"Rupert" > wrote in message
oups.com...
> On Aug 3, 2:27 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>
>> oups.com...
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> > On Aug 3, 11:22 am, "Dutch" > wrote:
>> >> "Rupert" > wrote
>>
>> >> > See, that's the thing. You two, Dutch and Derek, good pals of
>> >> > Jonathan
>> >> > Ball, want to draw this ethical distinction whereby Karen forfeited
>> >> > her right to privacy by expressing controversial views about
>> >> > paedophilia, but Ball hasn't done anything to forfeit his right to
>> >> > privacy.
>>
>> >> That's exactly right, he hasn't threatened anyone, directly or
>> >> indirectly,
>> >> particularly not children.
>>
>> > Well, actually, that's not strictly correct. He has repeatedly
>> > threatened violence towards me, which is illegal. Karen illegally
>> > threatened violence towards him as well, it's true. But Derek's
>> > conduct wasn't in response to that, and as far as I know apart from
>> > that incident she has never threatened anyone or broken the law in any
>> > way, and is not likely to. The rational grounds for thinking Ball
>> > might be a genuine threat to others are pretty slim, but they're
>> > there. In Karen's case they're not.
>>
>> >> > I don't buy it.
>>
>> >> That's because you're a slimy little prick.
>>
>> > **** off
>>
>> You **** off, how dare you come prancing in here accusing good people of
>> being murderers? Then you have the gall to complain that we're being rude
>> to
>> you.
>
> At last you're being upfront about your attitude: you think that
> anyone who comes in here and takes an anti-speciesist position thereby
> forfeits their right to basic courtesy. It's a joke. You're not worthy
> of having intelligent, civilized people engage with you seriously.

Calling good people murderers is no joke. You're not civilized, you're not
worthy to call yourself a human being.

On Aug 3, 2:48 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>
> oups.com...
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Aug 3, 2:27 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>
> groups.com...
>
> >> > On Aug 3, 11:22 am, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >> >> "Rupert" > wrote
>
> >> >> > See, that's the thing. You two, Dutch and Derek, good pals of
> >> >> > Jonathan
> >> >> > Ball, want to draw this ethical distinction whereby Karen forfeited
> >> >> > her right to privacy by expressing controversial views about
> >> >> > paedophilia, but Ball hasn't done anything to forfeit his right to
> >> >> > privacy.
>
> >> >> That's exactly right, he hasn't threatened anyone, directly or
> >> >> indirectly,
> >> >> particularly not children.
>
> >> > Well, actually, that's not strictly correct. He has repeatedly
> >> > threatened violence towards me, which is illegal. Karen illegally
> >> > threatened violence towards him as well, it's true. But Derek's
> >> > conduct wasn't in response to that, and as far as I know apart from
> >> > that incident she has never threatened anyone or broken the law in any
> >> > way, and is not likely to. The rational grounds for thinking Ball
> >> > might be a genuine threat to others are pretty slim, but they're
> >> > there. In Karen's case they're not.
>
> >> >> > I don't buy it.
>
> >> >> That's because you're a slimy little prick.
>
> >> > **** off
>
> >> You **** off, how dare you come prancing in here accusing good people of
> >> being murderers? Then you have the gall to complain that we're being rude
> >> to
> >> you.
>
> > At last you're being upfront about your attitude: you think that
> > anyone who comes in here and takes an anti-speciesist position thereby
> > forfeits their right to basic courtesy. It's a joke. You're not worthy
> > of having intelligent, civilized people engage with you seriously.
>
> Calling good people murderers is no joke. You're not civilized, you're not
> worthy to call yourself a human being.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

I'm not calling anyone a murderer. I'm saying that if you financially
support a process which harms sentient beings, then the moral status
of your conduct does not depend on the species of the beings affected.
If the beings affected were humans of similar cognitive capacities in
relevantly similar circumstances, the moral status of the conduct
would be the same. The same goes for me, of course.

This is a perfectly respectable position. You haven't given any good
arguments against it. Even if you had, it's still a perfectly
respectable position to take. The idea that because I express it I'm
"not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.

On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Jul 31, 3:40 pm, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Jul 31, 12:29 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>> On Jul 30, 2:38 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>> On Jul 30, 1:52 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>>>> On Jul 29, 1:56 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>> On Jul 29, 1:10 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>>> On Jul 29, 12:58 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Jul 28, 3:22 pm, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Guppy the Corpse Pumper wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Jul 27, 2:08 pm, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Jul 27, 12:52 pm, shrubkiller > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> On Jul 27, 1:42 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> rupie, you lisping fruit: you assert that (non-human)
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> animals are due equal moral consideration (compared
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> with humans). You haven't established that. Get busy,
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> you lisping utilitarian fruit.
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Why would anyone have to prove something which is SELF EVIDENT?
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> It is not self-evident. In fact, it is more likely self-evidently
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> false.
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> More proof that
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> The proposition of equal moral considerability of
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> animals (with humans) is self evidently false.
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Well, surely if I can be criticized for making an assertion without
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> meeting by burden of proof, then this assertion of yours here can
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> equally be criticized on that basis.
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>> I'm just following your lead.
> >>>>>>>>>>>>> I see. Well, that blabber of mine to which I directed you
> >>>>>>>>>>>> zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
> >>>>>>>>>>> I mean, you did ask me to defend my position in your opening post. So
> >>>>>>>>>>> I direct you towards a considered attempt at a defence
> >>>>>>>>>> Post the content here, skirt-boy. I'm not interested
> >>>>>>>>>> in signing up for your fruit-display Yahoo group.- Hide quoted text -
> >>>>>>>>> I don't think you have to sign up to the Yahoo group to download the
> >>>>>>>>> file. Dutch did it and I don't think he signed up. It's too long to
> >>>>>>>>> put in a newsgroup message. Maybe I'll put it on my webpage.
> >>>>>>>>> So, anyway, by your own admission you dismissed my talk as "babble"
> >>>>>>>>> without having read a single word of it.
> >>>>>>>> I know that you assume that which you are required to
> >>>>>>>> prove.
> >>>>>>> Yes, yes. You know a lot, Rudy.
> >>>>>> Right - I do. I do know that you still assume in your
> >>>>>> little sermon that animals are entitled to equal moral
> >>>>>> consideration, when that premise is the very thing you
> >>>>>> are tasked to show. You haven't shown it, and we all
> >>>>>> know you can't.
> >>>>> You asked me for an argument. I gave you one.
> >>>> You didn't. You merely repeated the assertion you
> >>>> can't seem to support.
> >>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
> >> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
> >> due equal consideration?
>
> > I directed you to a document
>
> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Engage with the arguments in my talk.

"Rupert" > wrote in message
ups.com...
> On Aug 3, 2:48 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>
>> oups.com...
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> > On Aug 3, 2:27 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>> >> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>
>> groups.com...
>>
>> >> > On Aug 3, 11:22 am, "Dutch" > wrote:
>> >> >> "Rupert" > wrote
>>
>> >> >> > See, that's the thing. You two, Dutch and Derek, good pals of
>> >> >> > Jonathan
>> >> >> > Ball, want to draw this ethical distinction whereby Karen
>> >> >> > forfeited
>> >> >> > her right to privacy by expressing controversial views about
>> >> >> > paedophilia, but Ball hasn't done anything to forfeit his right
>> >> >> > to
>> >> >> > privacy.
>>
>> >> >> That's exactly right, he hasn't threatened anyone, directly or
>> >> >> indirectly,
>> >> >> particularly not children.
>>
>> >> > Well, actually, that's not strictly correct. He has repeatedly
>> >> > threatened violence towards me, which is illegal. Karen illegally
>> >> > threatened violence towards him as well, it's true. But Derek's
>> >> > conduct wasn't in response to that, and as far as I know apart from
>> >> > that incident she has never threatened anyone or broken the law in
>> >> > any
>> >> > way, and is not likely to. The rational grounds for thinking Ball
>> >> > might be a genuine threat to others are pretty slim, but they're
>> >> > there. In Karen's case they're not.
>>
>> >> >> > I don't buy it.
>>
>> >> >> That's because you're a slimy little prick.
>>
>> >> > **** off
>>
>> >> You **** off, how dare you come prancing in here accusing good people
>> >> of
>> >> being murderers? Then you have the gall to complain that we're being
>> >> rude
>> >> to
>> >> you.
>>
>> > At last you're being upfront about your attitude: you think that
>> > anyone who comes in here and takes an anti-speciesist position thereby
>> > forfeits their right to basic courtesy. It's a joke. You're not worthy
>> > of having intelligent, civilized people engage with you seriously.
>>
>> Calling good people murderers is no joke. You're not civilized, you're
>> not
>> worthy to call yourself a human being.- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> I'm not calling anyone a murderer. I'm saying that if you financially
> support a process which harms sentient beings, then the moral status
> of your conduct does not depend on the species of the beings affected.
> If the beings affected were humans of similar cognitive capacities in
> relevantly similar circumstances, the moral status of the conduct
> would be the same. The same goes for me, of course.

Mumbo jumbo, you're calling people murderers.

> This is a perfectly respectable position.

It's despicable, and idiotic.

>You haven't given any good
> arguments against it. Even if you had, it's still a perfectly
> respectable position to take.

I've given plenty, and it's not a respectable position, or a serious one.
Animal rights "philosophers" like Regan and Singer are jokes.

> The idea that because I express it I'm
> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.

Nobody with a modicom of rationality subscribes to "AR".

On Aug 3, 3:31 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>
> ups.com...
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Aug 3, 2:48 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>
> groups.com...
>
> >> > On Aug 3, 2:27 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >> >> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>
> >> groups.com...
>
> >> >> > On Aug 3, 11:22 am, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >> >> >> "Rupert" > wrote
>
> >> >> >> > See, that's the thing. You two, Dutch and Derek, good pals of
> >> >> >> > Jonathan
> >> >> >> > Ball, want to draw this ethical distinction whereby Karen
> >> >> >> > forfeited
> >> >> >> > her right to privacy by expressing controversial views about
> >> >> >> > paedophilia, but Ball hasn't done anything to forfeit his right
> >> >> >> > to
> >> >> >> > privacy.
>
> >> >> >> That's exactly right, he hasn't threatened anyone, directly or
> >> >> >> indirectly,
> >> >> >> particularly not children.
>
> >> >> > Well, actually, that's not strictly correct. He has repeatedly
> >> >> > threatened violence towards me, which is illegal. Karen illegally
> >> >> > threatened violence towards him as well, it's true. But Derek's
> >> >> > conduct wasn't in response to that, and as far as I know apart from
> >> >> > that incident she has never threatened anyone or broken the law in
> >> >> > any
> >> >> > way, and is not likely to. The rational grounds for thinking Ball
> >> >> > might be a genuine threat to others are pretty slim, but they're
> >> >> > there. In Karen's case they're not.
>
> >> >> >> > I don't buy it.
>
> >> >> >> That's because you're a slimy little prick.
>
> >> >> > **** off
>
> >> >> You **** off, how dare you come prancing in here accusing good people
> >> >> of
> >> >> being murderers? Then you have the gall to complain that we're being
> >> >> rude
> >> >> to
> >> >> you.
>
> >> > At last you're being upfront about your attitude: you think that
> >> > anyone who comes in here and takes an anti-speciesist position thereby
> >> > forfeits their right to basic courtesy. It's a joke. You're not worthy
> >> > of having intelligent, civilized people engage with you seriously.
>
> >> Calling good people murderers is no joke. You're not civilized, you're
> >> not
> >> worthy to call yourself a human being.- Hide quoted text -
>
> >> - Show quoted text -
>
> > I'm not calling anyone a murderer. I'm saying that if you financially
> > support a process which harms sentient beings, then the moral status
> > of your conduct does not depend on the species of the beings affected.
> > If the beings affected were humans of similar cognitive capacities in
> > relevantly similar circumstances, the moral status of the conduct
> > would be the same. The same goes for me, of course.
>
> Mumbo jumbo,

No, an accurate statement of my view.

> you're calling people murderers.
>
> > This is a perfectly respectable position.
>
> It's despicable, and idiotic.
>

That's not a serious criticism. You've yet to offer any good reason
why it should be rejected.

> >You haven't given any good
> > arguments against it. Even if you had, it's still a perfectly
> > respectable position to take.
>
> I've given plenty,

Not a single one.

> and it's not a respectable position, or a serious one.
> Animal rights "philosophers" like Regan and Singer are jokes.
>

That opinion of yours is ignorant and worthless. No respectable
philosopher would take it seriously.

> > The idea that because I express it I'm
> > "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
> > statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
> > a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
>
> Nobody with a modicom of rationality subscribes to "AR".

You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 3, 3:31 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>
>> ups.com...
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> On Aug 3, 2:48 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>>> oups.com...
>>>>> On Aug 3, 2:27 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>>>>> oups.com...
>>>>>>> On Aug 3, 11:22 am, "Dutch" > wrote:
>>>>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote
>>>>>>>>> See, that's the thing. You two, Dutch and Derek, good pals of
>>>>>>>>> Jonathan
>>>>>>>>> Ball, want to draw this ethical distinction whereby Karen
>>>>>>>>> forfeited
>>>>>>>>> her right to privacy by expressing controversial views about
>>>>>>>>> paedophilia, but Ball hasn't done anything to forfeit his right
>>>>>>>>> to
>>>>>>>>> privacy.
>>>>>>>> That's exactly right, he hasn't threatened anyone, directly or
>>>>>>>> indirectly,
>>>>>>>> particularly not children.
>>>>>>> Well, actually, that's not strictly correct. He has repeatedly
>>>>>>> threatened violence towards me, which is illegal. Karen illegally
>>>>>>> threatened violence towards him as well, it's true. But Derek's
>>>>>>> conduct wasn't in response to that, and as far as I know apart from
>>>>>>> that incident she has never threatened anyone or broken the law in
>>>>>>> any
>>>>>>> way, and is not likely to. The rational grounds for thinking Ball
>>>>>>> might be a genuine threat to others are pretty slim, but they're
>>>>>>> there. In Karen's case they're not.
>>>>>>>>> I don't buy it.
>>>>>>>> That's because you're a slimy little prick.
>>>>>>> **** off
>>>>>> You **** off, how dare you come prancing in here accusing good people
>>>>>> of
>>>>>> being murderers? Then you have the gall to complain that we're being
>>>>>> rude
>>>>>> to
>>>>>> you.
>>>>> At last you're being upfront about your attitude: you think that
>>>>> anyone who comes in here and takes an anti-speciesist position thereby
>>>>> forfeits their right to basic courtesy. It's a joke. You're not worthy
>>>>> of having intelligent, civilized people engage with you seriously.
>>>> Calling good people murderers is no joke. You're not civilized, you're
>>>> not
>>>> worthy to call yourself a human being.- Hide quoted text -
>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer. I'm saying that if you financially
>>> support a process which harms sentient beings, then the moral status
>>> of your conduct does not depend on the species of the beings affected.
>>> If the beings affected were humans of similar cognitive capacities in
>>> relevantly similar circumstances, the moral status of the conduct
>>> would be the same. The same goes for me, of course.
>> Mumbo jumbo,
>
> No, an accurate statement of my view.
>
>> you're calling people murderers.
>>
>>> This is a perfectly respectable position.
>> It's despicable, and idiotic.
>>
>
> That's not a serious criticism. You've yet to offer any good reason
> why it should be rejected.
>
>>> You haven't given any good
>>> arguments against it. Even if you had, it's still a perfectly
>>> respectable position to take.
>> I've given plenty,
>
> Not a single one.
>
>> and it's not a respectable position, or a serious one.
>> Animal rights "philosophers" like Regan and Singer are jokes.
>>
>
> That opinion of yours is ignorant and worthless. No respectable
> philosopher would take it seriously.

Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.

>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
>
> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.

I know very well what I'm talking about. People are just being polite,
they actually loathe you and have no respect for the ridiculous ideas
you're pushing. People should stop being so civil to you, your ideas are
not civilized.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:

>>>>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
>>>> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
>>>> due equal consideration?
>>> I directed you to a document
>> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> Engage with the arguments in my talk.

Post your "talk" here, nitwit.

Rupert wrote:
> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.

You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
I killed a retarded human to eat him.

So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.

And you call this a respectable position? You're one sick ****.

On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
>
> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
>
> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
>
> And you call this a respectable position?

Yup.

> You're one sick ****.

On Aug 3, 8:24 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
> >>>> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
> >>>> due equal consideration?
> >>> I directed you to a document
> >> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
>
> >> - Show quoted text -
>
> > Engage with the arguments in my talk.
>
> Post your "talk" here, nitwit.

What on earth for? It's too long, anyway.

Didn't your mother ever teach you to speak politely to people?

On Aug 3, 8:10 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 3, 3:31 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>
> roups.com...
>
> >>> On Aug 3, 2:48 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
> legroups.com...
> >>>>> On Aug 3, 2:27 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
> oglegroups.com...
> >>>>>>> On Aug 3, 11:22 am, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >>>>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote
> >>>>>>>>> See, that's the thing. You two, Dutch and Derek, good pals of
> >>>>>>>>> Jonathan
> >>>>>>>>> Ball, want to draw this ethical distinction whereby Karen
> >>>>>>>>> forfeited
> >>>>>>>>> her right to privacy by expressing controversial views about
> >>>>>>>>> paedophilia, but Ball hasn't done anything to forfeit his right
> >>>>>>>>> to
> >>>>>>>>> privacy.
> >>>>>>>> That's exactly right, he hasn't threatened anyone, directly or
> >>>>>>>> indirectly,
> >>>>>>>> particularly not children.
> >>>>>>> Well, actually, that's not strictly correct. He has repeatedly
> >>>>>>> threatened violence towards me, which is illegal. Karen illegally
> >>>>>>> threatened violence towards him as well, it's true. But Derek's
> >>>>>>> conduct wasn't in response to that, and as far as I know apart from
> >>>>>>> that incident she has never threatened anyone or broken the law in
> >>>>>>> any
> >>>>>>> way, and is not likely to. The rational grounds for thinking Ball
> >>>>>>> might be a genuine threat to others are pretty slim, but they're
> >>>>>>> there. In Karen's case they're not.
> >>>>>>>>> I don't buy it.
> >>>>>>>> That's because you're a slimy little prick.
> >>>>>>> **** off
> >>>>>> You **** off, how dare you come prancing in here accusing good people
> >>>>>> of
> >>>>>> being murderers? Then you have the gall to complain that we're being
> >>>>>> rude
> >>>>>> to
> >>>>>> you.
> >>>>> At last you're being upfront about your attitude: you think that
> >>>>> anyone who comes in here and takes an anti-speciesist position thereby
> >>>>> forfeits their right to basic courtesy. It's a joke. You're not worthy
> >>>>> of having intelligent, civilized people engage with you seriously.
> >>>> Calling good people murderers is no joke. You're not civilized, you're
> >>>> not
> >>>> worthy to call yourself a human being.- Hide quoted text -
> >>>> - Show quoted text -
> >>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer. I'm saying that if you financially
> >>> support a process which harms sentient beings, then the moral status
> >>> of your conduct does not depend on the species of the beings affected.
> >>> If the beings affected were humans of similar cognitive capacities in
> >>> relevantly similar circumstances, the moral status of the conduct
> >>> would be the same. The same goes for me, of course.
> >> Mumbo jumbo,
>
> > No, an accurate statement of my view.
>
> >> you're calling people murderers.
>
> >>> This is a perfectly respectable position.
> >> It's despicable, and idiotic.
>
> > That's not a serious criticism. You've yet to offer any good reason
> > why it should be rejected.
>
> >>> You haven't given any good
> >>> arguments against it. Even if you had, it's still a perfectly
> >>> respectable position to take.
> >> I've given plenty,
>
> > Not a single one.
>
> >> and it's not a respectable position, or a serious one.
> >> Animal rights "philosophers" like Regan and Singer are jokes.
>
> > That opinion of yours is ignorant and worthless. No respectable
> > philosopher would take it seriously.
>
> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
>

You don't know what you're talking about.

> >>> The idea that because I express it I'm
> >>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
> >>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
> >>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
> >> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
>
> > You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
>
> I know very well what I'm talking about.

No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.

> People are just being polite,
> they actually loathe you and have no respect for the ridiculous ideas
> you're pushing. People should stop being so civil to you, your ideas are
> not civilized.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 3, 8:24 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
>>>>>>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
>>>>>> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
>>>>>> due equal consideration?
>>>>> I directed you to a document
>>>> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>> Engage with the arguments in my talk.
>> Post your "talk" here, nitwit.
>
> What on earth for? It's too long, anyway.
>
> Didn't your mother ever teach you to speak politely to people?

Like calling them murderers and cannibals? Did your mom teach you that?

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 3, 8:10 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 3, 3:31 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>>> ups.com...
>>>>> On Aug 3, 2:48 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>>>>> oups.com...
>>>>>>> On Aug 3, 2:27 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
>>>>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
>>>>>>>> oups.com...
>>>>>>>>> On Aug 3, 11:22 am, "Dutch" > wrote:
>>>>>>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote
>>>>>>>>>>> See, that's the thing. You two, Dutch and Derek, good pals of
>>>>>>>>>>> Jonathan
>>>>>>>>>>> Ball, want to draw this ethical distinction whereby Karen
>>>>>>>>>>> forfeited
>>>>>>>>>>> her right to privacy by expressing controversial views about
>>>>>>>>>>> paedophilia, but Ball hasn't done anything to forfeit his right
>>>>>>>>>>> to
>>>>>>>>>>> privacy.
>>>>>>>>>> That's exactly right, he hasn't threatened anyone, directly or
>>>>>>>>>> indirectly,
>>>>>>>>>> particularly not children.
>>>>>>>>> Well, actually, that's not strictly correct. He has repeatedly
>>>>>>>>> threatened violence towards me, which is illegal. Karen illegally
>>>>>>>>> threatened violence towards him as well, it's true. But Derek's
>>>>>>>>> conduct wasn't in response to that, and as far as I know apart from
>>>>>>>>> that incident she has never threatened anyone or broken the law in
>>>>>>>>> any
>>>>>>>>> way, and is not likely to. The rational grounds for thinking Ball
>>>>>>>>> might be a genuine threat to others are pretty slim, but they're
>>>>>>>>> there. In Karen's case they're not.
>>>>>>>>>>> I don't buy it.
>>>>>>>>>> That's because you're a slimy little prick.
>>>>>>>>> **** off
>>>>>>>> You **** off, how dare you come prancing in here accusing good people
>>>>>>>> of
>>>>>>>> being murderers? Then you have the gall to complain that we're being
>>>>>>>> rude
>>>>>>>> to
>>>>>>>> you.
>>>>>>> At last you're being upfront about your attitude: you think that
>>>>>>> anyone who comes in here and takes an anti-speciesist position thereby
>>>>>>> forfeits their right to basic courtesy. It's a joke. You're not worthy
>>>>>>> of having intelligent, civilized people engage with you seriously.
>>>>>> Calling good people murderers is no joke. You're not civilized, you're
>>>>>> not
>>>>>> worthy to call yourself a human being.- Hide quoted text -
>>>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer. I'm saying that if you financially
>>>>> support a process which harms sentient beings, then the moral status
>>>>> of your conduct does not depend on the species of the beings affected.
>>>>> If the beings affected were humans of similar cognitive capacities in
>>>>> relevantly similar circumstances, the moral status of the conduct
>>>>> would be the same. The same goes for me, of course.
>>>> Mumbo jumbo,
>>> No, an accurate statement of my view.
>>>> you're calling people murderers.
>>>>> This is a perfectly respectable position.
>>>> It's despicable, and idiotic.
>>> That's not a serious criticism. You've yet to offer any good reason
>>> why it should be rejected.
>>>>> You haven't given any good
>>>>> arguments against it. Even if you had, it's still a perfectly
>>>>> respectable position to take.
>>>> I've given plenty,
>>> Not a single one.
>>>> and it's not a respectable position, or a serious one.
>>>> Animal rights "philosophers" like Regan and Singer are jokes.
>>> That opinion of yours is ignorant and worthless. No respectable
>>> philosopher would take it seriously.
>> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
>>
>
> You don't know what you're talking about.

Yes I do. There is no legitimate thinker who takes people like you
seriously. They sometimes listen politely, but they shouldn't.

>>>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
>>>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
>>>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
>>>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
>>>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
>>> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
>> I know very well what I'm talking about.
>
> No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
> everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.

I'm not assuming anything. There is no legitimate endeavor with an "AR"
component. Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
hangout for a few deluded fools.


>> People are just being polite,
>> they actually loathe you and have no respect for the ridiculous ideas
>> you're pushing. People should stop being so civil to you, your ideas are
>> not civilized.- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
>

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
>> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
>> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
>> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
>> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
>>
>> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
>>
>> And you call this a respectable position?
>
> Yup.

Yet you yourself implicitly support the unnecessary killing of animals
to sponsor your own comfortable lifestyle. Instead of responding
substantively to this accusation you dismiss it with vague verbiage
like, I'm not convinced that it is..blah blah"

You have not only forfeited any right to civil discussion, you have
abandoned your intellectual integrity along with your moral compass.

>> You're one sick ****.

On Aug 4, 5:58 am, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 3, 8:10 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 3, 3:31 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
> egroups.com...
> >>>>> On Aug 3, 2:48 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
> oglegroups.com...
> >>>>>>> On Aug 3, 2:27 pm, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >>>>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote in message
> >>>>>>>>news:1186106001.648906.263330@d30g2000prg. googlegroups.com...
> >>>>>>>>> On Aug 3, 11:22 am, "Dutch" > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>> "Rupert" > wrote
> >>>>>>>>>>> See, that's the thing. You two, Dutch and Derek, good pals of
> >>>>>>>>>>> Jonathan
> >>>>>>>>>>> Ball, want to draw this ethical distinction whereby Karen
> >>>>>>>>>>> forfeited
> >>>>>>>>>>> her right to privacy by expressing controversial views about
> >>>>>>>>>>> paedophilia, but Ball hasn't done anything to forfeit his right
> >>>>>>>>>>> to
> >>>>>>>>>>> privacy.
> >>>>>>>>>> That's exactly right, he hasn't threatened anyone, directly or
> >>>>>>>>>> indirectly,
> >>>>>>>>>> particularly not children.
> >>>>>>>>> Well, actually, that's not strictly correct. He has repeatedly
> >>>>>>>>> threatened violence towards me, which is illegal. Karen illegally
> >>>>>>>>> threatened violence towards him as well, it's true. But Derek's
> >>>>>>>>> conduct wasn't in response to that, and as far as I know apart from
> >>>>>>>>> that incident she has never threatened anyone or broken the law in
> >>>>>>>>> any
> >>>>>>>>> way, and is not likely to. The rational grounds for thinking Ball
> >>>>>>>>> might be a genuine threat to others are pretty slim, but they're
> >>>>>>>>> there. In Karen's case they're not.
> >>>>>>>>>>> I don't buy it.
> >>>>>>>>>> That's because you're a slimy little prick.
> >>>>>>>>> **** off
> >>>>>>>> You **** off, how dare you come prancing in here accusing good people
> >>>>>>>> of
> >>>>>>>> being murderers? Then you have the gall to complain that we're being
> >>>>>>>> rude
> >>>>>>>> to
> >>>>>>>> you.
> >>>>>>> At last you're being upfront about your attitude: you think that
> >>>>>>> anyone who comes in here and takes an anti-speciesist position thereby
> >>>>>>> forfeits their right to basic courtesy. It's a joke. You're not worthy
> >>>>>>> of having intelligent, civilized people engage with you seriously.
> >>>>>> Calling good people murderers is no joke. You're not civilized, you're
> >>>>>> not
> >>>>>> worthy to call yourself a human being.- Hide quoted text -
> >>>>>> - Show quoted text -
> >>>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer. I'm saying that if you financially
> >>>>> support a process which harms sentient beings, then the moral status
> >>>>> of your conduct does not depend on the species of the beings affected.
> >>>>> If the beings affected were humans of similar cognitive capacities in
> >>>>> relevantly similar circumstances, the moral status of the conduct
> >>>>> would be the same. The same goes for me, of course.
> >>>> Mumbo jumbo,
> >>> No, an accurate statement of my view.
> >>>> you're calling people murderers.
> >>>>> This is a perfectly respectable position.
> >>>> It's despicable, and idiotic.
> >>> That's not a serious criticism. You've yet to offer any good reason
> >>> why it should be rejected.
> >>>>> You haven't given any good
> >>>>> arguments against it. Even if you had, it's still a perfectly
> >>>>> respectable position to take.
> >>>> I've given plenty,
> >>> Not a single one.
> >>>> and it's not a respectable position, or a serious one.
> >>>> Animal rights "philosophers" like Regan and Singer are jokes.
> >>> That opinion of yours is ignorant and worthless. No respectable
> >>> philosopher would take it seriously.
> >> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
>
> > You don't know what you're talking about.
>
> Yes I do. There is no legitimate thinker who takes people like you
> seriously. They sometimes listen politely, but they shouldn't.
>

That's just ignorant, I'm afraid. All academic philosophers
acknowledge that Singer's and Regan's contributions to the debate
deserve to be taken seriously, and plenty of respected thinkers take
similar positions. You wouldn't know anything about it one way or the
other.

> >>>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
> >>>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
> >>>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
> >>>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
> >>>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
> >>> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
> >> I know very well what I'm talking about.
>
> > No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
> > everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.
>
> I'm not assuming anything. There is no legitimate endeavor with an "AR"
> component. Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
> hangout for a few deluded fools.
>

Where do you draw the line? I'd be happy to have my position
categorized as a "new welfarist" position. Just what exactly is it
about my position that makes it a position for "deluded fools"?

