WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat • Hacker News Board

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#41

Post by guhidalg » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:40 PM UTC

meowface wrote: post #18

nwah1 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And not because of environmental concerns. But moral concerns. Something that is flagrantly immoral would be opposed regardless of environmental questions. That is important to note because it is not a simple question whether meat is net positive or net negative for the environment. It isn't even clear what it means if something is net positive for the environment. This is a moral issue, not an eco issue.

I completely agree. The primary reason to not eat meat is that it's inherently unethical (factory farm or not). But a lot of people don't feel that way, so any argument that will persuade them to eat less (or no) meat works in my book.

Sigh... please explain why it’s immoral to consume other organisms?

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#42

Post by kyledrake » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:40 PM UTC

I can't eat a lot of types of food due to allergies. Meat is one of the few things I still can eat without issue. Yes, there are actually people out there (hi, me!) that actually cannot eliminate certain foods from our diets without getting sick. This policy would prevent me from being able to work at that company, for recognized medical health reasons, because I would not be able to do legitimate expenses of food related to travel, nor would I be able to eat probably anything during the "summer camp".

I also have serious concerns about letting companies have moral opinions about paying for choices you make for your own health, for example with health insurance, and considering the current supreme court situation, maybe you should too.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#43

Post by nwah1 » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:41 PM UTC

guhidalg wrote: post #41

meowface wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely agree. The primary reason to not eat meat is that it's inherently unethical (factory farm or not). But a lot of people don't feel that way, so any argument that will persuade them to eat less (or no) meat works in my book.

Sigh... please explain why it’s immoral to consume other organisms?

The eating itself is neutral. It is immoral to pay people to raise other organisms in confinement and later slaughter them.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#44

Post by floil » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:41 PM UTC

bg4 wrote: post #28

maccio92 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does that argument extend to animals that eat other animals? And why is the default defined as not eating meat?

Apparently lions, tigers and bears aren't aware of the Kantian perfect/imperfect duty divide.

Oh my.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#45

Post by PKop » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:41 PM UTC

This is the anti-humanistic mindset that prioritizes "no impact" on nature above all else, instead of prioritizing human well being / human flourishing, which itself would account for environmental stewardship, but not to the level of sacrificing health to avoid eating animals (the healthiest option).

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#46

Post by riku_iki » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:41 PM UTC

ahelwer wrote: post #12

Nice. If you care at all about moral justifications for your own actions, eating meat is an extremely difficult position to defend. It even falls on the wrong side of the Kantian perfect/imperfect duty divide, since the default really is not eating meat, so eating meat is a positive action which must be justified. I think it's a great example of philosophy pointing out the absurdity of a (very) widely-practiced pheno…

> If you care at all about moral justifications for your own actions, eating meat is an extremely difficult position to defend.

Let's do it gradually, first move to eating beef: less killed lives per lb of meat. From another hand if we reduce demand, those chickens will not even been born..

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#47

Post by busterarm » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:42 PM UTC

elsyms wrote: post #38

busterarm wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The common justification for this is the comparative anatomy argument that we're primates and primates don't eat meat. These same people have had their heads in the sand for the last 30 years, because it's been found that primates do quite commonly eat meat.

Definitely not. The common justification for this is that we, as the most intelligent species on the planet, have developed a moral conscience. As such, it is unconscionable that we support the literal mass murder and ill-treatment of billions of animals each year when there are alternatives that require no suffering and no death.

Parent Poster said:

    > the default

You're talking about something else completely. There is no default morality. If morality is a choice to make then it is not a default behavior. I'm responding to the question asked while you're propping your moral choice above the observed natural behavior of other species. I didn't even begin to discuss the morality of eating meat.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#48

Post by db48x » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:42 PM UTC

Seems like a breach of contract to me.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#49

Post by christofosho » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:42 PM UTC

ahelwer wrote: post #25

maccio92 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does that argument extend to animals that eat other animals? And why is the default defined as not eating meat?

We usually divide the world into moral agents (pretty much just humans) and non-moral-agents. The default is not eating meat because the default is not eating anything . Humans must take a positive action to eat something. Generally perfect duties in the Kantian sense take the form of "thou shalt-nots", so a positive action you shouldn't take, like killing a random stranger or some such. This is contrasted with imper…

Couldn't this be extended to plant life as well?

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#50

Post by Torgo » Fri, Jul 13, 2018, 9:42 PM UTC

maxbrunsfeld wrote: post #39

maccio92 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does that argument extend to animals that eat other animals? And why is the default defined as not eating meat?

Animals don't raise other animals on cruel factory farms.

Ants farm aphids.