You’re the one being obtuse. Killing a plant is not killing an animal. Killing a plant that eats animals is not humans doing something to an animal. It’s actually the opposite: it’s humans saving animals.
If you want to get that granular, whatever device you’re using to type your pedantic replies was made of parts that were shipped. At some point, the vehicle they were shipped on killed a bug. You caused way more animal deaths typing your replies to me than anyone ever did killing a venus flytrap, because killing a venus fly trap does not actually kill any animals.
Epic response.
When you eat that organism, its cells that feed you were produced because it ate flies, those cells are not products of the flies death? No one said killing a plant was killing an animal, What I said was if you avoid products of animal suffering why would you not avoid the biological products of animal suffering? And if humans eating things that harm animals is saving animals then why don't vegans eat carnivorous animals? Because that not what veganism is about. Also the amount of animal death I cause has nothing to do with the debate at hand. One thing does not become vegan simply because something else causes more animal death, I don't even know what point you're trying to make talking about vehicles.
When you eat that organism, its cells that feed you were produced because it ate flies, those cells are not products of the flies death?
Isn't the logical extension of this that nothing is vegan? Think about it: animals in nature get preyed upon constantly. A wolf kills an elk, eats part of it, and then its corpse decomposes. The carbon from the decomposing body is then used by plants in the biosphere to build new cells. These plants are now the products of dead animals. Are these unethical to eat because they had their cells built from recycled carbon that once belonged to an animal? Probably not. And this is true of all plants everywhere. And if you were to say "yes, but those plants didn't kill any animals themselves," then that argument would also have to apply for humans eating venus flytraps: humans didn't kill any animals themselves; they're just consuming something that did.
humans didn’t kill any animals themselves; they’re just consuming something that did.
But wouldn't that argument only hold up for flytraps found in the wild? Any that have been cultivated by humans, especially for human consumption, would likely be fed by humans to ensure any food the plant gets is not going to negatively effect the quality of the food. But vegans also wouldn't eat eggs found in the wild, even if they could somehow know that they were unfertilized and abandoned. At the very least this is not a black and white case, I think it's very easy to imagine groups of vegans abstaining from these if they were a food product. Not everyone's definition of vegan is the same I've acknowledged that from the beginning, some vegans go as far as some Jainists do, breathing through cheesecloth to avoid killing as many microorganisms as they can. Everyone draws their own line somewhere, I'm just convinced that if people actually ate flytraps, plenty of vegans would abstain.
In that case, your issue seems more to be with a semantic definition of veganism. You've framed it in the terms of "is eating a plant that eats meat non-vegan," but conceptually what you're asking about is the transitive nature of suffering and accountability and how that intersects with a particular, very specific lifestyle choice. Which is a fine and ostensibly interesting discussion to have, but the way you elected to frame that conversation is...less than ideal.
Or, hear me out, people shouldn't get defensive in a thread explicitly about a fabricated hypothetical. It's meant to be examined and I'm not sorry for examining it.
I think people have found the way you chose to approach the discussion to be counterproductive and frustrating. If you aren't willing to reflect on the frustration voiced by the people who took the time to reply and engage with you seriously, you are either entitled or simply unwilling to reflect on your expressive shortcomings.
And I think people have interpreted everything I've said as a personal attack against veganism despite the fact that no one really eats these plants. Id like to know what specifically you have issue with? Perhaps the one time I called someone obtuse for purposefully evading the point?
Id like to know what specifically you have issue with?
I take most issue with the fact that you just don't seem to really understand the conversation you're having or the arguments people are making. No one thinks you are personally attacking veganism. Not that I've seen, at least. What people find frustrating is the fundamental fact that they are arguing that suffering, the act of profiting from it, and the "guilt" that comes with that does not have some kind of transitive property, and you are, it seems, arguing that it does, and you can't seem to understand the fact that the discussion and difference of perspective deadlocks there.
