And why can’t we treat animals similarly to how we would want to be treated?

Many animals show quite civilized behavior. Live and let live. Sometimes they cooperate cross-species. Where they don’t, it’s mostly due to evolutionary pressure and need for survival. We’ve gone beyond the need of consuming meat for survival. And more importantly, we can reason about if it’s good or not. Also, occasionally I question how “civilized” us humans really are.

I feel like you’re just saying that humans are better, more important and/or more special than animals, treating that as a fact, and somehow extrapolating from there that we somehow have the “right” to inflict harm on “lesser” beings purely because meat tastes good?

Also, thank you for being open.