On Aug 4, 6:11 am, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
> >> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
> >> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
> >> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
> >> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
>
> >> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
>
> >> And you call this a respectable position?
>
> > Yup.
>
> Yet you yourself implicitly support the unnecessary killing of animals
> to sponsor your own comfortable lifestyle. Instead of responding
> substantively to this accusation you dismiss it with vague verbiage
> like, I'm not convinced that it is..blah blah"
>
> You have not only forfeited any right to civil discussion, you have
> abandoned your intellectual integrity along with your moral compass.
>
>
>
> >> You're one sick ****.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

I've been through this quite a few times. If you financially support a
process that harms sentient beings, then it is the same as it would be
if the victims were humans with similar cognitive capacities in
relevantly similar circumstances. I think that this requires
boycotting most animal products, not necessarily all. I don't believe
that what I am doing is morally wrong.

On Aug 4, 5:46 am, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 3, 8:24 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
> >>>>>> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
> >>>>>> due equal consideration?
> >>>>> I directed you to a document
> >>>> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
> >>>> - Show quoted text -
> >>> Engage with the arguments in my talk.
> >> Post your "talk" here, nitwit.
>
> > What on earth for? It's too long, anyway.
>
> > Didn't your mother ever teach you to speak politely to people?
>
> Like calling them murderers and cannibals? Did your mom teach you that?- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

"Murderers and cannibals" is your spin on it. I have not used those
words.

I've talked this over with my parents. They think I have every right
to express the position I do and have it seriously engaged with, and
be treated with basic courtesy. They think that you are mistaken that
I am not making a good faith effort at rational debate, and when you
say "decent people should pour scorn on you" they think you are a
nutcase.

My parents' diet is similar to yours. They are middle-class people who
used to vote Labor, these days tend to vote Green. They work for the
Conservatorium of Music. My mother is a pianist and my father is an
academic. They are ordinary middle-class people, somewhat left-leaning
politically, with no particularly strong stand on animal issues. They
have listened to me discussing my position and they do not find it
offensive, although presumably they are not convinced. The impression
that they have formed of you is that you are a nutcase. They think
that you are the one that needs help. So there it is. I wonder what
everyone else thinks.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 4, 5:58 am, Dutch > wrote:

[..]

>>>> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
>>> You don't know what you're talking about.
>> Yes I do. There is no legitimate thinker who takes people like you
>> seriously. They sometimes listen politely, but they shouldn't.
>>
>
> That's just ignorant, I'm afraid. All academic philosophers
> acknowledge that Singer's and Regan's contributions to the debate
> deserve to be taken seriously, and plenty of respected thinkers take
> similar positions. You wouldn't know anything about it one way or the
> other.

What debate? There is no serious debate going on which suggests that
humans cannot use animals as food or as subjects for critical medical
research, none whatsoever, except among a few woolly-headed navel-gazers
like you.

>
>>>>>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
>>>>>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
>>>>>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
>>>>>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
>>>>>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
>>>>> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
>>>> I know very well what I'm talking about.
>>> No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
>>> everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.
>> I'm not assuming anything. There is no legitimate endeavor with an "AR"
>> component. Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
>> hangout for a few deluded fools.
>>
>
> Where do you draw the line?

I draw the line between AR and AW. AR is an attempt to redefine the very
way of life of the human race based on the misguided notion that
non-humans morally fall into the same class of beings as humans. It's a
insidious idea that has you hooked right in. It uses terms like
"speciesism" and arguments like the AMC to achieve the illusion of
credibility. AW is a response to the recognition of the needs of animals.

> I'd be happy to have my position
> categorized as a "new welfarist" position.

If you switch the label on a can of rotten fruit it's still got rotten
fruit inside.

> Just what exactly is it
> about my position that makes it a position for "deluded fools"?

A person could write a book in answer to that question. The short answer
is that in order to support the idea you are forced to delude yourself,
to give over control of your reason to make the idea appear to be
coherent to yourself and if possible to others.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 4, 6:11 am, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
>>>> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
>>>> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
>>>> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
>>>> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
>>>> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
>>>> And you call this a respectable position?
>>> Yup.
>> Yet you yourself implicitly support the unnecessary killing of animals
>> to sponsor your own comfortable lifestyle. Instead of responding
>> substantively to this accusation you dismiss it with vague verbiage
>> like, I'm not convinced that it is..blah blah"
>>
>> You have not only forfeited any right to civil discussion, you have
>> abandoned your intellectual integrity along with your moral compass.
>>
>>
>>
>>>> You're one sick ****.- Hide quoted text -
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> I've been through this quite a few times. If you financially support a
> process that harms sentient beings, then it is the same as it would be
> if the victims were humans with similar cognitive capacities in
> relevantly similar circumstances.

There *are* no marginal humans living in farmer's fields or grain silos,
so how does this relate to the animal victims of our lifestyles which do
live there?

> I think that this requires
> boycotting most animal products,

Why specifically animal products? Cotton is one the most deadly crops in
the world, rice, grain, and fruit crops are not far behind.

> not necessarily all. I don't believe
> that what I am doing is morally wrong.

Even though your lifestyle kills sentient beings? Is that because you'd
live the same way even if there were retarded people being poisoned?
Sorry, the connection between your lifestyle and your restatement of the
argument from marginal cases is difficult to parse. It comes across as a
tap dance signifying nothing.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 4, 5:46 am, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 3, 8:24 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>> On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
>>>>>>>>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
>>>>>>>> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
>>>>>>>> due equal consideration?
>>>>>>> I directed you to a document
>>>>>> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
>>>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>>>> Engage with the arguments in my talk.
>>>> Post your "talk" here, nitwit.
>>> What on earth for? It's too long, anyway.
>>> Didn't your mother ever teach you to speak politely to people?
>> Like calling them murderers and cannibals? Did your mom teach you that?- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> "Murderers and cannibals" is your spin on it. I have not used those
> words.

How does avoiding using the words make your insinuations any less insulting?

> I've talked this over with my parents. They think I have every right
> to express the position I do and have it seriously engaged with, and
> be treated with basic courtesy. They think that you are mistaken that
> I am not making a good faith effort at rational debate, and when you
> say "decent people should pour scorn on you" they think you are a
> nutcase.

You've shown them some harsh words, not my arguments. You're their son,
they don't want scorn heaped on their son.

> My parents' diet is similar to yours. They are middle-class people who
> used to vote Labor, these days tend to vote Green. They work for the
> Conservatorium of Music. My mother is a pianist and my father is an
> academic. They are ordinary middle-class people, somewhat left-leaning
> politically, with no particularly strong stand on animal issues. They
> have listened to me discussing my position and they do not find it
> offensive, although presumably they are not convinced.

Presumably, you think? If you weren't their son, and our arguments were
compared side-by-side, they would pick you as the nut case. I suspect
that they are patronizing you, in more ways than one, because you're
their son, and they know that you're harmless. But if they were
compelled to really engage with the implications of your words I think
they would be offended. You are saying essentially that you find no
difference between their diet and that of cannibals.

> The impression
> that they have formed of you is that you are a nutcase. They think
> that you are the one that needs help. So there it is. I wonder what
> everyone else thinks.

Yes, there it is, supportive loving parents. Perhaps they should have
tanned your bottom a little more often when you were a young lad, you
seem like a spoiled brat.

"Dutch" > wrote in message news:ENLsi.27556$rX4.20000@pd7urf2no...

> Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end

Only for the animal exploitation industry, which "dutch" serves.

'PROJECT FOR THE NEW AMERICAN CARNIVORE

From Lyman to Niman in 10 Short Years
by James LaVeck and Jenny Stein

In 1997, while attending our first national animal advocacy
conference in Washington DC, we were surprised to find that
one of the speakers was a former cattle rancher. His name was
Howard Lyman, and not only was he now a vegan, but he had
publicly renounced the exploitation of animals and dedicated
the rest of his life to sharing with the world the lessons he had
learned about ethical eating, environmental sanity, and peaceful
grassroots activism. His message, along with that of several
other people we heard at that conference, inspired us to change
our own diets and join the movement for nonviolence and animal
rights.

Now, ten years later, another conference is happening in our
nation's capital. While several of the speakers and supporters
remain the same, this year's most publicized animal protection
conference will not be featuring any cattlemen gone vegan.
Instead, it will be putting on the podium a multi-million dollar
rancher, a pig farmer, a turkey farmer, and others known for
talking of compassion and animal welfare while at the same
time profiting from their unapologetic killing of animals.

Now, ten years later, a well-known animal sanctuary, as well as
organizations that are the public face of animal advocacy in the
United States, have partnered with members of the meat industry
to develop "new and improved" standards for the exploitation of
animals, and to actively promote consumption of products such
as "cage-free" eggs and "animal compassionate" veal.

Now, ten years later, veganism, once widely understood within
our movement to be a moral and ethical imperative, a commitment
to not participate in the exploitation of others nor to cooperate
with those who do, is rapidly being reduced to a mere "lifestyle
choice," a "tool," to be selectively used as a means to an end.
Similarly, the concept of animal rights, once widely understood
to represent a zero-tolerance policy on the exploitation of animals,
has become so diluted and degraded, as we shall later see, so as
to be comfortably invoked by those who butcher thousands of
baby cows and lambs every week.

For us, and for many other activists we have spoken with
over these last months, this turn of events has been equal parts
disturbing and bewildering. For some it has even been the
cause of despair. There is a sense that the movement we have
given our lives to is being cynically co-opted and transformed
into a caricature of itself.

As we have worked to understand what is happening and
why, we have gradually realized that something about this dark
experience is eerily familiar. It is, in fact, strongly reminiscent
of the cultural and political changes that have befallen our
country over the last several years, changes resulting from the
Neo-conservative domination of Washington politics.

Rise of the Neo-carns

As most of us know, the Neo-cons are a relatively small network
of policy analysts, political operatives and elected officials who
have been the driving force behind the radical shift America's
foreign policy has taken over the last several years. Their Project
for the New American Century, a think-tank now famous for
spawning most of the players and policies behind the US invasion of
Iraq, openly advocates for world domination through military force.

What fewer are aware of, however, is that amongst the founders
of the Neo-con movement were several former liberals, and it was
their insider knowledge of progressive politics that made the Neo-cons
so effective at discrediting their former ideology and advancing a new
and radical agenda. It was the Neo-cons who conceived of making a
doctrine of pre-emptive war official US policy. It was the Neo-cons
who found a way to make secret prisons and systematic torture not
only legal, but also socially acceptable.

We have developed a hypothesis that some of the more mystifying
changes that have come to the movement for veganism and animal
rights in recent years can largely be explained by the adoption of the
Neo-con mindset and methods by a handful of influential animal
organization leaders, philosophers and animal husbandry consultants,
several of whom are former animal rights activists. They are the
Neo-carns, and they have partnered with certain segments of the
animal exploiting industries, using their insider knowledge to redefine
the animal movement just as radically as the Neo-cons have redefined
the policies of our government, with a similarly disastrous effect.

Our hypothesis is not a conspiracy theory, but rather a theory of
cultural influence and unconscious imitation. By speculating about
what might be some significant parallels between Neo-conservatism
and Neo-carnism, we hope to inspire a community-based critical
thinking process in service of a healthier and more effective
movement.

Enriching the exploiters

Over the last few years, thousands of American soldiers and
hundreds of thousands of Iraqi citizens have been killed, maimed,
and psychologically scarred, their families torn apart. The
economies of both countries have been bled just as severely to
pay for all the mayhem, all in the name of "bringing democracy"
to Iraq and "preventing terrorist attacks" in America.

As doubtful as the benefits of this endless "War on Terror" will
continue to be for those millions of individuals whose lives hang
in the balance, its perpetuation is nothing short of a goldmine for
the management and stockholders of a number of multi-national
defense contractors and oil companies. For no matter how many
innocent people die, these corporations will get paid huge sums
of money to build the bombs, and then after the bombs are
dropped, get paid even more money to rebuild the buildings and
infrastructure the bombs have blown apart. In fact, the greater the
destruction, the more money they will ultimately make. Such
corporations have close ties to the Neo-cons, and it is well-known
that some of the profits they make flow right back into the coffers
that fund the Neo-con political machine.

Similarly, The Neo-carns have formed an alliance with a group
of large-scale meat sellers and animal exploiters who publicly
proclaim their concern for the well-being of those they kill for
profit. Working together, they are developing and promoting
new standards for the exploitation of animals, and co-producing
media events and public relations campaigns that culminate in
mutually-beneficial legislative initiatives, all of it amounting to
what we might call an endless "Campaign to Refine the Process
of Exploitation."

However uncertain the benefits to the animals and the animal
movement will be, this endless campaign waged under the banner
of "protecting animals" and "reducing suffering" is virtually
guaranteed to bring millions in new profits to the "cage-free"
egg industry, the "humane" meat industry, the organic dairy
industry, and numerous other purveyors of "happy" animal
products. In fact, the more the public is taught to channel their
concern for animals into the purchase of these new and pricier
products of suffering, the more money these large scale exploiters
will ultimately make. Some of this money is already being spent
within the advocacy movement, being used to sponsor animal
conferences, for example, that are now presenting some of these
animal exploiters as respected speakers alongside long-time
animal rights advocates.

Butchers for Animal Rights?

Nicolette Hahn Niman, in a recent New York Times op-ed, writes
with considerable passion and authority about the cruelty and
brutality of the common agricultural practice of cutting off the tails
of pigs and cows. "Eventually," she says, "our consciences and
common sense-as well as science-should tell us that we need an
outright ban."

Described in Neo-carn media as being "haunted by the pigs she
saw while touring pig confinement operations as an environmental
attorney," Niman notes that "Studies have shown that sows confined
in gestation stalls exhibit 'behavior characteristic of humans with
severe depression and mental illness.'" Niman's seeming recognition
of the intelligence and emotional capacity of pigs is so persuasive,
it nearly succeeds in obliterating our awareness of the 2,000 pigs
whose lives are taken each week by her 100 million dollar company,
Niman Ranch. One wonders if Ms. Niman has ever taken the time to
observe whether each of these 2,000 pigs exhibits physiological and
psychological behaviors characteristic of humans, innocent of any
crime, being brutally executed one after the other.

Then there's Randy Strauss of Strauss Veal & Lamb, who is
quoted in Neo-carn media saying that veal crates are "inhumane and
archaic" and "do nothing more than subject a calf to stress, fear,
physical harm and pain," and has even gone so far as to say that
"Animal rights are important."

Strauss's strong-sounding "pro-animal" language, as well as his
being highlighted and praised by the Neo-carns, distracts us from
realizing that he, like the war profiteers, has a vested interest in the
endless expansion of the exploitation and the killing. In Strauss's
own words, "We're now the largest veal company in the United
States... We're slaughtering and processing between 1,700 and
2,500 calves and breaking three to five loads of domestic lamb a
week at our Franklin facility."

