May 7, 2012 -- 3:29PM, arielg wrote:

There have been -- not many, but a few -- Human Cultures which DID engage in Cannibalism ...

Yes, that was their choice. If you don't want to do it, don't.  We souldn't preach, judge or make them feel morally inferior because of  their choices. Get it?

Bravo, arielg!  Take a bow!! 

Still, is does seem that there is a directly proportional relationship between glorifying hunting, industrial killing of animals for food and meat eating, and condemning cannabalism.  It comes down to one's assumptions about man as something other than animal, I think -- a hereditary prejudice.

May 6, 2012 -- 11:54PM, solfeggio wrote:

That's an interesting point about gender politics, Rabello.  I hadn't thought of it that way, but it fits. 

As one author, Jacques Derrida, observed:

'In order to be recognized as a full subject one must be a meat-eater, a man, and an authoritative, speaking self.'

Another writer (Carol J. Adams) noted that meat eating was irreducibly linked to masculinity.  She goes on to say that 'what, or more precisely who we eat, is determined by the patriarchial politics of our culture, and the meanings attached to the meat eating include meanings clustered around virility.'

The message is that men are supposed to eat meat, and meat is associated with virility.

And at least one study backs that up.  According to a 1992 study by Vegetarian Times, of the 12 million Americans who call themselves vegetarians, 68% are female, while only 32% are male.  In other words, in the vegetarian world, women outnumber men two to one.

Women adopt vegetarianism at twice the rate of men, which may be due to the hierarchical way the gender roles are established.

OMG, solf, we agree on something! 

No doubt in my mind, a less patriarchal world will also mean less meat consumption -- more vegitarianism. 

Hi, mouse -

  Actually, we are probably in agreement where many topics are concerned.  

But, thanks for being the only one to respond to my post, which I had thought just might give a new direction to this discussion.  I guess that isn't going to happen, though.

You have said in the past that you predict that vegetarianism is going to be the way of life for people in future, and I like that sort of thinking, because it gives us all hope.  I'm such a cynic that I lost hope for a better tomorrow a long time ago.

Maybe that's why older people are so often looked upon as grouchy.  We're just too jaded to be cheerful anymore.

May 7, 2012 -- 5:08PM, solfeggio wrote:

Hi, mouse -

  Actually, we are probably in agreement where many topics are concerned.  

But, thanks for being the only one to respond to my post, which I had thought just might give a new direction to this discussion.  I guess that isn't going to happen, though.

You have said in the past that you predict that vegetarianism is going to be the way of life for people in future, and I like that sort of thinking, because it gives us all hope.  I'm such a cynic that I lost hope for a better tomorrow a long time ago.

Maybe that's why older people are so often looked upon as grouchy.  We're just too jaded to be cheerful anymore.

 

No problem, Solf. I think that mass meat consumption -- along with many other things in our society -- is essentially patriarchal. I think a true and actual balance between the feminine and masculine, actual equality of men and women, is in humanity's future.

Not only that, but the mass production/mass consumption of meat is untenable in the long run for three basic reasons.

Animal cruelty, environmental concerns, public health. 

May 7, 2012 -- 5:11PM, solfeggio wrote:

teilhard -

From what I've read, eating humans can lead to resistance to CJD.

www.nhs.uk/news/2009/11November/Pages/br...

Curiouser and curiouser.

In a canablistic society, "Having a friend for dinner" takes on a whole new meaning.

Two canibals are eating a clown. One says to the other -- "Does this taste funny to you?"