Quote:
Originally Posted by RVCA
I find vegetarians a bit wishy-washy myself. From what modern science can determine, no other species on the planet is capable of metacognition, or thinking about thinking. Sure, animals feel pain and perhaps other more complex emotions, but where does a vegetarian draw the line? It's not okay to eat cows, chickens, and pigs because it's "unethical". Is it okay for primitive African tribes to eat insects as a source of nutrition? Surely they're animals as well, and on a psychologically evolutionary scale, they're on the same playing field as the aforementioned meats. Is it okay to exterminate ants because they're invading your home? Aren't they animals as well?
If you think it's wrong to eat cows but okay to eat insects and kill ants, you need to describe to me how and where you made that distinction.
One might ever go as far to argue that because animals like cows are bred exclusively for our consumption, it's even less ethical to consume insects that were born of their own accord, so to speak.
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I don't tell others what they can / cannot eat, and would never dream of doing so. I just don't eat meat personally for my own reasons, and I can understand that others don't share those particular viewpoints.
Additionally, I don't kill bugs at all. I catch and release any and all bugs which come into my home, including a recent (very careful) catch and release of a brown recluse spider. I wasn't about to allow it to continue living in my bedroom for obvious reasons, but I didn't see that it had done anything wrong aside from happening to make its web in an inconvenient location. I carefully got it on a piece of paper and then into a jar before releasing it into the abandoned shed near my house.
Really, I don't care if people eat meat, or if they eat it in front of me. I do think it's somewhat douchey when people have been like, "Sara, check it - I'm eating this delicious cow, mmm...." or try to hold meat up to my face (guy friends apparently think that's funny sometimes) but it's whatever. The only time I've ever really had a problem with people doing something I don't agree with in that respect in front of me is when people seek out bugs to kill in my presence for no good reason. Particularly if they're not even especially afraid of said bug and are just like, "Oh, is that a beetle?" *steps on beetle*. That's kind of bothersome.