"I like meat too much" - Another angle?

[Clueless Git]

A nice young couple having a meal in our local veggie restuarant. The guy is working hard at impressing the young lady with his intellect rather than how many 'inches' he is 'packing' or what drugs he has stashed away at home that they can both get mashed on later.

Nice that. Don't get much of it round our way :)

Anyways, the guy is struggling a bit and spotting my bag of vegan freezer goodies he starts asking me questions. Turns out that the young lady is a confirmed veg-head and he isn't .. He is kinda there under sufference as she thinks that the odd meal out somewhere that doesn't disgust her is entirely reasonable for him to have to put up with once in a while.

Two things come up; The issue of not forcing vegetarianism on children and the usual old cobblers of how the guy respects everything about veg*ans and veg*nism (i.e. "damn these play hard-to-get veggie-chicks but I desperately want my 'jollies' later) but could never actualy be one as "he likes his meat too much".

So, first we discuss the natural choices of babies at the point of weaning: How the first solids they will accept, in order, are; Fruit (banana?) then blandish carbs (mashed potato etc) and then vegetables.

The fact that ALL babies will reject any detectable meat in their food is accepted.

The fact that the only way to get babies to eat meat is to slowly introduce it in virtualy undetectable quantities to their vegetable foods and then slowly up the dosage is (because it is indisputably true) accepted also.

After that the conversation becomes based on acceptance of the idea that babies will choose to eat fruit, carbs and veg willingly but can only 'progess' to eating meat if parents circumvent the babies natural choices by tactics of 'deception'.

We switch back to the "I like my meat too much ..." thing and this question arises;

"How can you actualy know that to be true when you were 'tricked' at such a young age out of ever knowing if you would have liked a meat free diet better?"

[pete_m]

To be honest, I'd have thought the reason babies don't eat meat is due to texture. It's not liquid or mushy! As opposed to any innate meat phobia, I mean.

But then I'm no expert :) Do you have any links to back up what you're saying?


I agree that the way a child is brought up will determine their tastes and views, obviously. Religion is a prime example of this.

[missbettie]

"How can you actualy know that to be true when you were 'tricked' at such a young age out of ever knowing if you would have liked a meat free diet better?"

Love this! I never thought about it from the baby POV cool.

[khadagan]

I've actually seen a baby once gum a bit of steak to death, maybe this was an exception or the baby was very hungry, I have no idea. I never heared of babies naturally rejecting meats, although I'd love to believe that. I have no experience with this myself, since I only introduced vegan foods to my daughter, she does have a bit of an unusual taste for foods like olives, garlic, seaweeds etc, even when she was very little, but then again those are exactly the foods I love and ate lots of so maybe she received a taste for them as well while she was still being breastfed, I reallly don't know. Just guessing here.

[missbettie]

Ya but even the majority of parents don't give their kids meat when they start them off on solids... It typically starts with mashed bananas and avocados!! kids learn to eat what their parents give them. :) Its like when someone says, don't you think that your kids deserve to choose whether or not they can eat meat? Well the majority of people don't give their kids the choice not to eat meat... its not even a choice that most parents even mention!

[khadagan]

I guess the kids can later choose to opt out. You raise your children in the way you think is best and unfortunately for most people this means giving them meat and other animal foods. Personally I find it disgusting seeing small children eat any sort of animal product, but everybody just wants the best for their kids and that's what they think thy are giving.

[emmapresley]

true. i also get properly turned off to see young kids eating meat, especially (not that im advocating 'good' meat) crappy junk food meat..chicken nuggets etc. i see kids at work getting way overexcited at the prospect of a chicken nugget. what is it about them thats so great? but yes, the parents do say things like 'you need to eat it all up cos youre growing..etc etc' or 'you cant have chocolate until youve eaten all your <insert bad meat product here> up'

i have seen babies (kids i would look at and reckon to be under one years old ) gnawing on burgers, licking at chickens legs, sucking on deep fried fish fingers dipped in tomato ketchup.

sure the kids can opt out later..but it takes great strength for a kid who knows its wrong to eat animals to go against the grain of their families habits without being ridiculed/mocked/left out/made to feel awkward. assuming they have their parents support. and i personally know of kids who have wanted this, but have been made to feel like theyre being a pain in the arse for being 'faddy'..or the family is simply too busy to have to see the kids needs as valid.

