Vegetarians, convince me!

[NUKe]

I agree that a largely plant based diet is more healthy for most people. Consuming good quality meat in moderation is healthy too - as long as you enjoy the taste.

I disagree that plants and fungi are not sentient beings however, so the ideological/moralistic arguments for chosing to eat them rather than animals is blinkered by sentimentality bias towards living organisms less alien and more akin to ourselves.

The only thing left to eat is troll meat then

[windmiller]

I agree that a largely plant based diet is more healthy for most people. Consuming good quality meat in moderation is healthy too - as long as you enjoy the taste.

I disagree that plants and fungi are not sentient beings however, so the ideological/moralistic arguments for chosing to eat them rather than animals is blinkered by sentimentality bias towards living organisms less alien and more akin to ourselves.

The only thing left to eat is troll meat then

I'm an omnivore myself so I will be just fine, If cannibalism is your thing? shrugs

[landsurfer]

I have exaggerated slightly perhaps, for entertainment.

Yes .. but your still funny ....really ... well in this case ... respect ...

[pwa]

If you agree that we have evolved from plants,then it follows that we are plants in an evolved state.

Have we though. Have not plants and animals evolved separately from eukaryotes or something?

This all misses the point. if one is vegan or vegetarian for ethical reasons the thing one is likely to be concerned about is harming a sentient being, a being that thinks and feels. So if scientists ever do what they threaten to do and grow meat without it ever being part of a creature that had to be harmed to harvest it, that would be acceptable. Ditto for road kill.

[reohn2]

FWIW,we went veggie about twenty five years ago when we realised that the animals we eat were being fed crap and so it followed we were eating crap.
So we stopped eating crap,and tpatmthe same time tried to eat organic where we could,we aren't religious about organic put we try where and when we can.
That's what convinced us.

[Mike Sales]

If you agree that we have evolved from plants,then it follows that we are plants in an evolved state.

Have we though. Have not plants and animals evolved separately from eukaryotes or something?

This all misses the point. if one is vegan or vegetarian for ethical reasons the thing one is likely to be concerned about is harming a sentient being, a being that thinks and feels. So if scientists ever do what they threaten to do and grow meat without it ever being part of a creature that had to be harmed to harvest it, that would be acceptable. Ditto for road kill.

Just being pedantic. Diners may make whatever distinctions please them, as far as I am concerned.
Even omnivorous trolls are said to prefer billy goat.
I draw the line at purple people eaters.

[661-Pete]

I agree that a largely plant based diet is more healthy for most people. Consuming good quality meat in moderation is healthy too - as long as you enjoy the taste.

Enjoy the taste? Yes, that may well be the issue for some wavering veggies. I think the main reason for 'lapsing' is that they crave after the taste of - say - a good juicy steak. Something that now repels me.

Which kind ot meat did it take me longest to 'go off'? Perhaps chicken. I don't think I'd reject a piece of chicken if there was nothing else to eat. But this puts me in mind of a little story. I'm an avid fan of wild mushrooms (are they sentient? We'll get on to that later!). There's a particular species called "chicken of the woods" which is supposed to taste like - well - chicken breast. Well, I usually ignore that one, but once I did pick some, cooked it and tried it. I thought it was horrible! It must be one of the very few edible fungi that I don't like. So if it really tastes like chicken (which I doubt) - goodbye to chicken!

I disagree that plants and fungi are not sentient beings however, so the ideological/moralistic arguments for chosing to eat them rather than animals is blinkered by sentimentality bias towards living organisms less alien and more akin to ourselves.

I think there's no answer to that. It depends on what you mean by 'sentient'. One interpretation of the word is that it applies only to creatures that can 'think' like humans. Used in that way mostly by SF writers, I guess!

Anyway, who can possibly know what a plant or fungus (or indeed an invertebrate) 'feels'? That's akin to asking, what does it 'feel' like to die? No-one has come up with a rational answer to that last, either - but we're all going to experience it sooner or later...

[pwa]

We make a mistake if we think there is one universal justification for being vegetarian, or vegan, or omnivore. Every individual makes dietary choices based on their own experiences. This applies as much to omnivores as it does to vegetarians. I have family and friends who happily eat a beef steak, but who would turn their nose up at horse, dog or cat. There is no real logic or consistency in that, but why should there be? If we were using logic rather than feelings we would be eating fellow humans who had died from accidents rather than disease. Almost all of us have diets restricted by personal or societal choice.

I became vegan in the mid 1980s, later backing off to be just vegetarian when I met my future wife, who was vegetarian. I wanted us to be able to cook for each other with no stress. I don't attempt to justify that because it is nobody else's business and I'm not asking others to follow suit. Life is full of compromises and I have no illusions about that. Again, we are all making compromises every day, and that is what I did then.

My choice not to eat body parts from any animal was initially taken because I did not want to eat sentient beings. Sentient to me meant having thought, even if only very basic. On a philosophical level, the more advanced the thinking of a creature was, the more concerned I was not to eat it. So if I accidentally swallowed a fly while cycling I wasn't very concerned. Others are welcome to their own thoughts on these matters. These were just my own feelings at the time, and I feel more or less the same way today.

I have always been aware that a vegetarian diet with milk and eggs does finance an industry that inevitably ends up with the killing of animals, so my acceptance of milk and eggs has always been a compromise. I know that and I live with it.

I have been vegetarian for thirty odd years, so my initial reasons for abandoning meat are almost irrelevant now. The thought of eating meat has long been unacceptable to me because of revulsion rather than just a philosophy that can change. I know there are people who think vegetarians undergo mental torture having to deny themselves bacon when they smell it being cooked,but that couldn't be more wrong for me. The odour of any red meat being cooked makes me feel a bit queasy, the smell long since having ceased to be pleasant to me.

And if that were not enough, if I went back to meat I'd have to undergo the financial shock of buying meat. I've been used to living off cheaper stuff for so long.

None of this is meant to draw anyone in, or to justify. It isn't a logical argument and I don't think I need one. It is my own path to my own preferences, which I explain because I want to and not because I have to. I am not an automaton working on pure logic, none of us are. And I am not a diet campaigner. You eat what you want to and I will do likewise.