Why is it OK to eat vegetables?

Question

Frankly, I think vegetarianism is the primary form of racism.

How do you know that vegetables have no feelings?

I wouldn't be surprised if your response weren't used by some people agains other races of people; your response strengthens my premise.

Goodgirl: One needn't HATE to be racist. Being ignorant and behaving according to that ignorance is racist. To treat vegetables differently than animals because you believe that the one group deserves better treatment than the other, I am naming as primary racism. There is probably a more precise modifier, and some would say racism incorrect because we don't use the word 'race' to distinguish between kingdoms of living things, but these are semantic technicalities.

Iprinpretz: Vegetables eat meat. Some, such as pitcher plants and venus flytraps, eat it more actively than others, but they all (or at least almost all) absorb some nutrients from decaying animal matter. So, do you think that meat may be the cause of fighting between vegetables, and between fungi? I'm not trying to be funny here. Competition for food is a survival strategy in all living things.

Whome: If my previous two detail-additions aren't enough, let me know how much more you need.

More for Goodgirl: As to your comment about how our bodies can't make food -- is not entirely correct. We do convert sunlight to make vitamin D. I'm not sure what other photosynthetic capabilites we have, but we seem to have kept at least that vestige of it.

Also, have you ever wondered just what happened to make us start eating anything at all? Maybe eating happened by accident, when one vegetable cell accidently absorbed another. It didn't need it, but it enjoyed it and ate more. It got addicted. It developed ways to get rid of the part it couldn't use --especially the part that would kill it if it kept it inside it (read that "TOXIN"). Eventually, the addiction was so great that the species could no longer survive without the food, because it couldn't keep its structure with photosynthesis alone. Speaking of which, it is suppertime. I don't wanna make anyone sicker than I have so far, so I won't give details of what I'm about to consume. ;-)

Vegan&Proud: I don’t know why you felt the need to engage in an ad hominem attack upon me, or why you decided to make the assumptions you made, but I will not attack you back in the same manner. I will, however, answer your attack, point-by-point.

How do you know I am a meat eater? Show me where in my question or the details I say that I am.

Where in my question or in the details do you see a defense of meat-eating?

Nowhere in the question or the details did I say that vegetables have feelings. I asked an answerer how SHE knew they DIDN’T.

You say vegetables don’t bleed. You may not consider sap to be analogous to blood, but I do.

You say they don’t yelp in pain. How many fish scream? How many turtles scream? Do they feel pain? The fact that you cannot detect a sound coming from an organism does not mean it is not feeling pain.

I need another "details" section to continue.

I don’t know if any farmed vegetables are fed hormones. I do know that some are cloned, some are genetically altered and some – talk about torture! – are grafted with others so that the root of one is used to support the fruit of another.

I don’t know what vegetables you are eating, but the ones I eat are not grown in what I would consider natural habitat. They are planted row-upon-row, acre-upon-acre in immense farms, covered in pesticides and in many cases trampled by machinery at harvest.

While I am sure most factory-raised animals are mistreated as you say I ask you, why is it bad to do it to the animals, but OK to do it to the vegetables?

I need another "details" section to continue.

You say that since vegetables don’t have a brain or a central nervous system, they cannot feel pain. Non sequitur. We HAVE these things and therefore have no frame of reference as to what it might feel like to be injured when having a different system. I have read that when attacked by gypsy moth caterpillars, that trees communicate with each other (http://www.creationmoments.com/radio/transcript.php?t=130 : A large variety of trees -including beeches, poplars, sugar maples, and red oaks- communicate with each other. Scientists believe the trees communicate by releasing chemicals called pheromones into the air.).

You say by eating meat, I (would be) eating more vegetables. If that is true, then why don’t you eat meat?

I need another "details" section to continue.

You say I would never normally say vegetables have feelings. As I pointed out above, I have not said in the question or the details that vegetables have feelings. I asked an answerer how SHE knew they DIDN’T. HOWEVER, I will now state to you that in fact, I do believe that vegetable likely have feelings. I cannot say conclusively, but I believe it. You, however, are decades late in saying I would never normally say this. I have been saying this for over 30 years. I just hadn’t said it in here until now.

