Simple Sauce,

You've misunderstood my use of the term "dictate." I never said that humans don't have a role in ecosystems, but that we exercise far more choice than is suggested by those who want some immutable law to govern their diets (and in my experience those same people only use that line of thinking to justify generally indefensible positions -- giving absolute power over to "nature" eliminates the need to employ ethics). Indeed, as I suggested, humans and the non-human world participate in a constant process of negotiation, and I would never suggest some transcendent position for humans with regard to the environment.

Oh, and Simple Sauce, another set of straw men regarding vegan positions:

-You can't be progressive if you eat meat of any kind in any quantity. (dogmatic)
-Meat eaters are belligerent and warlike. (scapegoating)
-Hunters are compensating with guns for small packages. (fallacious)
-Humans are herbivores. (laughable)

In fact, despite what these anthropocentric characterizations represent, I think many vegans are less committed to attacking people, and more interested in focusing on the lives and deaths of non-human animals. Certainly, human behavior must be addressed in the equation, but the issues need to be framed in terms of addressing the integrity of the animal.

Nobody is sickened to the core at the thought of eating an apple but some are actually sickened to the core. Those with allergy to apples (yes this is actually a common allergy) cannot eat apples. Your choice to be a vegan is fine with me. We evolved with tools like spears, so your tangential rant about taking animals without tools is irrelevant. We eat meat (muscle) not intestines. We also eat choice organs like the liver. Eating the heart raw while still beating is a common ritual among primitive cultures. I wish you good luck on your home purchase. My wife and and I actually bought our land/farm while still renting. We are high intensity vegetable farmers allowing us to convert 90% of our farm to natural habitats. You may not like my philosophy, but I think you might approve of our actions. We have put in a pond, three wetlands and over 25,000 trees. And yes, I hunt and eat what we kill. However, we support far more animals than I take and the poulations are growing. Meat is a natural food for humans, but we can do without it if we take suplliments and are very careful. The unnatural argument just does not fly.

P.S. Pathogens are not produced by animals but are commonly present, similar to fungal toxins in corn (e.g. aflatoxin - really bad toxin). This does not rule out corn as an evolutionarily important food. All raw kidney beans are toxic. Sorry, but fire has been with us for a while.

Aren't you the one that said we cook our meat to "kill pathogens"? Are those not "compounds that will poison us"? Look, if you want to eat meat, you know as well as everyone else that that is your choice, but it is just that. A CHOICE. Animal products are unnecessary to human survival. My wife and I have been thriving on a vegan diet for 6 years and our 14 month old daughter seems to be doing just fine. Yes, we take a b-12 supplement due to the sterile environment we live in and that is just fine by me. Like I said, if you can take down an animal with your bare hands, bite into its throat until it lie motionless, tear into its intestines and devour it from the inside out while its heart is still beating, more power to you. 99.999% of the world population cannot which leads me to believe we are a vegetarian species. Again, I would never argue that humans are a vegan species. In the wild we would eat what we needed to to survive. I agree that a vegan diet is best if you grow your own food but that's not practical for many people myself included. When we have our own house, soon I hope, I do plan on growing a lot of our own food. So in the meantime we go to farmer's markets and the grocery store and do the best we can to lessen our impact on the environment. I try not to judge people who eat meat; I did for 26 years. NOBODY is sickened to their core at the thought of eating an apple.

to stanfabio:

"Vegans are proof that we don't need to base our life on the destruction of other animal life."

Again, how does me eating organic, ethical eggs further the destruction of other animal life?

How does a person being a vegan but still eating the results of industrial agriculture make them not engaged in the destruction of animal life?

I also dislike the use of the term "natural" when in fact everything that exists must be natural. However, I do think it is possible to observe the way a functioning ecosystem works, notice that almost always involves predation, and realize that our eating or not eating of meat is not the crux of what is causing the rampant ecocide and animal rights abuses we are committing.

It is our removal of ourselves from the ecological framework and declaring ourselves gods over those systems. I wouldn't say that hunter-gather cultures are based on the destruction of animal life. They are based on a profound respect for animal and plant life.

I also don't think it's a straw man argument for me to bring up that I have never heard Vegans explain what it is we are to do with livestock animals once we stop eating them or using them in agriculture. I certainly understand that no one is claiming that we let foxes eat the chickens. I am just pointing out that no one addresses what it is we should do with the chickens, and I am also trying to point out that if we don't eat them other things will continue to eat them.

