Justify My Meat

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I was vegetarian until a few months ago when I could no longer stand up in a morning. It was quite terrible. I justified my move to meat in some complex system of hypocracy I'm trying hard to recall, I went as far as to invent a theory that vegetarianism inhumans will result in disaster. As humans cease to eat meat, cows wildly overpopulate and shit too much, leaving the whole earth in a cloud of methane. all the grass dies and the land is covered in dead cows. A stretch, perhaps. Is there any point to vegetarianism?

― matthew james, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

As long as you're getting the proper nutrients, I don't see what the problem is, choosing between meats and veggies. Me, I do both, but I usually just eat chicken or fish - I can get beefed out quite fast.

One of my friends has been whole-hog vegan for quite a while. For the past 3 weeks, he's been feeling run down, lethargic, deathly tired. When I was suffering through similiar symptoms, my doctor told me to get some iron (which, of course, is found in STEAK). I wonder if my friend has a similar problem.

But, hey, if they thought of cow methane calms your nerves about eating Bessie, more power to ya.

― David Raposa, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Of course people are free to choose whatever, I'm just wondering whether many people view the politics of vegetarianism as entirely flawed.

― matthew james, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I think the politics of vegetarianism are the stupidest politics I've ever heard. I mean, it's all well and good to want to not kill a cow (well, no it's not because cows are SCARY FUCKS but that's a digression), but don't they realize that the only reason said farm cow is alive is to be used by humans? If no one ate cows or wore leather, cows wouldn't need to be bred by farmers as they are useless fuckers, and as such cows would cease to exist. Either way = non- living cows, whether it's killed on a farm or just simply not born.

I am a vegetarian because I hate the taste of meat, that's all. I hate animals, I'd gladly be a raving carnivore, eating all their scary asses, if it wasn't for the fact that meat makes me physically ill.

Though I am being forced now to eat chicken occasionally as my doctor said the reason I get sick so often and bruise so easily is because my body's low iron level. I have ridiculous anemia, but it's natural, not much I can do about it because my blood doesn't process it, but he said eating actual meats instead of taking iron pills will help me more. But I throw up every time I eat chicken so I really cheat and don't eat it.

I do eat fish and seafood because I like the way that tastes. I think it has something to do with the varied proteins and fatty acids in farm animals versus seafood.

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I don't eat meat when cooking my own food because I feel guilty, but when other people serve it I don't want to tell them I won't eat their cooking, so I eat it. Politeness over principles, I guess. A book called 'The Story of B' made me feel justified to eat meat, and then stupid Ovid and his stupid Metamorphoses made me feel guilty again.

― Lyra, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

stupid Ovid and his stupid Metamorphoses: classic or dud

― mark s, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I'm a vegetarian, but a pragmatist. I don't eat the bigger animals partly or mostly because I don't care for the farming methods. I also think that if people want to eat large mammals, they should kill 'em themselves. Like Ally, I also think it's just plain gross, and you don't need red meat if you live in a big city anyway. I don't care much for chickens as animals, so I don't feel to bad for them, but the conditions they're often raised in are abysmal. And I hate fish, but if there is nothing else on the menu, I'll eat it. I get put off by animal rights extremism, tho. I've even accidentally eaten bacon and chicken broth without much alarm.

I do dairy, not much because it's unhealthy and gives me gas, but I need the calcium and am terrified of getting osteoporosis. Plus, I have yet to taste a decent fake ice cream.

― Kerry, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Farming methods are horrible. Besides the fact that animals are kept in horrible conditions, they are fed completely unsuitable things. I'm amazed anyone's willing to eat farm animals at all.

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

― Emma, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Well it's very unhealthy if you're lactose intolerant!

Anyhow, the methods used to ensure loads of milk are just weird - I don't want to drink cow hormones. I also get into arguments with my mom, who won't eat beef because she thinks she'll contract Mad Cow Disease, because she still drinks milk and eats ice cream. Where does she think they get the milk from?!

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

US cows have more hormones than European cows. And lactose intolerance is very rare but lots of people pretend to have it cos they seem to think it makes them special or fashionable or like a film star or whatever.

― Emma, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Farming methods are horrible. Besides the fact that animals are kept in horrible conditions [...]

Yeah, but never mind because at least they're living at all, which they wouldn't be if there weren't people to eat them at the end of it all. That was your argument right?

I'm not a particularly committed vegetarian, but this bullshit about 'ooh, if no one ate meat then there wouldn't be many cows and sheep left' bewilders me. WHO CARES? I'm not some kind of crazed pro-life Catholic who thinks life should be created for its own sake. Are you?

― Nick, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

You know those sharp canine teeth you have? They aint for biting through celery thats what.

― Michael Bourke, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I know a guy who'll only eat meat if it's killed humanely like on his mum's farm. Sounds a bit crazy to me, as how do you kill humanely? I'm sure a cow killed for human consumption suffers significantly less pain than a wilderbeast torn to bits by a lion.

