Why do Indian Vegetarians have a problem with Eggs but not with Milk?

Ishna · #55 (**permalink**) 05-Jul-2012, 05:49 AM

Gyani ji, you've got the right idea! I didn't know male chickens were eaten for meat. That kind of system makes logical, ethical sense.
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Randip Singh · #56 (**permalink**) 05-Jul-2012, 16:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ishna

Randip Singh Ji, with all due respect (which is more than you've cared to show me) I believe you have misunderstood my point. Feel free to delete my clarification here if it goes against your point of view.

I understand quite well how chicken biology works, thank you. Female chickens lay unfertilised eggs if they do not breed with a male. They continue to do so until they stop laying eggs and die. When your chickens die, you get a male and breed some more chickens. As I'm not aware if we can select the sex of the chickens before they hatch, we end up with a bunch of female egg laying chicks and a bunch of male chicks who don't lay eggs. These male chicks are quite often destroyed as they will not produce unfertilised eggs.

A colleague of mine keeps chickens on her semi-rural property just outside of my town. She brings her organic, free range eggs to work and we buy them (myself include, sir). When I visited her fir Christmas one year she explained to the group in conversation that they'd just borrowed a friend's male chicken (rooster, cockrel, whatever) and hatched a some more chickens. The males were put in a box, taken out of town a couple of kilometer and left to the foxes.

Please tell me how male chicks are processed in an ethical, organic commercial setup as I would like to know. It is not evident from the links you provided.

If you must delete my post, kindly respond by private message.

Regards.

Sorry if I seemed discurteous, but I find posts that don't back themselves a bit tedious and if you scroll back and re-read some of them you'll see what I mean. Between you wanting to vomit and Kamala making eggs come out of my backside, the topic had gone awry.

Ethical farmers (as Gyani ji pointed out), use male chicks for meat. Cockerel meat is particularly sought after in the East.

The problem with cockerels is however, left to their own devices, they will attack and kill each other, thats why some think its better to just leave the chicks out to be killed by fox's....at least it provides food for them.

But I really don't see how this is different from milk production, where the calf is removed from the cow, and killed for veal?

Ishna · #57 (**permalink**) 05-Jul-2012, 17:43 PM

Randip ji, yes you were discourteous but I appreciate your apology. I also apologise for making cheap one-liner posts that don't contribute to meaningful discussion, that was my mistake. The vomiting was actually with reference to Gyani ji's recounting of the cow being made to urinate with a stick in her business but I failed to make that clear.
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/health-and-nutrition/38699-why-do-indian-vegetarians-have-problem.html
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=38699

I've got no problems with ethical farming practices as yourself and Gyani ji have illustrated and agree with your question - how is it different than the milk/calf situation?

Randip Singh · #58 (**permalink**) 05-Jul-2012, 22:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ishna

Randip ji, yes you were discourteous but I appreciate your apology. I also apologise for making cheap one-liner posts that don't contribute to meaningful discussion, that was my mistake. The vomiting was actually with reference to Gyani ji's recounting of the cow being made to urinate with a stick in her business but I failed to make that clear.

I've got no problems with ethical farming practices as yourself and Gyani ji have illustrated and agree with your question - how is it different than the milk/calf situation?

Me personally, I've tried every spectrum of vegetarianism and non-vegetarianism, to see how my spirituality could accomadate that.

I have come to the conclusion that it is about your own conscious and what it can live with. If you don't like the idea of something then don't do it. Simple!

We have some very good friends in Model Town in Jallandhar, very wealthy and I remember him sat with me (Hindu Vaishnavite btw), telling me how proud he was the he was a vegetarian and he wasn't cruel to animals. He then gets a phone call from someone who sounded quite desperate and to whom he owed money. He put the phone down. I thought how cruel he was to that fellow who was obviously distressed and had owed mony to for years and yet he was saying how kind he was to animals. The hypocrasy was there to be seen. He would no doubt justify what he did.

The same could be said of eggs and milk debate here, with people justifying their positions.

Kanwaljit Singh · #59 (**permalink**) 05-Jul-2012, 23:01 PM

Quote:

I have come to the conclusion that it is about your own conscious and what it can live with. If you don't like the idea of something then don't do it. Simple!

