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Sections
- Intro
- Definition of Freeganism & History
- Pro-Freegan consequentialists; Unnatural Vegan, ModVegan & Tobias
- Anti-Freegan consequentialists; LayVegan and Footsoldier
- Contrast with Greece’s potato movement
- Consequentialist wrap up
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- Liam Anthony on asking servers to change gloves before they start making his vegan food.
- Contrast with Feedback and Society of St. Andrews
- Virtue ethics wrap up
- Gary Francione on not eating food cooked on the same grill.
- Contrast with APV who also sees merit in treating some duties to equality as a rule
- Deontology wrap up
- Eisel Mazard on meat eating being cannibalism
- Contrast with my interest in the Situationists concept of psycho-geographies,
- Subjectivist wrap up
- Video Summary
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Intro
[Starting out the video introducing the context, Edwins Generation and questioning whether had done something wrong within veganism by still enjoying taste of meat and preventing it going to waste.]
Throughout the video we’re going to look at the arguments against freeganism about how it might be internally inconsistent, whether that’s because it’s actors don’t consistently act in a way to challenge supply and demand, as they say they wish to. Or because they don’t sufficiently feel the requisite shame attached to the act which cost so many lives in our previous lives as meat eaters.
At the same time I intend to give counter examples of freeganism in action correlating with the same philosophical tendencies, as in a lot of the cases the critique simply has a short sighted idea of what being freegan means, and I don’t want it to appear that the critique is representative of their entire school of philosophy.
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Definition of Freeganism & History
For starters let’s quickly give the popular definition of freegan:
[Voice over screen capture video]
a person who rejects consumerism and seeks to help the environment by reducing waste, especially by retrieving and using discarded food and other goods.
Ok so main point as shown in the picture here:
Origin: early 21st century: blend of free and vegan.
That’s also interesting, 21st century, I know the biggest group advocating against food waste, Food not Bombs have been around a lot longer than that.
Let’s look up one more definition:
[Wikipedia] Freeganism is a practice and ideology of limited participation in the conventional economy and minimal consumption of resources, particularly through recovering wasted goods like food. The word “freegan” is a portmanteau of “free” and “vegan”.
So some anti-capitalist sentiments flowing through much of the movement’s origin that makes people wary of identifying with the term, what I’m promoting here could be called freegan-lite, but I think the mainstream image has taken on a different much broader use since then and will continue to change over time.
Let’s just quickly look at the history. Yes so; “The word ‘freegan’ itself was allegedly invented in 1994 by Keith McHenry, the co-founder of Food Not Bombs.” And popularised in the 2000s.
Food not bombs grew out of the 60s, ban the bomb demonstrations against the building of more nuclear weapons and ratcheting up of tensions between the two superpowers US and Russia fighting a proxy war with each other in places such as Vietnam and Afghanistan.
So now we’re all on the same page, let’s look at present day advocates for veganism, who are for and against freeganism…
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Pro-Freegan consequentialists; Unnatural Vegan & ModVegan
Unnatural Vegan put out a great video discussing the coherency of labels, questioning in reality where is the harm?
ModVegan also in the same vein discussed vegan gatekeeper syndrome and the future of the vegan movement.
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Anti-Freegan consequentialists; LayVegan and Footsoldier
Okay back to the first vegan’s critique:
LayVegan put out a great breakdown of Edwins Generation video, acknowledging the good freegans do for advocating against the wasteful system of meat production, distribution and consumption. I do want to push back on one thing he said in the video which is:
“You’re right, and do you know what would save even more money and methane emissions from being released into the atmosphere, not visiting restaurants, you know like actual freegans.”
As I said before I think this stereotype is the reason Edwin and others are scared away from identifying his actions as freegan, but is this really a good thing? I recommend reading our article on all the actions that being freegan can encompass, but are not mandatory:
http://philosophicalvegan.com/wiki/index.php/Freeganism
“The interest in stripping back and living as minimally as possible can be seen to be more synonymous with Zero Waste. However, Freeganism also concerns itself with how society’s most abundant, most energy intensive products are poorly managed. In this way, Freeganism and Zero Waste have a similar consumer activist mindset that can mean taking steps to lead the way in changing consumer practices.”
