Hacker News Reader

Comment by 12ian34 | Hacker News Reader

When I lived in NL, I took a trip to Maastricht which is a beautiful place right in the South and tried a popular local dish - Zoervleis[0] which is traditionally horse meat. It was delicious. It always amuses me that when I tell this story, it's often met with disgust - even by meat-eaters! "But, how could you eat horse! They're so nice!". Yeah... you eat beef, have you ever met a cow up close? They're also lovely creatures! I see this as double-standards - similar to how most meat-eaters also seem so disgusted by the idea of eating dogs in certain parts of Asia.

[0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoervleis

View on HN

> It always amuses me that when I tell this story, it's often met with disgust - even by meat-eaters! "But, how could you eat horse! They're so nice!". Yeah... you eat beef, have you ever met a cow up close? They're also lovely creatures! I see this as double-standards - similar to how most meat-eaters also seem so disgusted by the idea of eating dogs in certain parts of Asia.

Doesn't this more indicate that many people deep-down think that eating animals is wrong and have these thoughts overridden by cultural preferences and tribalism, and that instead of resolving the above double-standard by embracing eating every kind of animal they could resolve it by not eating eat any? Where do you draw the line? You can find places and times in history where people ate dolphin, whales, cat, gorilla, and elephants too I think.

> Doesn't this more indicate that many people deep-down know that eating animals is wrong

I am severely limiting my meat intake, both from environmental as well as animal welfare pov. But what you express is an entirely cultural opinion. Humans are by nature omnivore animals. They always ate meat. But we do it now on industrial scale, eating way too much. There's very few hunter-gatherers in their traditional habitat driving a spear to the wild animal's neck left.

> I am severely limiting my meat intake, both from environmental as well as animal welfare pov. But what you express is an entirely cultural opinion.

I think claims about environmental damage and animal welfare are objective, not opinion.

> Humans are by nature omnivore animals. They always ate meat. But we do it now on industrial scale, eating way too much.

This is just naturalistic fallacy. We do lots of things in our modern lifestyles the last 100 years we never used to and stopped doing things we used to commonly do before that. Humans don't require meat to thrive any more plus climate change is a new problem we have to adapt to.

Really deep down, i.e. at the level of hunger and what looks tasty to your body, eating animals is very right. They are a fantastic source of nutrition.

However, we also like to domesticate animals, as companions and helpers. Hence the conflict.

We eat way too much meat, but strict vegetarianism and especially veganism does not scale to the whole population of the planet - animals are simply too efficient at converting what we can grow everywhere but can't eat (grass mostly) to what we can eat. Simply, an exclusively plant based diet would require the elimination (by starvation?) of who knows, 90% of the world population?

Of course, strict vegetarianism and especially veganism is not much more than social signalling for a particular and narrow demographic - the cultural preferences and tribalism you allude to.

> We eat way too much meat, but strict vegetarianism and especially veganism does not scale to the whole population of the planet - animals are simply too efficient at converting what we can grow everywhere but can't eat (grass mostly) to what we can eat. Simply, an exclusively plant based diet would require the elimination (by starvation?) of who knows, 90% of the world population?

Which is not true at all, most meat is cow beef, pig and poultry fed with grains. Grains that we have to grow, and take land and water away from growing other things that could feed us directly.

This would only be true if everyone ate grass-fed beef - which would be premium and 10x more expensive- and a lot more goat and similar that can be fed low quality grass.

> animals are simply too efficient at converting what we can grow everywhere but can't eat ... Simply, an exclusively plant based diet would require the elimination (by starvation?) of who knows, 90% of the world population?

"Half of the world’s habitable land is used for agriculture, with most of this used to raise livestock for dairy and meat. Livestock are fed from two sources – lands on which the animals graze and land on which feeding crops, such as soy and cereals, are grown. How much would our agricultural land use decline if the world adopted a plant-based diet?

Research suggests that if everyone shifted to a plant-based diet we would reduce global land use for agriculture by 75%. This large reduction of agricultural land use would be possible thanks to a reduction in land used for grazing and a smaller need for land to grow crops.

...

In the charts here we see the energy and protein efficiency of different animal products. This tells us what percentage of the calories or grams of protein that we feed livestock are later available to consume as meat and dairy. As an example: beef has an energy efficiency of about 2%. This means that for every 100 kilocalories you feed a cow, you only get 2 kilocalories of beef back. In general we see that cows are the least efficient, followed by lamb, pigs then poultry."

https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-diets

Most of what we eat are grasses. Rice, wheat, corn, etc.

