Are there any animal products which are not the result of exploitation or cruelty (hypothetically)? For instance, wool comes to my mind as a product that could be obtained in a completely animal friendly manner. Just curious what you think.
All animal products are not vegan with the caveat that you live in a modern society. The fact that we do have the ability to go to a supermarket and choose what food we want to eat, what clothes we wear, etc means that turning those animals and their products like wool into commodities for our own use is inherently not vegan. The definition of veganism includes this caveat by way of the phrase “as far as is possible and practicable” (https://www.vegansociety.com/go-vegan/definition-veganism).
So if you are an Eskimo and you literally have no way to survive other than killing an animal or using it’s fat for warmth, etc that could be considered vegan. Or at the very least, I don’t think that anyone including vegans would argue that that person has a moral obligation to simply let themselves die. However, the vast majority of people that ask questions like this are not in a situation like that. We really don’t have to wear wool or eat meat or drink milk. So by doing it when it isn’t necessary you are inherently causing unnecessary suffering which isn’t vegan.
And to be clear, animals like sheep produce wool for a reason. When we take it from them and view them/their wool as a commodity we are already crossing a line. It would be easy to see how keeping human females locked up, breeding them to produce more and more hair, and taking their hair to sell to make wigs would be unethical right? You are taking away their autonomy even under the best conditions. If that individual was able to consent and they signed a contract that gave them food, shelter, water, and whatever else the needed in exchange for their hair that would be another thing, but sheep can’t consent. Capitalism will always lead to farmers treating animals as commodities and not as living beings.
Thanks for your thoughtful response! There’s a lot to unwind from the ethics here (for me). For example, let’s say I own a sheep. The word ‘own’ already implies commodification to a degree. However, let’s say I do everything I can to make my sheep comfortable and happy. I keep it fed, I make sure it has a lot of space to walk around, I take it for long walks, I provide it a home. Now from what I understand not shaving sheep is quite cruel, because their hair keeps growing (perhaps this is only certain species, I’m not an expert), at some point the weight of the hair becomes unbearable. Part of taking care involves shaving them periodically. Using the shavings to produce wool in this hypothetical I don’t believe is unethical. But, unpicking the hypothetical a bit further does give me a little unease:
- Is it ever ethical to ‘own’ any animal?
- Animals have been domesticated since before recorded history. This has created a symbiotic relationship with humans in which the animal depends on the human for it’s wellbeing.
- To stop ownership and breeding would surely mean the extinction of certain species.(and I’m not even sure if that would be a bad thing)
There’s more food for thought from your answer. There’s an aspect of anthropomorphism that I think is at play here. Are we projecting when we think about some of the ethics around this? Can we really know what an animal wants or how it feels? I believe animals signal discomfort, hurt, pain, stress, happiness, content, e.g., emotions, so, to a certain degree I believe we can. That’s the reason I 100% agree with you that it’s impossible to use animals as commodity ethically, i.e., commercially exploiting animals. My question was more around the hypotheticals, can we, even in the society we live in, use products that come from animals. Can we own, or rather, live together with, animals and share with each other?
Thanks again for your answer and indulging me while I explore this topic.
You’re very welcome! I’m more than happy to discuss my beliefs around veganism with someone who is clearly open to the discussion and is able to think critically about the topic.
I don’t believe that “owning” any animals regardless of context is ethical. That being said, there are places like animal sanctuaries for example that do things like take care of animals that have one way or another escaped the cruel system of exploitation that we have created for them. Cows that have been saved from dairy farms, etc. Obviously I’m not opposed to those sanctuaries doing their work and I believe that it is the most ethical way to handle that situation.
Moving to the idea of pets in general, I believe there may be some more division among vegans here but that could just be my own lack of knowledge. However, it is my belief that there are some complexities we have to talk about if we want to answer whether or not pets are fundamentally unethical due to “owning” animals being unethical. First of all, our society is set up in such a way that legally speaking you will always “own” your pet in much the same way that the sanctuaries “own” their animals legally speaking. But in much the same way that sanctuaries don’t view themselves philosophically as “owning” the animals and truly have the animals best interest in mind, I believe that humans can have truly healthy relationships with “pets”. I use pets in quotes because it is often associated with ownership so it may not be perfectly accurate to describe a healthy relationship in my opinion but for the sake of the discussion it’s the best word I can think of to illustrate the point. The key is that the human treats the animal as an individual and doesn’t philosophically view themselves as “owning” the pet. Another key thing to consider is whether the pet was rescued from a shelter or purchased from a breeder. Supporting breeders is extremely bad for obvious reasons hopefully. Now… That leads to the difficult reality that it isn’t the animal’s fault that they were born to a breeder. And even an animal purchased from a breeder can be well looked after (although I would argue that purchasing an animal from a breeder inherently implies that the human views themselves as owning the animal in the vast majority of cases). However, despite it not being the animal’s fault and the fact that they can still be well looked after and loved, by supporting the market of breeding you are telling the breeder that there is a demand for what they view as a commodity. That they should continue breeding animals to sell because they can make money off of it. On top of that already being unethical, in the pursuit of profit they also make other very unethical decisions like abandoning animals that aren’t likely to sell, etc. So I believe that while it is sad for the animals born to a breeder, the best thing that we can do to prevent even more future suffering is to not support that breeder in the first place. If no one buys their animals, they won’t waste their time and money breeding and abusing them.
