Where do you stand

[fallen-archie]

Just watched a debate on veganism, featuring a couple of dairy farmers and a vegan activist. The latter believed that we have no right or need to eat meat in any form and that all our food should be plant based, the dairy farmers had posted a picture of three new born calves and after an initial round of supportive comments started to receive vile abuse from vegan activists. The representative in the studio was determined to press Home the point of animals being sentient and the fact that they were often gassed and had their throats cut, I find such comments unnecessarily graphic and designed to shock, which seems to be the case with many causes these days. Surely as sentient human beings we should be able to make a considered choice rather than being accused of animal welfare criminality. I see folk jumping on the bandwagon using animals to further their own agendas. Do you buy into this or do you believe that we have the right to choose what we eat including dairy products?

[mikes*corvettes]

Of course we should have the right to choose.

But once again the minority wants too dictate to the majority, the world has gone stark raving mad.

[jd.linklater]

Each to their own personal preference. I have no objections to what vegetarians and vegans prefer to eat, I only ask that they allow me the same choice. I have long thought that we eat far too much meat, the acreage we devote to raising animals for food could be much better used growing edible crops, which would improve the health of the country in general. Perhaps we need a return to the days when meat was more of a luxury item than it is today. I certainly didn't eat meat every day as a child, but that was mainly because we couldn't afford to.

[cee-dee]

Well, I waited to give others a chance to "speak" before commenting. I see lots of readers but only a couple of brave souls posting?

I think everyone should be allowed to say and eat what they like but as for "activists" attempting to belittle other for following their own preferences, that's not on. Some of the outpourings sound like hate speech for a start?

I think "activists" are on the way to becoming a type of terrorist!!!!! Over years we have seen activists in some fields doing irreparable damage in the furtherance of their outlandish pursuits. You can "protest" and state your case but that should be as far as it goes. The moment you become an activist, I think you've become a criminal!

Remember the "activists" who went round Mink farms and released Mink in to the wild? Look what's happened now?

What are these "activists" going to do next? Go round farms letting the animals go? Go round farms setting them and farm equipment on fire?

Activists in all fields need countering by the legitimate Law of the country.

[Anonymous]

I think we should have the choice.

I eat meat and I always will, but I've never been a big meat eater.

It's the easiest source of all the B vitamins, which are often called the anti stress vitamins.

Maybe those vegans are a bit stressed.

[fallen-archie]

I agree that we should have the choice and not face shaming or ridicule for so doing. It’s the way of the world right now and I hate it! It is wrong in my opinion to seek to influence people using shock tactics and bullying and yet it seems to be getting to the point of normality among many pressure groups! Who will be the first person in Britain to be sent to prison for eating meat?

[upthecreekyetagain]

I am also in the group that believe we have the right to eat whatever we are happy with.  I eat meat regularly and will continue to do so.

I do believe however that those who object to animals being bred for meat have every right to speak in graphic terms on the conditions animals are kept and slaughtered.  I also believe that everyone, myself included, who eat meat should see photographs and videos of how animals are slaughtered - there should be some connection between the shrink wrapped parcel of protein sold in the supermarkets and the animals that graze in a field.

Good farmers have tremendous respect for their animals unlike many commercial organisations had as was demonstrated with battery hens, veal crates, pig cages, automated dairy operations and live animal exports.

Animal ‘activists’ have been responsible for tremendous improvements in animal husbandry over the years - improvements that most likely would never have occurred without their efforts.

[astrologica]

I also eat meat, mainly chicken, but I have become increasingly uneasy about it. I would like to give up meat altogether, but being a vegetarian is a complicated business and requires dedication and a knowledge of how to eat on a vegetarian diet and stay healthy. I haven't got a love of food or cooking, and I 'eat to live' rather than 'live to eat'. 

Anyone who eats meat should be allowed to do so without being harassed or harangued, it is a personal choice. These 'activists' are, as a previous poster said, verging on terrorists. It is another area where people are being called out for just having a different view.