In other words, you don't seem to realize that you and the people to whom you are speaking are operating on different (and this is a very important concept in any kind of debate) foundational premises. These are things that are core ideas on which any argument sits. Most of the time they're incredibly philosophically or ideologically basic, like 1 + 1 = 2, or "a child should not be held responsible for the crimes of their parents." To make matters worse, you also seem to be coupling this foundational premise with a definition of veganism which most people in the thread simply find to be objectively incorrect at worst, or remarkably obtuse at best. Honestly, if it seems like people are pissed at you for how you talk about veganism, it might be the fact that your understanding of it seems superficial, because your argument about fly traps comes across as an attempt at deconstructing the "rules" of veganism while ignoring the ethical intent behind it as a lifestyle.
This leads to a just awful discussion, because you 1) have your own definition of veganism that fundamentally differs from nearly everyone else's and 2) that definition is premised upon an understanding of animal suffering and what constitutes a human being "profiting" from it with which almost everyone here also disagrees. The worst thing, however, and which I personally find the most frustrating is that your reading comprehension skills are just frankly abysmal. You're probably going to read this comment, have a hard time following it, and not really understand the argument being made, and instead latch onto small details that are superficial at best to this reply, probably doubling down on your belief that you are unjustly maligned because people refuse to acknowledge your extremely illogical perspective as more reasonable or intelligent than it really is.
So, summing it up, what I specifically have issue with is that you, from doing the above, have managed to craft a perfect storm of completely useless and unproductive debate. Everyone here is dumber for having partaken in this discussion. Me included. Actually, probably especially me.
The literal first thing I did was acknowledge that everyone has a different version of veganism, explained one I've heard from plenty of vegans I've spoken with, so your whole thing about foundational premises is pretty moot. I defined a clear scope of my arguement and stuck to it, most of that critique is you being mad I stayed within the scope I defined instead of letting off topic points detract from what I said and then the fact that I still don't buy your arguements. God forbid we don't agree on a hypothetical, sorry that upset you enough to want to be snide in your critique. I find your critisim to any lack depth or relevance to actual things I said, and contain little substance but veiled personal attacks about making everyone reading it dumber. Im sure it did make you dumber so at least we agree on that.
My first comment verbatim with emphasis added:
"If a plant has to eat animals to survive then that plant is a product of animal suffering. Thats why vegans don't drink milk or eat eggs too. So if that's the definition of vegan that someone subscibes to then the flytrap is not Vegan "
I set pretty clear conditions of my arguement, don't be upset I didn't let people detract from what I actually tried to argue instead of what they perceived I was arguing.
The literal first thing I did was acknowledge that everyone has a different version of veganism
In that case, since the definition of vegan is relative, what did you hope to get out of this discussion beyond people agreeing with you?
your whole thing about foundational premises is pretty moot
It's really not, though, and the fact that you think it does strongly supports what I've said about reading comprehension.
I defined a clear scope of my arguement and stuck to it
It's not an "arguement" (also, not how argument is spelled), it's an opinion you are voicing. You think it's not vegan. Other people think it is. It's a discussion purely couched in competing definitions. You never try to work beyond those competing definitions so whatever it is you're "arguing" for is DOA.
veiled personal attacks
They aren't veiled.
"If a plant has to eat animals to survive then that plant is a product of animal suffering. Thats why vegans don’t drink milk or eat eggs too. So if that’s the definition of vegan that someone subscibes to then the flytrap is not Vegan "
And if my grandmother had wheels, she would have been a bike. Pretty much everyone here already said "that's not really the definition of veganism." And you proceeded to argue with them about it. That's not productive discussion or "lively debate" - it's just bickering.
Once again, you don't understand the argument I made. You are not doing anything to move beyond competing foundational premises and competing definitions, so there's no point to the hypothetical you posed. Either people agree with you without argument, or they won't, and there's nothing beyond that. And that's because of how you chose to frame the discussion.
How does you ignoring my foundational premise make you the arbiter of whos talking in good faith and, but me refusing to justify points I didn't make makes me the bad guy? Perhaps I framed it the way I did because thats the way it made sense to me.
