Reasons Why I Appreciate USM ~Suu999

I was visiting the PETA website yesterday to see what kinds of stuff they had their site (usually just to make fun of their radical beliefs), and I visited the forum because I was curious to see if they had any posts made by the meat-eating side. They didn't...not surprisingly, I suppose. What I saw on there is what made me realize how much I appreciate the USM forum, in terms of friendliness, tolerance, forgiveness, and debates.

First of all, their forums were enormously unfriendly. Everything was for vegans/radical vegeatarians. I hold nothing against vegans or garden-variety vegetarians (no pun intended) as long as they don't try to put their beliefs on me. Going back to PETA's forum's unfriendliness, I noticed a lot of clique-ish behavior. They try to exclude members who don't have their beliefs and will generally call meat-eaters 'ignorant' 'narrow-minded' 'nazis'...all kinds of things. Thankfully we don't allow any of that here. I think USM is very friendly overall. We accept many people and don't try to exclude anyone.

The second item is on tolerance of others. On USM, there are all kinds of people from many walks of life. Even in its old days of being a psychic place, we still invited in the skeptics and disbelievers. PETA doesn't do that, by contrast. They only want vegetarians, or, at best (for them anyway), extreme vegans who won't eat anything that has a shadow. If they find a single meat-eater on the site, that person will be walking on eggshells, all the time. They don't have a separate place for meat-eaters to discuss their love of milk or a juicy steak; they only have entries for posts on vegan stuff. I am so glad USM's members don't act that way towards skeptics, regardless which forum category they're in.

The third item is on forgiveness. USM is very good at that, even though it takes a lot of work on the accused part's to work for it, still, it's totally worth it in the end, as I have found out. The other day when I was surfing the PETA forums, I came across a post that had a dissenting opinion on it...in short, this person was telling them off. The vegans railroaded this guy for having his opinion and gave him no room whatsoever to try and redeem himself. I really don't believe one should have to apologize for having certain beliefs, like if you're a vegan or a meataterian, you shouldn't have to apologize for being either one. Or, if you're talking back to an organization and perhaps you DID insult them in some way, I think one should apologize for the insult, but not for believing a particular way. I am so glad that USM gives the writer a chance to apologize for whatever in the forums, because it saved my comeback so I can continue to make my posts like I am now.

The final part is on debates. USM is full of debates, which is why we have a Debates and Discussion forum. We debate everything from redundant debates to fresh ones. We're open to dissenting opinions and we can discuss them intelligently. Now, on PETA, let's say someone has a dissenting opinion. If they express that opinion, the other members will RAILROAD them. They'll call the I know debates on this site can get really really heated, but we don't try to humiliate the person and accuse them of things without looking further into their post. That kind of behavior really can't change a meat-eaters opinion, if PETA really wants them to join their side.

And those are the reasons why I love USM'S forums so much. Now, this post isn't meant to spark a meat-eaters/vegatarians debate, this is just comparing one particular forum's behavior to ours. Like I said, I hold nothing against vegans/vegetarians, as long they're not all macho about it or something. I do love animals (even though I eat meat), I do love the environment (because we live in it!), I just don't like PETA's behavior as an organization because they are very radical in a bad way. And if any of you reading this are PETA members...well, please express your views in a non-provoking way, and I'll listen. Ahh, I hope I have defused any possible negative comments now.

That's all for today...loves for USM! And I can't wait for the new Unsolved Mysteries show to come back on the air, w00t!

Cheers ~Suu999

Don't join PETA. They're very bad news. If you want to debate animal rights peacefully or find vegetarian recipes, come to USM instead. They're much friendlier and you don't have to walk on eggshells just to make a post.