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"Would you kill a puppy for a million dollars?" "Do you eat meat?" Snow Dogs discussion devolves into fight between meat eaters and vegan. (np.reddit.com)

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[–]StillOnlyCountsAsOne 8ポイント9ポイント  (86子コメント)

So I'm the vegan.

I didn't make that initial comment with the intention of stirring up shit, but things got out of hand pretty quick.

I don't know if I come off as a total asshole on this post. Maybe I do. I still just don't understand why people got so angry about me asking that question.

Anyway if any of you guys want to ask me some questions that's cool. I promise I'm not generally such a preachy dickwad, but the people that replied to me pretty much immediately started off by being assholes. That combined with me already being kind of drunk just wasn't a great combination.

[–]Atari_5200 26ポイント27ポイント  (14子コメント)

Alright man, I'm going to try and do you a solid here and help you talk about this stuff without having people immediately tune you out. I'm gonna level with you first though: I'm a hunter and I eat what I kill. I do not hunt for sport and I never take a shot that will make the animal suffer.

Do you eat meat, out of curiosity? If you do, I'd find it really odd that you have no qualms about thousands of animals dying so that you can eat them but are so concerned about the life of one puppy.

You're basically doing a cold opening here where puppy deaths are being discussed and your opener is an accusation. People are mad and sad and you're immediately trying to turn that inwards and that doesn't work for shit. You've got to read the room better and generally go for a softer open.

A better open would've been something about how this sort of needless suffering and death upsets you.

It's so senseless that those poor puppies had to suffer and die for a silly movie. I can't even conscience animals suffering for food, but for a movie? That's even worse.

Boom. You're capitalizing on what's already there and inviting people to have a look at your values, which leads anyone with half a brain towards self reflection. Remember you'll never convince some people! You just have to find the ones who might make the leap.

Anyways if that's some remedial bullshit I apologize. You just seem legit surprised by the reaction you got and it makes me think you might be able to use the advice I've given here.

[–]TheIronMark 18ポイント19ポイント  (8子コメント)

I didn't make that initial comment with the intention of stirring up shit

http://imgur.com/Ufbr5ej

[–]StillOnlyCountsAsOne -1ポイント0ポイント  (7子コメント)

I know that may sound like an outrageous claim in light of all that happened afterwards. But I really did just want to understand better what made a puppy so different from all the livestock animals that are routinely killed. And no one ever did give me an answer to that.

[–]REDDIT_IN_MOTION [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

You can't be this obtuse by accident

[–]BRXF1 10ポイント11ポイント  (0子コメント)

Because we all know you were judging him in a passive-aggressive way but do go on and claim how it isn't so over multiple threads that will convince no-one.

[–]kgb_operativeis literally Putin 29ポイント30ポイント  (50子コメント)

Because, at the core, what you're saying is that they're bad people for doing something people have been doing since time immemorial that they've been raised to see as perfectly normal and acceptable, and that they consider at least in some ways part of their identity. You can't say what the person is doing is evil without also calling them an evil person; our culture is almost incapable of distinguishing the two.

[–]StillOnlyCountsAsOne -4ポイント-3ポイント  (49子コメント)

Well, I don't necessarily disagree with you. I remember what it was like to hear "meat is murder" back when I still ate meat. But I think the important distinction is that it is a choice. It's pretty easy to choose not to eat meat. And the thing is, to me it's a moral issue. And having thought through it as much as I have, I find it really difficult to think of circumstances in today's society in the first world where the consumption of meat can be morally justified.

It isn't that I'm not interested in having dialogue. It's just that I'm pretty sure I've already thought through and decided against almost every justification that people try to bring to me to defend eating meat.

And yes, I do think that they're bad people for choosing not to care about the suffering that they cause by continuing to choose to eat the diet that they do. The way I see it, humans are omnivores. But we're not obligated to be omnivorous. We can make a moral choice to rise above our base instincts, and do what we think is right based on logical reasoning. We have the capability to avoid causing suffering to other sentient creatures because of the way that we eat. And I do resent people that choose not to.