― matthew james, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Well, there's this thing called a FOOD CHAIN, and apart from Bengal tigers, Homo sapiens is at the top of it. So I eat what I like.

I did try vegetarianism briefly but my mum sabotaged it with deli salt beef, pumpernickel, and nice mustard. She just waited until I broke down and cackled herself senseless when she caught me making a midnight fridge run for it.

― suzy, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Thanks to a variety of veg friends, while I'm hardly a vegeterian myself, I have absolutely no problem with all veg meals and the like -- indeed, thanks to many cool places around here, I look forward to it (two kickass Vietnamese places, a variety of Chinese, etc.). I think what is interesting is getting people used to even *trying* an all veg meal, like not having meat means it's not valid. I've noticed that an awful lot over time, has anyone else?

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I'm not a particularly committed vegetarian, but this bullshit about 'ooh, if no one ate meat then there wouldn't be many cows and sheep left' bewilders me. WHO CARES? I'm not some kind of crazed pro- life Catholic who thinks life should be created for its own sake. Are you?

No, I'm not, because I don't give a shit whether or not cows and sheep exist - I am the one who said they should be killed for killing's sake, cos I hate them. However, someone who goes on and on about how you can't eat a cow because they are great, gentle creatures and as such should be living peacefully in hippyland playing in the flowers seems to be someone who would care about such a thing, no?

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Suzy, what is this supposed to mean? You can do something therefore you should do it? That's not much of a starting point for a very enlightened moral code is it? Or do you hold the food chain in some kind of mystical awe?

― Nick, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I do not understand this very recent thing which seems to come from the US that says dairy is unhealthy. And the 'you should kill animals yourself' thing is also pretty illogical, should I also brew my own beer?

Dairy is unhealthy in large quantities. It's loaded with fat and cholesterol, for one thing. Doctors recommend only very small portions of it in the daily diet.

As for the 'you should kill animals yourself' - 1) I was being partly facetious, 2) we have some pretty horrific and environmentally destructive factory farming methods in the US. There are all sorts of disturbing aspects to meat production that people are not aware of. Many a slaughterhouse worker has been turned off meat for life.

Anyone who knows me would laugh at the suggestion that I am 'illogical'. I'd make a snotty comment about the illogic in your beer analogy, but I'm above that.

― Kerry, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Oh, Ned, don't get me started on people who won't even try things. I used to date someone who told me point blank that he hated jsut about every cuisine on the planet, particularly ones that had a lot of meat- free dishes. So I take him to an Italian restaurant anyhow, and he became ADDICTED TO PASTA because - sit down - he had never actually tried it in about the past ten years, because the last time he had it the noodles were mushy or something like that. I mean, WTF? People = weird.

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Well to be fair, Kerry, lots of things are unhealthy in large quantities. Everything in moderation etc. etc. And I have skimmed / semi skimmed milk which isn't high in fat. Please feel free to make as many snotty comments as you like, I'm a big girl.

― Emma, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Skim milk is fine for you. It's the only kind I can drink. That whole animal fat acids thing again.

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It'll be you making the snotty comments if you carry on with all that crazy dairy guzzling, mucus girl.

― Nick, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Mucus girl? Anyway like I should be worrying about the food I eat given all the beer, rum and fags I get through. I am off to the pub now so could we hold off on the insulting mucus girl comments until I can defend myself?

― Emma, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i work at a vegan co-op.

― ethan, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Although I do not eat meat that often,I find vegetarianism pointless and a waste of time. Sorry for offending people; but deep down I agree with my professor who said people have distanced themselves so far from the killing process that they feel sensitive even thinking about it. We have to grind the meat and then make a hamburger out of it so we can eat it without thinking of the poor cow that was butchered. There is nothing wrong about killing for survival. We are designed to be meat eaters. Fair enough if you choose not to, but you'll need to take care to eat enough iron. So few people do. You can see the signs: pale, blue veins showing through, letharigic,... If however you don't like meat, then I can understand completely.

― nathalie, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

You can see the signs: pale, blue veins showing through, letharigic,

Stop it - you're turning Madchen on.

― Nick, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i've said it once, i'll say it again, apart from monkey butlers, animals are for eating, not for entertainment.

― Geoff, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

bestiality; classic or dud?

― ethan, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

depends - are the animals consenting?

― Geoff, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Vegetarianism fails in my view because SOMETHING has to die or be exploited for the necessary energy transfer. Once that is established, it then becomes a matter of trying to work out what is conscious enough to be unethical to eat, and when that happens you're in a moral (not to mention SCIENTIFIC) quagmire.

― DG, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I don't think I'm in much of a quagmire. Call me a dull pragmatist, but plants don't have central nervous systems, which will do for me. Incidentally, when was the last time you heard someone being described as being in a REAL quagmire, rather than this whussy figurative shit?

