Vegetarian dillema: my "veggie" sandwich is actually roast beef?

Question

I got a free meal from my a school event today. It was so packed and so hard to find my friends (who don't care to use their cell phones except at night) that I decided to grab the meal and eat at our student center, an 8 minute walk away.

When I arrived and sat down, I discovered that my sandwich, which I'm certain I picked from the "veggie" table, was actually roast beef. I'm currently a pescatarian, (seafood eater) and plan to be full vegan by the end of the semester. I've not eaten a bite of meat or poultry since late June, and when I sat looking at my sandwich today I was like a recovering alcoholic looking at a beer. I love the taste, but I know it's not healthy and I can't turn a blind eye to livestock cruelty.

I ended up taking the meat off the sandwich and tossing it. I didn't want to be wasteful of the poor animal's flesh, but I felt like eating it would be cheating my ethics. What do you guys think? Would eating it have been morally permissible?

Clarification: I noticed the meat before I took a bite. I opted to eat everything on the sandwich except the meat since nobody I knew was in the dining area. In hindsight I suppose I could've saved it for some of the cats on campus, but the cats don't trust people so I don't know if they'd have eaten it.

My motivations are dual: Despite loving the taste of meat, I don't want to eat it because it's unhealthy for me and it comes from unethically treated animals. Additionally, I feel like I'm kicking an addiction and I don't want to even put the real thing in my mouth or else I'll break my stride.

Answer 1

There is no dillema here. A vegetarian would never eat beef, and you should have tossed the whole sandwich away - the beef would be on the other ingredients.

A vegetarian does not eat meat, fish, poultry nor slaughter by-products. The definition does not continue "unless it was in a sandwich bought in error"

Answer 2

I am not going to say you did wrong, but . . .

I have hard time figuring out how it is ethical to throw food away, but unethical to eat it. If you are a vegitarian b/c you don't want to be part of a process that causes animals to be killed, you didn't save a cow by throwing away meat.

If you didn't eat the meat b/c it is unhealthy then that is a different story.

It sounds like you really like meat. (Many vegetarians don't like the taste of it.) It also sounds like your primary reason for not eating meat is you don't want to cause the death of animals.

How does this sound, only eat meat if it would otherwise be wasted. E.g. in the example here. Of if a friend offers you a half a sandwitch and says if you don't have it is just going it to the trash.

If you don't order it or buy it you are not spawning to killing of the animals.

Although most people eat more meat than is healthy, it is not unhealthy to have it once in a while.

There definately is a middle gound between eating meat 3 meals a day and never.

My personal belief is you are more disrespectful to the animinal to have had it die in vain, than to eat it. I also feel throwing away perfectly good food disrespects the 1/3 of the world living in hunger.

Just my two cents.

Answer 3

Wow, that was so much worse. You could have just eaten the damn meat, thats what those pointy teeth in your mouth are for! Youre so worried about the animals, but guess what, it was already dead. What about people, im sure someone at your school didnt have a sandwich, and you just threw it in the garbage! What a waste. Do you think depriving your body of the nutrients it needs is healthy? I'm sure that wasnt the best meat, but if you love it and are looking at it like an alcoholic looks at a beer, maybe your bodys telling you something. I dont support animal cruelty either, and was a vegetarian at one point, but i appreciate food too much to be picky. Its fine that you want to be vegan, but its not going to stop the cruelty or selling of meat.

Answer 4

I am noy a vegetarian but I understand your dilemma. I don't think you did anything wrong butI agree with the girl above that maybe giving it away or to an animal might have been a better option. I wouldn't feel bad about being tempted, it is tough to deny your self something you used to want, ie like your analogy of an alcoholic. However, I commend your willpower and I am sure it probably was in the wrong bin, I remember those days when the semester started, it is always a mess for awhile!

Answer 5

I think throwing it away was fine, it was already killed, and you would be doing yourself the harm by eatting it, and someone else harm by giving it to them. The taste is meant to be great, because it cured with tons of yummy salt, and humans just love salt. Meat does taste good, but aside from the animal crulty fact, chances are that if your school is giving it away, it was cheap American meat which is pumped up full of products you dont want in your body anyways. Meat is bad, but I don't personally think as bad a dairy, currently. Just stay focussed on your goals. Its no big deal though, everyone trying to abstain from these types of foods gets into this once in a while.

Answer 6

never feel guilty over mistakes... get used to it... you're going to deal with this again.

especially when you eat out.. or are with pranksters who don't respect YOUR choices...

if they want to live in a world of choice.. why is it all of the sudden your choice isn't valid? (that's what grabs me...)

you should have 'shared' it with a friend.. explaining the dillema or stretching the truth a tad.. saying you can't digest all this meat element.. you have GERD or an protein allergy from meats... (if they're cynical towards your preference)

most times the meat isn't healthy because of the way it's treated.. alive and dead. hormones.. beating the animal.. keeping it in rotten conditions.. chemicals all that fun stuff... isn't good for any foods or creature.

develop a maturity to this issue... because when you go to some restaurants where they claim they serve vegans/vegetarians there may be a case where they service you with animal product or the food's been prepared in animal product or in the same grill, pan, other that animal product has been prepared in.

you'll learn to figure it out... you'll get a 6th. sense to it with practice.

Answer 7

I don't think wasting it was any more ethical than eating it; better for you health though. Maybe you should have given it to one of your friends who would like an extra thick sandwich or to a stray animal? Don't worry too much about it though. It wasn't your fault you got the wrong sandwich and you're just starting out.

Answer 8

There's always other things you can do besides either eating it or tossing it. Give it to a friend, keep it in your fridge for awhile and wait for someone who eats meat come by and give it to them. I don't know about your college campus, but there's always homeless on the outskirts of mine, give it to them if there's any.

Answer 9

It's okay that you ate it because you didn't know that it was meat. But, once you took your first bite of the sandwich, wouldn't you have know that you were eating meat by it's texture and by it's taste. Just don't let it happen again.

Answer 10

that was one of those "damned if you do, damned if you dont" situations. Because, eating it or not wouldn't bring the animal back to life. You didnt save any additional animals.

but, I congrat you because you didnt eat it. It feels better on your concious not to have eaten it.