I'll volunteer my response, as a thirty-five year vegetarian. You might not agree, but I hope it's reasoned. By the way, I despise PETA.
Few people will eat a human animal. Why? It's wrong to take the life of such a highly evolved, conscious being unnecessarily. Likewise, few people would eat a monkey or a chimpanzee. Going further down the scale, a billion Hindus won't eat a cow, and probably a similar number of Westerners won't eat a horse or a dog. Most people in the world will eat a bird or a fish. Nearly everyone wll eat a fruit or a vegetable.
To me, it's simply a personal moral choice as to where you make the cutoff. As a vegetarian, I'd rather not take the lives of animals when I can easily subsist on lesser creatures from the plant world.
"I'll volunteer my response, as a thirty-five year vegetarian. You might not agree, but I hope it's reasoned. By the way, I despise PETA."
Fair enough and your reasoned response (congrats!) denies the false dichotomy of meateater vs vegetarian. What we probably both despise is this dichotomy created by the Animal Worshippers that puts them on a different plane than us "savages". Rather than living to help animals, they become egocentric and phoney crusaders.
However, let us do note for the record that western civilizations do eat animals that are on the "dumber than dirt" side - fish, cattle, poultry, eggs have as much personality as cauliflower.
Are you vegan and what do you think about these new meat products that are actually grown in a test tube and violate no life?
Thanks again for your enlightening post.