@Pericles:

‘Do you drive a car?’

Let me address this point specifically. Yes I drive a car – sometimes. I also make many trips with other transport means eg walking, bike, public transport etc. Here are some points on this:

1) If consuming animal products was just something that had an environmental impact (which it does, as I have outlined in some of my comments above), then I would be all for just reducing our use of animal products. But because each animal product on a supermarket shelf comes from a slaughtered animal (meat) or an animal who will face the slaughterhouse well before they could otherwise live (in the case of eggs and dairy), I advocate eliminating animal products, rather than just reducing.

I think driving and consuming animal products are not quite analogous – I believe cutting an animal’s life short purely because of their species (rather than based on a lack of ability to suffer, value their own life etc) is an example of the discrimination based on species (speciesism). If consuming animal products is a form of discrimination, rather than just something that has an environmental impact, then I think a better comparison is with racism and sexism. And yes I reject racism and sexism in my daily life, just as I reject speciesism.

2) In a city like Perth, it is very difficult to travel around without a car, it is a very poorly planned city. In contrast, I find it extremely easy to be vegan in Perth. The only foods you need to be healthy are fruit, vegetables, legumes and whole grains – which are easy to find at any supermarket. http://www.pcrm.org/health/diets/vsk/vegetarian-starter-kit-new-four-food-groups

However, even if people disagree and think consuming animal products is, like driving, extremely difficult to avoid, that doesn’t dispute the central argument of my article. The central argument was that slaughtering puppies is not significantly different ethically to slaughtering other animals like cows, pigs, chickens and sheep. If people accept that argument, they can assess how they can and want to put that idea into practise in their lives.

Continued below...

@Pericles:

‘Do you drive a car, Mr Pendergrast?’

…Comment continued from above:

3) If someone did publish an article promoting the idea that people should reduce or even eliminate the amount of car driving they do, I wouldn’t argue they are lecturing me or that they are somehow being religious for not just travelling how they want to travel and keeping quiet about it. In contrast, I welcome people encouraging others to travel more sustainably or to make a positive impact on the environment more generally (in fact I do this myself).

4) Whether or not I drive a car doesn’t have much to do with the validity of the central argument of my article. Even if you don’t accept any of the arguments above as to why I sometimes drive a car, it doesn’t really matter in the context of the article. As I’ve said many times, the point of this article, or for arguments for veganism generally, are not about my own “moral superiority” but are about encouraging people to question their attitudes and actions towards other animals and hopefully make positive changes to their choices. Again, people can consider my central argument that slaughtering puppies is not significantly different ethically to slaughtering other animals like cows, pigs, chickens and sheep. Then, if they agree, they can work out how (and if) they want to resolve this issue in their consumption choices in terms of what they want to do, what they see as possible etc.

>>Again, people can consider my central argument that slaughtering puppies is not significantly different ethically to slaughtering other animals like cows, pigs, chickens and sheep.<<

It is different ethically when the slaughtering was performed by a chronic solvent sniffer using a blunt steak knife:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-09-13/kimberley-man-kills-and-eats-puppy/4260030?&section=news

Which was described by the presiding judge as the worst case of animal cruelty he had ever seen.

Contemporary Australian cuisine does not include the regular consumption of puppy meat. If it was a widely consumed meat it's slaughter would be carried out in puppy abattoirs by trained slaughterers using appropriate tools. There would be monitoring of slaughter practices by outside bodies and avenues of appeal if you thought the puppies were being cruelly treated. It is the ethics of that hypothetical situation against the ethics of attacking a puppy with a blunt steak knife that you need to compare.

Unless abattoirs are employing steak knife wielding solvent sniffers as their slaughterers there really isn't much comparison between the way one man slaughtered a puppy and the way we slaughter farm animals on an industrial scale.

Cheers,

Tony

I guess that does surprise me, just a little, Mr Pendergrast.

>>I think driving and consuming animal products are not quite analogous<<

Considering the fact that you believe that the barbarous throat slitting of a puppy in front of a five year-old child by a "chronic solvent sniffer living in a humpy", is comparable to all forms of animal husbandry, I would have thought that your use of the word "analogous" has a pretty wide application.

But you do misunderstand my point, just a little.

It was your indiscriminate application of logic that needed illumination. The parallel is not between the actions themselves, but the logic from which they are derived - as Tony Lavis has, very patiently, tried to point out to you.

And you are treading on the proverbial rake with this one:

>>I believe cutting an animal’s life short purely because of their species (rather than based on a lack of ability to suffer, value their own life etc) is an example of the discrimination based on species (speciesism)<<

How do you feel about rats? Not to eat, of course, but the ones that exist in great numbers in every city in the world, and have been blamed for spreading some interesting diseases. Is killing rats - the most popular urban method appears to be to poison them, which results in a particularly nasty death - speciesism? Or is it just another example of comparative utility?

>>In a city like Perth, it is very difficult to travel around without a car, it is a very poorly planned city. In contrast, I find it extremely easy to be vegan in Perth<<

Interesting. That tells me that convenience plays a part in your ethical calculations. Which is highly illustrative of your thought processes in general.

Just to be clear, I have no problem with your choice to be vegan. What I do have a problem with is your need to convince others that it is something more than a lifestyle choice, but is somehow a deeply important ethical statement.

It is not.

@Yabby:

‘Those wild animals, as their numbers start to increase, move in on crops, so are shot for exactly that reason.’

Yes but just as at sanctuaries like Edgar’s Mission they manage to protect the animals there without shooting or otherwise killing/harming wild animals, I’m sure we could protect crops without resorting to such measures by using alternative techniques such as adequate fencing. Just as animals are slaughtered all the time for food when we could easily find other ways to get all the nutrients we need, wild animals are routinely killed rather than exploring other options. I think if we started objecting to the slaughter of other animals for food, we would also start to look for other options to protect crops without harming wild animals. These options may require some “thinking outside the box” rather than just doing what is easy/known because it has always been done and implementing alternative solutions, even if they are more costly/difficult.

Yes you’re right that ‘we don't have social welfare and medicare for animals’ but if we had a change in attitudes towards other animals from merely things for us to use and kill when it is convenient/profitable for us to viewing them as beings with inherent value, then a lot would change for animals, not just domesticated animals, but wild ones as well.

Comment continued below…

@Yabby:

…comment continued from above…

‘you claim that someone is better off never being born at all, if they can't live out life to a ripe old age.’

As I’ve mentioned before, someone isn’t someone until they’re born, so not bringing someone into existence doesn’t harm anyone.

‘If your other choice was starving to death, then yes they could.’

But that is not the choice that the animals slaughtered in animal industries face. Yes they would starve in these industries if they were not profitable for their owners because those in these industries only see these animals as worthy of getting food, water etc as long as they are profitable. Again, an example is the egg and dairy industries, where they are slaughtered as long as they are no longer producing enough eggs/dairy. But there are many examples (sanctuaries for one) where animals are not slaughtered and they also do not starve to death – so luckily this isn’t the choice we have to make.