Martha To Mark:
>Thanks for stating your original point, which I though was a very good
>and valid one.  I'm sorry you got reamed for it.

Reamed? I didn't stand for the ET analogy and its implications, but
_reamed_? We sure have different perspectives, eh?

>Compassion is an
>unpopular stance on this list, and even though your point was not about
>compassion per se, but about being sure we don't delude ourselves, it
>still took a lot of guts to post it.

Now _you're_ at it, Martha. "Compassion is an unpopular stance..." My
Websters says compassion means "deep sympathy; pity". Short and sweet. It
seems that vegans have redifined the word as something that anyone who eats
animal foods lacks. If Mark limited his stance to delusion I would support
it (and have), but he went beyond that, as have you. I may never understand
how that is invisible to you. :/

>Kirt:
>>Animal rights folks seem much more perseverated on compassion and
>>mercy than anyone else. What feelings might they be assuaging?

Martha:
>I looked up both perseverate and assuage in my pocket Websters.
>Perseverate is not in there, so I'll have to assume it's like 'fixated.'

It is a form of "persevere", and fixate is close enough for jazz. "Assuage"
means to mitigate or make less intense, and Mark used it first. Both are in
my dictionary but you can bet I checked after you got me privately earlier
with some word I was misusing ;)

>So,
>back to the time-honored tradition of psychoanalyzing
>compassion-types.  It seems to me they are not assuaging but rather
>trying to live by their feelings.

And everyone else isn't I suppose? Perhaps the time-honored tradition is of
psychoanalyzing non-vegans (I can hardly say non-compassion-types, can I?).
Mark says that Ellie's concept of compassion is really a rationalization. I
ask, in so many words, if the vegans might be rationalizing themselves.
Martha says, no, they are the people who are true to their feelings. Fine,
but I wonder: do you even consider that you may be offbase in generalizing
maternal compassion to a cow eaten as food? I mean, I truly do stop and
feel it out to the best of my ability when someone claims I am
rationalizing. Do you and Mark? Or is "I feel sorry for the cow" as far as
you can take it and you proceed from there to the vegan house of cards?
Whether you believe it or not I feel sorry for the cow too--but that's the
way it goes, that's the "naked facts" (to use one of Mark's phrases) of
being an omnivore. But such a feeling is nothing like the pain I'd feel if
Melisa was killed and eaten by a tiger. There is a huge huge difference.
Trying to make them the same is false-to-my-reality.

I can feel sorry that a cow is born to be my lunch and still have no
problem killing or eating it. I suspect most people feel the same. This is
mot because they are in a trance, but because they are by nature omnivores,
and social mammals to boot. If we didn't have the capacity to distinguish
between our offspring and lunch meat we'd have gone extinct! But now we
have the John Robbins crowd telling us that we are supposed to feel so
sorry for they cow that we could never eat or kill it. Talk about delusions.

I read somewhere that in ancient India the cow was revered as an excellent
source of nutriment (milk, meat, organs, etc.) and of useful raw material
(bone, skin, intestines, etc); that like the buffalo for the Plains
Indians, the cow was a staple animal for the ancient Indian Indians. The
reverence eventually bordered on sacredness and someone finally started to
wonder, "hey, what are we doing killing a sacred animal?" and eventually
there were cows getting the right of way in the streets and a
lacto-vegetarian culture arose.

I don't know how accurate such a summary is, but the modern version seems
to be: 1] living is great 2] all life is great 3] all life should be
revered 4] all life is sacred 5] never should a life be taken, animal or
human (plants are OK though) for any reason including lunch. Except that
eating animals is a part of the life of our species--our birthright. Some
people succeed to a degree on a vegan diet (esp cooked, and esp
w/supplements) and most never completely break from animal foods even if
they want to, but because of the spurious reasoning above people are
expected to aspire to veganism or risk being less compassionate. Just to
prove to you how deserving I am of vegan pity, I will state that even if a
vegan diet/supplement was developed which gave me health which matches my
omnivorous diet, I would _still_ be fine with killing my lunch, because
that is what I am, an omnivore--I need make no excuses for it. And that is
no rationalization, but the naked fact.