Which, believe me, is kind of a difficult thing to feel. The majority of my friends and family still choose to partake in meat, and it makes me feel really awful to see them choose to be part of a system that, in my eyes, brings about so much pain and evil when they don't have any real reason to other than enjoying the taste of meat.

[–]kgb_operativeis literally Putin 45ポイント46ポイント  (32子コメント)

So you do understand why people got upset with you. And make no mistake: it's disingenuous for you to say that you're just asking a question. You're asking leading questions from a place where you consider them bad people for not making the same choice you did. There are few scenarios where you're not going to make people angry with you.

If you want to continue proselytizing for your expansion of the moral universe, you should probably get over your woe-is-me hand wringing.

[–]chaoser 10ポイント11ポイント  (9子コメント)

I think it's "easy to not eat meat" is only true for a certain part of the world population. Not everyone has the luxury of following veganism so I guess to me I don't see eating meat as evil because that means a huge part of the world is just performing evil all the time with no control over it.

[–]MahJongK 2ポイント3ポイント  (2子コメント)

It's mainly cultural, now we understand nutrition but go on with meat because it's been there forever.

with no control over it.

It takes a lot of control to produce so much meat. One of the main non ethical points is that instead of giving a huge part of the cereals and fresh water to sustain this industry we now know it's cheaper and easier to stop.

I keep saying in the vegan sub that these things are the easy part. The tough one is the cultural habit.

[–]chaoser [スコア非表示]  (1子コメント)

Health on a purely vegan diet without any supplementation is hard to control though. I don't think at all it's a cultural issue, there are many health problems even with the vegan here in the United States (issues with infant malnutrition during breast feeding, B12 deficiency causing anemia). In poorer countries these problems are even more pronounced due to the scarcity of supplements)

http://m.jn.nutrition.org/content/133/11/3932S.full

[–]MahJongK [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

Yeah it is tough and IMO not for most people in the foreseeable future, but why not just say that reducing meat consumption a little bit is a good idea? That would already be revolutionary.

Not eating meat everyday or even every meal is so much ingrained, meat has a special status in every culture (going from praised to banned), even just acknowledging that the amount should be discussed is a huge step.

Right now it's almost like talking about global warming to people 60 years ago. The backfire even suggesting that eating meat is a big deal is just amazing.

And I'm not a militant. I am not even vegetarian or anything. I keep saying that eating meat is a subject even tougher than religion as we just evolved with it and it predates many other things like making fire.

[–]rave-simons 5ポイント6ポイント  (2子コメント)

Most of the very poor people in the world eat very little meat and historically have eaten very little meat.

[–]niroby 5ポイント6ポイント  (0子コメント)

Very little meat is still meat. It's not too much meat vs some meat, it's meat vs no meat.

[–]chaoser [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

Yes but the reason for eating less meat is due to a low supply of meat not because they want to eat less meat. Consequently because they eat lower amounts of meat they are more at risk of developing serious medical issues.

http://m.jn.nutrition.org/content/133/11/3932S.full

[–]StillOnlyCountsAsOne -2ポイント-1ポイント  (2子コメント)

Fair. Maybe I should add the caveat "when it's unnecessary." But I don't think there are many people that have the means to access reddit but are unable to avoid meat. I know veganism is a bit more to ask, but at the least a vegetarian diet isn't impossible for most people.

[–]majere616 5ポイント6ポイント  (0子コメント)

"Most people" is definitely a stretch if anything most people don't have the luxury of adhering to a vegetarian lifestyle let alone a vegan one. Like, I agree with your overall point that eating meat when you don't have to is inherently immoral because you're basically deciding your own gratification trumps another living thing's right to continue living. People just get pissy when they're confronted with the fact that their moral framework is inconsistent and tailored more towards convenience and familiarity than actual morality. Like I long ago accepted the fact that vegans/vegetarians are totally justified in looking down on my hedonistically omnivorous ass when I am unabashedly doing a bad thing because I'm too lazy and self-indulgent not to. It's not really any different from looking down on any other form of moral shortcoming people just don't like it because it's their moral shortcoming and they don't want to recognize it as such.

[–]ACW-R 1ポイント2ポイント  (0子コメント)

Take everybody still living at home for example.