Of course im not moving beyond that definition because my whole premise was dependent upon that definition AS I SAID IN THE FIRST COMMENT COMPLETE WITH A BIG 'IF'. You're whole arguement is that it's wrong of me to not change the definition that I already stated my arguments depend on because then people either agree or won't. Thats probably because I did nothing but follow logical steps from a definition I know is still common. And I don't know how many times I have to say that I know and have spoken with plenty of vegans who use that definition so Im not really concerned that a handful of people on lemmy use a different one, especially when they go out of their way to continue ignore my premise, without proving any type of evidence that no vegans use the definition I've started with other that saying 'no they dont' after hearing that I've heard these definitions right from real people. Some I'm even related to. Or do you really think your definition is the only way someone can be a vegan? Because what I think is your definition is the only one where you can keep arguing. You even tacitly admited to that saying that within the framework I chose, one can only agree or disagree. No wonder you're so desperate to move away from that
No one forced anyone to respond to my comments but if I make a point completely within a common framework, the least one could do is not ignore the framework simply because it's easier to respond that way. Hell I'd even accept any kind of data on how people define their own veganism, but short of that my anecdotal evidence from the vegans I know is by definition just as good as any anecdotal evidence provided against it, and that's all thats been provided. Tell me if theres any things you've heard from people you trust that someone could change with anecdotal evidence online?
What kills me is you still won't even acknowledge theres not simply one type of vegan with only one definition despite the fact that its the first thing I did before making a point on a clearly defined subset of vegan. And if you look through my comments elsewhere on this post, not in this chain, youll also find me aknowledge a differnt definition of vegan and come to a different conclusion, so if thats all you wanted you've been wasting a lot of your own time. So only one of us is even stuck on there only being one way to be vegan. Thinking I haven't been the flexible one is hilarious.
I think it's a stretch to say that a venus fly trap dish is immoral because the venus fly trap ate an animal, which it is literally forced to do by nature. You don't blame a lion either for eating meat, because it is literally a carnivore and cannot survive otherwise. I believe when they say animal suffering they mean suffering resulting from exploitation and so on by humans.
And those are both products of animal suffering, a common definition many vegans use. Come on, now you're just being obtuse on purpose.
Venus flytraps aren’t products. They’re organisms.
You’re the one being obtuse. Killing a plant is not killing an animal. Killing a plant that eats animals is not humans doing something to an animal. It’s actually the opposite: it’s humans saving animals.
If you want to get that granular, whatever device you’re using to type your pedantic replies was made of parts that were shipped. At some point, the vehicle they were shipped on killed a bug. You caused way more animal deaths typing your replies to me than anyone ever did killing a venus flytrap, because killing a venus fly trap does not actually kill any animals.
Epic response.
When you eat that organism, its cells that feed you were produced because it ate flies, those cells are not products of the flies death? No one said killing a plant was killing an animal, What I said was if you avoid products of animal suffering why would you not avoid the biological products of animal suffering? And if humans eating things that harm animals is saving animals then why don't vegans eat carnivorous animals? Because that not what veganism is about. Also the amount of animal death I cause has nothing to do with the debate at hand. One thing does not become vegan simply because something else causes more animal death, I don't even know what point you're trying to make talking about vehicles.
Isn't the logical extension of this that nothing is vegan? Think about it: animals in nature get preyed upon constantly. A wolf kills an elk, eats part of it, and then its corpse decomposes. The carbon from the decomposing body is then used by plants in the biosphere to build new cells. These plants are now the products of dead animals. Are these unethical to eat because they had their cells built from recycled carbon that once belonged to an animal? Probably not. And this is true of all plants everywhere. And if you were to say "yes, but those plants didn't kill any animals themselves," then that argument would also have to apply for humans eating venus flytraps: humans didn't kill any animals themselves; they're just consuming something that did.