[SlackAlice]

I guess the kids can later choose to opt out. You raise your children in the way you think is best and unfortunately for most people this means giving them meat and other animal foods. Personally I find it disgusting seeing small children eat any sort of animal product, but everybody just wants the best for their kids and that's what they think thy are giving.

Yes , we naturally all want the best for our babies.. so we move on from feeding our infants mashed veg and fruit to feeding them meat almost without a thought because we are all brainwashed by the idea that meat promotes 'healthy growth'. Who would want to deny their baby that?

Slack

[cobweb]

I'm so glad I never gave my baby meat!. He still chose to try it when he got a bit older though :eek: (but is now vegan and has been for 7 years :cool:).

I've never heard of babies rejecting meat either, but I'm sure most young kids would rather not eat animals if they knew the truth about what their meat actually was. How sad :confused:.

[missbettie]

My little nephew who is 3 demands meat...but i think its from outside sources...his mom just turned pescatarian which is awesome. :) and now she spouts off to her children, "Are you sure you want to eat that? Would you really eat a pig they are so cute!!" and now more often then not my little nephew says "noooo I don't want to eat the piggy!!!" I love it!

[harpy]

One swallow doesn't make a summer, but FWIW I didn't like red meat (or eggs or cheese or butter) when I was small and had to be coaxed to eat them - bet my mother wishes she'd saved herself the trouble now... Think I was happy to eat chicken or fish, unfortunately.

[Clueless Git]

To be honest, I'd have thought the reason babies don't eat meat is due to texture. It's not liquid or mushy! As opposed to any innate meat phobia, I mean.

But then I'm no expert :) Do you have any links to back up what you're saying?

'Lo Pete :)

Remember we are talking about at the weaning stage here - NOT after they have been weaned matey.

Check out any article on weaning babies that you can find on Google. They all, from a 'baby must eat meat' PoV, teach that pureed or otherwise meat must be introduced to babies diet slowly.

[andybuildz]

Well first off I too questioned your statement that babies reject meat...soooooo...I Googled the question and sure enough it does seem to be true for the most part...not always but a lot and it does seem to be b/c of the texture.

As far as being tricked one way or another I'd have to say that in life in general we brainwash ourselves. sometimes for the good and sometimes not. Years ago I was an abuser of alcohol...real bad. Bad enough that I sent myself to rehab for a month (Eric Clapton's place, "The Crossroads" in Antigua ). Long story but the bottom line was...I knew I was living on borrowed time and didn't need to be told so. I went to many AA meeting and absolutely HATED them and it wasn't b/c I was in denial b/c I wasn't. I just hated most everything about it especially...well...I have a long laundry list why so I'll skip over that part. for me...I needed to change my lifestyle and guess what? It was REALLY simple to do..in spite of how bad I was. The reason it was easy was because I was honest with myself and knew the best road to take if I wanted to be well so I created my own program. Another long story. I called it, "TAP"...an acronym that stood for, "The Andy Program". It was catered by me, for me. You could say I brainwashed myself into a healthy way to live. I took my BRAIN..and WASHED it...CLEAN!

