the great vegetarian debate

[Ron-The-Elder]

Spiny: I think generally people are just stating their opinions on a question of Buddhist ethics. I wonder if the perception of "lecturing" occurs when others don't like those opinions?

What you say may be true for some, but in general from my experience, at least in the The Western Cultures, it is the idea of "The Rules of Debate", which place us in the position of adversaries. The conversation turns from "sharing" what we do to live and how we have learned to live, and letting others in on our personal perspectives to "fencing", where there can only be winners, losers and judges. Hubris becomes our armor and passive aggressiveness, overt aggression, character smearing, and ballistic ad hominem our dueling weapons.

Ironically, none of us are morally superior when it comes to surviving by ingesting nutrients. We each for our karmic benefit or detriment have an obligation to understand and decide what to consume for the sake of our samsaric survival and decide which form of karmic consequences to accept as a consequence of doing so. Of course we can choose to starve as others have already pointed out. Not my path, though. "Me Tarzan! You Jain?"

[Mkoll]

\Ironically, none of us are morally superior when it comes to surviving by ingesting nutrients. We each for our karmic benefit or detriment have an obligation to understand and decide what to consume for the sake of our samsaric survival and decide which form of karmic consequences to accept as a consequence of doing so. Of course we can choose to starve as others have already pointed out. Not my path, though. "Me Tarzan! You Jain?"

I agree that there's no point in judging others for meat-eating. It's their prerogative, their kamma. I'm just providing reasons for rethinking that habit. Food for thought, if you will.

To me, the focus is not one person being morally superior to another. Rather, the focus is kamma and compassion, as you've said. By avoiding the eating of flesh, I think one sows seeds of harmlessness for other beings in future lives and gains the fruits thereof.

The Blessed One said: "There is the case, student, where a woman or man is a killer of living beings, brutal, bloody-handed, given to killing & slaying, showing no mercy to living beings. Through having adopted & carried out such actions, on the break-up of the body, after death, he/she reappears in the plane of deprivation, the bad destination, the lower realms, hell. If, on the break-up of the body, after death — instead of reappearing in the plane of deprivation, the bad destination, the lower realms, hell — he/she comes to the human state, then he/she is short-lived wherever reborn. This is the way leading to a short life: to be a killer of living beings, brutal, bloody-handed, given to killing & slaying, showing no mercy to living beings.

...

"There is the case where a woman or man is one who harms beings with his/her fists, with clods, with sticks, or with knives. Through having adopted & carried out such actions, on the break-up of the body, after death, he/she reappears in the plane of deprivation... If instead he/she comes to the human state, then he/she is sickly wherever reborn. This is the way leading to sickliness: to be one who harms beings with one's fists, with clods, with sticks, or with knives.

[chownah]

But we all have choices. I wouldn't want to contribute even in a small way to all the suffering involved in the meat industry in general and slaugherhouses in particular.

Some people who feel the way you do don't purchase milk or milk products because clearly in purchasing them one is contributing to the meat industry and slaughterhouses in a small way.
chownah

[Spiny Norman]

But we all have choices. I wouldn't want to contribute even in a small way to all the suffering involved in the meat industry in general and slaugherhouses in particular.

Some people who feel the way you do don't purchase milk or milk products because clearly in purchasing them one is contributing to the meat industry and slaughterhouses in a small way.
chownah

Yes, true. But again, most of us have a choice about what the kind of food we buy. We can't do everything, but we can do something.

[Spiny Norman]

Hubris becomes our armor and passive aggressiveness, overt aggression, character smearing, and ballistic ad hominem our dueling weapons.

Yes, that can be a problem when controversial topics are being discussed. But IMO the answer is to be mindful of our debating style, not to ban controversial topics or suppress discussion.

[lyndon taylor]

On this forum I am very thankful we have a balance of meat eaters and vegetarians contributing, on another forum I browse, the vehement meat eaters run the show, call for the topic to be banned, and the moderators step in and ban the vegetarians from saying anything, so much for freedom of expression!! (there not here) They also have a thread where everyone calls for moderate drinking alcohol, and no end of rudeness to anyone that says you shouldn't drink. Seems like some other forums stop being Buddhist forums, and simply become people claiming to be buddhist forums!!

