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[Kagus]

One of the difficulties with buying free range eggs is that the definition of the term "free range" is subject to interpretation and lobbying.

My current WTF: it's 7:30 AM, I can't sleep properly because my stomach is throwing a hissy fit after three beers and the nausea is keeping me from relaxing fully.

[Devastator]

Is it unethical to eat meat products if you live in a place unsuited for agriculture?

[Yoink]

Is it unethical to eat meat products?

Si.

[wierd]

nonsense.  Depends on the strategy of the herbivore.  Some herbivores, like rabbits, *NEED* predation to stay in equilibrium with their environment, as they are R-stragegists, and will engage in exponential growth without an externally applied effect. (Granted, they DO begin exhibiting female sterility when stress levels of the warren reach a certain threshold, but by that time they are heavily destroying their environment.)

If it is ethical for fox, wolves, owls, hawks, and pals to eat meat, it is ethical for humans to do so as well.

[Kagus]

It's now 11:40. I've managed to sleep a little by elevating my upper body and keeping my stomach uncovered. I have attempted to eat some breakfast to at least have something solid in my belly, and have so far succeeded in consuming nearly an entire cracker over the past four hours.

Dammit, I wanted to do things today... I was all happy with myself for being geared to have two constructive days back to back, and then this dumb shit hits me and nearly immobilizes me.

I had three beers over a four hour period last night, how the hell did I get this sick off of that? Yes, they were stronger than average, but still...

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[wierd]

Voting with the wallet wont work, because that's not how markets work.  In terms of market dynamics, the factory eggs are the superior option because more are produced, more inexpensively.  You have to introduce a bad to make them stop being the market superior option.

Is... is that an economic point that doesn't trigger me? Does somebody actually get it?! This must be a trap.

In all fairness, I only 'partially' "get" market ideologies.  The basic lesson is that when there is a large set of producers to draw on, the consumer will tend toward the option that gives them the maximal economy for their transaction. (EG, the most eggs, for the lowest price.)  When you combine this with techniques that produce large amounts of that product, very inexpensively,  the producer that can produce the most of that product, the most inexpensively, and still draw viable profits, will be the market winner.  They will get the majority of all transactions.  This is especially true if they can resell their product to other vendors to disguise the origin of the product from consumers, should they develop a bad reputation score. Outside of required point of origin tracking required for foodstuffs, eggs are a pretty fungible commodity. (You can put a bunch of eggs together, and suddenly you cant tell the difference between the free range egg, and the factory egg.) As such, even with a large campaign to try to harm the bottom line finances of the largest player who uses the factory techniques to corner the market in exactly the way I stated, the producer just needs to rebrand, and the consumer wont know differently, and will resume their normal spending habits. (Purchasing the most eggs, at the lowest functional price.) 

The desired goal is to get the factory egg maker to stop cutting corners on price through the use of minimal-levels-needed-for-viability methods for keeping their animals alive and productive, and force them to use more ethical standards.  Those more ethical standards are expensive. The factory egg producer is *NOT* going to voluntarily do that. They would rather spend money on shell companies and advertising agencies, and keep their egg production rates up, so that they can keep the market saturated, so that the free range producers do not get any realistic portion of the market.  The only way you are going to get them to comply is via legal action.  Even then, they are likely to resist, and start sending the lobbyists.

(Additionally, if the pool of consumers is large enough, such as with a global market, they can recoup sufficient sales internationally by INCREASING their cheapness to drive out foreign competitors to make your efforts at a boycott completely futile.  The "vote with wallet" method would be completely impotent.)

[Hanslanda]

Huh. I get free homegrown eggs from a guy I know. They're probably way better than anything you could buy.

[Cathar]

Snip

You can very well design a level playing field that allow for humane treatment of animals while allowing both cheap products, healthy competition and livable margins. For exemple, a group of countries can very well say "alright, from now on, if you want to sell eggs in our group, you have to show that your chickens were not tortured out of it". It also forbids unhealthy foreign competition to compete with an unfair advantage due to their own unregulated market, and starts treating their livestock ethically with profit as a motive.

It's healthy and sane all around.

Problem is, when this solution is attempted, you always get a group of very vocal politicians screaming about sovereignty and european elites wanting to enact Orwell's 1984 and this makes the process a tad difficult to put in place.

[wierd]

So, in other WTF related things...

After setting up a fancy new plugin on my linux box, so that Totem video player can handle DLNA server sources (For my fancy NAS hosted video collection), I noticed that it also grants access to apple's "Movie Trailer database".

One of the items is "Son of bigfoot."
(obligatory youtube link)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJ5yzbUDz_c

This is a pixar-esque family digital cartoon, about a prepubescent boy, who is the son of bigfoot, who seeks out his missing dad. (He does not know that his dad is bigfoot until after he finds him.) Apparently, getting full-body hair, and giant feet, only happen after puberty, which seems to be a theme in the trailer.

Now, this is all nice family stuff-- since dad appears to be an otherwise ordinary person that just so happens to be a mythical fur-covered being that can talk to animals. (They seem to have gone out of their way to make him look like even more human than a sufferer of hypertrichosis.)

However, it leaves certain things omitted, that are total WTF fuel.

Such as-- Mom totally had to bang bigfoot for this story to happen. (full stop.) This leaves one to wonder-- how exactly mom met dad, and how they managed to pull this off.  It also leaves the open question of why mom is estranged from dad (sure, he says he was being hunted by crazy scientists in the trailer, but this just further increases the mystery), and a number of others.

Apparently, it is now OK to make a kid's show about defacto beastiality, as long as dad is able to talk, and looks vaguely human.

[Kagus]

Apparently, it is now OK to make a kid's show about defacto beastiality, as long as dad is able to talk, and looks vaguely human.

This is nothing new. You're forgetting Bee Movie.

Everyone knows that bestiality is best. It's in the name!

[Frumple]

Huh. I get free homegrown eggs from a guy I know. They're probably way better than anything you could buy.

I'unno. I've had home grown/free range eggs from several different sources, and about the only difference in terms of taste/food stuff I've noticed is the store bought ones tend to provide more egg per egg. Taste is pretty much identical. Add on that someone else washes the chickenshit off for you and, well...

[Yoink]

If it is ethical for fox, wolves, owls, hawks, and pals to eat meat, it is ethical for humans to do so as well.

Farming it is never ethical, though.   

[scourge728]

Would you rather people hunt it from the wild, and thus wipe out MORE species of animals?

[wierd]

If appropriate protections are in place (In EVERY direction! We DO NOT want idiotic pandering politicians to release wild boar in areas they are not indigenous to! Because that is exactly what has happened in many states, to "increase game tourism" or some shit.), then it would not be a problem.

If anything, it would add to the novelty and price of meat, and encourage people to eat more veggies like they are supposed to.