To eat meat or not? My thoughts and theories.

I say eat what you want, and don't force it on me like these "We are better than you"-type vegans who somehow get it into their head that just by eating meat or drinking milk we're automatically supporting cruelty to animals. I hate to tell you, but your diet has absolutely NO bearing on your morals or moral character(well, unless you're eating your best friend.... but I digress! ).


As for the whole meat has toxins, causes higher rates of cancer, etc.; imo it's just the result of us noticing how fragile the human body is, and how just about ANYTHING will lead to a chance of some kind of health defect. I bet you could find studies showing higher instances of [insert disease here] in Vegans, too.

[edit on 3-11-2007 by Core90]

reply to post by Core90

I say eat what you want, and don't force it on me like these "We are better than you"-type vegans who somehow get it into their head that just by eating meat or drinking milk we're automatically supporting cruelty to animals. I hate to tell you, but your diet has absolutely NO bearing on your morals or moral character(well, unless you're eating your best friend.... but I digress!

).

If you do eat meat you ARE by proxy contributing to the slaughter and mistreatment of animals, and the poor environmental conditions caused by operating industries. And nobody said anything about morality but if you want some ammunition for that seemingly irrelevant part of the discussion, I don't have a lot of "morality" when it comes to getting around, and I've also been known to throw a punch in a tense situation. Don't get me wrong, I'm a good dude in general and am always involved in some sort of philanthrophy, but when it comes to girls and fist fights, my diet is far more righteous than my social interactions. Hahahaha.

As for the whole meat has toxins, causes higher rates of cancer, etc.; imo it's just the result of us noticing how fragile the human body is, and how just about ANYTHING will lead to a chance of some kind of health defect. I bet you could find studies showing higher instances of [insert disease here] in Vegans, too.

Sorry, but meat causes adverse side effects. Especially in the digestional tract and the colon. I don't see how having 10 pounds of partially digest meat in your body is a healthy thing.

And in this conversation, we're not even taking it to one extreme or the other. I think this is the most stable thread I've seen regarding the subject. A lot of good questions and answers from both sides of the discussion.

I avoid meat when I can, and because I'm also extremely picky about food. I will only purchase red meat from elk hunters in my area, and that only happens rarely. Humans were not really designed to eat meat if you look at the anatomy. Their intestines are way too long and they don't have canines like a wolf, despite that...humans are an adaptable parasite so they are also opportunistic and have for centuries cooked their meat to make it easier to digest.
Besides that....I heard humans taste a lot like pork....to be honest I'd much rather eat humans. It would be more economic and they're also plentiful. And the unhealthy humans I wouldn't eat, but you could make lampshades out of them.

As always when faced with a tricky issue like this, i like to refer to history.


The idea that pre-domesticated meat was sought after wherever possible is flawed.

Meat was seen as a delicacy, something that took secondary importance over the gathering of non-meat products of nature - humans back then could not rely on meat for survival, especially if those humans were part of a community.

This is why there were few hunters in comparision to gatherers.

People would go days, perhaps weeks without meat.

The only reason that people hunted for meat back then is because they didn't have the variety of vegetables and fruits that the agricultural revolution provided - they would be able to gather a certain balance of the nessecary foods from vegetables and plant-life, but only a merchant or nobility could truly survive only on a vegertarian diet, where a variety of foods were available.

As such, when a kill was made, the entire village would share in the feast.

Quite a stark contrast to the readily available 'carniverous' appetites of modern day society.

So why the continued reliance on meat, you might wonder.

The answer is simple - Meat as a product has always sold for more money than vegetables and fruits, despite the fact you can survive for far longer than you may think on mere vegetables and fruits than you can on meat.

It's cheaper, too.

I suppose this could be attributed to a number of reasons - Such as Capitalism's nessecity to keep the masses conditioned in such a way to support their rather flawed and obselete economy.

Another such reason could be that we're brought up with a dependance on meat.

All this points to one thing; It is possible to condition a society on an inter-generational scale.

reply to post by laiguana


Hell has officially frozen over. I gave one of you reptilian people a star.. Gross.

reply to post by Throbber


I knew there was a reason we ended up being on the same team... It's called "rationale", "knowledge", and the the capability to apply them. A rare concept in this day and age.

reply to post by DeadFlagBlues


It's not as rare as you may think, it's just that more than a few people ignore that rational part of their logic in favour of the benefits of ignoring it.

Which defiles their true personality, to be blunt.

oh another one of these threads?



I devour flesh.

reply to post by laiguana



what a crock.

I would say human are less designed for plant consumption considering how we cant fully digest plant matter; Cellulose, its a bitch aint it?

Got fiber?


Omnivore>All

I dont eat alot of meat, i dont eat a whole lot of food really..

But my daily intake is approximately only 25% meat. And of that 25%, none of it is pork because I do not eat pork, period.