But wouldn't that argument only hold up for flytraps found in the wild? Any that have been cultivated by humans, especially for human consumption, would likely be fed by humans to ensure any food the plant gets is not going to negatively effect the quality of the food. But vegans also wouldn't eat eggs found in the wild, even if they could somehow know that they were unfertilized and abandoned. At the very least this is not a black and white case, I think it's very easy to imagine groups of vegans abstaining from these if they were a food product. Not everyone's definition of vegan is the same I've acknowledged that from the beginning, some vegans go as far as some Jainists do, breathing through cheesecloth to avoid killing as many microorganisms as they can. Everyone draws their own line somewhere, I'm just convinced that if people actually ate flytraps, plenty of vegans would abstain.
In that case, your issue seems more to be with a semantic definition of veganism. You've framed it in the terms of "is eating a plant that eats meat non-vegan," but conceptually what you're asking about is the transitive nature of suffering and accountability and how that intersects with a particular, very specific lifestyle choice. Which is a fine and ostensibly interesting discussion to have, but the way you elected to frame that conversation is...less than ideal.
Or, hear me out, people shouldn't get defensive in a thread explicitly about a fabricated hypothetical. It's meant to be examined and I'm not sorry for examining it.
I think people have found the way you chose to approach the discussion to be counterproductive and frustrating. If you aren't willing to reflect on the frustration voiced by the people who took the time to reply and engage with you seriously, you are either entitled or simply unwilling to reflect on your expressive shortcomings.
And I think people have interpreted everything I've said as a personal attack against veganism despite the fact that no one really eats these plants. Id like to know what specifically you have issue with? Perhaps the one time I called someone obtuse for purposefully evading the point?
I take most issue with the fact that you just don't seem to really understand the conversation you're having or the arguments people are making. No one thinks you are personally attacking veganism. Not that I've seen, at least. What people find frustrating is the fundamental fact that they are arguing that suffering, the act of profiting from it, and the "guilt" that comes with that does not have some kind of transitive property, and you are, it seems, arguing that it does, and you can't seem to understand the fact that the discussion and difference of perspective deadlocks there.
In other words, you don't seem to realize that you and the people to whom you are speaking are operating on different (and this is a very important concept in any kind of debate) foundational premises. These are things that are core ideas on which any argument sits. Most of the time they're incredibly philosophically or ideologically basic, like 1 + 1 = 2, or "a child should not be held responsible for the crimes of their parents." To make matters worse, you also seem to be coupling this foundational premise with a definition of veganism which most people in the thread simply find to be objectively incorrect at worst, or remarkably obtuse at best. Honestly, if it seems like people are pissed at you for how you talk about veganism, it might be the fact that your understanding of it seems superficial, because your argument about fly traps comes across as an attempt at deconstructing the "rules" of veganism while ignoring the ethical intent behind it as a lifestyle.
This leads to a just awful discussion, because you 1) have your own definition of veganism that fundamentally differs from nearly everyone else's and 2) that definition is premised upon an understanding of animal suffering and what constitutes a human being "profiting" from it with which almost everyone here also disagrees. The worst thing, however, and which I personally find the most frustrating is that your reading comprehension skills are just frankly abysmal. You're probably going to read this comment, have a hard time following it, and not really understand the argument being made, and instead latch onto small details that are superficial at best to this reply, probably doubling down on your belief that you are unjustly maligned because people refuse to acknowledge your extremely illogical perspective as more reasonable or intelligent than it really is.
So, summing it up, what I specifically have issue with is that you, from doing the above, have managed to craft a perfect storm of completely useless and unproductive debate. Everyone here is dumber for having partaken in this discussion. Me included. Actually, probably especially me.