Of course it wasn't EZ per se but the concept was very easy but it took a lot of perseverance and dedication but hell.....what good thing doesn't?
My first step was to go on a two week brown rice "cleansing". I ate nothing but BR 3x a day with nothing on it for two weeks. I drank a cup of twig tea before or after each meal...my choice was bancha tea..with nothing in that. It taught me a lot.
After my two week cleansing I slowly slipped into very Yin/Yang balancing of my foods (and life). I watched my acids and alkalines among other things. I ate as much organic as possible. I made sure to concentrate on chewing my foods until they were fully pullverized rather than shovel in bite after bite with no conscious thought.
It took work before it became habit..before it became part of my life....and yeh...I switched one bad habit...for a good one.
It took work!
If torturing and murdering innocent animals makes sense to someone...IMO..there's something very sick inside them that either they're not willing to address or haven't even considered.

I think we can say people have been brainwashed but we're talking about a lot of very very very intelligent people so how could that be??? Thats really the question. What makes intelligent people turn a blind eye to torture and murder and even worse...EATING the victims!
How can folks defend that practice is beyond me.

I know it's a hard habit to break having been indoctrinated from a very early age but so was becoming sober after many years of abuse. Lots of things in life are difficult but people do them to clean up their lives...in all forms.
For me..when I became vegan it felt even better than when I quit bustin' the bottles over my head. Not only was I saving innocent animals but I wasn't housing them in my body.

I've said it a million times. I think it'd be easier to get folks to stop believing in god that to stop eating meat...for the most part..intelligent people too..even brilliant people.

For me...I'm constantly pushing the vegan lifestyle to the point I think I'm becoming annoying which is something I really have to watch out not to do. there's a fine line in offering out information and becoming annoying.
A real lot of folks tell me that eating meat isn't going to kill them...that people ate meat for hundreds of years and live to be a hundred. I keep telling them..that even more than discussing being vegan for your health..more importantly it's about the torture and murder of innocent animals and I think thats where I lose them. They seem to care more about the health factor..or should I say more about, me me me..than genocide of the animal kingdom.

I reckon you just have to keep up the fight!

[cobweb]

going back to the babies thing, surely a baby rejects anything which is of a texture they can't cope with?

[Clueless Git]

Well first off I too questioned your statement that babies reject meat...soooooo...I Googled the question and sure enough it does seem to be true for the most part...not always but a lot and it does seem to be b/c of the texture.
The blindingly obvious appears to have been, as the 'blindingly' bit of the term implies, just a bit too blindingly obvious to have been easily seen.

Liquidised/pureed/smoothied (as all weaning foods have to be) meat has virtualy no detectable texture if, after having been Liquidised/pureed/smoothied it actualy has any texture left at all.


As for the rest of what you shared in your post, Andy, I just want to say this ...

I'm impressed and humbled matey. Anyone who can get that tough with themselves to turn their life around has my total and utter respect.

[Clueless Git]

Yes , we naturally all want the best for our babies.. so we move on from feeding our infants mashed veg and fruit to feeding them meat almost without a thought because we are all brainwashed by the idea that meat promotes 'healthy growth'. Who would want to deny their baby that?

Slack
Aye, longstanding meat industry propaganda, that, and its grip on the minds of the 'herd' is very very strong.

So strong that one well meaning 'earth mother' type actualy accused me and the ex-missus Stunt, of child abuse when she found out that none of our children had ever eaten meat.

[SlackAlice]

I keep telling them..that even more than discussing being vegan for your health..more importantly it's about the torture and murder of innocent animals and I think thats where I lose them. They seem to care more about the health factor..or should I say more about, me me me..than genocide of the animal kingdom.

!

Thats where we all lose them Andy!!:mad:

They listen intensly when you mention the health benefits to THEM. They might even listen when you mention enviromental issues that could effect THEM. But try and get them on the torture of animals they fall away. No THEM in there to care about. not pets belonging to THEM just a stream of nameless animals . No impact on THEM at all .

