For those of you who eat meat:

[urbpan]

Why do you?

And why do I have to think about what I eat and you don't?

Comments

[hai-kah-uhk.livejournal.com]

Family relations. They're a lot less strained if I eat what I'm served at the all-important family feasts. I know because I've tried it both ways. Family ended up winning over vegetarianism.

I don't have to think about what I eat? Says who? If I could stop thinking about it, trust me, I would.

[reinadelaire.livejournal.com]

yeah.. I was a vegetarian for a while and the only reason i haven't gone back yet is because I'm living with a lot of meat-eaters that find it difficult enough with me not eating beef.. I'd rather not put them through the strain of vegetarianism.

i'd really like to go back, but i know i would have to do a ton more planning than I did the last time or else my health will suffer for it. quesadillas and bagels are not a balanced diet. (of course i was at college too so there was no hope of a balanced diet anyways)

[chocomocha.livejournal.com]

(Due to some rather unfortunate/humorous typos, I had to delete and repost this!)

I'm curious to see responses to this. :)

I was just about to post something similar in one of the vegan communities on LJ about why it seems that so many meat-eaters are offended by my choice to not consume meat. Immediately, I'm almost always confronted with, "you should eat meat!" Never have I once shouted (or said quietly!) in an omnivore's face, "You should STOP what you're doing right now! It bothers and confuses me!!!"

I find it similar to the treatment I get from Christian-types who take offense at the fact that I'm agnostic. It's like, why should my personal choices require explanations? Also, why must the vast majority try to convert me or tell me I'm going to Hell or I should get 'saved' while I still can?

I've sort of come to see it as this, though: People part of large groups are threatened by things/beliefs/attitudes different from the 'norm.' The possibility that what they have always considered 'natural' or 'right' isn't the only option to live by freaks them the hell out and because they've never questioned this before, well, then what's different has just gotta be wrong.

Anyway, sorry to get all ranty in your post. :) The whole thing is so interesting to me on both personal and sociological levels. :)

Go you.

[gythiawulfie.livejournal.com]

I tried Vegan. It didn't like me back. (We don't all have the same body types and different bodies require different things. Then again, people swear I am more wolf than not.)

I will tell you some of the BEST foods I have had, have come from the Vegan side. Ya'll do some awesome stuff with spices I never dreamed of, and I incorporate alot of your recipies with mine. Your's are my side dishes.

Now why I am not a red meat ever day kind of person, I do eat meat every day. Not in massive quantities.

And if you read my other post below, you will see I would rather eat game, that the stuff you get in the supermarket.

However, I will grant you this, the reaction you mentioned about meat eaters toward vegans, well, lets just say I wanted to sock a few vegans for telling me I murdered animals because animals were alive. I made the mistake of mentioning plants were also alive, and I, being a shaman could hear the screams and pleas not to be cut down and eaten. That didn't go over to well, as you can imagine.

Hmm Mixed Bag

[gythiawulfie.livejournal.com]

I went Vegan for 6 months. Made sure I got everything I needed elsewhere that I usually got from meat. My body? Hated it. All the stuff that was supposed to get better got worse. We have no idea why. I took multivitamins to make sure my iron didn't drop (It went to nil) and my choleserol got worse, not better. My doc was a confuzzled as I was.

So, I went back to eating meat. Now, I don't eat red meat alot, and neither pork. I will say I eat more chicken and fish than anything else.

Pork about once a month.
Beef about once a week, which is fine.

I am however, primarily an omnivore.

I also eat game. I would prefer to eat game more than processed stuff from the supermarket.

I also try to buy free range and organic whenever possible. I would prefer my meat did not have the gazilion tons of anitbiotics and steroids they do.

[ms-cantrell.livejournal.com]

i sometimes eat locally grown, free-range, organic chicken.

way back when i first stopped eating all meat, i caught hell all of the time. not many vegetarians in Reno in the late 80s. then i went vegan and they decided i was a lost cause, and they left me alone. mostly for me, it was a disgust with the meat industry. when i came across ethical meat, i was happily back to being vegetarian again, and didn't want it.

my husband, though, had a really hard time switching to fake meat products, and so i'd get him poultry. after several years, about 7, i think, i started eating it every few months. no red meat in the house, no mass-produced, commercial meat - it's all from local ranches, free range, organic, happy right up until it's dead.

[ms-cantrell.livejournal.com]

oh! i should have used this icon...