And to NotSoHotPink: read some books on quantum physics or take some mushrooms or meditate and look around at vegetation and tell me it's not sentient on some level.

Where do you draw the line on sentience and how sentient does something have to be for it to be wrong to eat it?

This is a move in the right direction, but there are still a range of ethical issues with even "free-range" and "organic" chicken, not to mention environmental issues with the resources used to produce this meat on our already overburdened Earth.

Incorporating more vegetarian and vegan foods, as well as reducing our consumption of animal products as a whole, will surely have the most positive effect.

Maybe Britain is different but in North America "free range" is often a false label.
Chickens still end up brutally slaughtered.
Veganism is the only ethical food system for humans.

Its good for humans and non humans alike.

Plant a garden, and if your town lets you, raise your own chickens or ducks. Then you'll know what's what!

Veganism is best.

Plant a garden and fight the fowl for the food.

I wonder how chicken sales would have done if the supermarkets had sold only live birds and people had to slaughter them themselves.

Some fowl can eat grass and other things that humans can not - so they don't take away from produce that humans need. Cows can also live on grass and things that humans can't eat. Chickens can forage for thier own food. So if you are very poor or in a bad place, eating meat can keep you alive.

Veganism wouldn't be best if you were starving or oppressed.

Veganism is best if you are well to do.

Unless you are raising and slaughtering your own livestock, or know a small organic farmer who is, you're eating tainted carian.

I'm eating a lot of corn, beans, and rice these days . . .

Please dear lord, let build our small farm based communities again like they used to be and are supposed to be. We would not have these problems that we have today if the small farm and farmer reigned king again.

Most people wouldn't recognize the food if it was raised well. Nothing beats the taste of free range grass fed beef and no one knows how to cook it either, its so lean. Have you noticed the color difference between free range, organic and "standard" chickens? Organic has a white fat layer while free range is corn fed and slightly yellow, "Standard" is yellow with brown tinges and looks and smells way different. Standard looks like the crap it lived in! They are still nothing like the food you grow, slaughter, and raise from little cute chicks on your farm. Home farm raised food tastes so much better, city dwellers would think its a different animal or vegetable all together!

There are no native vegan tribes in lands that snow.

Yeah. Sure. Veganism is best.

Why can't I eat local, free range, organic eggs and dairy again?

Oh yeah. I forgot. THERE IS NO LOGICAL ARGUMENT NOT TO DO SO. From an animal well-being and/or environmentalist perspective.

I am so sick of self-righteous vegans thinking it's their way or the highway. I eat a predominantly vegetarian diet with the occasional local ethical chicken or hunted meat.

Sustainable biodynamic farmers and permaculture experts have explained to me time and again about the value of having chickens on their farms. They eat natural pests. Their waste fertilizes the soil. They provide eggs. At the end of their lifespans they are eaten.

But noooooooooooooooo. No comprehensive approaches to agriculture based on what works best in your locale, we all must go Vegan. Let's all eat soy raised in the Amazon packaged up to look like meat.

Riddle me this: who has the bigger eco footprint... a self-righteous urban dwelling vegan, or an indigenous hunter/gatherer?

Make all the Inuit VEGAN! It's 2008, they don't need to live that way anymore. (a vegan actually told me this).

Yeah exactly, let's have them live as a cancer on the earth like us! Just so long as they don't kill those cute furry animals. (Whoops, I just smooshed a spider... but who cares about spiders.)

Apparently no one has any problems killing carrots. But let's just free all our chickens so they can be massacred by foxes, since without us killing them they will obviously become immortal and all death and suffering on earth will disappear. Lions will lie down with lambs and sharks will eat plankton!

Hooray! Isn't being naive and unrealistic grand!

Here we go again all you PETAphiles

http://www.thirdeyemag.com/nonfiction/essays/stuck-in-disneyland/

perceptionexperiment wrote: "I am so sick of self-righteous vegans ..."

The only self-righteous comments I see posted on this thread so far are yours.

I have been a vegetarian for 35 years and a vegan for 20 years, and I will tell you, in the strongest possible terms: I don't give a crap what you eat. So climb down off your self-righteous pontificating soapbox and stop embarrassing yourself with stupid, belligerent, mean-spirited attacks on people whose dietary choices are different from yours.

