To ask why people are so against giving up meat?

[NewCracker]

Just that really, why are people so against giving up meat?
Without a doubt we know it's better for the environment, we know it's better for our health, we know it's better for animal welfare and it's actually quite expensive. But still as soon as you mention to the greater public about cutting their meat consumption, they get defensive and almost offended.
Would you ever consider giving it up, if you do consume it now? If not, why not?
I'm expecting some hate, this is MN after all, but I am genuinely just curious. Not trying to rattle feathers.

I think you have not read my previous reply to you earlier, I specifically pointed out I have zero anger at vegans. I could not care in the slightest what people chose to consume, what I do have an issue is are when people try to force their ideals on others and try to push false hoods about all people who consume meat.

I have plenty of vegan friends, who are as knowledgeable as me in the industry I work in and we get along just fine. That is their prerogative and I have mine, as i said numerous times meat has a place in our consumption and there are many times the affects of farming and management are a bonus to our ecosystems and environment.

There is no blanket statement that is factual that states one is bad and and the other is good that's bullshit and that's where I stand up to correct people. Unfortunately as with most forums and human nature people identify one fact separate it from its context and then spread it as gospel with little knowledge of the wider implications and facts surrounding their sound bite.

The materials for your mobile phone are often mined,in hazardous conditions, by child labourers , who are paid pennies.And that's before we get to the environmental issues caused by the mining. Most people don't think about that.

@Fernbreeze i suppose my feeling would be that arguments that go against the status quo are subject to so much more analysis though.

If a vegan says ‘you shouldn’t eat meat’, you get a crowd of angry people responding ‘well what about grouse moors? Rats get run over in soy fields! Quorn is UPF!’.

Whereas, an omnivore like me can say ‘it’s okay to have a burger’ and I’m never ever expected to justify myself or source my facts or account for the cost of my statement.

It’s a bigger idea than just eating meat I guess and probably not something you can reasonably answer 😂

Was this in response to me? Sorry but I’m still a little lost as to why we’re talking about mobile phones now…

Because people get carried away with the whole being veggie is good for the planet when there are all sorts of other things going on. And mining for the minerals in mobile phones is bad for many reasons, but I can't imagine many would give those up either.

The number of people on here condoning animal abuse and saying they don't care about killing animals is quite disheartening.

But at least we are having the debate.

A great source of information which backs a vegan world is the excellent book This is Vegan Propaganda by Ed Winters.

@Fernbreeze - maybe you'd like to debunk it for us.

It can't be a surprise that people who eat meat are not overly swayed by moral arguments about killing animals, surely. Everyone who eats meat knows where it comes from.

You mean all the people who seem not to give the shiniest of shits about the enormous amounts of animals directly killed through grain, vegetable and fruit farming? Never mind the massive destruction of biodiversity caused by mono cropping. Yeah, I get how disheartening that is alright.

The issue is when you bring up a choice which is considered unethical, many people get hostile because you are bringing the moral realities into question which people don’t like.
If we were discussing child brides in impoverished countries, as most people don’t participate in it, they would not condone it and would speak out openly about the horrors that these children face.
People are more likely to pick and choose what they find abhorrent but if it’s them taking part in it, it’s a whole new issue. I’ve always struggled to understand why some people are so angry with people choosing not to buy into the meat industry.

But @Wanderingowl we all eat grains, vegetables, and fruit - it’s not just vegans and vegetarians.

Most monocrops must be eaten by the 90% of us that are omnivores.

Why is it a problem for vegans but not for you and me? Surely we’re more to blame for that massive destruction of biodiversity?

No hate here, I don’t want to give up meat as I like to eat it. I’m from a farming background and I know the ins and outs of producing meat and I am very conscious of only buying meat from reputable sources.

not sure how you think giving up meat would help animal welfare as if farmers didn’t farm animals they wouldn’t exist in the way you think of them to day.

we are all on the food chain we all live and die and that is no different for animals.

I sometimes wonder what world would be like with only 0.5-3% of the current count of livestock. Whole landscapes have been shaped because keeping sheep had potential profit. And once all the livestock can't exist, pet cats can't be far behind in disappearing. There'd be no industry to feed them.