[mildmannered.livejournal.com]

It's delicious.

That said, I don't like the meat industry or what it does to animals, farmers, the environment, and the general public.

I eat a lot of fish. I eat chicken and turkey. Beef very rarely. Pork's never been a big part of my diet. If I could find a good source of ethical red meat, I would be very happy; this might be something I look into when I'm more settled in my life.

Thinking about food is like thinking about where my clothes come from. The miserable life of the person who stitched my sneakers. I'm part of a food chain; thinking about it too hard makes me crazy. So mostly I try just to live a worthy life.

I'm not one of the ones who walk away from Omelas, if you know what that means.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_bazilisk_/]

1)Convenience, convenience, convenience.

It's everywhere. Ubiquitous, even!

2)And the reason I went back all those years ago (cough! 2005) was the social reason. It caused undue strain on my family and friends. I HATED feeling like the problem child, when family or family of friends would get all uppity about either A) "You really should eat meat, you know." or B) "Here, I think this dish is vegetarian, you eat fish, right? No? Well, when we come back you can have a cheese pizza, I have one in my freezer! Oh, dad, did you buy her those veggie burgers I told you to buy?"

3) I HATE the feeling of being restricted in what I eat. Being a vegetarian for a while made it like having a food allergy to any product made of flesh: it makes you sick to accidentally or intentionally have some after not having it for a while. Eew! I am really into trying new and weird foods, and most of them have meat in them.
It felt like I was limiting my experience on earth by having such a limited palette, much of the time.

4) The political reason I stopped eating meat in the first place, a protest against factory farming, started to sound hollow. I stop eating meat, all the meat companies have to do is make burgers a hundredth of an ounce larger and they still will sell as much meat as before and kill as many cows. I felt very outwitted by the corporate smarts.


I find myself slowly inching away from meat again, just because of how gross the food service meat is on campus. I eat it once every day or two at this point, and I could see it dropping down to once or fewer times a week. But I don't want to become "allergic" to it again, and I am not fooling myself into thinking I am actually changing the world like I did last time.

[jenhime.livejournal.com]

I eat meat. I think about the food I eat.

In fact, I spend a lot of time looking at what I'm eating and where its coming from and how it was raised -- both veg and meat. When I eat chicken, I think of the hens in my backyard; when I eat beef, I think of the dairy cows I've met. I understand and respect that meat comes from animals.

I don't think I can point to one reason that I eat meat. It seems to be equal parts tradition, health (anemia), and the fact that I think it tastes good. I have no problem with vegetarianism and eat quite a few meatless meals each week.

My husband comes from a long line of farmers and I've seen feedlots firsthand. I fully understand that grain/vegetables farming isn't necessarily more ethically produced than meat ranching. I believe there are ways to raise food (including meat) in an ethical and sustainable manner and I think that supporting those farmers is more important than not eating meat at all because no-one's going to convince most meat-eating people that they shouldn't eat meat. Food is cultural identity, in many respects.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_bazilisk_/]

And I do think about what I eat. Obsessively.

I just came to different conclusions about the efficacy of food-protest than you did.

[bloolark.livejournal.com]

Because I don't think it's morally wrong to kill animals for food. Because it's tasty. Because it's REALLY tasty.

Seriously, though, I don't find it morally wrong to kill animals for food, which seems to be the basis of moral vegetarianism. I do think it's morally wrong to torture animals for food, which is why nearly 100% of the meat I eat comes from local, organic, healthy farms (something that BC is really good at -- their requirements for organic farms include a high quality of care for the animals).

Also, did I mention tasty? :)

[sayashaw.livejournal.com]

Meat is always an interesting subject for me... I have a lot of friends that are Vegan or vegetarian, and i've run across a lot of people who look at me like i'm the anti-christ when I say I eat meat and probably couldn't live without it. I have lived on a farm for the last 17 years of my life, and though I love my dairy cows, i couldn't not eat them...they're delicious! I love chicken, I love pork...and I who says people who eat meat don't think about what they're eating...I don't do a lot of store bought meat (i eat mostly beef and that comes from my back yard) and when I do buy meat I try to be conscious of were it comes from. I have great respect for people who can do without meat, I just don't have that kind of self control, quite frankly.

[bunrab.livejournal.com]

habit, the way I was brought up, lack of willpower, laziness, need for easy protein. At least I'm honest about my reasons!

[calypso72]

A recommendation to your meat-eating friends: Read The Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter by Peter Singer.