Animal welfare is paramount, and in an ideal world all animals bred to eat would have a wonderful life before being slaughtered. Animals are sentient beings and should be treated with care and respect at all times.

One subject which really disturbs me is Halal slaughter and meat, and after a lot of research I am horrified at the extent to which this cruel method of slaughter has found its way and been actively encouraged in this country. I do not buy any meat at all now from supermarkets, because most of it is Halal. I buy from a local butcher, who raises his own animals. My OH will eat any piece of meat that comes his way, so consequently we have separate freezer compartments! But I respect his right to eat any meat that he chooses.

[upthecreekyetagain]

Personally I’m more concerned with Kosher meat than Halal meat.

The halal method allows for an animal to be stunned prior to slaughter unlike the kosher method which doesn’t.

The major supermarkets including Tescos say that all meat sold in their stores was stunned prior to slaughter and the only difference between halal and non-halal meat they sell is that the halal meat has been blessed.

[upthecreekyetagain]

With regards to consumers of meat being harassed and harangued then I would agree that is wrong but my personal experience suggests that the opposite is the reality - I have never been approached let alone harassed over the subject.

The meat ‘cycle’ does however appear to have been sanitised.  Just as a ‘for instance’, on the BBC1 program Countryfile there have been numerous segments covering the entire agricultural cycle, from preparation to planting, care and harvest.  Not once have I seen a segment showing the transport of animals to the slaughter house, the conditions they are held in and the actual slaughter.

Whenever you do see a ‘butchery’ scene the start point is always the split carcass with the offal and skin removed.  If we are meat eaters we should in my opinion be aware of how that meat arrived on our plates.

[fallen-archie]

I Am uncomfortable with both methods, neither of which I see as necessary to the responsible slaughter of an animal for consumption. Both methods are backward and represent all that is bad about meat production imho. I recently had a discussion with a Muslim on the subject of halal methods and he was adamant that the cutting of an animals throat and the subsequent draining of the blood was essential to purifying the meat, as far as I am concerned his views were archaic and have no place in modern society, so whether it’s kosher or halal I as a lover of black pudding cannot see any defence for this barbaric treatment of animals!

[upthecreekyetagain]

Isn’t this an example of how we are not made aware of how animals are slaughtered?  For centuries most animals have been slaughtered by cutting their throats, including pigs which neither Muslims nor Jews will eat.

The difference between how we kill them now is that most are stunned prior to slaughter, in my opinion we should behave in the same way as Denmark and insist that all animals are stunned.

Unless the public is made aware of exactly how animals are transported and slaughtered on a regular basis then only the extreme horrific cases put forward by activists will emerge and the more regular poor practices will never be scrutinised.  

[margaret*e]

How are the animals stunned, is that done in a humane way?.

[upthecreekyetagain]

It should be done humanely - normally by a slaughter man with a bolt gun - there are reports that in some abattoirs there are occasions where due to bad practice or inexperience animals aren’t always totally stunned 😞

[**bustysinclaire**]

I eat meat too, and I don't feel guilty about it. I wish I could afford to be choosy about the meat I eat. I wish I could afford go to a top quality butcher.

My brother on the other hand worked in an abattoir for a good few years and it turned him right off eating meat. He always says if you knew what goes on in those places you wouldn't eat meat either.

We were given permission to eat meat after ther flood, before that mankind ate vegitation only.

We have stardards to slaughter by and it has to be humaine but we do also have to live by the law of bleeding the animal and that is part and parcel of where, "we should not eat blood comes from".  Blood should be poored back to the ground, but nowhere does it state we should not be humaine.

I do agree it is a matter of choice and the activists go too far, they are actually IMHO as bad as the inhumaine slaughterers because they are commiting a kind of abuse themselves.

[**bustysinclaire**]

wish I could spell too xxx

[al**bear]

I think because, there are more of Us, than there are of them,

we should force feed 'radical' Vegans

Meat and Dairy

If they want to impose their choices on Us

Why can't we force our choices on them ?

[al**bear]

Humans like most Apes are Omnivores

(the only exception being Gibbons)

So it must go back, a very very long time, in our Ancestry