How to Start a Flamewar
Just ask a simple question about why vegetarians are so widely ridiculed/marginalized. Holy cow. Four pages of comments, and growing!
Also, an unrelated bonus flame:
One larger point here is that, while “rising stars” like Sanford and Jindal may be individually compelling, they must operate within a Republican Party that has enthusiastically embraced ignorance on a whole host of subjects, economics included. The issue is whether they can escape these constraints.
December 5th, 2008 at 1:59 pm
Vegetarians aren’t marginalized anymore. EPA is proposing a fee of about $175 for each dairy cow, $87.50 per head of beef cattle and $20 for each hog for greenhouse gas emissions. This under the Bush administration. Wait till the Obamalamadingdongs get ahold of the EPA.
via Drudge:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081205/ap_on_bi_ge/farm_scene_cow_tax_2
December 5th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
People tend to have visceral reactions to things that make them think something they like is going to be taken away. I’m a veggie myself but I have little interest in trying to force people to not eat meat, and find the supposition to the contrary kinda funny.
Frankly I think the market is going to sort this one–eventually the cost of high carbon foods will make it a lot more attractive to eat lower on the food chain.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Sebastian-PGP: A “market” with the thumb of the government firmly planted on one of the scales, you mean.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
I can’t produce a number of proteins from their components like most people do, so for medical reasons. It bugs me for slightly different reasons than most.
For most people, it’s the hypocrisy of the (average non-PGP) vegetarian, the insistence that killing for food is somehow especially horrible. Humans kill things. Run over a deer, walk across an ant pile, decide to take a long shower and borrow water a wild animal could have used, you’re killing something. Drawing a line in the sand for that sort of pathetic joke is just self-deception.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:25 pm
Why would I flame somebody for making sure there were more steaks for me?
I do have one nit to pick, however: The restaurant from which I like to get my steak dinners has veggie items on the menu to accommodate the frail and sickly, but when I go to lunch with my neurasthenic pretentious vegan friends, their favorite eatatorium (“Gaia’s Groundnuts”, or whatever the hell it’s called,) doesn’t have any pulled pork or rare filets to stave off my hunger pains. Unfair.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
Harold, the thumb of the government is ALREADY firmly planted one of the scales—meat is heavily subsidized. Not directly, but through public grazing allotments, water subsidies and corn subsidies (50% of corn is fed to livestock). If the government truly washed it’s hands of the whole thing and let “the market” work itself out, then you would probably not be able to afford meat anymore. There’s a reason why throughout human history, meat was often a luxury only the wealthy could afford.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:10 pm
gatt:
I think that oversimplifies why many vegetarians are vegetarians, but I also think that it gets at the crux of the matter. As with many groups, the particularly annoying ones get all the attention and give the rest of the group a bad name. (I’m looking at you, PETA.)
I personally know several vegetarians who are vegetarians for economic and/or environmental reasons having nothing to do with “killing animals is wrong.” Heck, I even knew one vegetarian who was so simply because she had some averse reactions to meat a couple of times.
Tam:
There are plenty of places that don’t offer any vegetarian options. Here in Memphis, at least, it’s pretty damn tough to find decent vegetarian options — even the salads have meat on them! 🙂 It wouldn’t surprise me in the least, then, that a place that explicitly bills itself as a vegetarian or vegan restaurant wouldn’t offer meat, just as it wouldn’t surprise me that I can’t go into a kosher restaurant and get a bacon cheeseburger.
Your complaint that some restaurants that serve meat also have vegetarian options, but vegetarian restaurants don’t offer meat, is rather like complaining that Wal-Mart sells guns, so why the hell doesn’t the gun shop sell lawn mowers?!? Or, why the hell doesn’t this Atkins Diet™ place serve me a baked potato and dinner rolls?!?
Also, for what it’s worth, I’m pretty sure that your “frail and sickly” remark is precisely the sort of macho ridicule and marginalization publius was talking about. 😉
Guav:
He could probably afford meat, but would have to settle for lesser cuts, and/or eat it less often. Which, I think, was Seb-PGP’s point.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
I think it’s probably because every single person has encountered that one preachy up their own ass vegetarian in their neighborhood who ruins it for other vegetarians. You get the speech. I have. The result was I ordered 3 burgers to make up for the one she wasn’t going to eat and to add one more.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
Thumb on the scales or not, the market for protein in animal form is going to get pricey if even 1/100th of what scientists are telling us about food production, climate, population growth, overfishing, etc is true.
