Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food. The body, these waterheads imagine, is a temple that should not be polluted by animal protein. It’s healthier, they insist, though every vegetarian waiter I’ve worked with is brought down by any rumor of a cold. Oh, I’ll accommodate them, I’ll rummage around for something to feed them, for a “vegetarian plate,” if called on to do so. Fourteen dollars for a few slices of grilled eggplant and zucchini suits my food cost fine.
~ Anthony Bourdain (2000)
Category: Proslavery
Even if stress didn’t spoil the meat, we would never mistreat an animal
We farmed Alberta beef for decades, there is little as insulting as someone who has probably never even met a cow telling people terrible lies about how farm animals are treated—farmers love animals and even if stress didn’t spoil the meat, we would never mistreat an animal.
Then there are these idiots who seem to think we should turn all the cows and whatnot loose and let them get chased by wolves, hit by cars, freeze to death, etc. We cannot ignore the fact that these animals cannot survive in the wild.
This kind of ignorant nonsense is why the actual mistreaters of animals get away with it, factory egg farms for example, can point out how absurd and inane arguments like the one in the post are, making out that ALL farm animals are the same and are treated cruelly, which is so stupid that nobody will listen to anything else you might say, even if it is legitimate, because you have proven to know nothing about it and just use emotional language like an antichoicer.
~ Jennye Blain (June 4, 2016)
I was a vegetarian for a year in my late teens, aswereweall
I’m a hearty meat eater. But I’m also a very mindful meat eater. I grew up on a small farm and we raised goats for milk and meat. Early summer, Dad would load us into the car, a buck on each of our laps and we would cart our goats to the local abattoir to be killed and butchered. My brothers and I saw where they were killed, we knew the butcher who then cut them up for Mum and we knew, a week or so later, when we were eating one of our beautiful goats.
This was the beginning. I was a vegetarian for a year in my late teens, aswereweall. It made me hungry, neurotic about food and “heavy”. I then worked in the food industry on and off for about 20 years, and developed a heightened respect for meat and how it should be consumed. And today, for a range of reasons, I’m a vocal and passionate meat consumer.
~ Sarah Wilson (December 12, 2012)
HSUS’s reform-oriented campaigns
There are some folks in animal agriculture who caricature HSUS, charging that we are trying to end animal agriculture. But why would we work jointly with the United Egg Producers if we were against all animal agriculture? Why would HSUS have a pig farmer serve as its VP of Outreach and Engagement who leads our Rural Affairs program? Why would we work with the Nebraska Farmers Union on marketing of humanely produced animal products? Why would I serve on the board of the Global Animal Partnership, which conducts an animal welfare rating program and certifies products from farmers who raise animals in humane and sustainable ways?
My request to your readers: Look at the facts, not the rhetoric from groups that don’t like HSUS’s reform-oriented campaigns. Farmers and other leaders in agriculture can help solve animal welfare problems, and we look forward to working with anyone who wants to be constructive and help in solving problems for animal welfare.
~ Wayne Pacelle (December 13, 2012)
The animals are not destroying the Earth. Vegans are.
You can say what you will, but I’m not a vegan. I believe that we all have a right to our opinions & I was trying to point that out. I say don’t tell me what to eat & I won’t tell you what to eat. I don’t want to see dogs & cats die for whatever reason. The animals are not destroying the Earth. Vegans are. Plants breathe in carbon dioxide & breathe out oxygen to help us survive. You plant eaters are destroying the very things that help you breathe. Plants are alive, yet you kill them for food. Who’s the bad guy now?
~ Joella J. Brooks (June 12, 2012)
Slavery is everywhere in the Bible
Black churches also embrace a literal reading of the scripture because of its unique history, says Blum, author of “W.E.B. DuBois, American Prophet.”
During slavery and segregation, many blacks saw the Bible as the one document they could trust. The Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, state and local laws—all found some way to ignore their humanity, Blum says.
The Bible, though, was one book that told them that they weren’t slaves or three-fifths of a person, Blum says.
It said they were children of God.
“Throughout the 18th and 19th century, what document could they trust?” Blum says. “When the Bible says it’s so, it’s something that black people believed they could trust.”
Their enemies, though, used that same veneration of the Bible against them. Slaveholders had a simple but powerful argument when critics challenged them: Trust the Bible.
Ethical hunting of feral animals is environmentally sound
Wearing fox fur used to support a fox shooting and trapping industry here in Australia[,] rabbits as well.
Now [that] so called conservationists have stopped people wearing fur[,] foxes and rabbits have been able to breed and spread damaging native animals to the point of extinction.
People need to realize ethical hunting of feral animals is environmentally sound.
~ Doug Steley (May 12, 2012)