What about other carnivore pets, like snakes?

Local owl sanctuary feeds gassed day old boy chicks to the captive owls. Cheap & safe. So ... what would be fed to the owls in sanctuary if the whole egg-laying industry stopped existing?

This is basically my position.

Already debunked, I have no interest in anything Ed winters says in his book.

Ed Winters has a bachelor's degree in film and TV production and a self taught activist and vegan educator from the UK.

Why should I even care what he says? 😂

The environmental argument against meat has most definitely not been made.

You have to include all the by products from the livestock industry to make a true judgement of the environmental impact.

By products include leather, wool, feathers and down, fertiliser, emergency food aid, baby formula, pet foods, glues and adhesives used in construction, materials used in medical research, cosmetics, confectionery and many more. All these would have be manufactured or we would have to live without them.

When the vegan lobby can put forward a convincing case, one which doesn’t make up stuff, twist stuff and ignore stuff that doesn’t suit it then I might start to think about giving up meat.

There's a lot of posters who talk about evolution and how we’re meant to eat meat and that we’re designed to eat meat, but there’s many things humans are and are not designed or evolved to do. There are things we’re not designed to do but that we do, and there are things we are designed to do but don’t do.

We've evolved to be physically active but there are plenty of people who laze around eating junk food. Or stare at computer screens all day. There are better examples obviously of the many changes to the human lifestyles of today, that we’re not evolved for and that will probably affect us for better or worse way down the line. The mental health that many people suffer these days could be one such example.

But that’s how evolution happens. It’s not static. Our ancestors weren’t all humans for the past millions of years. They did stuff that for them at the time they weren’t designed for, and over time, they evolved and adapted. And we do that now with many things. Evolution doesn’t have to stop here.

But meat eaters looove bringing up evolution and how we’re designed to eat meat when it comes to this kind of topic. Never mind that they probably go against what they're designed for in other aspects.

I swear these types of people treat evolution like some kind of code of honour that they have to rigidly stick to or something.

Yes I do try and honour evolution, not for no particular reason but for my health. We've not physiologically evolved since we were hunter-gatherers. We are not, as you say, evolved to be obese and sedentary. We are certainly not evolved to constantly eat ultra-processed food, sugar, refined carbohydrates and seed oils.

Eating meat is a great, easy way to consume very nutritious,very digestible protein.

Some people really must love food so much
so long as it tastes nice they are willing to overlook all manners of atrocities
I can’t imagine prioritising me and my belly that much

😂

so long as it tastes nice they are willing to overlook all manners of atrocities

Not at all. An athlete who is also a qualified nutritionalist that I follow, Dave MacLeod, doesn't even personally like meat that much but he eats it for the large variety of positive health effects he gains from it.

But I'm not pretending to be morally superior. I'm not pretending animals don't die in vast numbers for my diet. Animals die for my meat and they die for my bread and my jam. But more don't die for me as an omnivore. I eat far, far less monocrop produced food than a vegan because my protein, calcium, fat, amino acid, creatine, collagen, choline, vit D, vit B12, iron, etc needs are met through animal sources. There are strong arguments that less animals die for my diet than a vegans but whether or not that's true, vast amounts of animals die for all of our diets. I'm just not in denial.

@Fernbreeze well I surely don't know what you do want then. Your hostility oozes out on to the page. You clearly don't have any respect for any of the posters on this thread who don't agree with you. You asked for vegan arguments yet it comes across that you are trying to superciliously ridicule anyone who doesn't agree with you. Maybe ask one of your vegan colleagues to explain and actually listen openly to their response.

And no, mono cropping is much more destructive to biodiversity than meat and dairy farming. That's genuinely inarguable.

Mainly because I have IBS and can’t tolerate much dairy, beans or pulses which rules out many vegetarian options and alternative sources of protein. I don’t eat loads of meat but I don’t wish to give it up.

It’s not sustainable for animals to be produced and processed in the longer term, this has been backed up by scientists and those in a similar field and proven to be harmful to the planet. Reducing meat consumption is something I feel humans have the ability to do, many just choose not do it, you don’t even need to avoid meat altogether, reducing would be hugely beneficial.