Pescatarianism as an 'ethical halfway house'?

[WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll]

Let me say at the start that I am an omnivore and that I fully respect people's choices as to their own dietary decisions (as long as they respect mine), but I am a bit baffled at some people's attitudes to pescatarianism.

Now, if you're pescatarian because you don't like beef, chicken, pork, lamb etc but do like fish then it makes perfect sense. However, there seems to be a widespread attitude amongst a not-insignificant number of people who pride themselves on their personal ethical choices that fish 'aren't really animals'.

When certain people who are vegetarians for ethical reasons find themselves in a foreign country/situation where eating vegetarian is very difficult, they often seem to settle on eating fish as a compromise - a 'halfway house' - in a way that they never would dream of with chicken or beef, however limited the alternative options.

We have a very dear friend who, whilst not 'evangelical' about it, has always described herself as, and prided herself on, being a vegetarian. We were shocked once when we went out for a meal and she ordered scampi. There were several vegetarian options, but she just 'fancied' the scampi. Fair enough. I expressed gentle surprise and she said "Oh, yes, I eat fish." I commented in a friendly way "Oh, I didn't know you were pescatarian." This made her very cross and she insisted "No, I am a VEGETARIAN!!" I left it there - her life, her choice - but I was somewhat perplexed.

Considering that it is perfectly possible to stun and kill a cow or sheep in a relatively humane way with little pain or advance knowledge/fear (obviously, still totally unacceptable to many); whereas it is impossible to catch and kill a fish without causing it trauma and drowning it.

As I say, it's entirely up to everybody to choose what they are willing to eat for whatever reason, but I just wonder why some people will pointedly not eat 'anything with a face' for ethical reasons - unless it's a fish; and then get offended (OK, it might just be my friend on this one) when you describe them using the neutral term that was specifically developed to distinguish them from vegetarians.

I realise that vegans mostly see ALL vegetarians as 'halfway-house fence-sitters' for not eating the remains of a slaughtered animal but for happily enjoying the products of their 'misery' - taking milk away from calves, eating eggs that leads to male chicks being thrown into a mincer as soon as they're born etc. - although, even then, how many vegans take a stand and actively refuse to buy produce originating from farms that use pesticides and thus cause the deaths of animals in order that humans can eat?

But I digress. No intention at all of insulting or criticising people for their own choices - I'm just interested to understand the rationale behind permanent or temporary pescatarianism amongst those who blanket-refuse to eat all other kinds of animals for ethical reasons.

Your friend seems annoying, making faces at what others eat (in any case) and more so for claiming one thing and doing otherwise. Then acting like she’s not a hypocrite.

Beyond making sure my children eat healthily, I don’t worry about what other people eat.

I mostly eat vegetables and animal products (dairy, honey, eggs) and occasionally fish.

So, by that I’m pescatarian. I buy the eggs and honey from local farms via farmers markets. I try as much as I can to be ethical about it, there’s no perfect system.

No one is perfect, and for the most ethical way to eat, I think we’d have to grow/care for what produces all of our own food. Mass farming has its effects on the environment too.

I also chose it for health reasons as my bloodwork once came out sky high for iron. I thought why not cut out all animal land meat, not just one? Especially after I saw a video of a pig trying to rescue it’s friend when the men put it on the chopping block. It actually attacked them.

It's not rational anyway to think eating plants instead of animals is in some way more ethical - it just demonstrates the person's inability to empathise or relate to plants in the way they do animals, so claiming it's about ethics in my view makes them hypocrites.

Anyone going to comment on this piece of brilliance or shall we just quietly move on...?

I already did. I wouldn't have used such judgy strong language myself, but I think it's a valid way of seeing things. Nobody but a tiny minority of weirdos eats people, as they are, well, like us. We see animals as one step of life away from humans, so for many of us, we have no objection, but for many others, that's too close for comfort. Plants are a further step away, so just about nobody objects to eating them.

Indeed, we're all allowed to choose what we're each comfortable with, but except for fruitarians and scavengers, we have to accept that our continued lives rely on the death of other living things to a greater or lesser extent.

Can someone explain how you drown a fish

Leave it out of water. Humans drown by being in water for too long without coming up to breathe, as we cannot breathe in water. Fish are the opposite to us, in that they cannot breathe outside of water.

My OH is pescitarean but describes himself as vegetarian just because some people haven't heard of a pescitarean. But if corrected like you did he'd agree with you. Your friend is not a vegetarian. You either are or you're not. What I hate is the dipping in and out sort. It puts others out. Fine if you are ethically committed to something. Not fine if tomorrow you have a bacon sandwich for breakfast.