"There are a growing number of people who, if they feel good
about what they're eating, will eat veal," says Strauss. "If we can
capture that market, we're going to increase the 0.6-pound per
capita consumption market resulting in a healthier veal industry."

Squandering the Work of Generations

In a recent New York Times article titled "Veal to Love, Without
the Guilt," it was noted that twenty years ago, Americans were
eating eight times more veal than today, and that this dramatic
change was due to a successful animal rights educational campaign
and boycott carried out for years by thousands of animal advocates.
The article then goes on to feature the comments of numerous
parties who declare how delighted they are to once again be eating
veal, except now, the "humanely-raised" veal products are rosy
colored and sport a more zesty taste. At some upscale restaurants,
this new "guilt-free" delicacy is rapidly becoming one of the most
popular items.

Could this have anything to do with a prominent farm animal
sanctuary and numerous animal protection groups putting their
moral authority and the names of their organizations behind new
"more humane" standards for the exploitation of dairy calves?
Does it have anything to do with their publishing lists on the
internet of restaurants that virtuously serve up the flesh of
"uncrated" baby cows, or their elaborate PR collaborations with
meat sellers such as Whole Foods and restaurateur Wolfgang
Puck, who is only too happy to tell the world how much tastier
"happy" animals can be?

Puck has recently launched a high profile PR initiative that
includes the development of new "humane" exploitation standards.
His company told Special Events magazine that it would use the
resulting media exposure "to educate consumers and provide
'how to' information on using fresh, natural, organic and humanely
treated ingredients." [Emphasis added].

This initiative succeeds brilliantly at marketing Puck's expensive
products, among which veal is one of the top selling items. It
also has caused the animals themselves to disappear. Now they
are no longer individuals, sentient beings being exploited and killed.
They are merely "humanely treated ingredients." This single example
captures the essence of what is wrong with so many Neo-carn
"victories." Lots of press and hoopla, the public image of animal
exploiters lifted to the heavens along with that of their Neo-carn
partners, and the basic truth of what is being done to the animals,
the most inconvenient truth of them all, methodically swept under
the rug.

Irrational Rationalizations

The architects of the Neo-carn revolution seem as blithely
untroubled by the unraveling of the veal boycott as the Neo-cons
are by the unraveling of American civil liberties. One prominent
Neo-carnist offered the following in response to an advocate's
criticism of his organization's role in the breaking of the veal boycott:

Of course, when people stopped eating veal in the 1980s, it meant
more animals were being exploited, since people largely switched
from veal to chicken and/or fish (who are much smaller animals).
Lots of animal people tout the anti-veal campaign as the paradigmatic
"incremental abolitionist" campaign, even though the result was that
far more animals ended up being raised/killed as a result of it.

So just as the Neo-cons ask us to believe that we should allow
our civil liberties to be curtailed as a means of protecting our
"freedom," the Neo-carns ask us to believe that putting the animal
movement seal of approval upon the new "humane" veal is actually
saving the lives of animals. In both cases, there appears to be a
comfort with assuming ownership and control of - and then
"spending" - the decades-long work of large numbers of well
meaning people in ways that directly contradict the original intent.

Compassion for Sale

And then there is Whole Foods Markets, one of the largest
meat sellers in America, and now a major sponsor of numerous
animal conferences. Whole Foods CEO John Mackey is commonly
presented as a business visionary committed to reconciling record
levels of profit with philanthropic altruism. The Catholic Reporter,
in fact, described Mr. Mackey as one of the few CEOs who "remain
as models of ethics in both their personal and professional lives."

However, it was recently reported in the New York Times that over
the course of eight years, Mackey made more than 1,000 posts on
a popular internet financial forum under a false identity, touting his
own company's stock and deprecating a competing company's
stock, a company he is now in the process of attempting to buy.

In a popular vegetarian magazine, where Mackey has now twice
been honored for his "vegan" values, he was recently described like
this:

Mackey's compassion for animals led to Whole Foods'
implementation of a humane production system to ensure the
industry's highest quality conditions for animals raised for food.
Whole Foods Markets' stringent quality-standards program requires
frequent auditing and compliance from animal agriculture producers,
making it tricky for even the slickest rancher to slip beneath this
progressive company's radar.

However, after years of such unqualified animal movement
endorsements and what is essentially a massive branding and
advertising campaign carried out for free by trusting animal
activists, apparently not even one of the "animal compassionate"
exploitation standards Mackey and his suppliers developed in
collaboration with participating animal organizations has been
put into practice.

According to the Whole Foods Animal Compassion Foundation
web site, "although no producers have met these standards yet,
many are exploring the opportunity."

Perhaps the problem will be solved when Whole Foods fills its
new Alternative/Compassionate Farm Animal Production Coordinator
position. "We are looking for someone," says the job posting on
the Whole Foods web site, "who can bring solid evidence that they
can produce a meat product in a pasture based system that will
leave the taste buds screaming for more, and then get out there and
help others do the same."

Curiously, at the upcoming national animal conference, Mackey's
multi-billion dollar grocery chain will be presenting a talk titled
"Whole Foods Market: The Journey Towards Transparency,
Accountability and Responsibility with Farm Animal Welfare."

Curious, and Curiouser

Is it not strange that while the institutional animal movement
has historically struggled to develop and sustain any significant
collaborations with the peace, environmental, and human rights
movements, it seems to have had no problem at all developing
elaborate and rather intimate alliances with animal exploiting
corporations such as Whole Foods, Niman Ranch, and Wolfgang
Puck?

And is it not also strange that nearly every adult in America is
now aware of their option to buy some sort of "humanely-raised"
animal product, an option that is being exercised more and more
frequently - yet, at the same time, hardly any Americans are aware
of the fact that animal agriculture is estimated by United Nations
scientists to be directly responsible for 18% of global warming
emissions, and that adopting a plant-based diet saves more
carbon pollution than driving a hybrid auto?

What the World Needs Now

Rather than launching a much-needed massive global warming
education campaign that teaches people how to transition to a
plant-based diet, the Neo-carns have instead elected to commit
millions of dollars and countless activist hours to convincing people
to buy "happy" animal products linked to largely symbolic
legislative initiatives. Possibly voted down, and more than likely to
be weakly enforced, such initiatives suffer many potential limitations
in terms of the real benefits they might offer animals. Yet, regardless
of the outcome, these initiatives are a winner from the word "go"
for "happy meat" corporations and Butchers for Animal Rights.

Committing serious resources to the promotion of a plant-based
diet, while it may be great for the animals, a moral imperative, and
one of the most effective tools for addressing the global warming
crisis, isn't going to sit well with the Neo-carns' animal industry
partners. And let's face it, it is also unlikely to bring in as many
donations as legislative initiatives that aspire to modify animal
husbandry practices while introducing the public to new and tastier
animal products. Actually confronting and criticizing the use and
killing of animals creates some stress, and stress is bad for business.

Consider how the Neo-cons scoffed at the Kyoto Climate Change
Treaty, and have failed to push Detroit to develop electric and
hybrid vehicles, opting instead to offer tax breaks to buyers of
Hummers. Could it be that Neo-carn leaders, enthralled with their
newfound ability to conjure one illusory victory after the other,
have all but missed the greatest educational opportunity the animal
movement has seen in a generation?

Normalizing the Unthinkable

The methods of the Neo-cons and the Neo-carns are often both
overwhelming and outrageous, and this tends at first to stun and
immobilize those they are attempting to control. Recall, for example,
the voting public's paralysis in the face of the Supreme Court
deciding the 2000 election. And then came the difficult and
discouraging interval between the run up to the invasion of Iraq and
the "Mission Accomplished" moment. More and more people were
awakening from the trance, yet still, most of us remained silent, unsure
of ourselves, afraid to step out of line and become a target like the
Dixie Chicks and others who were the first to say out loud what
many of us knew in our hearts to be true.

That's where we are now in the animal movement. "Victory" after
"victory" is being declared, and in such a climate, it seems
"unpatriotic" to raise any questions or doubts. But the troubling
consequences are mounting. It is getting harder and harder to hide
the fact that segments of the meat industry are being enriched just
like the corporations profiting from the war, and that hard-won
progress in the battle for public respect for the rights of animals is
slipping away. And as one boundary after another is violated,
what was unthinkable and shocking the previous year becomes
normal and accepted the next. The relentless quality of the process
brings on a kind of learned helplessness.

The Doctrine of Pre-emptive Defeat

So here we come to a crucial point. Neo-cons and Neo-carns
both damage the integrity of individuals and society in general by
convincing us that we must violate our core principles in order to
serve the common good, that by insisting on upholding cherished
beliefs and values we are actually impeding progress. We must
torture prisoners in order to be safe from attack. We must invade
and occupy other countries in order to spread democracy. We
must vote for politicians whose policies in nearly every other area
are repugnant, because they have promised to support a certain
animal welfare bill. We must partner with the animal exploiting
industry to promote "happy" animal products even though we
know in our hearts that using and killing animals is wrong.

Both the Neo-cons and the Neo-carns offer grim proclamations
about the future, creating a climate of despair that enables public
acceptance of their radical violations of moral and ethical codes.
The Neo-cons, for example, emphasize that the "War on Terror"
is likely to go on for generations. They tell us that we must steel
ourselves for the nasty business of an unending conflict on many
fronts, and that those who insist on questioning their policies are
"aiding and abetting the enemy," or "abandoning our troops."

The Neo-carns similarly repeat over and over that "this isn't
going to change in our lifetimes," presenting as fact their
operating assumption that large numbers of people will not stop
eating meat in the foreseeable future. The Neo-carns put forth this
doctrine of pre-emptive defeat, and then convince other
well-meaning people that their "happy meat" program is the only
sane and compassionate course of action. Those who persistently
question the wisdom of their approach are likely to be characterized
as being "willing to abandon the billions of animals suffering now."

Such intimidating rhetoric distracts our attention from the simple
truth that there are other choices, including addressing the root
causes, rather than the symptoms of violence and injustice. This
begins with the simple act of saying "No," of refusing to participate
in the domination and exploitation of others, or to cooperate with
those who do.

The Road Not Taken

So what might saying "No" look like? Consider the following
excerpts from a 2006 American Psychological Association press
release, clarifying the association's position on the issue of torture
and abuse:

The Council of Representatives of the American Psychological
Association (APA) has approved a resolution reaffirming the
organization's absolute opposition to all forms of torture and abuse,
regardless of the circumstance.

The Association unequivocally condemns any involvement by
psychologists in torture or other forms of cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment or punishment. This APA policy applies to
all psychologists in all settings.

The resolution, approved on August 9, 2006, further underscored
the duty of all psychologists to intervene to stop acts of torture
or abuse as well as the ethical obligation of all psychologists to
report such behavior to appropriate authorities.

"Our intention is to empower and encourage members to do
everything they can to prevent violations of basic human rights -
at Guantanamo Bay or anywhere else they may occur," said
Gerald P. Koocher, PhD, President of the American Psychological
Association.

"It is not enough for us to express outrage or to codify acceptable
practices. As psychologists, we must use every means at our
disposal to prevent abuse and other forms of cruel or degrading
treatment."

Contrast this with the language from a letter published on the
Whole Foods web site, signed by 17 animal advocacy groups
regarding their position on the development and use of
"compassionate" standards for animal exploitation:

The undersigned animal welfare, animal protection and animal
rights organizations would like to express their appreciation and
support for the pioneering initiative being taken by Whole Foods
Market in setting Farm Animal Compassionate Standards. We
hope and expect that these standards will improve the lives of
millions of animals.

As you consider these two approaches, ask yourself what
message each sends to the world about the morality of
practicing violence against others. Ask yourself which inspires
you to get involved and take a stand against injustice.

The Journey Home

It is time to stop selling off our movement's ethical foundations
piece by piece in exchange for illusory short-term gains. It is
time instead to devote our collective wisdom, energy and
resources to creating the nonviolent culture our planet is crying
out for.

It is time to put our full support behind those developing a
nonviolent cuisine, nonviolent clothing, nonviolent art, nonviolent
education, nonviolent technology, nonviolent laws, and nonviolent
foreign policy.

For the first time in history, human society has the ability to
evolve and transform on a planetary scale, and this new ability
comes to us at the same time as our collective impact on the
world's ecosystem threatens disaster. Never has the average person
had the ability to do so much harm, or so much good. This time of
crisis teaches us as never before how profoundly interconnected
our lives are, and how we must now cultivate a holistic perspective.
We must lift our gaze up from the ground at our feet, and make our
decisions while looking much further down the stream of time, at
least several generations ahead.

In this larger, longer term view, as great as the problems caused
by Neo-conservatism and Neo-carnism may seem to be, they
ultimately serve the purpose of awakening a deeper understanding
and a deeper commitment in us all. These inherently flawed
ideologies have only gained a foothold because we have allowed
our philosophy to be corrupted and our language to be degraded,
because we have lost sight of our vision, because we have forgotten
who we are. In answering their challenge and regaining our
movement's health, we have the chance to rediscover the best parts
of ourselves and the most exciting aspect of the human journey-
choice.

It's up to us to choose the vision that will shape our world, and
the values that will guide us along the way.

Will it be a vision of a "compassionate" seal of approval on every
package of animal flesh? Or a vision of every child in America
raised on a non-violent diet and receiving a humane education?

Will it be a vision of endless supermarket shelves lined with
cage-free eggs? Or a vision of vegan restaurants on every corner,
in every town?

Will it be a vision of animal activists collaborating with "kinder,
gentler" animal exploiters to cultivate the "sensitive carnivore"?
Or a vision of animal activists and former animal farmers joining
with environmental and human rights activists to combat violence,
hunger, disease, and global warming?

Will it be a compromised, ends-justifies-the-means vision forged
upon the assumption of defeat? Or an inspired, confident,
long-term vision that fosters peace and planetary transformation?

Our vision is what gives us strength during the darkest times.
It is what gives us moral authority when we speak out for the
vulnerable. It is what inspires others to become involved. It is
what makes our hope for the world more than just a fantasy.

If we faithfully serve our vision, if we fiercely protect and
support it, if we defend it from co-option and corruption-then,
and only then, will we have a real chance of bringing our vision
to life.


---------------------------------
Post script: Following publication of this essay, a helpful
reader brought to our attention a powerful article recently
published in Vanity Fair magazine, "Rorschach and Awe," which
explores the involvement of psychologists in interrogation and
torture. As it turns out, there are many outside observers as well
as practitioners within the American Psychological Association
that believe that the APA's policy regarding torture referred to in
this essay is not strong enough, as, for example, it does not
specifically prohibit their members from participating in
interrogations. The article also points out the division and conflict
that has developed in the APA as a result of the involvement of
some psychologists in the actual design of interrogation techniques.

