Can a vegan or vegatarian please explain to me why it is OK..?

Question

to eat plants, but not animals? Aren't they all living organisms? Why is it morally OK to eat a tomato but not a chicken. They were both once alive. Where does the line get drawn, is it because the animals have a brain and walk around? Help me out here.

Answer 1

Because vegetarians and vegans are hypocrites most of the time. Both animals and plants can be a crop and you are right, both are living organisms.

If God didnt want us to eat animals, he wouldnt have made them out of meat.

Answer 2

I'm a veggie, and I don't eat anything with a complex CNS (central nervous system). This includes all the higher animals (I hate that terminology) such as fish, dogs, cows, sheep, chickens...but does not include mussels or prawns, and certainly not plants. Plants do not have nervous systems at all - everything is controlled using communication substances such as auxins. I don't eat them because I hate them - they're an important part of life and essential to life on this planet. They're also beautiful and fascinating.

But we need to eat plants to survive. You can't get by without eating something living, because we're not producers (like plants). However, we don't need to eat meat to survive: there are enough alternatives. Until there are alternatives to eating plants that do not have adverse effects on the body or the environment, I'm afraid we still have to keep eating them. They harness the energy of the sun: all the stored energy that we use originally came from the sun, via plants. We can't do this: we can't drink some water, breathe in carbon dioxide and lie in the sun to live.

Besides...never heard of a battery farmed tomato. :)

Answer 3

Been asked that before.
Well, I guess the best way to explain would be to say that we allmust do as much as we can to lessen the suffering on this planet. For some people, that means just not flipping out when someone hits your car with their car door in a parking lot.

For others, it means not eating veal or pate or other flesh foods that involve even more excessive suffering.

For some, it means not eating any flesh foods or seafoods, nothing with a face so to speak but will drink milk and eat cheese and eggs.

For some, they will not touch ANYthing made from animals including honey.

I think it more has to do with not harming anything with a face or taking anything away from them.

Plants probably do feel pain, but we all do what we can and hopefully we'll all evolve a little more with each generation.

Answer 4

plants have no brains this means:

they cannot experience pain
THey have no emotions (don't tell me that animals don't. I had a dog starve herself to death out of sadness after her sister died.. exactly like "When the Red Fern Grows").

That's a big part of it, anyway. Also you have to realize that there are other reasons for being vegetarian besides having an aversion to the idea of animals dying.

Health- Animals today are full of disease, cancers, mad cow disease, etc.. It's all becaues of how people raise them, the hormones they're pumped full of, etc.. vegetarian animals (cows) being fed ground up sheep, etc... Science is finally showing that a plant-based diet is better for our health. Most Americans eat WAY more protein than the human body needs.. etc.. etc..

Ethics- Some vegetarians acknowledge the fact that we are "above" the animals, and the idea of animals dieing for our sustinance isn't WRONG in itself.. however they have a problem with the extreme inhumanity of HOW it is all done nowday. Gone are the days of happy cows roaming the pastures enjoying the sunshine and sweet grass, and then being slaughtered quickly and "relatively" humanely. Now they are kept in miserable conditions (which increase disease) Lead perfectly miserable lives and even their manner of death is prolonged and inhumane. They feel it is wrong to support these kinds of practices.

Some people just don't like the taste of meat, or their system doesn't tolerate it very well..

Answer 5

Everyone has a line somewhere that they draw. Vegetarians don't eat animals. You can ask the same question of everyone. Why is it OK to eat a Cow but not a dog or a horse or another person?

For me its basically the following.

1. Eating Vegetarian is healthier for me.
2. I don't need to eat meat so I don't see a reason to subject the animals to that pain and abuse.

Personally I think each person much make there own determination of where that line is drawn. I don't eat meat but I do each cheese. My wife and kids eat eggs, milk and cheese but no meat. If some asks me why I don't eat meat I will give my reasons but I don't force my views on others.

Answer 6

How about if you have a big dinner party. Invite all your friends and family and as everyone is sitting down to a nice meal - you take out an huge butcher knife. Slice off the head of the chicken and then slice the tomato in half. Which one causes the greater instictive horrified reaction in your guests? Which one seems more violent and causes more pain and fear that we can recognize?

I go with what is the option that causes the least harm. There are all kinds of violence and harm in this world and I just want to minimize my participation in those things.
Plus tomatoes are full of vitamins and anti-oxidiants and taste wonderful - the chicken is just dead and cooked flesh eaten off the bone of an animal that wanted to live and died in pain and fear. Seems like an obvious choice to me!

Answer 7

Plants cannot feel, touch, love, or cry. Animals do. They scream when they feel pain. Plants do not have a nervous system as animals do.
People are animals too, so do you think it is morally okay to eat a friend or a sister?
If we didn't have plants, what would there be to eat besides animals?

Answer 8

Here is the one and only reason, and Ive been a vegetarian for 10 years.

The one thing in ANY living thing that makes it feel is the central nervous system.
If it doesnt have that, it has no feeling, be is physical or mental or emotional.

Plants dont have one. Animals do. Humans do. If it has this central nervous system that feeds information to its brain, the organism has the ability to fear, love, and basically 'feel'.

Tomatoes dont have that, so they feel nothing. they dont think. Cows do.

Answer 9

well there is a difference between vegan's and vegatarians. Vegans eat absolutly nothing from an animal not their meat not their eggs none of that and vegatarians may or may not eat stuff like fish or chicken but not beef or pork but will still drink milk and eat eggs. vegans are the one's that would think of it as it has all vital organs that a human has so it's not right. and that if it comes from the earth it's natural therefore ok to eat.

Answer 10

Easily put:

Plants aren't concious of themselves. There's no evidence of this. If you pick a flower, it doesn't scream. As far as we're aware, plants cannot feel pain. Animals (including us) can, though.

...Though in all honesty, I feel bad for eating plants anyway. I like little plants. I think they're wonderful. ...but it's the kinder of the two greater evils to snip off a stalk of celery than it is to behead a living chicken.

Answer 11

Great question! I am a practicing Buddhist and the mandate is to not kill sentient beings, that is anything that is aware and can feel.

Plants and trees respond to air, water, and light but aren't considered to be "feeling" because their response is an involuntary reaction to stimuli. You're right, It's a fine line but it's easy worth walking.