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I know. I studied a lot of nutritional biology at university. It just seems so unnatural to need to pop pills just to maintain a normal diet.

Snrub wrote:I would like to say "survival of the fittest" and leave it at that. But its not always that simple is it?

Actually.... no. It is that simple. Survival of the fittest baby!


It doesn't bother me that we slaughter thousands of animals a day/week/month/whatever and then throw away what we dont eat. What bothers me is self righteous Vego/Vegan "Holier then thou" jerkwads that hand me a "Dont eat meat or your going to hell" pamphlet and then yell bloody murder at me for being a meat eating bastard beacause i look at the defeathered chickens hangin upside down and say "Hmm tasty".
Did i provoke them by saying hmm tasty? Yes I almost certainly did.
Should they have tried to cram their nonmeat stance down my throat like i cram chicken nuggets? No. Not they should not have.



Also take a gander at this. WARNING - You may find this somewhat offensive if you are one of those uppity self righteous vegans.
http://thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=vegetarian_test

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”
It's increasingly looking like meat is economically/environmentally unsustainable. Just a head's up.

Meat is a luxury. Our society has made it far more cheap and plentiful than it was historically, but our bodies don't tend to stay very healthy when we eat too much of it, which is part of why we have the rates of heart disease and other nutritional issues we do. Of course more of it is just the general ton of sugars and saturated fats we eat, and eating too little veg.

I love meat, but I respect and appreciate folks who choose to go vegetarian. It's often very good for the body and it's certainly much more environmentally-friendly.

Plants are the same. To sustain the world on a plant-only diet, you'd need the whole world literally as one big farm.

Mr Hyena wrote:Plants are the same. To sustain the world on a plant-only diet, you'd need the whole world literally as one big farm.

No...meat requires about 9 times as much farmland as vegetables per calorie.

No you wouldn't. It takes more produce to feed the animals we're eating than it would to just grow produce to feed ourselves.

No...meat requires about 9 times as much farmland as vegetables per calorie.

http://www.jstor.org/pss/20027371

Assuming we continue as is, without meat, and we keep our nature reserves...then it will increase from 1/10th of the world's land to half once our population doubles.

Completely cutting out meat makes this worse.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800902000496

The biggest effect is actually consumption patterns.

If we eat more vegetables...we'll need more land and we're limited for crop-producing land.

When we finally get Saline-resistant GM crop varities of our normal crops and allow farmers to grow them normally with no stupid overzealous laws, then maybe we can see this as an alternative.

Rice can only grow in certain areas like many other plants.

Mr Hyena wrote:

No...meat requires about 9 times as much farmland as vegetables per calorie.

http://www.jstor.org/pss/20027371

Assuming we continue as is, without meat, and we keep our nature reserves...then it will increase from 1/10th of the world's land to half once our population doubles.

Completely cutting out meat makes this worse.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800902000496

The biggest effect is actually consumption patterns.

If we eat more vegetables...we'll need more land and we're limited for crop-producing land.

When we finally get Saline-resistant GM crop varities of our normal crops and allow farmers to grow them normally with no stupid overzealous laws, then maybe we can see this as an alternative.

US livestock feed alone could feed 800 million people: http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Aug97/livestock.hrs.html
Neither of the things you posted alter the fact that it's impossible for meat to be produced more efficiently than veg.
Obviously you can't draw a direct parallell between the two sources...people need to get their protein from somewhere, man does not live on carbs alone.

Several rare and unusual breeds are only maintained for agricultural purposes. If we didn't eat them they would go extinct. No really. Just an interesting perspective on the cruelty of eating animals.

I do eat meat, but I try to buy free-range. I know an animal has died to feed me, but I would like to think that it has had some quality of life. Chickens in particular, I will not buy eggs from battery housed chickens. I want an animal that has seen daylight. Furthermore, animals that are housed in cramped conditions have far more antibiotics and hormones pumped into them so that they can make it to your plate. Also down the cheaper end of the meat market they pump water into the meat to make it look bigger. This of course comes out when you cook and your meat seems a lot smaller as a result. I've also found that cheap bacon doesn't fry as easily because water collects in the pan preventing you browning it off.

