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Where is the balencing point in taking a life away from an innocent and defenceless sentient animal? Not trolling.. I just don’t get that logic
Thrasher-
It's a fair point.
But ecosystems/animal life cycles depend on animals killing other animals for food. We're animals in the end. And animals in the wild experience stressful fates as prey etc.
I'm not advocating harm to any animal. I think we need to be mindful of animal welfare, create lives for livestock that is humane etc etc. Give animals good comfortable lives. This requires overhauling the industry, raising prices to match the value of the lives of meat, produce less, not having meat focussed diets.
But we are omnivores. We've evolved this way. If you look at ancestral lineages where we split from other primates, it's partly due to the nutrients an energy derived from meat and this has allowed our brains, sociality, and mobility to evolve. But we also evolved in conditions where these things weren't handed to us in a heaping platter.
Brain evolution has given us the innovation to now be in positions of choice. And being vegan, or veggie (I did this for years) etc are luxuries. But it isn't going to work for the average person. Which is why I'll always end up advocating for 'balance' because a large mass of people making small changes can have a larger net effect. Behaviourally, this is easier or the average person to manage.
When I cook at home I mostly buy meat/fish that's on offer/about to be thrown out (because I don't like the idea of waste) or from the butcher. I probably only have 1-2 meals that have meat in them out of the 27 meals in the week. Some things are nicer with meat in it -- e.g. a good bolognese, duck fat roasted potatoes are just better. I have milk in my coffee/porridge but mix it up with Almond/Oat.
r_mash
I'd like to think that eating meat responsibly is all about balance/moderation.
I think we've gone too extreme in our diets, meat-focussed and sugar-focussed. They are easy filling calories.
Michael Pollan's writing on this subject is always reasonable: "a little bit of everything, but mostly veg". I think you're never going to get the average person to cut down in an extreme way (veganism, 100% veggie) -- so it has to be about balance. People's livelihoods depend on meat farming but we just can't do too much of it.