....How many of you would eat the same amount of meat?...
I'd eat exactly the same amount I do now, which is none. I've been a vegetarian my whole life, and am very healthy, so you certainly don't NEED meat to live.
There are many (most) who choose to eat meat, and that's their privilege. If I was faced with a survival situation where I had to kill something in order to live, I would do that. For people who need to supplement their diet by hunting as a necessity, I can understand that too.
As a general choice, I don't want something to have to die so I can eat. Just because meat tastes good is not a valid reason for raising and slaughtering animals for food. Whoever wants to can flame away at me for being a PETA lover or whatever -- I don't care. This is how I feel.
I do understand that hunting is needed to regulate animal populations. If that was the only way animals were killed, I could understand. I personally know people who just like to hunt and kill, and have mutliple freezers stocked with meat that's several years old, and never gets eaten.
I feel that since I don't have the power to give life, I do everything I can to not have to take it away.
Thanks for bringing this topic up in a thoughtful way, Talfuchre.
I like this question! And its so rare to see a question like this asked and all the answers being intelligent and non-criticizing. But I dont think asking this board is accurate. Firstly, this board is mainly men and all are outdoors people, the crowd where hunting and butchering game is common. I think the answers would be very different if you asked a "normal" person from the city. Also, I think a lot of people who are possibly even vegetarian would not respond. ( I have nothing against vegetarians - I respect someone who is willing to give something up because they have "ethics" against it, no matter how much I disagree with them ).
ChrisN
Edited to respond to ChrisN: I guess I'm your odd man out, then. As a vegetarian city dweller who appreciates the need to carry appropriate tools every day (gun, knife, light), and gets outside to hike/bike/climb whenever I can, it looks like my perspective is rather different than any of the posts so far. I was raised in the country, where we had vegetable gardens every summer, as well as an orchard that we planted, and we canned fruit and vegetables every year, too. We just didn't have meat, but found our protein in other sources.
As for the poster who commented on the Atkins Diet -- please do some careful research before you embark on that shipwreck. Massive amounts of protein in your diet causes the pH of your blood to shift to the acid side, requiring a base to bring it back to the correct level. The calcium is a good base, but you can only take so much as a supplement before your body starts to simply pass it on through. The balance then comes from that large reserve you have -- your skeletal system. This leads to weakening of your bones, and a host of other problems, eventual organ failure among them.
If you want to lose weight, eat a balanced diet high in fiber and fresh fruits vegetables, and get more exercise. This is the same diet recommended by doctors over and over again, and it works.
