Rat & Swan wrote:

>
>
> Bill wrote:
>
>> Your rotten explanation for your appalling inconsistency stinks.
>
>
> Only because you have no understanding that it is not only my
> individual action which concerns me.

Your abstinence from meat concerns only you, and your
self image.

> I see more than you do;

No. You fabricate more than I do. I don't fabricate
at all.

> I am concerned for social change, not personal attack.

This isn't about personal attack on my end, but it is
on yours.

>
>
>> Killing animals for meat, and thoughtlessly killing them collaterally
>> in the course of vegetable production, *both* reflect a failure or
>> refusal to recognize what you claim is their intrinsic worth.
>
>
> True, as far as it goes.

True, period.

> But one results from the other (which is
> far older) and is difficult to continue without the other.

Utterly false.

....

>
>> Your adoption of a strictly vegetarian diet does nothing to change the
>> societal view of animals; it is a symbolic gesture *only*, and is
>> plainly seen as such.
>
>
> Again, true as far as it goes.

It goes all the way to the heart of your hypocritical
self flattery.

>
>
>> Likewise, working assiduously to ensure that you consumed only CD-free
>> vegetables *also* would be *only* a symbolic gesture, and would
>> correctly be seen as such.
>
>
> True, as far as it goes.

It goes all the way to the heart of your hypocritical
self flattery.

>
>
>> Why do you engage in one purely symbolic, utterly ineffectual
>> gesture, but not the other?
>
>
> Because, as I said,

That's AT LEAST the 8th time you've said "as I said" in
the last couple of days. Repetition does not turn your
lying into truth.

> the entire system of meat and animal-derived
> commercial product production is founded in an immoral concept
> of animals as things, as property.

Irrelevant, and not your objection. We've been through
that.

Your answer is a non sequitur. It does not address
your different behavior in the face of two identical,
ON PRINICIPLE, instances of a view of animals as
lacking intrinsic moral worth. Killing them to eat
them, and killing them casually and incidentally in the
course of growing vegetables, BOTH reflect a lack of
consideration of their supposed intrinsic moral worth.
But you make a symbolic gesture to protest one, while
not making the analogous symbolic gesture - in fact,
while doing nothing at all - to protest the other.

Your "because" is crap. It does not explain the
difference.

> The system, like slavery, is
> immoral _per se_.

No more so than the casual and incidental slaughter of
animals in the course of producing vegetables. This
latter is like the indirect annihilation of Native
Americans. Not the direct killing of them; the
indirect killing of them by destroying their way of
life and forcing them off their land.

It is EXACTLY like it.

> Vegetable production is not immoral _per se_.

1. Killing the animals collaterally IS immoral per se,
in your
faulty world view.

2. Eating the meat IS NOT immoral per se.

3. The methods of producing the vegetables YOU eat ALL
are based on an implicit assumption that it is
acceptable
to kill animals collaterally and even deliberately.

You have not established a morally meaningful
difference. All you have done is try to rationalize
your willful refusal to abide by principle. As before,
you fail. You are seen, FOLLOWING a correct analysis
of your behavior, to be a liar, a hypocrite, and
fundamentally immoral. There is no personal attack.
There is a moral conclusion, fully justified by the
evidence.

> All that is required is that methods of vegetable production
> be changed,

It won't happen, as long as vegetable farmers are
rewarded for farming in ways that kill animals.

> and that we search among existing vegetables for
> ones produced with less harm.

You DO NOT do that.

....

>
>> Your answer to date is unacceptable. I asked earlier what
>> distinguishes the two gestures:
>
>
>> Refraining from eating meat, and refraining from eating
>> CD-causing vegetables, BOTH are purely symbolic
>> gestures. What distinguishes them?
>
>
>> You answered:
>
>
>> What distinguishes them is that buying meat and other
>> animal products supports a system which represents a view
>> of animals which is philosophically opposed to AR: that
>> animals are property, that they have a moral standing which
>> allows us to use them in unjust ways, raise and delibrately kill
>> them without consideration of their intrinsic worth.
>
>
>> That answer is wrong, because collateral deaths in vegetable
>> production *also* occur due to societal failure to give "consideration
>> of their intrinsic worth."
>
>
> Yes, as far as it goes,

Stop being evasive; "Yes", full stop. It goes to the
very end. You gave that answer to try to illustrate
some difference, and it DOES NOT illustrate a
difference, it illustrates morally identical cases.

> but, as I said,

That's about 10 now...

> the system of vegetable production is not immoral per se,

The killing of animals collaterally by the methods used
to grow the vegetables YOU consume on a daily basis IS
immoral per se, according to you. DAILY, you
participate in an activity that DOES kill animals.
Whether it NEEDS to do so is irrelevant. It does. You
are morally complicit in the killing of animals, and
you do nothing.

....

>
>> In fact, you have ADMITTED as much, in your sleazy rationalization
>> for why you refuse to make the more difficult and costly symbolic
>> gesture, preferring instead to continue to cause CDs:
>
>
> I would say that I don't cause CDs.

You are wrong. Your participation in the market as it
exists is integral. You can't pull a Derek and say
you're only paying for the end result, not the methods
used.

> My purchase of vegetables
> provides a motive for farmers to cause CDs,

That's all we need to know. It is perfectly analogous,
morally, to a buyer of stolen property. Buying stolen
property is a crime precisely because it provides
incentive to others to commit crime. If killing the
animals collaterally is wrong, you are guilty of a
moral crime, because you are incentivizing the farmer
to keep killing.

