I am now a vegetarian. Woo!

[fire_of_avalon]

I am concerned with the factory farming methods we use to harvest most of out meat, but I believe meat is food. Result? I eat less meat.

It seems like a lot of people forget that's an option.

This. And I avoid eating meat at restaurants when the people who work there can't tell me where the meat comes from. And I'm really picky about the meat I buy. If I can find out where it's from and that place pastures the animals and treats 'em well, I can spare a little extra cash.

The difference between eating a plant and an animal, to me, is that one is sentient, and one is not.

I have an excellent example to show what I mean.

In my left hand I have a gerbil. In my right hand I have a potted plant.

If I set fire to the gerbil, what will be your reaction?

What if I set fire to the plant? What if I set fire to a tree? Rip a sapling off the ground? Cover a plant in darkness?

Why is it morally neutral to mistreat plants? Cognitive Dissonance? I think so.

I actually would freak over both. It kills me when people treat plants like that.

I guess ill say this now..

Some things are to be expected.. inevitable, one might say.

When you are living with millions of people on small pieces of land, it is impossible to keep nature the same way it is.

Animals are stored in small spaces so there is more meat to eat and cheaper, woods get cut to make place for houses..

The fact just is, that we are too overpopulated in most countries to be succesful vegetarians. Already woods are being cut by the football field to make place for coffeebean farms..

The thing about ranch meat is, is that the animals are kept in places where there is space. But with the way we just keep building and the population grows, those things will become more expensive and will eventually disappear.

I dont like it.. but thats just the way economics work.

Completely false. The amount of land required to raise animals is far, fair higher than the amount of land required to grow crops for Humans. Crop farming is far more space-efficient than husbandry.

Well, this is true and false. The current livestock industry thrives on grain which must be grown which does mean more land is used to raise livestock than to raise crops. Agriculture itself is pretty horrible too, though. Another HUGE reason for this, though, is the fact that not only do people eat those products, but we also waste food like nobody's business. See all the crap restaurants throw away that ends up in a landfill - organic matter that doesn't do any good to anyone. Just rots.

Pasturing animals, though, and using only what you need, takes up less land than industrial agriculture. Of course, the same rules about waste DO apply to agricultural products too.

This is one of my pet issues, waste of food I mean. No reason for people to waste food if they think before they eat.

Lol animal rights.

How can animals have rights? They don't talk.

Mute people have rights too, and those who can't communicate at all

My international human rights law professor put it this way: All rights give rise to responsibilities. If animals have rights, does that mean they have legal responsibilities too?

Slightly off topic, but children don't have legal responsibilities (aside from not committing violent crimes, I suppose.) But children have rights.