Jump to content
Sign in to follow this  
Roderick

Legal rights for dolphins and whales

Recommended Posts

I anthropomorphize things way too much (not just animals, but also inanimate objects like my car) but I just cannot manage to ascribe human or human-like motivations or attributes to chickens.

I eat more chicken than I do beef.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
this (relatively) sudden wave of vegetarian ethics

Humans in this era eat way more meat than at any other period in human history. Meat in the US, for example, is insaaaaanely cheap and has tended to be so for a long time (new Irish immigrants to the USA would write back to the Old Country, saying "we eat meat seven times a week" in order to brag).

More things pulled out of my ass: I think that in the past, there wasn't a vegetarian ethics thing because people who didn't eat meat usually were doing so because they couldn't afford to, not out of choice. Now, because of increased efficiency in the meat trades (both in terms of faster fattening of animals and improved reclamation of meat - woo pink slime), and improved food preservation (allowing meat to be packed centrally - take a look at Tyson and Perdue, who I think are the only large scale chicken packers in the US), affording meat isn't a problem for many. Vegetables, on the other hand...

These days, eating meat seven days a week wouldn't be a brag - eating local (lol locavores), or sustainable, or organic, would probably be the comparable brags.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Yeah, that's the thing that always destroys me about the US: how expensive vegetables are in comparison to meat.

Vimes is also right that the health benefits or detriments of eating meat versus other foods are disputable, i.e. there is little causation proved. There is however a growing list of correlation that links eating (lots of) meat to many illnesses such as cardiovascular diseases and cancer. It's true that things as the China Study have room to poke holes into, but it's silly to completely ignore the vast material of work that points to eating lots of meat is bad for you, and eating lots of vegetables and a little bit of fish will prolong your healthy life.

I also thought about the anthropomorphosis of animals yesterday (and let's face it, I had a ton of things to consider through this topic yesterday, holy shit). It's safe to say that pretty much each animal will be the apex of something. Just because mankind is one of the more successful beings (alongside bacteria, certain worms, cockroaches, &c), doesn't mean our standard is suddenly the highest aspiration. It is, however, a crucial way in which we are wired to understand the world. We see humanity in things, we want to recognize it. Our empathy is based on it, and a huge part of our morality too. It might not be completely fair and a shortcut, but it is understandable why it is so important to us and why we would use it as the foundation of legal (human) rights.

If you want a cleaner way to 'rank' animals, Bentham provided an alternative: rather than the ability to reason, he pointed to the capacity for suffering as the benchmark.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Seems everyone ignored my post, but I'll try to expand in one way: if we stopped eating cows for food, would we need to stop using them to obtain milk? Isn't it pretty much slavery for them anyway, even if we try to treat them well? And if we did not stop milking them, how would their lives improve? Perhaps they would have to suffer in their old age instead of a quick death *. Would we start burying them?

I think these things are not as simple are most of you seem to be making them out to be. Then again, maybe they are and I'm just trying to find justifications for my own preferences. But somehow I don't think it's as easy as humans stop eating meat and that unquestionably makes us more moral than if we didn't.

* I might be talking out of my ass, there are probably different milk cows and meat cows for the most part. I don't know what happens to the milk cows, really.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Didn't mean to ignore you, Erkki. Regarding your earlier post: it's well-established that raising a kilo of meat costs anywhere from six to ten kilos of vegetable matter. Should we overnight stop eating meat and all livestock be erased, our food surplus would actually dramatically increase, not to mention the pastures freeing up valuable fields for raising crops.

Of course, this is all a fantasy, since there is no scenario where any of this would happen instantly. Say that we as a society wean ourselves off eating meat, and perhaps even off of using animals for non-murderous production entirely. That is a process that will slowly evolve over the decades and society will have ample time and room to adjust. New industries will rise to fill the voids of the old.

Whether we should stop milking cows and keep chickens to lay eggs is a strange case, by the way. Millennia of breeding and human selection have made these creatures so docile and so fit for captivity that some species wouldn't be able to survive in the wild. Keeping these animals in pastures might actually be best for them. As far as I know (do correct me if I'm wrong), milking a cow isn't annoying to it, and might actually be useful. Cows originally didn't produce milk continuously, we bred them for that purpose. No matter how our relationship develops to involve rights and whatnot, we need to keep servicing the cow in this way (and gaining wholesome milk in the process).

