Veganism

I am a FE-er, and I am also a vegan. And I think everyone should go vegan. Here are my reasons for it:
1. Nobody has yet proven that human beings have to eat meat to be healthy. This also applies to children and teenagers (I am 16). To me, as a FE-er, that is a very good argument.
2. Contrary to popular belief, it has never been proven that a vegan diet increases the risk of ANY illness. Just do some research on, let's say, Wikipedia about Vitamin B deficiency, Vitamin D deficiency, anaemia… Many people believe that it does, but it's been countless times proven otherwise.
3. As everyone knows, eating meat has been proven to increase the risk of many diseases. And that's much more than most of the people expect. Food you eat often affect your body more than medications you take. This goes for the vast majority of heart diseases, cancers, but also the risk of the diseases even doctors wouldn't expect to, like osteoporosis and some mental illnesses.
4. The explanations they have for how a vegan diet decreases the risk of getting those diseases make much more sense than the explanations for how they could increase. For instance, the explanation that vegans give for the increasing rate of osteoporosis is that too much protein from meat is turned by the pepsin in the stomach to amino-acids that decrease the PH of blood to a level that makes blood dissolve minerals from bones. This makes a lot more sense to me than the explanation in my biology textbook that the sexual hormones somehow cause the change in the bone structure, considering that the metabolism of bone cells is regulated by the thyroid.
5. Animal sentience can be proven using only your senses. Most of the animals won't attack you if you are nice to them. They will only attack you if they consider themselves a food. That means animals don't want to be eaten. You don't observe that in plants or mushrooms. I understand that animals eat other animals, but, unless proven otherwise, we, humans, don't have to.
6. Contrary to popular belief (although not contrary to common sense) factory farms generally don't use anesthetics. They only use antibiotics, and they use them for their own gain. So, there is no way we could make the lives of farmed animals worse if we don't give money to the farms. (If we don't buy meat).
7.Contrary to popular belief, farmed animals generally live SHORTER than wild animals. Cows are, for example, slaughtered at the age of 5, while they could live 20 years (only a quarter)! Yes, it does free them of their suffering, but also of all the pleasures in their lives! I don't think that anyone would argue that humans should be killed at the age of, let's say, 20 (a quarter of what a human being could live). So, not only is the quality of life of an animal reduced if it is farmed, the quantity is reduced also!
8. Workers in a slaughterhouse are more likely to be mentally ill than anyone else is!
9. 90% of global soy production and 70% of global crop production is used to feed those animals, while we don't even have enough food for ourselves! So, don't use the world famines as an argument against veganism. Also, even if everyone going vegan would in fact make MILLIONS of people die, it still wouldn't matter. There are BILLIONS of people who would benefit from that (even if you are going to disregard animals).
10. Cow's milk is the number one cause of allergies in the world. It also may be the primary cause of some mental illnesses (do some Wikipedia research!).
11. Contrary to popular belief (although not contrary to common sense) cows have to be repeatedly impregnated to produce milk. And this is done using machines. Let me explain: unlike humans, oxen don't have to be sexually aroused (to have an erection) to ejaculate. So, to make a cow produce milk, they rape an ox and a cow using those machines, and then take their child away when it's only a few days old! Imagine if that's been done to humans!!!
12. Similar things happen to chicken in factory farms. Male chickens are killed as soon as possible!
13. Contrary to popular belief, eggs are neither safe (germs), neither a good source of protein (although it's a good source of dangerous low saturated fats), neither are chickens treated humanely (they are usually kept in overcrowded conditions, even if there are no wires!).
14. Contrary to popular belief, the meat, dairy and egg industry cause by far the most pollution. And it is easy to explain how! Actually, environmental arguments for veganism are so convincing that I think the majority of FE-ers would be convinced.
15. They catch much more fish than they sale! In fact, unless people stop eating fish, you could expect fish less oceans by the year 2050!
16. Contrary to popular belief (but not contrary to common sense), most of the caught fishes die slow and painful death of suffocation!
17. I think that even a fish (that probably doesn't have many pleasures in its life) values its life way more than we value its meat!
18. Contrary to popular belief (but not contrary to common sense), animal experimentation doesn't give any useful medical data. Penicillin, for example, in most of the rodents used in the animal experimentation causes a deadly allergic reaction. In fact, many useful medications would be rejected if tested only on animals!
19. Most of the meat is tasty only because of vegan spices in it. So, if you add those same spice to, let's say, soy, you won't notice any difference.
20. The statement that animals being less intelligent than humans makes their lives less valuable makes no sense. Nobody would argue that we should have the right to kill infants because of their lack of intelligence. And pigs are way more intelligent than them. Also, someone could argue that computers already are more intelligent than humans (they can solve mathematical problems probably impossible for any human to solve). Does that mean computers are more valuable than humans? Of course not. We shouldn't exploit any sentient being, and you can see the animal sentience with your senses.
21. Relating to that, you could also argue that a life of a bee is more valuable than human life. Without bees, every eco-system would collapse. The same is not true for humans. So, what gives us the right to exploit bees by stealing their honey they would use to feed their children?
22. Anecdotal evidence for the health benefits of non-vegan diets don't matter! The fact that there are very old meat-eaters simply means that, at the time and place they were born, there were no vegans to begin with! If they were, the basic logic suggests, they would live even longer and be even healthier!
23. The fact that most of the people in most of the cultures don't care about food animals doesn't prove that they are not sentient. Claiming that it does is begging the question fallacy.
24. An average meat-eater eats 5000 animals during his lifetime. That's how many lives, according to the law of supply and demand, it takes. That's more than the majority of serial killers!
25. A conclusion from all above: If there were only one sentence we could pass on to the next generation, that would be: "Don't exploit anything that tries to defend itself!"

