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ALL RELIGIONS: How do you justify meat eating?

EtuMalku

Abn Iblis ابن إبليس
I am not a vegetarian but I am Hindu. Like 550 million other Hindus of the world I eat meat and i've been constantly criticised for it.

The main argument is you're killing another creature for taste.

How do you justify it?
In my belief system we consider mankind to be the apex predator of this world. Therefore, we may if we choose so, to devour anything on this planet. However, a common axiom in our community is; 'With great power, comes great responsibility'. That said, there are a surprising amount of adherents who do not eat meat for health reasons, and many who oppose the meat industry for various socio-political reasons.
 

SomeRandom

Still learning to be wise
Staff member
Premium Member
I am not a vegetarian but I am Hindu. Like 550 million other Hindus of the world I eat meat and i've been constantly criticised for it.

The main argument is you're killing another creature for taste.

How do you justify it?
As a wise lady once sang, “it’s the circle of life.”
Besides, in this modern era who here actually goes out and physically hunts for their meal?
It’s all farmed and the animals are bred specifically to eat. Granted I personally prefer humanely treated animals, no need to be barbaric in animal husbandry. But eh. Everything dies and everything else consumes them. Tis natural.
 

QuestioningMind

Well-Known Member
Plants and animals are different at the cellular level.

animal-cells-vs-plant-cells-373375_final-5b462d7fc9e77c00375014f1.png

Yes, they are. However, that doesn't answer the question of why it's okay to eat one and not the other.
 

QuestioningMind

Well-Known Member
Plants bear fruit. Also one can cut an amount of foliage from a plant and it will continue to flourish.

How many living animals have you tried that with successfully?

Okay... so does that mean it's NOT okay to eat plants that don't bear fruit or to eat an entire plant or enough of it so that it no longer flourishes?
 

We Never Know

No Slack
Some of the plants I’ve eaten from remain alive.

I must eat for my mind and body to remain alive. But I can do so by harming the least I am able.

Not the part of the plant you ate.
We all eat to remain alive. Different tastes are plentiful. From plants, meat, insects, spiders, snakes, gators, fruits, scorpions, etc. The world is becoming a sad place when people have to defend why they eat what they do(as long as it legal, not something like cannibalism :D)
 

We Never Know

No Slack

I don't know if plants feel pain but many plants recognize trauma, even grass.

That "Fresh Cut Grass" Smell Is a Distress Signal

Trauma, that’s what. It’s the smell of chemical defenses and first aid. The fresh, “green” scent of a just-mowed lawn is the lawn trying to save itselffrom the injury you just inflicted.

Leafy plants release a number of volatile organic compounds called green leaf volatiles (GLVs). When the plants are injured, whether through animals grazing on them, you cutting or mowing them, or even just unintentionally rough handling, these emissions increase like crazy.

That "Fresh Cut Grass" Smell Is a Distress Signal
 

We Never Know

No Slack
Some of the plants I’ve eaten from remain alive.

I must eat for my mind and body to remain alive. But I can do so by harming the least I am able.

I'm assuming you are talking about fruits , berries and such which are produced by the plant.

Question, if I eat the egg but not the chicken that laid it or eat the calf but not the cow that birthed it, is that along the same line as eating the fruit but not the tree?
 

siti

Well-Known Member
Plants bear fruit. Also one can cut an amount of foliage from a plant and it will continue to flourish.

How many living animals have you tried that with successfully?

Some of the plants I’ve eaten from remain alive.

I must eat for my mind and body to remain alive. But I can do so by harming the least I am able.
I know one or two have picked on this, and I guess to some extent it is true that a plant that has its leaves cut off whilst the leaves are still perfectly functional are stressed as a result. But overall, I reckon attempting to feed ourselves in a manner that causes the least harm is a viable and noble strategy. My wife and I do try to focus on fresh fruits and vegetables - for health, not religious, reasons. But we do eat meat and fish occasionally.

But if we look deeper into it, it is inevitable that we will kill other living things in order to remain alive and healthy. When you use soap and water to wash yourself or you clothes you kill other living things - when you use disinfectant to clean your bathroom or toilet you kill other living things...and when you eat, even your choice of food determines which of your gut fauna thrive and which die off...that's quite apart from the life in the food itself.

Killing to eat is just part of biology - we can't avoid it - but perhaps we can make it as 'painless' as possible to other living things?
 

QuestioningMind

Well-Known Member
plants are living beings too. However, they do not have the levels of self awareness nor the nervous system that animals have.
The reality is that all animals in the cycle of rebirth have three choices: 1) eat animals, 2) eat plants, 3) don’t eat. So to create as little suffring as possible one try to choose what create less karma and suffering for one self and other. And since we must eat, plants are the way to go.

If someone does see this as a wrong path, that is up to them ofcourse

It's an interesting concept... though I confess I find it rather confusing. It doesn't make much sense to me that we'd be born into a world where consuming food is a requirement; yet to consume any food creates negative karma. Which then forces us to try and determine which lifeforms are more or less aware in an attempt to create less negative karma.

I'm not saying it's a wrong path... just that it doesn't make much logical sense to me.
 

Evangelicalhumanist

"Truth" isn't a thing...
Premium Member
I note that the question was originally put to "all religions," which doesn't seem to include atheists, but if nobody minds, I'll answer. I justify eating meat by studying how humans evolved, human nutritional needs (which can be deduced by watching what happens when some of those needs are neglected), and studying our dentition (our teeth). Excessively clearly, humans have evolved to be omnivores, and thrive best when they eat from a variety of food groups.

As the saying goes (that I think is the best diet advice ever): "Eat food, not to much, mostly plants." (Notice, "mostly" plants, not "solely" plants.)
 

blü 2

Veteran Member
Premium Member
I am not a vegetarian but I am Hindu. Like 550 million other Hindus of the world I eat meat and i've been constantly criticised for it.

The main argument is you're killing another creature for taste.

How do you justify it?
Why does it need justifying? Humans are metabolically omnivores, and billions of animals are alive today solely because we eat meat.

(Whether that's good for the environment is, I think, a different moral question to the one you're asking. It's a relatively inefficient use of resources too, but that doesn't tend to stop humans until it becomes a crisis.)
 

Marcion

gopa of humanity's controversial Taraka Brahma
Why does it need justifying? Humans are metabolically omnivores, and billions of animals are alive today solely because we eat meat.

(Whether that's good for the environment is, I think, a different moral question to the one you're asking. It's a relatively inefficient use of resources too, but that doesn't tend to stop humans until it becomes a crisis.)
You forget the billions of animal lives that we are preventing from living (and killing also for "fun") because we took away their habitats in order to create our human cities, villages, farms, golf courses and industries.

Plants, fungi and bacteria are life too, but animals with more developed brains have the higher consciousness and deserve more protection.
But humans that consume meat, fish and large quantities of dairy are taking more than their fair share and are destroying biodiversity on this planet creating a new disastrous mass extinction.
Besides that, humans that eat too much meat and dairy suffer from all kinds of avoidable diseases, their medicines pollute our waters and their lives are needlessly shortened.

That is why I eat vegan and I have decreased my ecological footprint in other ways as well.
Growing plants for consumption requires far less land than raising farm animals and emptying our seas and oceans for fish is disastrous for marine ecosystems as well.
Without becoming vegetarians and vegans we have as a species become a pest on this planet.
 
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The Reverend Bob

Fart Machine and Beastmaster
In my belief system we consider mankind to be the apex predator of this world. Therefore, we may if we choose so, to devour anything on this planet. However, a common axiom in our community is; 'With great power, comes great responsibility'. That said, there are a surprising amount of adherents who do not eat meat for health reasons, and many who oppose the meat industry for various socio-political reasons.
Mankind is the apex predator? Tell that to the ebola or flu viruses
 
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