ilja

The Animal Holocaust

63 posts in this topic

@datamonster Good point. I agree, though I think that there is a certain difference between those points, even if the line is very fine.

I think that the difference is that vegans are a... let's just call it "moral minority". For most people (if not all?), morals are being dictated by our culture. And most cultures on earth are just fine with butchering our fellow earthlings. The general consensus is that it's okay to massacre animals by the billions. Either that or we're looking away, acting like this genocide isn't happening.

This trend, surprisingly enough, is still petty prevalent in spiritual circles. The amount of people who refuse to consume animal products might be relatively high, compared to the general population, but they're still a minority.

You could say: "Well what if murdering jewish people was cool with most cultures? Would that make it okay?" To which the answer is no. Killing animals isn't okay eihter. My point is that this isn't an even playing field. Right now most people are fine with treating animals as nothing but resources. And we, as those that care about all the animals being killed, have to work with what we've got. We won't be able to change anybody's opinion by moralizing them. By acting like our morals are superior. This would be a fight we couldn't win, because again: Most people's morals are being dictated by culture. It would be like fighting a dragon. So we have to start by educating them. We have to build bridges, instead of burning them. Culture is a very complex system and we're trying to change a very fundamental part of most peoples lives: Their diet.

So my point isn't that we should tolerate it. My point is that we HAVE to tolerate because that's the playing field. Our best option is to operate from within culture in order to make changes, to stay positive and to be a rolemodel for the younger generations. Eventually more and more people are going to wake up to other alternative diets. And that's where we come in. We have to show them those alternatives.

Does that make sense? Please let me know if it does and feel free to suggest alternative perspectives and solution. I'm genuinely trying to find a good way to deal with this problem. I understand that this situation probably requires way more nuance than that.

Edited by DefinitelyNotARobot

beep boop

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9 minutes ago, datamonster said:

However, real change doesn't come about by people staying all passive. Sometimes you have to cross boundaries, step outside cultural norms and risk making yourself unpopular. 

Agreed. I think that there can be a certain value to activism. Sometimes you just need to shock people in order to wake them up. Shocking people can force them think, but you've got to do it in a way where you don't antagonize them too much. It's honestly a complicated topic.

Personally I wouldn't know how to express activism in a healthy way. I think that requires a certain maturity. This documentary is a good example in my opinion.

Hopefully I can educate some of my younger family members when they're ready, but I'd do it in a neutral manner. I'd just explain to them why I think the way I do and maybe show them one or two documentaries and then let them come to their own conclusion.


beep boop

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14 minutes ago, datamonster said:

I believe nobody here would tolerate someone arguing that gassing jews is ok. 

So, what's the difference? Why do we need to tolerate opinions that concentration camps for animals are ok, but when it comes to humans we have zero tolerance for such ideas?

After all, we are animals, too. So, isn't this a very biased, human-centric perspective? And don't we all generally agree that it's a good thing to stand up for the weak and defenseless?

Evolution of consciousness takes time, but it only moves in one direction. Animal rights activists have to realize that those comparisons sound absurd to people who are at the human-centric stage of development, which is still the vast majority of the world's population. At this stage it is counterproductive to be intolerant of those who support animal exploitation. Unless a significant percentage of the population is already on board, It will only create more resistance.

My advice to activists would be to contain your outrage and continue to raise awareness in a non-judgemental way. Do not demonize and point fingers at people who eat meat, or at the people who work in the industry. They literally don't understand what they're doing, and you can't blame them for that. It's possible to advocate for animal rights without blaming and shaming. More importantly, you can lead by example and you can vote with your wallet. In the past 10 years there has been an explosion in sales of vegan alternative foods in Europe, and it's predicted to accelerate the more options become available. It's so easy to shop now, compared to just 10 years ago. You can get any kind of food you can imagine, so the excuse that being vegan is difficult and expensive just isn't true anymore.

Once you have the majority on your side, then people will naturally start being "intolerant" of those who haven't yet caught up with the new cultural norm. Just like being openly homophobic or racist went from being the norm to being career endingly unacceptable in the span of a few generations, so too will being speciesist in the future. 

 

 

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Nah it's good to give ego's ideas some opposition once in a while for it not to escape. We are not people pleasers. but that aside keep the thread about the animals!