Grazing cattle on marginal land is extremely labor intensive. So most cattle calories come from potential or actual farmland. Either as highly productive pasture or crops optimized to feed cattle. Especially as grazing clause significant damage to marginal land resulting in desertification or other issues if not carefully managed.

I think 100% would be apt

More likely that we've been disconnected from the realities of the food chain; in general people didn't eat horses because they're more valuable as work animals vs meat.

Farmers et al who deal with animals day in and day out don't seem to have much problem also eating them.

No, it indicates that people are completely unaware and disconnected from their food. Most people would also be disgusted by having to pluck a chicken, slaughter their meat themselves, or even just make a sausage. Hell, I've seen people disgusted at harvesting vegetables from the garden, eating berries off the bush, or fermenting anything (Oh no, dirt and bugs and bacteria!).

The psychology of eating animals is definitely a great example of how people compartmentalize and simply avoid thinking about the details too much in order to evade cognitive dissonance. Which is also why so many respond with hostility when prompted to do so. (Disclaimer: I'm an omnivore.)

As an omnivore, at some point avoiding the dissonance became a zen of embracing the dissonance.

tbh i dont get why people arent ok eating horse or dog. i've had both and they're fine, like why is this a problem? i will be the first to call out veganism but i also have literally been lectured by meat eaters about how me eating those 2 is wrong and then they have eaten a burger or steak in the same day.

Dog is clearly a special case. It's the most common pet in the USA; many people consider their dog part of their family.

Dogs are known for forming such strong connections to their humans. On the spectrum between farmed-for-food and totally-off-limits, it's not hard to guess where we would put dogs.

It's just like indians and cows. Cows have a special place in their culture, therefore they don't eat beef.

I’m not a vegan but I had a few cows growing up that basically became like pets. They would come up to me just to spend time and receive physical affection, they knew my voice, etc. I’m not sure if this reason for not eating dogs stands up to scrutiny for me.

ya lots of farm kids have pets like that and lots of us end up eating them later

Many social norms are arbitrary. People don't do things because you're not supposed to do things and nobody else does (or at least admits doing).

Animals that are both higher intelligence in our perception and closer to us day to day will fall into the category of disgust, imo. For instance, I've had dogs my whole life. They're pretty deep creatures with emotions, intelligence, and personalities all their own. If you tell me that you ate what I have a personal connection to, what I consider my family - It's hard not to look at you in disgust. Similar to the disgust that people feel when they hear someone ate human flesh. The case with horses is similar.

Cows, chickens, turkeys, pigs, and fish on the other hand are not similar at all. They often have short memories, and live pretty simple lives. Thus, it's a bit easier to look at them as purposes for lunch. I'd be curious if Hindus feel relative disgust over seeing folks eat cow, I think that might bolster this theory a bit.

That said, although I feel disgust over that stuff I don't really say anything. If offered, I'd probably smirk and say, "That's not for me". Other cultures are allowed to, in my mind, enjoy things that might disgust me and vice versa.

Edit:

I'm also curious that if one day when all meat is lab grown if we'd ever feel those feelings of disgust. If the loss of what we view as potential personal connection is removed, it's entirely possible we wouldn't feel disgust at all.

Cows have much larger brains than dogs and are quite intelligent, and so are pigs. The "dogs are special" argument is a familiarity thing or perhaps a statement that dogs evolved to more effectively manipulate human emotions.

As I said, it probably has to do more with our aggregate personal connection to animals in a given culture, because that will influence how we perceive their intelligence.

If you've read the studies I did, they're not very good. For instance, the test that asserted a pig is smarter than a dog was where they were tasked with moving a joystick designed for a monkey that controlled a cursor that they wanted moved into a blue region on a screen. I'll let you make your own judgements about how sound the testing with respect to the assertion is. My dog certainly has eyes that can be tuned to manipulate me, but she also has a sizeable vocabulary, a lot of tonal intuition, and this little heat seeker in her nose that quite literally syncs her heart rate with mine. There's a good amount of theory that says this adds up to empathy.

Cows may have larger brains, but they also have much bigger bodies. They aren't anywhere near as intelligent as dogs.

Now, with pigs, you have a point. They're indeed very smart.

I justify eating pigs by reasoning that pigs will happily eat humans if they get a chance (a few pig farmers lose their lives that way every year, plus there's the occasional serial killer...). Turnabout is fair play.

> Animals that are both higher intelligence in our perception and closer to us day to day will fall into the category of disgust, imo.

Think in general this holds to animals seen as pets. Like in the West with adorable little guinea pigs, which in the Andes Mountain regions are a food source. And it makes sense too if you live high in the mountains that get snowed in in the winter, to have a bunch of them living in your home.