There are other things like the method of slaughtering affecting the meat. Animals in a panic release adrenaline which causes lactic acid to build up in the meat which affects the flavour. Which is why some higher quality meat producers are fussy about keeping the animals all happy until they are stunned unexpectedly. I havent done a taste test to prove this to myself, but this is what I've seen done and it wasn't done purely for ethical reasons.

We chose to cut down on the volume of meat we ate to pay for buying better quality meat. So we have more vegetarian dishes. Partly this was recommended to help with my wife's hormonal problems, and we both think that she has shown signs of improvement. It's not a trend in our diets I'm going to reverse to find out if we can cause problems.



Oh and yes, meat production is a lot less energy efficient than just growing vegetables. You have the land use, the energy, water and the crops to feed them. The resources used to produce a single animal could produce a large volume of vegetables. What Mr Hyena says doesn't make sense, if we stopped meat production we wouldn't be short of food, we'd have an abundance as all resources were redirected into producing fruit and veg directly for humans. I think though that we'll always have meat, but currently there's rather too much meat consumption and a lot of pressures would be eased simply by cutting back on the meat industry by getting people to eat less meat. For example, people everywhere seem to eat meat every day of the week, people a few generations ago didn't do this. Western societies eat meat as a luxury not as a necessity, you really don't need much meat in a week.

Oh and yes, meat production is a lot less energy efficient than just growing vegetables. You have the land use, the energy, water and the crops to feed them. The resources used to produce a single animal could produce a large volume of vegetables. What Mr Hyena says doesn't make sense, if we stopped meat production we wouldn't be short of food, we'd have an abundance as all resources were redirected into producing fruit and veg directly for humans. I think though that we'll always have meat, but currently there's rather too much meat consumption and a lot of pressures would be eased simply by cutting back on the meat industry by getting people to eat less meat. For example, people everywhere seem to eat meat every day of the week, people a few generations ago didn't do this. Western societies eat meat as a luxury not as a necessity, you really don't need much meat in a week.

People are forgetting about arable land. Good quality crop growing land is quite limited. Animals aren't quite so fussy. Land that is bad for crops is usually good enough for animals.

Think of all the considerations required to grow crops: pH, Temperature, Climate conditions, Saline concentration etc. Then consider how our population is spiralling out of control. Our crops are notoriously specific. The real problem is not enough GMO work is being done.

Can't grow crops well in the Northeast, but you can fish.

Depends. Fish stocks are quite low in some regions and dangerously low in others for certain species.

But animals often need feed that is grown on prime agricultural land.

The problem with GM is that it's become very politicised and there's a strong anti movement in Europe that has undermined research, while in the US and parts of the East the technology has been developed more freely. We are being left behind when we should be among the world leaders.

I honestly care for animals that go through that sheise but theres nothing you can really do to stop it. I personally would prefer to eat the chicken that weren't harmed (range free chicken or something?) you just can't buy from purdue or tyson.

I guess the weak will always fall to the evil strong.

I consider myself a Carnitarian, every time I hear someone make a deal over animal cruelty or getting a vegan option I order extra dead animal. Bacon wrapped fillet, check, chicken cordon blue, check, turduckin, heck yeah.

Joking aside though I have to try really hard not to laugh at vegans. They always have such flawed and superfluous arguments as to why it's bad to eat animal products and they always come off with a holier than thou attitude.

I grew up on with cows in the pasture and chickens in the coop. I've been to turkey farms, dairy farms, etc around Missouri. I've seen them slaughter cows and I've killed my fair share of chicken. I've hunted deer (albeit I haven't killed one myself) and eaten the spoils.

I have not seen anything in anyplace I've been that makes me feel sorry for the way the animals are treated up unto the moment they are killed. Modern farms aren't the same barbaric institutions they were many years ago. They've figured out how to treat the animals as best as needed (as needed being key) to create a quality product. Free range/organic is an incredibly less effective method of farming and you can see the effects on prices. It isn't practical to feed our population with those methods. They don't make sense.

I'm too lazy to pull resources at the moment but there are studies that correlate.

And speaking of vegetables, don't get me started on corn. That should be capitalized I think... Corn. One of the stupidest crops to grow but due to the chemical conglomerates it's being put in everything. High fructose Corn syrup anyone? It's in everything... Or Corn based ethanol fuels even though celulosic ethanol is more efficient and doesn't cut into the food supply...

