Militant-ism isn't going to win people over.

The great lie of capitalism is pushing a theory of personal responsibility rather than legislating these problems away.

There are so many elements of my life that cause harm to other beings that addressing the harm could be a full time job.

Killing rodents, mosquitos, and ants is something most people will do without a second thought. I've sprayed a wasp nest with wasp killer and one writhed on the ground for 5 minutes and I felt awful about it, but there is practically a whole aisle of it at the local hardware store.

How many insects do you think have been harmed by industrial pesticides used in growing grains? What type of animal harm do you think pet ownership brings? How many wild birds do you think are killed in how many different ways? How many animals do you think are hit with cars? What do you think the effect the shipping industry has on sea life? What about trash? What about the smog? What about the chemicals dumped into the environment that are used to produce the hardware we are communicating with?

How much animal testing has been done by scientists on all types of animals to have what we have today?

My desire to pay as little as possible for coffee means the barista can't afford a home and likely will have their body harmed by the stress of not having enough money to operate in today's society. We send manufacturing off to poor countries were pollutants more directly harm their citizens than ours.

The wikipedia article states that poultry sex can be determined before hatching and that European countries have legislated that culling must stop, so it sounds like we are able to make progress. "Beyond" shows there is at least research going into lab grown/cruelty free meats.

Do I have a moral obligation to go live next to a pond feeding on what I can forage while living in a dwelling I built with my own hands or is it satisfying enough that I vote progressive and hope to make progress over time by regulating the more atrocious of our actions.

FWIW, I have tried vegetarianism and I did not enjoy it at all. I found it greatly limited my food choices. It felt ascetic and I felt miserable. So while it is easy for you, I did not find it easy.

We're all guilty aren't we, even speaking as a vegetarian, but for me it's about how much cruelty I can avoid, not all or nothing. I don't kill insects but I eat eggs. I try to use public transport but I do have a car. Don't let perfection be the enemy here.

Reminder to self: don’t read the comments

Wow. That you attack someone who merely said they're a vegetarian in these terms, and your comment isn't flagged and dead, is extremely embarrassing for HN.

I mean, I have low expectations (on HN) for anything involving vegetarians and vegans, but you've gone lower.

Can you see why a person would find trivializing diet restriction a little militant?

I'm not sure the rest could be considered an "attack."

If being vegetarian feels righteous, that's great, and I am happy for anyone who feels good about restricting their diet for ethical reasons. The rest of my post is stating that I don't think (ethical) vegetarians are better people, and the corollary, that I am not a bad person because I choose to spend my ethical attention on things other than avoiding chicken. There is clearly no shortage of ethical endeavors.

I am not even an ideological enemy. The post I was originally responding to was somebody who successfully made a website showcasing an emotional appeal to the amount of animal consumption in the US. I added the information of an emotional intensifier (male chicks getting macerated en masse) as something that would intensify the web page and something that causes me (someone who doesn't have a lot of qualms about meat consumption and its consequences) discomfort and cognitive dissonance.

When it's you vs me, that guarantees there will be conflict. When it's us vs the problem, there is a chance.

> You can "handle that" by no longer eating meat. It's that easy.

What do you think would have happened if the person had instead said "What prevents you from giving up eating chicken?"

Alternatively, what do you think would have happened if this person had instead said: "I saw something like that and was motivated enough to give giving up meat a go, I found it much easier than expected and haven't regretted my decision for two years." Same content, wildly different level of righteousness, conviction, and condescension.

> rodents, mosquitos, and ants

> How much animal testing has been done by scientists on all types of animals to have what we have today?

Nothing compared to what we are doing to meat animals. We make these animals to eat like a machine. All these are to hide your guilt.

You can just accept that meat is a human food. Animals die for it. The natural world involves animals eating other animals. If you have to kill male calves because you're on a dairy farm then you kill the male calves. It's really not that shocking.

Meat is human food. But industrialization of meat is much more morally grey. Working with a local farmer to buy pasture raised pigs free from gestation crates is totally different from the hog mills with tiny cages and concrete floors.

