Read the rest here: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/runkle-disgusting-hypocrisy-eating-animals-article-1.2275120
This article sums up a lot of the frustration I've been feeling with this issue for the past few weeks.
Read the rest here: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/runkle-disgusting-hypocrisy-eating-animals-article-1.2275120Two simultaneous celebrations took place in recent weeks during which millions of animals were grilled, slathered in sauce and served with alcohol. The animals had been packed into trucks and transported - often over hundreds of miles - to slaughterhouses. They arrived weak, dehydrated and coated in urine and feces. Many endured brutal beatings and other abuses before their deaths. During the slaughter process, some of the animals were scalded and dismembered while still alive and fully conscious.
One celebration commemorated the summer solstice; the other fêted fathers. One was observed in the Chinese city of Yulin; the other took place in every city in America. On the menu in Yulin were 10,000 dogs and cats served with lychees and liquor. In America: millions of pigs, cows and chickens served with fixin's and beer.
Only one of these celebrations generated an international outcry, local and global protests, and a record-breaking 4 million signatures on a Change.org petition from people calling for the animals to be spared. Why?
Although I agree to a certain extent, Saying that rude vegans and vegs are the reason other people don't turn out the same is a bad excuse.Selective compassion doesn't make you a hypocrite. It makes you a potential vegetarian and a potential vegan. Unless someone fouls up royally by calling you a hypocrite, which makes vegetarians and vegans look like a club you wouldn't want to be part of.
Selective compassion is why people are more likely to donate an organ to a close relative than to a stranger, and why they give more money to domestic charities than to foreign ones. The animals you know, the people you can identify with, will always have the strongest lines to your heart. I think it's admirable to extend that compassion to all of humanity and to the whole animal world, but I don't think it's admirable to call people names whose compassion is more for the kinds of animals that love them back.
I hope you're not serious in suggesting that innocent people should die because their country hosts a dog meat festival. That's a horrible thing to say.Any country that simply doesn't spare any species of animals from becoming food like China must be nuked, and after the radiation singes every skin and eyeballs of the population there, it must be nuked again, and again and again and again.
We're probably all guilty of varying degrees of hypocrisy, which is why I try never to use blanket statements such as "I am against violence toward animals" without clarifying exactly what kinds of violence I'm against. I take every opportunity to state that I oppose the unnecessary and intentional torture and slaughter of sentient creatures and that I intend to reduce my participation in such activities as much as can reasonably be expected.And to address no whey jose's point, that it's hypocritical to say you're against violence to animals while directly participating in violence against animals. At what point does direct participation become indirect participation? When the violence is against biting insects? When it's against the animals your dog or cat eats out of a can? Are we all really expected to draw our lines in exactly the same place, as far as who we should be calling out as hypocrites?
For the record, I'm not suggesting that the use of the word "hypocrite" in debate is the best choice. I prefer "cognitive dissonance" or "logical inconsistency." I'm merely arguing that it is, in fact, a form of hypocrisy whether we name it or not. I also don't personally attribute any harsh connotations to the word, as I consider myself an occasional hypocrite and will openly admit to that. I very much identify with this quote from comedian Louis C.K.:When you say you believe someone is making a mistake you aren't giving the same poke in the eye as when you say you think they are lying. "Inconsistent" implies error. "Hypocritical" implies dishonesty. One is taken as a personal attack, and the other one isn't. Debate coaches always tell their debaters to attack the point, not the speaker, and I think that applies to this issue.
I still don't understand how hypocrite equates to "despised person." Perhaps our definition of the word is different. I recognise the hypocrisy in my friends and family the same as I do in myself, and I try to help them live their lives in a way that more accurately aligns with their stated moral beliefs.Again, I wonder how those with omnivore partners, friends and/or family members reconcile the charge of hypocrisy with willingly living with and/or socializing with these hypocrites. I can't imagine anything more soul destroying than living with someone and/or depending on the friendship of people one despises so much.
Yes, and I'd be as repulsed as I am when my partner eats anchovy and tuna pizza-- which is quite repulsed. I'm not precious about dogs, though.Also, I'd still like to hear from those who don't refuse totally to ever eat a meal in the presence of someone eating flesh. Would you sit down and eat a meal with someone who is eating dog?
That's not hypocritical unless you claim to feel otherwise. If you say that the suffering of all animals affects you equally and then only cry when you see dog meat, you're being hypocritical. If you openly admit to a preference, you're being honest. If you claim that the suffering of all animals affects you at all, and then you EAT an animal (of any sort) for no particular reason aside from taste or convenience, you would be a hypocrite in that instance.If that makes me a hypocrite, so be it, but I think it is a perfectly normal human reaction to have a different reaction to a species as a whole if one has had a deep emotional attachment to one or more members of that species.
That's because the human legal system exists not to make everyone perfect, but to cover up the imperfections of people. It carefully illegalizes what the majority of the population do not indulge in, while legalizing illegal things where revenue opportunity exists. Man has made a lot of illogical checks & balances to ensure his protection & survival. Those who take the middle stance are always those who get the most praises, but really, what will ever come out of liberals calling both wrong-doers and radical defenders as wrong? Radicalism itself is a dreaded word today thanks to religion. Governments are nothing but control-radicalists who will do anything for taxes. In the end everybody knows that total peace is the only way out, this simple movement will unite religions, create gender equality, give animals breathing space on this earth and stop crimes of all sorts.It's really really difficult to be calm and kind in the face of passive cruelty. If we show just the slightest bit of upset, no one will want to "deal" with us. It's a very unfair world and we have to work twice as hard to live in it peacefully. But I kind of feel like if we don't play by "their rules" we wont be able to make progress. In any instance there is oppression and suffering, those sufferers are expected to be on their "best behavior" for others to "see their side" or they'll be labeled as radicals. And it SUCKS. But it doesn't seem like anything else is effective at getting through to others? :/
Yes. The implied dishonesty comes across even stronger here:For the record, the actual definition of "hypocrisy" is:
hypocrisy
h??p?kr?si/
noun
the practice of claiming to have higher standards or more noble beliefs than is the case.