[Spiny Norman]

On this forum I am very thankful we have a balance of meat eaters and vegetarians contributing, on another forum I browse, the vehement meat eaters run the show, call for the topic to be banned, and the moderators step in and ban the vegetarians from saying anything, so much for freedom of expression!! (there not here) They also have a thread where everyone calls for moderate drinking alcohol, and no end of rudeness to anyone that says you shouldn't drink. Seems like some other forums stop being Buddhist forums, and simply become people claiming to be buddhist forums!!

It takes all sorts I guess.

[walkart]

On this forum I am very thankful we have a balance of meat eaters and vegetarians contributing, on another forum I browse, the vehement meat eaters run the show, call for the topic to be banned, and the moderators step in and ban the vegetarians from saying anything, so much for freedom of expression!! (there not here) They also have a thread where everyone calls for moderate drinking alcohol, and no end of rudeness to anyone that says you shouldn't drink. Seems like some other forums stop being Buddhist forums, and simply become people claiming to be buddhist forums!!

I was banned on some buddhist forum because i was in contradiction with some bhikkhus who said that killing for self defence and during the war its ok, that muslims must be eradicated, that HHDL was à b*** and that when some bhikkhu buy meat with money its ok too...

[LXNDR]

I was banned on some buddhist forum because i was in contradiction with some bhikkhus who said that killing for self defence and during the war its ok, that muslims must be eradicated, that HHDL was à b*** and that when some bhikkhu buy meat with money its ok too...

bhikk who?

[walkart]

I was banned on some buddhist forum because i was in contradiction with some bhikkhus who said that killing for self defence and during the war its ok, that muslims must be eradicated, that HHDL was à b*** and that when some bhikkhu buy meat with money its ok too...

bhikk who?

Good question )

[Ron-The-Elder]

Bhikk-whooooo?



A truly wise monk?

[cooran]

Interesting research - but what does it mean for Vegans??

Plants can hear themselves being eaten:
http://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-an ... eing-eaten

With metta,
Chris

[TheNoBSBuddhist]

It means they can still eat vegetables. It's a defence mechanism, not a cry for help. A plant can 'feel' in the sensory sense, not in the emotional sense. It is not a good idea to anthropomorphise everything. In fact it's a decidedly foolish and ignorant thing to do.

[culaavuso]

It's a defence mechanism, not a cry for help. A plant can 'feel' in the sensory sense, not in the emotional sense. It is not a good idea to anthropomorphise everything. In fact it's a decidedly foolish and ignorant thing to do.

Our natural way of thinking about these standard emotions is that the mental perception of some fact excites the mental affection called the emotion, and that this latter state of mind gives rise to the bodily expression. My thesis on the contrary is that the bodily changes follow directly the PERCEPTION of the exciting fact, and that our feeling of the same changes as they occur IS the emotion. Common sense says, we lose our fortune, are sorry and weep; we meet a bear, are frightened and run; we are insulted by a rival, are angry and strike. The hypothesis here to be defended says that this order of sequence is incorrect, that the one mental state is not immediately induced by the other, that the bodily manifestations must first be interposed between, and that the more rational statement is that we feel sorry because we cry, angry because we strike, afraid because we tremble, and not that we cry, strike, or tremble, because we are sorry, angry, or fearful, as the case may be. Without the bodily states following on the perception, the latter would be purely cognitive in form, pale, colourless, destitute of emotional warmth. We might then see the bear, and judge it best to run, receive the insult and deem it right to strike, but we could not actually feel afraid or angry.

If you wave your arm at a housefly, it flies away. Do you conclude that the housefly feels fear? We don't know what a housefly feels, if anything. You might not assume it feels fear. If you damage a beehive, the bees come at you to sting you. Are they angry? Again, you could quite reasonably answer either "no" or "I don't know."
...
In short, the question of emotions in extraterrestrial animals may be unanswerable. At best you could say that in certain situations these animals act as if they are fearful or angry. Here is a key point: We never observe emotions. We only infer them.

In the late nineteenth, and first half of the twentieth century, doctors were taught that babies did not experience pain, and were treating their young patients accordingly. From needle sticks to tonsillectomies to heart operations were done with no anaesthesia or analgesia, other than muscle relaxation for the surgery. The belief was that in babies the expression of pain was reflexive and, owing to the immaturity of the infant brain, the pain could not really matter.

[TheNoBSBuddhist]

None of which actually contradicts what I posted....?

Not sure if you're supporting my comment or contradicting it.

Actually, I guess it could be neither....