What have you heard or read about "flexatarians", the eaters who have backed off slightly from following a true vegetarian diet?  I read an article that made them sound a little . . . .well . . . .snobbish.   They claim to eat meat only rarely, but it has to be from animals that were raised humanely and not fed any chemicals and not kept penned up in cramped spaces.  I dunno . . . . . . . the critter still has to die to become "meat", doesn't it?  What am I missing, here, in this rationale?

I haven't seen the article but some object to how the animal is treated..like they'll eat beef but not veal where the baby calf is kept penned up and underfed, etc or they'll eat eggs or eat chicken but not if the chicken was penned up...or how the animal is killed matters to them. Iwouldnt' call this vegetarial and dont' see what the term 'flexaterian' has to do with this lifestyle. I know some people wont' wear clothing where kids were forced to make the product..just what a person chooses to do.

Yes I have heard of this term tho I am not sure exactly what it means.  I have been a vegetarian for about 13 years now and at times I have eaten some things that some vegetarians would not eat.  Like eggs.  I eat eggs but only free range (they run around on a farm) vegetarian fed, antibiotic free, organic eggs.  I choose to eat only those because while I am choosing to eat the egg I would like the chicken that made it to have a nice happy life instead of living in a dark, overcrowded building being fed whatever make it produce the most eggs and pumped full of antiobiotics.  I would hope that all people, not just vegetarians or flexetarians would like to see animals treated humanly and fed the food God designed them to eat not what makes them grow the fastest and also not see them pumped full of antiobiotics and growth hormones as both these things are bad for the people eating them. 

I think the term itself is more of a marketing label (and really kind of silly) , for those who have decided (for whatever reasons) to decrease their meat consumption. There's a great cookbook called "The Flexitarian Table," about 3 years old, that gives a lot of recipes that are very easy to make for vegetarians and then easily add meat to appeal more to meat-eaters, without having to cook a whole different dish. That's the first time I heard the label.

We're among those who have cut down dramatically on meat consumption. I believe it's healthier, and it certainly saves money. I also have issues with "industrial" meat producers, not only for the way they treat their animals, but because the way they raise their animals means, for one thing,  they have to increase the antibiotics given, which in turn causes health problems for humans. The chemicals and hormones rerleased by a stressed and terrified animal just before death also show up in the meat's color and form; a trained butcher/chef can see it, it's very visible, and makes it  tougher.

But I still enjoy a good steak sometimes; I'm not THAT disciplined, and I doubt my actions are going to change the world, but we feel more comfortable living by what we believe.

I don't proselytize about it; I'm far from pure. That's just what we believe, and we try to act on. It puzzles me though, when the label "snobbish" is applied, and I saw it here once before in a thread about organics.. To me it's a matter of looking after my health and my checkbook, and trying to live by my beliefs, at least to a degree. It's a belief system; a lifestyle choice. Why is that considered snobby?

Betty, I surely don't consider your actions 'snobbish'.  Let me try to explain what the newspaper article sounded like to me--it came off as one of those new notions of what the "in" people think is the fashionable thing to think, or do.  You've seen this in our public life in the USA a number of times.....it becomes de rigeur to go play handball before one goes back to the law office; or to go to one of those whatchamaycallits with the artificial walls, and 'climb the walls' for exercise, or to order the newest cocktail that has come "into fashion" (what is a mojito, or a mimosa, or whatever that name was, anyway?), or to vacation in whatever spot is touted as the most wonderful new playground, or to go on whatever the latest weight-reduction diet or regimen is, etc etc etc.   The taking up of fads aspect of the thing, Betty . . . that's what came through to me while reading that article.  I regret my use of a word you found offensive.   I think you're altogether correct about how, in general, Americans would do well to consume less meat, particularly 'red meat".