>> I know prejudice when I hear it:
>> admit it, you think that non-vegans are simply not as good as vegans.

>This in and of itself smacks of prejudice against veganoids.  (My
>term...should I copyright it?   :-))

Huh? If that somehow sounds to you like its opposite we may as well be
speaking different languages. I am still waiting for a single vegan to
admit that non-vegans aren't as good as vegans are (as opposed to assuming
it) in public and in non-vegan company. I admitted that I HAVE NO PROBLEM
killing for food or eating food that has been killed. Wouldn't it be fair
for a vegan to admit that they think I DO HAVE A PROBLEM outloud and above
board? As far as I can tell that is the whole reasoning behind the John
Robbins/animal rights stance, no? But every time I press the issue its all
kindness and tolerence and sure you can eat whatever you want, but...you
know, well, you'd better think twice about your lack of compassion, mercy,
etc etc etc--that is, if it is not out and out bullying from the likes of
NFL.

>>To pre-judge folks based on lunch seems the silliest of all, but...

>This really begs the question.  If he *was* judging you, which I still don't
>admit, it's not for 'lunch' but for killing.

You haven't a clue about what I've been saying!! Let's try it from this
track: You say killing is bad, compassionless, merciless, or whatever
you'll admit to. I say there is all sorts of killing. Killing for food is
different than killing for sport which is different than killing in a
jealous rage which is different than killing for "patriotism" which is
different than killing for self-defence which is different than killing for
money which is different than killing for fun, etc etc etc. On top of that
killing a human is different than killing a animal, which is different than
killing a plant, which is different than killing a mosquito.

Yeah, of course something ends up dead regardless of motive/circumstance,
but it seems obvious to me that judging me (which I admit you don't admit
Mark did) for killing for food is part and parcel of vegan ethics. The ET
analogy is dripping with judgement. So is your crack that "Compassion is an
unpopular stance..."

Face it:
1] Nearly all foods consumed by animals were once living, or
2] All animals kill for food (assuming plants can be killed, but even so,
insects and microbes are consumed by herbivores), and
3] Humans have killed (and scavanged) their food since before they were human
4] Every known human culture which has ever existed consumes animal foods
which were, of course, once alive

So...on one hand you have the entirety of nature and human culture--which
cares not for the notions of compassion or mercy (with the exception of
maternal and social mammals--the most social of which, BTW, are often
hunters), and on the other you have the, as far as I know only
hypothetical, 100% vegan since birth. Is it not at least _possible_ that
vegan idealism is an abberation of nature and not some next step in
evolution? That compassion has little to do with lunch or with a
once-living lunch?

English has no verb for "killing for lunch" so, at worst, I am equated with
a murderer (which I have been called outright and repeatedly by vegans),
and at best, a merciless killer who is in some sort of trace--because I eat
plants and animals as I was born to. If you can't see how tiresome that can
get, then you might be letting compassion displace empathy.

>>And FWIW, if I ever do sink into dismissing vegans ...

>I'd say that ship has sailed, your stated exceptions notwithstanding,
>based on the remainder of the sentence:

>>it will have nothing to do with their lunch, but everything to do with their
>>tacit "superiority" they excude and the relentless anger they direct
>>toward the "bad guys" who eat the "wrong stuff".

>Sigh....

Yeah, sigh...

>>I'll repeat my original question to you[Mark]: Why must the other fellow
>>defend his/her lunch to you?

>HE NEVER ASKED YOU TO!  What am I missing?  Are you guys having a
>private conversation besides this public one?