---------------------------------

Other Essays on Related Topics:

Compassion for Sale?
Doublethink Meets Doublefeel as Happy Meat Comes of Age

Invasion of the Movement Snatchers
A Social Justice Cause Falls Prey to the Doctrine of "Necessary Evil"

Truthiness is Stranger Than Fiction
The Hidden Cost of Selling the public on "Cage-Free" Eggs

---------------------------------

Copyright © 2007 Tribe of Heart Ltd. All rights reserved
http://www.tribeofheart.org/tohhtml/pnac.htm

pearl wrote:
> "Dutch" > wrote
>
>> Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
>
> Only for the animal exploitation industry, which "dutch" serves.
>

Palpable nonsense.

"Dutch" > wrote in message news:Ny3ti.28567$_d2.10681@pd7urf3no...
> pearl wrote:
> > "Dutch" > wrote
> >
> >> Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
> >
> > Only for the animal exploitation industry, which "dutch" serves.
> >
>
> Palpable nonsense.

What?

pearl wrote:
> "Dutch" > wrote in message news:Ny3ti.28567$_d2.10681@pd7urf3no...
>> pearl wrote:
>>> "Dutch" > wrote
>>>
>>>> Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
>>> Only for the animal exploitation industry, which "dutch" serves.
>>>
>> Palpable nonsense.
>
> What?
>
>
The whole thing, from your false introduction to the flimsy conspiracy
theories in the article, to the very notion that you or I or anyone else
actually believes in "Animal Rights" except in some version of the
colloquial.

On Aug 4, 2:02 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 4, 5:58 am, Dutch > wrote:
>
> [..]
>
> >>>> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
> >>> You don't know what you're talking about.
> >> Yes I do. There is no legitimate thinker who takes people like you
> >> seriously. They sometimes listen politely, but they shouldn't.
>
> > That's just ignorant, I'm afraid. All academic philosophers
> > acknowledge that Singer's and Regan's contributions to the debate
> > deserve to be taken seriously, and plenty of respected thinkers take
> > similar positions. You wouldn't know anything about it one way or the
> > other.
>
> What debate? There is no serious debate going on which suggests that
> humans cannot use animals as food or as subjects for critical medical
> research, none whatsoever, except among a few woolly-headed navel-gazers
> like you.
>

Here you're just flying in the face of the plain facts.

>
>
>
>
> >>>>>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
> >>>>>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
> >>>>>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
> >>>>>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
> >>>>>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
> >>>>> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
> >>>> I know very well what I'm talking about.
> >>> No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
> >>> everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.
> >> I'm not assuming anything. There is no legitimate endeavor with an "AR"
> >> component. Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
> >> hangout for a few deluded fools.
>
> > Where do you draw the line?
>
> I draw the line between AR and AW. AR is an attempt to redefine the very
> way of life of the human race based on the misguided notion that
> non-humans morally fall into the same class of beings as humans. It's a
> insidious idea that has you hooked right in. It uses terms like
> "speciesism" and arguments like the AMC to achieve the illusion of
> credibility. AW is a response to the recognition of the needs of animals.
>
> > I'd be happy to have my position
> > categorized as a "new welfarist" position.
>
> If you switch the label on a can of rotten fruit it's still got rotten
> fruit inside.
>
> > Just what exactly is it
> > about my position that makes it a position for "deluded fools"?
>
> A person could write a book in answer to that question. The short answer
> is that in order to support the idea you are forced to delude yourself,
> to give over control of your reason to make the idea appear to be
> coherent to yourself and if possible to others.

Nonsense. There's no good reason why my position is any less credible
than yours.

On Aug 4, 2:12 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 4, 6:11 am, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
> >>>> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
> >>>> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
> >>>> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
> >>>> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
> >>>> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
> >>>> And you call this a respectable position?
> >>> Yup.
> >> Yet you yourself implicitly support the unnecessary killing of animals
> >> to sponsor your own comfortable lifestyle. Instead of responding
> >> substantively to this accusation you dismiss it with vague verbiage
> >> like, I'm not convinced that it is..blah blah"
>
> >> You have not only forfeited any right to civil discussion, you have
> >> abandoned your intellectual integrity along with your moral compass.
>
> >>>> You're one sick ****.- Hide quoted text -
> >> - Show quoted text -
>
> > I've been through this quite a few times. If you financially support a
> > process that harms sentient beings, then it is the same as it would be
> > if the victims were humans with similar cognitive capacities in
> > relevantly similar circumstances.
>
> There *are* no marginal humans living in farmer's fields or grain silos,

Irrelevant.

> so how does this relate to the animal victims of our lifestyles which do
> live there?
>
> > I think that this requires
> > boycotting most animal products,
>
> Why specifically animal products? Cotton is one the most deadly crops in
> the world, rice, grain, and fruit crops are not far behind.
>

In general, animal food products are much worse and they're also much
easier to avoid. There may be a case for boycotting some non-animal
products as well, yes.

> > not necessarily all. I don't believe
> > that what I am doing is morally wrong.
>
> Even though your lifestyle kills sentient beings? Is that because you'd
> live the same way even if there were retarded people being poisoned?

Yes, if the level of difficulty in boycotting the products in question
were similar.

> Sorry, the connection between your lifestyle and your restatement of the
> argument from marginal cases is difficult to parse. It comes across as a
> tap dance signifying nothing.

On Aug 4, 2:27 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 4, 5:46 am, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 3, 8:24 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>> On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
> >>>>>>>> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
> >>>>>>>> due equal consideration?
> >>>>>>> I directed you to a document
> >>>>>> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
> >>>>>> - Show quoted text -
> >>>>> Engage with the arguments in my talk.
> >>>> Post your "talk" here, nitwit.
> >>> What on earth for? It's too long, anyway.
> >>> Didn't your mother ever teach you to speak politely to people?
> >> Like calling them murderers and cannibals? Did your mom teach you that?- Hide quoted text -
>
> >> - Show quoted text -
>
> > "Murderers and cannibals" is your spin on it. I have not used those
> > words.
>
> How does avoiding using the words make your insinuations any less insulting?
>

I have offered an argument which is critical of what you do. I've
considered the argument carefully and I think it deserves some
consideration. If you find my support for the argument insulting,
that's really not my problem. No reasonable person finds it insulting.
You're welcome to try to engage with it rationally if you want to.

> > I've talked this over with my parents. They think I have every right
> > to express the position I do and have it seriously engaged with, and
> > be treated with basic courtesy. They think that you are mistaken that
> > I am not making a good faith effort at rational debate, and when you
> > say "decent people should pour scorn on you" they think you are a
> > nutcase.
>
> You've shown them some harsh words, not my arguments. You're their son,
> they don't want scorn heaped on their son.
>

You're not offering any arguments at the moment, you're just being
abusive. They wouldn't alter their judgement of your current behaviour
if I were to show them the arguments you've offered on other
occasions. That's not relevant, of course you're entitled to offer
those arguments, but that has no bearing on the way you're behaving
now. Nor would they alter their judgement if it were someone other
than their son involved. They're reasonable people who think that
people are entitled to put forward arguments and propositions in good
faith without being abused. All reasonable adults would react that way
to the way you're carrying on at the moment: "What a nutcase."


> > My parents' diet is similar to yours. They are middle-class people who
> > used to vote Labor, these days tend to vote Green. They work for the
> > Conservatorium of Music. My mother is a pianist and my father is an
> > academic. They are ordinary middle-class people, somewhat left-leaning
> > politically, with no particularly strong stand on animal issues. They
> > have listened to me discussing my position and they do not find it
> > offensive, although presumably they are not convinced.
>
> Presumably, you think? If you weren't their son, and our arguments were
> compared side-by-side, they would pick you as the nut case.

Wrong. If it were just a question of the actual arguments we have
offered, they would think we have both made cases which are worthy of
some consideration, which is true. When it comes to your contention
that the simple fact that I have expressed my position means I have
forfeited my right to basic courtesy, that I am "not civilized", "not
worthy to call myself a human being", and "all decent people should
heap scorn on me", then of course they would think you were a nutcase
regardless of who was involved. Any reasonable, decent person would.

> I suspect
> that they are patronizing you, in more ways than one, because you're
> their son, and they know that you're harmless.

Yes, I thought we might get some speculations from you about what my
parents really think of me. How generous of you, now that Ball has
slunk away in humiliation, for you to don his clown suit in his
absence.

My parents think my position is a perfectly intellectually respectable
one and they think that I defend it in an articulate and interesting
manner. They have a lot of respect for the seriousness with which I
have engaged with the issue. So do all of my non-AR friends, which
certainly includes some very intelligent and well-educated people. So
does Malcolm France, the directory of Laboratory Animal Services at
the University of Sydney.

> But if they were
> compelled to really engage with the implications of your words I think
> they would be offended.

Groundless speculation. I have discussed this with them on my
occasions and they're not offended. No reasonable person would be
offended simply by someone putting forward this position for
consideration.

> You are saying essentially that you find no
> difference between their diet and that of cannibals.
>
> > The impression
>
> > that they have formed of you is that you are a nutcase. They think
> > that you are the one that needs help. So there it is. I wonder what
> > everyone else thinks.
>
> Yes, there it is, supportive loving parents.

Yes, certainly, no doubt about that. I am very fortunate to have
parents like them and I am very grateful for everything they have done
for me. However, that's beside the point.

There's no particular reason why they should say "We think that guy is
a nutcase" just because they're supportive loving parents. There's no
reason why they should express any view about any of the issues
discussed here at all just because they're supportive loving parents.
Being supportive loving parents would just involve them saying "Well,
you're entitled to your view and he's entitled to his, and you can
engage with him if you like, but you don't have to engage with him if
you don't want to." They're saying they think you're a nutcase because
they do, based on the facts which I have presented to them about you.
Most reasonable adults would draw that conclusion.

> Perhaps they should have
> tanned your bottom a little more often when you were a young lad, you
> seem like a spoiled brat.

Would you care to elaborate on what has led you to that conclusion?

On Aug 4, 2:27 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Yes, there it is, supportive loving parents. Perhaps they should have
> tanned your bottom a little more often when you were a young lad, you
> seem like a spoiled brat.

You know, Dutch, I really marvel that you feel that you are in a
position to talk to me like that when you are on the public record as
having lied about whether you have kids or not. My parents brought me
up better than that, I can assure you.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 4, 2:02 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 4, 5:58 am, Dutch > wrote:
>> [..]
>>
>>>>>> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
>>>>> You don't know what you're talking about.
>>>> Yes I do. There is no legitimate thinker who takes people like you
>>>> seriously. They sometimes listen politely, but they shouldn't.
>>> That's just ignorant, I'm afraid. All academic philosophers
>>> acknowledge that Singer's and Regan's contributions to the debate
>>> deserve to be taken seriously, and plenty of respected thinkers take
>>> similar positions. You wouldn't know anything about it one way or the
>>> other.
>> What debate? There is no serious debate going on which suggests that
>> humans cannot use animals as food or as subjects for critical medical
>> research, none whatsoever, except among a few woolly-headed navel-gazers
>> like you.
>>
>
> Here you're just flying in the face of the plain facts.

The number of serious academics, scientists and philosophers who
subscribe to the notion of Animal Rights is tiny, probably smaller than
the proportion of animal rights adherents in the general population,
which is a fraction of a percent. It's simply not a serious idea. That's
not to say it's irrelevant, to the extent that ARAs occupy positions of
power or activists resort to various forms of violence it becomes a
serious concern.


>>>>>>>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
>>>>>>>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
>>>>>>>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
>>>>>>>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
>>>>>>>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
>>>>>>> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
>>>>>> I know very well what I'm talking about.
>>>>> No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
>>>>> everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.
>>>> I'm not assuming anything. There is no legitimate endeavor with an "AR"
>>>> component. Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
>>>> hangout for a few deluded fools.
>>> Where do you draw the line?
>> I draw the line between AR and AW. AR is an attempt to redefine the very
>> way of life of the human race based on the misguided notion that
>> non-humans morally fall into the same class of beings as humans. It's a
>> insidious idea that has you hooked right in. It uses terms like
>> "speciesism" and arguments like the AMC to achieve the illusion of
>> credibility. AW is a response to the recognition of the needs of animals.
>>
>>> I'd be happy to have my position
>>> categorized as a "new welfarist" position.
>> If you switch the label on a can of rotten fruit it's still got rotten
>> fruit inside.
>>
>>> Just what exactly is it
>>> about my position that makes it a position for "deluded fools"?
>> A person could write a book in answer to that question. The short answer
>> is that in order to support the idea you are forced to delude yourself,
>> to give over control of your reason to make the idea appear to be
>> coherent to yourself and if possible to others.
>
> Nonsense. There's no good reason why my position is any less credible
> than yours.

Yes there is, my goals are attainable, they relate to the real world,
"Animal Rights" proposes a philosophical model which bears no relation
to the real world. Regan waxes eloquently in those lilting tones of his
about the right of animals to be given respect by humans, not to be
harmed or exploited for our purposes. The way he actualizes that
principle in his own life is via the familiar "vegan" formula,
attempting to eliminate the usual suspects, "animal products" from his
lifestyle. But this is barely a token measure, animal products account
for maybe a half dozen species of the tens of thousands that we harm
constantly, and must harm if we are to compete and thrive as a species
in the world. So where is this respect for "subjects-of-a-life"? It's
purely fantasy being perpetrated by a charismatic charlatan.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 4, 2:12 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 4, 6:11 am, Dutch > wrote:
>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>> On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
>>>>>> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
>>>>>> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
>>>>>> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
>>>>>> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
>>>>>> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
>>>>>> And you call this a respectable position?
>>>>> Yup.
>>>> Yet you yourself implicitly support the unnecessary killing of animals
>>>> to sponsor your own comfortable lifestyle. Instead of responding
>>>> substantively to this accusation you dismiss it with vague verbiage
>>>> like, I'm not convinced that it is..blah blah"
>>>> You have not only forfeited any right to civil discussion, you have
>>>> abandoned your intellectual integrity along with your moral compass.
>>>>>> You're one sick ****.- Hide quoted text -
>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>> I've been through this quite a few times. If you financially support a
>>> process that harms sentient beings, then it is the same as it would be
>>> if the victims were humans with similar cognitive capacities in
>>> relevantly similar circumstances.
>> There *are* no marginal humans living in farmer's fields or grain silos,
>
> Irrelevant.

What? It's the basis of your argument.

>> so how does this relate to the animal victims of our lifestyles which do
>> live there?
>>
>>> I think that this requires
>>> boycotting most animal products,
>> Why specifically animal products? Cotton is one the most deadly crops in
>> the world, rice, grain, and fruit crops are not far behind.
>>
>
> In general, animal food products are much worse

But we don't live our lives "in general" when we live according to
principles, we live according to specific actions which comply with
those principles. Avoiding animal products and doing nothing more, the
vegan formula, is a lie, it does not respect "subjects-of-a-life".

> and they're also much
> easier to avoid.

Rice is easy to avoid. You're making the assumption that you have not
proven, that dividing food into animal products and non-animal products
is a valid expression of the principle expressed by Regan.

