Here are a couple of questions meat eaters might ask me:
Why would you bother not eating meat, if there are plenty other species in nature that have to eat meat? It's not like we can convince them to become vegetarians.
Yes, but I feel we shouldn't do our part in contributing to the problem by eating meat if it isn't necessary. Also, maybe God put the carnivorous animals here as a metaphor for the duality that lives in all man. We can be saintly, and we are capable of abominable behavior. Maybe he wants all of those animals to die, but we have to see that first. I'm not even saying that's laid in stone, I just think it's a possibility.
Secondly, why would you bother not eating meat, when you're constantly stepping on ants, and rolly-polly's and little bugs, and probably killing tons of bacteria without even knowing it?
Well, again, a Jainist considers all life equal, so they consider an ant's life to be as important as their own. That may be true, but it would seem the only way to justify that belief would be to kill yourself immediately, unless you honestly think you can walk around and manage not to kill any insects barely discernable to the human eye. Secondly, maybe since I believe the more advanced one's brain is, the more worthy they are of life, so an insect's life wouldn't be near as valuable as say, a deer, or a pig. Also, you would need to factor in their expected life span, and how much of their life you would be cutting short.
Whether either of my theories are true or not does matter to me. However, I could be wrong, and ultimately I still feel good about not eating meat. So, the end justifies the means, in my case.
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