To think that the world will never turn to being veggy...

[bananasinpjamas]

To think that the world will never turn to being veggy...and meat is actually quite tasty...yumm ....roast chicken....

But buying free range/freedom food meat if you can afford it is the next best thing?

I knew that you could feed more on less land if theyw ere veggie but didn;t realise those 40 million / 540 million stats- wow.

I agree with the premise in the OP. I eat as good quality as I can afford, which varies but I think is a decent working premise. I also choose independent lcoal butchers over supermarkets and am constabtly amazed that they save me money even with traceable lcoal produce. Nuts.

Ex veggie; as also have allergies to milk and am simply too disorganised to manage a vegan diet I now eat meat and have done for almost 2 decades after 13 years not. I am healthier but my sisters who are veggie and able to eat dairy etc and equally so.

I often hear stories about vegetarian children growing up to eat meat, but I'm similarly confused as to how it happens.

Everyone I know who was brought up vegetarian or vegan remained so as an adult. Including me.

There is no point in everyone becoming entirely vegetarian. Some environments are not really appropriate for growing crops on, but are adequate for grazing livestock and producing winter fodder for that livestock. Fish is also a potentially sustainable resource.

People just need to eat less meat and fish so that grazing land and fishing stocks can be managed in a sustainable way. I'm vegetarian but my children eat some meat and fish, so as a household our environmental impact from pastoral agriculture is low.

MillyR - 'environmental impact from pastoral agriculture is low' - really???

I think that you will find that many DC brought up by 'evangelical parents' are atheists. I would hazard a guess that more DCs become atheists than Christians, otherwise all the adult I know who were altar boys and in church choir etc would be in church this Easter!
My very evangelical vegan friends have a DS who is now a chef, who not only cooks meat but is interested in butchery and eats the stuff. I believe it stems from being told what he had to think.
It always amazes me that people give birth and think that gives the right to tell DCs what to think! The world doesn't work like that-DCs grow to adulthood and do exactly as they like. The recent thread on parental disapproval shows that if their parent disapproves they still do it! And so they should-whoever bases adult decisions on 'I am a vegetarian because my mother doesn't think eating meat is ethical'? They will decide for themselves if they think it is ethical. Naturall they will only get the veg option at home, but with friends, school dinners and parties they should have a free choice once they are about 8yrs and old enough to understand.
Certainly a parent telling me I can't eat meat would have me seizing the sausage rolls at a party once she was out of sight!

There's an impulse towards smug, aggressive martyrdom in a lot of people - not just choosing not to do or consume certain things, but being completely incapable of discussing it rationally or indeed shutting up about it. And the idea of vegetarianism as a kind of purity thing is not that new, self-denial as a way of getting your head even further up your arse has been around for centuries. Basically, human being evolved as omnivores eating rather more plants than meat. Most people on meat-free diets have to put a lot of effort and thought into making sure they get the right mix of nutrients and usually they have to take supplements. Which is fair enough if you can be arsed to do it for yourself, but it;s simply not that big a deal to most people. And rational people will go on eating good quality meat in moderation no matter how much the nutters scream and howl. Because nutters are just nutters and sensible people ignore them.

Okay, here's a question. On average, do you think an eight-year-old (brought up in the UK) would be willing to eat cat or dog sausages at a party?

Everyone I know, whatever their diet, would've refused. Similarly, the vegetarians refused pig sausages, too.

Maybe it's an upbringing issue- I always thought of vegetarianism as a quite matter-of-fact thing; as matter of fact a thing as not eating poo, or dis-secting the cat. Maybe it's just that everyone I know likes cats as pets. Maybe people outside my circle would eat cat. I await your replies with interest!

I think my issue with vegetarianism is the Why not the what?

I am a human animal. I am an omnivore as nature designed me.

As for what meat we eat, well most animals have preferences in prey. I personally wouldn't eat cat or dog as they are companion animals and fulfil a different role to cows and pigs etc, IMO.

Why some people choose not to eat meat, you mean?

Well, everyone has different reasons. I wouldn't kill a cat and eat it; nor will I kill a cow and eat that.

