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Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

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Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#41

Post by ornornor »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #31
tharne wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

meat isn't a vice. It's a traditional part of the diet of the majority of human civilizations. Stop creating vices just to be against them.

Indeed, not only the majority of human civilizations but no evidence of a single paleolithic pre-"civilized" group that didn't consume meat or seafood. Choosing a vegetarian diet is something we can do now, and is always an ideological or religious choice. It was not a choice for our ancestors, even if they often ate way less of it.

The way these groups did it and the way we do it aren’t even comparable.

They didn’t keep animals in piss poor conditions where they can’t even turn around in their cages or are so deformed they can’t stand up (battery chickens are engineered that way so their breasts are more meaty for instance)

Seafood eating didn’t involve dragging dozens of kilometers of net across the sea floor destroying everything in its passage to throw most of it away (dead) because we can’t eat it anyway/it sells too cheap.

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#42

Post by ornornor »

romanoderoma wrote: post #19
hombre_fatal wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So does other food. A fur coat provides a lot of warmth. So does other clothing. Let's not go down the motte-and-bailey rabbit hole of suggesting our vices are simply utilitarian.

At what cost? Fast fashion and cheap and disposable clothes is many times worse than an animal coat that can easily last 80 years. Reuse is an important part of sustainability.

It’s not either/or. If we wanted, we could make durable cloth clothing. No need to farm and kill animals for that. Ask your grandparents how long did their clothing last when they were young compared to the junk we get now. It’s not like we don’t know how to weave durable textiles, we just choose not to.

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#43

Post by airstrike »

cblconfederate wrote: post #32
jfk13 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those already happened. https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/06/14/8760024...

2020 never ceases to amaze

I got a head start in January by watching an apartment 5 floors below mine completely melt on fire at 2am on a cold Winter night... Luckily nobody died.

It was one of those things you never think will happen to you / near you, but then it does. My parents had a fire in their building a couple months after that.

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#44

Post by notreallytrue »

ornornor wrote: post #38
romanoderoma wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dennet wrote a lot about animal perceptions and self consciousness It's hard to tell if the life they live makes some difference for the individual It's hard for us humans to fathom it, but is it for them? We still don't know for sure. https://lafavephilosophy.x10host.com/dennett_anim_csness.htm...

If in doubt, why not err on the side of caution and just not inflict animals this existence, just in case they might care?

We are not doing it though

What do you do if a snake or a cockroach appears in your house?

What happens if a bear wants to share the same living space you live in?

I understand your position, but the simple fact that we live in a modern World and we are at the top of it "inflicts animals this existence"

I like to not do it on purpose and I don't own a fur, if that's what you are curious about, but I'm not lying to myself believing that mink farming is worse than living in big cities that pollute the environment irreparably

Am I being cautious enough?

I don't think so...

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#45

Post by notreallytrue »

ornornor wrote: post #42
romanoderoma wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At what cost? Fast fashion and cheap and disposable clothes is many times worse than an animal coat that can easily last 80 years. Reuse is an important part of sustainability.

It’s not either/or. If we wanted, we could make durable cloth clothing. No need to farm and kill animals for that. Ask your grandparents how long did their clothing last when they were young compared to the junk we get now. It’s not like we don’t know how to weave durable textiles, we just choose not to.

> If we wanted

Who's we though?

I want, you want, everybody say they want them, but then fashion industry makes billions.

And not for the lack of durable clothing

My real leather shoes are 20 years old

My sneaker are less than a year old and already not good enough to walk

The problem is I can't wear leather shoes all the time and even if I buy expensive clothing,they are not durable enough to be on par with the ones my grandfather (he was a tailor) made 50-60 years ago.

The offer is simply not there (except luxury goods, which are usually made with old school materials, that's why they cost so much) and the bulk of the demand is simply made of cheap and affordable sh*t.

On the other hand my girlfriends owns a fur that belonged to here grand-grandmother, it's 60 years old, it still looks brand new.

1 human of the past = 1 fur for life

1 modern human = at least 2 or 3 jackets every season.

