ao5357 · March 31, 2012 23:32
diff --git a/Flight_of_Fancy_Feast.txt b/Flight_of_Fancy_Feast.txt
 Speciesism, as commonly considered, is inherently speciesist; we differentiate ourselves as reasoned beings and see ‘sentient’ species as superior to others based on a murky bioethics. The sociobiological context surrounding our own aged, though, provides a lens for the human ethology that justifies our omnivorous streak. To illustrate this, let us take a clichéd flight of fancy:

 You, a vegan brand of heterotroph, walk hungrily-yet-idyllically in the woods. Your eye lands on a fawn getting a drink at a stream. Suddenly, the wind gusts heavily; this violent action alarms the deer. Perhaps due to uncontrollable fright or a heart defect, the animal keels over.

 That’s unfortunate for the deer, but perhaps more so for you. You’re left with a moral quandary: is it okay to eat this would-be-fortuitous food source? After all, the common justifications don’t apply. The fawn may never have suffered, in life or death, at the hands of man. And if you decide to pass and eat flora instead, the deer’s body will naturally be eaten by other organisms as happens to dead things. The carcass’s energy would continue in the life cycle, perhaps consumed by you as wild mushrooms not too long from now.

 You didn’t bring a thermometer to confirm the venison’s USDA-recommended internal temperature of 160℉, but decide to chance it for your wellbeing. As you eat by the fire, you conclude that the opportunity cost of eating guilt-free fauna is similar to that of a plant-based equivalent. It wasn’t a starvation emergency that prompted this decision, just pragmatism.

 You leave the woods and find a hospice at the edge. Having just witnessed the inevitability of death, you decide to see what you can learn there.

 ...

 It’s somebody else’s job to make a case, if possible, that factory farming and similar practices are ethical. Others are welcome to demonstrate how aquaculture is environmentally comparable to crop farming. This essay is intended only to establish a compassionate case for killing animals and eating their remains. As such, the onus is on the reader to vote with their wallet/vote to make agriculture as ethical as desired.
	Speciesism, as commonly considered, is inherently speciesist; we differentiate ourselves as reasoned beings and see ‘sentient’ species as superior to others based on a murky bioethics. The sociobiological context surrounding our own aged, though, provides a lens for the human ethology that justifies our omnivorous streak. To illustrate this, let us take a clichéd flight of fancy:

	You, a vegan brand of heterotroph, walk hungrily-yet-idyllically in the woods. Your eye lands on a fawn getting a drink at a stream. Suddenly, the wind gusts heavily; this violent action alarms the deer. Perhaps due to uncontrollable fright or a heart defect, the animal keels over.

	That’s unfortunate for the deer, but perhaps more so for you. You’re left with a moral quandary: is it okay to eat this would-be-fortuitous food source? After all, the common justifications don’t apply. The fawn may never have suffered, in life or death, at the hands of man. And if you decide to pass and eat flora instead, the deer’s body will naturally be eaten by other organisms as happens to dead things. The carcass’s energy would continue in the life cycle, perhaps consumed by you as wild mushrooms not too long from now.

	You didn’t bring a thermometer to confirm the venison’s USDA-recommended internal temperature of 160℉, but decide to chance it for your wellbeing. As you eat by the fire, you conclude that the opportunity cost of eating guilt-free fauna is similar to that of a plant-based equivalent. It wasn’t a starvation emergency that prompted this decision, just pragmatism.

	You leave the woods and find a hospice at the edge. Having just witnessed the inevitability of death, you decide to see what you can learn there.

	...

	It’s somebody else’s job to make a case, if possible, that factory farming and similar practices are ethical. Others are welcome to demonstrate how aquaculture is environmentally comparable to crop farming. This essay is intended only to establish a compassionate case for killing animals and eating their remains. As such, the onus is on the reader to vote with their wallet/vote to make agriculture as ethical as desired.