In cases where you have market failure and the cost you pay doesn’t reflect the actual cost of the product in question (oil and meat come to mind), govt is going to get its say.
One way or the other. You may as well get used to the idea.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
Uncle:
Substitute “gun nut” or “environmentalist” or “Christian” for “vegetarian,” and you’ll have identified a pretty common problem. Thing is, vegetarians for whatever reason seem to be the brunt of a lot more contempt than the other groups, and I don’t think they’re any preachier by and large. Maybe it’s just because there are fewer of them, I dunno.
December 5th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
I remember having a company lunch-in where we substituted lasagna for something sort of vegan lasagna instead. The results were not pretty.
But I guess it has to do, at least in my experience, that a lot of smug college kids are vegans (the majority of vegetarians, vegans, whatever I knew).
December 5th, 2008 at 6:59 pm
“…why vegetarians are so widely ridiculed/marginalized.”
Uh, ’cause 90% of their rationalization has to do with ridicule and contempt for classic American omnivores. There’s been an on-going movement to create disgust and hatred of meat eaters, most especially white male meat eaters, going back at least to the 1960s. I could fill an encyclopedia with examples from popular media.
Additionally, we unapologetic omnivores understand that the human body is designed to be omnivorous, and that cutting animal protein out of one’s diet ranges from dangerous to unhealthy to outright child abuse in the case of parents feeding their kids a vegetarian diet.
This is the classic leftist M.O; Poke and prod and poke and prod at regular Americana for several decades, including legislation, and then when they get a small taste of their own medicine, they cry “Unfair abuse!” Fuck all of them. If someone is politicizing their food choices, they have mental problems. That I bring it up occasionally in defense of free choice is their fault and theirs alone. If they can’t take criticism, they can always shut the fuck up and stop criticizing others. Deal?
And t; For someone who claims to be a political agnostic you sure do promote the leftist mentality, oh, about 100% of the time.
December 5th, 2008 at 8:52 pm
Lyle:
I think you’ve got the wrong impression of me. I’m apathetic toward gun issues, with a general lean in favor of gun rights. But I’ve never even attempted to hide my liberal tendencies. I’m an unabashed liberal, especially on most social issues. My main blog is called “Lean Left,” for Chrissakes! I gave a pretty good overview of my politics when I started blogging back in July of 2003 (has it been that long?), so if you’re interested, you should go read that.
It’s worth noting that since writing that, I’ve warmed quite a bit to the idea of some sort of single-payer health care, in large measure because the market has failed to provide accessible health care for everyone, and because the skyrocketing costs I feared managed to happen anyway, even without government involvement.
As to your 90% figure, I’m thinking that exaggeration is based on what I wrote above, about the noisy ones ruining it for everyone. Most of the vegetarians I’ve encountered have been completely non-judgmental. Sure there are the obnoxious dickheads, but you’ll find those in any group.
December 5th, 2008 at 8:57 pm
tgirsch,
Shut up and buy a low-carbon-footprint tofu gun for Jesus, you neurasthenic hippie. 😉
December 5th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
Speaking of environmentalist boomsticks, my brother-in-law did get me lead-free ammo for Christmas a couple of years ago…
December 5th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
Whether or not one believes in the Neanderthal-Remnant theory of autism, I do believe that I’m a borderline autie, and that I do better, and think better, the more meat I eat.
I do think that the “Caveman Diet” has been established as the optimum human diet. It’s a shame that most people can’t afford it.
December 5th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
tgirsch
Pretty much accurate, at least as far as I can tell. PGP-style vegetarians are a matter of discussion of facts or predictions, which is a lot easier to honestly debate. Idealists — speaking as one — aren’t, and that tends to get similar qualities of debate in response.
That’s not to say I agree with PGP’s viewpoint; I’m pretty sure that the numbers work out a little differently when you look at articial fisheries and remember that most cereal grains are easiest to produce away from oceans and in heavy CO2.
December 6th, 2008 at 12:42 am
The Caveman Diet? Which caveman diet is that? If it’s what I think it is, the exact opposite is probably true. Not sure what you’re saying “optimum” is.
Not sure what disagreement gattsuru thinks he’s raising, but much as the planet obviously can’t sustain the standard of living of the American consumer for all 6bil plus people on earth, it can’t sustain a meat heavy diet for all of them either. The point stands–the further up the food chain you go, the more carbon heavy and energy intensive you go.
