Animal Ethics

SEPTEMBER 23, 2009

There are two approaches a vegetarian might take in arguing that rearing and killing animals for food is morally offensive. He might argue that eating animals is morally bad because of the pain inflicted on animals in rearing and killing them to be eaten. Or he could object to the killing itself.

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Animal Ethics

JANUARY 9, 2009

A third of a century ago, when the modern animal-liberation movement was in its infancy, Martin published an essay entitled “A Critique of Moral Vegetarianism,” Reason Papers (fall 1976): 13-43. I suspect that many readers of this blog are Christians but not vegetarians. The contrast would be, for example, “health vegetarianism.”

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Animal Person

JUNE 23, 2010

Interviewer: "Are you a vegetarian?". Interviewer: "Oh, so you've killed chickens.". Now you kill turkeys, chickens, fish and--". Interviewer: "Cows, okay, there's another one you kill. If you kill animals or pay someone to do so for you, you support animal cruelty. Contestant: "Nope. Well, sort of.

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Animal Ethics

JULY 7, 2009

For an explanation of this feature, click on “Moral Vegetarianism” at the bottom of this post. So, even if animals are killed painlessly and raised for food in humane ways, it is wrong to kill them. Consequently, the killing of some animals for food, if done painlessly, is not morally objectionable.

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Animal Ethics

JUNE 3, 2008

There I argued that the interests of animals ought to be considered equally with our own interests and that from this equality it follows that we ought to become vegetarian. Peter Singer , "Killing Humans and Killing Animals," Inquiry 22 [summer 1979]: 145-56, at 145 [italics in original; endnote omitted])

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Animal Ethics

MARCH 8, 2009

For an explanation of this feature, click on “Moral Vegetarianism” at the bottom of this post. If so, the lactovo vegetarian should have no qualms about someone’s eating such legs. But keep in mind that many lactovo vegetarians care about how animal products are produced, not just the fact that they are animal products.

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Animal Ethics

NOVEMBER 9, 2009

For an explanation of this feature, click on “Moral Vegetarianism” at the bottom of this post. It is argued that the killing and eating of meat indirectly tends to brutalize people. It is argued that the killing and eating of meat indirectly tends to brutalize people. But Hitler was also a vegetarian.

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Animal Ethics

FEBRUARY 6, 2010

Either the vegetarian argues on utilitarian premises, or he tries to supplement or replace his utilitarianism with some plausible non-utilitarian principles implying the wrongfulness of rearing and killing animals for food. Either the vegetarian argues on utilitarian grounds or the vegetarian argues on nonutilitarian grounds.

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Animal Person

AUGUST 18, 2011

Hal Herzog writes about how many people who say they are vegetarians will also say they ate meat within the last 24 hours. And of course, many self-identified vegetarians eat fishes and/or chickens. A good friend said he "loved" animals the other day and my response was, "Yeah, you love them grilled." You say a prayer and Poof!

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Animal Person

AUGUST 16, 2011

Well, as it turns out neither a trip to a slaughterhouse nor killing an animal yourself is powerful enough to make people go vegan. He watched cockfighting and killed and skinned animals, but won’t eat veal. So why the hell do you continue to participate in the killing of chickens for food, yet cockfighting is no longer on your list?”

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4 The Love Of Animals

JULY 31, 2010

Kitten Rescue’s goal is to help Los Angeles become a no-kill city. Sold out crowds of over 400 guests have enjoyed a vegetarian dinner complemented by cocktails with themed names such as the “Fuzzy Kitten” and the “Tom Cat”. Kitten Rescue volunteers place approximately 1,000 cats and kittens into new homes every year.

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Animal Person

APRIL 26, 2010

which is a documentary co-produced by two young girls from NYC, one of whom was raised as a vegetarian. I wrote about " The End of the Line " over at Animal Rights & AntiOppression, so I won't rehash. I also saw " What's On Your Plate? Another bit of misinformation is that when you get diabetes it's forever.

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Animal Person

MAY 30, 2009

Let's deconstruct: The interview reminds me of how the industry views us and how little they know about the community of people who care about the lives of the animals brought into this world for one reason only: to kill and eat them. I wish their mission was to end animal agriculture.

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Animal Ethics

MAY 4, 2008

It does not settle such questions as to whether it is right to kill them if they are a burden or if they are enduring pointless suffering, but it does bear in an important way on such questions. If animals have rights, the case for vegetarianism is prima facie very strong, and is comparable with the case against cannibalism. (

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Animal Ethics

AUGUST 17, 2008

The plea that animals might be killed painlessly is a very common one with flesh-eaters, but it must be pointed out that what-might-be can afford no exemption from moral responsibility for what-is. Salt , The Logic of Vegetarianism: Essays and Dialogues [London: The Ideal Publishing Union, 1899], 51-2 [italics in original])

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Animal Ethics

DECEMBER 18, 2006

Currently, I do not believe that killing an animal is prima facie morally wrong. I simply believe that when animals are killed it ought to be for a good purpose, and in a manner that is respectful to their capacity to suffer. Also, I am not a vegetarian, though I attempted to be one last year (an experience I plan on posting about).

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Animal Ethics

DECEMBER 7, 2008

According to Singer , the principle of the equal consideration of interests 'requires us to be vegetarians'. This is a moral principle, and states that 'the interests of every being affected by an action are to be taken into account and given the same weight as the like interests of any other being'.

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Animal Ethics

APRIL 27, 2008

And there is no good reason to breed, confine and kill animals for food unless we believe that economic benefit justifies killing. We call ourselves vegetarians. There is no happy ending for even the most humanely raised animal. More and more people do not. Patti Breitman Fairfax, Calif.,

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Animal Ethics

DECEMBER 30, 2009

Here are just a few facts drawn from the column: Drug-resistant infections killed more than 65,000 people in the U.S. Protect your own health and the future effectiveness of antibiotics: Go vegetarian in 2010! last year—more than prostate and breast cancer combined. 70% of the antibiotics used in the U.S.