Edited by ilja

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6 hours ago, DefinitelyNotARobot said:

creates a greater divide. It's counterproductive.

Told you.

But the video was moving TBH I saw the live chickens go into the grinder, and the difference looking at the pig all happy. I even felt something in my heart (physically) not good.

 

Arc

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The worst part of the documentary is seeing the workers abusing the animals.  Why they gotta do that?! the animals are already in hell. It takes some type of person to be able to work in an abattoir.  Usually it’s out of desperation for a job. 

Edited by intotheblack

 

 

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On 2/15/2021 at 10:39 AM, Stomatopod said:

intelligent and knowledgeable can still engage in heinous devilry when their level of consciousness is at a low level.

I accept it I am at a low level of consciousness. I am at stage orange, but I had a SAE

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4 hours ago, datamonster said:

So, what's the difference?

I was thinking about animals the other day (I have a cat and my family has dogs) An animal is more than something but less than someone. That was my conclusion.

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16 minutes ago, intotheblack said:

The worst part of the documentary is the workers abusing the animals.  Why they gotta do that?! the animals are already in hell.  

It is inevitable. What is demanded of the workers is to treat individuals as objects, so you cannot continue to view them as individuals. If the workers did view them as individuals, they would be incapable of doing what they are doing. This should be quite obvious, any empathetic person who would work in a slaughterhouse will either psychologically disintegrate or adapt and start viewing these individuals as objects. And objects you cannot treat badly, they are just objects. There is nothing wrong with kicking or punching an object.

It is irrational to complain about the abuse when the entire industry is about killing these individuals. Each workers is killing hundreds of individuals every day, that itself is abuse no matter how you cut it. Imagine it was your job to kill children, hundreds every day. You had a few seconds to slice the throat of each child. What would this do to you? Even if you started out having empathy for these children, who would you be even after a single day of doing this job? This job demands that you have no empathy for these individuals.

 

Can you see how the consumers not only have no empathy for the animals, but also lack even the most basic empathy for these workers who are coerced by our society to do something that goes against their nature?

 

Watch this to get some good insight:

 

 

Can you see how this is an absurd contradiction:

"Slice this pigs throat against it's will, but treat it with respect!"

Edited by Scholar

Glory to Israel

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Just now, datamonster said:

I think I would arrive at the same conclusion. But even if animals are "less" than person, don't they still deserve at least the same basic rights to freedom and to not be harmed unnecessarily?

The question is, how do you arrive at that conclusion? What is the difference between a pig and a human that makes one worth less than the other? An intuitive justification is not sufficient, because otherwise you would have to accept the appeal to intuition that a racist would provide in his stance that some races are less an individual than others.

 

Think this through and apply any difference you find to humans. Peter Singer provided a good argument for this, called Argument from Marginal Cases. This means any trait other than humanity itself will reduce you to a position in which certain groups of humans are considered less worthy of life, or less worthy of being called an individual, than others. This would for example apply to the mentally disabled. Do you actually believe that the mentally disabled are less individuals, or less worthy of life, than other healthy humans, or that these individuals are only as much worth of life as we because of their genetic code?

If the trait is humanity, which is basically species, then you are not much different from a racist, who simply chooses race as that which we cares about.

 

Instead of looking at what is different between two beings, look at what you truly care about. Do you really value individuals with higher cognitive abilities more than others, or is it subjectivity itself that you value, and someones capacity to experience well being and suffer?


Glory to Israel

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@Scholar I know and agree with everything you said. I actually watched that documentary over a year ago. But just pointing out how they are deliberately beating the animals.  it’s already horrific what is being done but to then add the beatings on top of that.  Isn’t killing the animal enough, why do the people in that video also have to beat them, as if there is some enjoyment to it.  And yes, it’s one of the worst jobs and lowest paid and the workers are fucked up from it. 
 

 

 


 

 

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5 minutes ago, datamonster said:

If I stranded on a lonely island with a pig and a person and nothing else to eat, I would kill the pig without hesitation any time.

Does this make me racist? - In a certain sense, kinda yes! In a survival situation I think it makes sense to prioritize your own species. So, I do see animals as "less" in that sense.

