Vegetarianism Ethics Quotes & Sayings

Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight. — Albert Schweitzer

It may be considered folly by common opinion but this refusal to destroy life unnecessarily, this reverence for it, must become a deeply implanted part of his ethical standard. — Paul Brunton

When we lift our forks, we hang our hats somewhere. We set ourselves in one relationship or another to farmed animals, farm-workers, national economies, and global markets. Not making a decision
eating 'like everyone else'
is to make the easiest decision, a decision that is increasingly problematic. — Jonathan Safran Foer

Morally it may be better to not kill any creature for their flesh, but biologically, meat was one of the greatest factors involved in the rise of the psychology of thinking humanity. — Abhijit Naskar

I get really excited about collaborating because by the end of the day you have something that you never thought you'd have. I was really happy about writing "Bad News" and a bunch of other stuff on the record that came out so well. — Orianthi

In a war, the first casualty is human dignity. — Paulo Coelho

The persistence of the story of animal consent into the contemporary era tells of a human appreciation of the stakes, and a desire to do the right thing. — Jonathan Safran Foer

When I was nine, I had a babysitter who didn't want to hurt anything. She put it just like that when I asked her why she wasn't having chicken with my older brother and me: "I don't want to hurt anything." [ ... ] What our babysitter said made sense to me, not only because it seemed true, but because it was the extension to food of everything my parents had taught me. We don't hurt family members. We don't hurt friends or strangers. We don't even hurt upholstered furniture. My not having thought to include animals in that list didn't make them the exceptions to it. It just made me a child, ignorant of the world's workings. Until I wasn't. At which point I had to change my life. — Jonathan Safran Foer

The choice-obsessed modern West is probably more accommodating to individuals who choose to eat differently than any other culture has ever been, but ironically, the utterly unselective omnivore - "I'm easy; I'll eat anything" - can appear more socially sensitive than the individual who tries to eat in a way that is good for society. Food choices are determined by many factors, but reason (even consciousness) is not generally high on the list. — Jonathan Safran Foer

Once you come to terms with why you don't eat cats, dogs, monkeys, and dolphins, you will begin to understand why I don't eat cows, pigs, chickens, and lambs. — Edward Sanchez

A simple trick from the backyard astronomer: if you are having trouble seeing something, look slightly away from it. The most light-sensitive parts of our eyes (those we need to see dim objects) are on the edges of the region we normally use for focusing.
Eating animals has an invisible quality. Thinking about dogs, and their relationship to the animals we eat, is one way of looking askance and making something invisible visible. — Jonathan Safran Foer

I was always geared towards either wanting to finish number one or be number one as far as the best player that I could be, or be the best player at my position in the league. I wanted that to be a constant reminder to my teammates that they looked to their leader who is wearing that number, this is what you should strive for as well. — Warren Moon

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

While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered beasts, how can we expect any ideal conditions on this earth? — George Bernard Shaw

You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Thus, the same blow that strikes interest down will send wages up. — Benjamin Tucker

If I ruled the world, every woman would have a Chanel suit in her wardrobe. — Bill Nighy

Until he extends the circle of his compassion to all living things, man will not himself find peace. — Albert Schweitzer

Despite the fact that an Indonesian island chicken has probably had a much more natural life than one raised on a battery farm in England, people who wouldn't think twice about buying something oven-ready become much more upset about a chicken that they've been on a boat with, so there is probably buried in the Western psyche a deep taboo about eating anything you've been introduced to socially. — Douglas Adams

My view [is] that what morality boils down to is, 'Don't harm, and do help.' And now the question is, 'Can creatures like chickens and cows be harmed?' And the answer is, 'Of course they can.' Consequently, I think it's immoral to harm them. And that seems to me to provide a very strong moral reason to be vegetarian, to not wear leather ... it seems to me that our treatment of animals is morally appalling ... and that we ought to radically revise the way we live, precisely because they feel pain, they can be hurt, and we're constantly hurting these creatures! — Shelly Kagan

Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages. — Thomas A. Edison

People often say that humans have always eaten animals, as if this is a justification for continuing the practice. According to this logic, we should not try to prevent people from murdering other people, since this has also been done since the earliest of times. — Isaac Bashevis Singer

The symbolism of meat-eating is never neutral. To himself, the meat-eater seems to be eating life. To the vegetarian, he seems to be eating death. There is a kind of gestalt-shift between the two positions which makes it hard to change, and hard to raise questions on the matter at all without becoming embattled. — Mary Midgley

When we actually refer to God's blueprint, we gladly work in fascinated conjunction with it, suddenly realizing that any other action outside of that blueprint is foolhardiness and lunacy of the worst sort. — Craig D. Lounsbrough

Killed a policeman? How Vegetarian! Well, I suppose it was, so long as they didn't eat him. — G.K. Chesterton

I don't believe vegans (or vegetarians) who still get their (packaged, preservative/chemical-ridden) food from industrial food systems have any righteous ground to stand on, nor do I think a deep look at the sentient life of plants or the true environmental impact of agriculture permits them any comfortable distance from cruelty. Everything in this world eats something else to survive, and that something else, whether running on blood or chlorophyll, would always rather continue to live rather than become sustenance for another. No animal wants to be penned up and milked, or caged and harvested, and you've never seen plants growing in regimented lines of their own accord. — Brian Awehali

It is good strategy to stand up for the right, even when it is unpopular. Perhaps I should say, especially when it is unpopular. — Ezra Taft Benson

Everyone always asks me, 'Do you want to be famous ... ' I never really thought about becoming famous. I just want to work, to be able to put out inspiring and good film and TV. — Kim Shaw

Anyone who suggests that there is a perfect symbiosis between the farmers' interest and the animals' is probably trying to sell you something (and it's not made of tofu) — Jonathan Safran Foer

Before child labor laws, there were businesses that treated their ten-year-old employees well. society didn't ban child labor because it's impossible to imagine children working in a good environment, but because when you give that much power to businesses over powerless individuals, it's corrupting. When we walk around thinking we have a greater right to eat an animal than the animal has a right to live without suffering, it's corrupting. — Jonathan Safran Foer

We think of dogs as being more like people than pigs; but pigs are highly intelligent animals and if we kept pigs as pets and reared dogs for food, we would probably reverse our order of preference. Are we turning persons into bacon? — Peter Singer

Quality is a direct experience independent of and prior to intellectual abstractions. — Robert M. Pirsig

There's nothing like a love song to give you a good laugh. — Ingrid Bergman