Slack

[andybuildz]

I know it doesn't help the planet much to talk among like minded friends as we do here except for the fact that it helps us feel as though we're not alone within our mission and thoughts. ..anbd to talk to those that laugh at us only becomes frustrating but if we get through to one out of a hundred then the frustration becomes well worth it..although I'm not even sure the odds are as good as one in a hundred...but still.
What gets me most is.....I KNOW we're right..100% right. the thing that hurts most is...all these intelligent people that don't agree with us.....that go to church and preach peace, love and understanding...that run our countries, that educate our children, that heal the sick and wounded....those people...a tremendous percentage of them turn a blind a eye to our cause which shouldn't be "our" cause. I don't even get how it can be an issue but it's a tremendous one.
Just looking at videos of factory farms (to put it nicely)..wait, wait....THEY call it slaughter houses..it's not even really them that call it factory farms. When you look at those videos how on earth can you not understand..and stand up against this atrocity? How on earth can ANYONE think this alright? It's that out of sight/out of mind mentality.
Again...here I am talking to like minded people so how am I helping?
I do what I can in the time that I have. I go on site after site trying to educate folks fwtw. I talk to all the folks I can eye to eye/heart to heart.
I'm far from a Gary Yourvosky...but I do what I can
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=es6U00LMmC4
http://www.adaptt.org/index.html
Anyway..thats my morning rant...gotta get back to what I do to feed myself...bangin' nails : )

[Ms_Derious]

To be honest, I find arguments such as 'I like meat too much' very hard to argue against. If someone doesn't actually think it's morally wrong to use animals, then they are not going to think it's a worthwhile reason to give up eating something they like. If they have health concerns, sure, I can see why people might say that. I, for example, like cooked food too much to go raw, though I think there are a lot of benefits. I don't think there are any great moral implications against the use of cooked food other than more energy use than *some* raw foods, but I'm not convinced enough of that to eschew all cooked food.

If they do think it's morally wrong, well, that's another thing but to be honest most omni/vegetarians don't really accept the harm in animal products. It's a bit like saying 'I commit adultery because I like sex too much'. If you think adultary is wrong, then that's rather a ridiculous statement, if you think it's fine, then it quickly becomes hard to argue that it's something people shouldn't do. Technically there is no law against it, but it can be deeply harmful to others and eventually to the person doing it, but legally it's their choice if they want to do it.

To my mind, ethical veganism quickly breaks down to a question of 'do you think it's okay to use other living creatures as things' if the answer is yes, then an ethical vegan point of view is hard to discuss unless you take a welfareist stance rather than an abolitionist one. If you say 'No' then really ethical veganism is the only option.

Having sad that, in my experience most people don't really live their lives according to what they think is morally correct, but what they think they can 'get away with' and still be seen in the way they want to be. In this way, even if someone agrees that using animals is wrong, if the majority of people are going to approve of their actions they really have no incentive to change them.

[andybuildz]

To be honest, I find arguments such as 'I like meat too much' very hard to argue against. If someone doesn't actually think it's morally wrong to use animals, then they are not going to think it's a worthwhile reason to give up eating something they like. If they have health concerns, sure, I can see why people might say that. I, for example, like cooked food too much to go raw, though I think there are a lot of benefits. I don't think there are any great moral implications against the use of cooked food other than more energy use than *some* raw foods, but I'm not convinced enough of that to eschew all cooked food.

If they do think it's morally wrong, well, that's another thing but to be honest most omni/vegetarians don't really accept the harm in animal products. It's a bit like saying 'I commit adultery because I like sex too much'. If you think adultary is wrong, then that's rather a ridiculous statement, if you think it's fine, then it quickly becomes hard to argue that it's something people shouldn't do. Technically there is no law against it, but it can be deeply harmful to others and eventually to the person doing it, but legally it's their choice if they want to do it.

To my mind, ethical veganism quickly breaks down to a question of 'do you think it's okay to use other living creatures as things' if the answer is yes, then an ethical vegan point of view is hard to discuss unless you take a welfareist stance rather than an abolitionist one. If you say 'No' then really ethical veganism is the only option.

Having sad that, in my experience most people don't really live their lives according to what they think is morally correct, but what they think they can 'get away with' and still be seen in the way they want to be. In this way, even if someone agrees that using animals is wrong, if the majority of people are going to approve of their actions they really have no incentive to change them.