So, what arguments do you have against veganism? Can you refute ANY of my arguments? If not, then, go vegan! Stop paying the destruction of animals, environment, and, most importantly, the health of majority.

So, what arguments do you have against veganism?

I REALLY like eating meat!

But most of your points are probably true, except 18 is definitely not true.
I am surprised you did not drive the CO2 argument, because of all your arguments I think it is the strongest, but still does not apply to me in my country.

When a lion kills another animal its considered okay, and when man kills another animal it is also okay. (T's&C's apply)
Although if you had a cat, you would know that most people are not as cruel as animals are.

In nature, death happens, and thats okay.
Its okay because nature does not have empathy and really does not care about your views, a crocodile will eat you like any other antelope.
People do not kill each other, other wise we would be an unsustainable society and would not be where we are today

If your biggest reasons for not eating meat are from an emotional stand point, then I disagree with you. Nature does not care for bunny huggers and neither do I. So arguments 5,6,7,11,12,13,16,17,20,21,23&24 are invalid.
To support your views though I am against all cruelty of any kind. I really love animals and live literally surrounded by game farms, where there are wars going to to maintain the rhino populations against some idiots who want to a hard on.

To end
I dont have many arguments against Veganism, but the arguments for it are too weak for me to consider changing.

While I'm sympathetic to vegetarianism at least, on the sole basis of the atrocious impact that animal agriculture has on the environment, economy, and human health, veganism is a step too far and a step taken for the wrong reasons entirely. Animals are not sapients, they don't possess any rights, and we should not constrain human activity to their "benefit". We should largely end the practice of consuming animals for food, because doing so is incredibly wasteful and destructive, but that entails ending those animals, not setting them into the wild or any such nonsense.

There are some things that animal agriculture produces which are more or less exclusive - especially fat and bones which we use for a wide variety of industrial applications - so we should maintain enough of the practice to continue fueling those industries. That said, the overwhelming majority of animal product is meat and dairy, which we can cut down dramatically, allowing us to feed the population with less than a quarter of the space used now and freeing up the majority of the globe's surface for things like wind and solar energy.

The barrier to making this happen is of course replacing meat and dairy in the average diet, something that we are today very close to achieving with entirely plant-based materials.

Arguments like yours, though, are the other major hurdle - the crowd of sobbing "animal rights activists" who place sentiment ahead of reason. Veganism is simply not rational or desirable, it promotes actively destroying efficiency for the sake of "m-muh feelings".

I don't like vegans.
It makes me nervous watching them eat the food my food eats.

Yeah...  You're right.  We need to stop eating so much meat 'cause it's bad for us and the (round) Earth.  It's also inhuman and unsustainable.  I know it's no excuse, but bacon is delicious and I lack the motivation to become vegan.

I am a FE-er, and I am also a vegan. And I think everyone should go vegan. Here are my reasons for it:
1. Nobody has yet proven that human beings have to eat meat to be healthy. This also applies to children and teenagers (I am 16). To me, as a FE-er, that is a very good argument.

True

2. Contrary to popular belief, it has never been proven that a vegan diet increases the risk of ANY illness. Just do some research on, let's say, Wikipedia about Vitamin B deficiency, Vitamin D deficiency, anaemia… Many people believe that it does, but it's been countless times proven otherwise.

The problem is a poorly balanced diet, as it is with omnivores.

3. As everyone knows, eating meat has been proven to increase the risk of many diseases. And that's much more than most of the people expect. Food you eat often affect your body more than medications you take. This goes for the vast majority of heart diseases, cancers, but also the risk of the diseases even doctors wouldn't expect to, like osteoporosis and some mental illnesses.
4. The explanations they have for how a vegan diet decreases the risk of getting those diseases make much more sense than the explanations for how they could increase. For instance, the explanation that vegans give for the increasing rate of osteoporosis is that too much protein from meat is turned by the pepsin in the stomach to amino-acids that decrease the PH of blood to a level that makes blood dissolve minerals from bones. This makes a lot more sense to me than the explanation in my biology textbook that the sexual hormones somehow cause the change in the bone structure, considering that the metabolism of bone cells is regulated by the thyroid.

