Why do some people misundestand the definition of 'omnivore'?

Question

An omnivore does not HAVE to eat both plants and animals. For those who believe humans are omnivores, that is the silliest reason to justify eating meat. A grizzly bear can live perfectly well without meat if it had unlimited access to plant protein. It probably won't because it doesn't think about ethics. If you eat meat, you stoop to the ethical reasoning ability of a grizzly bear.

Answer 1

I just get my protein from veggies and tofu not from meat silly. I don't have to eat any meat to stay healthy. I have to eat certain veggies that have more protein though everyonce in a while. Sorry. Good try though.

I'm not a grizzly bear so what the bear has to eat to stay healthy does not apply. I can choose what to eat. The bear cannot always choose to get it's protien from plants so it has to eat meat.

Answer 2

Yes, the "omnivore by nature" argument is a weak one indeed. A much more cogent argument would be that it's very *easy* to be an omnivore-leaning-carnivore in most civilized places, or that some people genuinely *do* enjoy meat. This by no means suggests my subscription to such arguments, but comparatively speaking, they're less easy to dismiss. I'm honestly surprised we don't hear these more often. They're actually much more choice-centric than "'cuz nature sez" copouts, and lots of these people are quick to bash veg*ans as dirty filthy hippies. Perhaps a term analogous to 'victims of mother nature' could be hoisted up, albeit something with a bit more zing? :P

Answer 3

I don't think it is a silly reason at all. Humans are naturally omnivores. We always have been. We are just living in unnatural times.
We live in a world (although I'm in the USA, so only so in developed countries, I suppose) with plenty of rich (often enriched) foods, and with a constant supply of ready food and vitamins. Thus, at this time and place we don't need meat. It is unnecessary. However, if we were living in circumstances that we would have been living in thousands of years ago when humans first evolved, a diet without any meat would have been bad because there would be fewer nutrients, fewer calories, etc. that would have made life either very hard or impossible for those humans. They, as well as modern humans in developing countries, do need meat for survival.
A lot of studies I have heard of studies that indicate that humans, for thousands of years, evolved eating fish, which may account for our higher intelligence (and perhaps even for our relatively hairless skin). Theoretical, but thought provoking.
In natural circumstances, a diet with meat would be beneficial. A grizzly bear eating only plants would die, trust me. They especially need meat. (No offense, this is kind of a bad example to use...a better one may have been a rat or pig or something that would do a lot better without meat, as both of them are also omnivores).

I'm not going to get into the idea of ethics. There is no set principle of ethics, and it would just get too long, so I am only sticking to what seems to be your original argument.

Eating meat is natural, but not under the slaughterhouse conditions of now.
I hate the "instinct" argument a lot of people use. For a lot of people, seeing a certain animal would give them the idea to kill it and eat it. But if I saw a field of wheat, I wouldn't have the instinct to go and tend to it in order to get bread. That is just as unnatural as you claim eating meat is.

Answer 4

become attentive to: Animal Lover Age: 12 Weight: a hundred twenty 5 Vegetarian, vegan, omnivore, or carnivore?: omnivore, I must be vegetarian for the main suitable way prolonged?: Vegetarian for about a million a million/2 years. suitable: 5'71/2

Answer 5

Most meat eaters tell me you HAVE to eat meat to be healthy & eating meat is human nature. I say B.S. Vegetarians and vegans outlive omnis by a decade and there aren't exactly a whole lot of obese vegans running around. As for the human nature part. If you have an apple tree in your front yard, you will have the natural instict to pick the apple and eat it. If you see a cow in your yard, you will not run at it full speed and bite it on the neck. Why? It's not human nature. If it were nature we would eat meat raw like the rest of nature does. Humans were scavengers until tools. Honestly, what is a human capable of hunting with bare hands. No claws, no fangs, no speed, therefore, no meat.

Answer 6

Yeah,people think omnivore means that you HAVE to eat both meat and plants...when it really just means that you are capable of consuming/surviving off of both.

Answer 7

An omnivore is capable of eating both animal and plant matter. Just because we are capable..does not mean we NEED it by any means.

Answer 8

Larry B:

"The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for white, or women created for men." - Alice Walker

Answer 9

OK, Mr Smartypants, explain to me why cows and pigs even exist. They sure as hell aren't going to win any beauty pageants, although they're probably smarter than Miss South Carolina, at the Miss Teen USA pageant a couple of weeks ago .

Answer 10

Thank you, Mr. Webster.