I think a lot of it comes from ancient tribal customs. Many pastoral/nomadic groups, like the Aryans, would only eat horses as a last resort. The horse was so important to the tribe's survival. Incidentally, the same taboo was probably applied to eating cows, as that animal was extremely important for Indo-Aryans' survival. Over time the original meaning of the taboo is lost, it just continues to get enforced by each subsequent generation.

In most cases, if you grow up eating something, it's normal. If you don't, it's unusual. Sometimes people think things are disgusting when they really mean they're not used to them. I think that explains about 95% of it.

me with escargot

I think there’s an important distinction to be made between being disgusted by the thought of eating escargots and being morally judgemental of the thought of eating horses. That said, it is not a far-fetched idea that moral disgust has its roots in the more visceral feeling of physical disgust, as evinced by the alimentary restrictions imposed by some religions.

having grown up around farm animals I never really felt either dissonance or the need to compartmentalize.

You can have a relationship with animals and raise them but they are also food. You can ride horses and eat them, to me that isn't contradictory because killing for sustenance isn't an evil act, and if the animals are raised well and kept in good conditions and live happy lives there's no issue.

I think the psychological issues are mostly about anthropomorphizing animals and not having personal experience with the food chain, killing animals for sustenance or quite frankly death which most people now have a completely pathological relationship to.

Yes, I realize that historically in agrarian societies, common folk in particular have had a very different relationship with animals than most modern Westerners, and some people still do. I did not mean to imply that compartmentalization is something inherent or unavoidable, just that clearly in the modern Western society this sort of mental model is more or less prevalent. You’re probably right that it’s connected with our relationship with death.

Also NL. I feel that the opinions have shifted last couple of decades. Anectdotal maybe, when I was younger eating horse meat wasn't something one thought about much. My mother used to go into town especially for buying horse steak, because "they are way better than cow beef steak". Recently I asked her if she still buys it. "Horse meat? No!". She forgot about how we always ate it.

In the US at least there's a perception of it being "lower quality/class" meat, so that may also play into it (especially in media, etc).

When I was young I lived in the province Drenthe. We visited our grandparents every weekend. My grandfather would often have horse meat for dinner.

At the time I quite enjoyed it. I was young and didn’t think much of it.

Once I got a bit older my father mentioned once that he thought horse meat smelled like pee. At that point I stopped eating horse meat. However I am not even sure if there was some truth in what my father said at the time … seems unlikely.

He likely got you with that joke :D

My small child. How do you spell chicken? Not the kind you eat, the bird.

Oh my. We had some tears that day.

Similarly, my young niece had surmised that chickens produce nuggets in much the same way they produce eggs.

In a way they do…

One can get horse meat in Japan too. (I think they mostly import it from France these days.) I had a nice cheval carpaccio there once, at the insistence of my Japanese hosts. It tasted good, but I have no desire to eat it again.

I don't intend to ever try dog. From what I've heard the meat of carnivores tastes unpleasant, but that might be folklore.

> I've heard the meat of carnivores tastes unpleasant

People eating salmons and other predatory fish would disagree. Horse meat is really good, and dogs probably taste like chicken anyway ...

But no meat beats well-prepared tofu & seitan ;p

Agreed. I've only heard the legend in relation to land mammal carnivores.

Dog tastes nothing like chicken it's a much darker meat. I had it in China and it wasn't exactly unpleasant but definitely what we in the USA would describe as gamey. Basically pungent and heavy on flavor. The preparation I had was in Sichuan so they added tons of red chilies as well so it was very spicy. I wouldn't eat it again, once was enough.

the primary problem with dogs is that you don't know where they come from. there is no guarantee that dogs are raised in a healthy way specifically to be eaten, like sheep or chicken, but there is a high risk that the dogs are caught on the street, and have been feeding on whatever trash they found. and you don't know what kind of diseases they had either. basically, i would treat dogs like rats, unless the restaurant can certify that their dogs actually came from a farm for that purpose.

In many areas they actually torture and abuse the dogs while butchering them also because they think the adrenaline makes the meat less tough. If I knew back then what I know now I would probably have declined when it was offered.

If I'm not mistaken, the preparation of the dish (meat boiled in vinegar for several hours, then sweetened up with gingerbread and reduced apple juice) was traditionally intended to tenderise the tough meat of old farm horses that had been used for ploughing the land. Almost all restaurants prepare the dish with beef nowadays.

Many old dishes are like this - slow cooking, for example, really comes into its own when you're slow cooking a egg-laying chicken that is 3-5 years old vs the "grown for meat" ones these days that are barely 8 weeks.

I'm reminded of an old Joy of Cooking recipe for raccoon: Boil it in baking soda overnight, then throw away the water and braise it for another few hours iirc

You also get this reaction if you declare having eaten what I would call secondary meats (rabbit, duck, lamb).

