Any Vegetarians out there...but who feed their tanks?

[Vincerama2]

Crystal, do you eat eggs and cheese? Just asking because a friend of mine is a "vegetarian" but (at 250 lbs+) he's a big [profanity] fat vegetarian. Mostly because his "vegetarianism" consists of eating more eggs and cheese than 8 people combined. (but no other meat).

My theory on why ALL my vegetarian friends are fat is because for some people, they eat MORE vegetarian stuff because it doesn't have animal fat, which I believe "satisfies" your hunger faster. I could be wrong, but dangit! Those guys are fatsos! Oddly, I have a VERY carnivorous (read "eats BBQ everynight) who you'd think would snap in half in a strong breeze...weird...I live in Bizarro world. Luckily, I'm an omnivore and I'm on my way to being fat so at least that's normal!

V

What makes you think it is ok to use that word?..BrianD

[sihaya]

Well, I'm not fat. And I doubt vegetarianism has anything to do with your friends being overweight. Like I said, you can be an unhealthy vegetarian just as easily as you can be an unhealthy meat eater. I mean, all the best calorie-loaded foods like cake and icecream, chocolate, cookies and donuts, etc... don't have any meat in them.

I highly doubt Animal fat does not satisfy hunger more than any other fat. However, I suspect your friends may be "carb addicts" as is something I think vegetarians are more vulnerable. They probably just don't eat wisely.

And actually, I'd say it's just as "immoral" to over-eat as to eat meat (if I were to say either were immoral... which I try to avoid saying). Both constitute waste of resources and over-indulgence (in my opinion). But as someone who still has to count calories, I know it's not always easy to keep thin.

[CrystalAZ]

LOL!

Yes, I eat eggs and cheese. I am not 250 lbs, but I'm not a tiny thing either.

Vegetarian DEFINITELY does not automatically = healthy. If someone eats more calories than they burn, it sure doesn't matter if the calories come from meat or from something else.

But for me, giving up meat hasn't given me more of an appetite or caused me to need to eat more to get full.

Crystal

[daistarya]

Laugh all you want Flanders. If I didnt have to eat chicken I wouldnt. But whatever.

[Vincerama2]

Ah, so basically, my friends are pigs (which are also mostly vegetarians!) I just thought it was funny. I believe that my FVF (Fat Vegetarian Friends) are veggies more for ethical reasons than health reasons. Obviously, eating CORRECTLY is more important if health is your reason.

I actually have a skinny veg friend who, a year ago, decided (after 10+ years of vegging) that he'd eat meat, mostly so he could "bulk up". He's still a stick.

And oddly, my FVF (he of 250 lbs) once went on a crazy fitness regimen of working out everyday and eating only protien (ie; all meat!) and he seriously looked like a Men's Health magazine cover model. It certainly worked out well for his love life (despite the fact that he's a bastard and was married at the time). Then he got remarried, had a kid, and is fat again. So yeah, fatness/skinniness is more to do with eating HABITS versus veg/meat avoidance.

This morning I dumped a litre of (home grown) phytoplankton into my tank so I'm offering my corals some veggies! Actually, I believe that as the bottom of the food chain, the phyto plankton will feed the zoo plankton in the tank...then the corals can make their own lifestyle choices as to whether to eat the phyto or the zoo plankton!

Ha ha!

Actually, do to high BAD cholesterol, I've been informed by my doc that I gotta cut down on red meat and up the intake of "green leafy veg". Ugh... Maybe one day I'll make the leap to veggie too...(for both health and anti-evil-meat-company reasons).

Honestly, if I were fed an entirely veggie diet, it wouldn't bother me. However, since I have to cook my meals (and my wife's!) it's much MUCH easier to cook food with meat. Veggie cooking is very challenging (from the times I've tried) even if you "cheat" with "pretend meat" products.

My hats off to you vegetarians, it's not easy!

I think I'll go home and hatch some brine shrimp... mwahahahahaaa


V

[rvitko]

Hey Vince, you could switch to deer meat. Here people pay big money to hunt for Axil Deer as it is more like beef and virtually cholesterol free- you can buy it at high end grocery stores, emu and buffalo are similar. Anyway, just spreading evil.

Also, don't use f** and the like to trick the profanity censor it is generally frowned upon, you know kids check in here with their parents. No big deal just try to not do it again.

[BrianD]

Actually, with all the warnings we give people, it is getting to be a big deal.