> There may be a case for boycotting some non-animal
> products as well, yes.

That's conveniently vague. If you are called upon to allow
"subject-of-a-life" animals to live their lives without your
interference then consuming commercially grown food and other
agricultural products like cotton and wool is certainly off limits. You
also better get ready to accommodate a lot of hungry rodents we
currently exterminate.


>>> not necessarily all. I don't believe
>>> that what I am doing is morally wrong.
>> Even though your lifestyle kills sentient beings? Is that because you'd
>> live the same way even if there were retarded people being poisoned?
>
> Yes, if the level of difficulty in boycotting the products in question
> were similar.

How difficult is to to boycott rice?

>
>> Sorry, the connection between your lifestyle and your restatement of the
>> argument from marginal cases is difficult to parse. It comes across as a
>> tap dance signifying nothing.

Just like Regan, a lot of bluster and rhetoric without substance.

On Aug 5, 1:13 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 4, 2:02 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 4, 5:58 am, Dutch > wrote:
> >> [..]
>
> >>>>>> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
> >>>>> You don't know what you're talking about.
> >>>> Yes I do. There is no legitimate thinker who takes people like you
> >>>> seriously. They sometimes listen politely, but they shouldn't.
> >>> That's just ignorant, I'm afraid. All academic philosophers
> >>> acknowledge that Singer's and Regan's contributions to the debate
> >>> deserve to be taken seriously, and plenty of respected thinkers take
> >>> similar positions. You wouldn't know anything about it one way or the
> >>> other.
> >> What debate? There is no serious debate going on which suggests that
> >> humans cannot use animals as food or as subjects for critical medical
> >> research, none whatsoever, except among a few woolly-headed navel-gazers
> >> like you.
>
> > Here you're just flying in the face of the plain facts.
>
> The number of serious academics, scientists and philosophers who
> subscribe to the notion of Animal Rights is tiny, probably smaller than
> the proportion of animal rights adherents in the general population,
> which is a fraction of a percent. It's simply not a serious idea. That's
> not to say it's irrelevant, to the extent that ARAs occupy positions of
> power or activists resort to various forms of violence it becomes a
> serious concern.
>

Incorrect. The number of academics who subscribe to animal liberation
or animal rights is much *larger* than the proportion of animal rights
adherents in the general population, and *everyone* acknowledges it as
a serious idea that needs to be engaged with. Animal rights and animal
liberation are acknolwedged in academia as serious ideas.


>
>
>
>
> >>>>>>>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
> >>>>>>>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
> >>>>>>>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
> >>>>>>>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
> >>>>>>>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
> >>>>>>> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
> >>>>>> I know very well what I'm talking about.
> >>>>> No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
> >>>>> everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.
> >>>> I'm not assuming anything. There is no legitimate endeavor with an "AR"
> >>>> component. Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
> >>>> hangout for a few deluded fools.
> >>> Where do you draw the line?
> >> I draw the line between AR and AW. AR is an attempt to redefine the very
> >> way of life of the human race based on the misguided notion that
> >> non-humans morally fall into the same class of beings as humans. It's a
> >> insidious idea that has you hooked right in. It uses terms like
> >> "speciesism" and arguments like the AMC to achieve the illusion of
> >> credibility. AW is a response to the recognition of the needs of animals.
>
> >>> I'd be happy to have my position
> >>> categorized as a "new welfarist" position.
> >> If you switch the label on a can of rotten fruit it's still got rotten
> >> fruit inside.
>
> >>> Just what exactly is it
> >>> about my position that makes it a position for "deluded fools"?
> >> A person could write a book in answer to that question. The short answer
> >> is that in order to support the idea you are forced to delude yourself,
> >> to give over control of your reason to make the idea appear to be
> >> coherent to yourself and if possible to others.
>
> > Nonsense. There's no good reason why my position is any less credible
> > than yours.
>
> Yes there is, my goals are attainable, they relate to the real world,

So are mine.

> "Animal Rights" proposes a philosophical model which bears no relation
> to the real world. Regan waxes eloquently in those lilting tones of his
> about the right of animals to be given respect by humans, not to be
> harmed or exploited for our purposes. The way he actualizes that
> principle in his own life is via the familiar "vegan" formula,
> attempting to eliminate the usual suspects, "animal products" from his
> lifestyle. But this is barely a token measure, animal products account
> for maybe a half dozen species of the tens of thousands that we harm
> constantly, and must harm if we are to compete and thrive as a species
> in the world. So where is this respect for "subjects-of-a-life"? It's
> purely fantasy being perpetrated by a charismatic charlatan.

Here you are talking about Regan's problems, not mine. I would imagine
Regan has answers to these criticisms.

On Aug 5, 1:23 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 4, 2:12 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 4, 6:11 am, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>> On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
> >>>>>> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
> >>>>>> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
> >>>>>> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
> >>>>>> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
> >>>>>> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
> >>>>>> And you call this a respectable position?
> >>>>> Yup.
> >>>> Yet you yourself implicitly support the unnecessary killing of animals
> >>>> to sponsor your own comfortable lifestyle. Instead of responding
> >>>> substantively to this accusation you dismiss it with vague verbiage
> >>>> like, I'm not convinced that it is..blah blah"
> >>>> You have not only forfeited any right to civil discussion, you have
> >>>> abandoned your intellectual integrity along with your moral compass.
> >>>>>> You're one sick ****.- Hide quoted text -
> >>>> - Show quoted text -
> >>> I've been through this quite a few times. If you financially support a
> >>> process that harms sentient beings, then it is the same as it would be
> >>> if the victims were humans with similar cognitive capacities in
> >>> relevantly similar circumstances.
> >> There *are* no marginal humans living in farmer's fields or grain silos,
>
> > Irrelevant.
>
> What? It's the basis of your argument.
>

The fact that the hypothetical scenario does not occur in reailty is
irrelevant to my argument.

> >> so how does this relate to the animal victims of our lifestyles which do
> >> live there?
>
> >>> I think that this requires
> >>> boycotting most animal products,
> >> Why specifically animal products? Cotton is one the most deadly crops in
> >> the world, rice, grain, and fruit crops are not far behind.
>
> > In general, animal food products are much worse
>
> But we don't live our lives "in general" when we live according to
> principles, we live according to specific actions which comply with
> those principles. Avoiding animal products and doing nothing more, the
> vegan formula, is a lie, it does not respect "subjects-of-a-life".
>

Make up your mind, are you attacking Regan's position or mine? If
you're attacking Regan's position, I'll leave him to defend himself,
it's not relevant to my position.

> > and they're also much
> > easier to avoid.
>
> Rice is easy to avoid. You're making the assumption that you have not
> proven, that dividing food into animal products and non-animal products
> is a valid expression of the principle expressed by Regan.
>

I never said any such thing. I'm not talking about Regan's theory.

Yes, rice is easy to avoid. But I don't see any clear-cut evidence
that it causes anywhere near as much harm as most animal products.

> > There may be a case for boycotting some non-animal
>
> > products as well, yes.
>
> That's conveniently vague. If you are called upon to allow
> "subject-of-a-life" animals to live their lives without your
> interference then consuming commercially grown food and other
> agricultural products like cotton and wool is certainly off limits. You
> also better get ready to accommodate a lot of hungry rodents we
> currently exterminate.
>

You're conveniently pretending that I'm aligning myself with Regan,
when I'm not. Regan may or may not have answers to these challenges of
yours. They do not bear on my position.

> >>> not necessarily all. I don't believe
> >>> that what I am doing is morally wrong.
> >> Even though your lifestyle kills sentient beings? Is that because you'd
> >> live the same way even if there were retarded people being poisoned?
>
> > Yes, if the level of difficulty in boycotting the products in question
> > were similar.
>
> How difficult is to to boycott rice?
>

I don't eat that much rice, if I stopped eating rice the reduction in
impact would be trivial. There isn't any reasonable measure I could
take to significantly reduce my impact on animals short of becoming
self-sufficient in food.

>
>
> >> Sorry, the connection between your lifestyle and your restatement of the
> >> argument from marginal cases is difficult to parse. It comes across as a
> >> tap dance signifying nothing.
>
> Just like Regan, a lot of bluster and rhetoric without substance.

It's easy enough to sling mud. You haven't made any cogent criticisms
of my position.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 4, 2:27 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 4, 5:46 am, Dutch > wrote:
>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>> On Aug 3, 8:24 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>>>> On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
>>>>>>>>>> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
>>>>>>>>>> due equal consideration?
>>>>>>>>> I directed you to a document
>>>>>>>> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
>>>>>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>>>>>> Engage with the arguments in my talk.
>>>>>> Post your "talk" here, nitwit.
>>>>> What on earth for? It's too long, anyway.
>>>>> Didn't your mother ever teach you to speak politely to people?
>>>> Like calling them murderers and cannibals? Did your mom teach you that?- Hide quoted text -
>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>> "Murderers and cannibals" is your spin on it. I have not used those
>>> words.
>> How does avoiding using the words make your insinuations any less insulting?
>>
>
> I have offered an argument which is critical of what you do.

I didn't see an argument, I saw a bunch of confused rhetoric ending up
in a baseless accusation of immorality.

> I've
> considered the argument carefully and I think it deserves some
> consideration.

I've considered your words and find them to be confused rhetoric.

> If you find my support for the argument insulting,
> that's really not my problem.

I find the support non-existent and the accusation presumptuous.

> No reasonable person finds it insulting.

You're not in a position to say what reasonable people are thinking.

> You're welcome to try to engage with it rationally if you want to.

I have engaged you rationally at every juncture, with little to show for it.

>>> I've talked this over with my parents. They think I have every right
>>> to express the position I do and have it seriously engaged with, and
>>> be treated with basic courtesy. They think that you are mistaken that
>>> I am not making a good faith effort at rational debate, and when you
>>> say "decent people should pour scorn on you" they think you are a
>>> nutcase.
>> You've shown them some harsh words, not my arguments. You're their son,
>> they don't want scorn heaped on their son.
>>
>
> You're not offering any arguments at the moment, you're just being
> abusive. They wouldn't alter their judgement of your current behaviour
> if I were to show them the arguments you've offered on other
> occasions. That's not relevant, of course you're entitled to offer
> those arguments, but that has no bearing on the way you're behaving
> now. Nor would they alter their judgement if it were someone other
> than their son involved. They're reasonable people who think that
> people are entitled to put forward arguments and propositions in good
> faith without being abused. All reasonable adults would react that way
> to the way you're carrying on at the moment: "What a nutcase."

As you do regularly, you have sidetracked the discussion into a tedious
complaint about the form of your opponents. You think I am a monster,
then when I refer to you as a nutcase you go crying to your parents.

>
>
>>> My parents' diet is similar to yours. They are middle-class people who
>>> used to vote Labor, these days tend to vote Green. They work for the
>>> Conservatorium of Music. My mother is a pianist and my father is an
>>> academic. They are ordinary middle-class people, somewhat left-leaning
>>> politically, with no particularly strong stand on animal issues. They
>>> have listened to me discussing my position and they do not find it
>>> offensive, although presumably they are not convinced.
>> Presumably, you think? If you weren't their son, and our arguments were
>> compared side-by-side, they would pick you as the nut case.
>
> Wrong. If it were just a question of the actual arguments we have
> offered, they would think we have both made cases which are worthy of
> some consideration, which is true. When it comes to your contention
> that the simple fact that I have expressed my position means I have
> forfeited my right to basic courtesy, that I am "not civilized", "not
> worthy to call myself a human being", and "all decent people should
> heap scorn on me", then of course they would think you were a nutcase
> regardless of who was involved. Any reasonable, decent person would.

You're not in a position to say what a reasonable decent person would
do. Reasonable decent people don't think of good people as murderous
cannibals. And you can wrap in a fancy paper and put a ribbon on it, but
that's what it amounts to.

>> I suspect
>> that they are patronizing you, in more ways than one, because you're
>> their son, and they know that you're harmless.
>
> Yes, I thought we might get some speculations from you about what my
> parents really think of me.

I didn't suggest that they think badly of you, they spoil you.

How generous of you, now that Ball has
> slunk away in humiliation, for you to don his clown suit in his
> absence.

I guarantee you his absence has nothing to do with humiliation.

>
> My parents think my position is a perfectly intellectually respectable
> one and they think that I defend it in an articulate and interesting
> manner. They have a lot of respect for the seriousness with which I
> have engaged with the issue.

But they think that you're wrong. Do you think that they have seriously
considered the implications of what you're saying as I have? I know that
they haven't.

> So do all of my non-AR friends, which
> certainly includes some very intelligent and well-educated people. So
> does Malcolm France, the directory of Laboratory Animal Services at
> the University of Sydney.

How do you know anything except how the come across to you and how you
interpret it? My experience with you is that you are incapable of seeing
yourself as wrong about any of this. They sense that there's no point
arguing with you.

>> But if they were
>> compelled to really engage with the implications of your words I think
>> they would be offended.
>
> Groundless speculation. I have discussed this with them on my
> occasions and they're not offended. No reasonable person would be
> offended simply by someone putting forward this position for
> consideration.

Quite true, but not because it's an acceptable position, because they
are not taking you seriously. Anyone who REALLY thinks about the
implications of what people like you or Regan say, or just read some of
the disgusting rhetoric, they WOULD be offended. The fact is people
don't allow themselves to engage seriously with what you're saying as we
are doing. They listen, nod politely, say "How interesting Rupert", then
carry on as if you don't exist. It's a self-defense mechanism.


>
>> You are saying essentially that you find no
>> difference between their diet and that of cannibals.
>>
>> > The impression
>>
>>> that they have formed of you is that you are a nutcase. They think
>>> that you are the one that needs help. So there it is. I wonder what
>>> everyone else thinks.
>> Yes, there it is, supportive loving parents.
>
> Yes, certainly, no doubt about that. I am very fortunate to have
> parents like them and I am very grateful for everything they have done
> for me. However, that's beside the point.

I don't think it's beside the point at all.

> There's no particular reason why they should say "We think that guy is
> a nutcase" just because they're supportive loving parents. There's no
> reason why they should express any view about any of the issues
> discussed here at all just because they're supportive loving parents.
> Being supportive loving parents would just involve them saying "Well,
> you're entitled to your view and he's entitled to his, and you can
> engage with him if you like, but you don't have to engage with him if
> you don't want to." They're saying they think you're a nutcase because
> they do, based on the facts which I have presented to them about you.
> Most reasonable adults would draw that conclusion.

There you go, Mr. less than 1% minority thinks were a bunch of cannibals
telling me what reasonable people think.

>
>> Perhaps they should have
>> tanned your bottom a little more often when you were a young lad, you
>> seem like a spoiled brat.
>
> Would you care to elaborate on what has led you to that conclusion?