The literal first thing I did was acknowledge that everyone has a different version of veganism, explained one I've heard from plenty of vegans I've spoken with, so your whole thing about foundational premises is pretty moot. I defined a clear scope of my arguement and stuck to it, most of that critique is you being mad I stayed within the scope I defined instead of letting off topic points detract from what I said and then the fact that I still don't buy your arguements. God forbid we don't agree on a hypothetical, sorry that upset you enough to want to be snide in your critique. I find your critisim to any lack depth or relevance to actual things I said, and contain little substance but veiled personal attacks about making everyone reading it dumber. Im sure it did make you dumber so at least we agree on that.
My first comment verbatim with emphasis added:
"If a plant has to eat animals to survive then that plant is a product of animal suffering. Thats why vegans don't drink milk or eat eggs too. So if that's the definition of vegan that someone subscibes to then the flytrap is not Vegan "
I set pretty clear conditions of my arguement, don't be upset I didn't let people detract from what I actually tried to argue instead of what they perceived I was arguing.
In that case, since the definition of vegan is relative, what did you hope to get out of this discussion beyond people agreeing with you?
It's really not, though, and the fact that you think it does strongly supports what I've said about reading comprehension.
It's not an "arguement" (also, not how argument is spelled), it's an opinion you are voicing. You think it's not vegan. Other people think it is. It's a discussion purely couched in competing definitions. You never try to work beyond those competing definitions so whatever it is you're "arguing" for is DOA.
They aren't veiled.
And if my grandmother had wheels, she would have been a bike. Pretty much everyone here already said "that's not really the definition of veganism." And you proceeded to argue with them about it. That's not productive discussion or "lively debate" - it's just bickering.
Once again, you don't understand the argument I made. You are not doing anything to move beyond competing foundational premises and competing definitions, so there's no point to the hypothetical you posed. Either people agree with you without argument, or they won't, and there's nothing beyond that. And that's because of how you chose to frame the discussion.
How does you ignoring my foundational premise make you the arbiter of whos talking in good faith and, but me refusing to justify points I didn't make makes me the bad guy? Perhaps I framed it the way I did because thats the way it made sense to me.
Of course im not moving beyond that definition because my whole premise was dependent upon that definition AS I SAID IN THE FIRST COMMENT COMPLETE WITH A BIG 'IF'. You're whole arguement is that it's wrong of me to not change the definition that I already stated my arguments depend on because then people either agree or won't. Thats probably because I did nothing but follow logical steps from a definition I know is still common. And I don't know how many times I have to say that I know and have spoken with plenty of vegans who use that definition so Im not really concerned that a handful of people on lemmy use a different one, especially when they go out of their way to continue ignore my premise, without proving any type of evidence that no vegans use the definition I've started with other that saying 'no they dont' after hearing that I've heard these definitions right from real people. Some I'm even related to. Or do you really think your definition is the only way someone can be a vegan? Because what I think is your definition is the only one where you can keep arguing. You even tacitly admited to that saying that within the framework I chose, one can only agree or disagree. No wonder you're so desperate to move away from that
No one forced anyone to respond to my comments but if I make a point completely within a common framework, the least one could do is not ignore the framework simply because it's easier to respond that way. Hell I'd even accept any kind of data on how people define their own veganism, but short of that my anecdotal evidence from the vegans I know is by definition just as good as any anecdotal evidence provided against it, and that's all thats been provided. Tell me if theres any things you've heard from people you trust that someone could change with anecdotal evidence online?
What kills me is you still won't even acknowledge theres not simply one type of vegan with only one definition despite the fact that its the first thing I did before making a point on a clearly defined subset of vegan. And if you look through my comments elsewhere on this post, not in this chain, youll also find me aknowledge a differnt definition of vegan and come to a different conclusion, so if thats all you wanted you've been wasting a lot of your own time. So only one of us is even stuck on there only being one way to be vegan. Thinking I haven't been the flexible one is hilarious.
I think it's a stretch to say that a venus fly trap dish is immoral because the venus fly trap ate an animal, which it is literally forced to do by nature. You don't blame a lion either for eating meat, because it is literally a carnivore and cannot survive otherwise. I believe when they say animal suffering they mean suffering resulting from exploitation and so on by humans.