Did you know that if you promote Chinese medicine then you are supporting cruelty to animals?

Question

http://advocacy.britannica.com/blog/advocacy/2007/10/traditional-chinese-medicine-and-endangered-animals/

Answer 1

yep

thats why i spit on my local chinese medicene shop when i walk past.

Answer 2

I did not know that but I'm far to interested to care about cruelty to humans to be interested in what happens to animals.

most people eat them. Modern intensive farming isn't exactly a walk in the park for animals either.

Answer 3

Well there you go..Such is life

Answer 4

David G.If you support any medicine there is cruelty to animals,or don't you know about Americans,English,Idian,chinese and the rest of the bloomin' world who experiment on animals? What! You had your head in the sand or something?

Answer 5

yes i did actually

Answer 6

ya its sad and stupid because they are endangered.. but you shouldnt be racist because not all chinese people do this. It really matter on who that person is. I find it cruel.. but whatever... i cant stop it : /

Answer 7

I did not know that.

Answer 8

thats why I take Chinese medicine three times a day!

btw- Chinese medicine is the source of several common Western medicines, so its all a matter of the lesser of two evils...

Answer 9

Well I don't want to get all political here but how about cruelty to human beings?? Isn't that a problem?

And no I'm not Chinese..

Answer 10

There are a few tactics debunkers use which really make it clear they're completely full of it.  One that I learned from watching fox news and scientology productions was the "make up something which has no relationship to the issue your discussing, and associate it with the opposition to emotionally slander them," and by doing so, effectively admit the propoganda nature of your work.

In the case of the Chinese Medicine debate, since allopathy is worried about losing it's market to a cheaper treatment modality, they've funded a massive campaign to make the claim Chinese medicine is baseless, and a waste of money and hence reclaim their lost customers.  In that context, what point does it have to mention that Chinese medicine hurts the environment?  It's like arguing whether or not a cake tastes good, and then pointing out the book the recipe came from was published on an anniversary Hitler's birthday, so you're a n**i for claiming the cake tastes good.

The more annoying thing about this argument is that being a completely irrelevant flame to the actual issue, it's also logically flawed.

First off, the vast majority of Chinese medicines, especially those outside of china do not use endangered species, and plenty of people in the TCM field go after those who do.  This argument is the same as discrediting all pharmaceuticals because one had negative non medical related aspects.

Secondly, a lot of western medicines go a bit further than just harming the environment.  Have you ever heard of all the testing drug companies have done on people in africa and the deaths which resulted from those practices?  Killing endangered species is bad, but murdering people in the third world is unnacceptable.  At least there you can somewhat make a case for boycotting drugs in general, since it will cut into the profits of the companies that perpetuate this injustices, while in TCM the poacher is completely divorced from the doctors which conduct the practice.

David, the additional details you raised have 0 relevance to either your question or what I said.