Humans have choices.

"Vegetarian food leaves a deep impression on our nature. If the whole world adopts vegetarianism, it can change the destiny of humankind."
Albert Einstein


"There is just no reason why animals should be slaughtered to serve as human diet when there are so many substitutes. Man can live without meat."
The Dalai Lama


"If man wants freedom why keep birds and animals in cages? Truly man is the king of beasts, for his brutality exceeds them. We live by the death of others. We are burial places! I have since an early age abjured the use of meat."
Leonardo-da-Vinci


"I do feel that spiritual progress does demand at some stage that we should cease to kill our fellow creatures for the satisfaction of our bodily wants."
Mahatma Gandhi


"Flesh eating is unprovoked murder."
Benjamin Franklin


"Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. He shall eat butter and honey, so that he may know the evil from the good."
Isaiah 7:14-15


"...Behold I have given you every herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all the earth and every tree in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat..."
Genesis 1:29


"Thou shalt not kill."
Exodus 20:13


"One should treat animals such as deer, camels, asses, monkeys, mice, snakes, birds and flies exactly like one's own son. How little difference there actually is between children and these innocent animals."
Srimad Bhagavatam 7.14.9


"To avoid causing terror to living beings, let the disciple refrain from eating meat...the food of the wise is that which is consumed by the sadhus (holy men), it does not consist of meat... There may be some foolish people in the future who will say I permitted meat-eating and that I partook of meat myself, but meat-eating I have not permitted to anyone, I do not permit, I will not permit meat-eating in any form in future, in any manner and in any place. It is unconditionally prohibited for all."
Lord Buddha


"We pray on Sundays that we may have light/To guide our footsteps on the path we tread;/We are sick of war, we don't want to fight,/And yet we gorge ourselves upon the dead."
George Bernard Shaw


"Every act of irreverence for life, every act which neglects life, which is indifferent to and wastes life, is a step towards the love of death. This choice man must make at every minute. Never were the consequences of the wrong choice as total and as irreversible as they are today. Never was the warning of the Bible so urgent: "I have put before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life, that you and your children may live."
Deuteronomy 30:19) Erich Fromm


"Cruelty to animals is as if man did not love God."
Cardinal John H. Newman


"Plant life instead of animal food is the keystone of regeneration. Jesus used bread instead of flesh and wine in place of blood at the Lord's Supper."
German Composer Richard Wagner (1813)


"Man did not weave the web of life: he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself. To harm the earth is to heap contempt on its creator."
Red Indian Chief (1854)


"If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men."
St. Francis of Assisi


"Killing is a denial of love. To kill or to eat what another has killed is to rejoice in cruelty. And cruelty hardens our hearts and blinds our vision, and we are unable to see that they whom we kill are our fellow brothers and sisters in the One Family of Creation."
G.L. Rudd, author of Why Kill For Food?


"Vegetarianism is a way of life that we should all move toward for economic survival, physical well-being and spiritual integrity."
Father Thomas Berry, Fordham University, New York


"To be non-violent to human beings and to be a killer or enemy of poor animals is Satan's philosophy. In this age there is always enmity against animals, and therefore the poor creatures are always anxious. The reaction of the poor animals is being forced on human society, and therefore there is always the strain of cold or hot war between men, individually, collectively or nationally...
Pythagoras


"The earth affords a lavish supply of riches, of innocent foods, and offers you banquets that involve no bloodshed or slaughter; only beasts satisfy their hunger with flesh, and not even all of those, because horses, cattle, and sheep live on grass. As long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed, he who sows the seeds of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love."
Pythagoras


"For my part I rather wonder both by what accident and in what state of mind the first man touched his mouth to gore and brought his lips to the flesh of a dead creature, set forth tables of dead, stale bodies, and ventured to call food and nourishment the parts that had a little before bellowed and cried, moved and lived. How could his eyes endure the slaughter when throats were slit and hides flayed and limbs torn from limb? How could his nose endure the stench? How was it that the pollution did not turn away his taste, which made contact with sores of others and sucked juices and serums from mortal wounds? It is certainly not lions or wolves that we eat out of self-defense; on the contrary, we ignore these and slaughter harmless, tame creatures without stings or teeth to harm us. For the sake of a little flesh we deprive them of sun, of light, of the duration of life to which they are entitled by birth and being."
Plutarch


"If you declare that you are naturally designed for such a diet, then first kill for yourself what you want to eat. Do it, however, only through your own resources, unaided by cleaver or cudgel or any kind of ax."
Plutarch


"The steam of meat darkens the light of the spirit...One hardly can have virtue when one enjoys meat meals and feasts..."
St. Basil


"...Ethics has not only to do with mankind but with the animal creation as well. This is witnessed in the purpose of St. Francis of Assisi. Thus we shall arrive that ethics is reverence for all life. This is the ethic of love widened universally. It is the ethic of Jesus now recognized as a necessity of thought...Only a universal ethic which embraces every living creature can put us in touch with the universe and the will which is there manifest..."
Albert Schweitzer


"I am full of the burnt offering of rams and the fat of fed beasts. I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of goats...Bring no more vain offerings... When you spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes though you make many prayers, and I will not hear you. For your hands are full of blood..."
Isaiah 1:11-15


"I will have mercy and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings..."
Hosea 6:6


"...Therefore the Lord will give you meat and you shall eat. You shall not eat one day or two days, or ten days or twenty days, but till it comes out at your nostrils and becomes loathsome to you, because you have rejected the Lord..."
Numbers 11:18-20


"...He who gives permission, he who kills the animal, he who sells the slaughtered animal, he who cooks the animal, he who administers the distribution of the flesh, and at last he who eats the flesh are all murderers and all of them are punishable under the law of karma."
The Laws of Manu (5:55)