No. Mark has said the following:

========
Mark:
>Would the families of the people that were eaten feel gratitude that their
>loved ones were killed with "mercy" and "compassion" because they weren't
>tortured?  I'm afraid I wouldn't be so charitable.  If the ETs felt true
>compassion for us, they wouldn't kill us. [and by the exacting analogy
>which Mark has created: if _humans_ felt true compassion for _animals_
>they wouldn't kill them]

and

Mark:
>When one speaks of killing another being not out of self-defense, but for
>one's own gratification or needs, real or imagined, it would seem to me
>hypocritical to speak of doing so "mercifully."  Look up the word mercy and
>you will find definitions like kindness, compassion, etc.  People who talk
>about killing an animal with kindness or compassion are only trying to
>rationalize their actions to themselves or others.

and

Mark:
>If you are speaking about killing without inflicting suffering beyond that
>needed to kill, I wouldn't call that merciful. I would say that would be
>the bare minimum of decency which should be expected of a human being.  And
>one ought to legimately question whether that standard is being met in our
>slaughterhouses and factory farms.  Even people who go out and kill animals
>on their own are probably, for the most part, inflicting as much if not
>more suffering than the slaughterhouses.

and

Mark:
>But on the scale of my
>individual human-ness, I think it is perfectly natural to expect others, at
>least intelligent beings, to exhibit some kind of kindness and compassion.
>And if they argue that they are merciful and kind and compassionate because
>they are not torturing us, I would argue that a more appropriate word would
>be "non-sadistic."

and in a delightfully frank moment:

Mark:
>I don't mean to judge you or others who eat flesh as less
>compassionate, though I admit to having those feelings at times.
===========

Besides insinuating right and left about how there must be a lack of
kindness, compassion, and/or mercy in one who kills for food--all these
quotes do say to me: justify your lunch.

I don't mean to pick on Mark since any number of aspiring vegans could have
shared similar sentiments (they appear to have read the same books and been
swayed by the same arguments) and apparently Mark deserves special congrats
for being brave enough to go into the lion's den (and certainly for his
clear apology to Ellie). My point is that for all the talk about kindness
and tolerence, there is an often-present undercurrent of hostility to those
who aren't as advanced as the aspiring vegan. But, Martha, for you to say,
"HE NEVER ASKED YOU TO!" is surprising in this context. Mark has been among
the most polite and diplomatic "vegan-ethics" posters I've ever seen on
this list. Yet he will often say, in effect, "I'm sorry, but you are still
wrong" which is fair enough, but I can't really understand your "shouting"
on this topic when it has been the repeated point of his posts (just after
the polite stuff).

>>I have no desire to convert anyone to any point of view. I find (aspiring
>>and actual) vegans to have a corner on "touchiness" when their beliefs
>>are challanged

>I can't even believe you wrote this after the touchiness you've displayed
>here.

You know, it seems like, to a vegan its all equal. I mean, Mark, out of the
blue posts a challange to animal eaters to stop considering themselves
merciful, compassionate, or kind or whatever. We're both born omnivores but
because of the John Robbins' of this culture I am now accountable to anyone
who aspires to be a vegan for my lunch. And you wonder that it gets to be a
sore spot? Or that I am so touchy to the point of actually responding to
such awkward notions? And now I suppose the tables will be turned, eh? "How
would you like it if most people thought you were nuts not to eat animal
foods, if you always had to defend yourself for being more compassionate
than the average carnivore, etc." you might say. Mark wants us to stop
deluding ourselves, but every sacred cow we hold may be a delusion, even
and especially veganism. I am perfectly able to imagine that I am all wrong
about, say, raw foods and look at the landscape afresh from a new
perspective. It seems vegans, however (perhaps because compassion is so
all-important to them) are unable to imagine, even for a second, that they
are all wrong about the evil of killing for food. If you _are_ wrong, then
it all comes tumbling down, doesn't it? So much compassion is probably
needed to hold up such a house of cards. ;)

><<snip rest of diatribe>>
>Do you feel better now?  This whole thing just made me feel really sad.
>But, I've put my helmet on, so flame away, or simply ignore, your choice.

>Cheerless,
>Martha

Do I feel better now? About what? I never had any problem with killing my
lunch in the first place. I'm where I started: without mercy. ;)

Martha, you are probably gonna be sad everytime you turn around since
you'll always be confronted with evidence that vegan ideas are only that,
not some higher ground. With any luck, you'll see that this response is not
a flame, but I suspect, from your point of view, I will be guilty of
increasing your sadness.

Cheerlessness aside,
Kirt