True

5. Animal sentience can be proven using only your senses. Most of the animals won't attack you if you are nice to them. They will only attack you if they consider themselves a food. That means animals don't want to be eaten. You don't observe that in plants or mushrooms. I understand that animals eat other animals, but, unless proven otherwise, we, humans, don't have to.

This is not a proof of sentience, only of threat identification.

6. Contrary to popular belief (although not contrary to common sense) factory farms generally don't use anesthetics. They only use antibiotics, and they use them for their own gain. So, there is no way we could make the lives of farmed animals worse if we don't give money to the farms. (If we don't buy meat).

I don't buy meat from factory farms.

7.Contrary to popular belief, farmed animals generally live SHORTER than wild animals. Cows are, for example, slaughtered at the age of 5, while they could live 20 years (only a quarter)! Yes, it does free them of their suffering, but also of all the pleasures in their lives! I don't think that anyone would argue that humans should be killed at the age of, let's say, 20 (a quarter of what a human being could live). So, not only is the quality of life of an animal reduced if it is farmed, the quantity is reduced also!

Of course their lives are shorter, no one wants to eat old meat.  It is tougher than younger meat.

8. Workers in a slaughterhouse are more likely to be mentally ill than anyone else is!

I call bullshit.  Citation required.

9. 90% of global soy production and 70% of global crop production is used to feed those animals, while we don't even have enough food for ourselves! So, don't use the world famines as an argument against veganism. Also, even if everyone going vegan would in fact make MILLIONS of people die, it still wouldn't matter. There are BILLIONS of people who would benefit from that (even if you are going to disregard animals).

We do have enough food, we do not have an adequate or just way of distributing our food.

10. Cow's milk is the number one cause of allergies in the world. It also may be the primary cause of some mental illnesses (do some Wikipedia research!).

Or cite your source, as is your duty to this conversation.

11. Contrary to popular belief (although not contrary to common sense) cows have to be repeatedly impregnated to produce milk. And this is done using machines. Let me explain: unlike humans, oxen don't have to be sexually aroused (to have an erection) to ejaculate. So, to make a cow produce milk, they rape an ox and a cow using those machines, and then take their child away when it's only a few days old! Imagine if that's been done to humans!!!

This is fallacious.  We have different standards based for humans on an evolutionary predilection to protect our own species.  It would be odd if we treated cows better than humans.

12. Similar things happen to chicken in factory farms. Male chickens are killed as soon as possible!

Too bad, I bet they taste good too.

13. Contrary to popular belief, eggs are neither safe (germs), neither a good source of protein (although it's a good source of dangerous low saturated fats), neither are chickens treated humanely (they are usually kept in overcrowded conditions, even if there are no wires!).

You can easily get eggs from chickens that are not kept in over-crowded conditions these days.  I do. And actually, the  fats in egg yolks are chock-a-block with fat soluble vitamins.  Also, eggs help reduce the levels of LDL cholesterol in your blood because of its choline content.

14. Contrary to popular belief, the meat, dairy and egg industry cause by far the most pollution. And it is easy to explain how! Actually, environmental arguments for veganism are so convincing that I think the majority of FE-ers would be convinced.

True.

15. They catch much more fish than they sale! In fact, unless people stop eating fish, you could expect fish less oceans by the year 2050!

True

16. Contrary to popular belief (but not contrary to common sense), most of the caught fishes die slow and painful death of suffocation!

True

17. I think that even a fish (that probably doesn't have many pleasures in its life) values its life way more than we value its meat!

Maybe, maybe not.  Can you show that a salmon is even aware it has a life?

18. Contrary to popular belief (but not contrary to common sense), animal experimentation doesn't give any useful medical data. Penicillin, for example, in most of the rodents used in the animal experimentation causes a deadly allergic reaction. In fact, many useful medications would be rejected if tested only on animals!

Animal trials are used to identify broad effects, but obviously they are not definitive.

19. Most of the meat is tasty only because of vegan spices in it. So, if you add those same spice to, let's say, soy, you won't notice any difference.

I dont know what this means.  What the fuck is a vegan spice?

20. The statement that animals being less intelligent than humans makes their lives less valuable makes no sense. Nobody would argue that we should have the right to kill infants because of their lack of intelligence. And pigs are way more intelligent than them. Also, someone could argue that computers already are more intelligent than humans (they can solve mathematical problems probably impossible for any human to solve). Does that mean computers are more valuable than humans? Of course not. We shouldn't exploit any sentient being, and you can see the animal sentience with your senses.

True.  I argue we should kill them because they are a delicious source of food.

21. Relating to that, you could also argue that a life of a bee is more valuable than human life. Without bees, every eco-system would collapse. The same is not true for humans. So, what gives us the right to exploit bees by stealing their honey they would use to feed their children?

