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if you look at our teeth, they really aren't designed for meat consumption...very dull, really
but dogs and tigers etc. have very sharp teeth and couldn't live healthily on only plant products, so they are clearly carnivorous with good reason. also they don't get there meat from tortured sources, and probably dont have the brain capacity to understand exastly what they're eating.

iit also makes you feel better--healthier. since you tried it for a while you should know...however i respect (but do not fully understand) your opinion

thx for listening

that's true of just about everything.

I'm a vegetarian, and so I've been for two years now! 4laugh A little more perhaps.

My main reason for becoming a vegetarian was the way animals were and still are treated on farm. It simply hurt seeing so many animals being treated as if they were objects and not living beings.
After some months, at dinner time we were having steak, potatoes and peas, so I made up my mind and didn't put the meat on my plate. My mother asked me why, and I said that I just couldn't eat it. So she asked me if I wanted to become a vegetarian. I nodded and she accepted.

Ever since then I've not touched meat, and truth be told I've never had the cravings.

So that's my story. 3nodding

Buddha told his monks that it was okay to eat meat, it's a personal decision, so long as they don't kill the animal, and the animal wasn't killed for them.
I used to be vegetarian.. for a while.. But I just kinda lost a reason to be one, and it was hard avoiding it. So, I'm a meat-eater now.

I'm not a vegetarian, largely out of habit and partially due to my high metabolism...I do support the vegetarian path as a means of reducing the accumulation of bad karma and would be willing to eventually become vegetarian.

However, I like good vegetarian food and cook a considerable deal of "experimental vegetarian" fare...I just made some surprisingly-delicious sulfur-shelf fungus (wild foraged) sauteed with candied ginger and fresh nectarine slices! biggrin

Veganism, however, seems a bit extreme to me and makes me think of "hippy" fluff-bunnyism...it seems like a "I'm more ascetic than thou" practice with little scriptural or rational support.

[Please excuse my accidental butchering of the quote above cry ]

These are well-meaning thoughts, though broad "responsibility for death" for meat-eaters is a contentious issue due to the highly-indirect nature of the relationship between eater and animal, in most cases (fishing and hunting is more clear-cut). Also, the widespread boycott of animals-for-meat could be expected to have very negative consequences on most of said animals (i.e. humans would have little reason to raise animals and future generations would simply never-come-to-be; the Iron Law of Karma would compel the affected consciousness-streams to reincarnate in equally-wretched lives elsewhere. For instance, the life of a deer can be one filled with fear of predators and the sufferings of disease and parasites).

The belief that "animals are far superior to humans" is what I call the Taoist-Zen Fallacy. It lies in beliefs outside the core Buddhist canons (Hinayana and Mahayana; save Ch'an/Zen) and requires that the idealist be ignorant of the actual state of animal existence. The Buddha held that human birth was "most precious" due to the myriad traits that allow the attainment of Enlightenment and the opportunities to live in a state with the proper mixture of suffering and pleasure for such attainment. Almost all Buddhist traditions place non-human animals in the "lower realms of rebirth" for their lack of human traits (in degree more than kind) and their tendency to experience suffering beyond that of the human average. Furthermore, every bad practice of humankind has been observed in non-human animals (ranging from theft, to sexual assault, to cannabilism).

This does not mean people have the right to disvalue the lives of non-human animals, just that they should be happy for their human life and strive to encourage future human-rebirths while minimizing harm to other lifeforms whenever possible. Being "natural" simply means being in tune with the ways of Samsara, which are to be rejected and transcended to the degree that they conflict with a Nirvanic mindset...To say "animals are superior because they're more natural" is in line with Samsaric materio-idealism. In reality, "artificial" and "natural" are just illusionary frames of view conjured by the afflicted, conceptual-mind; Dependent Origination and Karma work without regard to whether or not the actor is human.

I'm a vegetarian. Represent! whee