I also do not eat fish or any type of seafood except for rare circumstances, so none of the 25% is that either.

The 25% is mostly chicken with some red meat. I'd say 15% chicken, 10% red meat.

So my daily red meat intake is only 10% of what I ate that day, that is a good percentage I think.

Because I am a big advocate of eating meat; I think it is an essential part of our diets, and it is even responsible for the development of the modern human being's intelligence capability, or brain growth and human evolution.

But too much of it can turn you into a butterball turkey; my sister eats like, 80% meat.. sometimes more, of her daily food. out of that, its pretty evenly split between chicken and red meat; she eats lot of meat dude! and guess what? shes all big and fat.. and its because of that.. so definitely too much meat is a bad thing. However, if you're underweight and possibly malnourished, too much meat can be a good thing for a little while, lol.

Gimme the steak! the big FILET MIGNON .. medium rare, nice and plump and juicy with the pink center, yummy. I'm all about a $20 steak at a family chain resturant like .. Outback Steakhouse.

reply to post by Lysergic


Hey. The grown ups are having a discussion here. Go listen to your dated Alt. Rock and make sure it's not too loud. I'll be in before the night to tuck you in.

reply to post by runetang


I just replied to another one of your seemingly oblivious comments.

Do people not read anymore? Do people not think? Do people lack all rationale? I really don't understand people, I guess. I thought knowledge, going against your beliefs or not was to be taken in to augment your thought towards purity and stability. Absolute understanding.


This just shows why we're at a current "plateau" in human evolution.

reply to post by DeadFlagBlues


lmao.

Remove the tofu block from yer bum.


Will you promise to tuck me in after you get done straightening your hair please!?

Sorry if I crushed someone belief, but deny ignorance an' all, can't exactly digest plants 100% but can with protein, mmm mmm i love me some amino acids in the morning!

Have grrrreat day!

reply to post by Lysergic


Humans don't even have acidic saliva, genius. Meat only has 1 non essential amino acid over those you can get from plants. Your body has a terrible time digesting flesh in any form, even fish, and especially poultry. It's good to read every once in awhile. At first, I didn't believe either.


And yes.. As soon as I'm done straightening my hair, I'll be right up.
haha.

reply to post by DeadFlagBlues


Who said a word about acidic saliva?

and it's all about moderation, the older we get the less protein we require.

The majority of true vegans seem sickly, that or they're recovering fat chicks.


anywho I'll be waiting for you.

reply to post by Lysergic


I don't mean to bash my own people or anything, but I don't know what it is about a lot of "vegan" girls.. But there's a lot of fat ones. For sure.


Chubby cheaters.

reply to post by Throbber

Originally posted by Throbber
The idea that pre-domesticated meat was sought after wherever possible is flawed.

Meat was seen as a delicacy, something that took secondary importance over the gathering of non-meat products of nature - humans back then could not rely on meat for survival, especially if those humans were part of a community.

You can prove this? We know that hunter-gatherer societies tend to be nomadic. This type of existence is one of subsistance, humans back then relied on whatever they could get their hands on to eat, scavanging a corpse would not be out the question for these people. Your theory is flawed on another premise all on its own, you have a hunter-gatherer society in Europe what vegtables and fruits are there to be had in the dead of winter? Another flaw in your reasoning is the fact we know man developed hunting tools, if this was not an important aspect of their lives they would not devote precious gathering time to make them.

Originally posted by Throbber
The only reason that people hunted for meat back then is because they didn't have the variety of vegetables and fruits that the agricultural revolution provided - they would be able to gather a certain balance of the nessecary foods from vegetables and plant-life, but only a merchant or nobility could truly survive only on a vegertarian diet, where a variety of foods were available.

Again proof of this please. Common sense would dictate that depending on what region it is you lived in the types of fruits and vegtables available would vary. Also it should be noted the domestication of livestock goes hand in hand with the first agricultural revolution. being a pretty important part of it to, don't you find it just a bit curious that the animals that are raised on a farm have multiple uses, including but not limited to being edible.

Now lets look at another flaw in the whole of your argument, First off you describe meat as being a delicacy, so basically it would be the most powerful people in the village or tribe that got to consume it first right?
Then you go on to tell us that after the agricultural revolution occured that despite having plenty of grains and vegtables to eat growing year in and year out, that only the most powerful people in the society could live off the proceeds as such? You can't have it both ways.

Originally posted by laiguana
Humans were not really designed to eat meat if you look at the anatomy. Their intestines are way too long and they don't have canines like a wolf.

The exact same thing can be said for eating plant matter we dont have a mouth full of molars and our intestines are not long enough to digest it completley either. Early man did not need to cook his meat, in all likelihood he was a scavenger and could eat decaying and rotting meat rather easily. Man is an omnivore specializing leads to extinction.




[edit on 11/3/2007 by Jovi1]