Hello, vegan posters: As a child I lived on my grandparents' small farm, where we had a cow, chickens and a rooster. "youbetterwork" (12:39) wrote: "Cows can also live on grass and things that humans can't eat. Chickens can forage for their own food." That's exactly right. Evolution did not provide us with two stomachs: try eating grass sometime, and see if you can turn it into milk like a cow does!

Since naturally raised chicken, beef and pork became available locally (though expensive), we have switched, and reduced our meat purchases because of the cost. But I've never understood the holier-than-thou moral universe of veganism, relative to those of us who eat naturally raised meat. Yes, the animal was alive and is now dead. But so was the carrot you just yanked out of the ground (don't you think all living things have some kind of consciousness?) and now the carrot will get chopped to pieces and thrown into boiling water. Does that make you a humanitarian?

Some years ago scientists put two identical groups of plants into separate soundproof rooms, and piped classical music and jazz into one room and rock 'n roll into the other. They all got the same food, water and sunlight, but the latter group drooped and eventually died, while the former flourished. Still don't believe plants have consciousness?

Even humans are part of the great circle of life, and when we die, "From dust we came, to dust shall we return." (I like to think it's stardust!)

I don't kill spiders. They eat flies and mosquitoes.

The market works when the people, not the politicians, decide.

Let the people decide:

www.ni4d.us

Yes we all know vegan is best, but don't use the bludgeon. (this thread is pretty mild, but you know who you are)

We grow in steps. From Cig smokin, factory steak eatin, to "I'll have the chicken instead" to "is that free-range?", to "which range did it come from exactly?", to "I'll have the cabbage".

But I do feel a sentiment here, the reaction many have on CL when someone raves about vegans. There is a sense of selfrighteousness. Which futhers my belief that you should never tell another how to live or think because that person will end up HATING you.

The best argument here for veganism AND/OR local farm shopping is "Unless you are raising and slaughtering your own livestock, or know a small organic farmer who is, you're eating tainted carian."

I'd love to see this tie in to local/vegan etc: We eat TOO MUCH anyway. Any takers?

Reminds me of when I foolishly got in a conversation with a PITA person protesting a zoo...
Me: So what would you do with all these animals?
Pita: Return them to the Wild
Me: and where is that exactly?
Pita: what about reserves in africa?
(note: not all animals are from africa)
Me: and who starts and maintains those?
Pita: the goverment?
Me: well, in part. A lot of support comes from.....

Zoos.

I very much agree, and have written before, that promoting veganism without context - i.e., where you obtain your food and the total environmental cost of producing, packaging, marketing, storing, transporting, utility and other development impact by grocery stores, parking lots, advertising, etc. - is no virtue.

When we look at the environmental degradation caused by industrial farming, it becomes very clear that anything other than grow your own or purchase from small local farms is as much an assault on the planet as anything. In fact, the number one cause of destruction to wild animals is loss of habitat, and a there are two primary causes of loss of habitat - housing/development and industrial farming.

On the other hand, Ducks Unlimited has been a vigorous advocate for habitat preservation, for sustainability, and for eliminating toxins in habitat.

I am continually disappointed to see arguments for veganism that leave out the issue of mass farming and shopping at the local grocery store. Veganism needs to be attached to a grow-your-own message like I am attached to my foot. Otherwise, for me, it fails as an environmental or moral message.

"So climb down off your self-righteous pontificating soapbox and stop embarrassing yourself with stupid, belligerent, mean-spirited attacks on people whose dietary choices are different from yours."

Hmmmm mean-spirited? Try an attempt at humorous sarcasm.

Stupid? Try logical. I don't see how you've made any attempt to explain how the points I am making are wrong. Again, care to explain why folks can't eat ethical eggs? Still waiting.....

Self-righteous? Where did I say "My diet is the only ethical diet for all humans" as vegans repeatedly claim.

I must apologize, as when I say "self-righteous vegans" I am not only referring to those who maybe posted here. I am referring to folks I also run into and interact with constantly, and who proclaim their diet as the end all be all solution to our agricultural woes.

And don't sit here and tell me there are no self-righteous vegans running around giving animal rights activists a bad name. I've conversed with them and so have you.

Oh and I should add... I don't CARE if you are vegan. In fact, I respect veganism wayyyyyyyyyy more than the avg. fast food eating steak obsessed American. My problem is with the 'tude that comes along with knowing that your diet is THE diet for everyone.

