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Rollin Hand wrote: ↑Mon Jul 24, 2023 8:47 pm I just don't like veggies all that much.

tonebender wrote: ↑Tue Jul 25, 2023 10:18 am I love all kinds of veggies. I eat lots of broccoli, carrots, tomatoes (fruit), corn, and especially beans of all varieties. Many times all I have is veggies but most of time there is a small portion of protein. Even my snacks are either nuts or veggies. No sweets for me.

BatUtilityBelt wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2023 10:19 pm Today a vegetarian tried to make me feel guilty for eating animals and it had me thinking. Now I know the scientific justification I could lean on is that our teeth indicate we are natural omnivores. We have the means to process both meat and vegetation, so at worst, I am evolutionarily compliant. But my mind didn't stop there.

Many bugs inhabit the vegetation we eat. Some of those plants wouldn't even exist without the symbiotic relationship they have with those bugs. For an easily googled example, consider the female fig doesn't get pollinated unless a wasp climbs inside (and typically dies there). The fig dissolves the wasp, and we just don't see it. Other bugs just like to snack on veggies as freeloaders. Either way, we eat a lot of them without even realizing they're in there, and many are too small for us to see. They vary greatly in size and we only get grossed out when we see them. And yes, insects are animals.

Vegetables are also teeming with multicellular organisms even smaller than the tiniest insects, but they are animals as well. We just don't care because they don't bother us and we can't see them, so we don't think about them. There are far fewer of these on meats and dairy products than on or in fruits and vegetables.

So a meat and dairy consumer eats fewer animals than any vegetarian who consumes approximately the same amount of food. But I am not judgmental about them eating more animals than I do. That's not who I am.

Tonray's Ghost wrote: ↑Tue Jul 25, 2023 11:02 am

tonebender wrote: ↑Tue Jul 25, 2023 10:18 am I love all kinds of veggies. I eat lots of broccoli, carrots, tomatoes (fruit), corn, and especially beans of all varieties. Many times all I have is veggies but most of time there is a small portion of protein. Even my snacks are either nuts or veggies. No sweets for me.

Aren't you worried about the insects and multicellular organisms? ()

slowhand84 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 25, 2023 12:23 pm Honestly in my experience typically it's vegans that are more judgmental of meat eaters. I know a LOT of vegetarians and 90% of them will never say anything to someone eating meat to make them feel guilty or uncomfortable, but boy will the vegans often let them have it lol. I'm a big meat eater, my wife is 100% vegetarian, and we never have any issues respecting each other's eating habits.

The comparison you're making here is more than a little unreasonable though, because eating a microscopic organism that's present on a piece of romaine lettuce is far from the same thing as breeding pigs and cows specifically to slaughter them for burgers. You can't equate those two things, especially because one is an intentional decision and the other is something that no one can do anything about...you have to eat SOMETHING if you're going to survive, and obviously eating vegetables is undeniably more of a cruelty-free way to go than eating meat. There is also a huge intelligence difference between a cow/pig/etc. versus a microscopic organism/most insects, and that also plays a role in the way vegetarians think about this sort of stuff.

golem wrote: ↑Tue Jul 25, 2023 6:39 pm My sister and BIL are vegetarians. One thing they will never do is make you feel guilty for eat meat.

I'm pretty sure if you include the bugs animals eats, us omnivores eat even more animals still.

tonebender wrote: ↑Tue Jul 25, 2023 10:18 am I love all kinds of veggies. I eat lots of broccoli, carrots, tomatoes (fruit), corn, and especially beans of all varieties. Many times all I have is veggies but most of time there is a small portion of protein. Even my snacks are either nuts or veggies. No sweets for me.