Poll: Meat causes cancer :O | What will you do? | Human Evolution vs. Contemporary Science?

[47_Ronin]

If you don't think the lives of non-human animals are as important as those of humans that's fine, I too have a bias towards my own species. But that bias has a limit and it's not a stretch at all to compare battery farming to the conditions people faced in concentration camps during the Holocaust. Yeah the species being slaughtered is different, but can you not see the parallels between concentration camps and battery farms? What animals go through is torture, plain and simple. They are force-fed nutrients and antibiotics, they barely have room to move, body parts are removed and then at the end they get to watch in horror as they're brought to the slaughter.

My point about the conditions animals live in to produce meat and other products was to compare battery farming to the hunting that other animals do. People always defend meat consumption by comparing humans to other animals, but those animals don't breed billions of other animals with the sole purpose of slaughtering them. Actually maybe my comparison with the Holocaust is a bit inaccurate. If the Nazis bred Jews for the sole purpose of slaughtering them over and over again that would be on par.

I might, might excuse all that if humans needed meat to survive. But they don't, they certainly don't need to consume as much as they do. I can't believe this is considered a controversial opinion, there is no way that we need the current excessive supply of meat. It's like trying to justify the rapid consumption of fossil fuels (and seeing as meat production contributes highly to pollution and deforestation, it has the added issue of ruining the environment).

Apart from the victimised species, what difference is there between this and the Holocaust? And no, I don't mean differences that make it worse.

I concur. The dramatic impact of your comparison may vary for those with less empathy towards other animals, but I often find myself arguing the same point. Speciesism is hard to see and hard to convey to others.

And as I've already said. I know that the US (and UK, and many other EU nations), are making a right dogs breakfast out of farming responsibly and keeping animal welfare in mind.

However, that produce isn't being imported to where I live, exactly because it's a right dogs breakfast.

You must be living in animal heaven then, I know of no country that does ethical mass production of meat.
Btw.: 'produce' refers to crops, fruits, vegetables and such.

 

[Dragonbums]

I honestly couldn't give a shit.

I think I read somewhere that 80% of all cancer cases happen because of sheer bad luck more so than any random anomaly in your meat, phone, bra choice, whatever.

I can eat meat for the next 70 years of my life and be cancer free. Some other person could be vegan and come down with cancer.

There is nothing you can do about it. Just make sure you catch it early and your chances of surviving are high.

These kinds of scare mongering news reports about 'X can give you cancer!' are clickbait trash to the fullest.

 

[Batou667]

I'm cynical enough to be completely unfazed by tabloid-style scaremongering like this.

Meat "probably" causes cancer? Well, that puts it in good company, since most things in life apparently "might" cause cancer.

I'm going to continue eating meat with most meals. It's delicious and in my opinion the nutritional benefits by far outweigh these speculative carcinogenic effects.

The only point I partially agree with is to eat high-quality whole cuts of meat. I've never been a fan of processed, mechanically separated and reformed stuff.

 

[Dizchu]

I concur. The dramatic impact of your comparison may vary for those with less empathy towards other animals, but I often find myself arguing the same point. Speciesism is hard to see and hard to convey to others.

It's a really confrontational comparison that makes people extremely uncomfortable, but I'm not gonna sugarcoat the reality of the situation. Harsh truths are hard to deal with, whether it be battery farming, child labour or sweatshops. Every species is "speciesist", but humans have the self-awareness and global influence to make huge alterations to the planet. I think comparing humans to lions chasing after gazelles is an extremely romanticised and naive way of looking at the meat industry.

 

[Batou667]

it's not a stretch at all to compare battery farming to the conditions people faced in concentration camps during the Holocaust. Yeah the species being slaughtered is different, but can you not see the parallels between concentration camps and battery farms?

Apart from the victimised species, what difference is there between this and the Holocaust?

If we're engaging in meaningless thought experiments, then we can also see the chilling parallel between mowing your lawn and Hiroshima. Or fumigating a wasp's nest and 9/11. Seriously, what are these analogies good for other than to cheapen genuine disasters through flippant hyperbole and possibly offending people?

I might, might excuse all that if humans needed meat to survive. But they don't, they certainly don't need to consume as much as they do.