Statements like: Veganism is best! Veganism is the only solution!

I don't believe there is one right way to live, and we shouldn't parade around pretending there is one right way to eat. Especially when there is literally no logical way to explain your position and it is solely based on an emotional appeal to some impossible ideal of purity that simply doesn't exist in the natural world.

"I am continually disappointed to see arguments for veganism that leave out the issue of mass farming and shopping at the local grocery store. Veganism needs to be attached to a grow-your-own message like I am attached to my foot. Otherwise, for me, it fails as an environmental or moral message."

Here, here!

AdeleTheCzech, when you can prove that plants are sentient creatures, then you can bitch about carrots.

Go vegetarian, go organic, be healthier and live longer.

Well-said, oldgrowthforest. I wonder if you dare to tread in the discussions about ever-increasing human populations as a factor in all this?

To perceptionexperiment: Oh, there are many forms of illogic in your posts; the one that struck me most obviously is your use of the straw man fallacy:

"But let's just free all our chickens so they can be massacred by foxes, since without us killing them they will obviously become immortal and all death and suffering on earth will disappear."

Now, I admire your commitment to thinking about food issues in ways that most people I know do not, and I think your mainly vegetarian diet is a productive starting point for further development. I think the greatest challenge you pose to my own thinking is with this: "some impossible ideal of purity that simply doesn't exist in the natural world." First, I don't buy the idea that there is some essential "natural" way to be, and I certainly don't buy the idea that human action is, could, or should be dictated by such laws; culture and nature are in constant conversation, as I understand it. Yet it is the other part of that statement which I wrestle with most: is adopting an ideal stance, one that I have been told has apparent contradictions, a strong enough and legitimate ethical stance? In the end, given the widespread utilitarian treatment of animals (and I do not adopt a welfare stance on these issues, but rather one like Gary Francione argues connected to liberation) that I believe we both would agree is out there, I think a hard line is necessary. Vegans are proof that we don't need to base our life on the destruction of other animal life.

I was afraid to read the comments on this story, simply because I expected the routine bullshit from the militant vegans. (Note, of course not all vegans are militant, just like not all christians are militant. Duh.) You know the tripe:

-You can't be progressive if you eat meat of any kind in any quantity. (dogmatic)
-Meat eaters are belligerent and warlike. (scapegoating)
-Hunters are compensating with guns for small packages. (fallacious)
-Humans are herbivores. (laughable)

I've had proselytizing vegans try to justify their intolerance by using infantile "trophic pyramid" and non-cyclical water consumption arguments, and pretending that a few hundred thousand years of archaeological evidence is simply "corporate propaganda." I've yet to hear a convincing argument for excluding animals from sustainable farms, and I've yet to hear an ecosystem-based rationale for preferentially taking the lives of plants over the lives of animals to sustain my own. It's always based on karma or willful ignorance of plant sentience, neither of which make much sense to me.

Don't get me (or the other non-vegan posters here) wrong... Veganism is not a problem. I'm happy for those who have found their personal solution to the moral dilemma of modern human omnivores. I can't stand the simpleminded arrogance of those professing to have the only right way to live.

stanfabio:

"First, I don't buy the idea that there is some essential "natural" way to be, and I certainly don't buy the idea that human action is, could, or should be dictated by such laws; culture and nature are in constant conversation, as I understand it."

This statement assumes that human animals can exist independent of the rest of the natural world of which we are part. That is a fundamental problem unique to civilized humans. Human action has been responsive to the laws of nature (e.g. give back more than you take, cooperate instead of dominate, relate with your environment instead of controlling and abusing it) for all but the last 10,000 years or so of our history, and our culture is now beginning to suffer the consequences of these actions (as we've forced them upon others for millenia - see the history of western contact with indigenous peoples).

Just because you are not "buying" that there is a natural role for humans in the ecosystems that support our existence, that does not mean that such a role does not exist. The fact that humans have lived sustainably with ecosystems all over the world for thousands of years demonstrates this well enough. The main point to a principled rejection of universal veganism is that the ecosystems on which humans depend are almost infinitely complex and diverse, and one universal lifestyle is not only inappropriate, it is in fact damaging and counterproductive if our goal is to live in harmony with our different landbases.

Stanfabio,

I certainly agree with you that many vegans are less committed to attacking people.

However, I think the folks simple sauce are addressing do exist and this isn't just a list of strawmen.