Even if I wanted to avoid meat like the plague, I can't, because my mum buys meat for her, my dad, and my brother to eat. Their budget is stretched thin enough, and for me to claim that I'm not eating meat any more and need special treatment and different meal options puts more financial weight and stress on them. It isn't feasible in my position for that reason. I'm also not an animal-rights activist. I do think it's inhumane what they're doing to animals, but consider these two possibilities; it could be worse, and I don't care about some animal I've never seen nor seen struggle just like I don't care about each and every North Korean prisoner in their death camps. It's a disconnect which I'm comfortable with. I don't wish to have that emotional stress weighing my mind down so much as to where I need to start changing my life to be more content with how those animals are being treated.

The short and simple, often immoral and unthinkable reason is that I simply don't care. It doesn't affect me, and thus it doesn't matter to me. That's the reason. I won't even bother trying to justify it or convince you I'm actually a good person for it, because I'm not. I'm like most of the world's population who don't care about anything outside of their reach or outside of their cares. It doesn't matter to me.

[–]YesThisIsDrakeTEEN SEX 1ポイント2ポイント  (1子コメント)

Question, how do you feel about medicine derived from animal products?

[–]StillOnlyCountsAsOne 5ポイント6ポイント  (0子コメント)

Well, it depends on the reason that the medicine is derived from animal products. If it is because there is no alternative, then I'm pretty much okay with that. If animals products are only used as an inactive ingredient, I would try to avoid that medicine if at all possible (e.g. gelatin used as a chemical binder, etc.). I recognize that because this isn't always possible, sometimes we have no choice but to use a medicine derived from an animal. In which case, I'm okay with it.

The most common definition of veganism, and the one that I think makes the most sense, is the following: "Veganism is a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as is possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose."

The key part of that definition is "as far as possible and practicable." For instance, insulin used to be derived primarily from pigs. I wouldn't consider it wrong for someone who was diabetic or needed insulin for some other reason to use that medicine derived from an animal. However, most insulin is now derived from genetically modified bacteria, which I vastly prefer. I'm in favor of reducing the amount that we have to rely on animal products, but I am a realist. I understand that sometimes we don't really have an alternative choice.

[–]King-Of-Throwaways -1ポイント0ポイント  (2子コメント)

I don't have anything of substance to add, but for what it's worth: I sympathize with you. I'm also pretty passionate about this topic, and I also find it frustrating how many rational people lose all sense of reason as soon as the ethics of the meat industry is brought up.

I'm inclined to say that, if your aim is to cause as much introspection as possible, then it's probably best to avoid writing anything that could be perceived as a judgement and to stick strictly to the logic and facts of the discussion, but it's understandable that you'll write passionately when it's a topic that you feel passionate about.

Shit's hard. I don't think there's a solution other than to exercise restraint where possible.

[–]StillOnlyCountsAsOne -3ポイント-2ポイント  (1子コメント)

Yeah. I normally do. But the hypocrisy just seemed completely absurd to me in this instance. People saying they wouldn't kill a puppy for ten million dollars when the gladly pay to eat animals every day. It's kind of infuriating. And I come off as the crazy one somehow.

I think in a way people expect vegans to be a "perfect minority." It's fine that we exist, as long as we never say anything to upset them, make them think about what they're doing, or imply that they're bad people. How am I supposed to do that?

If I honestly feel that I'm constantly surrounded by murderers, how can I just accept that murder is okay for everyone else? Makes me want to give up and cry. No matter how perfectly I speak, or how passionately or logically I try to make an appeal, the world will always accept the killing of animals for food. It's like a nightmare.

[–]REDDIT_IN_MOTION [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

I hope you are under age 25, I'm really hoping you are under 20 actually

You sound like me in highschool calling cars "pollution making machines of death"

I really hope as you age and mature, your view of the world and the people in it age and mature as well.

[–]imgladimnothimWelfare is about ethics in welfare journalism [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

It's also pretty easy to not be a pretentious prick, but welcome to reddit I guess

[–]Taipers_4_daysChemtrail taste tester [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

I'll be nice, but you really did have a bad argument so I'll rephrase your argument in another situation so you can see where you went wrong. Right now you are only seeing your argument through rose colored glasses, but we will see how much you agree with the underlying logic when I just change the references.

