The consumption of meat is ethically wrong

Suffering is bad "In a sense... based on what everyone feels/thinks, suffering is bad." First off, I guess one could say that suffering by itself is a bad thing, but it is never by itself in reality. Suffering can be a beneficial or ethically justifiable thing depending on the circumstances. "In regards to character building, humans have these notions because humans think that suffering is bad... character building does not make suffering good, it only makes it less bad." The problem with this line of thinking is it ignores the fact that the temporary suffering is what makes the suffering later easier to handle. That temporary suffering is no doubt a beneficial thing to that man, as he can deal with suffering better later. Animal suffering is bad "I suppose that I must first affirm that animals (specifically ones with meat) can experience suffering... Valladarex essentially concedes this point in his outline..." I will go with the assumption that all animals feel pain as we do. "By extension of my first premise (suffering is bad), it follows that animal suffering is also bad..." Your first premise was that suffering is bad by itself. When we talk about farming, fishing, and hunting animals, we are talking about keeping people alive through nutrition. When it comes to keeping people from suffering through giving them the sustenance needed to live, this trumps the short amount of time the animals must deal suffering with during their deaths. I would also like to point out that the slaughtering methods that are used to ensure the suffering in the killing is at a very minimum. Methods include:(1) Carbon Dioxide This method is approved for sheep, calves and swine. The animal is asphyxiated by the use of carbon dioxide gas before being bled. Captive Bolt This method is approved for sheep, swine, goats, calves, cattle, horses, mules, and other equines. A captive bolt stunner is applied to the livestock so as to produce quick unconsciousness in the animals before they are bled. Gunshot This method is approved for cattle, calves, sheep, swine, goats, horses, mules, and other equines. The gun is used to render the animal quickly unconscious (and presumably dead) before being bled. Stunning or Slaughtering with Electric Current This method is approved for swine, sheep, calves, cattle, and goats. The current applied is sufficient to ensure surgical anesthesia throughout the "bleeding" of the animal. Each of these methods is outlined in detail, and the regulations require that inspectors identify operations which cause "undue" "excitement and discomfort" of animals. Humans are animals "I'm going to make this... Ultimately, we have flesh like the animals we kill." A big distinction between us and other animals is the ability to know that we will die in the future. When people are about to be executed, they suffer all the way up to that point until they actually die, because they have the capacity to understand what is exactly going on. This is why it is extremely different between the deaths of humans and the deaths of animals. For animals, they don't know that they are about to die. If it is a quick painless death, like the USDA approved methods of slaughtering, the suffering is so much less. "In the hope of showing... everyone would think very differently." Again, suffering is not necessarily a bad thing if there is a net benefit from the suffering. The well-being and happiness of people trumps the amount of suffering done to the animals, so long as the farming is done humanely. It is unethical to murder another human "Humans have a welfare state..the justification for the consumption of meat is that we need to eat meat to survive... " I think there should be a distinction between murder and killing. Murder is the crime of unlawfully killing a person especially with malice aforethought.(2) Killing is to deprive of life : cause the death of. When it comes to murder, one could say it is wrong since it is usually tied to laws which are made to ensure a maximum amount of happiness for everyone. For the umbrella term of killing, it is free from these laws designed to protect innocent people. Killing a person can be justified if it is done to ensure the well being of other people. For example, when a criminal is about to kill an innocent person with a gun, a police officer is justified in shooting him, and even taking his life if saves that innocent person. Another example could include a soldier fighting for a cause to protect other people from harm. When a union soldier in the Civil War killed a confederate soldier to help free more people from slavery, it is just. If you agree with me up until now... "It's here where I'm going... there should be a justifiable reason for the suffering caused." The justifiable reason for the suffering caused is that it provides a maximum well-being for people. As you said before, humans have a regard for their own well being. We want to provide maximum happiness for everyone. If the happiness caused by our consumption of animals is greater than the suffering caused, then maximum happiness is being provided. "If you agree with the tenants I have previously proposed...understand the suffering being inflicted, should it not be our responsibility to prevent it?" I'd like to think the price being paid for my survival will be paid off in the end through the amount of happiness and well-being that I get for myself and I provide for others. I hope that in the end, there will be a net amount of good from my existence. It may be uncertain whether it will happen or not, but I will personally try my best to make it happen. For the animals in pens and cages, their conditions may not necessarily be better off if they weren't kept in captivity. I agree that some conditions that exist today in animal farms aren't better, but many actually allow the animals to be happy in their lives until death. It's easy to focus on the short moment of suffering at the end of their lives, but we also have to look at what was done in the vast majority of their life. If they lived their lives happier than what would have been if they lived in the wild, then there is a net amount of happiness, not only for us, but for the animals too. For the suffering done to people working in horrible working conditions to provide us cheap products, it is definitely tragic. But, we must still see how things would be if these companies didn't work in the third world. In our desire to provide the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest amount of people, we have to ensure our actions provide this. There is no simple solution to third world poverty, but we must do everything we can to try to equalize the opportunities for people everywhere. If the people would be worse off if the sweatshops didn't exist, then a net benefit is being provided to these people. They take these job because they have no better options knowingly available to them. If these options are not artificially limited by other people, then the factories can be just, if done legally They provide greater pay to these poor individuals than they would have from other jobs. This ends up contributing to ending poverty by giving them more money to use on other things, which actually makes conditions better in their area. If the factories weren't able to use the third world for cheap labor, and had to provide them with higher wages than would be profitable for them, then they would in turn bring their jobs back to better-off countries, and actually hurt the third world. Conclusion I hope I've helped illustrate why things aren't always so simple, and things such as suffering have to be viewed in a larger picture. The sentient, feeling creatures may suffer for a short amount of time, but that suffering is just if a net happiness is had on a larger scale. I'll give you the chance to respond now. Sources: 1. http://www.animallaw.info... 2. http://www.merriam-webster.com...