Talk:Semi-vegetarianism

Semi Vegetarian?

"Semi-vegetarianism is a term used to describe the practice of excluding some meat (particularly red meat) from the diet while still consuming limited amounts of poultry, fish, and/or seafood[1][2]."

Surely that describes everyone that isn't vegetarian? Everyone is going to exclude "some meat" be it rat meat, dog meat or human baby meat. "Limited amounts" is not quantifiable and therefore cannot be used to identify who is "semi-vegetarian" or not. There's no such thing as semi vegetarianism, you either are or you aren't.

Muleattack (talk) 15:18, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Vague as the definition is, the term does exist. I'm not sure if "semi-vegetarianism" meets notability guidelines or not, but that's how it's defined. Though to avoid any confusion, maybe it could say "Semi-vegetarianism is a term used to describe the practice of excluding some commonly-consumed meat (particularly red meat) from the diet while still consuming limited amounts of poultry, fish, and/or seafood." (text in bold added). Or we could skip the vagueness altogether and go with the more specific definition given by the citations: "Semi-vegetarianism is a term used to describe the practice of excluding red meat from the diet while still consuming limited amounts of poultry, fish, and/or seafood." I think the latter should be used, because although it may not always be true, it's what the citations say (verifiability, not truth). -kotra (talk) 18:13, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Pointless / Nonsensical Article, Delete it or merge it with something else.

There is no such thing as a semi-vegetarian. By definition of a vegetarian (lets choose the vegetarian socieities definition to make it simple).. "We define a vegetarian as someone living on a diet of grains, pulses, nuts, seeds, vegetables and fruits, with or without the use of dairy products and eggs. A vegetarian does not eat any meat, poultry, game, fish, shellfish or crustacea, or slaughter by-products"

In a nutshell, you cannot be half of an absolute, you cannot half not eat animals, akin to the fact you cannot be half a smoker, you either are or you are not.

A so called semi-vegetarian is just somebody on a low-meat diet.

Listing 'health benefits of a so called semi-vegeatiran lifestyle is ridiculous! For a start theres no definition of what one is, what meats can or cannot be eaten etc. It's just another junk term thrown around to make the low meat diet sound more fancy than it is and shouldn't have a place on wikipedia.

Any thoughts?

Neosophist (talk) 02:40, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Neosophist,

The main problem with this article is that it lacks WP:RS so I will support WP:AFD. I think your absolutist argument is not relevant. If more people used the word and it were clear that there were many people who intentionally set out to call themselves and be 'semi-vegetarians', the nonsense of the label wouldn't make any difference as long as there were reliable sources. As it is, it may be a candidate for a dictionary entry, though there is a difference of opinion about whether it means the person eschews red meat or that they eat it rarely. That said, it probably doesn't deserve a whole encyclopedic article.-- Uwishiwazjohng (talk) 18:56, 22 February 2009 (UTC)