> but it is not my
> fault that farmers use unethical methods.

It is your fault that you continue to trade with them,
knowing how they farm. You cannot escape the stain.

> They choose to do so.

Because they have no reason to stop.

Meat producers ALSO don't stop producing meat,
subsequent to your symbolic, self aggrandizing refusal
to eat meat.

You are stuck, Karen.

>
>> I am convinced that veganism is a more ethical
>> position, since it rejects such animal deaths in
>> principle, and if the vegan position is accepted,
>> collateral deaths will decrease as a result of the awareness
>> of farmers. But CDs will be invisible to society as
>> a whole until a moral stance against the intentional
>> deaths of animals in production of food and other
>> products is seen as obligatory. Then society can
>> and will advance to the consideration of
>> unintentional deaths as well.
>
>
>> So, your claim about what the distinction is is FALSE. What IS the
>> distinction, then?
>>
>> The distinction is: cost and ease. Being "vegan" is cheap and easy,
>> relative to refraining from eating CD-causing vegetables. BOTH are
>> merely symbolic, but one is much more costly than the other.
>>
>> Your engagement in one symbolic gesture, but not the other, clearly is
>> NOT based on any legitimate principle, because the principle -
>> recognition of the intrinsic moral worth of animals - should dictate
>> BOTH.
>
>
>> Thus, we see that you are a thorough-going liar, three times:
>
>
>> 1. why you're "vegan": it is not based on principle
>
>
> Yes, it is.

No, it is not, at least not the principle you allege.
There is no way to continue to claim that it is.

>
>> 2. why you don't abstain from CD-causing produce: it
>> *is* based on cost and convenience,
>
>
> To a degree.

Solely.

> I live in a real world, not in a fantasy.

That doesn't stop you from indulging in the fantasy
that your abstinence from meat is meaningful.

> I wish it were possible for me to be more sure about the
> sources of my own food.

Easily said. For all practical purposes, you don't
care about the CDs attached to the sources of your
food. All you care about is cost and ease.

> But my personal actions are not the issue,

Yes, they certainly are. They illustrate that your
abstinence from meat is not based on principle.

> except to tunnel-vision Antis whose only
> argument is personal attack.

There is no personal attack, and you know it. This
makes a fourth lie.

> I'm talking about systems
> and general social change

Neither of which your utterly symbolic abstinence from
meat brings about. You aren't interested in effecting
any such change; you're interested in making a self
aggrandizing claim about it.

> -- I don't attack you personally.

Yes, you most certainly do. Not as savagely and
unethically as you attacked John Mercer, though.

> Why do you never see beyond the end of your nose?

I see far beyond it, much to your consternation.

>
>> and on making
>> your adherence to principle contingent on others'
>> acceptance of your views
>
>
> I do not.

Yes, you do. I have shown that you do. Then you lie
about it.

>
>> 3. what you have said about your dirty rationalization
>> of #2
>
>
> ???

Right below, dummy.

>
>> You LIED when you claimed you didn't base your refusal to abstain from
>> CD-causing produce on others' views and behavior. It is *exactly*
>> what you do:
>
>
>> > You claim that your inaction - your continued
>> > participation in the collateral slaughter of
>> > animals you don't eat - continues only because the
>> > slaughter of animals that are eaten continues.
>
>
> I don't claim any such thing. I do claim that unintentional
> CD deaths will not be seen as a major issue by society in
> general until intentional slavery and slaughter of animals
> for food and other products is seen as immoral by society in
> general. I think that is both true and obvious.
>
>> I have never claimed any such thing.
>
>
>> You are a liar. You do it above:
>
>
>> ...if the vegan position is accepted, collateral
>> deaths will decrease as a result of the awareness
>> of farmers.
>
>
> Which is true. They will.

First: you DID blame your refusal to abide by your
supposed principle contingent on other people changing
their thinking and behavior first. I just showed it,
and you didn't dispute it.

Second, it is irrelevant if it will or will not happen.
We're talking about your behaving according to moral
principle TODAY. You could do it today; you CHOOSE not
do to so.

>
>> YOU could stop participating in CDs today, but you won't,
>
>
> If, as you say, my individual action is a useless,
> ineffectual, symbolic gesture, how would my individual
> action change general social forces that create both
> meat production and CDs? That is my goal.

Why do you abstain from meat? That is every bit as
useless, ineffectual and symbolic. This is the whole
point: one useless, ineffectual and symbolic gesture
is cheap, easy and provides you with an unwarranted
sense of being virtuous, of making a difference. It is
no different in effect from the other, but it is cheap
and easy.

The one emptily symbolic thing you do does not do a
thing to advance your supposed goal. Thus, you are not
doing it based on any principle, except the principle
of moral self aggrandizement.

>
>> because others won't. You are waiting for CDs to go away by virtue of
>> *others'* changes in attitudes and behavior.
>>
>> Calling you a liar is not a "personal attack".
>
>
> What else could it be?

An objective analysis of your very public behavior and
statements.

>
>> You throw that out there
>> as if it invalidates the analysis of the appalling inconsistency in
>> your behavior, but you are wrong. The analysis of your shoddy moral
>> pose is correct. Your lying doesn't begin until you react to the
>> correct analysis, and the labeling of you as a liar follows that. You
>> ARE a liar, Karen.
>
>
> Why only address personal attacks?

I don't.

> Why don't you ever discuss ideas?

I do. I have shown that your idea that you are
behaving according to principle is false. Following
that, I have shown that you are a liar, and people
wishing to be morally good do not take moral
instruction from demonstrated liars.