The meat (and dairy, egg, poultry, and fish) production system today isn't good for the animals, it isn't good for us, and it isn't good for the environment. The only way to make it better is to boycott it completely.

[roaming.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the suggestion, I just ordered it.

[klandaghicat.livejournal.com]

Partly because my folks, I guess. We would regularly have meat, go to steak restaurants, raised our own meat. My sister just under me has never been a big meat or dairy eater, though. I've always been adventurous with food, eating all kinds of stuff. I've also learned that I have a physical requirement for a certain amount of animal protein and fat. I've tried going without and supplementing with alternatives. It led to joint problems and several health problems that went away (mostly) once I started eating meat again.

I still think about what I eat. I don't make the best choices sometimes. I try to limit red meats until my body starts craving it. My hubby can tell when I'm lacking, sometimes before I do. Even though he was vegetarian when we got married, he'll buy me a steak if I need it.
I just try to relate to my weasels and their need for meat, to make it easier.

[mandy-moon.livejournal.com]

I've noticed that a lot of people here commented that they received a lot of pressure from families and others over their decision not to eat meat. This I find interesting. I don't think it's because these people are freaked or threatened by somebody doing something not the norm.

I think people have a visceral reaction to those who refuse their offerings of food because since the dawn of civilization, breaking bread, feasting, etc. were ways to demonstrate that the people were trusted friends. To refuse one's offer suggests that the person who refused it is refusing a peace offering.

And meat- meat is a huge part of what brought us together as social animals. Chimps needed to develop sophisticated hunting tactics and methods of communication to hunt colobus monkeys. Humans had to do the same in order to hunt. In ancient human times, and in current chimp times, meat was/is a valuable commodity and used as currency.

[gigglingwizard.livejournal.com]

To refuse one's offer suggests that the person who refused it is refusing a peace offering.

That's very insightful. I know when I used to be a vegetarian, I used to get anxious about the subject coming up, not because I was afraid someone would jump down my throat about it, but just because it felt so awfully rude to reject someone's sincere hospitality like that. It's the same way I feel now as a pagan being invited to relatives' baptisms and first communions and such.

[roaming.livejournal.com]

Because you're more awake, aware, and evolved? That's my guess.

I eat meat because it tastes good -- BUT I don't have to see it's face, and I don't have to kill it myself. And I allow myself the selfish convenience of denial. Because it feels like it would be very hard to completely go without meat -- I don't want to go without bread or pasta either, but I should -- despite vegan/veggie programs that promise how simple it is.

I do believe that if I were a better person I would consciously choose to eat no meat at all. I salve my conscience by not eating meat all the time, avoiding veal totally, choosing "free range" and local and hoping it was killed quickly and painlessly. And yeh, I feel bad about it. Obviously not bad enough to give it up. Or fight with my steak'n'potatoes husband about it every meal.

[bluelinegoddess.livejournal.com]

It's delicious. Especially beef.

I personally don't care what people choose to eat or not. It has absolutely no effect on my life, why should I care?

[reinadelaire.livejournal.com]

I went back to eating meat for a bunch of different reasons. It seemed like it was impacting my health, not necessarily because of the lack of meat but the lack of variety. I had a very poor diet for a while, and like others have said, it sucks when others are doing the cooking or buying for you and you feel like a pain in the ass.

Big gatherings and potlucks always involved me with a salad, and going out to eat was difficult as well because some restaurants don't even have vegetarian options! There was one place in Canada that we went to eat at, and my meal was french fries. no salad, nothing. just french fries.

i don't think that the experience of being a vegetarian was limiting though, because it made me try a lot of new and different foods and really change my perspective on what makes a meal. i still don't eat beef but that's so much less problematic than being a vegetarian.

one thing i do miss is when someone shoves something disgusting in my face, urging me to try it and being able to reply, "sorry, i don't eat meat." i'm already a picky eater and i always have been, but "i don't eat meat" is a much more acceptable and even more polite refusal than "i don't like trying things when i'm not exactly sure what is in them and it looks like that thing is wicked gross. get it out of my face kthx."

[sydneycat.livejournal.com]

I was vegetarian for a few years...I went back to being an omnivore because of social pressure and the feeling of lack. I grew up in a meat and potatoes home and it just didn't work for me to be vegetarian (my family were not at all supportive of my being vegetarian). And to be honest it was when I was in college and I did it because the girl I liked and then the one I ended up dating were both vegetarians. It wasn't for a legitimate enough reason at that point to keep me committed.

