Is it moral to eat meat? ***Constructive Discussion ONLY***

[SpottedCrow]

I love meat!
I do say a prayer for the animal that it came from...
I've seen the videos and heard the propaganda, but I made my own decision.
I couldn't raise my own animals for meat...I just couldn't do it...I imagine that if I lived on a farm then I would be hardened to that fact...and could just do it anyways.

I don't think it's morally wrong...some of how it is PROCESSED is...

MY DH went to visit his relatives in Greece and they took the sheep out back and killed it and had sheep brain soup for dinner. Even my MIL said that she couldn't watch the chicken be killed either especially since she had just patted it. LOL

 

[greyfields]

I have learned to eat offal since we started selling animal meat at the market. You can't look the animal in the eye and then later let part of him or her go to waste because it's "icky".

Higher quality meat, less often... it's got a ring to it, doesn't it?

 

[estpr13]

I eat meat because I have teeth that allows me to do so. I eat my own chickens which I cared for and processed. Sometimes it is harder than others. I watch my chickens fight over bugs, worms and occasionally snakes that they kill and eat. They also seem to be aware that they are food to almost every other creature out there. I think people are repelled by the realization that they too are made up of food-worthy flesh, and somehow think that by not eating flesh they can make this go away. I had to deal with this when I was about three years old while helping my grandmother process home grown rabbits and chickens. Just as true now as then, she explained "it is just the way things are."

 

[dangerouschicken]

YEP! Well said!

 

[dacjohns]

Some very good posts. Especially Crunchie's.

I eat meat.
I'm an omnivore.
I like meat.
I don't take the time to have a proper diet so I would really be malnourished if I tried to be any of the different flavors of vegetarianism.
I hunt and fish. I don't trophy hunt. I do it for meat.
In addition to the animals I take from the wild I have also harvested my own animals. That is one reason I try not to make pets of my protein producers.
If someone wants to be a vegan or whatever that is OK as long as they don't condemn or judge me for what I eat.

 

[ratlummountain]

Quote:
agree,
i also think we have sharp teeth for a reason ...

 

[Jolyn]

I don't think it's immoral to eat meat. What i do find immoral is the horrible treatment i've seen recently of animals. The chickens piled into cages...the cows that are tortured and killed soooooooo inhumanly. I really never thought about it much until i saw a show on how commercial chickens are treated.....then i decided to raise my own hens for the eggs.

I've been thinking about raising some meat birds and have thought about a cow and a pig too. Until i get up the courage to do that i will be trying my best to research where the meat is coming from that i purchase. Dh says Trader Joes has range fed....maybe i will be starting there.

 

[OHChick]

this is a very interesting discussion indeed! when we first got our land we got 3 calves (2 girls and 1 steer) and we raised them and then had the steer processed for meat. as an animal lover who never grew up on a farm, i was torn about eating that beef, this was something i had never faced before. however, also as an animal lover, i know that cow was patted, fed treats, got to live out in the sunshine, had nice pasture to lay in and got more love an affection than probably an entire barn full of 'factory beef' cattle would get in a year.

since i started raising chickens for eggs i have also been contemplating meat birds. i go back and forth on the idea. i know processing them myself, would be out of the question. i just couldn't do it. but i am not opposed to paying someone else to do it.

so i guess the answer to the questions are yes, i eat meat. but certainly living out in the country and raising some of my 'meat' myself has given me new perspective. and it certainly has affected my choices when i am at the grocery store, but also life in general. i now am more apt to pay a bit more for something grown/raised locally, morally, ethically, and honestly. i buy my meat from friends, and obviously have my own eggs and am considering buying a CSA share for veggies that i cannot raise myself. i am also trying to support other small farmers/craftsman by buying their soap, honey, crafts, etc. for me, being a member of BYC and being a first time farmer has really changed my perspective on a lot of things in my world. and for that i am truly grateful.

sorry, i guess i'm on a bit of a ramble....

 

[dacjohns]

OHChick.

Good for you. I'm trying unsuccessfully to much of the same.

 

[mommy9994]

as a Christian, I look to the Bible for my sense of morality. While meat was not eaten before the Flood, God told Noah after the Flood that he could eat the meat of clean animals.