You want durable stuff and not pollute the environment with dangerous chemicals?

The old way it's still the best.

> No need to farm and kill animals for that

The pollution already kills a lot lot more of them than the fur industry.

Simply owning a cat is already a threat to ecosystem that compared to it the number of minks killed for their fur is an insignificant number.

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#46

Post by ornornor »

notreallytrue wrote: post #45
ornornor wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not either/or. If we wanted, we could make durable cloth clothing. No need to farm and kill animals for that. Ask your grandparents how long did their clothing last when they were young compared to the junk we get now. It’s not like we don’t know how to weave durable textiles, we just choose not to.

> If we wanted Who's we though? I want, you want, everybody say they want them, but then fashion industry makes billions. And not for the lack of durable clothing My real leather shoes are 20 years old My sneaker are less than a year old and already not good enough to walk The problem is I can't wear leather shoes all the time and even if I buy expensive clothing,they are not durable enough to be on par with the ones…

I guess you have to start somewhere though. Anyone could always be doing more but doing anything beats doing nothing at all. Even if pollution kills animals (and humans), it doesn’t mean it’s ok to just throw our arms in the air and say fuck it I’ll keep doing everything the same. There are things you can do to pollute less. There are things you can do so your cat doesn’t kill wildlife.

I think it’s a matter of inertia. Look at oil for instance. For decades, oil companies have made money hand over fist even though people wanted something better it just wasn’t there and it didn’t make a dent in their profits. But now, solar is the cheapest energy we can buy apparently and fully electric car company is a viable business model.

I think it’s a similar situation here. If I wanted to buy durable clothing made out of vegetal materials, I wouldn’t even know where to go. And paying obscene amounts of money for the more expensive stuff just guarantees that I’ll make a statement. The durability of the item will be marginally better than h&m etc but nowhere near the increase in price. And so then, why should anyone not buy the 5$ t-shirt you have to rebuy every year since the 200$ t-shirt doesn’t last 40 times as long?

Same as for energy I believe, when we’ll get credible alternatives then disposable fashion companies won’t make as much money anymore. But the fast that they’re making money now doesn’t necessarily mean people give them their money because it’s what they want... more because it’s all we have.

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#47

Post by ornornor »

notreallytrue wrote: post #44
ornornor wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If in doubt, why not err on the side of caution and just not inflict animals this existence, just in case they might care?

We are not doing it though What do you do if a snake or a cockroach appears in your house? What happens if a bear wants to share the same living space you live in? I understand your position, but the simple fact that we live in a modern World and we are at the top of it "inflicts animals this existence" I like to not do it on purpose and I don't own a fur, if that's what you are curious about, but I'm not lying to my…

We’re talking about farming animals and killing them for food or fur here.

I personally go out of my way to not kill anything. I catch bugs and throw them outside. I move frogs and snails off the road when I get the chance so people or cars don’t step on them. I’ve never faced a bear yet though. But that’s a bit extreme. How many people face bears?

It’s not a competition, because something is worse than something else or not doesn’t mean we should keep doing it. Farming animals is unnecessary in the vast majority of cases so why not stop doing it? Same with cities and pollution, it’s not all or nothing. There are more and less damaging ways of building, ways that are a bit less obnoxious than the way we’ve mostly been doing it for the last couple of centuries.

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#48

Post by cmrdporcupine »

ornornor wrote: post #41
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, not only the majority of human civilizations but no evidence of a single paleolithic pre-"civilized" group that didn't consume meat or seafood. Choosing a vegetarian diet is something we can do now, and is always an ideological or religious choice. It was not a choice for our ancestors, even if they often ate way less of it.

The way these groups did it and the way we do it aren’t even comparable. They didn’t keep animals in piss poor conditions where they can’t even turn around in their cages or are so deformed they can’t stand up (battery chickens are engineered that way so their breasts are more meaty for instance) Seafood eating didn’t involve dragging dozens of kilometers of net across the sea floor destroying everything in its passa…

I don't have an argument with you there but that is an entirely different topic from claiming meat eating itself as an aberation or vice.

