolio thanks you.
:capitalist:
Most food production is for profit so your stock portfolio will welcome my purchase of kidney beans
Lower profit margin with less cruelty. Agriculture is a very boring category aside from GMO patents.
Yeah less cruelty is a good reason to avoid meat. Capitalists profiting isn't that great of a reason since they'll profit off of anything you eat
cows love when people take away their children. Cows love being killed. Cows love being forcibly impregnated and milked everyday, despite common infections of the udders. Just because you don't care doesn't mean they don't
livestock is not like children, because I say they're different
I, as a good abolitionist, always avoid using cotton products and I do my part by shaming others into not using cotton products as well. This will surely end the system of chattel slavery in the South. Consumer choice is surely how systemic change, god forbid revolutionary liberation, occurs. Yes
I, a good abolitionist, oppose slavery in theory, but I won't free my own slaves because individual choices don't matter
I hope you actually sold them to recoup your losses. It’s only fair.
I, as a good abolitionist, always avoid using cotton products and I do my part by shaming others into not using cotton products as well. This will surely end the system of chattel slavery in the South. Consumer choice is surely how systemic change, god forbid revolutionary liberation, occurs. Yes
@jabrd - That was very much an actual abolitionist policy. Source.
It cut into cotton farmers sales, which was just terrible.
:capitalist:
It also didn't end slavery. Without grounded materialist analysis all of these discussions are just a morality circlejerk rather than a discussion of tactics/organization to pursue the political goal of animal liberation. That's why all the accusations going back and forth are about tone and privilege, there's nothing deeper there to discuss
Yes, yes, I agree. It is better to not take any steps against the machine unless it will fully solve the problem.
In the meantime, we must all accept things as they are and continue to purchase goods and services at a predictable and easily forecasted rate of profit.
Unless you're taking part in some organized political group that's actively pursuing the goal of animal liberation (and if you are, great job) you are taking no steps against the machine yourself. This lifestylism bullshit isn't saving any lives, it's just giving you a morality chub to stroke all over the internet
I am assuming you are doing this since you are advocating for it.
Animal liberation isn't the top of my political agenda. I take part in local organizations pursuing other goals. If it is your top priority then great, but I hope you're actually doing something about it other than buying the Che Guevara tee shirt equivalent of putting a "my food is grown, not raised" bumper sticker on your car
You are literally equating black people to dogs, what the fuck is wrong with you? Of course people care more about slavery than veganism, because humans are more important than other animals why am I even explaining this
The argument only carries over if you value dogs and humans equally, which is a fucking awful take no matter how you spin it.
Also, no one is eating meat purely to spite vegans, at least not anyone on this websiteThe argument only carries over if you value dogs and humans equally, which is a fucking awful take no matter how you spin it.
That is exactly their take. That's the problem.
The argument only carries over if you value dogs and humans equally, which is a fucking awful take
M4A is modern redlining because it doesn't cover my dog. I am a well-adjusted person.
Edit: The DNC should pay me six figures for this.
Soo many racist white libs would unironically love this.
Yeah the user that accused a indigenous person of "race baiting" is back at again harassing a POC in this very thread. Unbelievable, I actually thought this place was better for some reason.
Being against slavery is very expensive. Purchasing goods from countries which pay “livable” wages is very expensive. Much better to buy clothing made in developing countries. higher profit margin for the business as well, which is the most important part.
It's a bad analogy even if you want to be charitable and find nothing wrong with using a slavery analogy when literally anything else could be used without coming across as racist.
No one is eating meat purely because a vegan told them it was bad. They do it because it's the cultural norm, because it's easier, because they like the taste, and a multitude of other reasons that really don't justify animal cruelty but also have nothing to do with whatever PETA posted today. I don't think anyone is arguing that eating meat is somehow morally superior, it's not, but people like OP will gladly pretend they do and alienate 99% of people for no reason.The complaint is that those vegans are just too damn alienating so I guess I can’t go vegan.
Literally point to a single person who has said that unironically. We make both of those points ("vegans are annoying" and "I can't/won't go vegan"), but we have never connected them ("vegans are annoying therefore I won't go vegan"). Seriously, link me a single comment saying "I won't go vegan solely because vegans are annoying" unironically.
Posters caring more about dogs than black people? On my chapo? It's more likely than you think.
Don't forget indigenous people, why take their concerns seriously when you can just accuse them of "race baiting". (Actually happened in a vegan bit post on here)
Using culture as an excuse to do unnecessary harm is definitely something above all criticism.
Culture can never change or adapt in response to advancements in material conditions and our understanding of the world. Reject modernity, return to tradition, and buy more things.
:capitalist-woke: What label do I need to put on this merch to appeal to your individual identity?
how is this caring more about dogs than black people? Is Isaac Bashevis Singer antisemitic when he says "To the animals, all people are Nazis. To the animals, life is an eternal Treblinka"? Is that why veganism is more prominent in black people than white people ? Or are you just hiding behind black people to justify what you're doing?
Comparing eating meat to the Holocaust is a bad take, regardless of who it comes from.
because you said so? If jews can't talk about the Holocaust however the fuck they want, who can? Only you?
It wasn't only the jews killed in the Holocaust. I'm not saying he can't talk about it, I just saying that what he said is a bad take.
It wasn’t only the jews killed in the Holocaust. I’m not saying he can’t talk about it, I just saying that what he said is a bad take.
“No single jew can speak for every jew and therefore all jews should never talk about anything.”