You really said that very well! It's what people think they can get away with. That in_of_itself is worthy of a thread on it's own to comment on. Thing is...in all reality , thats no excuse because getting away with something is basically stealing in a sense. It's basically lying in a sense. It's basically being deceptive in a sense...and with all those things the argument/discussion with that deceptive meat eater thats trying to get away with their theory it becomes a moot point of discussion. It totally cancels out any validity in what their claims are IMHO. In order to respect a persons opinion they need to talk truth..not "get away" from the truth. So imo thats where the discussion should turn. Maybe turn to...is it OK to kill and eat your pet dog for example.

[Ms_Derious]

You really said that very well! It's what people think they can get away with. That in_of_itself is worthy of a thread on it's own to comment on. Thing is...in all reality , thats no excuse because getting away with something is basically stealing in a sense. It's basically lying in a sense. It's basically being deceptive in a sense...and with all those things the argument/discussion with that deceptive meat eater thats trying to get away with their theory it becomes a moot point of discussion. It totally cancels out any validity in what their claims are IMHO. In order to respect a persons opinion they need to talk truth..not "get away" from the truth. So imo thats where the discussion should turn. Maybe turn to...is it OK to kill and eat your pet dog for example.

But that leads into a very subjective idea of what truth is. It's my opinion that it's wrong to use any other living creature. Some people however don't feel that this is the case. Because you can't prove something as being 'true' in this sense it becomes a rather pointless argument. I can, and have, spoken to people until I am blue in the face about why I feel that it's wrong to use others (humans and non-humans) but unless they agree, it's very hard to gain any ground in the conversation. It's a bit like having a conversation with a racist about why racism is wrong. If they fundamentally believe that people of one race are 'lesser' than them, no amount of arguing is going to change their minds.

[leedsveg]

Ms_Derious

Exactly. The Gradgrinds can witter on about facts relating to veganism but facts, even when undisputed, can only take you so far, not all the way. There also has to be a belief that using animals per se, is morally wrong, just as using people from an ethnic minority (because they are seen as lesser persons) for medical experiments, is morally wrong*.

Leedsveg

(* Google Tuskegee Syphilis Experiments)

[Clueless Git]

.. It's my opinion that it's wrong to use any other living creature. Some people however don't feel that this is the case.
Lo Derious :)

There is kind of a 'trick' to dealing with that mentality, a bit of a 'bait, switch and trap'. Goes, loosely, summat like this ...

Bait: Confirm that they really do feel that there is no 'moral flaw' in the 'right' to use other living creatures as we choose to if we have the power to do so ..

Switch: Introduce a subject they feel strongly against; Slavery/wife beating/bestiality/paedophilia/whatever gets their personal 'goat' ...

Trap: Ask them (in a "we are both on the same side on this one but I need your help 'cos I wouldn't know where to start .." kinda way) how they would convince those people who believe it is their 'right' to use other living creatures in such ways that doing so is actualy wrong ..

It is a very amusing piece of 'role reversal', if you can pull it off.

[Ms_Derious]

Switch: Introduce a subject they feel strongly against; Slavery/wife beating/bestiality/paedophilia/whatever gets their personal 'goat' ...


The difficulty with that is that all of those things are illegal within the UK, so are accepted as being wrong. Using animals is not only permitted, but actively encouraged as we have rules on what is and is not acceptable. Thank you welfareism.

However, it does seem like it might well work with some people, so I'm going to keep it in my stack of 'things to try to defuse omni rage at my steadfast insistence on being difficult tool kit'

[leedsveg]

Can't see me ever using "paedophilia" and "bestiality" etc to try to convert omnis. Sounds like a recipe for getting thumped (or giving a weird view of veganism). I suppose it can work in theory but more likely to produce negative results. Also it may not be seen, on the whole, as the best promo for veganism.

Leedsveg