Relieving yourself outdoors is natural, and we've been doing it for ages. Killing intraspecies rivals/competitors is natural, and we've been doing it for ages. Dying of a preventable disease is natural, and we've been doing it for ages. I don't think we should base our behavior off naturalistic fallacies.
Is eating meat better for your health than abstaining? Usually not. Is eating meat better for the environment? Usually not. It's very easy to just eat meat and dismiss veganism as impractical because that's the socially dominant position to have.
It's easier than ever to transition to a more vegan diet. There are hundreds of replacement products to ease your transition if it's something you care about. There are ethical, environmental, and health-conscious reasons to reduce or eliminate meat consumption. Conversely, many arguments for eating meat are just appeals to tradition or appeals to nature. The industrial production of meat, which is universally detested, actually supplies the vast majority of meat consumed in the US.
I‘m all for reducing meat consumption. We don’t need meat every day, and maybe not even every week. Everybody except meat processing companies would be better off.
My personal view is that complete meat avoidance will lead to long term health challenges, 5-10y down the road. There‘s too much valid-sounding criticism of the china study to just believe its conclusions. Some low-mercury seafood every now and then does loads for your health.
Fishing is another dilemma. Technically as per above definition eating fish (unless bred) would be fine, but then again we've destroyed so much of the fish population already. If I were out at sea then sure, but just for pleasure right now while being land based? No thanks.
*) this first part of the sentence alone is enough for me to not want to have any part of it
If you think it's sadistic to hunt with the stopping power (and typically quicker death) of a rifle, you're not going to like bow hunting much.
So even in that sense, using a bow is more "sadistic", since it amounts to causing suffering to a living being for the sake of more challenging entertainment for oneself.
(And, of course, a bow would be a lot more painful to the animal, even in the best case of a non-botched shot.)
He had a friend who said it was harder than he thought, and invited him to come along sometime and see if he found it easy. Of course he went out, and even when lead in the direction of the deer couldn't manage to get one.
After that he was hooked. He had a similar story about eating the offal from the deer, and now thinks it's among the best bits.
More like target practice than hunting in my opinion. They did get a ton of game management tags and they were really targeting the non-typical deer (ones with messed up racks).
So it was a sad kind of "hunting" but did seem to serve a purpose.
If you mean the ability to take more game with a gun than with a bow, that is controlled by hunting licensing and game tags. Without tags and quotas, bow hunters would decimate animal populations just as well, through sheer numbers.
The skill side is a way to deserve it.
Fishing with a rod in a river versus a large boat with a big net. It's just too easy to wipe fishes without them standing a chance. A gun is similar to me.
I understand that you don't want to inflict pain and I don't want either, but as long as it's ~balanced, it's fair game.
Also, note that these animals have acute senses, hearing, smell.. it's not there for no reason. They also run fast to chase or run away. It's just how it is. I find balance in having to work for it, so I know deeply and appreciate few.
And that all is completely orthogonal to tools used. I guarantee you that if you only allowed hunting with e.g. a wooden spear, but removed any other restrictions, deer would be wiped out very quickly in US. There's just too many people, and in such a large population a subset that is both skilled and interested is "large enough".
But in any case, your original comment accused people who hunt with guns of sadism. Which very different than fairness.
Firstly one has to get in the right position to get a good shot. Of course bad hunters could take carefree pot shots, but they would be widely condemned by their peers. The right position means you have to be:
- close enough. Many forms of hunting will take all day to carefully track an animal and if you're lucky at the end of the day take one careful shot
- from the right direction. You wouldn't take a shot from behind the animal
- able to fire safely. You wouldn't fire at an deer on top of a hill as you have to think about where the bullet will go afterwards
Some forms of hunting, like a driven bird shoot can involve just standing and waiting for birds to come in your direction then take careful shots at them. With this type of shooting I can see more resonance with your objection but hitting a moving target is easier said than done and etiquette on these considers a well execute hard shot much better than going for easy ones.