I think in the end though it's that I like the taste of meat and enjoy cooking it. And I have the cynical belief that even if I was veggie it wouldn't really make a big difference, especially since everyone else in my family unit eats meat. I *do* try to get as much of my meat as possible from sustainable sources and I do try to support local farmers as much as possible.

[mizdarkgirl.livejournal.com]

I feel better when I have a high protein diet... My blood sugar is easier to control and I am able to keep the weight off. But I am not eating Atkins, the lack of veggies would make me very sad & I would feel awful.

So for me, it is a matter of balance. I am not saying one way is best, just eating meat is best for me. I hunt down good vegan recipes for my friends as well!

[donnad.livejournal.com]

Well to start with I have to continuously think about what I can and cannot eat, I have so many food allergies and sensitivities, many things will make me very sick.

I eat meat because without it I get sick. I have always been anemic, taking supplements doesn't work for me because I have bad reactions to some of the additives. I need the proteins in real meat. The few times I tried to become a vegetarian I ended up so sick I was hospitalized.

In fact when I was sick a few weeks ago I realized that I hadn't had any red meat for about two weeks. That hunk of steak tasted so good and I felt so much better after I ate it.

I can't seem to get sufficient protein from other foods. I can't eat soy in large enough quantities for it be a sufficient source of protein. I also have a sensitivity to foods high in beta carotene so that cuts out huge amounts of vegetables. I have a broken enzyme in my body and I cannot efficiently process fat soluable vitamins,if I consume anything high in fat soluables (vit A, E etc.) I have what would be considered overdose reactions to them. I am miserable for 6 to 8 hours or until whatever it was I ate is processed through my system.

Two of the few things I can eat with no problems is beef and chicken. So I eat meat, every meal if I can.

[morgi.livejournal.com]

Despite often liking animals better than humans, I don't see killing animals for food as any worse than killing plants for food. I see meat as something humans have evolved to include in their diet. I like meat very much, just as I like vegetables and pasta and fish bread and milk.

Also, as an end-stage renal patient I think it would be very difficult to get sufficient iron and protein from a vegetarian diet, even if I were inclined to try.

[melannen.livejournal.com]

I went mostly vegetarian back when I was living in a situation where I could do it without causing massive inconvenience to other people (although even then, I live on dairy, and I would occasionally cave and eat chicken.)

Basically, if I wanted to be strict about it on the moral level, I feel like I would have to go strict-vegan, and I'm not (entirely) convinced that a lettuce is that much less sentient than a sardine anyway - differently sentient, but it lives and feels. If I really wanted to live my convictions I'd go fruitarian (with humanely-harvested eggs and dairy and wool), but I just don't have the resources (monetary or emotional) right now to do it without messing up a lot of other things, and I don't know if I ever will.

On a health level, my diet sucks, and when I was going mostly-vegetarian (even though I was making sure to get lots of dairy) my energy level would be so noticeably up on the one day a month I had a chicken sandwich that I know that keeping balanced on a vegetarian diet is going to be a lot more work for me than keeping one with occasional meat.

And on the environmental level, yeah, meat is bad, and mutant hormone-and-drug-pumped factory raised meat is very bad, but on the scale of all the evironmentally bad things involved in modern food and product production, that just scratches the surface. So, again, if I had the resources, I'd go all-organic, all-local, all low-impact, but right now I have to compromise.

I kind of feel like everyone is making those compromises (even if they're strict fruitarian, or practicing ahimsa, or living out of their own garden) because, so long as we're not primary producers, we have to kill to eat, and I want to live. My line of compromise is quite a bit fuzzier and farther out than some people's, but I do always try to think about what I eat and choose the most ethical option when I can.

Honestly, the way food is sold, marketed, and, really, culturally processed these days, anybody who has to avoid specific ingredients, especially classes of specific ingredients, is in for a hard time. (I've friends who have to avoid all beef, no matter how processed, and the list of things they can't eat constantly suprised me at first. And I don't know how gluten-free people do it all. I get enough flak just from living on the Chesapeake and being shellfish intolerant.) I feel like as long as I'm living a mostly restaurant and ready-made lifestyle, without a lot of time shopping or cooking, flexible compromise is the best option. I usually only eat actual hunks of flesh once or twice a week these days, usually poultry, but the amount of heavily processed meat by-product I take in is more than I really want to try to add up. And I'm okay with that, right now.