Cannibalism aside, it's up to the individual what he or she eats and it's no-one's place to criticise or accuse of hypocrisy.

I must say that our friend is a very good one and she doesn't make comments as much now; even when she used to more, they were usually fairly good-natured.

If she'd said "Yes, I'm a pescatarian" or even just "I don't normally eat fish, but I can't resist this time" I wouldn't have judged her at all. It was just the insistence that she, who doesn't eat other meat but does eat fish, was so insistent that she wasn't a pescatarian, which is a widely-understood description for people who eat fish but no other meat, but was actually a vegetarian, which is a term for people who eat no meat at all.

It wasn't meant to be an insult, just a clarification where I'd previously misunderstood her inaccurate self-description. Is identifying somebody with her diet as a pescatarian any more an insult than, say, identifying a native of Portugal as Portuguese? Isn't it just a neutral descriptive term - nothing more and nothing less?

It was just the insistence that she, who doesn't eat other meat but does eat fish, was so insistent that she wasn't a pescatarian

Apologies for my weird, nonsensical phrasing there.

Many fish are farmed so don't have a good life, and farming practices can be polluting. Prawn production in Asia in particular.

I don't understand why people feel the need to be labelled, it's like they want a a badge as much as making the sacrifice. Why can't people just quietly make their own choices without a big song and dance about it?

It depends why people are eating a pescatarian diet. If it's because of animal cruelty it's a bit hypocritical but if it's because of health or environmental reasons it makes sense.

A plant based diet supplemented with fish is easier to maintain than a plant based diet alone if you've cut out meat for health reasons.

Environmental damage caused by livestock i.e. methane, land lost to growing animal crops etc. is a major contributing factor to climate change so removing any meat from your diet helps. I've completely cut out eating beef for this reason.

From a world hunger perspective eating fish is more ethical than eating meat. If we didn't use so many crops to feed animals we would have enough food to feed every single person on earth.

Basically anything we can do to eat less meat is worthwhile even if you just go meat free once a week.

I'm not asking anybody to justify themselves or accusing them of hypocrisy - just a bit baffled as to, firstly, why certain people make a public point of not eating animals for ethical reasons but somehow don't consider fish as animals; and secondly, why they object to a neutral descriptive term.

Taking my earlier analogy, if somebody who had been born in Portugal, to Portuguese parents, and always lived in that country, but then suddenly took offence at being described as Portuguese and insisted that they were in fact Spanish - because they were from the Iberian peninsula, where Spain is also located.... wouldn't that seem just a little bit odd?

I've not eaten meat for over 30 years including any product that has gelatine or any animal product in . I have occasionally eaten fish but not in a regular basis ( perhaps a few times a year )
You could dip your toe into trying various ways of eating to see how it goes.
Perhaps try eating an all vegetarian diet for 3 months, then if you feel if you are missing out add fish .

p.s. she definitely is a pescatarian and I'm not sure why she'd be offended by this

My BIL is a 'born again vegetarian' it's only been a month, but he bores us rigid with his stories and self absorption. This is the same man who for the last 25 years has been sitting at family meals with us and hadn't once noticed that I don't eat meat at all, nor do I feel the need to tell people or go on about it . Just goes to show how much he notices eh ? (I bet he'll still have turkey at Christmas.)

A plant based diet supplemented with fish is easier to maintain than a plant based diet alone if you've cut out meat for health reasons.

Everything else you said makes very good sense, but I would just ask how you can supplement your diet with fish if you've cut out meat? Meat is the flesh of dead animals and fish are animals. Why the distinction?

I think it’s about how people feel about fish. They are, I don’t know, quite hard to relate to?
People can and do have heart connections to other mammals, so they can relate to any suffering they go through.
It’s just a thought. I at be wrong.
You could also say that factory farming is more distressing for animals than being slaughtered, and lots of fish are caught from wild.

Ethically speaking vegetarianism is a half way house as there’s cruelty and suffering in the dairy industry, so vegetarians may as well eat a bit of fish or even meat occasionally if they fancy it.

I've not eaten meat for over 30 years including any product that has gelatine or any animal product in . I have occasionally eaten fish but not in a regular basis

But this is what baffles me. How have you not eaten meat if you have eaten fish?

