I’m always asked to lie down on the ground, so I don’t even need to do any work!

Ah, yes. Truly, the words of royalty.

Alas, the laws don’t stop idiots with a “great idea”:

• A Texas cosmetology school.
• A Florida high school teacher.
• A Texas company.
• A Canadian high school.

It seems companies aren’t as stupid about it as schools, though. I guess it’s easier to risk wasting taxpayer money than your own money 🫤

The people downvoting you clearly haven’t lived anywhere with shitty public transportation.

Good point, lol. I’ll agree to disagree, and you keep doing you 🤣

We can agree to disagree on our differing views of morality, I guess.

With regards to genocide, it’s a tough topic. We both agree that it’s wrong, but we don’t agree on how to approach it. I come from the perspective that there isn’t a baseline for morality and that it’s amoral to foist a subjective standard on others. You come from the perspective that there exists a universal standard for morality, and that it is amoral to allow societies to deviate from it.

Two diametrically opposed viewpoints that can’t be reconciled at this point in time. Maybe, in the future, if we have a unified global “culture” and moral relativism and cultural relativism are indistinguishable, we might be able to come to some agreement. Until then, you do you, and I do me.

Correct. I, and nobody else, should be permitted to override the moral autonomy of others. Atrocities have already been performed under the line of reasoning that the persecutors’ beliefs are objectivity superior to those that they are persecuting, and this is not something that we should aspire to repeat in the current day. Two moral wrongs—persecuting those that are persecuting others—does not make a moral right.

If the goal in your hypothetical scenario were solely to provide refuge and safe haven for willing members of said society, then I would have no problem with that. You would not be overriding moral beliefs; refugees would simply be voluntarily defecting from their own.

If your goal is to stop the genocide by destabilizing the society and installing your own set of moral beliefs in its place, then it would no longer be permissible.

I don’t think we’re coming to any sort of agreement here.

You believe there’s a universal set of morals, and I believe individuals’ morals are determined by environment (time, place, morals of others around the individual, etc.) and ultimately come together to form a collective understanding of morality for that point in time and those within that cultural environment.

That aside, concluding that I’m “tolerant of intolerance” is both disingenuous and incorrect. I believe that culture dictates morality, and I respect that other cultures are allowed to have their beliefs, but that doesn’t mean I choose to agree with them. I don’t consider any of your examples permissible under my own moral code.

I also accept that I am not the universal standard, and that it would be hypocritical to impose my own beliefs on demographics with a different moral code. To override the moral autonomy of others¹ in a crusade for moral righteousness would be an unjust act in itself. Or in layman’s idiom, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions.”

¹ Others, plural. Not individuals who are exceptional to the moral concensus of their surroundings (i.e. murderers)

From the perspective of cultural relativism.*

Insofar as our laws view animals, we do not afford them the same considerations or rights as we do our own species. I can’t speak for Europe, but in the legal systems of North American countries, animals are granted their own distinct protections separate from the protections given to entities with the designation of personhood (i.e. humans or service animals).

For instance, with permits and barring species that are protected for conservation reasons, humans are allowed to hunt and kill animals for both sport and sustenance. In such cases, animals do not consent to their hunting.

However, that does not mean that it is okay to hurt animals without cause. There are animal cruelty laws that cover unjustified and inhumane treatment of wild and pet animals.

If it is legal to kill animals but illegal to be “cruel” to them, then the act of killing an animal is not, in itself, cruelty. If it was, then animal cruelty would unconditionally occur during the process of hunting, making the latter illegal.

With these four points, and keeping in mind that laws are a reflection of the collective beliefs of society, we see that:

1. Harming humans is viewed as a different act than harming animals, and is not generally permissible.
2. Killing animals is permissible.
3. Inflicting intentional cruelty on animals is not permissible.
4. (2) is not precluded by (3).

By (1) and that punching a human in the face is an act of harming them (and also illegal), I conclude that it is not morally permissible to punch humans in the face.

By (2) and (4), I conclude that it is morally permissible to kill non-human animals.

Just in case anyone thinks relativism is a cop-out answer because laws were written in the past and may not be reflective of society’s current moral views, I ask you to consider this:

Laws are constantly changed to align with updated beliefs. Canada amended its laws to consider gender identity a protected class, which reflects the contemporary belief that transgender individuals deserve equality and freedom from being discriminated against. If society cared about not killing animals, hunting for sport would be unconditionally outlawed.

Edit 1: I meant cultural relativism. Non-Western cultures have different (and in some cases, more progressive) views on animal rights.

After reading that, I’m curious about your stance on ethics.

