Going vegan doesn’t save lives (does it?)
Unless you were previously hunting the animals yourself and you stopped?
By going vegan, you are effectively boycotting the meat industry (incl. fish, poultry, dairy, egg…) but aren’t the animals still getting killed?
If a lot of other people also go vegan, one likely result is the creation of a new market for it and in turn there are far more vegan products available in more places and they become more affordable. This in itself is useful as it helps show one can live without torturing and killing animals.
Now, the concept of supply and demand is simple economics. Especially when it comes to expensive and perishable items such as meat and dairy. If less people are buying these items in supermarkets, they will stock less and therefore producers will produce less. How would they make a profit from them if they were throwing lots away because they kept supplying the same amount, but people were not buying it? Of course it will self adjust as less people purchase these items. Thus vegans are certainly saving literal animals from slaughter. It takes time.
A counter argument could be that the meat market IS expanding because there are ever more people on Earth, but for every person who steps away from animal products, the market adjusts accordingly. We do save animals by our choices and if more people were to go vegan, we would begin to notice those market changes on a far more expansive level. But just because we are at the moment a small voice in the wilderness, doesn’t mean we aren’t making a difference to the lives of whatever number possible.
Still, I wish we were actually, automatically “saving” all these animals each year as a result of our boycott. I wish the meat industry wasn’t expanding. I wish we could hasten the abolition of meat or at least threaten the industry. Boycotting slows it down and opens the door to a world where alternatives abound. What then?
In order to stop child labour, you can boycott products of child labour but you wouldn’t go around accusing those who don’t boycott every possible product that may have come from child labour of not caring enough or as much. You wouldn’t deny them the label of activist, humanist or unionist.
In order to stop child labour, you wouldn’t think that boycotting is what it’s all about. You may demand a political solution. You may demand reforms and abolition and laws to prevent it, in one country, then another and hopefully in as many countries as possible. A revolution / a change of political system might be in order so as to remove a system that lead to child labour in the first place.
Similarly for animals, I believe we should follow the same path and not forget that boycotting is but one aspect of the struggle and that there is no point in wasting hours trying to get everyone to boycott every possible item if this time can be better spent demanding political change.
Indeed, changes do occur, they come thanks to the dedicated work of animalist organisations such as Animals Australia, Oscar’s Law, PETA, L214, ALV (and so on), and all the excellent work they do to expose the truth about the meat (and fish, poultry,…) industry. These changes of law and practice have a direct, immediate and genuine impact on animals.
I am (basically) a vegan and I encourage everyone around me to go vegan/vegetarian because it’s only logical that if you care about sentient animals, you are promoting a vegan/vegetarian world. Because once you stop promoting the murder of individuals every time you have a meal, it is significantly easier to start thinking with a lot more honesty about speciesism.
Nothing makes me happier than hearing of friends or family members going vegan/vegetarian or at least having vegan meals several times a week.
But as much as we love hearing it, do we change society and affect mentalities through a personal boycott? The boycott matters (it does), but the real, important work remains to be done on a social and political level.
When it is election time, we can write to politicians to ask them about animal issues. Animals Australia is doing a swell job organising this, too.
If we vote, we should vote for a party that promotes significant improvement regarding animal rights.
When we choose to support an organisation, we could choose an animalist one because we know plenty of other people won’t. Why not also volunteer for one, once in a while?
We ought to sign petitions, go to demonstrations and initiate conversations and cultural changes via education about speciesism.
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On the topic, I would warmly recommend:
- http://www.meat-abolition.org/
- http://www.meat-abolition.org/en/faq#11
- http://fortheabolitionofveganism.blogspot.com.au/
Thank you to Sharyn Williams for her help with acknowledging the positive outcomes of boycotting animal products.
Definition of SPECIESISM from the Merriam Webster dictionary.
1: prejudice or discrimination based on species; especially : discrimination against animals
2: the assumption of human superiority on which speciesism is based.
Compassionate Choices, by Joseph T. Espinosa
We choose not to eat meat, eggs and milk because we understand that if we do, animals will suffer and die for our pleasure. The same is true, and on a MUCH wider scale, if we choose not to take the plight of farmed animals to a large number of current meat eaters, as it is statistically overwhelmingly likely that even just a few hours spent leafleting, showing video footage or doing a feed in will spare more animals from suffering and death than our own vegetarian or vegan diet will spare over the rest of our lives. Put another way, the animals would actually be helped more by someone who ate meat and leafleted a few hours once a year. To avoid this vital work in order to avoid the relatively minor discomfort (compared to what the animals go through) it may bring us is pretty selfish. I tend to be pretty shy in general, but the amount of suffering and death that can be spared by simply asking passersby if they would like a booklet to help animals/help stop violence clearly outweighs my initial nervousness. And the more we do it and realize that our catastrophic thinking about how horrible it will be is unfounded, the easier it gets. We all have busy schedules, between work, family, dogs, rats and other obligations. Making time for what could clearly be the most impactful thing in our lives is important and worthwhile.
