On Wed, 18 Jul 2012 20:39:09 -0700, Dutch > wrote:

>Fidem Turbare, the non-existent atheist goddess wrote:
>
>> The fact is that humans are natural predators, and eating meat is a
>> normal life experience for most people. The problem is that many food
>> animals are raised and slaughtered without regard for their comfort
>> and pain, which I suspect is the crux of the issue.
>
>I agree with everything you said, except that animal welfare is not part
>of the issue in the debate between dh@ and everyone else. He tries to
>make it appear that it is, but that's just one of his smokescreens.

That's a blatant lie since I refer to animals who have lives of negative
value as well as those of positive value.

>The
>crux if his position is that users of animals and animal products should
>take pride in the fact that those animals "get to experience life"

Try presenting some example of me telling people they should take pride in
it. You can't meaning that you lied again, which is pretty much what you do. I
DO encourage people to give the animals' lives as much or more consideration
than their deaths though, which eliminationists hate because and only because
doing so works against the elimination objective.

>and
>conversely vegans ("eliminationists") as he calls them) do not sponsor
>animals getting to experience life.

· Vegans contribute to the deaths of animals by their use of
wood and paper products, electricity, roads and all types of
buildings, their own diet, etc... just as everyone else does.
What they try to avoid are products which provide life
(and death) for farm animals, but even then they would have
to avoid the following items containing animal by-products
in order to be successful:

tires, paper, upholstery, floor waxes, glass, water
filters, rubber, fertilizer, antifreeze, ceramics, insecticides,
insulation, linoleum, plastic, textiles, blood factors, collagen,
heparin, insulin, solvents, biodegradable detergents, herbicides,
gelatin capsules, adhesive tape, laminated wood products,
plywood, paneling, wallpaper and wallpaper paste, cellophane
wrap and tape, abrasives, steel ball bearings

The meat industry provides life for the animals that it
slaughters, and the animals live and die as a result of it
as animals do in other habitats. They also depend on it for
their lives as animals do in other habitats. If people consume
animal products from animals they think are raised in decent
ways, they will be promoting life for more such animals in the
future. People who want to contribute to decent lives for
livestock with their lifestyle must do it by being conscientious
consumers of animal products, because they can not do it by
being vegan.
From the life and death of a thousand pound grass raised
steer and whatever he happens to kill during his life, people
get over 500 pounds of human consumable meat...that's well
over 500 servings of meat. From a grass raised dairy cow people
get thousands of dairy servings. Due to the influence of farm
machinery, and *icides, and in the case of rice the flooding and
draining of fields, one serving of soy or rice based product is
likely to involve more animal deaths than hundreds of servings
derived from grass raised animals. Grass raised animal products
contribute to fewer wildlife deaths, better wildlife habitat, and
better lives for livestock than soy or rice products. ·