Sure - you might not be killing the cow, but you are quite prepared to keep the cow in an unnatural state, take away the calves, have the cow artificially inseminated, keep it in a barn, remove its horns and have it slaughtered when it is no longer producing enough milk?

Very good, young Padawan.

Unfortunately for you, I'm a vegan.

Sorry, that was overly patronising of me. It was probably a fair assumption that I was a vegetarian.

IJAFW, you are quoting me out of context. I said that as a household our environmental impact from pastoral agriculture was low, which it is.

People do what they can to minimise cruelty. I have never seen "If you can't/won't do B, there's no point doing A" as a legitimate argument. It seems as strange to me as saying that donating £5 to Women's Aid is pointless, because they could do more with £10.

Even if the human race became entirely vegetarian there would still have to slaughter some animals to provide meat for our domestic pets. Not a very nice job for a vegetarian.

I'm a vegetarian and I would have no issue with slaughtering an animal if it was necessary to do so.

MillyR - the environmental impact you make from pastoral agriculture may be low, but the environmental impact you make on other agricultural resources would be be greater..

I agree with you that the issue of 'sustainability' is important but cutting down on meat consumption is not going to cut the mustard!

You may well cut down and buy seasonal and local meat, but the worldwide demand for meat and products is huge

Actually re: the vegetarianism / sex puritanism analogy, it does strike me that being veggie is a bit like choosing not to watch porn. I've done my fair share of porn-watching and yes, I found it enjoyable. However, it's changed over the years to something that is more noticeably seedy. I don't watch it any more as I've become more aware of the exploitation and abuse. I think if I were to watch it, I might get turned on, but ultimately the pleasure would be overshadowed by guilt / revulsion at the cost of my pleasure. Same goes for eating a steak...I love eating meat, but not to the extent that I want to support animal cruelty.

I also think that people who claim not to care about animal welfare genuinely don't realise just how bad it is in the most part.

And re: the argument that everything we eat has an impact on the enviroment, well, yes, but it's about the extent of the impact, and vegetarianism is a step in the right direction, IMO.

I think whether you are vegetarian, vegan or a meat-eater, you have a responsibility to find out where your food comes from and be fucking more intelligent about it, instead of blindly consuming whilst corporations make millions and billions from our sheep-like mentality.

Be more intelligent.
Find out where your food comes from and how it has come to be.
Eating is the one thing we all do all of our lives and by god it's not hard to find out where your food comes from. We are lucky in that respect. Like it or not all food comes with moral impact on others in some way (especially from supermarkets and big chains, which, like it or not, is how the vast majority eat these days).
And the way they run their shop depends on how you shop.

Everything Threelittleducks just said.

No, of course my personal actions are not going to sort out global environmental problems.

Yes, I no doubt do directly consume more arable products than I would do if I ate meat, but that is far less than the arable products I would indirectly consume through eating a lot of terrestrial meat. It is basic ecology.

It is no hassle for me to not eat meat. If someone else enjoys eating it, they should carry on. There are other ways they can reduce their environmental impact. It doesn't have to be an all or nothing situation.

But instead of cutting meat out of your diet, surely the way forward is to ensure that better quality, sustainable produce is brought to the fore instead of demonising an entire industry ...

I do care about animal welfare - I can go into a supermarket and when I pick up my meat I can be fairly sure that I can be selective ...

However, I can't really be sure

I don't think most vegetarians are demonising an entire industry. They just don't feel a need to use that particular resource.

Too many people blindly follow labels - I eat Red Tractor, so I must be alright - without actually knowing what they mean.

Like RSPCA labelling. Oh it must be ok then.

Not necessarily.

My mum always says she doesn't want to know. 'Why does it make a difference?' This is the kind of attitude which infuriates me. Too many people would rather flick over the news than see the [often very edited] reality. A lot of the time in this world you may only know the real story if you seek out the truth for yourself.
That is the only way anything will change. Information communicated. People taking responsibility.
Yes it does make a difference. In your house. Maybe then it will spread to your children, their children, their children's friends. Your neighbours. Their families.
It always takes one person to start something.