All of the above being predicated on the 'not going to happen within the next century' scenario that animals do gain legal rights and that extends to cows, and that it all passes and that powerful meat lobbies don't cockblock it which they inevitably, aggressively will.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

By cockblocking, of course, I refer to both the usual sense of the word and 'cock' as in a rooster. It has a double meaning, appropriate to the context of farm animals.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

As far as I know (and trust me, I'm no expert in this), the modern dairy cows wouldn't survive in the wild without being constantly milked. And then there is the predator problem. So no, we can't just stop milking them without getting rid of them too. Also, there is dairy cattle and then there is beef cattle. I don't know which percent of the beef comes from dairy cattle.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Dairy isn't entirely humane, as far as I'm aware. The cows are sometimes on a bunch of drugs, and they can develop sores from the milking.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Didn't mean to ignore you, Erkki. Regarding your earlier post: it's well-established that raising a kilo of meat costs anywhere from six to ten kilos of vegetable matter. Should we overnight stop eating meat and all livestock be erased, our food surplus would actually dramatically increase, not to mention the pastures freeing up valuable fields for raising crops.

Hmm... of course. Seems I was being dumb. Still, there might be issues with the balance of nature that might affect that we don't know about. And of course, we couldn't just let the cattle out into the wild nature, so would we try to get rid of them somehow or just let them die out -- did we even have any right to breed them into what they are now? Anyway, I don't know where I'm going with this as it can't be any worse than the current situation.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

And of course, we couldn't just let the cattle out into the wild nature, so would we try to get rid of them somehow or just let them die out -- did we even have any right to breed them into what they are now?

I would think that it'd be the easiest to just gradually stop breeding them. I can't think of a reason to get rid of all the cattle fast.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Should we get rid of the cattle, we would see a huge beneficial effect on our environment, seeing as how the methane gas emissions from the enormous amount of animals we keep are a big factor in Co2 pollution.

Nachimir; obviously we would need to weed out the harmful practices surrounding any animal husbandry.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Vimes: your point about using technology that's been made in 3rd work sweatshops etc is entirely valid, but just because that is the case with a lot of the stuff we consume, I still think that's not an excuse for people to give up on trying. I do try to make conscientious purchases and when people raise my awareness about things I hadn't previously been aware of, I take that on board and don't just whine about how WELL IT CAN'T BE HELPED BECAUSE I LOVE WEARING NIKE TRAINERS or whatever.

I think that's an attitude that more people should take on board. Avoiding the vast majority of factory farmed meat is extremely easy. Brighton is pretty good for people being conscientious about things generally, and there isn't a single one of my friends that I know of who eats meat and doesn't make an effort to get free-range. But still there'll be slip-ups here and there... you don't think when you buy mayonnaise made with battery eggs, or fail to ask in a restaurant if the chicken is free-range. That sort of thing, but that's obviously far less obnoxious than people who knowingly and willingly purchase battery-farmed chicken breasts.

I think everyone should make more of an effort to think about where everything comes from, from food to electronics and everything else, and we should all fucking discuss things and pass on information and debate these things and call each other out, because otherwise we'll end up just being a bunch of giant complacent pricks stomping all over other people and living creatures in order to cheaply live the easy lives that we feel entitled to.

But still, there is only one viable excuse that I can think of for people who knowingly buy battery-farmed, unethical meat: Dickhead.

Having said that someone said that apparently meat is cheaper in the US than vegetables... is this correct???

EDIT: apologies for hastily written post, I'm at work (as always, it seems...)

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Yeah, with regards to the "tech made by slavery practices" things, a big part of mitigating that is to not be constantly upgrading if you don't need to. I still use a seven year old flip phone, not because I can't get a newer one or don't see the appeal, I just haven't needed to upgrade. My battery lasts for three days, and I can make calls and text people all I want. The need for slavery to continue cranking these things out is driven by people who can't stand using an iPhone 4 now that the 4S is out, or whatever equivalent you may want. Just keep using what you have until it isn't viable anymore and suddenly we can produce tech at a rate that won't drive workers to suicide.

As for dairy, I'm actually much harsher on that than I am on the eating of meat, due mostly to how the animals are treated. Pumped full of god-knows-what, milked to the point that what they produce is full of puss from the sores we've given them, etc, etc. I buy about a litre of local small farm milk (sorry if that sounds like a brag, Subbes. It's the only way I can feel ok about the milk I drink) about once a month, and the same for a carton of eggs. Given the choice between having factory farmed dairy and none at all, I always choose none. At work (Starbucks), we only have the giant 4-litre jugs of Dairyland milk, so anything I make for myself is soy only. A whole lot of the dairy industry is pretty gross.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I buy the organic milk from Costco, but my original motivation for that was that the regular milk is sold in giant multi-gallon bottles and would go bad quicker, while the organic is isn separate quart cartons.