I've heard all of those things come out of the mouths of animal rights extremists.

And I have dealt with vegans that seriously disrespect nonvegans, either covertly or overtly. Vegans that get into peoples face when they disagree with them. I don't think this helps the cause of animal rights.

I don't think anyone here has a problem at all with veganism. We have a problem with the way some people choose to represent it as a silver bullet.

perceptionexperiment,

Thanks for an engaging response. First, as I hoped to suggest with my compliment to oldgrowthforest, I am all in favor of a broad range of ethical considerations attached to veganism as a start for best practice. Two brief (can we vegans be moderate despite the claims of many?) points: (1) the issue of eggs is one that has vexed me for some time. In the end, I think that eating eggs contributes to a mindset of instrumentalizing animal life for many people (and I grant that there are many like yourself, I assume, who do not), but to be honest I have not fully thought through the issue. (2)In terms of ecosystems offering patterns for human culture, I would say that ecosystems do not include justice as we understand it. This threshhold changes everything for me.

Again, thanks, and I'll be quiet now, as many wish.

I'm afraid that if you aren't walking out your door to the back yard to pick your lettuce, there are enormous environmental impacts associated with all your food.

There is mining, shipping, utilities, deforestation/habitat eradication, packaging, etc. Just consider all the raw materials required to build a grocery store and parking lot, and the equipment and fuel required to do so, all the lighting-heat-cooling-water required by the store, the street lights for the parking lot, etc.

Consider the dead zones in the oceans, which exist due to industrial farming. It's all runoff from fertilizers, primarily, but also pesticides and herbicides.

The cost of not growing your own is big. It's very, very big.

As far as I'm concerned there is a problem with veganism if the individual obtains their food from grocery stores.

When I subsistence fish for salmon, catching my alloted 25 fish (at approximately 3-4 pounds per filet for Kenai River reds), and can live on the meat for 4-5 months, I have a far less impact on the environment than any single thing purchased in any grocery store anywhere. Especially if I can the meat rather than freezing it. Then I don't even use energy storing it.

And no, I don't feel the least bit guilty killing the salmon. On the contrary, I feel connected. I feel blessed. I feel sustained. I feel like I am provided for by God, by life. I feel a thrill watching the fish come in, leaping and shining in the sunlight, as many as 50,000 or more in a tide. I feel connected to the generations before me that practiced subsistence through hunting and growing their own food. I feel connected to the seals that follow the salmon and fish in the water in front of me, and the gulls that hurry to eat the waste I leave behind. I feel connected to my neighbors who fish beside me, who harvest this bounty so respectfully, so joyously.

We all leave tired, and happy, with new respect for our world and Life and, yes, ourselves. We know we have obtained food in a very good way. I hope this beautiful cycle continues forever, but I fear it will not.

Anyone who truly believes that grocery stores are a superior alternative to a first-hand connection with your food, either by harvesting or growing it yourself, has missed something vital to understanding life.

oldgrowthforest I applaud your commitment to procuring your own food and experiencing that connection.

I feel many of the militant vegans I have dealt with have lived in urban areas much of their life and simply haven't had those experiences.

Your comments are beautiful and I hope everyone reads them.

This whole discussion is very odd to me. As far as I can figure out we all live on the same mudball. Some want to eat meat, some don't. For whatever reason, humans seem to have different dietary needs. To me it is all in the balance. A little of this, a little of that.

All this article is advocating is that if you desire to eat chicken, than rationally consider where and how it is raised. That seems to be a good first step in making choices about what we eat. If that means you have to pay more, than it follows that you will eat less and enjoy it more. Is this a moral issue? Or an issue of choice?

I am going to continue to eat meat. But I am also going to make sure I know how that animal was raised and where. I may have to eat less of it, but that's okay.

Awareness and balance in all things is the key. There is no one answer that suits everyone on every level. To me we should all eat what is good for us in quantities that are sustainable. It's not a moral issue. At least to me. I will not sit in judgement of others. I have enough problems just dealing with my own issues and choices.

I've praise for oldgrowthforest's comments too. The true problem is not what we eat, per se, but rather how what we eat is produced. We have as much right to meat as any other omnivore or carnivore, but we produce it in a very sloppy and unnecessarily cruel way.