[burntom]

The best thing anyone can do for the welfare of animals is not to turn vegetarian, but to insist on only eating humanely reared, free range meat, and refusing to eat meat otherwise. You have a lot of power as a consumer. By buying meat reared in a more humane way, you're supporting businesses that I would guess have a harder time making money that the big factory farms.

[pnosko]

Welfare of animals? Where is the benefit to the animal in getting eaten?

[burntom]

My meaning is that you're never going to get the majority of the population to turn vegetarian. Ergo, there will always be a meat industry. Some people that want to eat meat also care about animal welfare (and want the animal raised and killed in a humane way, providing the animal with the best living conditions and least stressful death). If those people put their money where their mouths are and only buy humanely reared meat, that means fewer chickens and pigs are factory farmed and fewer animals suffer great stress when being slaughtered. All of which makes the meat taste better as well, as a handy side effect (though does increase costs).

[Vincerama2]

When I buy meat, I just go to the grocery store and buy it, I don't really know where it came from. I guess that's the big problem. I mean, how do I know if it came from a "humane farm"?

I think that is the biggest problem. And choices are limited in stores, you go to the meat department and there is plastic wrapped meat cuts with no "origin" information on it. And if there is, I never notice it.

V

[TwinRotts]

I cannot recall the source, so cannot validate the following idea. We'll just call it meaty food for thought for now.

years ago I heard a guy call into a radio talk show and make an interesting statement. He said that if you took vegetarianism to the extreme, i.e. the world stopped eating meat and became completely vegetarian; you'd actually cause more problems. Based on some data he had, he claimed that in order to feed the world's population on a strictly vegetarian diet, the amount of farmland required to grow the food would literally kill off pretty much all significant animal life anyway. If that's true, I wonder if any vegetarians are also environmentalists...and if that scenario worries them at all.

And now for my own agitating, but hopefully thought provoking statements.

Where does one draw the line on "inhumane" treatment of a live resource? Why stop with animals? I realize, and also disagree with, the treatment of food animals that basically abuses them. But think about the life of an ear of corn (or any other farm raised vegetarian food). Would you want to be forced to grow only in the little parcel of a row allotted to you, then be sprayed with harsh chemicals all your life, only to be brutally killed with a 10 ton machine at the prime of your life, then have the fruit of your loins ripped from your body and "processed". How bout all your buddies that were raised this way, but then just cut down and plowed under to maintain crop prices...or just left to starve and rot for the same reason? Heck, how bout the abuse of sugar cane by burning it for harvest?!?!? I've never heard of a cattle rancher killing off his heard to get a government subsidy (though it might occur, I've just never heard of it). Seems we treat our plants MUCH worse than we treat our animals. At what level of life do you stop/start caring for another species? Do vegetarians never swat at flies or spray cockroaches in their houses? Do they never wear leather of any kind or use down jackets or even butter for that matter (butter that's animal fat...and eat it, not wear it...though it might be fun to wear)? Do they draw a line between plants too? Are seemingly more "animal like" plants more respected...such as venus flytraps or pitcher plants?

I wonder what vegetarians would say if we ever came up with a process by which we could speedily transform plant/animal material into oil (instead of waiting for nature to do it for us). Would they then claim that it is an abuse of plants?

Another question for vegetarians who choose the lifestyle because of the inhumane treatments. Would you eat meats that were raised free range? There are companies that do this now and sell to high end restaurants.

And for the ones that won’t eat meat because they don’t want to eat a dead animal or kill one to eat….why is eating a dead plant or killing one to eat any different? Gets back to what level of life do you draw the line and why?

Here’s food for thought. Vegetables and fruit are basically a plant’s mechanism for propagation (ie, get something to eat it to spread the seeds). So if you think about it, it’s like eating the plant’s sex organs (I know this isn’t really accurate, but it’s an interesting thought). It’d be akin to eating animals scent glands or even their sex organs themselves (which I know, some are eaten).

Like I said, I don't think we need to abuse food animals, but raising them as a crop to feed a society seems perfectly reasonable. If it's done "humanely", what's the difference between that and everybody just hunting/killing for themselves?

I gotta get off my soapbox and go sit on my throne for a while.

Hopefully this little rant will spark some entertaining discussion. it's not meant to be mean or insulting, just to use irritating verbiage to bring up different perspectives. Can’t wait to see the responses. I’ll go and eat some cocoa to get all hyped up to reply.

[Vincerama2]

We, and many other "higher forms" of life seem to require consuming other forms of life to survive. That's what makes it so interesting that corals use SYMBIOTIC algae to survive. I mean, they don't EAT the zooxanthellae, they basically eat it's waste product.

