Do angry vegans turn you against going vegan?

[Spymaster]

How often do you see rabbit on a menu? Most people think of rabbits more as pets than meat and don't eat them.

You'll often see rabbit on menu's in restaurants specialising in game. The meat is excellent if cooked well and rabbit is in season all year round in the UK (except Scotland I think) so it's often great value. Jugged hare is an awesome Brit classic. You'll see prepped rabbit in clingfilmed trays in supermarkets but mainstream restaurants probably don't run with it because it's not easy to cook well. Same as game birds.

 

[editor]

That may or may not be correct, but that's not what has been asserted in the Guardian article posted up thread.

For the record, I don't particularly like dogs, and I would find the idea of eating them not to my taste (for a variety of cultural reasons, I guess) but that doesn't mean I'm outraged by the fact that some people from another culture and in another country might find it perfectly acceptable.

So you're cool with people rearing dogs in cruel conditions and then eating them. I could be wrong but I suspect you're in a minority.

 

[Spymaster]

yeah yeah but but evidence EVIDENCE or it didn't happen
you must provide EVIDENCE for the arbitrators of what's acceptable or else you're clearly lying!!! etc

Well just a couple of examples would do. Otherwise it's just noise.

I'd avoid dog meat now but that's because I wouldn't trust the suppliers of it and the one time I've tried it I didn't much care for it.

 

[andysays]

Most South Koreans are against the disgusting practice too:

South Koreans are increasingly turning their backs on cruel dog meat trade

Are you suggesting that the practice is disgusting because of the cruel conditions the dogs are kept in (which appears to be at least part of the argument of that Mirror story and the story linked to in the Guardian article claiming that "The west has gone into shock mode"), or would it be disgusting whatever conditions existed?

 

[editor]

I think this backs up what I've been saying:

Westerners' disgust
Our love of dogs isn't the only thing stopping us from eating them; it is claimed the feeling of "disgust" and fear of being judged by others influences our eating habits too.

In an article for The Guardian, science writer Dr Kathleen Taylor says: "To most Westerners, eating your dog is an abomination, end of story. That's the rule our culture happens to follow.

"Disgust is contagious. We catch it easily from others, and it tells us what's acceptable and what isn't.

"Eating Fido violates the rule and risks your being made a social pariah for having broken the moral code. It makes you untrustworthy, likely to break other, more important rules.

"Disgust, by contrast, keeps you clean and pure, up on the moral high ground. It protects you from being punished by your community, or worse, being seen as disgusting yourself."

However, what Westerners deem "disgusting" can also vary; most British people are against eating horsemeat, however it's estimated that around 18,000 tonnes of it is eaten in France every year.

Why the UK doesn't eat dog meat, but people in China do

 

[editor]

Are you suggesting that the practice is disgusting because of the cruel conditions the dogs are kept in (which appears to be at least part of the argument of that Mirror story and the story linked to in the Guardian article claiming that "The west has gone into shock mode"), or would it be disgusting whatever conditions existed?

I think it's disgusting on both levels: the abject cruelty (which is very widely documented) and the eating of the dog itself. But you're OK with that, yes?

 

[editor]

Oh, at no point have I been "outraged" by this practice. I just think it's cruel and disgusting.

 

[8ball]

I think it's disgusting on both levels: the abject cruelty (which is very widely documented) and the eating of the dog itself.

Clean and pure, up on the moral high ground, as the article says.

 

[andysays]

I think it's disgusting on both levels: the abject cruelty (which is very widely documented) and the eating of the dog itself. But you're OK with that, yes?

Thanks for clarifying.

I haven't said anywhere that I'm OK with the cruelty associated with much of the meat industry, dog or otherwise.

 

[editor]

Thanks for clarifying.

I haven't said anywhere that I'm OK with the cruelty associated with much of the meat industry, dog or otherwise.

Sorry, this comment suggested you weren't bothered by it: "For the record, I don't particularly like dogs, and I would find the idea of eating them not to my taste (for a variety of cultural reasons, I guess) but that doesn't mean I'm outraged by the fact that some people from another culture and in another country might find it perfectly acceptable." If you're not outraged, how about 'disgusted'?

Closer to home, what are your feelings on the cruelty and general mucking-about involved in, say, the chicken industry?

 

[8ball]

I think it’s useful to pull apart the conflation of the ethics of eating meat as a concept and certain brutal farming practices.

Some of the louder voices against the latter have come from meat eaters, and I don’t think anyone on this thread has expressed approval of either factory farming processes or the far worse things which are accepted in cases of pseudo-legal rearing of minority meat products.

The ‘carnism’ point of what is accepted as a ‘food animal’ is tied up with it, but is another separate point. Fact is, it would be better for those dogs in Korea if their livestock status had never been revoked, because standards of livestock rearing have been on a path of convergence with the West.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Cultures aren't fully logically consistent about what they consider food animals, for a variety of reasons. I totally reject the idea that people above the age of about 10 in the UK are put off eating rabbit cos they're cute. Bad example, and rabbit has a longstanding tradition in British cuisine. Horse would be a better example. There's no particular reason why people should reject eating horse over other animals, but many in the UK do do that.

But I'm not quite sure what this proves except that we're not completely logical beings in our choices and preferences. Regarding the disgust reaction, that's something that comes from a complex number of factors, and many people have weird disgust reactions to non-meat foods like mushrooms.

 

[8ball]

Yeah, the mushroom thing is pretty common, and seems a little odd. I don’t like beetroot but I don’t have that kind of reaction about it.

Maybe it’s related to the poisonous nature of so many related fungi.

 

[ddraig]

Cultures aren't fully logically consistent about what they consider food animals, for a variety of reasons. I totally reject the idea that people above the age of about 10 in the UK are put off eating rabbit cos they're cute. Bad example, and rabbit has a longstanding tradition in British cuisine. Horse would be a better example. There's no particular reason why people should reject eating horse over other animals, but many in the UK do do that.

