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this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2023
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It is weird just how secretive the slaughterhouses are.
I don't usually discuss this sort of thing very much with carnists IRL, because I tend to find their "arguments" and their positions rather tired and boring and in general completely irrational. The "but where do you get your protein?" type of questions or "I tried being a vegan/vegetarian but it didn't agree with me because of my special DNA due to my ancestry of northern Europeans or whatever" conspiracy theories are especially fun. It's usually the carnists that go out of their way to be activists about their choices, not me.
I'll usually answer direct questions and leave it at that. I find there is a certain type of carnist that get especially defensive (almost always men suffering from toxic masculinity) around the very presence of veg*ns and want to get into arguments, especially while eating.
But there have been times where I've asked why slaughterhouses have so much secrecy in some of these "conversations" where the carnist just won't drop the topic and I've noticed that gives them some pause. At least for a small glimmer of time. I think it is because these carnist activists are the ones with the most amount of guilt and they know that most (normal) people don't want to witness what goes on in slaughterhouses...
Are slaughter houses secretive?
I was raised in an agriculture focused community and did the whole FFA thing in highschool. I've since moved to another state and am now living the life of a city slicker, so maybe I've just become out of touch, but back then none of the "how the sausage is made" stuff was hidden from us. Hell we had a whole field trip to tour a pair of meat processing plants (one for poultry, one for beef).
Have things changed over the last 5-10 years? Is my experience just an outlier?
I think they’re referring to this:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ag-gag
Not necessarily the slaughtering part, but the living conditions that these animals are stuck in, sometimes for years, is barbaric. Imagine being in a cage where you can’t walk and you have to stand in your own shit for days on end.
The ethics of animal slaughter and how it’s done are almost a separate conversation imo. No living creature deserves to be tortured (and outright torture does occur, see Earthlings or Dominion for the details)
It is a separate conversation, and I'm glad you pointed it out because it's an important distinction and one that is far too frequently overlooked.
Bringing an animal into the world with the intent of later killing it when it is entirely unnecessary to do so seems a bit wrong no?
I dunno, maybe your state did not have ag-gag laws.
That's exactly why they're secretive. It's also true of many other industries and processes. There are a lot of things we benefit from that have unpleasant origins. When it comes to meat, you can make a relatively easy choice about it.
In my country it's not a secret how these places operate, I went to a slaughter house as a class trip back in high school + one of our relatives owns a massive chicken and cow farm. The animals' conditions are vastly different here than what I see from these terrifying documentaries.
My favourite kind of carnists are the ones who say "Because you eat none, I'm going to eat two hamburgers!"
Uh, okay. Is that supposed to spite me? Enjoy your heart attack, dickhead.
Oh, right. I didn't even mention how the tired old Dad "jokes" get very boring, very fast. Especially when repeated nearly every time, by the same set of people, at almost every meal. That, or they nearly reflexively have to talk about how much they love meat, love to hunt, love to fish, love to grill, yadda yadda. No one brought up vegn anything mind you, it's just the mere presence of any vegn(s) that seems to cause this....shrug.
Sounds like you are doing a lot. I have found the phrase "the personal is political" became a very real thing for me years ago even when I just started cutting out certain meats (!) - when it came to the reactions of others as they found out, and also realizing in a very visceral way, that, with every single meal, there was a very concrete ethical, ecological, economical and health decision to be made.
I quickly found out that you have to "come out" at work (when food is being ordered out, restaurants are being decided on, etc) and for extended family, etc., even though you really don't want to necessarily answer all the questions, parry all the nonsense in that particular moment. Most people are fine, maybe a small subset groan and roll their eyes, but keep their opinions to themselves, but there is that small percentage that seem to keep harping on it.
I have seen similar reactions to early adopters of hybrid vehicles. Save for EVs later. Or, as a kid, when someone with a legit extreme dairy allergy refused all dairy. It's like there is a certain type of personality that really gets actually offended when someone decides to deviate from whatever system is handed to them as "the norm", whether it's ridiculously high meat and dairy consumption (no matter how harmful it is to themselves, even), or a standard internal combustion engine. Some people seem to really get worked up about it.
Anyway, I do what I can. I have not removed all dairy entirely, nor eggs. I view both as rather harmful to health, given the information we have (and the evidence seems to keep piling up on that), so I don't make them a central component in any meal. I never drank milk anyway even as an omnivore - it's been fairly clear that they are marketing that stuff as a "health drink" (lol) for a reason. Sometimes it's very difficult to assess whether a given food is vegan or even at least vegetarian, but labeling/awareness has grown with time, so that has gotten a bit easier.
I find that so weird and illogical, because what does anyone else's personal and internal choices have to do with me? The only reason I could care would be if I invited you to dinner I was cooking myself and you waited until serving time to mention you don't or can't eat something, and that's because I'd feel bad not being able to feed you. You are a grown ass man (place hyphen(s) wherever tickles your fancy), and get to make your own decisions and life choices. Plus there's more for me.
Maybe it's from growing up in the 90s and 00s, but asking about food allergies, sensitivities, and restrictions should be just another Tuesday for anyone ordering food for a group. But I'd also never expect the group to cater an entire meal around my preferences or restrictions. Grown ass man is successful hunter gatherer.
Now all bets might end up off the table if that respect doesn't extend both ways though, because again, every grown ass man (everyone regardless of gender and older than 18-21 gets to be a "grown ass man", with bonus "grown ass man" points if over 80 and a grandmother (Betty White being the ultimate grown ass man and I'll die on that hill)) gets to make their own decisions and life choices. Now this doesn't apply if you got local recommendations for ethically raised and delicious food that you're just passing along because better ingredients make better food. _itarian choices are like religion: follow what you believe, don't mock and detract others, there is a time and place for mutual debate based on mutual interest, and if you act like a Jehovah's Witness that showed up at the door then expect to get treated like one.