As for plants...I think there is a bigger distinction between plants and animals than your simplified (and tongue-in-cheek) analogy of the poor corn stalk!

For one thing, you could eat corn without KILLING the corn stalk. You can even plant a few kernels and the corn is STILL happy. (you ate a part of it, but also propagated it and it's still alive). Also, if you didn't eat the fruit off trees, the fruit would just fall off an rot anyway...leaving the seed behind. In fact the whole POINT of fruit is for other things to eat it and spread the seeds!

But many animals are destined to be on the lower rungs of the food chain. Ever seen one of those "Lions of the Serengetti" documentaries? Man Wildebeasts are like the "Hamburgers" of nature. Seems like they exist only to convert grass into meat! However, they also breed like nuts too. (Ditto rabbits).

That's why I don't feel bad about eating my fellow creatures.

I think "Ethical Vegetarians" are empathetic to the suffering of other creatures (or at least think about it more)...as we might be if we actually had to hunt/slaughter our own food. The "Ovo-lacto" crowd seem to ignore the plight of dairy cows/egg chickens conveniently... But again, different farms treat their animals differently.

If a hunter goes and shoots a deer that has lived its entire life frolicking in the woods....is that worse than an "ovo-lacto" vegetarian that eats cheese made by cows that live in a crate??

The problem is that we simply are disconnected to the source of our food. We don't know how things were treated before we bought them at the supermarket. And if a package says "Free ranch happy chickens" how do we even know that's true?

V

[burntom]

Originally posted by TwinRotts
[B]I cannot recall the source, so cannot validate the following idea. We'll just call it meaty food for thought for now.

years ago I heard a guy call into a radio talk show and make an interesting statement. He said that if you took vegetarianism to the extreme, i.e. the world stopped eating meat and became completely vegetarian; you'd actually cause more problems. Based on some data he had, he claimed that in order to feed the world's population on a strictly vegetarian diet, the amount of farmland required to grow the food would literally kill off pretty much all significant animal life anyway. If that's true, I wonder if any vegetarians are also environmentalists...and if that scenario worries them at all.

That doesn't tie with what I've heard (that the amount of land needed to raise animals for food far outweighs the amount needed to raise the same amount of vegetables/pulses).

[Scuba_Dave]

Yes, lets not eat the cows, pigs & chicken etc that are RAISED to be food.
Instead lets deplete the ocean of it's natural resources

[TwinRotts]

I've solved it! Let's develop a type of zooxanthellae that we can inject directly into our stomachs, then put a high power light source where the sun doesn't currently shine. Stick our tongues in an electric socket and BAM, we've got a symbiotic relationship with nature!

All kidding aside, I'm not sure it's a good comparison. I mean, those zooxanthellae don't live forever right? So in all the coral is really doing is providing a "safe" place for them to live while it lives off of them. Isn't it basically doing the same thing we are, but less brutally and on a less complex level? It's growing a forest of zooxanthellae to provide a source of energy, then discards it as it sees fit or as they die off. We do the same thing with animals...grow them, then use them for energy and discard the waste. It's just a lower level example of one life form taking advantage of a lower form. And just to show my ignorance, how is it that the coral obtains the energy from them (a link to the information will suffice, no need to change the topic)? Does it continually eat them as they reproduce or what?

I think people might be less offended by the practice if we were to find ways to use close to 100% of the animal in some respect rather than, for example, cutting the fins off for soup, then discarding the rest of the body.

You do make a good point about being able to eat the fruit without killing the plant though. So here's a strange thought. What if we were to farm raise all the different kinds of animals that can regenerate limbs and things, but only harvest the limbs for food and leave the animal to regrow more? Would that be more acceptable? I realize that it's again not a perfect comparison because plants grow that fruit with the intention of letting it go, but it's not too far off. How bout this; let the animals build up muscles via exercise (happy exercise at that), then surgically remove the muscle (which is what meat is anyway) and let them keep exercising to rebuild it.

Maybe it would be more acceptable to only harvest the animal after it dies of old age or natural causes or whatever. But then it wouldn't taste as good

Ahhh, who knows. All I know is I need to go feed off of some more of my symbiotic barley and wheat (of course I have to kill it and let it ferment first).

good fun and interesting discussion.

[KT & SJ]

Originally posted by Vincerama2


As for plants...I think there is a bigger distinction between plants and animals than your simplified (and tongue-in-cheek) analogy of the poor corn stalk!

