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Should Cats and Dogs go Vegan? - Professor Andrew Knight, University of Winchester
(www.youtube.com)
No they should not
this post was submitted on 22 Oct 2023
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If pets can get their nutrients from plants as well, why violate other animal's rights in the process?
Because they can't.
Your view is that it is impossible to get the same nutrients without killing another animal? Do you mind naming which nutrients you feel this way about?
For cats especially, yes. And no, I'm not going to do that. It's on you to prove that they can, and so far all evidence (other than this guy who is shilling his own food, surprise, and using unreliable self-selecting and self-reporting data) says otherwise.
It's not on me to do anything. I have no cat. I also have no idea if a cat can be healthy without eating meat. In fact, I don't even know if it is cruel to keep a natural born hunter in an environment where they almost never get to hunt live prey. When people have snakes they feed them live animals, and I'm not sure why cats get deprived of that instinct by their owners.
Personally, I prefer relationships where everyone involved is free to do as they please, so forcing a cat to live in a house so I can always have company just feels a bit like something I wouldn't enjoy. I think it is more on me to deal with whatever problem I have with being alone instead of forcing someone else to be my captive.
No. I mean I'm all for chosing to go vegan, but this is fucking asinine. Don't torture and malnourish your pets.
Is it only an issue of nutrients? Hypothetically, what if they were able to get all the nutrients they need without eating animals, would it be alright then?
Outside of the nutrients argument which you're hyper focused on (and which I don't agree that you have compeling evidence, especially when it comes to cats), I firmly believe that the choice to go vegetarian/vegan is a personal one. Pets and small children cannot make that decision for themselves, so I firmly disagree with forcing it on them (outside of extreme cases like animal protein allergies, unavailability of meat...etc).
I disagree. As long as the diet is nutritional, a vegan/vegetarian diet if fine. I would argue, one should not force a meat diet on a child. I raised my child on a vegan/vegetarian diet and she is fine. My daughter made her decision as she became older and experimenting with a meat diet for a short period of time.
You are right, I have no evidence that they can get all their nutrients without eating meat. I never said I did. I was just wondering if that was the only issue or if there was another issue as well. I'm just curious and trying to learn.
Even animal based cat food has to be fortified, so I don't find arguments about "natural" diet convincing. I'm also not sure what nutrient cats would have to get from animals. Animal specific nutrients are things like assembled proteins, which bodies break down and reform anyway. Assembled proteins are the natural way to consume amino acids but if anything that causes problems. Foreign proteins can over trigger our immune systems causing allergic responses and auto immune disorders, in rare cases misfolded proteins can directly cause disease like in the case of prions. There's a reason hypoallergenic pet food exists and you don't see people calling others monsters for feeding that to their pets even though that seems to be the common sentiment against people who feed their pets vegan pet food.
I don't understand your point about children. If your child wants to eat just Oreos would you let them? Parents always control what their children eat, if not directly, simply through what they are able to make available.
To me it's kind of moot though because I don't think we should be breeding "pets" in the first place. But while there are still pets that need to be adopted and cared for I don't think sacrificing livestock is the way to care for those animals. We are deciding that the life of one animal is worth the life and suffering of dozens. If you are ethically against vegan pet food then you should be pro murder/euthanasia because we are making a decision to kill either way.
Do you firmly disagree, when they feed thuna, deer and cow to their cats?
Earlier this month, a study published in PLOS ONE looked to find out if a vegan diet could be healthy for cats. Of the 1369 cat owners surveyed, 65 per cent were themselves vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian, or reducing their meat consumption. They found that there were no detrimental health effects in the cats fed a vegan diet, and even found that “cats fed vegan diets tended to be healthier than cats fed meat-based diets”.
No. Stop being idiots.
Experimenting on animals is bad. I though we all agreed on this by now?
I don't understand how experimenting on animals (let alone owning animals for entertainment) is compatible with vegan values.
Pets aren't compatible with vegan values
Should people even own animals?
We definitely shouldn't breed animals for the purposes of being kept in our households. As for animals already existing in shelters it is probably the most ethical option to adopt them, but if we need to slaughter other animals to sustain them then even that is no longer ethical.
I don't know any vegan that thinks this. This is just a way to pitch public opinion against vegans and to painting them as crazies, which they are not. Forcing carnivorous animals on a vegan diet is very obviously animal abuse.
At least watch the lecture