That is indeed a comprehensive point! And don't impose your own on other!

Kamala · #60 (**permalink**) 06-Jul-2012, 17:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Randip Singh

So let me get this right, any cows you have had have not produced milk after giving birth.

Now either you do not understand basic bioligy or you have milk from mutant cows.

The cow produces milk after giving birth only and for feeding its calf. In our farm in Punjab we had several, and we used to have to take the calf away and tie it up so it didn't drink the milk. THAT is how it works. THAT is the cruelty of milk. The calf pines for it mothers milk yet Vashnavites can justify that with hypocrasy.peacesign

Err no. This post is a bit juvenille. This is aupposed to be an adult debate. If you do not understand basic biolicy, then ask me and I will explain.

The egg comes out of the Chickens uterus, and comes out part of its cycle. Looks like YOU did not read the site I posted on how eggs are produced which makes NO reference to chickens feeling pain when they lay eggs.

Here is a post from a chicken keeper:

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/...434027916.html

The egg laying process is very dramatic! Here's what my hens do, see if it matches yours: when one is about to lay an egg, she will go rather frantically from nesting spot to nesting spot in the yard, all the while bawking and crying in a fretful tone, sometimes she'll seem downright frenzied. Sometimes other hens or the roo will accompiany her in her search for the Perfect Nesting Spot, and THEY have to get in on the noisemaking, too. The hen may also watch another hen who is laying, sticking her head in the nest box and cackling her head off at the top of her lungs. We call this the 'pre-egg cackle', and I think it serves to draw out any predators before the hen is committed to laying the egg and is stuck on the nest. When the hen is FINALLY actually ready to lay, she gets very quiet and secretive. She'll choose a nest (usually the same one she used before, despite all the searching that went on before) and as she sits, will seem to go into a trance, being quite still. When the egg is coming out she will stand up and concentrate hard (Moms who have seen their small children passing a bowel movement know this look!) and seem to strain a bit, then out pops the egg! After this she may stay and mother it for a few minutes, then will leap from the nest cackling loudly and sometimes running. Most of the time she'll go and eat a little food and have a drink.
All the hens treat their egg laying (and everyone else's) as a cause for loud celebration. I think the noise you are hearing is that rather than screams of pain. Also, for first-time layers, there is that freaked-out, 'what the heck just happened to me?!' quality to the hens' reaction to laying her first eggs. *L* They take this more in stride as they mature. The only time I'd worry is if you suspect a hen is egg-bound, and then you need to act very quickly. It isn't very common in chickens who get a good diet and proper care though. The symptoms of an eggbound hen are fairly marked, if you want to read more on it research the Internet or click on my 'My Page' link, I've discussed eggbinding there a bit.

Actually I did and I find it reprehensible BUT my answer to that was to buy ORGANIC and FREERANGE. Please look the terms up. I suggest you do that with all the veg you buy as well, to prevent cruelty to animals and the environment.welcomekaur

I still think the sound is of pain, I've owned a couple of parakeets and I know they are really stressed when they lay eggs etc.

As for the cows, I really never was there while they milked the cows, so I didn't know, I just saw our servants milking them and they were quite careful.

Either way I don't see what hak you have to just eat the eggs, even if it is unfertilized. I find it nasty you must eat the food made for a animal that isn't even a mammal :S

You use the chicken as a tool for the sensation of your tastebuds, very nice very nice.

Searching · #61 (**permalink**) 07-Jul-2012, 15:37 PM

I know a person who is lacto vegetarian. His logic for not eating eggs is that "How can something be fit for consumption that comes out from hens private part".
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=38699

I think people in India over centuries have become used to a certain kind of diet and they feel uncomfortable with the notion of changing it so they come up with various reasons no matter how wrong they are.

Kamala · #62 (**permalink**) 07-Jul-2012, 15:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Searching

I know a person who is lacto vegetarian. His logic for not eating eggs is that "How can something be fit for consumption that comes out from hens private part".

I think people in India over centuries have become used to a certain kind of diet and they feel uncomfortable with the notion of changing it so they come up with various reasons no matter how wrong they are.

What kinds of people are you talking about? It's about religious rules if you are talking about most indians.