Interesting! Is this US-specific?

Rabbit isn’t common in US grocery stores but Duck and Lamb are, especially around winter holidays.

Duck is a bit harder to prepare but is common - the local store even has Cornish game hens.

Meat rabbits are still grown in some areas, but it's relatively rare to find on a supermarket shelf.

Not the OP, but I'm in the US and.. it's complicated. I would say, in general, meats like lamb and, especially, veal have fallen out of favor due to the perceived poor conditions and youth of the animals. Rabbit isn't common in the US (it's not generally available in stores) but the "cuteness" factor plays a role here as well. This has changed since the 80's when lamb and veal were more popularly consumed. I'm guessing PETA's work has moved the needle in this area.

Living in Minnesota, however, wild game is more widely consumed so things like duck, geese, pheasant, etc. aren't seen as odd or offensive.

Horse is considered taboo for consumption in the US.

I would say, in general, Americans can be turned off a meat source if it is perceived to have produced from poor conditions or is "cute". This, however, does not apply to beef, chicken, or pork. (Though you can squeeze a few more bucks out of people by calling something "free range").

Lamb is completely common - you can buy it at Costco for crying out loud. Heck, I even had some at a FAANG cafeteria the other day.

Lamb’s consumption is not unusual in the US, and is completely unrelated to the veal issue.

My SO who lived for a time in the UK refuses to eat lamb in the US because "it's terrible." Apparently lamb in the UK is the gold standard for quality.

To go with your SO, meat is generally of a higher quality in Europe than the US due to the far more stringent regulations regarding production. It's also why Europeans tend to be far more relaxed than Americans regarding how meat is cooked.

Do you mean the thing about meat thermometers and making sure that meat is cooked right throught at the right temperature, always? Is that a US thing?

My US friends give me grief when I tell them I've eaten at McDonalds in Italy. "You went to Italy and ate at McDonalds???"

Yes. Yes I have. A few times. Nobody believes me when I tell them McDonalds burgers are much better in Europe than in the US. Plus they sometimes have an excellent espresso bar right there in the restaurant.

I was about to write the same thing when I read your comment.

Additionally, duck and geese can be bought at my local whole foods and often sell out.

Lamb in the US is just damn expensive

Interesting. Recently I've been eating a lot of lamb because it is some of the cheapest meat I can buy.

Do you live in the US

yes, west coast. the cheap lamb appears to be from NZ

Rabbit, Duck, and Lamb are all pretty common meats to eat in the US. Usually in finer dining, but I've never seen anyone raise an eyebrow at these. Horse, on the other hand...

Duck tends to be pretty expensive in upscale restaurants, but is generally available at a much more reasonable price in any good (but not necessarily fancy) Chinese restaurant.

Rabbit is readily available in the rural US if you hunt and skin it yourself. I could eat forever just on the population in my yard. But alas...tularemia is a thing.

I actually contracted tularemia while rafting and camping along the Colorado river in Utah. The campsites attracted alot of critters, especially desert jackrabbits. I got bit by a flea or horsefly that was infected from the rabbit and about 3 days later I had a 105 fever and literally couldn't get out of bed for 3 days. Sickest I have ever been in my entire life.

Also 'rabbit starvation' is a thing...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protein_poisoning

My experience with squeamishness around meats varies depending on the crowd. People I know who I would consider to be a sample of the Canadian general population tend to stick to the meat trinity.

Folks who are from multicultural groups are definitely more experimental with other kinds of meats.

You can get lion meat in the USA if you want to shock people:

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/03/25/175296454/wh...

Lamb and duck in particular are very common here in Australia. Personally, we seem to eat them more often than chicken.

The conservation status of lion is threatened. I feel the same way about eating lion that I do about southern bluefin tuna; it's not sustainable, don't do it.

I'd eat mountain lion or dog, but not lion or grey wolf.

nb: wild carnivores are almost always infected with parasites like trichinosis. If you do eat them, cook it well done.

It’s quite common to eat rabbit, pidgin, pheasant in the UK, and duck and lamb are standard dishes

where are you in America? i never got anything like this.

My (Swiss) kids enjoy eating chicken. I love eating duck, but I have to be VERY discreet about it, lest I want to be looked at like I'm a serial killer. Having referred to my food as "Donald" on one occasion probably didn't help…

I would argue horses are different than dogs. Dogs a are bred to attach to and love humans. Horses.... tolerate us. They'll fall in line if you demonstrate you're the leader, but they don't bond like dogs do.

Chickens, otoh. They are filth and evil enanimalfied. Let their suffering be infinite.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com