Like in the Life of Pi (we're reading it in English, so recently everything's been somehow related to Life of Pi to me) Pi is a vegetarian but by the end of the book, he's eaten all sorts of animals, (even bits of a human). When the issue is survival, morality flies out the window.
Perhaps not all morality, but pretty much all of these stupid principles we keep, such as modesty and purely personal beliefs that aren't grounded in any beliefs outside of themselves.
Considering in the life of PI, that the animals were largely metaphorical, he probably spent a lot of time eating humans...
Jehovah's witnesses may not take the vaccine...
I'm not a vegan anymore, so I can't really comment on THIS, but I wouldn't eat meat to save my life as a vegetarian.
If I were actually in the situation, things might be different, but I don't imagine I'd use antivenom either if I knew it was causing harm to animals. I don't think my life is any more important than any one animal, let alone thousands.
See I'm happy you've stated your opinion nicely, and hopefully I can do the same too. But, way I see it, as soon as you take yourself away from the comforts of modern life, if you were marooned on an island or lost in the woods, you immediately get 'back to nature' and go into survival mode. That's when people realise that we're equal to animals, which means they're fair game. They're prey, we're predators, that's just the nature of these things. I'd be more than happy to go back to hunter/gatherer existence to be honest, and I feel the only reason why people think that we shouldn't eat animals when we get down to it, is because they've forgotten their own humanity. Would be cool to hear your opinion on my thoughts too.
I think in a survival situation things would be totally different, I don't know how I'd react if I had no choice but to kill to live. I want to believe I'd stick with my morals, cause they've kept me sane, but I really don't know.
I don't object to people eating meat though, I just hate the idea of factory farming. If everyone raised/killed their own animals, or hunted for it, I think that'd be fair. But factory farming is nothing akin to "natural" and I refuse to support it. Maybe if I actually enjoyed the taste of meat I'd hunt or something, but the taste is gross to me either way lol
Then you're the best kind of vegetarian there is :P I'll just point out, 'factory farming' is a lot less common than PETA and Animals Australia etc make it out to be, and in a lot of cases actually doesn't stress the animals out. For instance, dairies have copped a lot of flack because the cattle don't naturally get milked, or they're 'bred constantly for milk'. As someone who has worked on dairies, the cattle could not be more relaxed, they're carefully monitored when being selected for breeding and allowed plenty of time to recover etc. If you (or anyone else) is really concerned, literally ring farms, most of the time people are more than happy to let people look around and explain what's happening, the behaviour of animals, what to look for in healthy animals etc.
Yup, I actually live right by a dairy farm, the cows seem pretty happy and have lots of room to roam. Theres also a few for-meat cattle around, who are perfectly content, but they're just for feeding that family as far as I know. I think most local farmers really care about their animals and want the best for them
I'm not a vegan (I don't know why I feel the need to clarify that) but just because there are a couple of situations in wich you would have to let go of your beliefs/principles (for survival) doesn't mean that you have to let go of them completely. I mean not every vegan is going to het bitten by a snake. And another point is I think vegans are against needlessly killing/hurting/using animals. They would probably take the antidote as it is necessary to take it for them to live.
But see, if someone spends a long time saying that animals have souls and that they're equals etc, then eats one because it's necessary, they're admitting that human instinct, and a big part of humanity, revolves around the killing and consumption of animals. Which it does.
Is it really human instinct to eat meat though? I mean I personally don't enjoy looking at raw meat or the corpse of an animal, and I don't feel hungry looking at a deer for example. I'd much rather see it alive than dead :)
It absolutely is instinct to eat meat. If you're out there, surviving on bare minimum instead of surviving within a supermarket, that deer would start to look mighty tempting. You're not tempted because you've never had to live in difficult conditions, as soon as you haven't eaten for a week, even bugs will start to look tasty, your human instinct knows you need that protein to survive.
That's probably true, everything would look appealing because your body is in a crisis. You would do a lot of things in a crisis you wouldn't do otherwise.
But just because something is human nature does not mean it is the right thing to do... some people have the instinct or urge to murder/kill/rape. If they would choose to not do such things they would be denying their human urges, but I think that's a good thing, right? If our civilisation suddenly collapsed there would probably be a lot more of "illegal things" being done. Things that people otherwise wouldn't have done. That doesn't mean that they should be doing these things now. Also, slavery has played a huge part in our history. One could see it as a human instinct, something that just naturally develops, and maybe it would come back again if we would be out in the wild again after some time.
My point is that in some cases it can be a good thing to suppress one's instincts and maybe killing animals is one of them.
Well, murder, rape, slavery etc have no benefit to anyone. The use of animals for nourishment, tools, medicine, clothing, really does a lot more benefit than most people realise. Look up a list of what animal products are used for, and you'll see just how important they are to us. If we all started to eat just crops, the land wouldn't be able to sustain us. As well as that, it would mean major destruction of habitat for native animals, increased co2 emissions from the mass production, exponentially increased chemical run-off (organic farming uses worse concoctions to kill off bugs, so don't tell me that's an option), and starvation for those who suddenly wouldn't be able to eat meat, which in third world countries is the only thing keeping people going (if they're able to have it at all).
Jehovah's witnesses may not take the vaccine...
Poison has to be ingested where as venom doesn't
Poison can be anything that's bad for you, ingested, inhaled, contacted, injected, or otherwise.
If I were actually in the situation, things might be different, but I don't imagine I'd use antivenom either if I knew it was causing harm to animals. I don't think my life is any more important than any one animal, let alone thousands.
I don't object to people eating meat though, I just hate the idea of factory farming. If everyone raised/killed their own animals, or hunted for it, I think that'd be fair. But factory farming is nothing akin to "natural" and I refuse to support it. Maybe if I actually enjoyed the taste of meat I'd hunt or something, but the taste is gross to me either way lol
But just because something is human nature does not mean it is the right thing to do... some people have the instinct or urge to murder/kill/rape. If they would choose to not do such things they would be denying their human urges, but I think that's a good thing, right? If our civilisation suddenly collapsed there would probably be a lot more of "illegal things" being done. Things that people otherwise wouldn't have done. That doesn't mean that they should be doing these things now. Also, slavery has played a huge part in our history. One could see it as a human instinct, something that just naturally develops, and maybe it would come back again if we would be out in the wild again after some time.
My point is that in some cases it can be a good thing to suppress one's instincts and maybe killing animals is one of them.