I'm a vegan and yes I am aware that it is impossible to live a life 100% free of animal products. I do not see that as a reason to use animal products that I
don't need to use, however. The fact that some of my choices as a consumer have been robbed by modern industry does not mean I should give up on my remaining choices.
I went vegan for a myriad of reasons. The primary reason I am a vegan is this: pretty much everything we do in life rides on the back of the suffering of others. However, I see no reason to cause suffering when I don't
need to for my survival. Deliberate consumption of animal products is a choice, not a necessity, and I would not choose to do something that I know harms others.
In addition to exploiting, killing, and often abusing animals, modern industrial animal agriculture is inefficient in terms of resource use, pollutes the environment, is linked to workers' rights abuses, and frankly isn't all that good for your health unless in moderation.
I am fully aware that modern industrial plant agriculture has many of the same issues, but considering that the overwhelming majority of our major crops are used for animal feed, animal consumption is even more linked to industrial plant agriculture than a vegan diet. And thankfully, there are enough local farms in my area that I can have a good say in where my much of my produce comes from. I would not have a good say in where the corn fed to my steak came from even if the steak itself was local & well cared for.
I have been to both very good and very bad modern farms. I've had first hand experience not only observing but participating in much of what livestock is subjected to. I'm not someone naive who has read a little too much PETA propoganda; in fact, I actively dislike PETA. I don't believe that farmers are evil animal murderers; in fact, I feel really, really bad for modern farmers (plant and animal), because they're being forced to adopt industrial agriculture or be driven out of business. And I have no unrealistic ideas of living a "cruelty free life" because it doesn't exist. I simply do what helps me sleep better at night by trying not to contribute to anything I find morally abhorrent if I don't NEED to.
Because farm sanctuary came up, can I clear a misconception stated in this thread? Farm sanctuary does not want to "return all animals to the wild." In fact, short of PETA & the ALF, I don't think I know any animal rights or animal welfare organization that thinks we should go let loose domesticated animals. Heck many of Farm Sanctuary's rescues were stray livestock. Farm Sanctuary's founder, whom I know personally, is a philisophical vegan. This means he opposes the
exploitation of animals, and breeding animals so that we can keep them as food, pets, etc. is a form of exploitation. Most philisophical vegans believe that we should stop breeding animals in captivity for human usage and allow domesticated strains to naturally lapse into extinction via the end of production, NOT that we should release the ones already here. I see animal welfarists being accused of not doing their research and I'd like to ask the same; please research what a philisophical animal rights perspective actually is before making claims about it rather than relying on what fundamentally insane fringe organization has perverted it into.
Also:
You can't imagine the amount of starvation that would happen with deer, and other animals, rabbits, exc... if hunting did not thin out the excess.
...So? Starvation in the absence of adequate resources is how nature deals with overpopulation and always has. It may look sad, but it is a good thing from an ecology perspective. It weeds out weak individuals, provides needed winter prey for predators and scavengers, and reduces reproductive success. That means a more sustainable population of herbivores and a more balanced ecosystem.
Putting hunting season right before winter is one of the dumbest ecological moves we've ever made. Winter naturally results in starvation, weaker body condition, etc. in herbivores. This means that in the absence of sufficient resources, unfit individuals perish and the ammount of young born is limited (and their suvival is based only on what the environment can support).
By artifically lowering numbers sigificantly below winter, we interfere with natural selection; I don't think nature had the meatiest does and the healthiest bucks in mind for "who dies this winter?" This not only lets less fit individuals survive to reproduce, but a fatter winter means more fawns and more successful birthing & rearing.
Before humans, nature regulated populations just fine. And it will continue to if we stop interfering with it. I guarentee a few good winter starve-offs would do MUCH more for reducing deer populations than hunting ever has.
We'll have even BETTER luck if we stop slaughtering predators every time they try to make a rebound in population - a policy we have routinely adopted to protect hoofstock FOR the hunting industry. Predators will not "whipe out" our hoofstock; again, nature does fine regulating itself. When herbivores become too scarce, predators starve to death, their populations drop, and herbivore populations rise. Look at any chart of ecological data on predator/prey cycles. This is how it as always been, and it is the best way to maintain a healthy ecosystem.
I am yet to see an example of an ecosystem where"management" by humans did an equally good job at creating a balanced ecosystem as the systems nature put in place. Indeed historically our wildlife "management" policies have spelled little but disaster for the environment. Our policies with furbearers, predators, marine mammals, and fish have been nothing short of ecological disasters, while our policies in hoofstock "management" offer no meaningful, long-term solution to the overpopulation we caused by upsetting predator/prey relationships.Nature does a much better job than us, period, so we should probably just quit meddling with it.
