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Sorry, Vegans: Brussels Sprouts Like to Live, Too
NY Times ^ | December 21, 2009 | NATALIE ANGIER

Posted on 12/22/2009 1:39:23 AM PST by neverdem

I stopped eating pork about eight years ago, after a scientist happened to mention that the animal whose teeth most closely resemble our own is the pig. Unable to shake the image of a perky little pig flashing me a brilliant George Clooney smile, I decided it was easier to forgo the Christmas ham. A couple of years later, I gave up on all mammalian meat, period. I still eat fish and poultry, however and pour eggnog in my coffee. My dietary decisions are arbitrary and inconsistent, and when friends ask why I’m willing to try the duck but not the lamb, I don’t have a good answer. Food choices are often like that: difficult to articulate yet strongly held. And lately, debates over food choices have flared with particular vehemence.

In his new book, “Eating Animals,” the novelist Jonathan Safran Foer describes his gradual transformation from omnivorous, oblivious slacker who “waffled among any number of diets” to “committed vegetarian.” Last month, Gary Steiner, a philosopher at Bucknell University, argued on the Op-Ed page of The New York Times that people should strive to be “strict ethical vegans” like himself, avoiding all products derived from animals, including wool and silk. Killing animals for human food and finery is nothing less than “outright murder,” he said, Isaac Bashevis Singer’s “eternal Treblinka.”

But before we cede the entire moral penthouse to “committed vegetarians” and “strong ethical vegans,”...

--snip--

“Even if you have quite a bit of knowledge about plants,” Dr. De Moraes said, “it’s still surprising to see how sophisticated they can be.”

It’s a small daily tragedy that we animals must kill to stay alive. Plants are the ethical autotrophs here, the ones that wrest their meals from the sun. Don’t expect them to boast: they’re too busy fighting to survive.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Philosophy; Political Humor/Cartoons
KEYWORDS: biology; health; plantbiology; plants; vegans
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To: sergeantdave
Heheheh, I do the same when I see vegans.

“Tomatoes feel pain, too!”

21 posted on 12/22/2009 4:45:49 AM PST by gogogodzilla (Live free or die!)
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To: neverdem

I’m still waiting for my veggies and flowers to defend themselves against deer and bunnies. Pacifists.


22 posted on 12/22/2009 4:57:10 AM PST by Right Wing Assault (The Obama magic is fading.)
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To: skr

Actually, silk worms do die in the process...


23 posted on 12/22/2009 5:05:51 AM PST by KeepUSfree (WOSD = fascism pure and simple.)
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To: neverdem

You don’t have to worry about me. I would never eat a Brussels sprout even at gunpoint.


24 posted on 12/22/2009 5:09:09 AM PST by Fresh Wind ("...a whip of political correctness strangles their voice"-Vaclav Klaus on GW skeptics)
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To: neverdem

Back 60 years ago when my father was teaching me to slaughter and butcher the hogs , he showed me many thing and told me of how the hog was made to be butchered.

The Achilles tendon is there to hang the hog, when you gut the animal if you do it right the whole mass falls into the tub, the intestines are cleaned to hold the sausage links, the hair is used for soap, Nothing is wasted on the hog but the last squeal/

As I sit here this morning enjoying me sausage and eggs I feel sorry for these Vegans who put aside the tasty hams, sausage, the bacon, and go out an buy a processed soy burger.

Well I dont feel so sorry for them that I dont laugh at them.


25 posted on 12/22/2009 5:47:58 AM PST by Venturer
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To: thecabal
"deluded kook"

Like everyone else on this forum, I don't care if a person is a vegetarian or not. But it seems veggie elites are not above lying to to achieve their agenda. Some years ago a stepson of one of my friends argued with me that man has only been eating meat for about ten thousand years and only due to a massive world-wide food scarcity. I tried to set him straight, but I don't know if it registered. Then I knew that the veggie leaders were telling all sorts of tales to gain adherents.

26 posted on 12/22/2009 6:20:49 AM PST by driftless2 (for long term happiness, learn how to play the accordion)
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To: neverdem
Image and video hosting by TinyPic

Could somebody pass the ketchup?

27 posted on 12/22/2009 8:28:35 AM PST by death2tyrants
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To: Venturer
As I sit here this morning enjoying me sausage and eggs I feel sorry for these

Just remember, the chicken is involved, but the pig is committed.

28 posted on 12/22/2009 8:31:32 AM PST by dfwgator
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To: ari-freedom

I started the Vegetable Liberation Organization (VLO) years ago but it never really caught on.


29 posted on 12/22/2009 9:28:18 AM PST by BubbaBasher ("Liberty will not long survive the total extinction of morals" - Sam Adams)
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To: driftless2

“Like everyone else on this forum, I don’t care if a person is a vegetarian or not.”

It’s the “religious” vegetarians you want to tie up and throw in a ditch. I have a close friend who is a vegetarian and I hardly know it because he isn’t “religious” about it (i.e. he doesn’t expect the rest of the world to organize around his food choices).


30 posted on 12/22/2009 9:42:15 AM PST by Owl558 ("Those who remember George Satayana are doomed to repeat him")
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To: muir_redwoods
Plowing an acre of land for a vegetable garden kills and destroys the habitat of millions and millions of insects and worms and other small animals.
Vegetarianism is murder!
31 posted on 12/22/2009 1:11:08 PM PST by BluesDuke (A stitch in time saves a surgeon from a malpractise suit.)
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To: El Gato; Ernest_at_the_Beach; Robert A. Cook, PE; lepton; LadyDoc; jb6; tiamat; PGalt; Dianna; ...
Compound found to safely counter deadly bird flu

Self-monitoring with blood glucose test strips inefficient use of health-care resources (Canada)

Brain Power: Studying Young Minds, and How to Teach Them

'HIV bungle' nightmare

FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list.

32 posted on 12/22/2009 4:21:43 PM PST by neverdem (Xin loi minh oi)
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To: neverdem

All life feeds on other life.

Even plants need nutrients that come from the decay of other things.

Mother nature is ruthless.


33 posted on 12/22/2009 6:11:03 PM PST by TASMANIANRED
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Comment #34 Removed by Moderator

To: BubbaBasher
I started the Vegetable Liberation Organization (VLO) years ago but it never really caught on.

Years ago I read about radical fruitarians. They live on fruit and nuts and won't pick until it's falling off the tree. They permit grass mowing, but only after the grass has had a chance to reproduce (go to seed).

35 posted on 12/25/2009 2:36:21 AM PST by SupplySider
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To: Yehuda
it’s the exploitation, what’s the matter with you!?! /s ( : >)

That is their argument. They consider honey a product of slavery!

I'm a life long vegetarian, not a vegan, but I am aware of the silent scream of the brussels sprout, so to speak. We all take life to survive.

My philosophy is, choose the point on the food chain you think is best, and respect the choice of others.

I far prefer the attitude of hunters, who typically respect the lives they take, over self-important veggie cranks like PETA ( people for the unethical treatment of humans).

36 posted on 12/25/2009 2:50:50 AM PST by SupplySider
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