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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

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

219 replies

bananasinpjamas · 22/04/2011 01:06

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?

OP posts:
exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 15:41

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 wouldn't bring up a DC to think that. Farm animals have been bred to eat (ever since man stopped hunting and settled in one place) and I started with the first board books-'pigs go oink and give us sausages'. We see lambs in the field and they know that they are there to eat. Cats are bred as pets.

I think it is far more important to make sure all food is ethically sourced. I find it strange that many vegetarians have no problem with dairy products- I put that down to being so far removed from the food chain that they don't understand milk production. If were to exclude animal products on cruelty grounds I would rather eat meat than buy milk.

As it is, I would become a vegetarian through health issues-slaughtering animals for food, as long as it is humane and they have had a good life doesn't bother me.

onagar · 22/04/2011 18:32

it does strike me that being veggie is a bit like choosing not to watch porn.

What you get with these threads is more like stopping having sex and then demanding that everyone else stops too.

Anyone can choose not to eat meat - that isn't the problem. Lots of days I don't eat meat either. Some people though want to force their choice on others and/or want some sort of praise for 'saving the planet'.

You have to wonder how many of the 'save the planet' ones are actually doing the other damaging stuff.

That's why I'm wondering if in fact the fundamentalist vegetarians were looking for a cause - any cause. Perhaps if the shop was out of veggy t-shirts they'd now be waving a different banner. Ban the Bomb? Save the Whale? Britain for the British, Down with the Patriarchy and so on.

Of course some vegetarians will have reasons for their choice, but I think they will be quietly getting on with it. Just like the majority of most religions.

SpawnChorus · 22/04/2011 18:54

"What you get with these threads is more like stopping having sex and then demanding that everyone else stops too."

Er no, I still have sex! It's just the porn that I have opted out of. Your interpretation of the analogy is more like saying that vegetarians don't eat...at all! Hmm

FWIW I hardly ever mention the fact that I'm veggie in RL, and certainly don't "force my choice on others". I only came on the thread to correct the crap spouted about it being impossible to feed the world population if everyone became veggie.

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 19:03

I agree ongar. The majority get on with it quietly and don't feel the need to convert everyone-not something that will ever happen.
It is the same with every choice-people make up their mind, it suits them and is therefore the way and is best for everyone.

CoteDAzur · 22/04/2011 20:13

"eating meat can also contribute to destroying the Amazonian rainforest"

Right Hmm

I agree with Winter.

CoteDAzur · 22/04/2011 20:25

"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 you are descended from a different branch of four-legged animals, but not eating meat does not come naturally to us Homo Sapiens.

Our entire morphology is geared towards two things (1) picking fruits (hands, mobile fingers, rotating wrists), and (2) catching/eating animals (eyes on the front of the face for tracking pray, teeth with conical roots, including incisor & canine teeth exclusive to carnivores).

If you don't want to eat meat, fine. But please don't act like this is how it's meant to be.

sharbie · 22/04/2011 20:28

i've evolved since then cote

SpringchickenGoldBrass · 22/04/2011 21:07

THe main reason not to eat dogs or cats is that they are carnivorous. Things which eat meat do not make very nice meat themselves.
So I am moderately in favour of there being a percentage of vegans and vegetarians around so I can eat them rather than the meat-eaters when the world ends and food supplies run out

InPraiseOfBacchus · 22/04/2011 21:17

"I afford the better meat by cooking vegetarian a lot of the time."

Hello. HELLO! [bugrin]

Just thought I'd take some time to comment on a calm opinion, since it's probably going to be most helpful.

I agree with this, and although I am a meat eater and ecologist, I am VERY aware of where my meat is from. If I can't afford what I consider ethical, I simply don't buy it. I eat it about once a week, but it's more just how it happens from day to day rather than a routine which I consciously follow.

As someone who has studied biology I can derive a nutritionally balanced meal with whatever I find around me in the kitchen, meat or no meat. To me it's just another foodstuff; neither a staple nor an evil substance

As for health issues, human beings have proved to be VERY versatile at surviving on diets which aren't biologically 'ideal' (i.e. vegans, AND people who eat too MUCH meat). People of ANY kind of diet can malnourish themselves or their children if they know or care too little about nutrition.

I'm off to make myself some dinner! Not telling anyone what's in it, though!

