"It's a personal belief."

When, oh when, are people going to pull their head out of their collective ass.. This rationalisation has so many things wrong with it I almost can't tell you all of them. But I'm going to try anyways, yes I am. And here we go:

Eating someone else's flesh is not a belief. It's an action.

Tell me, would you say that a white man paying someone to kill a black man for him is alright because it's a personal belief? Well, it is a personal belief. That white man believes that black men are inferior to him and that he can do anything he wishes with them. And he has evidence, too: why would the majority of black people be so poor if they weren't inferior? Lack of opportunity? Previous years of oppression disallowing them to actually make their way? Slaveowners of generations past purposefully breeding them to make them "stupid"?

NAAAAH. Can't be!

Now for the next question: would you say that what that white man does is a personal belief? No, it's an action. He's taking action and oppressing someone else.

See, I don't have a problem with you believing it's alright to do whatever you want to any nonhuman people.. I have a problem with you acting on it. And anyways, even if it is a choice, is it a valid one? Can I believe it's okay to rape you and do it and not be held accountable? (Sidenote: the factory farmers themselves call the place where dairy cows are taken to be forcibly impregnated the "rape rack".)

No?

Didn't think so. And why is that?

BECAUSE IT'S NOT MY RIGHT TO DECIDE WHAT TO DO WITH YOUR BODY.

See, this is why animals should have the basic right to bodily integrity: because they are biologically autonomous, because they can quite clearly give or revoke consent, because they are abused without it -- in other words, because they can use it, just as humans can. All humans, barring those braindead and with such conditions as anencephaly.

Seriously, where do people get the idea that it's alright to override someone else's rightful choice because "OH, BUT I WANT TO"?

Could it be, perhaps, THE PATRIARCHY?

You know, that Patriarchy that is based on having rungs of worthiness? That Patriarchy that is based on the top rung of worthiness being able to break the will and body of those below him? That Patriarchy that defines strength as how much you can break the person next to you? That Patriarchy that defines strength as how many people you can possess (i.e. again, break the will of)? That Patriarchy that ladles the same oppression out to all of those different from the white human adult straight Christian male -- whether it's animals, women, blacks, children, etc.?

Yoohoo, "feminists", why are you not realising that the oppression of ourselves and our furrier, featherier, and scalier brothers and sisters IS ONE AND THE SAME?

Same source. Same effect. Difference? Animals are the bottom rung, so you have no problem whatsoever with it.

You should know very well that oppressors do not want to see, do not want to stop benefiting from oppression. You are benefiting from oppression.

There is no oppression that is ordained, whether by nature or god/s. There is nothing that makes it right. There is nothing that makes it okay. Not excuses, rationalisations of lesser intelligence or limited emotions or might makes right or anything.

Look. Learn. Realise:

IT IS NOT OKAY TO SUPPORT THE PATRIARCHY IN ANY FORM.