That almost exactly the opposite of what I said. I said that he can say whatever he wants but it doesn't make him free from criticism. Please read the post before you reply to it.
I am a capitalist, I don’t reconsider anything unless I’m being paid to. What is my reconsideration worth to you in the marketplace?
Maybe we should treat all sentient beings better. If you see the issue with enslavement of a race of human beings, you can also see the issue with enslavement of a species.
Incredible suffering, all for the build up to one meal.
That’s the beauty of this fine system, everything is just voting with your wallet.
:capitalist:
Racism? In my chapo? Who could've thought?!?!?
But seriously this is a terrible post, and only gets a pass on here because the user base is 90% white.
Maybe this is a hot take here now, but I think human lives are more important than chicken and cow lives. (And yes, dogs too!)
Finally a good take after 2 days of nonsense from all directions.
Abolitionists are never going to gain support if they continue to be rude to everyone who owns slaves.
abolitionists didn't gain support, there was a fuckin war about it
you're missing the forest for the trees and being extremely racist in the process by doubling down on the trope of comparing black people to dogs
abolitionists didn’t gain support, there was a fuckin war about it
Ah yes, and the support for that war came from thin air.
Your other claim is frankly abhorrent. If you review my history I think you will find your words are slanderous.
Jesus this is most depressing post I've seen on this site yet, and I've been here since like day 3. Not because of you, OP. I agree with your point 100%. It's the folks who think this is a racist take (and getting tons of upvotes) in order to avoid like 5 seconds of introspection about their lives or whatever.
When people benefit from exploitation, they will rationalize away their choices. That's it, that's the comparison.
Yeah I'm disappointed, I thought this site was more open to self-crit but people are so quick to pull out shitty reductionist arguments as soon as something they do is criticized.
People love to think they’re a socialist until they experience even momentary discomfort.
... and that is the moment I can sell products to them.
:capitalist:
The issue isn't 'people think it's a racist take', it was the people posting the takes being unnecessarily racist.
"hey, you're accidentally making my people into the butt of a joke but I agree with the point about less factory farm consumption, maybe tone down the unintentional racism?"
"LOL I HAVE 69 UPVOTES, READ SETTLERS" "Is this honest indigenous person discussing their culture doing an irony?" "Man Bloodmouth carnists will misinterpret everything, why did you have to make my unintentionally racist joke all about race? Can't you see even though I made you into a punchline, I wasn't actually joking about you, it was a joke crafted for a different audience, wherein the punchline is people like you are funny to laugh at" "why do you have to continuously make things about race, after only 2 times of you calling me and my buddy's unintentional racism out?"
All while mods ignore the indigenous people posting and some mods will start their own struggle session implying people disagreeing with vegan trolls are reactionary or whatever, and parody a thread made by an indigenous person wherein posting the comments of a few indigenous vegans is made to directly counter actual racism from posters on this site, therefore missing the point completely.
It's both that and the fact that this take is stupid and racist. Drawing an equivalence between the nigh-insurmountable trauma imposed upon POC and communities through the insanely brutal history of slavery that weighs them down to this day with both structural and spiritual challenge to a morally wrong but entirely incomparable industry of growing and selling animals for food is utterly disgusting. No, because pigs were able to recognize food and basic patterns with the same efficiency as a baseline three-year-old does not make them equivalent to humans whatsoever--adding in downplaying of the utter trauma inflicted by slavery through this comparison only worsens this garbage take.
Honestly, yes to all of this too.
I was just posting a baby-step to that, because there is so much work to even acknowledge directly racist posters were racist, so I didn't even want to open that more conceptual can of worms.
And even then when some people were finally responding to my posts with stuff like "oh you and your people don't see dogs as equals, whatever, you're missing the point", despite me repeatedly saying my people view animals/humans/plants as equals and this understanding underpins why we would eat and use dog without qualms .
Then somehow I am called a reactionary, moralising idealist when that is exactly how many could label veganism and the specific sort of tone-deaf examples of it being posted yesterday.
lmao veganism isn't inherently anti-capitalist I 100% can imagine snowpiercer IRL but with soybars instead of bugbars
It’s so delightful. I’m collecting the salt to sell back to them later.
:capitalist:
You are correct OP in that individual choice did nothing to stop slavery. It took a war and mass murder of neighbors by other neighbors to stop it.
The same is true for animal slavery. It is :LIB: thought to believe that Free Market Choices Will Solve this. Be mad and challenge the system, not the people who are impacted by it. Quit this truly lib bullshit of "vote with your dollar to solve an existential crisis"
Yes, I agree. Better to continue supporting these wonderful legacy products and services.
:capitalist:
You are insufferable and at best a neoliberal
You do not care about your neighbors, as you show with this need to be mad at individuals and thinking that individual choice changes systemic issues
Kid, my name is literally “Capitalist”. Of course I am a neoliberal.
you should sincerely reconsider your life choices if you're trolling your friends
I'm disengaging from this, I hope you actually start to consider your friends and neighbors in your actions you selfish nitwit.
This is the internet and all of you are dollar signs.
:capitalist:
We don't say "those vegans might be morally correct", because you aren't.
Okay, why are they not equal to people? And if they aren't, does that justify the cruelty we put them through for no reason other than personal enjoyment?
I’m not vegan. I own stocks in multiple meat and dairy companies. My goal is to create cognitive dissonance in leftists so that they hopefully go all in on supporting these valuable and profitable industries.
Also I like to see socialists dance for me.
:capitalist:
