Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Rteacher]

This book by British author Tristram Stuart examines from an historical perspective various arguments (religious, medical, philosophical...) that have been advanced both for-and-against vegetarianism since the 17th century. Here's an excerpt from a review in the Observer:

...The encounter between Indian and European traditions provides Stuart�s book with one of its most striking and contentious assertions. Europeans, having long believed that animal flesh was necessary to sustain vigorous life, were astonished at the existence of the pagan yet pious Brahmins, who ate no meat but evidently thrived. Stuart, a British historian who lived for some years in India, endeavors to show that the spread of vegetarian doctrines in the West during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was a result of growing familiarity with the customs of colonized India. Evidently on the side of history�s herbivores, he �outs� as vegetarians canonical thinkers who occasionally reduced their meat intake or advised others to do so; he judges the number of Enlightenment vegetarians to have been �incalculably large�; and he celebrates vegetarianism as the leading edge of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century thought. Like so many other arguments in the vegetarian debate, though, the news from India could be used by both sides. Were the Brahmins moral exemplars, or did they prove the association between vegetarianism and religious error? ...
http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/history/0,,1854051,00.html

A lengthy N.Y. Times article "Vegetable Love" also highlights Stuart's book and is quoted from in great detail in this comprehensive article on the Sampradaya Sun website...)

...Stuart is of the opinion that vegetarians have long had the best of the intellectual arguments. If so, that just shows how little intellectual arguments matter to populations� eating decisions. The number of vegetarians in developed countries is evidently on the increase, but the world�s per-capita consumption of meat rises relentlessly: in 1981, it was 62 pounds per year; in 2002, the figure stood at 87.5 pounds. In carnivorous America, it increased from 238.1 to 275.1 pounds, and the practice is spreading in traditionally herbivorous Asia. Indians� meat consumption has risen from 8.4 to 11.5 pounds since 1981; in China, it has increased from 33.1 to an astonishing 115.5 pounds. This result has nothing to do with principle and everything to do with prosperity. Stuart�s �bloodless revolution� has been much less a conversion than a conversation... http://www.harekrsna.com/sun/features/02-07/features554.htm

[mindmetoo]

C'mon tell us again that Pamela Anderson is a leading thinker.

[Rteacher]

Although her name did appear on my main list on the thread "Why Are So Many Great Thinkers Vegetarian?"http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/korea/viewtopic.php?t=45720&highlight=great+thinkers+vegetarian I clearly qualified (fairly early on...) the inclusion of celebrities like her:

I'll more-or-less list great philosophers and scientists (and spiritual leaders) first, followed by literary giants, business whizzes, and famous entertainers, artists and musicians (obviously, I've included names of prominent entertainers and celebrities who would not be considered "great thinkers" ...)

However, I'll go ahead and post a picture which arguably promotes the health benefits of being vegetarian:

[JeJuJitsu]

Show me a single heterosexual vegetarian, and I'll show you a homo that hasn't yet left the closet.
--Bono

[Bramble]

Here are some articles that may be of interest:

http://garyfrancione.blogspot.com/2006/12/veganism-fundamental-principle-of.html

http://garyfrancione.blogspot.com/2007/01/clarifying-meaning-of-right.html

[Rteacher]

(George Harrison was right about Bono - an egocentric guy without that much talent - save for making money...)

I skimmed the article linked to by the vegan Rutger's University law professor. I agree that animals have a basic right not to be killed unnecessarily by humans. I disagree that cows milk necessarily should be avoided. Contrary to propaganda put out by vegan groups, Vedic teachings assert that cows milk is intended for human consumption, and that only cows milk can nourish the finest brain tissues needed for spiritual thinking...

Of course, the dairy industry's abuse and slaughter of cows (and all factory farming...) should be stopped. Of all animals, I think that cows should be given special protection because of their function as a type of mother to humans who have benefitted from their milk (and it would be much more beneficial and healthful without the harmful processing done by the dairy industry to maximize profits...)

Anyone can live simply in harmony with nature - and eat sumptiously - with five acres of arable land and a milk cow. There are literarily thousands of classic Indian recipes for various combinations of milk with fruit, grains, and vegetables.

Remember that from cows we can get not only milk, but also cream, butter, clarified butter (or ghee - the tastiest cooking medium for frying or stir-frying...) curd (farmer's cheese, cottage cheese...) yogurt (which can be mixed with fruit and sweetened or salted and cooked in sauces and curries. What to speak of all the types of cheeses that can be made without animal rennett - and ice cream! If one knows how to cook, what need is there to kill animals for the taste of their blood and/or flesh?

Being vegan is good in the sense of minimizing abuse, but it's a very austere diet and (as even the IQ tests referred to in the "Bloodless Revolution" article indicate...) it often doesn't provide full nutrition for the brain...

[Ryst Helmut]

Came across this a few days ago....sorta related (yes, RTeacher...minimize abuse is the key phrase)...

Vegetarian Diet Kills Animals Too

by Lee Dye

Steven Davis says he didn't set out to start a fight, but found one when he began attacking one of the most sacred beliefs of the vegetarian community. One of the reasons most commonly cited by vegetarians for giving up meat is the conviction that other animals have a right to life as well as humans. But when Davis began setting up a course on animal ethics for the animal science department at Oregon State University four years ago, he reached a rather surprising conclusion. Nobody's hands are free from the blood of other animals, not even vegetarians, he concluded. Millions of animals are killed every year, Davis says, to prepare land for growing crops, "like corn, soybean, wheat and barley, the staples of a vegan diet."

The animals in this case are mice and moles and rabbits and other creatures that are run over by tractors, or lose their habitat to make way for farming, so they are not as "visible" as cattle, he says. And that, Davis says, gives rise to a fundamental question: "What is it that makes it okay to kill animals of the field so that we can eat [vegetables or fruits] but not pigs or chickens or cows?" Any disruption of the land, whether it be to farm or to build subdivisions, reduces the amount of land left for other animals, resulting in the deaths of many. And Davis, a professor of animal science at Oregon State who grew up on a farm, says as a child he saw animals killed by the routine operation of farm machinery, so there's no way to have a bloodless farm.

"If they say they don't want to kill an animal so they can eat, I think their conclusion is misguided because they are killing animals so that they can eat that vegetarian diet," Davis says. "Those animals happen to be a little bit invisible. They are not as obvious to the man on the street as killing a steer in the slaughterhouse. But nonetheless, it's still going on."

Davis believes the death toll among all animals could be reduced if ranchers concentrated on raising cattle instead of pigs and chickens and let those cattle revert to foraging in open fields that could be shared with other animals. Citing US Department of Agriculture statistics, Davis says of the 8.4 billion animals killed each year for food in the United States, 8 billion are poultry and only 41 million are cows, calves, sheep and lambs. So he figures you could double the number of cattle killed each year, and lay off the chickens, and consequently save about 7.5 billion animals. But just letting cattle roam freely doesn't solve the problem because other animals like coyotes and wolves would still likely be killed.

It might do more good if all of us just ate a little less of everything.

Lee Dye is a former science writer for the Los Angeles Times who now lives in Juneau, Alaska.

Source: abcnews.go.com � 2004 ABC News Internet Ventures

!shoosh,

Ryst

http://www.flatrock.org.nz/topics/animals/bloody_hard_work.htm#lovely

[blaseblasphemener]

The Best-selling Book "Eat Right For Your Blood Type" says that a meat diet is most ideal for O blood types, which is the most common blood type. A is better suited to a nearly vegetarian diet, while B can incorporate both (but should not eat chicken), and AB can eat pretty much everything. I think the author has a book for vegetarians as well.

I feel better when I don't eat meat. I eat meat for the taste, not for what it does for my body. I think we'd be healthier and have a better world if everyone was vegetarian, but it's not going to happen as long as people have a choice.

[Bramble]

[Bramble]

[Rteacher]

Actually, from a karmic point of view, being vegetarian does involve a lot of bad karmic reactions. There can be - and have been - demonic vegetarians (like Hitler who arguably was more-or-less vegetarian...)

That's why in bhakti yoga vegetarian food is first offered in devotion to the original source and eternal maintainer of all living beings (who can "eat" it transcendentally...) thereby freeing it from any karma...

[Bramble]

Rteacher, vegan diets don't have to be "austere"; the vegans I know are anything but austere in their habits. There are tons of cookbooks out there with vegan recipes to satisfy any tastes: I'm sure you could easily veganize the dishes you like with a few substitutions (soy yogurt for dairy yogurt, soy cheese for real cheese, etc.).

Cows are "livestock." They're the legal property of their "owners," whose only reason for acquiring them was to make money. When it's unprofitable to keep old dairy cows, farmers always sell them for slaughter. They sell the surplus calves for slaughter too. How could there ever be a "humane" dairy industry? Who would want to go into the dairy business if they were obligated to keep feeding all the old cows - as well as their male offspring, who will never produce milk - until they died of old age? Many farmers would incur huge vet bills that would never pay for themselves in increased profits. They'd go out of business. Do you know of any dairy farmer, anywhere, who feeds and shelters all the animals on the farm until they die of old age?

Also, your nutrition information is flawed. Respectable studies don't back up your statement.

[Rteacher]

I wouldn't mind seeing all the big dairy farms that mistreat cows go out of business along with the whole meat industry and seeing a return to small family farms and co-ops that respect the rights of animals and humans to live in harmony with nature ...

The way things are going, the main chance of that ever happening is after the dust clears from a devastating nuclear war that wipes out all major cities of the world (nature gets her revenge one way or another...)

[RACETRAITOR]

I find vegans to be some of the rudest people I know.

[Bramble]