Oh you want organic crops? That label really doesn't mean anything. It says they used organic pesticides and organic chemicals on them which are less effective and just as dangerous. Remember, mother nature's made plenty of stuff that will kill you.... naturally.

I'm tired and hungry so this post is probably incoherent anyway, but the core of my argument against vegitarianism is bacon.


tl;dr Bacon is delicious. Burgers Smokehouse bacon. Applewood smoked, thick cut, with no added water. God I'm salivating. Try some of that and tell me you still want to be vegan.

martian_jo wrote:I consider myself a Carnitarian, every time I hear someone make a deal over animal cruelty or getting a vegan option I order extra dead animal. Bacon wrapped fillet, check, chicken cordon blue, check, turduckin, heck yeah.

Joking aside though I have to try really hard not to laugh at vegans. They always have such flawed and superfluous arguments as to why it's bad to eat animal products and they always come off with a holier than thou attitude.

I grew up on with cows in the pasture and chickens in the coop. I've been to turkey farms, dairy farms, etc around Missouri. I've seen them slaughter cows and I've killed my fair share of chicken. I've hunted deer (albeit I haven't killed one myself) and eaten the spoils.

I have not seen anything in anyplace I've been that makes me feel sorry for the way the animals are treated up unto the moment they are killed. Modern farms aren't the same barbaric institutions they were many years ago. They've figured out how to treat the animals as best as needed (as needed being key) to create a quality product. Free range/organic is an incredibly less effective method of farming and you can see the effects on prices. It isn't practical to feed our population with those methods. They don't make sense.

I'm too lazy to pull resources at the moment but there are studies that correlate.

And speaking of vegetables, don't get me started on corn. That should be capitalized I think... Corn. One of the stupidest crops to grow but due to the chemical conglomerates it's being put in everything. High fructose Corn syrup anyone? It's in everything... Or Corn based ethanol fuels even though celulosic ethanol is more efficient and doesn't cut into the food supply...

Oh you want organic crops? That label really doesn't mean anything. It says they used organic pesticides and organic chemicals on them which are less effective and just as dangerous. Remember, mother nature's made plenty of stuff that will kill you.... naturally.

I'm tired and hungry so this post is probably incoherent anyway, but the core of my argument against vegitarianism is bacon.


tl;dr Bacon is delicious. Burgers Smokehouse bacon. Applewood smoked, thick cut, with no added water. God I'm salivating. Try some of that and tell me you still want to be vegan.

exalted

Evolution gave me canine teeth.

Better make damn good use of them.

I need to eat meat because its inefficient to get 200g of protein a day from vegetarian sources. Also you have to mix them because of the incomplete amino acid profiles, whereas with animal products you get complete sets. Its easy, fast, and good quality. Its hard to stay strong when you dont eat meat.

Could we increase grain/vegetable production by cutting down on animal production? Probably. Growing dedicated animal feed a pretty inefficient way to feed people in comparison.

HOWEVER...

Animals are a significantly better way for humans to get their protein, and there will always be land that is more efficient feeding free-range animals than struggling to raise crops. For example, much of the western reaches of the U.S. Great Plains don't have enough water for easy farming. On the other hand, there is enough water to grow plains grasses aplenty, which feed cattle effectivly enough. And I imagine that this is far from the only location where this is true.

In short: For most efficent food production, use farmable land for crops, use non-farmable land for animals. Then eat a healthy balance of both. (Yes, those of us in America eat WAY too much meat...)

Animals were put on the earth for human cunsumption. I dont agree how they are treated but people have to eat meat. Replacing solid meat with pills or other things isn't the same thing as actual meat.

Its up to you weather or not you want to eat meat. But once you have eaten and loved eating meat for years. Its very hard to just stop eating it

Prefer fish to meat in general but if a delicious piece of meat is put in front of me you can be damn sure I'll eat it.

The only person who can pity a chicken is someone who has never been confronted to living chickens. These are some of the most vile and stupid creatures on earth and they only deserve hate and to be fried or roasted.

I've killed chickens and I've skinned rabbits. It was not funny, I didn't enjoyed it but I enjoyed the following meals, and see that as a necessity (it would have been so much more barbaric to eat them alive - and I don't talk about the taste-)

Human beings are omnivorous, we're made to consume both meat and vegetables, that's how evolution (or Nature, or God or whatever) made us (thus the canine teeth as aforementioned). So one of the most laughable thing IMO is a vegan claiming that eating meat is not natural, and that they don't eat meat in order to be closer to nature...

martian_jo wrote:It's in everything... Or Corn based ethanol fuels even though celulosic ethanol is more efficient and doesn't cut into the food supply...