This is not true, the eco-system as we know it would change, but it would likely keep trucking along in some new form.

22. Anecdotal evidence for the health benefits of non-vegan diets don't matter! The fact that there are very old meat-eaters simply means that, at the time and place they were born, there were no vegans to begin with! If they were, the basic logic suggests, they would live even longer and be even healthier!

What about data on bio-availability of protein being higher in meats?  Or that many plants are low in both content and bio-availability of key vitamins like D or calcium?

23. The fact that most of the people in most of the cultures don't care about food animals doesn't prove that they are not sentient. Claiming that it does is begging the question fallacy.

But you have also done nothing to show that these animals are sentient.

24. An average meat-eater eats 5000 animals during his lifetime. That's how many lives, according to the law of supply and demand, it takes. That's more than the majority of serial killers!

Speaking of fallacies....

25. A conclusion from all above: If there were only one sentence we could pass on to the next generation, that would be: "Don't exploit anything that tries to defend itself!"

So, what arguments do you have against veganism? Can you refute ANY of my arguments? If not, then, go vegan! Stop paying the destruction of animals, environment, and, most importantly, the health of majority.

I have no problem with veganism.  I just love meat more.

I've had some 'vegan' food.  Really quite tasty.  Little sandwich roll things... would have sworn there was meat in there, but didn't care.  I scarfed it down right quick.

None the less, I do eat meat too, and in the words of the great Ron Swanson, your's is the food my food eats.

I wonder what vegan tastes like?  Perhaps they should open a hunting season on vegans so we can keep their population healthy. 

Humans are, and have been for about 25,000 years, omnivorous. In fact, there is a sociological theory that states that the reason women today love shopping is because they were the gatherers. The reason men love sports is because they killed the bear. Granted, not universally true, but you see my point...

Any way I belong to PETA. People for the Eating of Tasty Animals. As long as they are kosher and all that, I am good. And, before the question is asked, no. Non-Jews are not expected to eat kosher.

On a serious note, hey, I grew up LIVING IN a State Park out in California. not near or by, but in. My mother worked for one and we lived right inside it. I am as much of an environmentalist as anyone else, but there comes a point when it gets stupid. Lets be rational about it.

If god did not want you to eat animals then why did he make them out of meat and so tasty?

If god did not want you to eat animals then why did he make them out of meat and so tasty?

Free choice?

Quote from: tappet on February 11, 2016, 01:11:19 AM

If god did not want you to eat animals then why did he make them out of meat and so tasty?

Free choice?

Exactly, but why do we have to listen to psycho herbivores destroying their planet with monocrops trying to ram salad down your throat? They need to grow a brain, eat some meat, shut the fuck up about saving their planet cause everyone's getting sick of hearing this shit anyway. "oh but its for future generations",  what a load of bullshit.

So, let me respond to your counter-arguments:

MaNaeSWolf:
Your statements about the environment are completely debunked here:
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As for your "lions also do that", lions have to do that! You can easily prove that: try to feed a lion on a vegan diet! On the other hand, humans don't have to! Humans don't have such an excuse for eating meat!
As for your statement that I am too emotional, look, how else would you argue against the holocaust?

Kali:
I also argued for veganism, and not only for vegetarianism. Do you lack reading comprehension, or what? And some vegans would argue that supporting milk and egg industry is worse than supporting meat industry, because animals involved in them suffer longer and harder.

tappet:
Animals are not your food, they are sentient beings just like you are! This is called begging the question!

mikeman7918:
Again, meat is delicious only because of the spices in it! The same meat tastes completely different if you add different spices to it. And if you add those same spices to soy, you don't notice any difference! So, if you become vegan, you don't lose anything. I hope you now have the motivation.

Rama Set:
2. How do you know?
5. Look, you can't be absolutely certain that anyone is sentient except you. Seriously, how do you know that other humans are sentient? Also, I would suppose you have a pet. So, how do you know that it is sentient? And if your answer is that it shows pleasure when you are nice to it, or that it tries to avoid pain and suffering, the same is true for the animals you eat. And to me, as a FE-er, that is way more convincing than any philosopher claiming that animals are not sentient.
6. Many people think so, but chances are that you do! The vast majority of meat today comes from factory farms!
7. I don't even understand the argument that you are making. Are you saying that we should make a compromise between their lives and our, well, whatever we use to justify eating meat? Sorry to tell you, but that's immoral!
8. https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=155688
And you can easily find a lot more.
9. How do you know? I've never heard that the food produced for humans spoils because nobody distributes it. And even if that were the case, we would still want more food for us! And if we all eat vegan, we have more food!
10. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milk_allergy#Epidemiology
11. Even if evolution is true, the concept of a "more evolved organisms" makes no sense. We all come from a common ancestor who lived billions of years ago and we've all been evolving ever since then. Of course, we evolved differently. But if an organism developed sentience, we should treat it as sentient!
12. Male chickens aren't eaten, they are disposed as a biological waste!
13. The truth is, you can't easily get eggs from "chickens that are not kept in over-crowded conditions these days" simply because the vast majority is kept in battery cages!
17. Again, if fishes weren't aware they had a life, why would they avoid threatens? I know that this is an argument from ignorance, but what are the other possibilities?
18. And that means that animal-tested medical products are not any safer for humans! Yet they cause suffering of millions of sentient animals.
19. All the spices are vegan. They are simply vegetables.
20. And they are delicious only because of spices added to them.
21. Do you have a bright idea of how much suffering a change of an eco-system would cause? That means that all the animals of some species starve to death!
22. And what do you think how do herbivores stay healthy? For example, contrary to popular belief, elephants are herbivores. So, if they can get all the nutrients they need from plants, why then couldn't we? Saying "I don't know which plant is full of X" is an argument from ignorance.
23. Again, I have!
24. OK, yes, this argument is an appeal to emotion, but what arguments do you use against killing innocent people?
25. So, tell us why do you like meat. You really have no reason to like it.