[badnoodles.livejournal.com]

1.) I eat meat because it's delicious. No vegetable product will ever match the complexity, the texture, the sheer beauty of a well-prepared cut of meat. As much as I love squash casserole, it has never brought tears to my eyes the way a flame-broiled filet does.

2.) It contains conveniently packaged nutrients that I have evolved specific biological mechanisms to utilize. From teeth to bowels, I am designed to consume both vegetable and animal products. While I can exist on nothing but plant material if I choose, it is easy and tasty to also consume meat.

3.) I see no moral quandary in killing and eating other creatures. We are all part of the food chain, or should be. Meat eaters should be aware that their food comes from a living animal and should respect and not waste it.

4.)I see no moral quandary in raising animals for slaughter. Humans aren't tooth-and-claw predators, we hunt with our brains. We have discovered that rearing docile, tasty animals is a more efficient and reliable means of providing animal protein for the majority of people than individual hunting of wild prey.

5.) Meat should be produced within basic humane standards, which is why I do not eat veal or foie gras. However, I don't think that cows need hugs and kisses or chickens need to roam around eating bugs to be considered humane.

6.) Meat should be produced under sustainable ecological conditions. I don't eat a wide variety of fish because the stocks are outrageously depleted. For farmed animals, whoe populations are non-threatened, use of feed and water for meat production are justified /to me/ because of the deliciousness and dietary contribution they bring to many people.

7.) There are some aspects of large-scale meat production that I dislike, such as widespread use of antibiotics. That is an issue I have with the /system/ not with the product. Similarly, I dislike and advocate against the patent process of GMO products, while wholeheartedly advocating their use.

8.) Non-meat eaters have to think about their food because their excluded class size is large. They will only eat (VEG not MEAT), whereas a meat consumer will eat (VEG not MEAT), (VEG and MEAT), and (MEAT not VEG). Even if veganism were the norm, not an unusual exception, a conscious non meat-consume would have to consider their food more carefully than someone more omnivorous.

[perspicuity.livejournal.com]

mostly what you said...

i was raised that way. there was no concept of alternatives for a large portion of my life. when i did learn of such, a lot of the new wave adopties really didn't look healthy to me - they weren't getting as full a spectrum of nutrients that they needed. things change, people learn.

a lot of vegans, most? and many vegetarians live on fairly narrow spectrums of food inputs as i understand it. LOTS of soy. lots and lots. plus some nuts and other things. if they're totally animal free (including insects in their brocoli), they have to know more about what they're eating to be healthy. that's the "thinking part"... monoculture food is scary in these times of highly processed foods.

so, i wasn't initially impressed with being "meat free". i love the taste and texture and how i feel when i get it. i've tried a mix of being vegetarian, i love my dairy and eggs, however, i've noticed i really perk up and have a ton of energy and stamina if i have my meat. i got sick more and needed longer to recover. one might say that i wasn't doing it right? well, perhaps, but i was doing as well as could be figured out. meat is easy peasy and i enjoy it.

meat sources. in the more distant past, i've fished, and hunted frogs and snakes and what not. foraged for plants and berries and fruits. i've lately learned a lot more plants i can eat in the wild, and what some of the benefits are. i'd have no problem going forth with bow and arrow and taking game for food, and utilizing the whole animal and its gifts.

road kill. no really. fresh road kill is a gift of the gods. why waste it? freshly dead from other causes (fell off cliff for instance goat), nummy num num. scavengers get all the meat, without the guilt.

if someone can point out a food source that does such wonderful things as a bacon cheese egg burger with [bean] chili and veggies but is meat/animal free, let me know :)

#

[mellawyrden.livejournal.com]

I eat it occasionally, mostly chicken and fish. I won't eat red meat or pork.

non flesh options for obtaining protein tend not to work for me.. I'm absolutely flat-out dead allergic to eggs... soy products make me ill.

[lindyhoppr.livejournal.com]

I am a big believer that what you eat nourishes you, because it was once alive, and you are being fed by the life force. Therefore, cows, tomatoes, lettuce, chicken, fish, all have life force, and will nourish my body. So I eat what tastes good.

I do eat things that were raised without cruelty whenever possible. I don't support fast food companies, big corporation farming, or pesticide-laden vegetables. I'll take my money elsewhere.

So, I guess I have to think about what I eat as much as anyone else. Except maybe people with gluten allergies. That stuff is everywhere.