A utilitarian could argue that—even if their lives were fleeting and miserable—the factory-farmed animals would otherwise not exist were it not for their use as livestock. Would it be less ethical to have prevented their existence entirely?

[A] The existence of these animals contributes to the net quantity of happiness in our world. Even if it’s very little on an individual scale, it’s a significant amount as a whole. Wouldn’t it, therefore, be better that they do exist, even in such conditions?

[B] Does a livestock animal’s life not have a value in itself? Even if its life was objectively awful, it was given the opportunity to experience it. Would it be more cruel to—as argued by pro-life individuals—deny it the chance to experience life, no matter how such a life turned out in the end?

[C] Relatively speaking, perhaps the animal did not have such a miserable life as we imagined. From the perspective of an outsider, growing up in a cage sucks. But, maybe an animal would enjoy being constantly given access to food and water for no effort. We can generalize based on scientific data, but much like humans, there could be lazy animals that enjoy the lifestyle.

That’s a false equivalence.

The vast majority of the Western world does not consider farm animals to have the same rights as humans or pets. Equating the ethics of eating meat and battery is really reaching for an example to make me look stupid.

But hey, if we’re playing that game, here’s some examples that demonstrate unnecessary and annoying proselytizing:

The people who want me to {blank} sure are smug about how they {blank}. They should keep telling me how their lifestyle is better. My opinion isn’t as important as theirs. I am very happy to be talked down upon. An enlightened listener, you might say! ☝️🤓

• Drive a Tesla
• Drink Pepsi instead of Coke
• Try homeopathy
• Wear Versace
• Own a PlayStation instead of Xbox
• Cook with propane instead of charcoal

Habits are hard to break, and the other person needs to have an incentive to stop eating meat and/or animal products. Much like New Years Resolutions, those “I’m thinking of” thoughts are just going to be dropped because there’s no tangible motivation to follow through with them.

You can try convincing people by teaching them the health benefits from avoiding red meats, but realistically, you’re not going to get far. There’s a lot of misinformation and outdated research on the viability of vegetarian and vegan diets, and it’s hard to change somebody’s mind when they feel like it might be unhealthy.

This is why I’m hopeful for lab-grown meat being cheaper than actual meat. You’re going to have the “GMO science evil” crowd that can’t be helped, but the average consumer would gladly trade their ground beef for an equivalent-tasting alternative that saves them money. It’s not vegetarian or vegan, but it solves the ethical issue of factory farming.

I hope you eat them afterward. That would be so wasteful if you didn’t.

“Pinball”

So that’s what we’re calling it these days?

You’re not going to change any minds by shutting on the people you’re proselytizing to.

Give it a few more years until lab-grown meat is cheaper than live animals, and then recommend that as an alternative. People are more motivated by money than ethics.

Veganism gets downvoted for the same reason any other fanaticism gets downvoted: the vocal minority that talks about it does so with a hoiler-than-thou attitude, much like you are doing right now.

Thank you for your feedback, PETA.

And therefore don’t have to incur the burden of large expenses such as replacing a roof, a sewer line, etc.

If someone bought a house without doing an inspection, that’s their own fault. If it’s a natural disaster, that’s why you have insurance. If it’s expected wear and tear, you would have emergency savings to cover it.

At least as a homeowner, I know I can actually get it fixed before freezing to death. Can’t say the same when waiting for profit-driven landlords to go through the script of checking it out themselves, finding some reason to claim its not broken, and then eventually pestering them for long enough that they do their damn job and hire someone to fix it in a couple weeks.

If you want to cherry pick an example of the most expensive areas of the country instead of the more reasonable examples of a $70k single family house. But then the person buying the property is responsible for all the repairs and maintenance.

The median price of houses in the country is $420k.

I’m sure I could build a nice doomsday-prepper shack in the woods somewhere for $70k, though.

The lack of housing development with increased demand creates a housing shortage. When there’s a shortage, pricing goes up. The United States is at least a decade behind where they should be in housing development.

And you don’t see how landlords—who are buying more real estate than they actually use—create increased demand?

A mortgage just pays the bank for the loan. A mortgage payment does NOT pay for repairs on the property. If the furnace goes out in the middle of winter, it’s up to the homeowner to come up with the money – typically thousands of dollars all at once.

I refer back to my first point.

Some are more permanently vacant because they’re in such a state of disrepair that they can’t be lived in.

Gee, I wonder who’s responsibility it was to make sure that didn’t happen. ¯\(ツ)/¯

hoard (verb.)
To accumulate money, food, or the like, in a hidden or carefully guarded place for preservation, future use, etc.

Rental property owners don’t hoard shelter.

I might be inclined to agree with you if landlords took out the locks and made those empty rental properties into interim homeless shelters, but we both know they would never do it.