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if you eat animals, your opinion isn't valid
Ooh, gatekeeping for the omnivores and carnivores.
Guess I'm glad that checks notes cats, dogs, owls, cheetahs, and most of the Animal Kingdom don't have thoughts that are valid?
Idk, do they? I don't think vegans care about animals' opinions (that they don't have bc they're animals)
This is about reducing unnecessary suffering. The animals you mentioned hunt out of necessity. We have alternatives that don't require hurting other beings.
I hear you.
Counterpoint: animals may very well have thoughts on this, but we will likely never know because there is not a common ground for exchanging thoughts between [an overwhelming majority] of species.
I can't quantify the number of times I've seen animals hunt others out of what amounts to an observed potential of either instinct or boredom: it may seem contrite, but domesticated cats hunting mice. They will play with mice, toy with them when the mice are clearly half-dead, and stop playing with them out of boredom when the mice can no longer move. Almost for sport. This is an observed behaviour that may be a byproduct of their domestication, but it gives credence to the fact that its not all for survival.
I'm not justifying the hunting of animals for profit; I am in the camp of thought that its a horrible practice. The same goes for hunting endangered animals. However, to hunt animals for food is not an unjust practice. That's how we homo sapiens get a good amount of protein (though I do concede that there are also plenty of other ways to do so). It is historically encoded into human existence.
AFAIK cats cats play with their prey not for fun but in order to tire it out.
I think that cruelty and sadism are human inventions and we inflict them on animals on an industrial scale. I believe this comes from hierarchy and domination present in our society, not from instinct.
Don't read up on dolphins or seals then. Cruelty and sadism exist in other animals. Humans are just better at it.
I mean lions don't have an instinct to control and dominate a herd... Wait.
And cats very often don't eat their prey, they like humans lol for the "fun"...