I believe vegans have every right to their diet, but hope they'll not get preachy about it - it's highly obnoxious, yes. I'd cringe a bit at a nursing or pregnant woman trying to follow a vegan diet - there's some evidence it may adversely affect their baby. But, still, I'm not going to get preachy with them, it's none of my business.

Plus, I think the true underlying problem is indeed overpopulation. I know this can get a bit touchy, and this isn't quite the appropriate place to discuss it, but in summary: (1) all humans everywhere, regardless of place or situation, need to control their breeding, (2) the best way to do this is through better education and opportunities for women, (3) temporary demographic problems will arise as the last overpopulated generation ages and eventually dies off, but over time these problems will ebb, and (4) population stabilization is not enough to arrive at sustainability, more will need to be done.

Human beings are omnivores. There are no non-animal sources of vitamin B12. Your liver can store up to 5 years worth of B12 that you got from animal sources but after you use those stores you will have to eat animal protein. It is available in flesh foods as well as eggs and milk/milk products.

It was once believed that B12 was available in certain seaweed/algae and some fermented soy products but current science has identified these as non-biologically active analogs. That, of course, can change at any moment.

We are all biochemical individuals. No one diet is right for everyone.

Vegans could only exist in an industrial society that manufactures synthetic vitamins.

For serious threats to our food supply from Codex Alimentarius (UN Food Code) see: www.healthfreedomusa.org

stan:

I don't think anyone here wants for you to shut up. That's not the point. The arguments that I listed are not strawmen, and though I doubt that they're universally held among vegans, they're arguments that have been posted on this site in the last few weeks since the slaughterhouse video came out.

To your point about ecosystems not including justice as we know it (or the Justice of western philosophy, abstracted from circumstance), I'll wholeheartedly agree. I see that more as a reason to reconsider what we mean by justice than whether we should follow the guidance of the natural systems that support our existence. Again, I don't think that we disagree much, and I'd much prefer to have this conversation in a non-text-based format.

--

I think oldgrowthforest and Rebel Farmer have it right on the money - it's about connecting intimately with the lives we take to support our own, not about dogmatic rules for which lives are more acceptable to take than others - the ecosystem will communicate with us each to help us understand the guidelines for that.

And perceptionexperiment: it sounds like we've talked with some similar people. :)

All you evolution fans out there take note. Human teeth are omnivore teeth. Cows and sheep etc. have vegetation type teeth. Dogs have meat eater canine teeth.

As far as teeth are concerned we are like rats as they have omnivore teeth as well. We are, of course, the big dangerous ones.

Animals raised in as sustainable and humane way possible can be added in a reasonable amount to a mostly vegetable, fruit, nuts, and grain based diet.

Mass corporate agriculture is no good for producing any foodstuff. It does, however make a really toxic mess.

Whether you eat meat or not doesn't mean sh-t, because billions of people do eat meat, will continue to eat meat, and would eat meat if they could. The point of this article was about growing livestock in a humane fashion and about the standards that need to be adopted by industry and farmers around the world. It was not about your food preferences, or how you think other people should eat. Your worlds are so small, it's pathetic. Do you know that sheep are shipped live from Australia to the Middle East so they can be slaughtered "halal?" Kind of like the slave ships, except not as cushy. Do you know that bush meat (monkeys and apes) are being slaughtered to feed loggers and others working in remote areas of Africa? Do you know that the Chinese love shark fin soup? That the Japanese (in one town) slaughter dolphins for food? If you only applied one percent of your self-righteousness in the direction of changing the system, animals would be much better off than they will ever be just because you don't eat meat. That would mean getting off your vegan ass and getting politically involved.

Alot of strong arguments here...

Someone said, "Vegans could only exist in an industrial society that manufactures synthetic vitamins.:

I totally agree with this statement. I've done a fair amount of studying, and without being able to take synthetic vitamin B12, nobody could be a vegan.

We were designed to eat meat. That is factual. That doesn't mean everyone would want to, and those who don't often choose not to for spiritual reasons. I respect that, but for me there is nothing anti-spiritual about eating meat. It was intended that we do.

I do hope that society can get back to the small family farms that produced the meat and milk and eggs that humans thrive on. I used to buy eggs from a farmer in Idaho when I lived there, and the flavor was so superior to store bought.

