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From: rhendel@mcs.drexel.edu (Russell Hendel)
Date: Sun, 7 Dec 1997 18:18:29 -0500
Subject: Another Point On the Prohibition of Destroying

The Talmud gives the case of two neighbors A and B: B says "Look I will
rebuild our common wall so we can have better windows..I'll pay for
everything you won't lose anything".  The Talmud says that A can say "I
don't want to live in a house with vibrating walls for a month (while
you fix it)"

B continues: "No problem...I will personally pay so that you can stay at
my mansion free and then come back when the wall is done. " A can still
stay "I don't feel like moving".

Both these cases are brought down in Jewish law in the Shulchan
Aruch. The implication is clear: "Personal inconveniecne--"I dont feel
like moving" is a valid reason to refuse an "improvement".

Maybe vegetarianism is "better"...but if eating meat has certain
conveniences then I have the right to avoid it just as i can avoid
improving my windows because I don't like vibrations or the strain of
moving.

Some deficiencies in vegetarianism (which, forgive me, no one
has yet mentioned)
	- Meat eaters get vitamin B12 easily
	Vegetarians have to go out of their way to get it

	- Meat eaters get complete protein easily
	Vegetarians have to combine foods in certain ways to
	achieve this( a famous experiment in which two vegetbles
	were eaten an hour apart showed that no protein had
	been absorbed even though complete protein would be
	absorbed if they were eaten together)

	- Finally, the taste of a juicy steak is preferable to a juicy
	eggplant!!

While some of these reasons may appear frivolous (e.g. taste) some of
them are serious (Vegetarians DO have to work to get complete
protein...)  Also B12 deficiencies can cause irreversible nerve damage.

I conclude that even if all the other reasons mentioned are true (one
method is insufficient, bal tashchis doesn't apply etc) I am still under
no halachic obligation to change my lifestyle if I "feel like it"

The only thing I can't do because I "feel like it" is to go and destroy
for no reason some object I own.

I hope this helps

Russell Jay Hendel; Ph.d;ASA; rhendel @ mcs drexel edu