Vegetarians - why?

[StormSeer]

From my standpoint, I prefer meat to eating vegetables but eat some
The people who bark that eating meat is wrong must understand that for men (a word I use to encompass all people regardless of gender) to rely entirely on fruits and vegetables would mean destroying the homes of countless animals in order to provide sizable farmland for production, and in the end, millions of species would go extinct through this process
insects would die via pesticides, as well as fish and animals that live in the soil from water poisoning, and animals that require specific plants to live off of would die out due to land clearing.

This is completely false. You do realize that livestock consumes more grains and plants than humans, right?

We'd actually use less farmland if everyone was vegetarian, because we wouldn't need all that extra farmland to grow corn for livestock.

 

[Steven True]

The people who bark that eating meat is wrong must understand that for [people] to rely entirely on fruits and vegetables would mean destroying the homes of countless animals in order to provide sizable farmland for production, and in the end, millions of species would go extinct through this process

You have that backwards. Raising animals causes far more habitat destruction than fruit and vegetables. To raise animals you need space for the animals plus a disproportionate amount of space to grow the feed for them.
If people relied entirely on fruits and vegetable that would mean less land use and far less destruction of natural habitats.
Eating lower on the food chain is always more efficient.

 

[Astoria]

I mean, I'm apparently in the minority in that I find chocolate ice cream absolutely disgusting and terrible.

...There is something wrong with you. How can you not like chocolate icecream D:

It's usually either they don't like the taste of meat or they are against animal cruelty. The taste thing I get but not animal cruelty. Not eating meat won't actually stop animals from being treated badly.

 

[E-mantheseeker]

On another note though, why would not eating dairy products be included in this (if at all)? Lactose intolerance aside that is.

All animals stop drinking milk at a certain point in their lives, humans are the only animals that continue consuming milk/dairy after our mothers stop producing it. To me, it makes no sense.

That is not entirely true.

Most mammals (mammals only is key here as only mammals produce milk) are only lactose tolerant when they are infants. Lactose tolerance decreases as a child gets older, and eventually they cannot have milk anymore because it is so high in lactose. Some humans (only about 10% of all humans actually) have developed lactose tolerance, for various reasons (mostly that they lived with milk producing animals and instead of outgrowing milk just developed to keep lactose tolerance up). So a vast majority of humans today cannot drink milk past the infant stage. Anyone can eat other dairy products like cheese and yogurt though because those are lactose free.[/

On another note though, why would not eating dairy products be included in this (if at all)? Lactose intolerance aside that is.

All animals stop drinking milk at a certain point in their lives, humans are the only animals that continue consuming milk/dairy after our mothers stop producing it. To me, it makes no sense.

That is not entirely true.

Most mammals (mammals only is key here as only mammals produce milk) are only lactose tolerant when they are infants. Lactose tolerance decreases as a child gets older, and eventually they cannot have milk anymore because it is so high in lactose. Some humans (only about 10% of all humans actually) have developed lactose tolerance, for various reasons (mostly that they lived with milk producing animals and instead of outgrowing milk just developed to keep lactose tolerance up). So a vast majority of humans today cannot drink milk past the infant stage. Anyone can eat other dairy products like cheese and yogurt though because those are lactose free.

]

if only about 10% of all humans have developed lactose tolerance enough to drink milk past infancy, I'd like to know why so much milk is sold, and why milk has been so heavily advertised as a necessity? ( I find the "got milk?" ads ridiculous)

overall with dairy, I think it boils down to, "It's not healthy or exactly nutritious, but it tastes good." This applies with meat as well

 

[Snake Plissken]

Basically, because I don't feel like I have the right. I'm not willing to kill any animal, because I don't think I personally could. If I could personally take the life of an animal with my own 2 hands, then I'd feel like I have the right.

If you are comfortable enough to kill an animal, and prepare it for consumption, feel free to eat all the meat you want. I don't care if other people do eat meat. Eat all the meat you want. I won't because I'd never be comfortable taking another life. Many of my friends are hunters, and I feel that they have fully earned their right to eat meat. I have not.

