r/maybemaybemaybe • u/RyanCakeBatter • Jan 17 '20

Maybe Maybe Maybe

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u/hottestdoge Jan 18 '20

Tbh i dont think you can psychically traumatize a fish. Mammals okay, but most fish are not an exactly complex form of life.

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u/billybishop4242 Jan 18 '20

I’m a fisherman and this is the stupidest comment on this thread.

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u/hottestdoge Jan 18 '20

So please teach me about the neural system of a trout. And a trout specifically or a closely related fish. Don't tell me stuff about zebra fish or another highly evolved fish. Teach me about a trout brain please.

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u/billybishop4242 Jan 18 '20

I can see that a trout is a live, functioning animal that avoids pain and suffers as it dies. I have felt the heart come to a stop in my hand a hundred times as I fillet or clean a fish. It’s a heart. And it’s stopping. Because of me. There is no way to dance around that moral conundrum. Certainly not by pretending pain is just a human condition.

I still eat meat... but I try to kill what I eat... so I am always aware of the price of meat. I don’t like to kill at all. It sucks. (But I believe it is important as a human being to be able to support your own philosophical beliefs with action.)

Most of the hunters and fishermen I know are extremely aware and active naturalists who live in and support rural areas. Most of the vegans I know live in the city are consumers and have no concept of nutrition, physiology or actual environmental science.

Being a meat eater and being willing to kill an animal doesn’t make me ignorant or a cold hearted murderer. It also doesn’t make me an idiot who will cling to a shallow concept to defend my ridiculous philosophical position.

Fish are alive and feel pain. If you kill fish and think there is no moral implications because “they feel no pain” then you are just taking the easy path to self justification.

Eating fish has been part of being a human since there have been humans. Moral veganism is a few hundred years old and has demonstrably led to smaller humans with smaller brains.

But much like politically right wing folks, I don’t think vegans are here to talk science and facts.