This. Meat as a food source is fine. Modern industrial food production isn't.

I live in NZ. Our meat is mostly grown in open fields. Except chickens. They get it rough.

> The natural world involves animals eating other animals.

A "natural world" argument will always be weak. The natural world also involves rape, infanticide, and a general lack of morality. A "feature" of humans is that we can reason about, assign morality to, and ultimately move beyond some things that occur in the natural world.

The natural world also involves species consuming their entire food supply and then going extinct. Or polluting their ecosystem until they are unable to survive.

I would hope we are intelligent enough to avoid that. Meat eating is contributing to both.

Not the first. Sounds like we're not consuming our entire food supply, but rather generating more as we need it.

And there's a lot of other things besides cow farts contributing to global warming, which can have a much bigger effect for much less effort than making the world vegetarian.

Clearing huge swaths of Brazilian rainforest, “the lungs of the planet”, to make way for cattle seems like a pretty significant contributing factor though, would you agree? Less demand for meat, less demand for eliminating large pieces of a rather important natural carbon sink.

Even more maddening: clearing land for growing crops, which are fed to cattle.

We can just cut out the middle man (cow)

Or by choosing to source your meat from places that treat animals well. Local, humane farmers.

It's pricier, but it's much higher quality and skips the industrial treatment of animals.

In addition to this, and for those who live in places where this isn't feasible, I recommend some serious thought into the amount of meat consumption. I tried the vegetarianism thing, and basically felt awful the entire time. I don't know why, but I found I just needed some read meat every now and again. However, I learned I only needed a small fraction of what I had before. I end up consuming a moderate portion once a week opposed to one a day and an able to supplement the rest.

nitpick: People confuse simple and easy. Losing weight is simple (don't put food in your mouth), but anyone who's obese can tell you it is not very easy to eat less.

Likewise eating vegetarian is simple but to many, not easy.

I found it very, very easy.

Giving up cheese would be hard.

I think you make it sound easier than it is. I also decided over dinner one evening. Then I realized meat was in almost every meal I loved. I tried them without meat and hated it. Habit I guess.

Then I realized I'd rather be a bad person than a miserable person; that it was wrong, but I'd do it anyway. This is what you're up against -- the sad but brutal reality of apathy and willful disregard.

Mea culpa.

I went vegan for about a year not too long ago. Just thought I’d try it. I ended up really liking it, mainly because it got me a bit more comfortable cooking and trying recipes and ingredients I would never have considered. I’m not vegan anymore, primarily because of a living situation (roomies.) I like meat, but I’m still thrilled to whip up a good quick vegan or vegetarian dish now and then.

However, if you take a meat centered dish and just remove the meat, or throw in a meat-like substitute (beyond burgers more than something like tofu or seitan), then yeah, it’s not going to be great. Vegetarian and vegan recipes are often really good precisely because they don’t attempt replace meat with anything. Instead I think they rely more on spice and flavor combinations.

You’re not going to find a replacement for a killer dry-aged ny strip steak that’s grilled to perfection. But you might find a fantastic curry, kimchi stew, roasted pepper, or black bean burger recipe that help to broaden your tastes and get comfortable eating less meat.

Bad person according to whom, though? What makes eating meat wrong? That some people decide it is? There's no consensus or laws that make it so, unlike the case with eating humans. You decided you didn't want to be miserable, but I guess you feel guilty because you decided it was wrong? I've decided it's not wrong, and I don't see that anyone can make me think otherwise.

So eating humans is only wrong, because other people think it is wrong and there are laws against it?

I find that really shortsighted. Slavery isn't bad because we as a society have decided it so. It always has been bad.

It’s always been bad to us living today, but it hasn’t always been bad to people in the past. I’m not a moral realist because I don’t see what sort of objective facts are moral. The universe doesn’t care. It’s humans who are moral, and what’s considered good or bad varies quite a lot. No, I wouldn’t want to be enslaved, and the golden rule seems like a good principle to live by, but nothing in nature makes it true. It’s a value judgement we moderns make.

Try to eat fewer meals with meat first. Find recipes, try them a few days of the week. That already helps.