Title might not be very clear of what i’m trying to say, but to clarify i want to know why does fish usually isn’t included in meat category, fishes are made of meat, am i right? then why are they excluded from the meat category?
In: Biology
Capybara are categorized as “fish” by the Catholic Church.
“ And though they’re decidedly mammalian, they have been categorized as fish before…by the Catholic church. The Vatican found their webbed feet and affinity for the water as grounds to declare the capybara a fish so that it could be eaten during Lent, a time when meat is forbidden on Fridays but seafood is allowed.”
https://www.fodors.com/news/outdoors/this-dog-sized-rodent-is-your-new-favorite-animal
People who don’t think fish is meat are idiots. Meat is animal flesh. Fish are meat. Cows are meat. People are meat. Whatever. I’m a vegetarian and when people find that out, 9/10 times the first question I get is “but you still eat fish right?” 🙄
Historically, in relationships to the Catholic “no meat on Fridays, but fish is ok” stems from a pope who’s brother owned a fish market who was having money problems. Nepotism over faith.
Although this “history” is under some debate lately, this is what I learned in Sunday school.
I’ve seen a variety of speculative reasons why the Catholic Church allows eating fish when “meat” is restricted. (Many of the responses have accurately said that this is the basis of the cultural phenomenon you’re asking about).
My hypothesis about this is that *Adam never names the fish*. God brings before Adam the beasts of the earth and the birds of the air and Adam names each one. But nobody ever names the fish!
I mean, some people are pescetarian: like vegetarians but they can eat fish too
I think this could be a cultural/religious thing but I actually think it’s quite reasonable (although, yes, I recognise that overfishing is harmful and I hate it too) as it still gives you protein that people criticise vegetarianism for!
In other words, this has made me realise that I may want to adapt to a pescetarian diet soon
This is the way it is in the Bible (Old Testament). There are three categories- dairy, meat, and parve (things that are neither meat nor dairy). Fish is considered parve.
My guess is because the laws of keeping Kosher mostly involving slaughtering animals and you cannot slaughter a fish.
Others have said similar, but fish has a different texture, weight, and nutrient content than other meats. Pescatarians eat only fish and plants. Fish has lower cholesterol and fat than most other meats, and typically have higher levels of fatty acids and whatnot. Just watch out for Mercury poisoning.
Cooking and science both have a lot of categorizations because there is a lot of data that needs to be handled and recalled for shit to be useful.
Since food is a constant activity for literally every human and science categorizes everything accessible to human knowledge they are both huge sets of information and there is going to be a lot of shared information organized in very different ways.
If you are talking about eating it, then fish is a culinary category, not a scientific one. You aren’t supposed to care that most of the edible parts of the fish are muscle fibers, you are supposed to care about how it’s cooked, what spices compliment it how it can preserved or prepared.
Meat,- lamb, pork, beef
Poultry- chicken, duck, turkey
Fish,- fishes
If you are cooking or eating, these are helpful categories.
This is very cultural. I believe, from your question, you are from a heavily judeo-Christian are, likely more heavily Christian.
The Torah mentions that you shouldn’t cook a kid (baby goat) in it’s mother’s milk. This has been interpreted to separate meat and milk, culturally as Jews, for thousands of years. Christianity came along and decided separating them wasn’t a big deal anymore, but kept in place the definition of lactating animals being meat. Chickens are a new world bird, and since most land animals we eat lactate then it was an easy choice to determine chicken as being meat. There are however a small group of people who do not count chickens as meat.
If you meet a Jew who claims chicken is meat (most), ask them about lactating chickens.
This is just “vegetarians” who want to say they are vegetarian but really aren’t. But if they don’t pretend they are actually vegetarian by saying fish isn’t meat, they can’t tell everyone they are vegetarian lol. This comment is just describing one person I know, not saying all vegetarians are like this.
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