The argument is my belief in the ownership, subjugation and murder of animals. It’s a complicated issue, so let’s go point by point.
• Morality: Morals are a social feature defined by those powerful enough, it’s indeed a unique feature of our human race. If we don’t kill animals, other predators will do it, mother nature established the law of the strong, where only those at the top can consider these things.
Since morality depends on society and beliefs, as humans there isn’t a single answer to whether we should kill animals for pleasure or not. I personally dislike killing animals without need and treating them badly, but not everyone thinks the same, and I can’t judge them based on my own beliefs.
• Health: We are omnivores, that point alone should make the answer obvious. Our body needs different proteins, vitamins and carbohydrates, amongst others. Some foods are better at bringing those necessities to us than others. Vegetables are very healthy, but pure vegans suffer from many issues due to lack of meat, while meat lovers suffer even worse problems. There is no real benefit to eating meat over vegetables or vegetables over meat in the long term; our body NEEDS a balanced diet.
• Environment: Possibly vegan lovers have the upper hand here, nurturing animals for products and food is unhealthier to the environment that cultivating fields of vegetables.
• Economic: There is no real advantage to being vegan or to being a meat lover in this point… cultivating huge fields of vegetables and maintaining them is very expensive, while growing animals for their products and food is expensive too.
• Convenience: Meat lovers win here by a VERY long shot, you can just buy a slab of meat, fry it, and eat it with good taste. In order to properly cook and eat vegetables you need to check if it’s fresh, wash it, peel it (in 90% of the cases), then cook it (if you’re going for a healthy diet, it’s probably boiling it).
• Taste: Our body and taste buds give more pleasure when eating something that contains what we’re missing (or is extremely tasty), if we’re tired and missing carbs; a good pasta will taste like heaven; if we have too high blood pressure, a good 100% natural lemonade will be tastier than a coke and if we have an excess of vitamins and our blood is too alkaline, meat will taste phenomenally.
This comment derailed a bit from the original objective, which was the ownership, subjugation and murder of animals; much as the post derailed from that question. So I’m going to answer finally both points:
Vegan or not vegan. I’d rather keep staying as an omnivore, but if a decision was forced upon me, I would choose to be a meat lover. It’s more convenient and easier to be a meat lover, and as long as you buy in a market and don’t go to a slaughterhouse you can keep your conscience clean to a degree.
Ownership, subjugation and murder: I agree with this in certain areas… if we didn’t protect the chickens or the cows in our barns, other predators would kill them, they would have more freedom, but what is freedom to livestock? They won’t get on a train or ride a plane, they won’t build the next empire state, they would just get killed by someone stronger. The only difference is that their lives are in our hands instead of the hands of mother nature; and at least we have remorse and conscience.