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Animal Ethics

NOVEMBER 6, 2009

So here is an even more modest proposal than roasting Fido: Try eating only what animals you are willing to kill with your own hands. In the name of moral consistency I became a vegetarian four years ago. Beyond the environmental impacts of meat production there is a basic ethical issue involved.

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10,000 Birds

MAY 9, 2022

She herself is a vegetarian, one of the sort that mourns even roadkill. It’s not clear from the book’s ending, but it sounds like she abandoned her nascent apprenticeship because of her traveling schedule, her marriage, and her own chickens who would certainly be killed if she kept a hawk.

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Animal Person

MAY 6, 2009

The book, which I have not read, that saved Derrick Jensen 's life is called The Vegetarian Myth: Food, Justice, and Sustainability by Lierre Keith, who was a vegan for 20 years, suffered serious medical problems, and started feeling better when she recommenced eating animals. Throughout the book, Keith mocks vegetarians and vegans.

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Critter News

APRIL 1, 2009

He asked whether cows, chickens, sheep and some of the other animals that we eat are usually treated and killed in a humane manner. The meat industry will say yes, of course, all animals are treated and killed humanely. The eventual kill is quick, clean, and painless. It's a thoughtful question I wish more people would ask.

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Animal Person

MAY 24, 2010

From the vegan equals vegetarian discussion, to the nonviolence does or doesn't include property damage, to certain abolitionists deciding that they are in fact the only real abolitionists, it has gotten comical. Tags: Activism Current Affairs Ethics Language abolition animal rights blogging veganism vegetarianism writing.

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Animal Person

JANUARY 23, 2010

God thinks vegetarians are evil, and we want to please god. Second, if the people who believe this would eat all of their "meat" unseasoned and raw, after having killed the source animal with their bare hands and ripped open the carcass with nothing but said hands and some teeth, I'd feel like maybe their argument was at least sincere.

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Animal Ethics

MAY 6, 2009

For an explanation of this feature, click on “Moral Vegetarianism” at the bottom of this post. Similarly, although there are differences between human beings and other animals, there are no moral differences that justify human beings’ killing and eating animals but not killing and eating one another. If not, why not?

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Animal Ethics

JUNE 4, 2009

For an explanation of this feature, click on “Moral Vegetarianism” at the bottom of this post. Not only are they killed in cruel ways, but it is well documented that they are raised in ways that cause them great discomfort and agony. Becoming a vegetarian is not merely a symbolic gesture. Tags: Moral Vegetarianism.

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Animal Person

OCTOBER 26, 2009

He always refers to himself and his wife and his child as "vegetarian." But why does he say "vegetarian?" That bothers me, as there's a significant difference in motivation for vegans and vegetarians and he sounds like one, yet calls himself the other. Imagine being served a plate of sushi. This is very silly.

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Animal Ethics

JANUARY 20, 2008

Ethical vegetarianism is the thesis that killing and eating animals is morally wrong whenever equally nutritious plant-based alternatives are available. The case for ethical vegetarianism starts with several uncontroversial premises. Nor ought we kill them without reason. Cohen, The Animal Rights Debate , p.

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Animal Person

FEBRUARY 6, 2010

He writes: There is a rational, and for some people a spiritual, case for being a vegetarian: Killing animals is wrong. Logically, he admits it does make perfect sense to eat dogs if you eat pigs and cows. However I cannot see a rational argument for saying eating dogs or cats is barbaric while eating pork or beef is fine.

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Animal Person

FEBRUARY 5, 2010

There is a rational, and for some people a spiritual, case for being a vegetarian: Killing animals is wrong. Do they suffer any more or less in death? Are they any more or less part of the mysterious unity of life? I think not.

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Animal Ethics

JANUARY 21, 2009

For an explanation of this feature, click on “Moral Vegetarianism” at the bottom of this post. SOME PROBLEMS OF MORAL VEGETARIANISM With respect to traditional moral vegetarianism some problems immediately come to the fore. Who Should Not Eat Meat, or What Does a Vegetarian Feed His Dog? Not necessarily.

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Animal Ethics

AUGUST 21, 2009

For an explanation of this feature, click on “Moral Vegetarianism” at the bottom of this post. Would they have the right to treat you as you treat animals you breed, keep, and kill for food? Tags: Moral Vegetarianism. KBJ: The following three propositions are inconsistent: 1.

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Animal Ethics

JULY 15, 2009

According to Stephanie Woodard's column in Prevention published today, the CDC reports that "certain types of MRSA infections kill 18,000 Americans per year—more than die from AIDS." Better yet, go vegetarian and stop having to worry about poisoning yourself or a loved one.

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Animal Person

SEPTEMBER 22, 2009

There was no meaningful discussion about our inefficient use of resources (grain and water) in the feeding of animals to kill to feed people. And in the pre and post show (that I saw), even in the interviews with the celebrities who are known vegetarians (I know, I know, they're not vegans.),

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Animal Person

FEBRUARY 2, 2010

Angus sent me a link to " Animal Parts: High Style of Just Plain Beastly " wherein Zosia Bielski reports that "hipsters are going whole hog, donning road kill as accessories and cow hooves on their feet.". This isn't about what's morbid or what's not, and what's art and what's not.

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Animal Ethics

SEPTEMBER 7, 2009

I suspect that many regular readers of Animal Ethics are already vegetarians. That's because those who read Animal Ethics with regularity know that there are many compelling reasons to adopt a vegetarian lifestyle. a vegetarian diet is associated with a lower risk of death from ischemic heart disease.

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