29silhouette:
Again, animals are friends, not food.

jroa:
Human meat tastes very similar to the meat of other mammals. As for hunting, look, a specie can't be both on the top of a food chain and numerous! So, what's more important. Also, I don't think that anyone of us would ever be in danger of being eaten by a lion. We are not like other animals, we control our environment. We don't live in a forest, we live in houses in villages and cities. So, indeed, human beings can be both herbivores and not eaten (and that is the only benefit of being on the top of a food chain).

Yaakov ben Avraham:
Well, to me, tradition doesn't mean anything. So doesn't what most of people think. After all, I am a FE-er.

tappet 1:
Well, cook human meat and add spices to it and it would also be tasty. Does that mean that God created humans to be eaten? Of course not.

tappet 2:
OK, well, what is more psychopathic: eating sentient beings or trying to stop others from doing so. And how do you mean that we use a force?

Ah, that made NO sense. The fact is, there are 613 Commandments of the Law, and not ONE of them reqires me to be a Vegan. Ergo, WHY should I subject myself to that?

I mean, we Jews have Commandments for EVERYTHING. What to wear, how to wear it, how to relate to others both Jewish and not, and OF COURSE, what to eat and how to eat it.

Now, the Kosher Laws are very strict about what kind of meats we can eat, and how that meat must be killed (it is more humane than in a secular slaughterhouse), and properly treated after death, etc etc. But no where does it forbid meat.

Now, there are plenty of people who find the Kosher Laws unnecessary, outdated, silly, or whathaveyou. Some them are in this thread right NOW. I have spoken with them before, and I have found their views so distasteful as to be classified in my mind as anti-Semitic. But even they are not silly enough to push this veganism, any more than I am to push Kosher eating on a non-Jew.

What it comes down to is this: Dude, you want to be a vegan and munch like a rabbit, hey, knock yorself out. If I want to follow the Kosher Laws then hey, knock myself out. But neither of us has any call to try to get each other or anyone else to agree with us. And trying to tell me that veganism is somehow morally superior to Judaism is just going to make me laugh at you, so if I were you, I would stop in your tracks right there.

Ah, that made NO sense. The fact is, there are 613 Commandments of the Law, and not ONE of them reqires me to be a Vegan. Ergo, WHY should I subject myself to that?

I mean, we Jews have Commandments for EVERYTHING. What to wear, how to wear it, how to relate to others both Jewish and not, and OF COURSE, what to eat and how to eat it.

Now, the Kosher Laws are very strict about what kind of meats we can eat, and how that meat must be killed (it is more humane than in a secular slaughterhouse), and properly treated after death, etc etc. But no where does it forbid meat.

Now, there are plenty of people who find the Kosher Laws unnecessary, outdated, silly, or whathaveyou. Some them are in this thread right NOW. I have spoken with them before, and I have found their views so distasteful as to be classified in my mind as anti-Semitic. But even they are not silly enough to push this veganism, any more than I am to push Kosher eating on a non-Jew.

What it comes down to is this: Dude, you want to be a vegan and munch like a rabbit, hey, knock yorself out. If I want to follow the Kosher Laws then hey, knock myself out. But neither of us has any call to try to get each other or anyone else to agree with us. And trying to tell me that veganism is somehow morally superior to Judaism is just going to make me laugh at you, so if I were you, I would stop in your tracks right there.

Well, as an atheist, I don't care about what your holy book says. Of course, I won't be surprised if it says that you should be a vegan, simply because that makes sense.
And of course being vegan is more moral than being a Jew, being vegan doesn't require any animals to be killed, while being a meat-eating Jew (or one who does animal sacrifices) does.
And I am not anti-semitic. Anti-semitic would want you to be killed, but I want you to be healthier!
And just like you can attack vegan with "you are like a rabbit", you can attack a meat-eater with "you are like a wolf"!