Your absolute inability to admit the slightest imperfection or error.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 4, 2:27 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Yes, there it is, supportive loving parents. Perhaps they should have
>> tanned your bottom a little more often when you were a young lad, you
>> seem like a spoiled brat.
>
> You know, Dutch, I really marvel that you feel that you are in a
> position to talk to me like that when you are on the public record as
> having lied about whether you have kids or not. My parents brought me
> up better than that, I can assure you.

I'm not going to get into the details of that, it's not what it seems,
and immaterial. I didn't call you dishonest anyway, I said that you act
spoiled. You do. I've never seen a person in my life that has to be so
damned RIGHT about every little detail.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 5, 1:13 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 4, 2:02 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>> On Aug 4, 5:58 am, Dutch > wrote:
>>>> [..]
>>>>>>>> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
>>>>>>> You don't know what you're talking about.
>>>>>> Yes I do. There is no legitimate thinker who takes people like you
>>>>>> seriously. They sometimes listen politely, but they shouldn't.
>>>>> That's just ignorant, I'm afraid. All academic philosophers
>>>>> acknowledge that Singer's and Regan's contributions to the debate
>>>>> deserve to be taken seriously, and plenty of respected thinkers take
>>>>> similar positions. You wouldn't know anything about it one way or the
>>>>> other.
>>>> What debate? There is no serious debate going on which suggests that
>>>> humans cannot use animals as food or as subjects for critical medical
>>>> research, none whatsoever, except among a few woolly-headed navel-gazers
>>>> like you.
>>> Here you're just flying in the face of the plain facts.
>> The number of serious academics, scientists and philosophers who
>> subscribe to the notion of Animal Rights is tiny, probably smaller than
>> the proportion of animal rights adherents in the general population,
>> which is a fraction of a percent. It's simply not a serious idea. That's
>> not to say it's irrelevant, to the extent that ARAs occupy positions of
>> power or activists resort to various forms of violence it becomes a
>> serious concern.
>>
>
> Incorrect. The number of academics who subscribe to animal liberation
> or animal rights is much *larger* than the proportion of animal rights
> adherents in the general population, and *everyone* acknowledges it as
> a serious idea that needs to be engaged with. Animal rights and animal
> liberation are acknolwedged in academia as serious ideas.

Delusion.

>>>>>>>>>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
>>>>>>>>>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
>>>>>>>>>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
>>>>>>>>>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
>>>>>>>>>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
>>>>>>>>> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
>>>>>>>> I know very well what I'm talking about.
>>>>>>> No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
>>>>>>> everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.
>>>>>> I'm not assuming anything. There is no legitimate endeavor with an "AR"
>>>>>> component. Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
>>>>>> hangout for a few deluded fools.
>>>>> Where do you draw the line?
>>>> I draw the line between AR and AW. AR is an attempt to redefine the very
>>>> way of life of the human race based on the misguided notion that
>>>> non-humans morally fall into the same class of beings as humans. It's a
>>>> insidious idea that has you hooked right in. It uses terms like
>>>> "speciesism" and arguments like the AMC to achieve the illusion of
>>>> credibility. AW is a response to the recognition of the needs of animals.
>>>>> I'd be happy to have my position
>>>>> categorized as a "new welfarist" position.
>>>> If you switch the label on a can of rotten fruit it's still got rotten
>>>> fruit inside.
>>>>> Just what exactly is it
>>>>> about my position that makes it a position for "deluded fools"?
>>>> A person could write a book in answer to that question. The short answer
>>>> is that in order to support the idea you are forced to delude yourself,
>>>> to give over control of your reason to make the idea appear to be
>>>> coherent to yourself and if possible to others.
>>> Nonsense. There's no good reason why my position is any less credible
>>> than yours.
>> Yes there is, my goals are attainable, they relate to the real world,
>
> So are mine.

No they're not. The specific goals that are attainable, the ones you
follow, are just token measures, they don't validate a belief in "equal
consideration" or "Animal Rights".


>> "Animal Rights" proposes a philosophical model which bears no relation
>> to the real world. Regan waxes eloquently in those lilting tones of his
>> about the right of animals to be given respect by humans, not to be
>> harmed or exploited for our purposes. The way he actualizes that
>> principle in his own life is via the familiar "vegan" formula,
>> attempting to eliminate the usual suspects, "animal products" from his
>> lifestyle. But this is barely a token measure, animal products account
>> for maybe a half dozen species of the tens of thousands that we harm
>> constantly, and must harm if we are to compete and thrive as a species
>> in the world. So where is this respect for "subjects-of-a-life"? It's
>> purely fantasy being perpetrated by a charismatic charlatan.
>
> Here you are talking about Regan's problems, not mine.

You're faced with those same questions, for which "veganism" has no answers.

I would imagine
> Regan has answers to these criticisms.

Oh I don't doubt it one bit. He'd begin by insulting my intelligence and
telling me to read his books.

Rupert wrote:
> On Aug 5, 1:23 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>> Rupert wrote:
>>> On Aug 4, 2:12 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>> On Aug 4, 6:11 am, Dutch > wrote:
>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>>>> On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
>>>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
>>>>>>>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
>>>>>>>> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
>>>>>>>> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
>>>>>>>> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
>>>>>>>> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
>>>>>>>> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
>>>>>>>> And you call this a respectable position?
>>>>>>> Yup.
>>>>>> Yet you yourself implicitly support the unnecessary killing of animals
>>>>>> to sponsor your own comfortable lifestyle. Instead of responding
>>>>>> substantively to this accusation you dismiss it with vague verbiage
>>>>>> like, I'm not convinced that it is..blah blah"
>>>>>> You have not only forfeited any right to civil discussion, you have
>>>>>> abandoned your intellectual integrity along with your moral compass.
>>>>>>>> You're one sick ****.- Hide quoted text -
>>>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>>>> I've been through this quite a few times. If you financially support a
>>>>> process that harms sentient beings, then it is the same as it would be
>>>>> if the victims were humans with similar cognitive capacities in
>>>>> relevantly similar circumstances.
>>>> There *are* no marginal humans living in farmer's fields or grain silos,
>>> Irrelevant.
>> What? It's the basis of your argument.
>>
>
> The fact that the hypothetical scenario does not occur in reailty is
> irrelevant to my argument.

Your scenario to have value must at least be plausible, otherwise the
argument isn't plausible.

>>>> so how does this relate to the animal victims of our lifestyles which do
>>>> live there?
>>>>> I think that this requires
>>>>> boycotting most animal products,
>>>> Why specifically animal products? Cotton is one the most deadly crops in
>>>> the world, rice, grain, and fruit crops are not far behind.
>>> In general, animal food products are much worse
>> But we don't live our lives "in general" when we live according to
>> principles, we live according to specific actions which comply with
>> those principles. Avoiding animal products and doing nothing more, the
>> vegan formula, is a lie, it does not respect "subjects-of-a-life".
>>
>
> Make up your mind, are you attacking Regan's position or mine? If
> you're attacking Regan's position, I'll leave him to defend himself,
> it's not relevant to my position.

It's just veganism, I thought you subscribed to that.

>
>>> and they're also much
>>> easier to avoid.
>> Rice is easy to avoid. You're making the assumption that you have not
>> proven, that dividing food into animal products and non-animal products
>> is a valid expression of the principle expressed by Regan.
>>
>
> I never said any such thing.

It's implied in your statement about boycotting animal products.

> I'm not talking about Regan's theory.

Good, because it's incoherent too.

> Yes, rice is easy to avoid. But I don't see any clear-cut evidence
> that it causes anywhere near as much harm as most animal products.

You have no clear-cut evidence either way, certainly not that most rice
causes more harm than selectively chosen meat.

>> > There may be a case for boycotting some non-animal
>>
>>> products as well, yes.
>> That's conveniently vague. If you are called upon to allow
>> "subject-of-a-life" animals to live their lives without your
>> interference then consuming commercially grown food and other
>> agricultural products like cotton and wool is certainly off limits. You
>> also better get ready to accommodate a lot of hungry rodents we
>> currently exterminate.
>>
>
> You're conveniently pretending that I'm aligning myself with Regan,
> when I'm not. Regan may or may not have answers to these challenges of
> yours. They do not bear on my position.

You're conveniently not taking a position that you can be pinned down on.

>>>>> not necessarily all. I don't believe
>>>>> that what I am doing is morally wrong.
>>>> Even though your lifestyle kills sentient beings? Is that because you'd
>>>> live the same way even if there were retarded people being poisoned?
>>> Yes, if the level of difficulty in boycotting the products in question
>>> were similar.
>> How difficult is to to boycott rice?
>>
>
> I don't eat that much rice, if I stopped eating rice the reduction in
> impact would be trivial. There isn't any reasonable measure I could
> take to significantly reduce my impact on animals short of becoming
> self-sufficient in food.

You don't know that, you have haven't considered anything other than
eliminating animal products.

>
>>
>>>> Sorry, the connection between your lifestyle and your restatement of the
>>>> argument from marginal cases is difficult to parse. It comes across as a
>>>> tap dance signifying nothing.
>> Just like Regan, a lot of bluster and rhetoric without substance.
>
> It's easy enough to sling mud.

That wasn't mud, it was a cogent criticism.

You haven't made any cogent criticisms
> of my position.
>

That's hilarious.

"Dutch" > wrote in message news:Tl4ti.28932$_d2.24814@pd7urf3no...
> pearl wrote:
> > "Dutch" > wrote in message news:Ny3ti.28567$_d2.10681@pd7urf3no...
> >> pearl wrote:
> >>> "Dutch" > wrote
> >>>
> >>>> Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
>>
> >>> Only for the animal exploitation industry, which "dutch" serves.
> >>>
> >> Palpable nonsense.
> >
> > What?
> >
> >
> The whole thing, from your false introduction to the flimsy conspiracy
> theories in the article, to the very notion that you or I or anyone else
> actually believes in "Animal Rights" except in some version of the
> colloquial.

The "whole thing" is true. You saying it is not is just worthless denial.
Most people believe that animals have the right to not be abused. Even
you. At least that's what you and those who profit from the exploitation
of animals *say*. But you have let fall the mask of "legitimate concern",
dutch, and we all now see 'animal welfare' for the lie that it is, "legitimate
concern" in the sense of a 'legitimate' financially-rewarding 'concern'.

On Aug 5, 3:41 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 5, 1:13 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 4, 2:02 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>> On Aug 4, 5:58 am, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>> [..]
> >>>>>>>> Respected thinkers don't take animal rights seriously.
> >>>>>>> You don't know what you're talking about.
> >>>>>> Yes I do. There is no legitimate thinker who takes people like you
> >>>>>> seriously. They sometimes listen politely, but they shouldn't.
> >>>>> That's just ignorant, I'm afraid. All academic philosophers
> >>>>> acknowledge that Singer's and Regan's contributions to the debate
> >>>>> deserve to be taken seriously, and plenty of respected thinkers take
> >>>>> similar positions. You wouldn't know anything about it one way or the
> >>>>> other.
> >>>> What debate? There is no serious debate going on which suggests that
> >>>> humans cannot use animals as food or as subjects for critical medical
> >>>> research, none whatsoever, except among a few woolly-headed navel-gazers
> >>>> like you.
> >>> Here you're just flying in the face of the plain facts.
> >> The number of serious academics, scientists and philosophers who
> >> subscribe to the notion of Animal Rights is tiny, probably smaller than
> >> the proportion of animal rights adherents in the general population,
> >> which is a fraction of a percent. It's simply not a serious idea. That's
> >> not to say it's irrelevant, to the extent that ARAs occupy positions of
> >> power or activists resort to various forms of violence it becomes a
> >> serious concern.
>
> > Incorrect. The number of academics who subscribe to animal liberation
> > or animal rights is much *larger* than the proportion of animal rights
> > adherents in the general population, and *everyone* acknowledges it as
> > a serious idea that needs to be engaged with. Animal rights and animal
> > liberation are acknolwedged in academia as serious ideas.
>
> Delusion.
>

To think otherwise is just ignorance.

>
>
>
>
> >>>>>>>>>>> The idea that because I express it I'm
> >>>>>>>>>>> "not worthy to call myself a human being" is a joke. You want to make
> >>>>>>>>>>> statements like that in public, fine, but you're only making yourself
> >>>>>>>>>>> a laughing-stock amongst people with a modicum of rationality.
> >>>>>>>>>> Nobody with a modicum of rationality subscribes to "AR".
> >>>>>>>>> You don't know what you're talking about. You're a joke.
> >>>>>>>> I know very well what I'm talking about.
> >>>>>>> No, I'm afraid not. You really don't have a clue. You're assuming that
> >>>>>>> everyone is a bigoted fool like you. That's not the case.
> >>>>>> I'm not assuming anything. There is no legitimate endeavor with an "AR"
> >>>>>> component. Animal welfare is a legitimate concern, "AR" is a dead-end
> >>>>>> hangout for a few deluded fools.
> >>>>> Where do you draw the line?
> >>>> I draw the line between AR and AW. AR is an attempt to redefine the very
> >>>> way of life of the human race based on the misguided notion that
> >>>> non-humans morally fall into the same class of beings as humans. It's a
> >>>> insidious idea that has you hooked right in. It uses terms like
> >>>> "speciesism" and arguments like the AMC to achieve the illusion of
> >>>> credibility. AW is a response to the recognition of the needs of animals.
> >>>>> I'd be happy to have my position
> >>>>> categorized as a "new welfarist" position.
> >>>> If you switch the label on a can of rotten fruit it's still got rotten
> >>>> fruit inside.
> >>>>> Just what exactly is it
> >>>>> about my position that makes it a position for "deluded fools"?
> >>>> A person could write a book in answer to that question. The short answer
> >>>> is that in order to support the idea you are forced to delude yourself,
> >>>> to give over control of your reason to make the idea appear to be
> >>>> coherent to yourself and if possible to others.
> >>> Nonsense. There's no good reason why my position is any less credible
> >>> than yours.
> >> Yes there is, my goals are attainable, they relate to the real world,
>
> > So are mine.
>
> No they're not. The specific goals that are attainable, the ones you
> follow, are just token measures, they don't validate a belief in "equal
> consideration" or "Animal Rights".
>

My behaviour and the goals that I advocate are consistent with equal
consideration.

