Thought it ethically made sense since early teens (a childhood friend was very into animal rights) but never made a serious effort, just went with my habits.
Then in my early twenties, I went to a 10-day vipassana meditation retreat. During that time, we were only served vegan food. Once coming back I just didn't start eating meat (including fish) again, and haven't since. It happened pretty naturally with basically 0 effort-energy spent. The urge was just gone. Did the basic nerding down on nutrition and all that and now it's >10y later. To be ethically consistent I'd be going vegan (save for eggs sourced locally where I have insights into the welfare) and perhaps an occasional oyster (they lack a central nervous system) but a combination of laziness and external/environmental factors make me "cheat" and have regular intake of non-ethical eggs, and dairy. Had some vegan periods in the past. I recognize it as hypocrisy but it's what it is for now.
At this point I avoid talking about it and my only real frustration is social: It's not very common where I currently live and basically almost every first meal with a new person becomes an inquiry in my diet and precisely what I do and don't eat, and how delicious this and that are and how they couldn't live without eating that and every other time they segue it into questioning my motivations. Usually I'd prefer to just enjoy the meal and avoid thinking way too much about the food industry and animal ethics - it's gotten old at this point. If anything I can be a living example of how yes, it's possible to have a sustainable decently healthy diet while enjoying food, but other than that I usually try not to bring up the topic unless someone is pushing me to try foie gras or something.
If you did it for ethical reasons, if for example you would find a rabbit or cow killed by natural causes like a big stone just rolled off from the mountain
and hit the animal on the head. In that case, would be ethically ok to eat it?
These are exactly the questions that invariably come up every so often and the conversations I typically don't enjoy anymore, it got old years ago.
I'd say yes, and I'd say the same about a human (instinctual aversion to cannibalism aside). If I'd personally actually eat it or not would depend a lot on the situation but in most cases probably not.
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Thought it ethically made sense since early teens (a childhood friend was very into animal rights) but never made a serious effort, just went with my habits.
Then in my early twenties, I went to a 10-day vipassana meditation retreat. During that time, we were only served vegan food. Once coming back I just didn't start eating meat (including fish) again, and haven't since. It happened pretty naturally with basically 0 effort-energy spent. The urge was just gone. Did the basic nerding down on nutrition and all that and now it's >10y later. To be ethically consistent I'd be going vegan (save for eggs sourced locally where I have insights into the welfare) and perhaps an occasional oyster (they lack a central nervous system) but a combination of laziness and external/environmental factors make me "cheat" and have regular intake of non-ethical eggs, and dairy. Had some vegan periods in the past. I recognize it as hypocrisy but it's what it is for now.
At this point I avoid talking about it and my only real frustration is social: It's not very common where I currently live and basically almost every first meal with a new person becomes an inquiry in my diet and precisely what I do and don't eat, and how delicious this and that are and how they couldn't live without eating that and every other time they segue it into questioning my motivations. Usually I'd prefer to just enjoy the meal and avoid thinking way too much about the food industry and animal ethics - it's gotten old at this point. If anything I can be a living example of how yes, it's possible to have a sustainable decently healthy diet while enjoying food, but other than that I usually try not to bring up the topic unless someone is pushing me to try foie gras or something.
If you did it for ethical reasons, if for example you would find a rabbit or cow killed by natural causes like a big stone just rolled off from the mountain and hit the animal on the head. In that case, would be ethically ok to eat it?
These are exactly the questions that invariably come up every so often and the conversations I typically don't enjoy anymore, it got old years ago.
I'd say yes, and I'd say the same about a human (instinctual aversion to cannibalism aside). If I'd personally actually eat it or not would depend a lot on the situation but in most cases probably not.