To start I'll post the copied text of your original statement so people can see I'm not being sneaky;

Do you eat meat, out of curiosity? If you do, I'd find it really odd that you have no qualms about thousands of animals dying so that you can eat them but are so concerned about the life of one puppy.

Now let's apply it to a theoretical situation where the question was "Would you kill a baby for $1,000,000?" instead of "Would you kill a puppy for $1,000,000". Your initial response in this situation would now be;

Do you support abortion out of curiosity? If you do, I'd find it really odd that you have no qualms about thousands of babies dying because mothers don't want them but are so concerned about the life of one baby.

Is this a good argument against abortion and killing a baby for money? Is it some grand defeater to all pro choice arguments?

Absolutely not.

This new argument is about as successful in making people pro life as your initial one was in making people vegan. It won't convince anyone who doesn't already agree with you.

You equivocate two things that really rely on context to determine morality. Going back to abortion then a mother having an abortion because she was raped by her father is way different than killing a cooing baby just for cash isn't it?

So how is it that meat is the exception to context? Why is taking an animals life for sustenance exactly as bad as killing it just for cash for you? Remember the baby example before you respond to that point.

Now let's add in the response you made to the other poster;

And I still do stand by it, as naive as that may be. The life of a puppy isn't inherently more valuable than the billions of cows or pigs that die each year. Especially considering that pigs are more intelligent than dogs.

I do appreciate you trying to "help" But I should just grow up and stop expecting people to be decent.

And again, let's take the underlying logic and apply it to the baby killing example I had above;

And I still do stand by it, as naive as that may be. The life of a baby isn't inherently more valuable than the billions of fetuses that die each year. Especially considering that fetuses are smaller babies.

I do appreciate you trying to "help" But I should just grow up and stop expecting people to be decent.

Has this new version of your argument and response made you rabidly pro-life? Probably not because you'll recognize the differences in context and know that morality isn't absolute, but instead dependent on context.

People like to argue with me on that but if we say something like "killing is always wrong" then it would also be wrong to kill Pol Pot, if you had the chance, before he started killing all those Cambodians. Again, context matters to morality.

Also, dogs are bred as companions and for the most part have been conditioned in the last few hundred years to be more puppy like and aggressive. Which is why you have dogs like Labs that really are just big puppies who want nothing more than to love and be loved.

Pigs on the other hand are smart but still food, and if you think a pig wouldn't eat you if it had the chance, you know nothing about pigs. Pigs are incredibly opportunistic omnivores and if you don't think a hungry 500 pound hog will try and eat you the second it has a chance, you need to stay the hell away from pigs. It happened in Oregon and it's known they will nip you. As soon as a pig draws blood all bets are off and those intelligent animals will try and kill you so they can eat you.

Somehow I don't have that same worry about my black Lab pulling that shit.

So I'm going to go ahead and say that killing a pet dog vs. killing a pig are such different things that they can't be equated.

But I digress.

My overall point is that your argument seemed excellent to you because you're already convinced you were right. You didn't have a strong argument though and that's exactly why people downvoted you while the other vegan was accepted.

If you are going to convince people of something you really need to start off lighter than; "You people are mass murdering monsters! You should leave your wicked ways and become a moral person like I am! Follow the one true way to be saved from your own wickedness!". While I am being facetious, this is really in effect what you were coming across as saying.

People don't generally respond well to being told they are really just bad people and as soon as they become opposed to you, they are not going to be receptive to what you want to say. Remember that in the future, otherwise you'll probably end up on /r/SubredditDrama again.

[–]leadnpotatoesLet's dispel once and for all with this fiction [スコア非表示]  (0子コメント)

Do you guys configure a google alert or do you use a bot like totes messenger?

[–]Mablak -2ポイント-1ポイント  (0子コメント)

I don't have any problem with what you said. It's logically inconsistent for people to care about animals in some cases, while also indirectly killing/torturing them for enjoyment. People call this 'preachy' as a cop out to avoid scrutinizing their own beliefs, because this belief in particular requires some extra effort. I wouldn't worry about reactions, because there's never a way to bring this up without making some people annoyed.