People Who Say They Don't Care About Animals

by Nia
(NY, NY)

Question:

How do you respond when people tell you that they just don't care about animals? I can never believe that people think that and I never know what to say.


Answer:

I know just where you are coming from Nia. When people tell me that I can barely conceal my cringing. I normally try to bite my lip so as not to be openly outraged.

Ultimately, people who say, "It's just a cow. Why do I care about a cow?" don't know what is really happening to that cow, both in life and in the process of being killed. If, for instance, that same person were to actually witness the slaughter of a cow first-hand, I think they would hesitate to say they don't care about the cow. After all, it's not so much the animal as the suffering.

Paul McCartney said, "If slaughterhouses had glass windows, we'd all be vegetarians."

He's completely right, and that's one of the reasons that we are never allowed to see the killing process. I do know of a few smaller farms that allow viewers, and they make the process much more humane. But, on the vast, vast majority of farms, the suffering any of us would see would surely be unstomachable.

However, if there is somehow a way that a human could be so numb as not to be affected by the facts of the lives and deaths of farm animals, the best way to approach that discussion (if you are planning to have one), is to look at it entirely from that person's point of view... How does eating animals affect them?

After all, that's what they are saying they care about... themselves, and possibly the lives of other humans. They might be interested in the environmental affects of animal farming, but often I find these same people are not really interested in the global affects of their diets either.

So, I approach it from the health angle. There are numerous studies about the benefits of a vegan diet and the drawbacks of a diet heavy in animal products. You can read up on the studies that show how animal-heavy diets are dangerous for your health and on how plant-based diets can lead to longer, healthier lives.

I hope that helps! Don't let anyone else's lack of compassion dampen your spirit, and try to remember back before you knew about veganism to see things from other viewpoints.




Comments for People Who Say They Don't Care About Animals

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Rating
starstarstarstarstar 		There are some VEGANS that don't care about animals.
by: Anonymous

There is a lot more to veganism that what meets the eye. There are some people that are vegan because they hate the taste meat and similar foods.
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starstarstarstarstar 		Vegans stay strong
by: Anonymous

Going vegan can be difficult, especially if people don't understand how you feel or can't see things from your point of view. You can't convince everyone and that's ok, there are some people who won't ever want to change but remember that there are more and more vegans than ever before and you are not alone. Dont loose hope or be disheartened, we are outnumbered but we are strong x
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starstarstarstarstar 		Projection
by: Anonymous

Humans care about other animals and other humans because of a trait inherent to empathy called projection. In other words, in order for you to even feel bad for another human being, let alone an animal, your brain has to automatically create a connection between you and the other. To do this, it projects what that experience is like upon your own person. By imagining how much it must hurt when you see pain, you are thinking about how badly it would hurt you. You are always comparing the experiences of others with your own experiences. That is how you come to developer empathy. Someone who just doesn't do that projection, whether for logical or illogical reasons is simply bypassing that mechanism. There are many elements to empathy which lead to your desire to care about animals. The question is if you really should for any objective reason beyond your own projection and state of mind. I would argue that by protecting an animal, you are attempting to protect yourself in some way or another. No action will be taken unless it benefits you in some way, even if that way is simply making you feel like you are doing something good. My main point here is this: you don't know how pain feels to another person, only what it feels like to you and , while it is reasonable to assume that it is similar, it is hard to know what level of pain an animal that cannot communicate is going through. Personally, I say do as thou will as it harms none. There must be a person present for harm to be done, so you can't hurt an animal because the animal cannot assert that it is aware of its own existence and therefore that by protecting it you are doing anything more than easing your own cringes of projected pain. How are we to know what the animals feels if it cannot tell us it can even feel in any kind of a knowledgeable sense. All signs that we as humans see are merely projected human characteristics. Even feeling is a projection. So who can say if an animal can even suffer if it is not self aware? Since we don't know for sure, it would be wrong to say that we know that animals suffer.
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starstarstar 		What about looking at best practices in slaughterhouse
by: Mark