 

[similar.squirrel]

I was a vegetarian [piscetarian, technically] for over five years, but I relapsed somehow during college. My main reason was that meat isn't the healthiest of foods, as the human digestive system is longer than that of pure carnivores, and any meat that you consume rots inside you, releasing carcinogens. Also, raising animals for slaughter is not very good for the planet. I think I'll give it up again after today, in fact.

 

[Android2137]

In the case of my mom, there's no moral reason behind it. She simply dislikes the taste of meat.

 

[FauxMask]

Alright so I skimmed these 3 pages to make sure that I don't repeat what someone else had already said.

Honestly, I'm surprised this never really elaborated on. I am vegetarian.
Many vegetarians use the "animal cruelty" card, and people brush that away without thinking about it much.

Honestly, I don't care if we eat animals, heck I wouldn't be a vegetarian if for these few things:

*The big meat industries pretty much torture the animals before killing them. No, laws against this aren't specific enough to prevent this. I won't get into this much because anyone can find out more easily on the internet if they're interested.

*(The following is my own logical opinion): Cows are animals. Puppies are animals. (As mentioned before, humans are animals?). Its not cool to torture and then eat puppies or humans. Honestly though, I wouldn't mind the just eating part.

(Enough animal cruelty stuff that you all, I'm sure, are sick of.)
*Fact: The major meat industries pretty much pump their animals with antibiotics. Hormones and all those terrible things are another story, and not all factory farms use those. Though, the majority of meat providers do stuff their meat with antibiotics.

*This is bad because if humans essentially eat what their food eats, and if we eat a lot of meat that eats a lot of antibiotics, then the general use of antibiotics to fend off illness is not as effect because our bodies will render antibiotics not as effective.

*This is not help the matter of (depending on where you are from) America's abundant use of prescription drugs to try to cure everything--but only making the problem worse (due to bacteria adaptation blah blah)

Those are my reasons for being a vegetarian and they have nothing to do with meat taste.
I love the taste of meat, but if we can compare the enjoyment of meat to the enjoyment of chocolate, then eating something that simply tastes good is not worth (in my opinion) the torture of animals coupled with my chances of getting well from an illness decreasing.

Thats why, if the chance permits me, I occasionally only eat meat from trusted vendors and kosher places (I'm not Jewish, but I hear they treat their animals well and kill them humanly).

Anyway, hope that wasn't too long to read through and I hope I didn't come off as preachy or "evil mean vegetarian"-ish

 

[ALX-00]

Why don't you eat human?

I'd try it if it was legal, although I suspect we would taste too gamey.
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As for the whole not eating meat issue, humans are omnivores, and we need meat for certain amino acids that we can't get from plants or make ourselves. (Taking pills doesn't count.) I love the taste of meat, and the textures just add to the "experience."

For the topic of slaughterhouses and farming animals, it is similar to normal farming of crops in a way. Sure you could argue that plants may not feel pain or suffer, and I will agree that the practices that involve animals should be made to cause as little suffering as possible, but that is the reason those certain animals were bred, as were the pants. Humans caused the production of these other living things to fill our needs.


So really, if you say you don't eat meat because it is causing harm to another living thing, then you should know that eating plants is doing the exact same thing. Hell, basically anything you do kills something.

Animals, that are carnivores/omnivores, eat each other, what makes humans special?

 

[Sparrow]

I'd be a vegetarian if meat didn't taste so damn good. I once saw a lamb get put into those meat processing plants in a video, that turned me vegetarian. Well, for a few hours.

I mean, I'm apparently in the minority in that I find chocolate ice cream absolutely disgusting and terrible.

I thought you meant you hated chocolate AND ice cream for a few seconds there, which would make you entirely abnormal. I'm actually more a mint ice cream guy myself...