But I'm not quite sure what this proves except that we're not completely logical beings in our choices and preferences. Regarding the disgust reaction, that's something that comes from a complex number of factors, and many people have weird disgust reactions to non-meat foods like mushrooms.

evidence?!?! where's your EVIDENCE of people above the age of 10 not being put off eating bunnies because they're cute??
otherwise it's just noise, as usual

 

[Spymaster]

But I'm not quite sure what this proves except that we're not completely logical beings in our choices and preferences. Regarding the disgust reaction, that's something that comes from a complex number of factors, and many people have weird disgust reactions to non-meat foods like mushrooms.

It's just the vegheads jumping up and down and engaging in the hypocrisy hunting that so exercises ddraig when the tables are turned.

 

[andysays]

Sorry, this comment suggested you weren't bothered by it: "For the record, I don't particularly like dogs, and I would find the idea of eating them not to my taste (for a variety of cultural reasons, I guess) but that doesn't mean I'm outraged by the fact that some people from another culture and in another country might find it perfectly acceptable." If you're not outraged, how about 'disgusted'?

I think a meaningful distinction can be made between the general fact of eating (dog) meat and the conditions which animals are kept in or the way they're treated before being killed.

I don't have a problem with the general fact of eating meat, even if some of the animals (eg dogs) people choose to eat are ones which I wouldn't eat myself.

I agree that the conditions in which many animals are kept are unnecessarily cruel, including chickens eaten in the UK and dogs apparently eaten in Korea. To the extent it's possible, I attempt to avoid eating meat from animals which have been kept in conditions I would regard as unnecessarily cruel, though I accept I could probably do more than I currently do.

But I'm not going to declare myself either disgusted or outraged by the fact that some people in Korea apparently eat dog meat, particularly when the driver for that feeling of disgust and outrage is a disingenuous story in the Guardian, attempting to use the Winter Olympics in Korea to whip up a story claiming that "The west has gone into shock mode".

 

[ddraig]

It's just the vegheads jumping up and down and engaging in the hypocrisy hunting that so exercises ddraig when the tables are turned.

only works one way does it?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Yeah, the mushroom thing is pretty common, and seems a little odd. I don’t like beetroot but I don’t have that kind of reaction about it.

Maybe it’s related to the poisonous nature of so many related fungi.

Could be. Disgust reactions tend to have their root in unpleasant associations, don't they?

Could also be related to a particular reaction to a chemical that others don't sense in the same way. Or a combination of the two.

 

[Spymaster]

only works one way does it?

Of course not. But the hypocrisy of your hypocrisy is amusing!

 

[8ball]

evidence?!?! where's your EVIDENCE of people above the age of 10 not being put off eating bunnies because they're cute??
otherwise it's just noise, as usual

Evidence is tricky in this regard, since rabbit meat is something of a cottage industry in the UK. You don’t get the kind of collated figures you get with large-scale factory farming.

There *was* that fuss over Jeanette Winterson killing, cooking and eating a rabbit about 5 or 6 years ago, but it’s unclear what proportion of the ‘great outraged’ were happily guzzling down chicken nuggets while hammering their keyboards.

 

[8ball]

Could be. Disgust reactions tend to have their root in unpleasant associations, don't they?

Could also be related to a particular reaction to a chemical that others don't sense in the same way. Or a combination of the two.

I was more thinking it might be some kind of ‘genetic memory’ (for want of a better word) similar to that speculated to be involved in an aversion of spiders and snakes (or cucumbers, if you’re a cat), but that’s an interesting idea.

A lot of mycophobes say it is the texture. I guess those people don’t eat tofu either. Most tofu eaters I know also eat mushrooms, but obviously I’m not going to draw anything from that.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I was more thinking it might be some kind of ‘genetic memory’ (for want of a better word) similar to that speculated to be involved in an aversion of spiders and snakes (or cucumbers, if you’re a cat), but that’s an interesting idea.

A lot of mycophobes say it is the texture. I guess those people don’t eat tofu either. Most tofu eaters I know also eat mushrooms, but obviously I’m not going to draw anything from that.

We're not always the best at explaining things like our disgust reactions, though. We confabulate some post facto story, but we're not reliable narrators.

 

[8ball]

We're not always the best at explaining things like our disgust reactions, though. We confabulate some post facto story, but we're not reliable narrators.

That’s my feeling too.

Would be interesting to know how many anti-fungists eat aubergine.

Also, a lot of foods become slimy in texture when going off.

 

[NoXion]

Don't like mushrooms or aubergines. Texture makes me boke.

 

[8ball]

Don't like mushrooms or aubergines. Texture makes me boke.

Science, bitches!

(Ok, small sample size...)

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

Is rabbit really such an odd thing to eat? It’s delicious if cooked right and readily available here in the UK...

 

[Spymaster]

Is rabbit really such an odd thing to eat?

Not. At. All.

 

[8ball]

Is rabbit really such an odd thing to eat? It’s delicious if cooked right and readily available here in the UK...

Certainly is (delicious, I mean, not odd). Though I was very conflicted as a kid when my Dad brought a freshly-shot one home.

I remember a lot of people saying Watership Down had a big effect on whether they would eat rabbit (of my generation, anyway).

Demand still outstrips what we produce here, though. According to (rough) estimates, it is mostly imported.

As of a few years ago, demand was increasing, but I can’t immediately find anything more current.

 

[Spymaster]

Sainsbury's, Iceland, and probably all the others currently stock rabbit meat.

 

[Spymaster]

I had rabbit in Malta. Tastes like chewy pork.

Rabbit is a national dish in Malta.