"Meat can never be obtained without injury to living creatures, and injury to sentient beings is detrimental to the attainment of heavenly bliss; let him therefore shun the use of meat."
The Laws of Manu


"Having well considered the disgusting origin of flesh and the cruelty of fettering and slaying of corporeal beings, let him entirely abstain from eating flesh."
The Laws of Manu


"Those who never harm others by (physical deeds), by thought and speech, in whatever condition they may be, do not go to Yama's abode. Men who harm other creatures do not go to heaven, in spite of their reciting Vedas, giving gifts, practicing austerities or performing sacrifices. Harmlessness is a great form of piety. Harmlessness alone is a great penance. Harmlessness is a great gift. This what the sages say."
Padma Purana III 31-25-28


"Whoever eats raw or cooked flesh, and whoever destroys a fetus shall be destroyed by us from here."
Atharva Veda 8.6.23


"A cruel and wretched person who maintains his existence at the cost of others' lives deserves to be killed for his own eternal well being, otherwise he will go down by his own actions."
Srimad Bhagavatam 1.7.37


"The devotees of the Lord are released from all kinds of sins because they eat food which is offered first for sacrifice. Others, who prepare food for personal sense enjoyment, verily eat only sin."
Bhagavad Gita 3:13


"One who loves Krishna will give Him whatever He wants, and he avoids offering anything which is undesirable or unasked for. Thus, meat, fish and eggs should not be offered to Krishna...Vegetables, grains, fruits, milk and water are the proper foods for human beings and are prescribed by Lord Krishna Himself. Whatever else you eat, can not be offered to Him, since He will not accept it."
His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada


"It is the order of the True Lord to the entire body of the Khalsa...that they shall abstain from bhang, tobacco, opium, alcohol and desist from eating meat, fish, onions, nor indulge in theft and lust..."
Hukum-nama


"All tremble at Violence; all fear death. Putting oneself in the place of another, one should not kill or cause another to kill."
Dhammapada 130


"He who has renounced all Violence towards all living beings, weak or strong, who neither kills nor causes other to kill - him do I call a holy man"
Dhammapada 405


"It is s...

Whether or not to eat meat is not a spiritual issue in my belief system. However I do not doubt your sincerity when you tell us that it is an issue absolutely central to yours.

Its interesting how many of your quotes simply use the word 'kill' and not the phrase 'kill animals'. Surely vegetarians kill plants all the time?
Why is it OK to kill plants, but not OK to kill animals?

Originally posted by vishvahetu
"Vegetarian food leaves a deep impression on our nature. If the whole world adopts vegetarianism, it can change the destiny of humankind."
Albert Einstein


"There is just no reason why animals should be slaughtered to serve as human diet when there are so many substitutes. Man can live without meat."
The Dalai Lama


"If man wants freedom why k ...[text shortened]...
"It is s...

Originally posted by twhitehead
Its interesting how many of your quotes simply use the word 'kill' and not the phrase 'kill animals'. Surely vegetarians kill plants all the time?
Why is it OK to kill plants, but not OK to kill animals?

Originally posted by vishvahetu
Mammals have almost the same sentient feelings as humans, having them feel pain and fear and suffering and stress, practically on the same level as humans. Mammals nurse their offspring and give milk to their young. Mammals are warm blooded as humans. Mammals exhibit choice and freewill because the consciousness is much more developed than plants. There ...[text shortened]... g, pulling lifting. There are mammals that give man wool for the manufacture of clothing. [etc.]

Originally posted by FMF
Whether or not to eat meat is not a spiritual issue in my belief system. However I do not doubt your sincerity when you tell us that it is an issue absolutely central to yours.

Originally posted by vishvahetu
Your comment is in error because knowing it or not, eating meat directly affects a person spiritual consciousness by stunting the development of higher spiritual realization.

Originally posted by FMF
What you fail to mention is that mammals are also food for thousands of millions of humans, some-many-most of whom are sentient, spiritual individuals who are able to think for themselves, weigh their own spiritual insights, and who do not recognize or submit to the "Vedic authority" that happens to underpin and animate your own personal lifestyle choices.

Originally posted by FMF
I can see that you sincerely believe that my opinion is "in error" and that your opinion is not "in error".

However the terminology "error", "higher", "consciousness " and "realization" and so on, can only really be applied to others who recognize or submit to the "Vedic authority", and can therefore be faulted or congratulated on their memorization of doctr ...[text shortened]... your accusations of me being "in error" are neither relevant nor credible to me.

Originally posted by vishvahetu
The Vedic teachings are the authority, and they are not up for debate, just like the law of the road is not up for debate, no matter how much you think for your self and weigh things up, it will always be wrong to go against a red light.

Originally posted by FMF
Your analogy is not relevant as I do not recognize or submit to "Vedic authority" or "Vedic teachings", although I accept that you do, and do not doubt your doctrinal certainty and sincerity. I am not a religionist, vishvahetu. I have found that religion - yours included - is a barrier to my personal search for spiritual insight.

Originally posted by vishvahetu
Mammals have almost the same sentient feelings as humans, having them feel pain and fear and suffering and stress, practically on the same level as humans.

The authority of the Vedas, inform us that there is no wrong in the cultivation and harvesting of plants.

Originally posted by twhitehead
So you essentially have two reasons (you are just not very good at summarizing):
1. Mammals feel pain and suffering.
2. The Vedas say don't kill animals.

So what about insects, fish and birds? Where do they come in 1. and 2.?

Originally posted by vishvahetu
They are lower on the scale and feel diffident degrees of pain and suffering.

Look there's one golden rule....if it lives, do not cause it to suffer.