The problem is agricultural meat eating doesn't scale to industrial levels without abject cruelty. To be frank, industrialism itself requires abject cruelty towards humans, too. I feel worse about humans labouring in brutal factory conditions in China making trinkets than I do about chickens in cages..

FWIW I like chickens. We have two pet chickens who stopped laying a long time ago and just live a life of leisure hanging out under a couple very large mullberry trees. I like humans more.

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#49

Post by notreallytrue »

ornornor wrote: post #46
notreallytrue wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If we wanted Who's we though? I want, you want, everybody say they want them, but then fashion industry makes billions. And not for the lack of durable clothing My real leather shoes are 20 years old My sneaker are less than a year old and already not good enough to walk The problem is I can't wear leather shoes all the time and even if I buy expensive clothing,they are not durable enough to be on par with the ones…

I guess you have to start somewhere though. Anyone could always be doing more but doing anything beats doing nothing at all. Even if pollution kills animals (and humans), it doesn’t mean it’s ok to just throw our arms in the air and say fuck it I’ll keep doing everything the same. There are things you can do to pollute less. There are things you can do so your cat doesn’t kill wildlife. I think it’s a matter of inert…

> Anyone could always be doing more but doing anything beats doing nothing at all.

That's a common misconception though.

US top the charts for meat consumption in the World, Kenya and Uganda are at the bottom.

Does it mean Kenya and Uganda are doing more than US?

I'm asking, because I don't have the answer, but I don't think that farming animals for fur amounts to some significant number and stopping it would change the situation in a meaningful way.

Energy consumption for example is a good indicator of lifestyle.

Norway consumes 3 times on average the average amount of energy consumed by all the other European countries.

Does that mean they are doing three times less than the average EU country?

Oil stayed with us because it's a very dense and easy to transport energy source.

You can' t transport wind or sun, you could use batteries, but they are not as dense and not as easy to stock pile.

Inertia, if you look closely, it's just another world for "lack of equally good alternatives".

The lack of durable clothing is not a direct consequence of not using vegetable materials, hemp has been used for millenia, what changed is that we buy a lot more clothes and recycle/reuse very little of them.

Because, mainly, they go out of fashion!

I believe the way we live has a much bigger impact than anything else and in that regard, even if I would never buy a fur for obvious reasons, I think fur farming is not the worst offender.

Re: Mutated Coronavirus from Minks is a threat to Humans

#50

Post by notreallytrue »

ornornor wrote: post #47
notreallytrue wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are not doing it though What do you do if a snake or a cockroach appears in your house? What happens if a bear wants to share the same living space you live in? I understand your position, but the simple fact that we live in a modern World and we are at the top of it "inflicts animals this existence" I like to not do it on purpose and I don't own a fur, if that's what you are curious about, but I'm not lying to my…

We’re talking about farming animals and killing them for food or fur here. I personally go out of my way to not kill anything. I catch bugs and throw them outside. I move frogs and snails off the road when I get the chance so people or cars don’t step on them. I’ve never faced a bear yet though. But that’s a bit extreme. How many people face bears? It’s not a competition, because something is worse than something els…

> We’re talking about farming animals and killing them for food or fur here

and they are two completely different categories, orders of magnitude different, and serve two completely different purposes

the amount of furs produced every year has been dropping for decades, meat consumption is not

> I personally go out of my way to not kill anything

Everyone does.

But being a S. Francesco is something we do for ourselves, it doesn't change much (it is nothing actually, but I don't want to sound insensitive)

Assuming you save 10 animals a day (which is very very very hard) it's 400 thousands animals in a lifespan of 100 years.

Meanwhile millions die everyday to keep our lifestyle going.

Meanwhile

Cats kill billions of birds every year and even more tiny rodents and other mammals in the United States

It's a matter of scale, not of will of the individual.

> because something is worse than something else or not doesn’t mean we should keep doing it

But maybe we should have priorities, so if something is not impacting the ecosystem in a meaningful way, the time used to fight it it's wasted and could be better spent on something vastly more dangerous.

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