For one thing, you could eat corn without KILLING the corn stalk. You can even plant a few kernels and the corn is STILL happy. (you ate a part of it, but also propagated it and it's still alive).
V

still happy? How could it still be happy when it is slowly being eaten alive over a long period of time? Why drag out this cruel and inhumain treatment and just put it out of its misery?

[Vincerama2]

Originally posted by KT & SJ
still happy? How could it still be happy when it is slowly being eaten alive over a long period of time? Why drag out this cruel and inhumain treatment and just put it out of its misery?

Because I hate corn, and torturing it over a long period of time would make me happy. Mwahahahaha!

As for "cutting limbs off animals and letting them regrow" well, milk from cows and eggs from chickens...not to mention wool from sheep are all sort of "partial harvesting" of animal products, right?

I think zooxanthellae are not themselves consumed by the coral, but rather, the zooxanthellae produce sugars or something as a biproduct of their own photosynthetic process, which the coral consumes. Sort of like how we might have a garden and eat the fruits/veggies without killing the plants (OK, except for stuff like carrots which is basically the whole plant).

V

[CrystalAZ]

And for the ones that won’t eat meat because they don’t want to eat a dead animal or kill one to eat….why is eating a dead plant or killing one to eat any different? Gets back to what level of life do you draw the line and why?

It's a sliding scale and corn isn't as far up on the scale as say, cows. It is unknown whether corn can actually feel pain, and if so, do they have consciousness to be aware of it? I don't believe so. If it was proven that they DID, I would rethink things.

As far as eggs and cheese, yes, I am disgusted by the treatment of most of these animals and would gladly pay more for eggs and cheese if the animals were given a "happier" existence.

I wonder what vegetarians would say if we ever came up with a process by which we could speedily transform plant/animal material into oil (instead of waiting for nature to do it for us). Would they then claim that it is an abuse of plants?

I wouldn't. I am sure SOME would. There is a fringe group of vegans called fruitarians. They don't eat anything that kills the plant. So they'll eat fruit, nuts, and some veggies, but if the plant has to die, they don't eat it.

Crystal

[Vincerama2]

You're kidding! Frutarians!? Wow, that is hardcore. What if they came across an animal that died of natural causes? Like a fish or a drowned chicken? Yes, it died, but not by anyone's hand.

Soon there will be people that only eat fallen leaves in Autumn!

V

[TwinRotts]

Interesting Crystal. Just out of curiosity (I know nothing about vegetarian philosophies), is there an even more fringe subset that considers eating the fruits and things bad as well because although you're not killing the plant, you are technically preventing those seeds from germinating and growing and thereby preventing further life. But I guess that would leave hardly anything at all to eat.

Are these people so strict that they don't buy the stuff at the market (presumably the plants that provided all that stuff have been killed in the process except maybe fruit bearing trees and things like that)? Or are there places to get the stuff where it's supposedly coming from plants that are maintained live after harvest?

And to they extend that respect for life beyond their nutritional needs? For example, not using paper or wood products because a tree had to die to provide it?

The point I'm getting to is that to say you don't want to eat the stuff if the plant/animal had to die doesn't make sense if you still use other kinds of products where plants/animals did have to die to produce the products.

It's the same argument I put to environmentalists (again, not to change topic, but just offer an analogy). There is absolutely NOTHING the human race can do to hurt this planet in any way. yes we can cause major changes, but looking in long timeframes (millions/billions of years), the Earth will adapt to anything we can throw at it. There's no way we can even approach the drastic impacts caused by say large meteor hits or ice ages. Yet the earth (and life) survived these things and adapted. So in reality, I think environmentalists motives really boil down to selfishness. They want to "protect" the Earth not for its own good, but for THEIR own good. I.e., they want it to stay the same for them and their children, etc. And ironically, the Earth will change drastically over the long term whether they like it or not. Does that mean we should do whatever we want to the environment with wanton disregard? No way. But don't believe for a second that we're anything more than a pimple on the Earth's butt. Even if we set off every single nuclear weapon and contaminated every ocean/stream with every nasty chemical we could, after a few million years, some new life would be here again (assuming nature didn't actually destroy the planet/sun by then).