*ROTFLMFAO* We haven't used sacrifices in 2,000 yrs. Try reading a book.

MaNaeSWolf:
Your statements about the environment are completely debunked here:
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I actually said your argument for being a bunny hugger using the environmental issues was your strongest argument, why are you debunking what I said by disagreeing with me? Although a lot of that video is not really true and uses incorrect stats.
Also, different places in the world have different conditions. Farming is not the same all around the world. Hint, I live in Africa.

As for your "lions also do that", lions have to do that! You can easily prove that: try to feed a lion on a vegan diet! On the other hand, humans don't have to! Humans don't have such an excuse for eating meat!

Who was making an excuse? I am saying that nature does not care about your moral argument. We can take all animals on earth, place them in zoos and give them high protein diets that dont require killing of other animals if we wanted too. But we dont, because you are inventing a moral argument that does not exist. We eat animals because that is what we are used to eating. . . just like the lions!

As for your statement that I am too emotional, look, how else would you argue against the holocaust?

By reading what I said

People do not kill each other, other wise we would be an unsustainable society and would not be where we are today

Also, for morality see below.

you can attack a meat-eater with "you are like a wolf"!

why thank you good gentleman, you are too kind!

From most of your arguments seems to be around the morality issue. To the point where you believe not eating a chicken makes you a "better person" than the next.

And of course being vegan is more moral than being a Jew

Morals is a term used to define acceptable behavior in a society.
or

standards of behavior; principles of right and wrong. - google

Society or your community decides what is right or wrong depending on their interpretation of empathy and a variety of different factors. Some have religious texts that guide them, others the experience of elders. People take those society definitions and interpret them to create a personal view of what is moral.
Your statement that one thing is more moral than the next holds no water because that is a personal view.

If you are trying to convert people to your sect, then I suggest a less aggressive stance against something that everyone holds very personally.
This is TFES, we can handle people saying the world is a dodecahedron, just dont mess with our steak.

There is no intrinsic greater morality to not eating meat than there is to eating meat. After all, humans are the highest order of Primate. We have been eating meat for as long as Cro Magnon Man has existed, and before him, other members of the family designated as Homo (Homo sapiens sapiens [us], Homo sapiens neandertalis, Homo erectus, etc). And this does not even begin to talk about earlier men-like persons such as the Australopithicenes and the like.

There has NEVER, at any point in the history of the development of man, been a time when people have been pushed NOT to eat meat, except in VERY small numbers, usually for religious reasons, particularly in the East  (some forms of Hinduism and some forms of Buddhism encourage vegetarianism, although outright veganism is a bit unusual even for them).

Based on the history of mankind, trying to claim the moral high ground for a particular diet, be it veganism, kosherism, vegetarianism, or good old Mid-West Steak and Potatoes is morally suspect in and of itself.


 

Kali:
I also argued for veganism, and not only for vegetarianism.

Yes, and the point of my response was quite clearly that you are being unreasonable because you are arguing for veganism and not for vegetarianism.

Do you lack reading comprehension, or what?

I should be asking that of you:

While I'm sympathetic to vegetarianism... veganism is a step too far and a step taken for the wrong reasons entirely.

And some vegans would argue that supporting milk and egg industry is worse than supporting meat industry, because animals involved in them suffer longer and harder.

Again, animal "suffering" doesn't matter. These creatures are not sapients who deserve rights, they are organic machines. Our only course of action must be the rational one, which entails ending the large-scale production of meat and dairy products, particularly from cattle, because of the economic, environmental, and health costs to humans of that activity.

So, to "Yaakov ben Avraham" and "MaNaeSWolf":

Why don't we simply define that evil is what causes suffering to sentient beings and that good is what causes pleasure to sentient beings? Now, moral is what causes more good than evil, and immoral is what causes more evil than good.
That's that simple! Also, I suppose you are FE-ers, right? Than how can you claim that the society is an authority about anything?!
Also, even if society were the only thing that matters, vegan is still better! That means that much less resources is spent on producing food. And that medications are much safer because they are not tested on animals, but on consenting humans. And so on.
I might seem rude to you, but that's because you take what I say personally. Don't take it personally, take it as a fact, or, in other words, a conclusion based on what our senses tell us! I, personally, don't believe that there are moral or immoral people. I don't think that anyone, including meat-eaters, does something if he knows or believes it is immoral. But I think that some people are simply too lazy or stupid to find out what is the right thing to do and do it.

To "Kali":

Again, you can't be absolutely certain if other humans or your pets can suffer, yet you don't demand evidence that they do! Why don't you apply the same standards of evidence for the food animals sentience as for the sentience of other animals including humans?

BUT BACON!
Hey, wait, you are not arguing only for vegetarianism, but even for veganism?!
BUT CHOCOLATE!
It's NOTHING without milk!
Also, do you know that milk and eggs go in the vast majority of cakes?