The idea someone else raised that vegetarianism equal child abuse is so stupid I’m ashamed to address it, but it usually comes from someone thinking vegetarian = I only eat vegetables. Duh. Er…no. From conception on up to adulthood, you can do just fine without animal protein unless you’re a real idiot.
December 6th, 2008 at 7:08 am
Caveman diet = fruits, roots, nuts, salads and the occasional small animal or fish. No cereals.
Basically what chimpanzees eat. When Jerry Pournelle was a starving grad student, he supplemented his diet with Purina Chimp Chow. He didn’t like it, but it nourished him adequately.
December 6th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
I dunno. I’ve never had one of the other groups lambaste me for no reason. They have lambasted me but because I asked. Vegetarians, not so much.
December 6th, 2008 at 2:09 pm
I still chuckle over the old definition of vegetarian – old Indian word for bad hunter.
I don’t care what any one eats or doesn’t eat. But the problem that I see is that a lot of people who go the vegetable route don’t do the research needed to ensure that they get everything they need in the way of nutriments.
Heck, I KNOW I don’t eat the way I should – at least according to the food police – but I do some serious vitamin supplements to minimize that.
December 6th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
Selective dietery restrictions are a primary means of one group differentiating and separating itself from another. Cultures do it on purpose to define their boundaries and create customs. I don’t know what kind of culture defines itself by Tofurkey though, that’s a strawman.
I grew-up and lived in a foreign country populated predominantly by vegetarian weaklings. The big and robust people who lived there were those who were not diet-restricted by religion. That included people who lived outside town in separate, segregated housing (another village). They were Untouchable by caste and trade, and handled dead animals and other waste that the high-caste people absolutely refused to touch or even go near. They were often larger, stronger, and healthier than their Elite-status counterparts, despite other disadvantages. One advantage was that their actual physical segregation from the Elite population enabled them to be free of some of the diseases that swept through the Elite’s villages.
I wrote my Anthro Thesis on this stuff which is my only claim to anything – have your way with that.
Many of the local people are “vegetarians” in only the most strict religious sense as non-beef eaters. Most Indian *country-people* (I didn’t spend much time in The City) commonly eat chicken and fish, and almost everybody ate dairy products of some sort. However the more vegetarian a person was or acted, the higher their religious status rose. There is a definite quid-pro-quo towards increasing personal status and religious holiness associated with vegetarian behavior and stringency.
Many local Christians (and other non-Hindus) also maintain a vegetarian or near-vegetarian diet out of respect and some coercion for the dominant population of Hindu neighbors – which, since some of those Christians are being attacked and killed somewhat randomly and brutally in small East Coast villages and forced to convert to Hinduism, that vegetarianism doesn’t seem to have worked very well as an appeasement gesture. Understand that the Christian minority population is about 10-percent and was established and has existed in the area since the 1700’s as an alternative to the dominant paradigm Hinduism represents, and after three-hundred years it’s not unusual to find entire Christian villages and even partly-dominant regions along the East Coast.
I tried being a vegetarian for a while and it was fairly easy to do “Indian-style” during the year I spent there – but it was rather unsatisfying and I returned to a more diverse diet when I came back to America.
Also as far a Hindu culture goes I found that in general Indians really don’t care what you eat, they only care what THEY eat. I was never badgered or lectured one way or the other about diet, and enjoyed some very good High-Brahmin vegetarian cooking at a popular restaurant I frequented and with high Caste families that I knew, but mainly nobody gave a crap and would never flame a person about it.
December 6th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
After telling us how to recycle, what to buy, what we can do to our property, and how big a car we will be allowed to drive, I suppose most people’s line in the sand starts somewhere near the pit that’s used to create the most wonderful mallard reaction known to mankind.
I think I’ve worked out most of the food prejudice out of my system a few years ago, but doesn’t even think of telling me what to stick in my mouth. (and on that note, while your mind is in the gutter, keep your laws out of the bedroom and the kitchen). tgirsch, this extends to the fucking nanny state laws against transfats too.
As an aside, I’d like to point out my observation about many of the non-meat foods that are accepted as complete meals by the meat-eating. Grilled cheese sandwich, peanut butter sandwich, Falafal, etc. all seem to have a healthy dose of fat.
Let’s face it, as far as I’m concerned, tofu is only good when it’s soaking in meat sauce, deep fried, or smothered in enough spicy kimchee.
December 7th, 2008 at 10:12 am
JTG, I stand corrected. I remember a lot of Adkins diet idiots insisting that bacon, butter, and cheesesteaks without the bread was the caveman diet and that was the healthy way to eat.
