[wombatmobile]

It is possible to eat meat and to value and respect animals. It requires the holding of two paradigms simultaneously. These paradigms are not incompatible or necessarily in conflict with each other.

Paradigm 1. Animals are awesome. Wanton killing is wrong.

Paradigm 2. Killing animals for food is OK provided the animal is killed humanely, the food is not wasted, and the animal is revered for its contribution.

Most people are able to do this. Some of them get lazy with the part about reverence, because the supermarket puts animals and the life cycle process out of sight and out of mind, hence there are few triggers for reverence.

Similarly, it is possible to use animals for scientific research and to value and respect animals. It requires the holding of two paradigms simultaneously. These paradigms are more difficult to state than in the case of carnivorous food above.

[pantalaimon]

The problem with the meat industry is less the killing of the animals than the lifetime of suffering they have to endure before.

[whowe1]

Haha. It's cool that you think that.

[nefitty]

Animals don’t “contribute”. That implies some act of conscious sacrifice on the part of the animal.

Those two paradigms can be boiled down to “Animals are pretty objects that I can kill and eat if I so desire.” It’s the polar opposite of reverence.

[wombatmobile]

You can boil paradigms down into whatever you like.

What you say I think and feel is not an accurate representation of what I think and feel. It is an indication of what you think and feel.

[nefitty]

If that’s your response then what’s the point of trying to rationalize your meat eating? If you like meat that comes from animals that are unnecessarily killed then that’s your prerogative, but don’t try to dress it up in spiritual terms like “reverence”.

[SunlightEdge]

Most people eat meat because they like the taste. It's way less ethical than scientific research into the visual systems of turtles.

And the majority of animal research is on pre-clinical treatments for human diseases.

I've always been amazed at how animal rights activists target scientists over the animal farming industry.

[PretzelPirate]

Animal rights activists regularly target both. They even go as far as doing sit ins in slaughter facilities to show how gruesome and cruel they are to the animals.

[SunlightEdge]

I don't think it's proportional. There should be way more on the animal farming industry and way less on scientific research. But that's just my opinion.

[rhn_mk1]

Not quite. Nowhere in those paradigms is the "pretty objects" part implied. But it does put some version of "I'm hungry" as passing the "wanton" threshold for killing something "awesome".

Which in my opinion is the real weakness of this proposal. You won't find me destroying something I consider awesome unless I'm actually starving.