For many other forms of hunting the actual shot is a very small part of the whole activity and whatever weapon is being used makes much less difference.
Then one also has to remember that there are many different types of gun. Take for example using a large caliber rifle and distances over 1km vs hunting with a handgun. Both require huge amounts of skill in handling the weapon on top of the other general hunting skills.
Some countries require a permit to go hunting, which follows a lot of study and then an exam. This material goes into a lot of depth, and actually discharging the weapon is a surprisingly small amount of this material.
Technology-wise a gun is an improvement on exhaustion hunting, or using more primitive projectile weapons, but is far from making the whole process overwhelmingly easy.
Nothing detests me more than killing a free creature. I absolutely loathe hunting and fishing, and I wish it was either made completely illegal, or the hunting of the hunters legalized (I heard comments that they do it for the thrill, so having another hunter on your back should be even more exciting!).
I do eat pieces of farmed meat from time to time, though.
That said I wouldn't have anything against making hunting hunters legal. :D At least if they're above a certain income level and thus don't have a practical need to hunt.
I know it's in jest, but I hunt (very occasionally) mostly to remind myself of the reality that the meat I eat comes from the taking of a life. It has nothing to do with physical need.
I think it's much more wrong to eat meat and hide how it is obtained from one's self than it is to stay at least tentatively connected to the reality.
That's true, but I think a similar argument can be made that any situation where the more powerful control the less powerful is natural, e.g. slavery, patriarchy, etc.
That said, I think the first step for everyone is to realize the cognitive dissonance that modern society tries to keep in place when it comes to eating meat (i.e. meat is just a nice, tasty hunk of protein that comes wrapped in plastic and styrofoam from the grocery storeand is in no way related to that adorable cow video I saw on Instagram). If that were more common I think many people would try to at least consume animal products more humanely as you have suggested.
I agree that last 50 years made us completely oblivious to reality. Which is probably the first reason for waste and over consumption.
our grandparents still lived in an era where they were a lot close to nature (vegies or animal) they used to do that with their own hands. To me that's the least you can do. And it has a lot of individual and social benefits too. You know more what is around, you enjoy more what you have, it creates group rituals.
Honest question. Are people this ignorant? I grew up around ranches so the source of meat is blindingly obvious to me. Are people really seeing beef in the grocery store as magic that comes from nowhere?
If, to eat meat, people had to kill the animal themselves, what proportion of meat eaters do you think would continue the practice? I obviously don't know the answer, but I suspect it would be far less than 100%.
It could be that the alienation brought by modern slaughter is the keystone in bringing about a substantial reduction in the number of eaters of animals; now that would be ironic!
It feels strange writing 'have never craved it'...ghoulish or something. Vegetarianism/veganism just becomes a habit, and once you're outside the, er, 'meat world', you can see the brainwashing, it's not pretty. All those heart-warming tv ads for eating lamb etc. (Kill and eat cute little sheep!??) The word 'meat' sounds...well, something akin to how 'long pig' sounds - somewhat disturbing. (I did a cartoon once of a cow saying "Hi! I'm a meat animal.") I hate how the fish in the oceans are referred to as 'fish stock', as if they only exist as food for humans. It bugs me more that humans are eating them all, and polluting the oceans with nets in doing it!
Personally, I'm a lazy vegan - I do vegan shopping, but don't refuse everything offered with some dairy in it. That would be a pain. Cheesy dishes just don't taste good to me now, they seem...smelly (e.g. it's getting harder to find pesto without cheese added..blech) But I infrequently think about what I eat or don't. Apart from these few times on HN, I haven't thought about it in years. I was more of a vegan activist when young...but I don't think I changed anyone's mind. It seems almost impossible for someone to see that something nearly everyone does is totally unethical. I can't remember what flipped the switch in my head. I think it just dawned on me one day.
It also takes commitment. I've been vegan before and I'm trying it again - usually stomach problems force me to at least retain cheese. I think with Elmhurst's new peanut protein shakes, Ill be able to stick to it. Give the vanilla one a try - they are amazing and so much better than soy.