 

[HappyStance]

It squicks me out.
I don't like the thought that what I'm eating was walking around not too long ago.

It's not a big deal, and I can push past it... And I often do. I'm not a strict vegetarian by any stretch of the imagination. I still eat fish on occasion, and every once I might have a meal with some meat in it.

I guess the term I should be using is flexitarian, but I just don't really like that word.

 

[Sean951]

I am not because I grew up in the Mid-West as part of a family that raised cattle specifically to sell or slaughter and then eat. The land we kept them on was typically too hilly to effectively farm, or was farmed during the Spring and Summer but used as pasture to fatten them up during the fall right after the harvest. Cows love corn stalks. That said, I have nothing against vegetarians who don't hide behind "animal rights." Animals live in a world where it is perfectly natural for another creature to eat it, humans have just developed more and more efficient ways to accomplish this task. Besides, do you really think that many of the modern breeds of cow would survive for more than a few decades in a natural world? They have been bred to be fatter, not faster or more dangerous as nature would have intended.

People who use "genetic modification" as an excuse also don't seem to really get what it is. Breeding is just a trial and error form done over hundreds of generations, I mean corn used to be completely different from what it is today. Doing this in a lab just lets it be done faster and cheaper, leading to larger harvests and more nutritious foods.

But so long as you don't try and force your diet on me, I won't try and force mine on you.

 

[FauxMask]

Why don't you eat human?

I'd try it if it was legal, although I suspect we would taste too gamey.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As for the whole not eating meat issue, humans are omnivores, and we need meat for certain amino acids that we can't get from plants or make ourselves. (Taking pills doesn't count.) I love the taste of meat, and the textures just add to the "experience."

For the topic of slaughterhouses and farming animals, it is similar to normal farming of crops in a way. Sure you could argue that plants may not feel pain or suffer, and I will agree that the practices that involve animals should be made to cause as little suffering as possible, but that is the reason those certain animals were bred, as were the pants. Humans caused the production of these other living things to fill our needs.


So really, if you say you don't eat meat because it is causing harm to another living thing, then you should know that eating plants is doing the exact same thing. Hell, basically anything you do kills something.

Animals, that are carnivores/omnivores, eat each other, what makes humans special?

Well the entire basis of my opinion and earlier statement is that the slaughterhouses do cause them to greatly suffer even before being killed. Plants have no nervous system and the issues with farmers are a separate subject in itself. So, eating plants is not "the exact same thing."

Nothing wrong with killing things for food. But you suggest that its alright because they were bred to be eaten. If I may offer some insight, I don't think the reasons for or ramifications of something being bred have to do with it being fine or not to cause them brutal pain or not.
Death is certain, but it doesn't need to be as horrific as slaughterhouses make it.

 

[snowpuppy]

eating meat can be unhealthy if done incorrectly, BUT the same can be said about going veggo, It's all about eating the right amount of food and the right types. Note:I don't mind vegetarians But I can't stand those arse-holes that shove it down your throat(No pun intended).

 

[Crash 9000]

Some people think it's healthier for them. They have a point, but they ostracize the wrong foods (FYI: excessive grains in a diet paired with little exercise tends to be what makes people fat). Some people do it because they think animals shouldn't be killed for food. To those people I say "Well then, carrot juice constitutes murder [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmK0bZl4ILM]".
Or maybe they don't like the taste of meat. Hard to imagine for me... but I guess I can relate a little... I like my steaks well done.

Because carrots are sentient!

 

[Easton Dark]

Bears, sharks, and many more animals can easily kill and eat humans. I don't think we're at the top of the food chain

No, what?

We're not on the top of the foodchain? Forgetting weaponry and strategy that we have as advantages over animals, we have caused the EXTINCTION OF ENTIRE SPECIES ACROSS THE GLOBE.

We know how to hold sharks so they go comatose, we know how to lure bears of cliffs, we don't kill animals (including sharks and bears) for survival, we do it for fun.

Not on the top of the food chain? Don't make me laugh.