MEAT-EATER OR VEGAN? The Danger of the EITHER OR FALLACY

Part 5 Moving Toward Vegetarianism


There are many health reasons and moral reasons for all humans to become non-meat eaters. (See my previous blog articles on this controversy for the reasons.)

So, ideally, not eating meat would be good for humans.

But it all gets more complicated—like so many controversies--when one gets down to the real daily level of life for specific humans.

For instance, years ago, I decided to try out being a vegan like Murray Rose, the famous Olympic gold medals winner. I read a biography on his amazing life.

Very bad, tragic results however! I lost 50 pounds and suffered malnutrition! Was put under a health doctor’s care who was a vegan, and she tried various methods to help me. None worked.

Another medical profession, head of the hospital in Pennsylvania where I worked told me that veganism wasn’t beneficial, for me at least, but the entire hour she talked to me, she chain-smoked!

Clearly, it seemed lucidly obvious that I shouldn’t take her advice. Why was she smoking cigarette packs a day as a medical professional?!

HOWEVER—HERE is a vivid CASE of the EITHER-OR-FALLACY!

Just because, the hospital chain-smoker wasn’t wise in her choices didn’t automatically mean that then my vegan health doctor was correct her views.

It turned out that both were drastically wrong.

While the famous Olympic star Murray Rose won gold medals as a vegan, that didn’t mean that everyone else ought to follow his views.
Some humans can’t digest plant protein well, some can’t get enough protein from vegetables, fruits, and nuts alone.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that everyone ought to go whole-hog in meat eating, either. And then there is also, ‘foul’ food.

I’m am still a work in progress, especially after the very severe stroke of the spine I got 4 years ago.

While I quit pork years ago (how can anyone continue to eat a sentient animal smarter than dogs and cats?!)...
And in the last 15 or so years ago, I stopped eating beef.

Not that I am harming beef raisers. I grew up in rural southeast Nebraska where we got ¾ a cow every year from my grandparents and have worked on a huge ranch as a cowhand in Montana, so I’ve done my bit for cattle owners and for being from the Beef State (though I am still a Corn Husker;-)—that’s the other mascot of my childhood home. Go Big Red!

At present, I am a cheesy-fishatarian, on my way to get back to the Garden;-)

More in the next section...

In the LIGHT

Dan Wilcox

To Eat or Not to Eat: That Is the Question--Sounds Fishy

Is There a Moral Case for Eating Meat?

Is Vegetarianism a Virtue?

Do We Need to Give Animals a Life Worth Living?

Are Human Beings Meant to Eat Meat?

Why Are Only About 1% of Humans Vegans?
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Here's the beginning of an intriguing, thought-provoking article from Vox and Grist:

"Is There a Moral Case for Eating Meat?"

by Nathanael Johnson

"Where are the philosophers arguing that eating meat is moral?

When I started researching this piece, I’d already read a lot of arguments against meat, but I hadn’t seen a serious philosophical defense of carnivores. So I started asking around. I asked academics, meat industry representatives, and farmers: Who was the philosophical counterweight to Peter Singer?

In 1975, Singer wrote Animal Liberation, which launched the modern animal rights movement with its argument that causing animal suffering is immoral. There are plenty of other arguments against eating animals besides Singer’s, going back to the ancient Greeks and Hindus. There are even arguments that Christianity contains a mandate for vegetarianism. Matthew Scully’s Dominion argues against animal suffering; Scully rejects Singer’s utilitarian assertion that humans and animals are equal but says that, since God gave people “dominion over the fish of the sea and the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth,” so we have a responsibility to care for them and show them mercy.

The arguments against eating animals are pretty convincing. But surely, I thought, there were also intellectuals making convincing counterarguments. Right? Nope. Not really..."

http://www.vox.com/2015/8/9/9122907/meat-ethics


http://grist.org/food/is-there-a-moral-case-for-meat/?utm_source=syndication&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=feed
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As you probably remember from a past post, I am on a long journey toward vegetarianism. Currently, I am mostly a fishetarian (read crab, salmon, catfish, etc.) though occasionally I eat foul food;-) with my extended family and friends.

I resigned off pig many years ago. Easy for me to do since I don't like pork. Then left the cattle grazing on a thousand hills about 15 years or so ago. (Though, when my allergies let me, I still borrow cheese and milk.)

Back in the late 60's, my first vegetarian experiment came about because of the influence of a friend. Shortly before she went down to D.C. for King's March on Washington, she adopted vegetarianism. By the time I was in full swing, living on only vegetable, fruits, and nuts, she quit and resumed meat dishes. But me, I went nuts.

Yes, I followed the radical advice of health food fanatics including a 6-medal Olympic swimming star, Murray Rose. It worked for him and others.*

Bode Miller

http://www.ecorazzi.com/2012/07/27/top-10-historic-vegetarian-and-vegan-olympians/

One can't become an Olympic star easily. But my body couldn't handle a vegan only diet. I lost almost 50 pound, down to about 117, when I ought have weighed 175! Got malnurished. Looked like a stupid-sort of gandhi, without the wise side. More of a not-so-wise donkey.

I know that the official name of a fish-eater is pescatarian, but that not only sounds too academic, it sounds like being a pest;-)

Because, this time around, 40 years later, I'm taking vegetarianism slower and wiser, not evangelizing, don't have a knife to grind, just want to move toward a more spiritual and ethical level.

In the Light,

Daniel Wilcox