Are dairy cows taken care of 'ethically' in Canada?

[descendancy0]

I'm a vegan, and I've gotten in a discussion with my canadian friend over how eating animal based products is morally wrong. (Animals are sentient and should not be used as tools, we do not need their products for nutrition, etc.) I'm not wishing to discuss my beliefs, but my canadian friend made the claim that all milk produced in Canada is taken by naturally impregnated cows who are not in factory farms and roam fields free, etc. She has no evidence to back this up, and I'm wondering, is the care/procedure for extracting milk from cows in Canada any way more ethical than it is in the United states or the UK? if so, how is it more ethical and where did you get the source? If Canada treats its cows just as bad as milk companies in the USA and the UK, what should I say to my canadian friend?

[brimstoneSalad]

It's a popular form of deflection for carnists to imagine that the cruelty in animal agriculture is just a problem in other places, and that their country would never do that -- entirely without evidence.
Some kind of perverted nationalistic ignorance.
I've heard that said of any number of smaller countries.

Here's a site specifically about factory farming in Canada:

http://www.beveg.ca/factory-farming-in-canada.php

Includes statistics, and both photos and videos of Canadian factory farms.

Factory farming is the norm, everywhere. It simply is not economical to produce meat and other animal products in other ways.

Even in India: http://www.hsi.org/issues/farm_animal_c ... rming.html

Nobody is nice to animals. Certainly not Canada.

[TheVeganAtheist]

Im from Canada, and your friend is entirely wrong. brimstoneSalad's remarks are spot on.

[descendancy0]

Thank you so much for helping me, my friend still remains bias and ignores every refutation I make of her claims, despite my finding of the abuse of cows in a Canadian dairy farm. I personally find soy meats to be far tastier than animal flesh and the majority of the reason why I became vegan was because of TheVeganAtheist's videos, despite my disagreement with his beliefs at first. Morality is subjective but not dead. Once again, thank you brimstonesalad.

[brimstoneSalad]

Morality is subjective but not dead.

Morality is relative, in the sens that it depends on the circumstances at hand, but not subjective, in the sense of being merely opinion/social norms.

Subjective morality is dead on arrival.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethical_subjectivism

I the context of subjective morality, animal agriculture is ethical today because people think it is (or for people who think it is), and slavery WAS ethical too, when people agreed with it.

[Volenta]

Morality is relative, in the sens that it depends on the circumstances at hand, but not subjective, in the sense of being merely opinion/social norms.

I don't think it's relative either, situational would be a better word to describe what you are saying. Or context-dependent. I thought relativism didn't go very well together with either an objective meta ethical view or an objective normative ethical theory (the definition on WikiPedia is pretty loose). And I'm sure you would on both levels actually argue for an objective standard (moral universalism/objectivism).

[brimstoneSalad]

I don't think it's relative either, situational would be a better word to describe what you are saying. Or context-dependent.

Yes, relative is a poor term because it has many meanings in practice; and I certainly don't mean that moral relativism is correct. Morality is relative in the sense that the speed of light is relative; and not that velocities are a matter of opinion or culture. It depends on reference frame, and that is circumstance. And in that sense it is highly relative.

It's relative to the actor, and the moral agency and capacity of that actor.
It's relative to the circumstances and consequences, and the harm or help actions will produce.
It's relative to the alternative actions available; some times there is no good to be done.

Situational is a better word, even if just to distance it from the notion of "moral relativism". I was trying to think where he may have gotten subjective from, and relative came to mind.

Relative is useful in the sense that it is the opposite of absolutism, but I think words probably fail us in this domain where things just kind of fell where they may.

Objectivism certainly isn't objective, after all.

Sometimes I feel like we have to use words to describe things that aren't part of their proper titles, but may be part of the proper titles of something else where they have no business being.

I thought relativism didn't go very well together with either an objective meta ethical view or an objective normative ethical theory (the definition on WikiPedia is pretty loose). And I'm sure you would on both levels actually argue for an objective standard (moral universalism/objectivism).

True, moral relativism doesn't, but morality is relative in an actual sense to circumstance, actor, situation, cost, etc.

And we shouldn't dare say objectivism, should we, for fear of the Randroids assuming our support?

Sometimes it feels like our language, particularly in philosophy and how things have come to be called, is so twisted up it needs to be seriously refactored. Nobody would allow variables to stand with these kinds of absurd naming conventions.

[Red]

All I know is that most cow milk is bagged in some parts of Canada.

[Volenta]

True, moral relativism doesn't, but morality is relative in an actual sense to circumstance, actor, situation, cost, etc.

Sure, but it doesn't align all that well with what's generally meant by it. Associations with things like cultural relativism should really be avoided. It's confusing: even if you were to use situational ethics, you're also describing something bigger than you want to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situation ... in_of_term

And we shouldn't dare say objectivism, should we, for fear of the Randroids assuming our support?

I think it should be the other way around. "Objective" is a very meaningful word to describe what we mean, while you would also inherit a lot of additional garbage with Rand's objectivism. The word "objectivism" is not really suggesting you're dealing with a word describing a whole ethical framework, but it seems she was stupid enough to think it did. Universalism would also work to describe what we mean, but I really think we have to claim the word "objectivism" for ourselves (not reclaim—I don't think we lost it).

Sometimes it feels like our language, particularly in philosophy and how things have come to be called, is so twisted up it needs to be seriously refactored. Nobody would allow variables to stand with these kinds of absurd naming conventions.

I agree. The way in which language grows and changes isn't really that nice. It generally doesn't even really try holding up to meaningful conventions/norms/standards/rules. Even in the philosophical domain it's a problem, it seems.

[brimstoneSalad]

I think we should claim relative and objective, since both are useful.

All those putty pooping potty pickers can go sit on a tack.

You're right that relativism probably has more negative connotation to the ears of the general theistic public, but it also has more rational connotations to others, who will see things being relative as very natural, and if you're not relative, you're "absolute", which isn't what we want to convey either.

Maybe we can find entirely new words, but it's a tricky situation.