Actually, I don't take you for rude. I take you for a fool. One, you're a Flat Earther. Anyone that holds such an idea ever since Aristotle may be so defined. Two, you don't believe in a Deity. That also defines you as such. Three, you are attempting to meet all of your dietary needs from non-animal matter, which has been proven to be very difficult. That further defines you as such.

If you are concerned about causing pain to an animal, then move to a kosher or halal diet. Either involves the virtually painless method of a quick slicing of the animal's throat. It has been scientifically proven that killing an animal in the kosher or halal way is virtually painless, as opposed to how non-Jews or non-Muslims kill in their slaughterhouses (usually one or more shots to the head).

That choice would meet both your ethical requirements of easing an animal's suffering, and would also enable you to provide yourself with nutritional benefit in an easier fashion.

Furthermore, you have not calculated one SERIOUS problem that would arise if the whole world were to go vegan. Jroa alluded to it in his joke about hunting vegans. If none of us ate cow, they would reproduce to the point that their population might need to be culled, just like coyotes and foxes in some regions. The same is true of hogs, and chickens, and other food animals. What would one do with all that meat if not eat it?

As far as your idea that milk causes disease, citation needed. Milk has been used for centuries to promote health, particularly among children. And like any college professor, no, I shall not accept Wikipedia as a valid source since anyone can edit that. As someone with a Master's and two Bachelor's, I expect better than that.

As someone who disagrees with most things that Yaakov ben Avraham says, I agree with most things Yaakov ben Avraham just said.

As someone who disagrees with most things that Yaakov ben Avraham says, I agree with most things Yaakov ben Avraham just said.

*SPEAKING IN A DEEP VOICE WITH A MOCK BRITISH ACCENT* Why thank you, Good Sir , thank you.

In all seriousness, however much I may disagree with various persons on this forum, or they with me, there is a certain level of common sense that any normal person has to have. Our vegan interlocutor seems lacking in that department.

tappet 1:
Well, cook human meat and add spices to it and it would also be tasty.

You are eating human meat, dummy.
Your diet lacks food so your body cannibalizes muscle for energy, that is why vegans look like zombies. They are eating human meat!
Mental!!!!!!!

On yet another level, Hindus do not eat cow, although they DO eat butter and drink milk. This has nothing to do with their belief in reincarnation. It is a common misconception among Westerners that they don't eat her because they think it might have been Grandma.

In fact, their objection to eating beef is due to the fact that the cow was sacred to Sri Krishna, one of their principle Deities (and to many monotheistic Hindus, the ONLY Deity).

While I certainly admire their devotion, this has had one unfortunate side effect. Because the reason for not eating cow is that said animal is sacred rather than profane (unlike in Judaism or Islam where the pig is regarded as filth and is not permitted to exist in Israel or in any Muslim country), the cow is permitted to roam at will in India and Nepal, both of which are majority Hindu countries.

The side effect in question is that, if a given cow happens to find its way into a large city such as New Delhi, Madras, Bombay, Kathmandu, or wherever, which often happens, and further, if said animal decides to rest in the middle of a busy thoroughfare, it can cause traffic snarls that often last hours. India has in recent years been working on reducing the problem by various techniques of road construction, but it does still occur.

My point is not to convince Hindus to eat cows. Their culture is used to this sort of thing, and I expect smart Indians probably know alternative routes to work and school in the event of a cow caused traffic problem, just as people in my city do in the event that we are blocked by a train, which is a frequent occurrence.

Hoewever, I am NOT a Hindu. I do not WISH to become familiar with that problem, and ways to solve it, any more than you want to live in a midwestern city surrounded by, and bisected by, railroad tracks. It is the height of rudeness to push that on me, even if your motives are ethical and not religious. Please keep your personal ethics to yourself.

Again, you can't be absolutely certain if other humans or your pets can suffer,

I don't care about suffering intrinsically. Human suffering is made important by virtue of the value it gets assigned by sapient creatures capable of assigning value. I don't care one iota about pets.

Why don't you apply the same standards of evidence for the food animals sentience as for the sentience of other animals including humans?

Sentience is not important. Sentient creatures are a dime a dozen. Sapience is the only quality that matters, as it is the only one that allows for the capacity to express values.

Actually, I don't take you for rude. I take you for a fool. One, you're a Flat Earther. Anyone that holds such an idea ever since Aristotle may be so defined. Two, you don't believe in a Deity. That also defines you as such. Three, you are attempting to meet all of your dietary needs from non-animal matter, which has been proven to be very difficult. That further defines you as such.

If you are concerned about causing pain to an animal, then move to a kosher or halal diet. Either involves the virtually painless method of a quick slicing of the animal's throat. It has been scientifically proven that killing an animal in the kosher or halal way is virtually painless, as opposed to how non-Jews or non-Muslims kill in their slaughterhouses (usually one or more shots to the head).