> >> "Animal Rights" proposes a philosophical model which bears no relation
> >> to the real world. Regan waxes eloquently in those lilting tones of his
> >> about the right of animals to be given respect by humans, not to be
> >> harmed or exploited for our purposes. The way he actualizes that
> >> principle in his own life is via the familiar "vegan" formula,
> >> attempting to eliminate the usual suspects, "animal products" from his
> >> lifestyle. But this is barely a token measure, animal products account
> >> for maybe a half dozen species of the tens of thousands that we harm
> >> constantly, and must harm if we are to compete and thrive as a species
> >> in the world. So where is this respect for "subjects-of-a-life"? It's
> >> purely fantasy being perpetrated by a charismatic charlatan.
>
> > Here you are talking about Regan's problems, not mine.
>
> You're faced with those same questions, for which "veganism" has no answers.
>
> I would imagine
>
> > Regan has answers to these criticisms.
>
> Oh I don't doubt it one bit. He'd begin by insulting my intelligence and
> telling me to read his books.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

On Aug 5, 3:49 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 5, 1:23 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 4, 2:12 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>> On Aug 4, 6:11 am, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>> On Aug 3, 8:30 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>>>> I'm not calling anyone a murderer.
> >>>>>>>> You're claiming that cows have the same moral status as humans of
> >>>>>>>> similar intelligence. Therefore according to you if I support and
> >>>>>>>> condone the killing of cows to eat it is actually morally the same as if
> >>>>>>>> I killed a retarded human to eat him.
> >>>>>>>> So you're not only calling me a murderer, you're calling me a cannibal.
> >>>>>>>> And you call this a respectable position?
> >>>>>>> Yup.
> >>>>>> Yet you yourself implicitly support the unnecessary killing of animals
> >>>>>> to sponsor your own comfortable lifestyle. Instead of responding
> >>>>>> substantively to this accusation you dismiss it with vague verbiage
> >>>>>> like, I'm not convinced that it is..blah blah"
> >>>>>> You have not only forfeited any right to civil discussion, you have
> >>>>>> abandoned your intellectual integrity along with your moral compass.
> >>>>>>>> You're one sick ****.- Hide quoted text -
> >>>>>> - Show quoted text -
> >>>>> I've been through this quite a few times. If you financially support a
> >>>>> process that harms sentient beings, then it is the same as it would be
> >>>>> if the victims were humans with similar cognitive capacities in
> >>>>> relevantly similar circumstances.
> >>>> There *are* no marginal humans living in farmer's fields or grain silos,
> >>> Irrelevant.
> >> What? It's the basis of your argument.
>
> > The fact that the hypothetical scenario does not occur in reailty is
> > irrelevant to my argument.
>
> Your scenario to have value must at least be plausible, otherwise the
> argument isn't plausible.
>

No, highly counterfactual thought-experiments can still be useful.

>
>
>
>
> >>>> so how does this relate to the animal victims of our lifestyles which do
> >>>> live there?
> >>>>> I think that this requires
> >>>>> boycotting most animal products,
> >>>> Why specifically animal products? Cotton is one the most deadly crops in
> >>>> the world, rice, grain, and fruit crops are not far behind.
> >>> In general, animal food products are much worse
> >> But we don't live our lives "in general" when we live according to
> >> principles, we live according to specific actions which comply with
> >> those principles. Avoiding animal products and doing nothing more, the
> >> vegan formula, is a lie, it does not respect "subjects-of-a-life".
>
> > Make up your mind, are you attacking Regan's position or mine? If
> > you're attacking Regan's position, I'll leave him to defend himself,
> > it's not relevant to my position.
>
> It's just veganism, I thought you subscribed to that.
>

I've told you what I think often enough. If you still don't get it,
too bad.

>
>
> >>> and they're also much
> >>> easier to avoid.
> >> Rice is easy to avoid. You're making the assumption that you have not
> >> proven, that dividing food into animal products and non-animal products
> >> is a valid expression of the principle expressed by Regan.
>
> > I never said any such thing.
>
> It's implied in your statement about boycotting animal products.
>

No.

> > I'm not talking about Regan's theory.
>
> Good, because it's incoherent too.
>
> > Yes, rice is easy to avoid. But I don't see any clear-cut evidence
> > that it causes anywhere near as much harm as most animal products.
>
> You have no clear-cut evidence either way, certainly not that most rice
> causes more harm than selectively chosen meat.
>

I am making every reasonable effort to reduce my contribution to
animal suffering.

> >> > There may be a case for boycotting some non-animal
>
> >>> products as well, yes.
> >> That's conveniently vague. If you are called upon to allow
> >> "subject-of-a-life" animals to live their lives without your
> >> interference then consuming commercially grown food and other
> >> agricultural products like cotton and wool is certainly off limits. You
> >> also better get ready to accommodate a lot of hungry rodents we
> >> currently exterminate.
>
> > You're conveniently pretending that I'm aligning myself with Regan,
> > when I'm not. Regan may or may not have answers to these challenges of
> > yours. They do not bear on my position.
>
> You're conveniently not taking a position that you can be pinned down on.
>

No. I've told you what I think often enough.

> >>>>> not necessarily all. I don't believe
> >>>>> that what I am doing is morally wrong.
> >>>> Even though your lifestyle kills sentient beings? Is that because you'd
> >>>> live the same way even if there were retarded people being poisoned?
> >>> Yes, if the level of difficulty in boycotting the products in question
> >>> were similar.
> >> How difficult is to to boycott rice?
>
> > I don't eat that much rice, if I stopped eating rice the reduction in
> > impact would be trivial. There isn't any reasonable measure I could
> > take to significantly reduce my impact on animals short of becoming
> > self-sufficient in food.
>
> You don't know that,

I've made some effort to find out, and I've got a pretty good idea.

> you have haven't considered anything other than
> eliminating animal products.
>

Yes I have, and I'm still looking into it. I see no evidence that
there are any ways to make significant improvements short of becoming
self-sufficient in food.

>
>
> >>>> Sorry, the connection between your lifestyle and your restatement of the
> >>>> argument from marginal cases is difficult to parse. It comes across as a
> >>>> tap dance signifying nothing.
> >> Just like Regan, a lot of bluster and rhetoric without substance.
>
> > It's easy enough to sling mud.
>
> That wasn't mud, it was a cogent criticism.
>

No, it was just empty abuse.

> You haven't made any cogent criticisms
>
> > of my position.
>
> That's hilarious.

Well, if you've made them where are they?

On Aug 5, 1:50 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> Rupert wrote:
> > On Aug 4, 2:27 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >> Rupert wrote:
> >>> On Aug 4, 5:46 am, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>> On Aug 3, 8:24 pm, Dutch > wrote:
> >>>>>> Rupert wrote:
> >>>>>>> On Aug 1, 1:05 am, Rudy Canoza > wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>> Okay, this is your response to my talk?
> >>>>>>>>>> What talk? The unsupported blabber about animals being
> >>>>>>>>>> due equal consideration?
> >>>>>>>>> I directed you to a document
> >>>>>>>> Post the proof of your assertion here, fruit.- Hide quoted text -
> >>>>>>>> - Show quoted text -
> >>>>>>> Engage with the arguments in my talk.
> >>>>>> Post your "talk" here, nitwit.
> >>>>> What on earth for? It's too long, anyway.
> >>>>> Didn't your mother ever teach you to speak politely to people?
> >>>> Like calling them murderers and cannibals? Did your mom teach you that?- Hide quoted text -
> >>>> - Show quoted text -
> >>> "Murderers and cannibals" is your spin on it. I have not used those
> >>> words.
> >> How does avoiding using the words make your insinuations any less insulting?
>
> > I have offered an argument which is critical of what you do.
>
> I didn't see an argument, I saw a bunch of confused rhetoric ending up
> in a baseless accusation of immorality.
>

Well, that's that then.

> > I've
> > considered the argument carefully and I think it deserves some
> > consideration.
>
> I've considered your words and find them to be confused rhetoric.
>

Fine. I guess the only thing you've got to consider now is whether you
want to bother convincing me of the vaildity of that assessment of
yours.

> > If you find my support for the argument insulting,
> > that's really not my problem.
>
> I find the support non-existent and the accusation presumptuous.
>

Jolly good.

> > No reasonable person finds it insulting.
>
> You're not in a position to say what reasonable people are thinking.
>

Yes, I am. I'm in a much better position than you to know what
reasonable people think.

> > You're welcome to try to engage with it rationally if you want to.
>
> I have engaged you rationally at every juncture, with little to show for it.
>

Not very often. Most of the time you've just been abusive. You've made
some effort at rational argument, but your attempts have been weak.

>
>
>
>
> >>> I've talked this over with my parents. They think I have every right
> >>> to express the position I do and have it seriously engaged with, and
> >>> be treated with basic courtesy. They think that you are mistaken that
> >>> I am not making a good faith effort at rational debate, and when you
> >>> say "decent people should pour scorn on you" they think you are a
> >>> nutcase.
> >> You've shown them some harsh words, not my arguments. You're their son,
> >> they don't want scorn heaped on their son.
>
> > You're not offering any arguments at the moment, you're just being
> > abusive. They wouldn't alter their judgement of your current behaviour
> > if I were to show them the arguments you've offered on other
> > occasions. That's not relevant, of course you're entitled to offer
> > those arguments, but that has no bearing on the way you're behaving
> > now. Nor would they alter their judgement if it were someone other
> > than their son involved. They're reasonable people who think that
> > people are entitled to put forward arguments and propositions in good
> > faith without being abused. All reasonable adults would react that way
> > to the way you're carrying on at the moment: "What a nutcase."
>
> As you do regularly, you have sidetracked the discussion into a tedious
> complaint about the form of your opponents.

Pfffft. *I'm* the one sidetracking the discussion? You've been
spending the last few posts telling me what a pitiful excuse for a
human being I am.

> You think I am a monster,

I've told you I don't think that.

> then when I refer to you as a nutcase you go crying to your parents.
>

You really are an offensive twit. I don't need my parents' support to
deal with you. The purpose of that exercise was to give you some
feedback on how rational people view this nonsense of yours.

>
>
>
>
>
>
> >>> My parents' diet is similar to yours. They are middle-class people who
> >>> used to vote Labor, these days tend to vote Green. They work for the
> >>> Conservatorium of Music. My mother is a pianist and my father is an
> >>> academic. They are ordinary middle-class people, somewhat left-leaning
> >>> politically, with no particularly strong stand on animal issues. They
> >>> have listened to me discussing my position and they do not find it
> >>> offensive, although presumably they are not convinced.
> >> Presumably, you think? If you weren't their son, and our arguments were
> >> compared side-by-side, they would pick you as the nut case.
>
> > Wrong. If it were just a question of the actual arguments we have
> > offered, they would think we have both made cases which are worthy of
> > some consideration, which is true. When it comes to your contention
> > that the simple fact that I have expressed my position means I have
> > forfeited my right to basic courtesy, that I am "not civilized", "not
> > worthy to call myself a human being", and "all decent people should
> > heap scorn on me", then of course they would think you were a nutcase
> > regardless of who was involved. Any reasonable, decent person would.
>
> You're not in a position to say what a reasonable decent person would
> do. Reasonable decent people don't think of good people as murderous
> cannibals. And you can wrap in a fancy paper and put a ribbon on it, but
> that's what it amounts to.
>

Yawn.

> >> I suspect
> >> that they are patronizing you, in more ways than one, because you're
> >> their son, and they know that you're harmless.
>
> > Yes, I thought we might get some speculations from you about what my
> > parents really think of me.
>
> I didn't suggest that they think badly of you, they spoil you.
>

What would you know about it, you ignorant twit?

> How generous of you, now that Ball has
>
> > slunk away in humiliation, for you to don his clown suit in his
> > absence.
>
> I guarantee you his absence has nothing to do with humiliation.
>

Interesting conjecture.

>
>
> > My parents think my position is a perfectly intellectually respectable
> > one and they think that I defend it in an articulate and interesting
> > manner. They have a lot of respect for the seriousness with which I
> > have engaged with the issue.
>
> But they think that you're wrong. Do you think that they have seriously
> considered the implications of what you're saying as I have? I know that
> they haven't.
>

I spelled it out for them, in order to explain why you find me
offensive.

> > So do all of my non-AR friends, which
> > certainly includes some very intelligent and well-educated people. So
> > does Malcolm France, the directory of Laboratory Animal Services at
> > the University of Sydney.
>
> How do you know anything except how the come across to you and how you
> interpret it? My experience with you is that you are incapable of seeing
> yourself as wrong about any of this. They sense that there's no point
> arguing with you.
>

I've got much less of a problem with giving a fair hearing to
criticisms of my position than you do.

> >> But if they were
> >> compelled to really engage with the implications of your words I think
> >> they would be offended.
>
> > Groundless speculation. I have discussed this with them on my
> > occasions and they're not offended. No reasonable person would be
> > offended simply by someone putting forward this position for
> > consideration.
>
> Quite true, but not because it's an acceptable position, because they
> are not taking you seriously.

That's just not true. You wouldn't know what you're talking about.
They listen to what I have to say, they think it's interesting and
they take it seriously.

> Anyone who REALLY thinks about the
> implications of what people like you or Regan say, or just read some of
> the disgusting rhetoric, they WOULD be offended. The fact is people
> don't allow themselves to engage seriously with what you're saying as we
> are doing. They listen, nod politely, say "How interesting Rupert", then
> carry on as if you don't exist. It's a self-defense mechanism.
>

Wrong. Lots of people engage seriously with what I'm saying. Malcolm
France came along to our animal ethics reading group because he was
interested. The research students I talk to give me lots of feedback,
they come up and talk to me afterwards. My parents gave me feedback
about my talk. You needn't kid yourselves that you're the only people
who bother to engage seriously with these ideas. The difference is
that you don't seem to be able to do it in a civil fashion.

>
>
> >> You are saying essentially that you find no
> >> difference between their diet and that of cannibals.
>
> >> > The impression
>
> >>> that they have formed of you is that you are a nutcase. They think
> >>> that you are the one that needs help. So there it is. I wonder what
> >>> everyone else thinks.
> >> Yes, there it is, supportive loving parents.
>
> > Yes, certainly, no doubt about that. I am very fortunate to have
> > parents like them and I am very grateful for everything they have done
> > for me. However, that's beside the point.
>
> I don't think it's beside the point at all.
>
> > There's no particular reason why they should say "We think that guy is
> > a nutcase" just because they're supportive loving parents. There's no
> > reason why they should express any view about any of the issues
> > discussed here at all just because they're supportive loving parents.
> > Being supportive loving parents would just involve them saying "Well,
> > you're entitled to your view and he's entitled to his, and you can
> > engage with him if you like, but you don't have to engage with him if
> > you don't want to." They're saying they think you're a nutcase because
> > they do, based on the facts which I have presented to them about you.
> > Most reasonable adults would draw that conclusion.
>
> There you go, Mr. less than 1% minority thinks were a bunch of cannibals
> telling me what reasonable people think.
>

I tell you I have a much better idea of what reasonable people would
think about this particular issue than you do. *Everyone* I talk with
about the people on this newsgroup says, "What a bunch of ratbags. Why
can't they just engage with the ideas, instead of engaging in personal
abuse? It must be because they feel threatened by you somehow." And
they're right.

>
>
> >> Perhaps they should have
> >> tanned your bottom a little more often when you were a young lad, you
> >> seem like a spoiled brat.
>
> > Would you care to elaborate on what has led you to that conclusion?
>
> Your absolute inability to admit the slightest imperfection or error.

Well, that's rubbish. I've certainly got plenty of imperfections, it's
just that I choose not to discuss them here, because they're none of
your business. I will admit error in my position when you convince me
that there are rational grounds for thinking it to be in error.