This all relates back to your question about sheep and their wool. It’s also a common argument used for animals like cows. People will often ask me if I’d rather all of the cows just stop existing as opposed to being bred into existence by us. The question is a flawed hypothetical since it is not the case that society will ever go from where we are to a 100% vegan society overnight. It will take a long time and the industries will slowly shrink as they breed less into existence naturally as a result of lower demand and also more sanctuaries can pop up to take care of those animals as necessary. However, I do generally believe that giving animals their autonomy and not forcing billions of them to live their literal entire lives in suffering is preferable even if it means that they have a smaller population. We shouldn’t have bred billions of them into existence to begin with. Coming back to the sheep, there is an additional issue that we haven’t discussed which is that when we breed animals as commodities like this, we artificially select traits that are favorable to us and not them. Cows produce more milk, animals grow quicker in general to be slaughtered, and in the case of sheep, they didn’t use to have the problem of their wool needing to be shaved. It is only the sheep that we domesticated and bred to produce as much wool for us as possible that have this issue. That in itself is unethical for us to have done. It is true that what’s done is done though and if a sheep is living on a sanctuary for instance, it would be ethical to shave their wool when necessary. The stipulation being that it should be done in a comfortable way for the sheep and not the way that the wool industry does it. Now… Would it be unethical to use that wool? I think that you could make an argument that it wouldn’t be unethical to an extent. One of the issues that I see with this is that by using that wool to say, make a sweater, you are perpetuating the societal belief that it is normal to wear wool and use sheep as a commodity. People will see you wear that sweater and become more used to the idea of using wool as a commodity. Furthermore, this is a very specific and uncommon example of how wool is obtained. Unless you are literally the one doing the work to take care of and shave the sheep you have no way of actually knowing if the wool was collected in an ethical way, and despite what labels in stores would have you believe, their wool isn’t ethical.
I feel like I had something else relevant to add but I forgot what it was, lol. Anyway, hopefully that helps a little bit at least. As always, these are my beliefs and shouldn’t be taken as gospel or seen as veganism’s beliefs as a whole or anything. Allowing my beliefs to be malleable is what has allowed me to come this far to begin with and while I truly do hold these beliefs, I think it is important to admit that we can always improve still and be willing to change.
If you approach veganism without intersectionality you quickly descend into ableism, classism etc.
Can you elaborate on what you mean please?
If you tell someone working multiple jobs to give up animal products and they’re only realistic options to feed themselves is fast food that’s classist. I can elaborate more if need be but I’m at work on the clock 😂
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe that what you’re trying to say when you use the word “classist” is that eating vegan is more expensive and that the person who is struggling to make ends
meat(edit: “meet” not “meat” lol. Slip of the tongue) and has to work two jobs cannot afford to be vegan, therefore by saying that they have a moral obligation to be vegan I am being classist right?Again, please correct me if I am misunderstanding you but assuming that’s your argument, here are some studies which have come to the opposite conclusion, finding instead that vegan consumers spend less money on average than omnivores. Furthermore, fast food in general is significantly more expensive regardless of dietary makeup of the meal so it isn’t reasonable in my opinion to claim that someone struggling to make ends meet can only realistically feed themselves with fast food.
https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2021-11-11-sustainable-eating-cheaper-and-healthier-oxford-study https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0921800915301488?via%3Dihub https://agrifoodecon.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s40100-022-00224-9 https://www.foodnavigator.com/Article/2022/07/26/plant-based-now-cheaper-than-meat-in-the-netherlands-vegan-burgers-are-on-average-78-cents-cheaper-per-kg
To reiterate, if someone truly does have no other options than to eat meat then eating meat does not go against the idea of being vegan. I simply believe that if you live in our modern society and have the ability to purchase your own food then you are inherently making decisions everyday about whether or not you want to be vegan. If you are so poor that you have to go to a food bank or beg for food then that’s a different story, but even then my understanding is that places like food banks will do their best to accommodate you still. It is very easy to let our brains play tricks on us which they absolutely do in order to protect us from the feeling of cognitive dissonance. If you have evidence to suggest that a vegan lifestyle is more expensive than that of a non-vegan I would be happy to look it over, but the information that I found did not support that claim.
Everyone’s experience with being vegan is different and I agree being vegan can be cheaper than eating an Omni diet, assuming you’re cooking fresh foods. those fake meats are more expensive than real meats, in my area anyways. I’ve been vegan for over five years now and I don’t spend a ton on food relative to friends and family.
In my example of someone working multiple jobs the classist bit is assuming they have the time to prepare vegan meals, they may well have the means to afford it but not the time to prepare it. You also have to consider access to fresh ingredients can be difficult in certain areas especially if you’re already strapped for time due to working multiple jobs.
Edit: basically my point is when we advocate for veganism we have to be careful about assumptions of the individuals means and conditions that may hamper their ability to be vegan in the way that me or you are able to be vegan. We should put a lot more emphasis on the “as far as possible and practicable” than we currently do.