@666onmyhead

Haha! Isn't that the case with Morrissey too? He makes a huge public display of being a vegetarian and campaigning against eating meat whilst his erstwhile Smiths bandmate, Johnny Marr, reportedly just quietly gets on with his own personal choice to eat a vegan diet.

To be clear: I think everyone should eat whatever they want to and not judge anyone else's eating habits/decisions.

However:

I expressed gentle surprise and she said "Oh, yes, I eat fish." I commented in a friendly way "Oh, I didn't know you were pescatarian." This made her very cross and she insisted "No, I am a VEGETARIAN!!" I left it there - her life, her choice - but I was somewhat perplexed.

This is one of my pet peeves! People who insist on calling themselves vegetarian when they eat fish make life so difficult for vegetarians like me, who have to explain to restaurants that no, I cannot eat their trout even though they have labelled it the "vegetarian" option (and many, many other examples over the years).

OP, I agree with you, fish is flesh the same way meat is, but I think pescatarianism often is a "half-way house" for people who want to be vegetarian eventually but want to "ease themselves in". I stopped eating red and white meat nearly 40 years ago now , but continued to eat fish for another 5 years or so, partly because it was much harder to find vegetarian alternatives or eat out as a vegetarian back then. I eventually stopped eating fish because it became more and more difficult to justify to myself, when I considered my reasons for not eating meat.

I don't understand why people feel the need to be labelled, it's like they want a a badge as much as making the sacrifice. Why can't people just quietly make their own choices without a big song and dance about it?

I'd love this! I have no need for a label, it's other people who seem to want to label me. Every time I order a vegan dish in a restaurant (which I always do if one is available), I will be asked if I'm a vegan. I say that I eat a vegan diet most of the time, but as I occasionally eat meat, fish or eggs, I'm not a vegan. I then get questioned on what meat and what circumstances, and how often, and why I'm not 100% a vegan, and how I make sure I get enough nutrients, and usually a justification as to why they eat meat (I don't care and I'm not judging). I have learned to just change the subject. Very boring.

Because I choose not to eat meat.
I did not call myself a vegetarian , I just stayed I have not eaten meat for over 30 years.
Some people will eat meat every day but would not entertain eating offal .

If I hadn't heard the term pescatarian on MN I would be baffled to encounter it in real life. Have no idea what it meant. Maybe that explains the OP's friend's reaction.

Technically I was pescatarian for most of 17 yrs... except I wasn't coz the term hadn't been invented yet. I ate like that for environmental impact reasons, not ethics. I didn't understand then as much about seas being overfished & fish farming. Or I might have not eaten fish too.

MN is the only place I know where people are het up about definitions of how people eat and want logic in the labels.

Jen

I think that's just people being weird about meals with no meat in them.

I'm not vegetarian and eat meat a about 2 or 3 times a week, but I'll often choose food without meat in which nearly always causes someone to say 'I didn't know you were vegetarian' or if they later see me eating meat, 'you're not vegetarian any more then' because in their tiny minds ordering macaroni cheese, vegetable soup, curries with paneer, pulses and vegetables in them, falafels and hummus etc etc is not just an omnivore eating normal food it's a vegetarian eating the special weirdy vegetarian food. I just give them a confused look and say 'I'm not vegetarian, its just food'.

I eat like that because I really love the whole mezze platter type stuff - I could literally live on halloumi, falafel, hummus, tabbouleu and pittas.

I also don't like meat with melted cheese so no cheeseburgers, pepperoni pizza or similar for me and I don't really like meat curry either, much preferring paneer and spinach or something with chick peas in.

Indeed, we're all allowed to choose what we're each comfortable with, but except for fruitarians and scavengers, we have to accept that our continued lives rely on the death of other living things to a greater or lesser extent.

So do their lives (unless they live naked, drinking streamwater on a mountain top. The Sunday Times devoted a whole supplement to the subject in the late '80s, early '90s and concluded that was the only way you can avoid ANY animal cruelty - not sure what would happen if say a gnat flew into that stream water ).

We are all hypocrites.

So do their lives (unless they live naked, drinking streamwater on a mountain top. The Sunday Times devoted a whole supplement to the subject in the late '80s, early '90s and concluded that was the only way you can avoid ANY animal cruelty - not sure what would happen if say a gnat flew into that stream water confused). We are all hypocrites.

I agree, which is why hypocrisy shouldn't even come into it. Vegans shouldn't have a go at people who try to reduce their consumption (but not give up completely) and omnivores shouldn't have a go at vegans who have a haribo once a decade. I think it's just a case of doing as much as we can.

BarbaraofSeville Yes, exactly!