I am a Pescatarian

[McTahr]

So far as I can tell from what the internet says, mostly the research done is correlating APs in plants, especially in carnivorous plants, to that of nerve tissue and fibers in animals.

Which, honestly, is shaky at best without a CNS.

[Seil]

I generally dislike diets, or getting rid of anything in my diet. It's not because I hate animals, but meat tastes good. I have recently started to drink a lot more water and eat a bit healthier - less deep fried, more rice, less junk food and alcohol.

[Great Cartoonist]

I just eat a whole bunch of foods from all categories. Steak, broccoli, goat cheese, rice vermicelli, black fungus--if it tastes good, I'll eat it.

And apparently, being extremely selective about what you eat could kill you.

Also, spicy salmon rolls with avocado tastes great.

[Hanuman]

I stopped drinking the occasional soda the day I figured out that Kerosene is cheaper than any soda on the market.

A balanced diet that includes meat (seafood is meat) is necessary to being balanced health-wise, otherwise you'll have to figure out some way to ingest the BCAA level amino acids found in meat to help maintain your insulin levels, otherwise you'll get scrawny... muscle-wise.

[DFM]

I cannot commit to any diet that would interfere with my breakfast of sugar bacon.

[Lyaer]

Yeah. In the end, we really can only go on what we can find with research, so if we can't find out with any reasonable degree of certainty that plants can suffer--if their biology does not resemble that of any known sentient entity closely enough for us to establish a basis for believing suffering is possible--then better to default negative. But at the same time, I hesitate to rule out the possibility that a sufficiently alien organism could experience something comparable enough to what we call suffering to be worthy of consideration, especially since I personally haven't studied biology (or neurology beyond what's covered in introductory Psych).

[Azisien]

My record for vegetarianism was three weeks, then I started craving burgers hard. Darn.

I found it difficult because I live in a house of meat eaters, with meat infused into every single meal.

I will say that during my foray, I experienced feelings similar to Nique. I can't rule vegetarianism out of my future, though. I admit to feeling a bit lost on where to start, but I haven't done much googling on the subject. Forget veganism for me too. If I have to give up meat, that just means I'll have to up the ante on my loves of milk, cheese, and carb. Me and my enslaved milk cows will just have to go down fighting (no doubt in an epic final charge of the Canadian Push campaign of the Dairy Wars of 2045).

[Lyaer]

There's also "Freeganism" which sounds stupid, but basically means you eat whatever is offered to you or that you can get your hands on, but only if it's free, so you're not participating in the market. Or I think that's the rationale, you'd have to ask an actual Freegan. It seems to me at least as ethically responsible as veganism etc, except that if you eat someone else's food then they might have to buy it again sooner. But it does have the advantage of being able to eat at other people's houses without having to risk offending them by declining food, and thus is probably better PR than veganism in some regards.

[Azisien]

Sounds like [hardcore] Jainism [monks], except you wear clothes!

[Magus]

Originally Posted by Lyaer

There's also "Freeganism" which sounds stupid, but basically means you eat whatever is offered to you or that you can get your hands on, but only if it's free, so you're not participating in the market. Or I think that's the rationale, you'd have to ask an actual Freegan. It seems to me at least as ethically responsible as veganism etc, except that if you eat someone else's food then they might have to buy it again sooner. But it does have the advantage of being able to eat at other people's houses without having to risk offending them by declining food, and thus is probably better PR than veganism in some regards.

Oddly enough, the only episode of The Goode Family (a family of politically sensitive hippy types) I watched ripped on Freeganism HARD, mainly because it sounds like you're bumming food off of people, except it's probably actually more like being like Jesus where he walked around accepting gifts as opposed to worrying about money. Unless you think Jesus was a bum (debatable). Also by accepting foods from people who've just participated in the market, it seems like you'd be vicariously supporting the market to an extent. So freegans should live on farming communes. I'm totally for freegans living on farming communes.