Thursday, February 19, 2015

Actually Useful Comments!


Pre-script: If you read only one link related to this, please read Vincent's great article!



At least someone cares about my financial well being*:
Matt Ball should just get a corporate public relations job at Niman Ranch Meats, Chipotle, or some other corporate animal product food peddler. He’d fit in with the big shots, and the job would fit his philosophy. He make a lot more money, too!

But some people actually read all of my article and Tobias' article, and offered insightful comments:

Carolyn summarizes:
They're asking us to think about why we'd say yes or no - to give the issue serious consideration, therefore seriously considering why we're vegan ourselves.

Gerry gives this example:
Funnily enough, something similar to this came up the other day for me in a way that was not hypothetical. A friend asked me how to deal with family members who would not eat at her house because they refused to eat vegan food (not for any ethical reason but because it was unfamiliar).
    We discussed whether she should agree to cook meat for them the next time they visit if they in turn agreed to try the vegan food on the following visit. If you run the numbers, it means that one less meat meal is consumed (without this Faustian bargain the meat eater would stay home and eat meat both times).
    More importantly, if the visitors ended up liking the vegan dish it could mean that they would broaden their diet to to include more protein from non-animal sources even if they continued to eat meat (as they probably would).
    This situation did not involve my vegan friend actually eating any meat, her compromise was merely to cook meat. It seemed like a good compromise to me

Dobrusia has an even better example:
Some undercover investigators eat meat because otherwise they would blow their cover. It's hard to pretend you're a factory farm worker when you eat tofu. So it's not just hypothetical, extremely devoted activists make this decision, and YES it does help more animals than being vegan for the same period of time.

I brought up Dr. Greger's example of how our pursuit of being ever-more-vegan can actually hurt animals by turning off people from considering it.

Thanks to everyone who actually read the articles and gave thoughtful, non-knee-jerk responses! (*And in case you were wondering, I'm joking re: financial well being.)

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