Why is it okay for some vegetarians to eat fish?

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it is an idiom meaning there is not really a written in stone meaning of vegetarian.
Linguistically it does not include fruit, salt or bread which I am pretty sure vegetarians can eat.
Milk and eggs are also eaten by some "vegetarians" so why not fish.
If vegetarian means does not eat animals maybe a better term would be non meat eater.
Although that may confuse some catholics who would still eat fish.

not excactly growing

Fish eaters are called piscetarians (from the same root as pisces).

I am not sure if agriculture qualifies as propagation. We developed agriculture because it gave us the chance of stop moving from place to place to get food (basically out of laziness). I do not know about you, but I do not throw apple cores (or anything else) around, and even if I did anything will grow, because we have so little soil here, only concrete. And by the way, where I live an apple tree would never grow.

I misspoke when I said "throw away applecores" here. Im meant we dont have to throw them on the ground- we can dispose of them. We have farmers to do the apple propagating for us-which they do on a grand scale. How is agriculture anything but propagation?

You're either a vegetarian or yo're not a vegetarian. Fish are living vertebrates with animal cells, thus they're not food for vegetarians.

Eggs and milk do not have their own metabolisms, thus they're not living creatures.

Sure sure but there is nothing linguistically embeded in the word Vegitarian that says you can eat Eggs and Milk. It mean Vegitable eater
Non-Meat-Eater seems to be the definition of Vegitarian that you subscribe to. It is a very good one. I tend to agree. The problem comes in that Catholics have no meat fast days used to every friday now they are rarer. But on those no meat days they can eat Fish.
Limiting the catholic meaning of meat to the flesh of land animals.

It is all semantics fun to talk about but ultimately arbitrary.



They are Ovo-lacto and come out of the swedenborgian tradition.

Very cute.

Fish arent plants. They are a type of animal. Eggs and milk are not plants but they are not animals either.

If you eat plants and fish but not do poultry and red meat then your are "semi vegitarian".

you're not a vegetarian. Because you eat meat from a kind of animal(by any yardstick-biologically, nutritionally, or morally).

If you dont eat fish, but do eat diary and eggs then its kinda gray. You could call yourself a "vegitarian", but "semivetarian" might still might be better.

But I admit that I never understood how the Vatican gets away with not calling seafood "meat", but thats probably just from centuries of linguistic clipping. A thousand years ago the rulebook probably did word it something like "land meat" as opposed to "meat from water critters" and then it got shortened.

Kinda like in the 1980's when the phrase "having a bad attitude" suddenly got clipped to "having an attitude" (you suddenly didnt need to specify good or bad-the bad was implied). So today having a good attituded is not having any attitude at all! Like crab meat is not meat- in catholicspeak.

Last edited by naturalplastic on 10 Aug 2012, 7:04 am, edited 1 time in total.

I don't know anything about your probablies but research shows the origin of the word Vegetarian
Turns out vegetarian is a badly coined word a blending of the words vegetable and agrarian it can be traced directly to the Vegetarian Society in Ramsgate in 1847. Just like Methodist contains the explicit meaning someone who uses a Method it means a follower of John Wesley. Vegetarian literally suggests any Vegetable who is bad at word coinage it means someone who follows rules of the Vegetarian Society in Ramsgate in 1847.
Meaning an Ovo-Lacto vegetarian or a Meat abstainer.
.
.
.
making you right in its assertion that one can not eat fish and be a vegetarian.
Because it is what the word was poorly coined to mean.

Well THATS real cute.

you're saying that you admit that I won the game "but its a dumb game- so Im taking my toys and going home!".

Lol!

you're admitting that Im correct in understanding the term "vegetarian", but its a "badly coined term" boo-hoo!

But you fail to explain exactly why you consider it to be "badly coined".



OK.. so apparently the "original" "vegetarians" were actually in that gray zone of ovu-lacto vegetarianism ( they dont eat animals but they do eat animal products- which are not plant matter). So I'll concede that. But they could still properly be called "vegetarians"IMHO. Though "meat abstainers" might have been a better term- Ill concede that.

But still-come on- A person who eats fish is not a "vegetarian". Thats not gray at all. Folks who eat fish are meat eaters pure and simple-though they are meat eaters who abstain from certain kinds of meat. But they dont abstain from all kinds of meat - as did the original "vegetarians" of 1847. Maybe 'strict" and nonstrict "meat abstainers" would be a better term for the two groups of diet practitioners. But "vegitarian" is easier to say.

Because Vegetable Agrarian does not mean Meat Abstainer?

I assume you know what Vegetable means, Eggs and Milk are not vegetables are they?



Reason 1 that it is a bad coinage.
if they meant the Adjective then it literally means relating to the cultivation of Vegetables.
if the Noun, a Vegetable that advocates a redistribution of landed property?

Reason 2
Agra-rian the agra bit is from agros (field in Greek) the arian bit makes it a descriptor.(because it came through french)
so following the rules of formation Vegetarian would mean of the vegetable.

So it is an illiterate coinage. You disagree?

This is not a dodge it is the argument that Vegetarian means Meat abstainer because of
the history of the word.

I am sorry that the culture of this forum is goalpost shifting and such I plead not guilty.
I just did the research and changed my opinion you know like smart people do.

Well perhaps it may be "an illiterate coinage".

But you're coming at it from the opposite direction as I am.

Whether the term is entymologically correct or not it implies that you eschew meat.

I think that you cant claim to eschew meat, and at the same time be a fish eater ( thats like a mom claiming to be a virgin)- regardless of what label you use.

Diary and eggs arent plants, but theyre arent animals either. Its a gray area whether people who from those categories should be classified by whateve term you want to use to mean "vegitarian". But you definetly cant include fish eaters.

But if your worried about how the word itsself was fashioned then thats a different issue.

About that: I dunno.

We pigeonhole animals into the categories of "carnivors", "omnivors", and "herbivors".

So using that as precedent we would have to call "vegetarians" "herbivors".

But when humans consciencously do something because its their creed cause or profession we stick an "ist" and the end (scientist, artist, animist, communist,feminist, Islamist, etc). But that would make the people in question "herbalists". But herbalist already has a seperate meaning. So "herbivorist" might be the best term (like Islamist it seems redundant but isnt). A cow is a "herbivor", but a human who makes a lifestyle out of not eating cows would be "herbavorist".