Unashamed omnivore, fisher, and hunter here. Working on our play farm so we can source all of our meat ethically in the future. Taking active steps to prevent the suffering of animals we consume. Don't have an ethical or moral problem with killing animals to eat them. Prefer to do it myself so that I know that I have done my best to minimize the suffering of the critters I kill.

I've been told I'm a raper and abuser.

fite me

[–] Draedron@lemmy.dbzer0.com 23 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Much better than sourcing animal products from the supermarker. Still worse than being vegan

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 12 points 3 months ago

I’ve been told I’m a raper and abuser.

Factory farming is absolutely industrial scale rape and abuse. The more traditional hunter-gatherer mode of existence is at least approaching "natural" levels of cruelty, but it also takes immense volumes of vacant real estate.

It's cool that you've found a way to do a little traditional animal husbandry, rather than procuring meat from the holocaust mills run by some soulless corporate horror show. But its not what I'd call economical. At least, not for anyone who commutes downtown from an apartment block.

I think there's a kind of ethical middle-ground for folks who can keep a deep freeze full of meat from a cow that gets butchered every couple of months. Then you're at least mitigating the enormous waste in industrial agriculture and you can talk about animals living a relatively dignified life in a pasture rather than walled up in a cattle concentration camp. But that would mean no pink slime on demand, which violates man's constitutional right to eat burger.

[–] deaf_fish@lemm.ee 11 points 3 months ago

Fellow unashamed omnivore. The vegans have the moral high ground. I hope one day to become one. No need to shame or be ashamed of eating meat though. Changes to society take a while, shaming and blaming rarely improve the situation. It often makes things worse.

[–] Drewelite@lemmynsfw.com 8 points 3 months ago (2 children)

I think your mentality is great. I've heard people say, "Sure I'll eat a burger, but what kind of psychopath wants to kill an animal themselves?"

I don't know, what kind of a psychopath pays an industry to do it for them so they don't have to feel bad about it? Look, I get it, I don't hunt. But I respect the people who respectfully end the animal's life themselves. Only they can really understand the cost. We just throw away some old chicken we forgot to cook while passing judgment on who we paid to get it for us and how they did it.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

what kind of psychopath wants to kill an animal themselves?

The mental health issues among abattoir workers is way above the national average. It takes a toll.

I don’t know, what kind of a psychopath pays an industry to do it for them

Out of sight, out of mind. We have professional wet workers for a reason. If everyone had to do this shit themselves, much of it wouldn't get done. Hell, I still stay up at night thinking about my elderly dog being put to sleep in front of me at the vet's. If I'd had to push that syringe down myself, I'd have probably sawed my own hand off by now, purely out of shame.

[–] Drewelite@lemmynsfw.com 1 points 3 months ago

Perhaps this is the perspective people need.

[–] Machinist@lemmy.world 4 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Exactly.

I enjoy hunting but I don't glory in the killing. There is always a part of me that is sad when I kill. Even killing a rat or butchering a fish gives me a twinge. I don't feel bad when I kill a mosquito, but do feel bad when I kill a black widow.

If I raise an animal to eat it, it will be properly cared for and have a good life and as painless a passing as I can make it.

When I take a picture of something I killed, I make sure blood or injuries are not visible. That is disrespectful to that life I took.

I recently killed a groundhog because it was being a varmint and digging up the foundation of my garage and chicken coop.

I tried to clean it so we could eat it, but must have hit the glands. The smell of the carcass was almost chemical it was so strong. They're supposed to be good, but I'd never had to kill one. Harder to skin than a squirrel and they have super tough hide.

I had to toss it and it bothered me. Even though it was being a varmint: to me it is ethical to kill a varmint and not eat it. However, you should make use of that life if you can.

I killed a coon once as a kid and had to eat it after it was smoked. Not good. Never killed an animal again that I wasn't going to eat except for varmints.

Varmints are animals out of balance. Rats and roaches are almost always varmints. Spiders rarely are. Overpopulated deer are often varmints. A groundhog out in the woods is just a critter, a groundhog digging out my foundation is a varmint. Cats are varmints when they are feral and killing wild birds, especially ground nesting birds.

Critters are animals in balance or domesticated.

Varmints are also almost always a species of least concern.

The environment would be in a much better place if people were more connected to their food.

[–] PetteriSkaffari@lemmy.world 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

You're still killing animals mainly for fun, which is not ethical no matter how you turn it. Humans generally do not need to eat meat, as they're omnivores. Keeping animals uses up large amounts of land and produces unnecessary greenhouse gases. With the amount of people and cattle being held on this planet, something has got to change in our behaviour in order to get things more balanced and keep a healthy planet for future generations. You try to keep old habits intact, which are not sustainable in the current world. Perhaps you don't want to know about this take on things, but I'm presenting them anyway, hopefully it will have an influence on your future thinking.

[–] Machinist@lemmy.world 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

You have your religion. Your religion says it's not ethical to kill animals. I don't believe in your religion.

Yup, omnivore. I've got the canines and binocular vision as well as the molars and gut to prove it. I like meat and vegetables. Your religion says it's bad to eat meat. I don't care about your strongly held beliefs: I think they're a bunch of hooey.

I have no ethical or moral problem with killing as I do it. It's not wrong to kill animals and eat them.

Hunting is pretty much built in to being human. It's about the closest thing to religion I have left. Squirrel hunting is my favorite type of quarry. I get to sneak miles through the woods and explore.

Other than a few vegans that actually do a lot of camping and hiking, I'm far more connected to nature, my place in it, and the effects of climate change than most vegans ever will be. My family and I moved 700 miles this summer. Climate change and the future of my children and maybe grandchildren was a big factor that drove the move.

Again, you have strongly held religious beliefs that I think are bullshit. I also really dislike the sneering judgement I see so much of coming from your religion and people. It's just like fundamentalist Christians in tone, stridency, superiority, and sanctimony. You're not any better than me. You just believe some crap that I don't. Again, just like the fundamentalist Christianity I grew up in. You know those televangelists that beg for money? That's a mirror of the people you believe in. The people protesting outside abortion clinics? That's your people with a different set of beliefs.

As far as climate change and greenhouse gases go, yup. Major problem. I'm actually reducing my impact, but, unless we tackle the industrial sources, an individual's impact is a drop in the ocean at the scales that we're talking about. Also, meat taken by hunting is about as low impact as it gets. Especially venison.

[–] BluesF@lemmy.world 1 points 3 months ago

You can moral relativism your way out of the ethical problem if you want, but believing killing animals is wrong is not a religious position any more than believing murder, or rape, or theft is wrong. It's cool that for you the opposite is a religion, but it seems like you have just found a convenient way to hand-wave away arguments against your position as "someone else's beliefs" which can't possibly have any bearing on your own.

I'm not trying to convince you of anything - you're right that, among all of those who eat meat, you're extremely low impact. Absolutely do whatever you want. But I'd consider the fact that in this thread you are claiming vegans are the religious ones while writing short essays on your own self described "religion" of hunting animals. The only one preaching here is you, man.