And you use more electricity, spend more money, and wear more clothes than you strictly need to survive. Kindly disconnect all your appliances, mail me all your disposable income, and strip stark naked right now. You know it's for the greater good.

Captcha: meat with gravy.

 

[Silvanus]

1) We are omnivores. That means a BALANCED diet. Not a strictly meat diet. A balanced one.

Indeed, which does not require meat. Meat is optional.

2) A model to how one ought to live? No! At the most it's a model of how things work. And again. As long as the animals don't suffer, there's no amorality.

It's a model for how things work, that's what I said-- but there's no compulsion for us to act according to that model. It's descriptive, not prescriptive.

3) As for getting a more efficient method of producing protein (your cost benefit analysis), one would have to use aquaculture. Herbivorous fish convert biomatter (read: plants) into animal protein more efficiently.

As for the benefits of a proteinrich diet.

Brain growth.

The reason Homo Sapiens Sapiens has such a large brain compared to its body, compared with the rest of the primates is because of the addition of meat to its diet.

Well, partially. Today, any missing proteins can be substituted into the diet in other forms, with a little simple diet-planning. You'll not find any evidence that modern meat-eating humans see better brain growth or higher intelligence than modern vegetarians.

As for my aggressive tone.

You'll have to excuse me, but the suffering of animals is a sore point for me, and being accused of being the instigator of animal-suffering half a planet away just grinds my gears.

I never accused you of that. I do not believe you're responsible for it at all. We're discussing principle, that's all.

 

[47_Ronin]

If we're engaging in meaningless thought experiments, then we can also see the chilling parallel between mowing your lawn and Hiroshima. Or fumigating a wasp's nest and 9/11. Seriously, what are these analogies good for other than to cheapen genuine disasters through flippant hyperbole and possibly offending people

I do not wish to speak for Dizzy, but I suspect he feels as I do, that this is neither meaningless, nor a thought experiment. To compare those two is not to substract meaning from one, but highlight meaning in the other. Anything else is the core of speciesism on a level where it is truly superfluous.

And you use more electricity, spend more money, and wear more clothes than you strictly need to survive. Kindly disconnect all your appliances, mail me all your disposable income, and strip stark naked right now. You know it's for the greater good.

This is a non-sequitur. Animal well being and environmental concerns are two separate issues.

 

[MrFalconfly]

1) We are omnivores. That means a BALANCED diet. Not a strictly meat diet. A balanced one.

Indeed, which does not require meat. Meat is optional.

2) A model to how one ought to live? No! At the most it's a model of how things work. And again. As long as the animals don't suffer, there's no amorality.

It's a model for how things work, that's what I said-- but there's no compulsion for us to act according to that model. It's descriptive, not prescriptive.

3) As for getting a more efficient method of producing protein (your cost benefit analysis), one would have to use aquaculture. Herbivorous fish convert biomatter (read: plants) into animal protein more efficiently.

As for the benefits of a proteinrich diet.

Brain growth.

The reason Homo Sapiens Sapiens has such a large brain compared to its body, compared with the rest of the primates is because of the addition of meat to its diet.

Well, partially. Today, any missing proteins can be substituted into the diet in other forms, with a little simple diet-planning. You'll not find any evidence that modern meat-eating humans see better brain growth or higher intelligence than modern vegetarians.

As for my aggressive tone.

You'll have to excuse me, but the suffering of animals is a sore point for me, and being accused of being the instigator of animal-suffering half a planet away just grinds my gears.

I never accused you of that. I do not believe you're responsible for it at all. We're discussing principle, that's all.

1) Yes, like it's optional to fill your car with 87 Octane (well 92 Octane, I'll be generous) petrol, but it's optimal to fuel it with 95 Octane (a balanced diet).

2) I didn't say you absolutely had to include meat in your diet. Only that a balanced diet would be optimal. And if one wants (notice, wants to do it) to include protein (efficiently) then one has to kill some prey-animals.

3) Yes, but I'm looking at a bigger picture here. The most efficient sources for protein (when it comes to area, and spent energy), is from animals. Sure one could substitute animal-protein with vegetarian protein, but the most "bang" (protein) for your buck (area used, CO2 expelled from tractors, and lorries) will be from steaks, pork, fowls and fish (animals).