That choice would meet both your ethical requirements of easing an animal's suffering, and would also enable you to provide yourself with nutritional benefit in an easier fashion.

Furthermore, you have not calculated one SERIOUS problem that would arise if the whole world were to go vegan. Jroa alluded to it in his joke about hunting vegans. If none of us ate cow, they would reproduce to the point that their population might need to be culled, just like coyotes and foxes in some regions. The same is true of hogs, and chickens, and other food animals. What would one do with all that meat if not eat it?

As far as your idea that milk causes disease, citation needed. Milk has been used for centuries to promote health, particularly among children. And like any college professor, no, I shall not accept Wikipedia as a valid source since anyone can edit that. As someone with a Master's and two Bachelor's, I expect better than that.

So, let me try to defend my other beliefs first: Most of you believe that the Earth is round precisely because Aristotle was the teacher of Alexander the Great. His arguments have long been debunked. I once used to be a RE-er, in fact, I made most of my posts on this forum trying to defend the position that the Earth is round. But I failed. So, I decided to be honest with myself and become a FE-er. I used to be a Christian, but I found out that there are no rational basis for my belief. Now I am thinking about becoming a Pastafarian (contrary to popular belief, spaghetti are mostly vegan), because it kind of fits in my worldview by being empirical. That means that there are no dogmas and that you can change your beliefs if they are contrary to what your senses tell you. But of all beliefs I've ever had, I think that a belief that it's OK to eat meat is by far the most immoral!
So, let's talk about veganism. Fist of all, if elephants can meet all their dietary needs from plants, why couldn't we? Second, slicing animals throat is not painless. They bleed out. You know that muscles pain when they don't receive enough blood, for example, when you run for a long time. Now imagine how much it would pain if they started to receive no blood while you are completely conscious. Yes, it would cause them to expand and contract without control, causing even additional pain. Now, imagine if it happened to all muscles in your body. Well, that's what animals experience when you slaughter them while they are conscious!
And Jewish slaughterhouses are even worse since they are literally forced to leave the cow conscious. So much about it. In fact, Earthlings made an entire scene about the Jewish slaughterhouses. Have you watched it?
And, no, that doesn't meet my ethical requirements. Have you ever heard of Golden Rule? That makes a lot of sense.
As for the "SERIOUS problem", I have calculated it. First of all, cows and pigs and chickens are so numerous because we breed them. We rape them using machines! Second, look, you need to understand that five moths from now (that's the age at which chickens are slaughtered) no chicken that exists today will be alive. So, if we don't breed new chickens, that means there will be no more chickens five months from now. The same goes for cows and pigs (except that they live a bit longer). I realize that that begs the question of how they would die. Well, even if vast majority of them starves to death, that's still better than keeping factory farms going! Let me explain: if we keep factory farms going then their children would be slaughtered, and their children, and their children, and so on… And an infinite number of animals being slaughtered is way worse than a finite number of animals starving to death, right? And there probably will be a few animals that would survive and procreate, so those species won't even go extinct!
And that problem would only happen if we all become vegan at once. If we all gradually became vegan (and that's probably what would happen) no animals would need to starve to death!
I guess that some of you will scream: "Well, what about the butchers!?" Well, that's like saying: "I don't want to stop smoking because of tobacco farms!"
And you will always think of some stupid excuses for eating meat, just like I was making excuses for believing that the Earth is round.
As for Wikipedias unreliability, look, you can see the references on the bottom of the page! And almost anything that has been a tradition has been proven wrong. Something being a tradition should be taken as evidence against it, rather than an evidence for it! Also, I think that Wikipedia is even more reliable than, well, anything else, because, for example, it's not allowed to claim that the Earth is not flat! :-)

P. S.
There are many Jews that are vegan, there are many Christians that are vegan, and there are many Muslims that are vegan! So, you really can't use any mainstream religion to justify eating meat!

So, let's talk about veganism. Fist of all, if elephants can meet all their dietary needs from plants, why couldn't we?

Here lies the problem, you do not know what you are.
If an elephant becomes a carnivore it will die.
If a lion becomes a herbivore it will die.
You think you are a herbivore and others believe they are omnivores. The problem with the omnivore is they think they can eat all plants and all meats which is also wrong. Oh, and being strictly carnivorous is wrong also, tried that one too.

Again. I don't care for your moral argument, neither does most of the world.
Animals live and die,  whether it be in slaughter houses or in nature where it would be much worse that your describing. Just because you get all teary eyed when you see a animal die does not mean other people have to follow your cult. Go spend some time in nature, and will will quickly see that your moral argument is self made.

From where I am.  All commercial farms have chickens roaming around. Without care they will continue to live just fine without intervention. So not sure why you are worried about chickens going extinct.

P. S. Rape is a serious issue,  don't make it a soft topic with your metaphors.

Get out a bit, you sound like a city boy that has never been to a place without cell signal