I made an attempt at Veganism in the early 90s, but at that time I was not aware of the need for B12, as well as supplementation of other vitamins and minerals that Vegans end up deficient in... it lasted a week. I was light headed and couldn't think straight. I was living in Salt Lake City at the time, and there was an Arby's on 21st south and State Street, across from the Salt Lake community college where I attended courses. During that week, the smell of that roast beef nearly did me in. By Sunday I was scarfing down two or three Giant roast beef sandwiches with horsey sauce..

Never have had the desire since to be a Vegan. And with the subsequent study that proved to me it is unhealthy, never will again.

But, for those who get into that... more power to you.

And for those who feel threatened by the attitudes of some who feel Veganism is superior - don't let it get to you. It's like a religion. Those who are into it always feel their way is best. Just shrug it off. Their numbers will never be sufficient enough (due to the dietary needs we humans can only fulfill by eating meat), for it to matter. Our ability to eat meat will never be threatened by their movement.

perceptionexperiment, the only self-righteous people I meet regarding vegetarianism are the ones who claim that animals were put here on earth for us to eat.

I've only been a vegetarian for three years, and I'll never go back to eating flesh foods. I honestly don't know how people can kill defenseless animals. Cows that look at you with their big brown eyes, provide milk for us and don't harm us, cute little chicks that grow up to be chickens who also don't harm us, etc. Why kill them? They have as much right to live as we do.

But eat whatever you want, it's not my concern. I don't go around telling people to not eat meat. It's just my own conscience that tells me not to.

"We were designed to eat meat. That is factual. That doesn't mean everyone would want to, and those who don't often choose not to for spiritual reasons. I respect that, but for me there is nothing anti-spiritual about eating meat. It was intended that we do."

While, it is your right to hold a moral position re. your choice of food, your justification suffers from the "argument from authority" fallacy even giving the benefit of the doubt that it is somehow possible for us to figure out what nature "intends."

As far as the "design" argument goes, while the human body can digest meat, it functions better on a fully plant-based diet (the obvious B12 caveat throw in [Ref: The China Study - by Dr. Campbell]). This is not an argument that someone should only eat a plant-based diet as we still have choice - there is no requirement that we must eat only healthy food.

NRA Freedom: "Veganism is not "like" a religion, it IS a religion. And Vegans are every bit as intolerant of non believers as the most wild eyed Muslim fanatic or born again Christian."

There are positions that can argue that veganism is a religion - but intolerance is not one of them. Tribalism is endemic to the human population, and explains the observable intolerance.

My thanks to all who point out the damage caused by industrial farming, and who encourage consuming locally grown produce.

--- Reasons why I choose to be vegan ---

From an ethical perspective, I choose to leave animals to their own destiny with minimal interference from humans. We interfere in globally anyway - no point piling on and interfering at the individual level. For the record, I do not support "animal rights" - it brings to mind an image of slave owners discussing how best to treat their slaves.

The above principle based on non-inteference, leads to formulations including, but not limited to:
- no support for forms of slavery (e.g. raising animals just for food)
- no support unneccessary killing
- staying away from areas of the world where the environment is harsh and does not support the cultivation of plants
- provides a simple rationale to stay from eating organic eggs or free range meat

Further, from personal experience, the bodily fluids and the breath of meat-eaters smell bad - the closest I can describe it is a low-grade smell similar to that of burning hair.

Gee, let's paint with a broad brush. Vegans = militant = wild eyed Muslim fanatics..., etc. We each have our own reasons for choosing to eat meat or not. I'm a vegan, but I'm not judging you, ok? To thine own self be true.

I'm a vegan because I don't want to kill animals. I love animals (and not in the way NRA-guy does, because they "taste good."). I don't want to be complicit in the killing of animals. I don't want to consume dairy because the dairy industry contributes to the killing of animals (e.g., newborn males that are worthless to the dairy industry are slaughtered on the spot or fattened up and then slaughtered for veal). And the cows, even if raised on organic, grass-fed farms, end up at the slaughterhouse. That's not okay by me. And the chickens, even organic, free-range chickens, also end up in the slaughterhouse, so I don't want to eat the eggs that come from those chickens, because then I believe I'm complicit in their slaughter. Also not okay with me.

I don't want to eat fish, because I think fish do feel pain at some level, and because they're sentient creatures, again, on some level. Plus, marine mammals get caught up in the nets with the fish that are caught. Also not okay with me.