EDIT:

And I know you didn't, but it's been brought up before, and I'm sorry to say that you were the straw (the very light, almost non-existent straw) that broke the camels back.

Suffice to say, I was a bit agitated, and I have this bad habit of just escalating word use, when I get "excited". I blame my old OR-7 (Staff-Sergeant for Brits, and SFC or Sergeant First Class for US Americans). I used to be a timid sod, but he told me that I had to be more brash, "kick in the door" and "own the room" when I enter. You could say I went a bit too much in the other direction.

 

[Ravenbom]

There's that old doctor joke:

A man asked his doctor if he thought he'd live to be a hundred.

Doctor says, So you don't drink, you don't smoke, you eat healthy and exercise every day, never have unprotected sex and you want to live to be a hundred?
Why?

 

[Dizchu]

If we're engaging in meaningless thought experiments, then we can also see the chilling parallel between mowing your lawn and Hiroshima. Or fumigating a wasp's nest and 9/11. Seriously, what are these analogies good for other than to cheapen genuine disasters through flippant hyperbole and possibly offending people?

Besides the fact that you are somehow suggesting grass is sentient, the comparison is not meant to "cheapen" the Holocaust but to draw attention the atrocity of battery farming. Why does comparing one instance of mass slaughter to another need to "cheapen" one of them? What you're essentially saying is "wow, how dare you compare Sandy Hook to Columbine?" or "how dare you compare Ed Gein to Ted Bundy?" The only way making a comparison between the two can be seen as "cheapening" is if (surprise surprise) battery farming isn't seen as "a serious issue".

Also in order for what I say to be hyperbole, I must be exaggerating something. I suspect the only thing I'm "exaggerating" to you is the value of the lives of animals, which is a subjective thing. As for offending people? I really don't care. I'm not inciting hatred or discriminating against anyone, I'm merely pointing out something that occurs in the real world and comparing it to something else that has occured, only that thing happened to humans and therefore is taken at face value.

And you use more electricity, spend more money, and wear more clothes than you strictly need to survive. Kindly disconnect all your appliances, mail me all your disposable income, and strip stark naked right now. You know it's for the greater good.

???

That's a ridiculous argument. Electricity, money and clothing are all necessary for being a part of society. You can survive without those things, but their absence makes life a lot more difficult. Meat on the other hand is not necessary to function in society and its absence hardly makes a huge impact, not when you can buy pretty much anything in a supermarket. That's why I don't have a huge problem with the Inuit eating fish, because for them food is scarce and also they don't industrialise the process.

If you live somewhere with easy access to fruit, vegetables, grains, dairy, dairy substitutes and pretty much every other food group, the only reason to eat meat is because of the taste. Don't get me wrong, I used to love me some chicken and beef, but to say it's as necessary as electricity?

 

[Silvanus]

1) Yes, like it's optional to fill your car with 87 Octane (well 92 Octane, I'll be generous) petrol, but it's optimal to fuel it with 95 Octane (a balanced diet).

2) I didn't say you absolutely had to include meat in your diet. Only that a balanced diet would be optimal. And if one wants (notice, wants to do it) to include protein (efficiently) then one has to kill some prey-animals.

With a little planning, the efficiency is the same. I have as much energy as the next person. That wasn't the case at the start; it took a little adaptation, but now, there's no noticeable difference in energy.

3) Yes, but I'm looking at a bigger picture here. The most efficient sources for protein (when it comes to area, and spent energy), is from animals. Sure one could substitute animal-protein with vegetarian protein, but the most "bang" (protein) for your buck (area used, CO2 expelled from tractors, and lorries) will be from steaks, pork, fowls and fish (animals).

This is a perfectly valid cost-benefit analysis. That's fine-- My original complaint was solely with the appeal-to-nature, which isn't. I should have been clearer. My choices are mine, and I recognise there are very valid reasons to choose otherwise.

EDIT:

And I know you didn't, but it's been brought up before, and I'm sorry to say that you were the straw (the very light, almost non-existent straw) that broke the camels back.