Main point being, very few in the Zero Waste lifestyle actually consider that they’ve cut out all harmful waste from their life, but it’s something they’re working towards, we shouldn’t scoff at someone who cares about food waste but also felt it was important to go to a restaurant with their family or friends.
Quick note, LayVegan also liked this comment, which proposes we don’t pick up the bad habit of eating other’s leftovers and that the solution will come in the form of energy captured from landfills. I find these arguments to be unconvincing; I think they make vegans look like we’re grasping at straws to defend an irrational puritanical form of veganism.
Whilst becoming more and more efficient at recycling resources is definitely a priority as a society, I don’t however think a good fix would be that we carry on wasting at the rate we are, but that it gets burnt off in some slightly more environmentally friendly way than being buried. Although calorie counting is a problem for some, which might lead some to want to avoid the habit, it doesn’t detract from it being a good carbon negative act for most.
FootSoldier also put out a video where in response to UV asking people not to fear monger against freeganism because it’s a lifestyle that doesn’t contribute to animal exploitation and saves food waste he says this:
If anyone who doesn’t know about freeganism, it’s essentially dumpster diving for food because either you’re too poor or too stingy to actually buy food and so you just get it out of bins.
Really great work staying objective, you’ve just taken a stereotype of the most prolific image or action people relate to freegans of dumpster diving and declared that “the definition.” He goes on:
The thing is I’ve got a bit of a problem with this, so situation one there’s lots of food being chucked away, and it’s just really wasteful when it could go to feeding people who need the food, well then the system should be addressed better like in Berlin we’ve got something called food sharing and you get a little membership card and you can go around shops and take all the food that they’re going to chuck out, you can just take it, it is really well adopted and really well done in Berlin and so places like in America and in Canada or wherever that they should probably adopt similar schemes, that’s a much better solution that people dumpster diving.
But if you do have enough money to shop, but you’re a freegan because you sort of have some sort of objection to the food system, then you’re an idiot because I can buy a really good organic food around the corner that has been produced like really well at the highest possible quality standards, why wouldn’t I give my money to the farmers who’ve worked hard to grow this food and to the people who have worked hard to distribute this food for me, I’m perfectly happy paying for that.
So footsoldier previously a member of the Durianrider raw fruit cult, can’t wrap his head around freegans who have money but chose not to consume the highest quality fresh produce and instead pick up food going to be wasted from shop owners or bins out the back of supermarkets, okay, that’s a personal value judgement, but again why misrepresent freeganism?
Freegans want the kind of food sharing solutions you gave as an example like in Berlin, but as a stop-gap to that perfectly legislated system, some are willing to drive to mega-supermarkets fill the van up to the brim with perfectly edible packaged food inside double-wrapped bin bags put out that night, bring it home and cook it up often for the public and homeless by street tabling like Food not Bombs do.
Or look at the potato movement in Greece whose national produce was going to be wasted because the austerity measures had driven consumer prices through the roof; groups organized days for the public to be able to buy in bulk from the farmers directly in town centres from the trucks, streamlining the utility of local resources.
If you are convinced about the hard effect we can have via supply and demand then freegans offset climate change for being carbon negative and reduce animal cruelty by feeding waste meat to their cats or making meals for carnists that would otherwise eat more bought animal products.
Okay I think that about wraps up the supply and demand consequentialist concerned section of this video. The consequentialist system being rooted in a hard calculus of weighing observable harm vs. good usually has a broad degree of consensus. So, any disagreement is usually rooted in misunderstandings and incorrect information. I think we’ve demonstrated that this is very likely the case here.
There’s an acknowledgment from those putting down freeganism that food sharing systems are morally positive and reduce harm. However, they question the need for vegans to participate in that for fear of sullying the image with newbies who haven’t acquired the right yuck factor yet. Ultimately though, we have no evidence of harm and plenty of good examples of harm reduction.
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Anti-Freegan Virtue ethicists
So next up we’ve got Liam Anthony on asking servers to change gloves before they start making his vegan food.
I try to support vegan cafes and restaurants whenever I can, but if I ever eat at a place that cooks meat and get served something with animal in it, I might not be able to eat it and send it back, but I’m not so naive that I think yelling and having a fit is going to endear them to adding more vegan dishes to the menu.