As for eating vegetables and the whole issue of whether plants "feel" something. Yes, I believe they respond to stimuli, such as music or kind words, etc. I've read/heard the studies. But I don't believe they feel "pain" the way an animal does. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it's something we're unable to measure, and maybe they're silently screaming when we pluck them up. I can't hear the screams of the vegetables (if they do in fact silently scream). But you can hear the screams of animals being slaughtered.

If I didn't eat vegetables because they respond to stimuli if plucked or cut, that would leave fruitarianism (where you only eat the fruit that drops off -- no plucking, no "pain," and yes, I'm serious, people think about this stuff). But I don't believe fruitarianism, even if I could do it, would give me adequate nutrition. Of course, there's breatharianism, which I think is ridiculous.

To me, there's hypocrisy in everything we do. No one is "pure." But it's a matter of degree. I try to do the best I can, and to do as little harm as possible. I don't believe in killing people. I don't believe in killing animals. I don't believe in killing fowl. I don't believe in killing fish. I don't believe in killing sentient beings, period. I've drawn the line at vegetables, fruits and grains, because I need them to survive. In this day and age, I don't need animals or fish or fowl to survive. And if I have to take a B12 supplement, fine. I'm not thinking about what humans were "meant to eat." I don't care if we're carnivores, omnivores, or herbivores by nature. If I can survive without eating animals or fish or fowl, that's what I'm going to do. And if that makes me a fanatic, then so be it.

What's up with all the hostility toward vegans? Where are these supposed "self-righteous", "intolerant", "proselytizing" vegans? I have yet to meet any finger-wagging vegans or vegetarians. If someone said "Socialism is best" or "Socialism is the only ethical system" (as opposed to veganism) would a bunch of progressives get all hot under the collar or would they think, this person is merely stating their opinion which might be different from my own.

We all make our food choices based on own belief systems. Ultimately, we have to live with ourselves. Years ago, I read Peter Singer's "Animal Liberation" and found his arguments for not causing suffering to sentient beings very compelling. I was forced to ask myself questions about my food choices and make changes. Occasionally, people (usually omnivores) try to "catch" me in some moral inconsistency. No one is morally pure. We try our best to live in line with our beliefs. I currently live in a small, conservative community. I never discuss my vegetarian eating habits with co-workers as I don't want to alienate people. My partner was a conscious omnivore for years (and I was fine with that). He couldn't find free-range meat in our new, little community. He also had to deliver some building materials to a local slaughterhouse and making eye-contact with the distraught pigs clinched it for him. So, he gave up eating meat and is now basically a vegetarian too.

I think the real point of this article is that in ENGLAND they were presented with the horrors of factory farming....and then the CONSUMERS in ENGLAND began buying only free-range/organic...thereby getting a healthier food....
I was in England last summer and I was so amazed at how many TV commercials and billboards were geared toward changing lifestyles for a HEALTHIER PLANET/HEALTIER YOU...it was so positive...the kids tv channel was full of positive ways to keep the carbon footprint down...and there was at least one environmental comercial per hour of TV time...
MY point is that WE the consumer have the power....we can stop the strangle hold corporations SEEM to have on us by simply not buying into their psychological ploy to get us to buy their stuff.
As I said in another post...the corporate advertising has been fed to us since birth, our post WWII parents were bombarded with how wonderful cigarettes were...and how they had to be modern and buy.. buy.. buy.. buy.. buy (Interestingly enough the exact same kinds of bilboards used in the late 40's are identical to the ones they are using in "developing" countries) belive me, Madison

Avenue knows the human psyche/ego very well..

So now we have been informed...we have the power to make informed choices...and those choices may be pesticide free/artificial hormone free/ free range/organic/harvested sustainably/free trade/without developing country slavery/ etc....the point is choice and the power to use it for a healthier planet

I seriously wonder if any of you people espousing the virtues of eating meat has ever chased down an elk (or rabbit, or deer, or javelina, or whatever), caught it with your bare hands, bit into its throat until it lay motionless, tore into its intestines, and began devouring it from the inside out while its heart was still beating. If you have, you are a meat eater. If you haven't, you are a VEGETARIAN PRIMATE.

Vegan vs Omnivore.

Issues like this divide the Left.

That seems to be their Purpose.

Only the privileged have time for this kind of bullshit.

As the article points out, the People make moral and healthy choices with food if they are informed, this is another encouraging sign for progressives.

Stop falling into this infighting like chumps.

Co-operation is the way forward.

-matti