CoteDAzur · 22/04/2011 21:18

No, you haven't, sharbie. You just got spoilt for choice.

Get lost in a forest for a week and you will start hunting whatever you can in no time.

CoteDAzur · 22/04/2011 21:19

SGB Grin

sharbie · 22/04/2011 21:21

speak for yourself cote

sgb gerr off Grin

happybubblebrain · 22/04/2011 21:31

Doesn't the thought of dead corpse rotting in your stomach for up to a week put any of you meat eaters off? Maybe you just don't think about it. Bits of flesh and skin between your teeth? The animals you eat are you just like us with thoughts and feelings. It really is a revolting habit.

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 21:33

Not at all happybubblebrain-we are all different. I can't see why we should all think the same.(or even why it is desirable)

niceday · 22/04/2011 21:36

Interesting thought, SGB.

That is exactly what came to my mind when someone mentioned overpopulation and lack of food due to too many vegetarians :).

Why not occasionally eat people? We'll come up with criteria. So vegetarians are a better choice, and are often healthier.
We'll need to make sure they've had a good life too.

happybubblebrain · 22/04/2011 21:41

It's your choice what you eat. I don't want anyone to tell me what I can and can't eat either. I think veggies find it hard to understand why people want to eat meat given all the facts. I realise everyone is different, but it just seems like some people don't give some things much thought - they just go with their desires, it's a bit primative.

CoteDAzur · 22/04/2011 21:46

"dead corpse rotting in your stomach for up to a week put any of you meat eaters off?"

How on earth can you be so far from reality as to think meat remains undigested in the stomach for up to a week? Shock

An entire meal is digested and gone from the stomach within about three hours.

A quarter-pound of meat stimulates almost twice as much gastric juices as does a quarter-pound of bread or other carbohydrates, and is correspondingly better for normal digestion.

In physiology and biology this quicker, more ample response to meats than to breads seems to confirm the popular belief that man is fundamentally more carnivorous than herbivorous.

All that and more from Time.

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 21:48

I have no desire to ask people to eat meat, but I object to being told I am primative! I grew up in the countryside, very close to the food chain. If we wanted veg we went to the local small holding,if we were having chicken for dinner my aunt killed one. I have the facts and I have decided.
Are you a vegan happybubblebrain? Have you the facts on milk production? I could see me giving up dairy products long before meat.

CoteDAzur · 22/04/2011 21:48

"they just go with their desires, it's a bit primative [sic]"

LOL. Oh yes, I'm a bit primitive in going with my primal "desires" like water, food, and air Grin

kw1986 · 22/04/2011 22:15

I'm all for people making their own choices... BUT if the world did go veggie then only idiots who didn't know anything about nutrition would starve... There are people who are vegetarian for decades and are as fit as a fiddle health wise.

As has already been stated, the land we use for crazing could be turned into crops and would feed LOADS (can't remember the exact amount) more people than whatever was grazing on it.

I've also read things about us not having the capabilities to kill an animal ourselves so therefore we weren't meant to be eating this. I mean this as in we don't have claws or a mouth of sharp teeth or a vice grip jaw... And also our intestines are LOOOONG as they were designed to get every last nutrient out of a vegetarian diet. Meat starts to decompose in our intestines as its just not meant to be there that long. Meat eating animals (lions for example) have much shorter intestines which get the nutrients out the meat and then get the meat out the body before it starts decomposing...

I've been veggie for 2 years as has 3 yo. DD, I'll never go back to eating animals because it does make me really sad :(

exoticfruits · 22/04/2011 22:24

I wonder what would happen to the countryside? Huge fields of crops-poly tunnels everywhere and no farm animals? Having to go to a historical farm open to the public to even see a pig?

OldMumsy · 22/04/2011 22:25

Why did God make cows taste so nice?? I mean why??????!!

niceday · 22/04/2011 22:37

Absolutely OldMumsy!!! Why did He?!

I guess the same reason he made alcohol, drugs and gambling so addictive...

SpringchickenGoldBrass · 22/04/2011 22:44

KW1986: but human beings developed the ability to use tools to kill dinner with extremely quickly.

PiaThreeTimes · 22/04/2011 22:46

I haven't read the full thread, but have seen the same old selfish, lazy and ignorant views from meat eaters.

Meat is bad for human health, devastating to the environment and the height of cruelty to other living creatures.

Eating meat is incredibly irresponsible.