Suffice to say, I was a bit agitated, and I have this bad habit of just escalating word use, when I get "excited". I blame my old OR-7 (Staff-Sergeant for Brits, and SFC or Sergeant First Class for US Americans). I used to be a timid sod, but he told me that I had to be more brash, "kick in the door" and "own the room" when I enter. You could say I went a bit too much in the other direction.

No problem. For my part, I apologise if I sound provocative or dismissive at any point; it's not my intention.

 

[renegade7]

Meat itself does not cause cancer in the same way that something like a cigarette does. Too much meat is bad for you, which should not be news to anyone.

A high-meat diet, especially red meat, predisposes one to cardiovascular problems like hypertension, cholesterol, and heart failure. These in turn predispose one to a sedentary lifestyle (they all cause fatigue) in middle age, which is a known cancer risk factor.

As with any health consideration, you have to keep in mind costs and benefits. It may be true that there is no non-carcinogenic amount of meat in the diet. However, it is also true that a diet with no meat can have its own health risks, mostly due to the potential loss of variety in the diet and possibly not getting enough protein or iron.

There's also a financial consideration. Meat is one of the best foods in terms of calories per dollar, so if you're low-income it might be one of your only options to get enough food every day. Replacing meat entirely with a vegetarian diet is possible but a fair amount more expensive, and if that extra cost strain would cause a burden then it could put you into a worse financial situation, which is also a risk factor for cancer.

Being out in the sun can give you cancer. But you also need sunlight exposure to regulate your sleep-wake cycle (interior lighting is not nearly bright enough), because chronic sleep deprivation is also a major health concern (and, for that matter, a risk factor for cancer). In the same way I don't think eliminating meat due to a small cancer risk is necessary or even a good idea.

 

[Simonism451]

No, it's essentially zero holocausts happening at once, since we're talking about animals and not human people. Also, the problem with the holocaust wasn't only the conditions in which the people that fell victim to it lived but also that they were actually killed, so I guess if we were to use your comparison, the problem with the consumption of meat would in fact be that animals have to die to provide meat.
I'm impressed by the mental gymnastics needed to believe that keeping an animal in horrible conditions is comparable to torturing a human but that killing it to eat it isn't comparable to murder.

If you don't think the lives of non-human animals are as important as those of humans that's fine, I too have a bias towards my own species. But that bias has a limit and it's not a stretch at all to compare battery farming to the conditions people faced in concentration camps during the Holocaust. Yeah the species being slaughtered is different, but can you not see the parallels between concentration camps and battery farms? What animals go through is torture, plain and simple. They are force-fed nutrients and antibiotics, they barely have room to move, body parts are removed and then at the end they get to watch in horror as they're brought to the slaughter.

My point about the conditions animals live in to produce meat and other products was to compare battery farming to the hunting that other animals do. People always defend meat consumption by comparing humans to other animals, but those animals don't breed billions of other animals with the sole purpose of slaughtering them. Actually maybe my comparison with the Holocaust is a bit inaccurate. If the Nazis bred Jews for the sole purpose of slaughtering them over and over again that would be on par.

I might, might excuse all that if humans needed meat to survive. But they don't, they certainly don't need to consume as much as they do. I can't believe this is considered a controversial opinion, there is no way that we need the current excessive supply of meat. It's like trying to justify the rapid consumption of fossil fuels (and seeing as meat production contributes highly to pollution and deforestation, it has the added issue of ruining the environment).

Apart from the victimised species, what difference is there between this and the Holocaust? And no, I don't mean differences that make it worse.

Apart from the victimised species, what difference is there between Ma and Pa farmer who know each pig they kill by name and the Manson family? Apart from the victimised species and the victimising species, what difference is there between a cat playing with a half-dead bird and IS burning Jordanian pilots alive?
It's cool if you think eating meat is bad. I do too. It's cool if you think eating meat coming from battery farms is super bad. I do too. It's even cool if you think that the former is still sorta okay and that the latter isn't, but please don't act surprised if people get salty when you say that it's essentially the same as killing people, especially when the specific instance of people getting killed you used for comparison was preceded by years of propaganda painting the victims as more animals than humans.

 

[Risingblade]

I'm starting get really sick of science...

 

[Dizchu]

Apart from the victimised species, what difference is there between Ma and Pa farmer who know each pig they kill by name and the Manson family? Apart from the victimised species and the victimising species, what difference is there between a cat playing with a half-dead bird and IS burning Jordanian pilots alive?