Yes, I do step on grass, but, believe it or not, I do think about how it perceives my presence from time to time, just as I think about the bugs on the windshield; the frogs, toads and snakes that the lawnmower maims; and the dead animals on the side of the road. I will admit, however, that I do not in the least care how mosquitoes, horseflies and black flies feel.

I still consider vegetarianism to be the most basic, primary racism. Nothing in your argument has swayed me.

Answer 1

I think you've been eating too much meat. Please tie together in a cohesive format your rational explaining your "theory". I would love to heard it! Racism? I could use some offbeat entertainment.

Answer 2

Because vegetables don't contain nerve cells or brains, they are part of a healthy diet, you can fit a lot more corn cobs into a field than you can cows (so in terms of the use of land and feeding the over-popluated planet, they're a damn lot more efficient than eating meat), and they're the primary producers in the food chain - turning sunlight into chemical energy through the process of photosynthesis - so if we didn't eat them, we'd starve. Unless you can live off sunlight? The fats that come from vegetables are nowhere near as likely to cause heart disease as are animal fats, and vegetables also contain FAR more nutrients and vitamins than meat.

(Oh, and how can it be racism when vegetables are not a race of humans? They're not even in the same KINGDOM! But if you feel like kicking up a fuss, then kick it up about mushrooms - mushrooms are infact more closely related (in the genetic and evolutionary sense) to animals than they are to plants - both humans and true fungi are in the opisthokont kingdom - although I still don't really mind eating them cause they still don't have nerve cells or eyes...)

Answer 3

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Answer 4

Okay,let me try to put what I'm thinking in words.you are reaching for a ridiculous arguement to defend you're meat eating habits,you are saying vegetables have feelings.One, they don't bleed,yelp in pain, or given hormones to fatten them.They grow out in the sun in their natural habitat.Where are animals raised?In factory farms,they don't see the light of day,they are given hormones,they are practically tortured,the only day the see light of day is the day they are put on a truck to be shipped to a factory farm.Two,vegetables don't have a brain,thus they can't have a central nervous system so they can't feel pain.three,by eating meat you are eating more vegetables.Four,You would never normally say vegetables have feelings,but when it comes to defend your meat eating ways you will reach
for such a ridiculous arguement.You never step on grass and think to yourself,Oh,sorry grass for stepping on you,Do you.Vegetarianism has nothing to do with racism.

I know you are not a vegetarian,then you would be considering yourself a racist and you would not try to prove that vegetables have feelings.Seriously,you have wasted yours,and now my time on this.I'm not rying to sway you any direction,but I don't know what you are trying to prove either.

Answer 5

Your question was short and to the point. Your comments were long and OY.. my eyes, how they burn.

It is okay to eat vegetables because they are a food source. Whether or not they are eaten by any said person, is entirely a matter of choice.

Answer 6

I think a better word for this question, rather than "Racism" might be "Speciesism".
Very common word used by Animal rights activists all over the globe.

According to Wikipedia:

"Speciesism involves assigning different values or rights to beings on the basis of their species membership."

To call vegetarianism a form of Racism suggests that you don't quite understand what that word means.
So here you go.

According to Wikipedia:

"Racism is commonly defined as a belief or doctrine where inherent biological differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, with a corollary that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others."

Based on your logic and how you are using the word "Racsim" would be like saying "So if you are going to beat one person with a stick, because of the colour of their skin, then you might as well beat everybody else."
So perhaps your argument isn't a very strong one. It's kind of funny but isn't very well thought out.

So are we assuming that biological organisms such as vegetables are in fact secular beings(species)?
Should we include Fruits, nuts and grains as well?

I think we need to define ignorance for this question as well.

According to Wikipedia (I love Wikipedia):
"Ignorance is a lack of knowledge. Ignorance is also a "state of being ignorant" or unaware/uninformed."

For most Vegans and vegetarians hopefully they are making a well informed choice. It is important to know what you are putting in your body no matter what diet you are on.

Most vegans I know are very well informed on this topic. They have done their research which is often what lead them to make this kind of lifestyle choice in the first place.

To call this lifestyle choice ignorant is, well, ignorant.

However.

All life on this planet is complex and delicate, so to assume that plants (including vegetables) do not have some kind of sensory nervous system that might make them self aware and in turn have some kind of pain sensory sytem intact, is, well at this moment ignorant.
Where is the research to prove or disprove this posibility?