― Nick, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Of course, my first thought when reading this question was "Hmmm, I eat meat but I still can't stand up in the morning and I'm still really weak and feeble and always ill and always tired"

I eat meat because, yeah, even though I know that the animals are kept in appalling conditions and yeah they go through an enormous amount of pain and suffering but it just tastes so good.

In an ideal world, meat production would be like a bovine Logan's Run where cows are able to live a really great life before being killed (I don't think they need to use that big spinny thing though and, please, let's not involve Peter Ustinov). But the fact that I'm stuck at work until 8 on a Friday night just goes to show that this isn't an ideal world.

― jamesmichaelward, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Stop it - you're turning Madchen on.

I was under the impression that's why you were so in love with me, Nick, my paleness with blue veins showing thru. Don't blame it on Madchen, damnit.

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

weirdest comment so far = "you don't need red meat if you live in a big city" WTF?? does soot make up for it?

― tracer Hand, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

We have wills of iron, or something like that.

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yes, because in the city no-one knows their neighbours (another fact brought to you by the powers of SCIENCE) they don't expend any energy arguing with them about loud music and parking outside each other's houses etc. Therefore: no need for red meat. See? SCIENCE IN ACTION.

― DG, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

You are a horrible scientist. I know everyone in my building, I work with two of them, on the second floor, and the guy above me works at our architect's. The man below me is a pain in the ass but I know him too. I hope he falls down the stairs. See? I know everyone. When the Germans lived across the hall, I hung out with them all the time. And in the building next door I know two people, and the one around the corner I know two as well. I know everyone in my neighborhood!

― Ally, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I should note that DG's skill at science should have led him to realize he would be one of the first evictees at Trig Brother. Then again, perhaps he did realize it, as he said very little after meeting his fate, whereas Emma, likely enough, is still talking about it. ;-)

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

The only meat i eat at home is organiclly farm raised or butchered kosherly or David shot. I toured a slaughterhouse before i considered reverting back from a veggie life.

― anthony, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I'm a fairly lax veggie - occasional tuna & cod, don't always check for gelatine on the ingredient list if the confection looks *particularly* delicious.

Turning point for me came in my early 20s when I realised I couldn't bring myself to *cook* meat, never mind kill for it. I suspect giving up the pleasures of the (animal) flesh pushed me into trying Indian, Vietnamese, Ethiopian, etc cuisines for the first time. Yum.

Does anyone know whether cows have reached the end of their milk-producing life when they're slaughtered? If not, then this seems like a terrible waste. Think of all that potential cheese! Cheese from very old cows might be as good as very old cheese.

― Michael Jones, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

You can see the signs: pale, blue veins showing through, letharigic,...

Here I thought I was pale 'cause I don't sunbathe. Eat a steak, get a tan? I'd type more but so... tired... mus... eat... whopprrr...

― Andy, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I was only the first out because I asked a valid question about armpit hair, which is an issue that needs scientific investigation. Realising you lot had no understaning of the value of empiricism, I accepted my fate gracefully. Besides, I got my revenge on some of you bastards as it started pouring with rain after I was safely inside Blue Posts One and you lot had to walk back in it. Ha ha ha! That will teach you to doubt science!

― DG, Friday, 17 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I've gone vegetarian finally...I can't stand the guilt anymore. It's unnecessary to eat meat for me. If there is a point where I need to eat meat for survival in the wilderness or something, I'll kill my own food so at least I know what's going on fully. If I suffer from malnutrition and can't make it up with vitamins and substitute foods I know I'll need it for survival.

― Lyra, Tuesday, 21 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Vegetarianism is one of those things that I've just never got (kinda like Goth). I mean, I know that slaughterhouses are pretty awful, I know what they do to veal calves (and, to be honest, I don't eat veal though that's as much because I don't care for veal as because I don't like how they treat veal calves), and I believe in treating animals humanely. But I like meat too much, and personally the whole thing seems silly and mush- brained. (Slaughterhouses, and their mechanized methods of killing animals, are as much a product of industrialization and commodification of labor as any other means and process of production and, like those other means and processes of production, won't really change as long as we're predominantly capitalistic -- sorry for the pseudo-socialist rant!)

― Tadeusz Suchodolski, Tuesday, 21 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Skimmed milk is water. Semi-skimmed is water with some milk in it.

Drink proper milk, for goodness sake!

By the way, my pale blue veins are bulging. Sorry.

― Ally C, Wednesday, 22 August 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

five months pass...

you guys are all foolish. be who you are - don't establish your identity by your fuking diet preferences.

― a vegetarian, Tuesday, 19 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Good call. It's better to establish your indentity with lots of random X's and a pile of shitty hardcore records.

― adam, Wednesday, 20 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

*snort* that's amusing.

― The Vegan One Actually, Wednesday, 20 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

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