My point is that usually we don't find ourselves in extreme survival situations, and we can go to the grocery store and choose from an abundance of food options. So, it's completely unnecessary to harm an animal to get your belly full.

Hence, even if I don't value an animal life and a human life equally, I think animals still deserve at least not to be harmed unnecessarily and have basic freedom as long as I have other options.

Yes but in a survival situation you would eat me too, that doesn't answer whether or not pigs are less individuals than humans. You gave an account that you value one over the other, but not why. Do you think just because someone is born with different DNA they are worth less?

 

People have the intuition that other races are worth less, or are somehow an inferior form of individuals, than their own race. And in a survival context that made complete sense. But this is not the question, the question is how do we justify these positions under rational inquiry. It is precisely because we have deconstructed our irrational beliefs about other individuals that we came to value all races equally.

Edited by Scholar

Glory to Israel

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I've been transitioning to a plant based diet over the course of the past few years for ethical reasons, but I also get the sense that is a structural issue endemic to Industrial Societies, and something that won't be solved until several generations pass and countries like the US are roughly at SD-Stage Green. Either that or because Climate Change literally forces our hand, with how unsustainable meat heavy diets are.

Of course there's a possibility that synthetic lab grown meat could perhaps be part of a move away from factory farming, but it's not something I'm holding my breath about.

My intuitive sense is that as long as large portions of society are having trouble meeting their basic needs, worrying about animal suffering is sadly going to be something of a luxury for privileged people to worry about.

Hell, in the US we haven't even fully transitioned away from what can arguably be considered Human Slave Labor, when you consider the state of the US Prison system and how inmates are paid pennies for manual labor.

Edited by DocWatts

I'm writing a philosophy book! Check it out at : https://7provtruths.org/

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Or what happens when it becomes extremely difficult to find someone willing to do the job of working in the abattoir.  I assume they would start to offer high salaries, but at a certain point once enough people are against it how will the system continue? It will be the job nobody wants so what then? 


 

 

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50 minutes ago, datamonster said:

Pigs are certainly highly intelligent and deserve to live as much as humans, but when I have to choose I'd always prioritize a human's life. Lucky I don't have to make that call ?

I can't tell you why. I guess, for the same reason that you'd prioritize the life of a family member over a random stranger.

There's no objective, rational reason for why one's family members is more important than a random person, yet this is what each of us would do. 

Yes, this however is different from moral worth. We can view all humans as equal, yet recognize that our duty towards certain individuals is greater than others.

My duty to a family member is higher than my duty towards a stranger. However this idea is more of useful in structuring a societies behavior to maximize harmony, it does not really tell us about the worth of each individual being.

 

This is why I think we shouldn't say that pigs are worth less than humans, but rather that our duty towards the pig is different from our duty towards humans. When we talk about decisions that make us choose over one individual than another, then this decision will be made in relationship to extrinsic factors, not intrinsic ones. For example, as you showed, an individuals relationship to you or others.

You might for example save an ant over Adolf Hitler, because of the extrinsic factors, not because the subjectivity of Adolf Hitler is worth less than that of the ant or vice verca.

Equally you could save your own cat over a stranger (human), because your duty towards your cat is viewed by you higher than the duty towards the stranger and so forth.

Edited by Scholar

Glory to Israel

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1 hour ago, datamonster said:

if you had to make a call, would you let an adult or a child die?

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@ilja

2 hours ago, ilja said:

@datamonster in any random context, if you had to decide before the context is revealed to you.

If I were considering and random context, I would save the adult.  The reasoning is that the adult should be more useful for survival.  For example, a man is stronger than a boy. 

This is the same logic I use for saving a human instead of an ant.  The ant is not useful for me, but the human is.  Saving the human's life is good for my social survival.  The human is not actually more valuable than the ant.

In the event of child or adult, there is an interesting scenario.  I would choose to kill the adult if he raped or murdered children.  That would be considered justice.  The problem is that he could have murdered a child because the adult was more useful for his survival.  I can't really kill adults for child abuse anymore because the utilitarian argument for saving the adult demonstrates my hypocrisy.

I can't really choose what being should live or die without a bias.  This bias is used to assign values which are fundamentally false.  The ant is not really less valuable than the human unless you are biased toward a specific quality or only considering human survival.  These biases come out in the form of sadism in slaughter houses.

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