In my opinion, the real problem is not about whether you eat meat or herbs, but why slaughterhouses have to use so drastic methods to process meats. Since beginning of time, humans have been hunting animals for their meat, others were falling on the herbs harvesting in order to survive, both are ways of life. What is problematic, is that the meat industry is now so big, that it cuts-short on best practices to increase abundance for the always-increasing demand. THAT is the problem to be addressed. If there were more home-style practices and less (be it not at all) industrial practices, I think the cruelty issue we have would not even be part of public blog posts and any other documentaries of the like.
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starstarstarstarstar 		its hard to be happy
by: Rachel Menti

i don't eat vegan for health reasons its for the animal reason. things are just getting worse for animals, I just can't believe it all. It just makes sense to eat a less processed diet, and everyone wonders where all the disease is coming from. the writing is on the wall
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starstarstarstarstar 		The west wasn't won on salad
by: Anonymous

People have been doing it for thousands of years. I totally understand your view point and I grew up on a farm with livestock. We would slaughter our own lambs and rabbits. We also had some larger animals, but we sold them to market.

When it's a way of life, it's not seen as cruel or unusual. We would also kill an animal if it were in pain or cripple. It's all perspective

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starstarstarstarstar 		We've been trained to eat meat
by: Anonymous

The Cargill corporation makes billions annually shoving the idea that meat is healthy down your throat. We're all just conned into thinking animal abuse is ok. Like slavery or shoving Jews in ovens people will just do what they're told because others say it's ok.
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starstar 		I don't care about animals
by: Anonymous

I do not care about people I don't know. I'm not a psychopath, I deeply care about my family and friends. But I wouldn't care about human slaughterhouses if it processed strangers. But what if you were one of those people? Good point, but hey guess what, I'm not.
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starstarstarstarstar 		Help one that's in need
by: Countryman

I love horses, cows are interesting to watch, and a good dog always adds to the scenery. But having animals in my house, on my funriture, at my heel with every move I make, I find that distracting. Still, I'll do all I can to help one that's in need.
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starstarstar 		This is rather im-holier-than-you way of thinking
by: Anonymous

And this judgmental way of thinking is exactly why so many people roll eyes on vegans. It is annoying. Secondly, not all people are vegans because they have concern for animals. Thirdly, animals kill animals. What about that? Some people simply accept this fact of nature. It would be wonderful if nobody had to kill anybody, of course, but this is a fallen world and if meat-eating humans do not kill animals, other animals will because the nature is arranged that way at present. Please stop judging other people for their choices and expect that they will conform to you. It is so childish. Do to them as you would wish done to you. And they probably wouldnt have reason to even say that if you didnt try to shove your lifestyle down their throat (because somebody had to start that conversation and likely it was you, because I cannot imagine a person saying that they dont care about animals, right out of the blue). Maybe they didnt even mean what they said nor knew what they were saying in fullness, because they were simply annoyed and said just about anything they estimated would cut the conversation.

Man is made omnivore and if somebody eats herbs this is a matter of CHOICE. I disagree with politically correct herbivore argumentation about our digestive system, because we do not have four stomachs like cows either and we cannot digest cellulose like herb eaters. To Christians reading this, God equally accepts meat eaters and herb eaters as long as each person does accordingly to their own conscience. But a lot of herb-eaters try to sound "better/holier than others" and judge others. Read Romans 14 for all this, and with understanding, if you will. Neither side is to judge, neither meat eaters are to look down on you, nor you on them.
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starstarstarstarstar 		Sad
by: Joe

It's so ironic that most of the people who say they don't care have never petted a cow's face or rubbed a pig's belly. It's so sad but after examining all the facts of the brutality that goes on in the factory farming industry, it becomes entirely too easy to hate people that eat meat.
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starstarstarstarstar 		People who say they don't care about animals
by: Anonymous

Thank you for that answer. You really have a keen insight and are extremeley articulat-God bless and keep up the good work!

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