Well I compared the two systems that I compared because they're that, systems. It's not about the individuals, McDonald's CEO isn't exactly Joseph Goebbels. I'm not here to make personal judgements. Even small-scale farming like that you describe Ma and Pa running has been ingrained so deeply into human civilisation since prehistoric times, and for good reason (we would still be hunter-gatherers without it). Unlike the Manson family, it's very likely that Ma and Pa cared about their "victims" and gave them a degree of dignity.

With the latter example, cats are carnivorous. The sort of behaviour you describe is linked to their predatory nature, it's in fact instinctual (the idiom "a game of cat and mouse" comes from this behaviour). When IS set Jordanian pilots on fire the motivation is cruelty and retribution.

please don't act surprised if people get salty when you say that it's essentially the same as killing people,

That's kinda the point. People should be salty, it's a confrontational statement. Are there less incendiary ways of saying it? Sure, but I didn't feel like sugarcoating it.

especially when the specific instance of people getting killed you used for comparison was preceded by years of propaganda painting the victims as more animals than humans.

Isn't that the crux of the issue though? It's "okay" to butcher animals on an industrial scale so the only way to do the same to humans to deprive them of their "human" status?

 

[dalek sec]

I'm still eating fucking bacon, like hell I'm giving up on it now at this late in the game...

I honestly don't care at this point, they say damn near everything causes cancer these days. I'm pretty sure just typing this post is giving me some sorta cancer, or playing a game on my tv will give me cancer as well.

At this point, just enjoy yourselves and don't worry about it. Worst case though? People give up bacon which means more for us!

 

[Idlemessiah]

Everything causes cancer and/or kills you if you have too much of it. Meat, fruit, cigarettes, stress, sunlight... you get the idea. What I don't understand is why we still seem to be figuring that out.

 

[JustAnotherAardvark]

I don't care a whole lot about the "meat vs non-meat" argument, but I don't often see folks in a public forum make an effort to actually understand each other rather than just shouting. Lord knows I don't. Kudos to you both.

 

[Simonism451]

Apart from the victimised species, what difference is there between Ma and Pa farmer who know each pig they kill by name and the Manson family? Apart from the victimised species and the victimising species, what difference is there between a cat playing with a half-dead bird and IS burning Jordanian pilots alive?

Well I compared the two systems that I compared because they're that, systems. It's not about the individuals, McDonald's CEO isn't exactly Joseph Goebbels. I'm not here to make personal judgements. Even small-scale farming like that you describe Ma and Pa running has been ingrained so deeply into human civilisation since prehistoric times, and for good reason (we would still be hunter-gatherers without it). Unlike the Manson family, it's very likely that Ma and Pa cared about their "victims" and gave them a degree of dignity.

With the latter example, cats are carnivorous. The sort of behaviour you describe is linked to their predatory nature, it's in fact instinctual (the idiom "a game of cat and mouse" comes from this behaviour). When IS set Jordanian pilots on fire the motivation is cruelty and retribution.

please don't act surprised if people get salty when you say that it's essentially the same as killing people,

That's kinda the point. People should be salty, it's a confrontational statement. Are there less incendiary ways of saying it? Sure, but I didn't feel like sugarcoating it.

especially when the specific instance of people getting killed you used for comparison was preceded by years of propaganda painting the victims as more animals than humans.

Isn't that the crux of the issue though? It's "okay" to butcher animals on an industrial scale so the only way to do the same to humans to deprive them of their "human" status?

In the same way that the crux of slavery was that people felt fine using workhorses? Or maybe the actual crux of the matter is that there's a marked difference in the value of self-aware, self-reflecting, intelligent human life and that of animals.
I'm sure you actually feel the same way, since somehow having it be natural for lions to be eating gazelles or for cats to be tormenting their prey makes it okay in some wishy-washy circle of life nonsense while you (I'd assume) feel very differently about Malaria, Aids and Smallpox.

 

[Pseudonym]

Well, what doesn't cause cancer? I like meat, and I won't stop eating it. If that gives me a slightly higher chance at cancer then so be it. I'm not going to spend my life panicking over every little thing my doctor disapproves of.