Well again, the definition of veganism specifically states “as far as is possible and practicable” (typed before your edit) which is meant to cover cases in which someone is literally unable to maintain a life without animal products. In that case they should aim to reduce their consumption of animal products as much as they can even if it isn’t down to zero. That being said, I don’t think that that situation applies to essentially anyone living in a modern society. There are plenty of vegan options in grocery stores that don’t require any more time to make than you would otherwise spend driving to a fast food restaurant, waiting in line, and then driving back to your original route/home. In fact, I would argue that if I stay home and throw together a vegan meal consisting of things that are able to be quickly heated up/eaten raw that I will be able to finish preparing that meal before my friend who goes out at the same time to buy fast food. And even if you have to spend an extra 3 minutes to make vegan food that is hardly an insurmountable inconvenience. Claiming that a few extra minutes of food preparation is worth more than the lives of all of the animals that you would have to sacrifice in order to avoid that inconvenience isn’t a reasonable take in my opinion.
ETA: additionally, there are tons of meals that you can make with essentially zero prep time. For example, I eat rice based dishes all the time by just throwing some rice and veggies in a rice cooker, turning it on and walking away until it beeps. Sure it takes some time to actually cook, but the actual time that I am required to spend making it is essentially non-existent.
It is in theory possible to obtain animal products without violating their rights. Like someone else mentioned, picking up a feather from the ground is totally vegan for example.
Wool however is a bit more complicated. The reason sheep produce massive amounts of wool in the first place is because we selectively bred them to do so. Shearing a sheep can be beneficial for the sheep, but it is a problem we should not have created (or continue to create) in the first place.
I think we should stop breeding animals that have all sorts of genetic problems we created. That includes sheep that don’t shed and need shearing to not overheat in the summer, it includes chickens that lay so many eggs their bones break due to calcium deficiency, etc.
Yes of course! Vegan means not using anything derived from an animal.
Thanks!
Basically any animal-derived product, means that there is necessarily an industry around its production, which means the objectification and commodification of animal bodies.
You can find a lot of longer expose’s online of what these animal clothing industries are really like.
Thanks. I guess I have to agree that in reality it would be impossible to build an industry around animal products.
It depends on who you ask. The most committed vegans say yes, the less committed shrug their shoulders and don’t worry too much about it.
Can you guess which kind I am?
Well you’re wrong. I’m not vegan. I had to quit due to health reasons.
Anyway, it’s not like being vegan is a religion; avoid animal products as much as you want. Every little bit helps, but I wouldn’t beat yourself up over the small stuff.
Personally, I walked around in leather boots the whole time I was eating vegan, because leather is an extremely durable material with no suitable non-animal replacement. I still have those boots. I would have gone through multiple pairs of shoes were it not for those boots. I am very thankful to the cow or bull that had to give up its life so I could have those boots.
Judging by the rest of the comments, yeah, not gonna be a popular answer.
“Exploitation” merely means to use for your benefit. If you are using an animal product, you are exploiting the animal it came from. There is no such thing as using an animal product without exploitation, by definition.
Even when cruelty and violence is not directly involved, because perhaps you simply found some bones or something, it’s still exploitation. There are lots of reasons to avoid exploitation that don’t require direct cruelty or violence, such as avoiding dependence and the biasing psychological effect that getting a benefit from an animal product has on our reasoning abilities as stupid apes.
My two cents: “being” vegan is overrated and subtly shifts the goalposts from reflecting and acting upon serious ethical questions to policing each others’ adherence to an imaginary pure ideal. I say this as a vegan btw.
So for example, I reject the idea of veganism as “avoiding animal-derived products as far as practicable” (paraphrasing the exact definition). I.e. if I’m stuck on an island with zero plant foraging skills, and I then catch some fish out of our necessity, I’m not vegan. It’s just that simple.
But I’m not going to feel bad about that fact and guilt-trip myself into inertia. Maybe the fish help me survive long enough to learn to identify edible plants, learn to climb trees to get coconuts etc. Over time, I’m able to completely eliminate my fish intake and rely on plants. So the initial fish helped keep me alive long enough…to protect scores of their fellow fish!
If I’d obsessed over being vegan everywhere and at all times, I’d ignore the ethical possibilities right before my own eyes, and possibly even conclude that the most ethical thing was to starve to death – all in the name of being recognized as “vegan”.
If you solely focus on individual acts of killing, you tend to forget that death is a part of life. It’s impossible not to kill, to be honest – just as it’s impossible not to be killed. We often forget that latter part. It goes both ways.
One notorious example I’ve encountered is when people go vegan for the “wrong reasons”. Say someone learns about the extremely morbid effects of meat & dairy, and then chooses to go vegan. I’ve heard people say that these people have no right to be “vegan” and should call themselves “plant-based”. In either case, the ethical effects on animals are basically the same, except that maybe the “plant-based” folk have a couple of animal-based non-food products around the house.
I’ll skip a few steps here to share my own broader position, which is that it’s consequently possible to have relations with animals that are reciprocal and not merely exploitative. People have practiced such relations all around the world for millennia.