What do we really truly understand of the other organisms that we co-inhabit the earth with?
Does it really matter if an organism feels pain when we kill it for our own survival?
So is it a question of morality vs our own survival?
Can we live with our conscience knowing that our own survival causes the suffering and destruction of other species on this planet?

Who or what are we, that allows us to put our life and existence above all others?
We have the ability to make this choice but our greed causes us to consume in such excess that species disapear from the face of the planet, so rapidly that we have to harvest our own domesticated livestock just to satisfy our lust for blood.
We don't need to live our lives in excess we just choose too.

So why is it Ok to eat vegetables?
Why is it ok to eat anything?

Perhaps we can take a lesson from these people.

According to Wikipedia:

"Inedia is the alleged ability to live without food. Breatharianism is a related concept, in which believers claim food and possibly water are not necessary for human sustenance, which can be nourished solely by prana (the vital life force in Hinduism), or according to some, by the energy in sunlight. The terms breatharianism or inedia may also refer to this philosophy practiced as a lifestyle in place of the usual diet. While it is often seen as an esoteric practice performed by eastern ascetics, recently some groups such as the Breatharian Institute of America [1] have promoted the practice as an option for anybody, once the proper techniques for accessing it are made known."

Thanks Wikipedia

Answer 7

Vegetarians don't eat meat. I really don't think they're racist over a flicking cow. They're just weird, man. I had one come over to share a meat lover's pizza, and he went home. How the hell you go home because of a meat lovers pizza? I told him "Pick the meat off." He said "I can still smell it, though." So I said, "Dude, I smell your *** all the time and do I complain?" I don't know what he got upset about...

Answer 8

Eating vegetables can slow mental decline, study shows

Eating two or more servings of vegetables a day may slow a person's mental decline by about 40 per cent compared with a person who consumes few vegetables, according to a six-year study of nearly 4,000 Chicago residents age 65 or older.

Consuming lots of fruit did not appear to offer the same mental protection, although fruit has been associated with a wide variety of other health benefits, said Martha Clare Morris, chief of Rush University Medical Center's Rush Center for Healthy Ageing.

The slowdown in the rate of cognitive decline experienced by people who ate 2.8 or more servings of vegetables a day is "equivalent to about five years of younger age" compared with people who ate less than one serving of vegetables per day, Morris reported in Neurology, the scientific journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

And older people who started eating more than two servings of vegetables a day still showed a significant delay in mental decline, Morris said.

The new findings come on top of two earlier Rush studies. Morris reported four years ago that eating foods high in Vitamin E appeared to reduce the risk of Alzheimer's disease, and last year she found that eating fish had a similar effect.

Vegetables, especially green leafy ones, are brimming with antioxidant compounds like Vitamin E, flavonoids and carotenoids, Morris said. They also contain more Vitamin E than fruit.

Eating vegetables with olive oil, vegetable oil or some other type of poly- or mono-unsaturated fats enhances the body's absorption of antioxidants, which help snuff out cell-damaging free radicals, she added.

In trying to figure out which specific food groups bestow important health benefits, epidemiologists match people as closely as possible so other factors in their lifestyles cancel out.

"When we controlled for all of those healthy lifestyle variables — physical exercise, age, sex, race, education, cognitive activity, participation — the effects of vegetables on cognition actually became stronger," Morris said.

"The link between better cognition and vegetables is interesting and certainly real," said Matt Kaeberlein, who researches the biochemical processes of ageing at the University of Washington. "But I wouldn't stop eating fruits based on this study. There's plenty of evidence that for overall health you're better off eating a diet high in both fruits and vegetables."

Further research is needed to document the exact role that vegetables play in mental health, Kaeberlein said. Learning which specific nutrients provide the greatest protection could lead to developing a pill people could take that would have the same benefits, he said.

Answer 9

Trees can think to some extent, I think but i don't think eating anything more than something else is any where close to racism, you are not eating the food you eat because you hate it, you eat food because your body can't make food like plants

Answer 10

In the superstore, fruits are usually selected far too soon. Some are rocks, many are bitter. Some of the fruit and vegetables are generally right (zucchini, onions, garlic, lettuce, greens, and a few others) so I'd have to go with vegetables.