Similar for the vegan/carnivore debate. Sure we shouldn't abuse plants/animals, but the only reason we have evolved to such a high level is because of our ability to use/manipulate these resources to our advantage. Granted we do now have the ability to control over the long term (duration of our species anyway) how we use those resources from here on out. But I don't think our civilization is at a point yet where we even fully understand what that would take or what impacts it would have on us, the plants/animals, and the Earth in general. Even if humans found a way to provide for their needs in a way that no animal or plant (or live resource in general) were harmed by us, nature still does. Perhaps we are just one of nature's evolutions such that we are SUPPOSED to be using these resources? Maybe the latest explosion of life on the planet needed a countering/controlling element and instead of ice ages or mass diseases, humans are currently that controlling element. Again, not that we have to abuse the resource, but consume it...yes.

edit_________________________
Another thought. All of this talk about ethical/humane treatment is really arbitrary. Those concepts are uniquely human and really created by humans, not instilled in us by some natural phenomena. So we do these things to satisfy ourselves that we are being ethical and keep guilt (another uniquely human and human created concept) at bay. Will concepts like this help us evolve further? Who knows. Will they actually end up hindering our evolution/development? Who knows. Maybe by suddenly (i.e. in the last thousand years or so) applying these concepts to our actual behavior and evolution, we end up stopping some process that has gotten us this far and theryby hindering us in the future. These are the kinds of things I'm talking about when I say we as a civilization don't fully understand the impacts to our future. Basically we'll be carrying out an experiment over the next few thousand years or so.

[sihaya]

Originally posted by TwinRotts
Just out of curiosity (I know nothing about vegetarian philosophies), is there an even more fringe subset that considers eating the fruits and things bad as well because although you're not killing the plant, you are technically preventing those seeds from germinating and growing and thereby preventing further life. But I guess that would leave hardly anything at all to eat.

Sorta... there are some people that will only eat fruit that has naturally fallen to the ground because that's when the tree "gives" it to us. But they're a bunch of wierdos and we don't talk to them.

Are these people so strict that they don't buy the stuff at the market (presumably the plants that provided all that stuff have been killed in the process except maybe fruit bearing trees and things like that)? Or are there places to get the stuff where it's supposedly coming from plants that are maintained live after harvest?

Who knows? There are all kinds of people with varying degrees of conviction and self-imposed moral discipline. I mean, even when it comes to things we all tend to agree are wrong, we all do them to varying degrees from time to time. For instance, lying is usually wrong, but who hasn't lied when they should have told the truth? In the same way, anyone who is vegetarian on moral conviction might not neccessarily have the discipline to not eat meat 100% of the time.

The point I'm getting to is that to say you don't want to eat the stuff if the plant/animal had to die doesn't make sense if you still use other kinds of products where plants/animals did have to die to produce the products.

That's a valid point... but like I mention abuse, there's usually only so much people are willing to sacrafice in order to abide by a moral code. So, yeah, there were likely animals killed indirectly in the production of my toilet paper... but I'm just not in a place right now where I'd be willing to give that up. Though, I do like to buy the kind made from recycled paper.

And again, it's the meat industry I want to put out of business. I'm not saying no animal should ever be killed for any reason.

There is absolutely NOTHING the human race can do to hurt this planet in any way.

Oh, you're kidding right? Well, I suppose with an extremely unusual definition of the word "hurt" that might be true... like maybe if turning Earth into Mars wouldn't hurt it, yeah, humans can't "hurt" the earth.

yes we can cause major changes, but looking in long timeframes (millions/billions of years), the Earth will adapt to anything we can throw at it.

Only problem is... we won't survive to see that happen. We'll all have starved to death or killed each other by then.

There's no way we can even approach the drastic impacts caused by say large meteor hits or ice ages. Yet the earth (and life) survived these things and adapted. So in reality, I think environmentalists motives really boil down to selfishness. They want to "protect" the Earth not for its own good, but for THEIR own good. I.e., they want it to stay the same for them and their children, etc. And ironically, the Earth will change drastically over the long term whether they like it or not. Does that mean we should do whatever we want to the environment with wanton disregard? No way. But don't believe for a second that we're anything more than a pimple on the Earth's butt. Even if we set off every single nuclear weapon and contaminated every ocean/stream with every nasty chemical we could, after a few million years, some new life would be here again (assuming nature didn't actually destroy the planet/sun by then).

Oh ok!! Let's try it then! Let's destroy everything! Let's mow down the rain forrests and crush the coral reefs... I mean, if it will all just come back, why not?!

Similar for the vegan/carnivore debate. Sure we shouldn't abuse plants/animals, but the only reason we have evolved to such a high level is because of our ability to use/manipulate these resources to our advantage.

