Lindt dark bunnies are actually vegan! And while we're on the subject, so are Peanut Chews. Nom nom nom nom.

Sentience IS the ability to feel pain, or to suffer and to be aware of that suffering. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentience It's not self-awareness. Self-awareness is self-awareness. And yes I agree it gets complicated but you can't say "well we need to kill mice, ergo I will eat cows and chickens". That to me is an…

That Kakapo is a total perve. I don't even need to watch the video...

Holy Christ - every one of us in NZ was complaining that this shit was front page news the day after Hugo Chavez died and while we're in the throes of a nationwide drought... and people say I care more about animals than people! Sheesh!!

Sentience is the ability to feel, so yeah that is "the" definition, not my definition. Everyone draws their line at a different place - I would argue that insects could be sentient, they have a nervous system that is pretty different from our own though, while birds and mammals and reptiles and even fish are pretty…

OMG I am totally stealing your limp dick rhino horn analogy. Thanks :)

I second this.

Cows, pigs, chickens, fish, turkeys, sheep, goats - all sentient. Self-awareness is a tricky one to test - just because an animal doesn't recognise itself in a mirror (some do, but I'm not sure that production animals do) doesn't mean they don't feel pain when you kill them. An ability to suffer is what gives an…

I responded to your request for proof with a request of my own, if only to demonstrate that it is just as reasonable to request justification of the status quo. Rather than seek some, you redirect it back to me. We could do this all day: it's not an answer. If you're going to base your personal ethics on "because…

Your use of the phrase "since we evolved" suggests you think evolution is a thing that just happened to us at a single point in our history, like: bam, that was it, evolution. If you go further back there was a time when the ancestors of humans didn't eat meat. Then we did. We can always change again. It is a…

I find it a bit dry - I know that sounds totally counter-intuitive but the blood messes up the other business.

That "aaah...ahhh" face they make before the "chooo!". Priceless.

Otherwise known as cat flu. Pretty much every second cat has it, particularly shelter cats!

Ok I'm sorry, I meant for most people I meet living in the "first" world, most people here, for you, for me, arguing on the Internet. As for those in poorer countries, please also remember that a really good proportion of the planet are effectively vegetarian because they don't have access to meat which is costly in…

Besides the fact that there is plenty of evidence that people and animals essentially ARE the same thing, it's bullshit to take that stance "Until you can prove it". Why not give animals the benefit of the doubt? Really the onus should be on you to prove that animals aren't sentient before you'd consider killing and…

Yes and for those of us sitting on the Internet writing about it - that is not an issue. I won't give anyone a hard time for eating meat if they don't have a choice, but for most people, that's not the case. And we can keep evolving, culturally - meat eating isn't the pinnacle of our evolution. We don't have to eat…

Ah, but comments like raqu's make people rethink their cultural paradigms - even if they don't agree with it. So I think the point was valid.

Yeah it totally makes sense, but I can't condone cultural reasons for treating (certain) animals shitty. It's just not a justification - this is why for example bullfighting is now banned in parts of Spain - "it's tradition" isn't a defence any more. Also people need to accept it's JUST cultural, not scientific or…

Yup, it's called speciesism and it can eat a dick. There's a lot of evidence to suggest that the monsters who do this sort of thing are not above doing unspeakable things to human beings as well.

I guess I'm the sort of vegan that thinks that saying some types of animals are deserving of better treatment than others because of their species alone (speciesism) is exactly the sort of thinking that makes people think it's alright to farm, own, murder and eat animals. As long as this is condoned by society we will…