As for the old canard that veggies don’t get enough nutrition, I will take issue with that. Most of us actually do just fine. I still eat dairy and other products and do just fine with B vitamins, iron, etc. Everything you think you can only get with meat is easily found elsewhere in nature–how the hell else do you think the cows and pigs you’re eating got it in their bodies?
December 7th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
“Because the market has failed to provide accessible health care for everyone”
Of course, what you meant to say was that people have failed to grow up, become adults, and take responsibility for their own health care.
December 7th, 2008 at 1:31 pm
i won’t disagree that it’s perfectly possible to live healthily while eating vegetarian, since many people demonstrably do. but that argument isn’t necessarily valid; other critters don’t have the same metabolism(s) we do, so a diet that sustains one animal might not sustain another.
obvious example: dogs don’t need vitamin C in their diet, they can produce it for themselves. humans (and some other simians) have a broken version of that gene, and get scurvy without vitamin C in our diet. so this particular defense of vegetarianism isn’t automatically a good one.
plus, the converse is also true; just as you can eat a healthy diet without meat, it’s possible (provided you’re not squeamish) to eat a healthy diet with only meat in it. the Inuit used to. question then becomes, why trade off one way or the other — and i think that question can give much better grounds for going veg.
December 7th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
rightwingprof:
Right, because the people who can’t afford the $12,000+ per year it costs to buy decent health insurance are in that position because they failed to “grow up” and “take responsibility.” If “the market” decides that health care should be expensive enough that only the relatively well-to-do can get it, then who are we to question the Almighty Market’s wisdom?
And you motherfuckers are the same people who oppose minimum wage laws, too.
December 7th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
Nomen,
I think you’re missing the point I was making, which was merely that the nutrients vegetarians might miss from not eating meet (B vitamins and iron are typically what critics of veggie diets point to) can be found elsewhere in a non-meat diet.
The Inuit having a healthy diet is probably at the very least controversial.
December 7th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
To clarify–there certainly are benefits to eating the types of fats that the Inuit eat, that much seems clear. The benefits of their particular high meat diet they eat certainly don’t provide exoneration for the high meat diet most Americans eat or would eat. There’s a big difference between whale blubber, seal blood, etc and eating Big Macs and bacon.
FWIW I do eat fish and am a big believer in the Mediterranean diet…dig me some Omega3 fatty acids.
December 7th, 2008 at 5:20 pm
girsch , again you’re a damn fool. a large number of the uninsured are uninsured by choice.
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba/ba379/
The ones that make under the amounts stated are generally young, and feel they don’t need insurance because they’re healthy.
And if you can’t eat meat, then you’re a genetic freak and should perish via the libs’ favorite pal, Darwin. You deride people who don’t believe in Darwin, yet you won’t practice his theory of natural selection. Practice what you preach.
December 7th, 2008 at 6:06 pm
My goodness, some of you sound like Methodist’s and Baptist’s arguing over dunking vs. sprinkling for baptism. Meanwhile other denominations are picking out who is going to hell cause they don’t do it right.
I don’t give a crap what people eat and I tend to change my diet from time to time, cutting down on meat, etc. Since mankind has been on earth most of our time has been spent getting enough stuff to eat to stay alive and now we Americans live in a land of plenty and even our poorest people are suffering from too much weight.
What a world when folks can bitch and moan and worry about what others stick in their mouths. Maybe the best thing that could happen to us is for the price of food to go up so that we appreciate what we have, you know, being thankful for our daily bread and all that stuff.
Bottom line to me is that people can live on a lot of different stuff and I personally like hunting and making my own meat whenever possible. I have a lot of frozen venison again and I like that whole back to the earth cycle of life stuff.
God bless each and everyone of you and may your choices help you in your pursuit of happiness.
December 7th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
atlien – you fail evo bio 101. if you’d like to learn about it, try talk.origins and start on their must-read FAQs. (using a scientific theory as if it were a way to insult people is pretty much an automatic debate loser, i’d say. doing so while demonstrating you’ve got some basic misconceptions about how that theory really works…)
December 8th, 2008 at 11:05 am
I became a vegetarian in protest of the mass production of meat. I remember reading that there’s a hog farm in North Carolina somewhere that’s so vast that the area blighted by the resultant pollution can be seen from space. I suspected it was an exaggeration, but the point was clear. Those places are a disaster and I don’t want to participate. I’d have less of a problem with privately raised meat, but by now I’m just not interested in eating meat of any kind. I’m happy eating as a vegetarian.