Biolfuels are almost a dead loss IMO. Currently they are working on sources of biolfuels that will grow on waste land, but a lot of biofuel is generated from agricultural land. So we're effectively burning our food instead of eating it. The best bit is that to meet the demand for greater use for crops like corn there have cut down sections of rainforest. Which is counter productive obviously but lets some people feel good about themselves as they drive around in their bio-cars.

I am not vegetarian and doubt I really will ever be. I do care for animals but it would be very tough not being able to eat meat as it contains lots of nutrition (and it tastes good too )

Animals eat each other, they muder and kill each other and the human body is built to eat meat as well as fruit and veg. I don't see how it's wrong to kill and eat animals.

Howard A Treesong wrote:Several rare and unusual breeds are only maintained for agricultural purposes. If we didn't eat them they would go extinct. No really. Just an interesting perspective on the cruelty of eating animals.

Yeah, I've always thought deep on this. Cows, as we know them now, have no place in a modern ecosystem, and would most likely just be killed by some large predator and eventually be eradicated. Their gestation period is far too long, and they have no real means of defense... Same with chickens and pigs. Wild boars are pretty fierce animals, but their cousins the 'pig' isn't at all.

What's the closest thing to a wild cow? Oxen? I can't really think of anything that a cow resembles besides a cow

VanHammer wrote:I need to eat meat because its inefficient to get 200g of protein a day from vegetarian sources. Also you have to mix them because of the incomplete amino acid profiles, whereas with animal products you get complete sets. Its easy, fast, and good quality. Its hard to stay strong when you dont eat meat.

I tried getting all the protein I needed from food for a while, but you very soon get sick of exclusively eating beans, eggs and (vegetarian) sausages. It's very easy to do with protein shake, however, which is entirely vegetarian.

martian_jo wrote:I consider myself a Carnitarian, every time I hear someone make a deal over animal cruelty or getting a vegan option I order extra dead animal. Bacon wrapped fillet, check, chicken cordon blue, check, turduckin, heck yeah.

Joking aside though I have to try really hard not to laugh at vegans. They always have such flawed and superfluous arguments as to why it's bad to eat animal products and they always come off with a holier than thou attitude.

I grew up on with cows in the pasture and chickens in the coop. I've been to turkey farms, dairy farms, etc around Missouri. I've seen them slaughter cows and I've killed my fair share of chicken. I've hunted deer (albeit I haven't killed one myself) and eaten the spoils.

I have not seen anything in anyplace I've been that makes me feel sorry for the way the animals are treated up unto the moment they are killed. Modern farms aren't the same barbaric institutions they were many years ago. They've figured out how to treat the animals as best as needed (as needed being key) to create a quality product. Free range/organic is an incredibly less effective method of farming and you can see the effects on prices. It isn't practical to feed our population with those methods. They don't make sense.

I'm too lazy to pull resources at the moment but there are studies that correlate.

And speaking of vegetables, don't get me started on corn. That should be capitalized I think... Corn. One of the stupidest crops to grow but due to the chemical conglomerates it's being put in everything. High fructose Corn syrup anyone? It's in everything... Or Corn based ethanol fuels even though celulosic ethanol is more efficient and doesn't cut into the food supply...

Oh you want organic crops? That label really doesn't mean anything. It says they used organic pesticides and organic chemicals on them which are less effective and just as dangerous. Remember, mother nature's made plenty of stuff that will kill you.... naturally.

I'm tired and hungry so this post is probably incoherent anyway, but the core of my argument against vegitarianism is bacon.


tl;dr Bacon is delicious. Burgers Smokehouse bacon. Applewood smoked, thick cut, with no added water. God I'm salivating. Try some of that and tell me you still want to be vegan.

I have never met someone who regarded eating meat as "manly" who wasn't a sickly wisp of a man. All the big guys I know are pretty ambivalent.

Vegetarianism is silly. We are omnivores. We need a little bit of everything.

Nothing against vegetarians as people though. Unless they're stuck up about it.

Melissia wrote:Vegetarianism is silly. We are omnivores. We need a little bit of anything.

fixed for you.