Ah, yes, let us all worship the rats and the cockroaches for their uncanny ability to infest any environment, reproduce to unsustainable levels, and then start eating their own young once they've exhausted every resource available to them!

Maybe the latest explosion of life on the planet needed a countering/controlling element and instead of ice ages or mass diseases, humans are currently that controlling element.

And maybe Elvis is still alive...

Another thought. All of this talk about ethical/humane treatment is really arbitrary. Those concepts are uniquely human and really created by humans, not instilled in us by some natural phenomena.

Well, I agree with you there. But that's the beauty of moral reasoning, it's always voluntary, it's always human... it's our specialty (or should be).

So we do these things to satisfy ourselves that we are being ethical and keep guilt (another uniquely human and human created concept) at bay. Will concepts like this help us evolve further? Who knows. Will they actually end up hindering our evolution/development?

Basically what you're saying is... we're all just ruthless, oppertunistic animals and so we might as well act like it.

[TwinRotts]

Cmon, we're no where near having the technology for terraforming a planet yet. My point was that when we speak of things like that, its from our own selfish (and self preserving) perspectives. I do (and did) concede that we do cause changes in our environment, but it's nothing compared to what nature has done and will continue to do. And nature will always adapt to whatever changes we do cause, no matter the severity. I don't think "hurt" has a definition in a long term gelological context, only change does. the idea that the planet was "hurt" comes from how WE think things should have gone or should go. So if the environment is trying to change on it's own (species dying off, global warming, ice ages, whatever), but we intervene and stop it, is that good or are we "hurting" things? You CANNOT say either way because you cannot accurately predict and/or compare the outcomes from intervening vs not intervening.

Only problem is... we won't survive to see that happen. We'll all have starved to death or killed each other by then.

Exactly what I was saying. We are concerned, not really on behalf the environment, but for our own selfish reasons of wanting to control it and set it up the way WE want it.

And I did not say we are ruthless and opportunistic and therefore should act like it. Nor did I say we should worship rats, etc (frankly I'm not sure if you're poking fun or if you reall inferred that from what I wrote). And I did not suggest we hurridly deplete all of our natural resources. I actually suggested we should be diligent in our use of resources. I suggested that in our quest to be some kind of shepards of life, we are way too ignorant at the time of all the interactions, consequences of actions, and long term effects to really throw out hard and fast rules about what we should or shouldn't do to protect/preserve it. You cannot predict that whatever position you support is 100% correct and is the proper path to travel because you really do not know what other ramifications it might cause. How many times has science or religion or even philosophy (Nietzsche was not 100% correct) come out claiming to have a hard and fast answer, only to find out later it had major unintended consequences that may be worse than the original issue?

Funny thing about your descriptions of the cockroaches and rats. Looks like you despise them and see them as a plague of sorts. Well consider this; we humans also have the uncanny ability to infest any environment, reproduce to unsustainable levels, and have been known to eat our own. And we're currently exhausting any resource we can find. We've already overpopulated the earth (from the perspective that the population growth is not followed by the proper ratio and distribution of food/resources), we've already infested every environment except the deepest oceans (and we're working on that). And guess what...we want to do it to other planets now. Which species is the bigger plague? There are things higher on the food chain and in nature that keep rats/roaches in check. Where are the mechanisms to keep humans in check? Since there really are none, we try to keep ourselves in check.

You answered your own "why not" question when you said we wouldn't be around to see the results. I don't think we should ravage the planet of it's resources either, but don't try to act like you believe it on behalf of the planet. You believe it because you want the planet to continue to provide for you (kind of an extremely large scale symbiotic relationship huh?). Once you accept that, then you can start coming up with legitimate ways to get to a better balance. Otherwise you're just manipulating things to whatever end you deem fit at the time....isn't that what we're taking about in the animal/plant abuse debate? Manipulating/using them to our own ends?

ohhhh, getting dizzy from pondering...not sure if the long-fingered rant above even makes sense or sticks to the point anymore. Till tomorrow. Look forward to your response.

[sihaya]

I certainly don't despise cockroaches and rats. Cockroaches don't bother me. And I actually like rats. They're very adorable and intelligent animals. I simply would never aspire to be like one.

The idea that we don't need to care about something we won't live to see is kind of absurd. At best it's blissful ignorance and at worst the logic behind murder-suicide.

So, yes, maybe I won't live to see humans *completely* destroy the world or subsequently the world coming back 5 billion years later... regardless, that fact in no way excuses me from caring.