I try to shop my conscience but sometimes the fact that I'm poor wins out.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

As for the poverty thing, I have two angles on that. First, I don't buy dairy or meat often enough for it to really impact my wallet. Second, I have a girlfriend who works at the natural foods store and gets me 25% off my groceries, making it cheaper than going to the Safeway anyway. I certainly understand the "eating with your conscience costs more" angle, as it was a barrier for a long time, but I'm kind of lucky in that regard myself.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

The issues with dairy farming are mainly prevalent in the US, where they do inject them with bovine growth hormone and things like that to improve the quantity of milk output. I think that's banned in most of Europe though. Unrestricted factory farming is pretty horrendous.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Pumped full of god-knows-what, milked to the point that what they produce is full of puss from the sores we've given them, etc, etc.

Where has this been documented? I'm not trying to be fresh; I've heard this a couple of times as an argument against industrial dairy-farming, but it sounds a bit like one of those lies crazy animal rights activists might make up.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Having said that someone said that apparently meat is cheaper in the US than vegetables... is this correct???

Hmm, I forgot who originally said this but what are the statistics and how is it being measured? Buying free range eggs isn't much of an upcharge at our local grocery store but a regular sized chicken can almost double in price when buying the organic version. On the other hand, it seems to me that vegetables are much cheaper to buy on what you get per pound than most meat in the store and the organic versions are always much less of an upcharge. If I factor in the tasteless packs of frozen vegetables, it seems cheaper still than buying some meat.

Maybe this is just Texas though? This is all solely going by the HEB chain in both Austin and Houston, so there could be a major difference with other bigger chain grocery stores. I don't think we've ever been through a full grocery run at any other store chain since 2007.

Yeah, with regards to the "tech made by slavery practices" things, a big part of mitigating that is to not be constantly upgrading if you don't need to. I still use a seven year old flip phone, not because I can't get a newer one or don't see the appeal, I just haven't needed to upgrade. My battery lasts for three days, and I can make calls and text people all I want. The need for slavery to continue cranking these things out is driven by people who can't stand using an iPhone 4 now that the 4S is out, or whatever equivalent you may want. Just keep using what you have until it isn't viable anymore and suddenly we can produce tech at a rate that won't drive workers to suicide.

Yeah, I feel the same. Even though I very rarely ever buy a new model I often feel very guilty about the electronics I buy, especially after a lot of the documented cases in China this year and last.

I have an early Nokia smartphone that's running symbian and everyone assumes it's ancient. I can fuck around a bit on the internet, it has wifi and 3G (if I wanted to pay for that), makes calls, and plays some games. I'm not sure what value I'd get over a new model. I guess I just completely miss the notion that you need to always rebuy something expensive that you just purchasd just so you can be up to date, whether it be cars, consoles, phones, TVs, etc. If anything, if I buy some electronic widget and two months later a newer model comes out with one or two improvements, I just tend to get super annoyed with the company doing so.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I lived next to a dairy farmer and he fed his cows a constant stream of penicillin to prevent their udders from becoming infected, or something. I'm allergic to it so I was surprised that this seems to be a routine preventative measure. So I don't know how widespread it is but the one farmer I ever knew did it.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Well I would imagine/hope that there are regulations against that sort of thing actually occurring in milk that is actually sold. Not to mention standard practices to prevent it. I have to agree with Toblix that it sounds like a worst-case-hypothetical to scare people.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I wouldn't be surprised if meat was cheaper per calorie compared to veggies. You have to eat helluva lot of veggies to keep from starving compared to meat. Although I suppose that depends on how much oil/butter you use when preparing your meals.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I find the term "organic" to be confusing. All food is (mostly) organic. I looked up what it means (we don't use that term here), but I still find it strange to call some food non-organic.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

It really just means "ooooh we don't use any chemicals or such!" In the case of animals, I can believe it's actually something worth mentioning for some people, as maybe it means they aren't treated poorly and given drugs to make up for it, but in the case of plants, it's pointless and just means you're paying more money to brag.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
Sign in to follow this  

×