Unnatural Vegan wrote: Definitely, it’s good to let the waiter know it’s not what you ordered, even if you do end up eating it. Most won’t save it for another patron, unfortunately. The hospital I stayed in for L&D did, though. They kept bringing up trays of food, and we kept turning them away. Every patient got the same thing so they would just take it to the next room.
Contrast with Feedback and Society of St. Andrews who help farmers glean vegetables that were not cost effective to pick because of cosmetic issues that year and give to charity, raising awareness at the same time.
Gary Francione on not eating food cooked on the same grill.
Contrast with APV who also sees merit in treating some duties to equality as a rule, her clip of the black panthers free breakfasts program, and clip of food not bombs today.
Eisel Mazard on meat eating being cannibalism, his wildlife management paradigm of a sign saying don’t feed the bears, us on one side, them on the other to do their own thing. Quote of Cora Diamond essay showing how flip of status quo intuitions.
[Explaining why I group myself with the existentialists it’s somewhat dense, and hard to articulate in soundbite form.]
I accept consequentialist concerns such as quantifying material conditions at the base of society. These would include, each persons labor and educating and providing the capabilities to arrive at good consequences such as people being able to follow their own craft. But I feel like the culture that is created out of different egoist ethics is so broad that if you tried to drill down at the level of description you’d find a radical emptiness that allows us to define the limits of our own societies. I don’t know if that’s true existential nihilism.
There’s also my interest in the Situationists concept of psycho-geographies, being able to cycle tour living frugally on land protests, doing a modicum of environmental consciousness raising through campaigns. The exploration of towns in the time between trains, the randomness of what you’ll find, like a pram for a mother that will be able to let her kid sleep while they go out looking for a chance to stow away in a lorry, or lemons that you didn’t know would help them prepare the citrus infused food that reminded them of home.
This never felt like a moral wrong. I experienced it as helping them get enough calories, find some comfort in being able to repeat habits from home, and preventing food waste.
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Fini
So the tally of channels for and against is:
For
- Vegan Gains
- Unnatural Vegan
- ModVegan
- Tim Jong Un
- Philosophical Vegan
- Activist Journeys
Not vegan, but ok:
- LayVegan
Against:
- Liam Anthony
- Gary Francione
- a-bas-le-ciel
- Chris Hines
- Banana Warrior Princess
- FootSoldier
- Jack Green
Not sure:
- Reg Flowers
- A privileged vegan – 99% sure yes, but should ask as thrown into doubt by Reg’s misunderstandings about food not bombs history
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Misc
Rest of the page is just resources i could work into the video:
Liam Anthony
Liam directed me to some comments of his on the Footsoldier video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9tZGBa0x4I&t=1089s
Liam Anthony
For the people who don’t realize there are two parts to the vegan society’s definition.
Veganism is a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as is possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose.
There are many ways to embrace vegan living. Yet one thing all vegans have in common is a plant-based diet avoiding all animal foods such as meat (including fish, shellfish and insects), dairy, eggs and honey – as well as products like leather and any tested on animals.
Footsoldier
yeah sure, that is the logical dietary conclusion of the primary statement written out, however UV and freegans think they can add an asterisk because the victim was already murdered.
TheNewHope
yet i have to disagree a bit “avoiding all animal foods” is still overruled by “as far as is possible and practicable” if one eats roadkill (which i don’t consider a food) in a survival situation where you had no other choice then you would still be vegan.
This situation will probably never happen to us but in theory i would consider someone vegan to eat a dead animal that died by accident if it was life or death situation for him.
Liam Anthony
Objectively speaking. By any definition. Vegan Society, dictionary, or colloquial. A vegan is someone who does not knowingly consume animal products. This is objective.
People throw around the vegan society definition of veganism but forget the second half. Seriously, check out their website.
It is NOT IMMORAL to eat road kill etc… But it isnt vegan. Vegans do not view animals as products for consumption dead or alive. This is a VALUE that is unique to the vegan in-group. And the practice of abstaining from animal products in any context is the identifier someone is vegan. its a baseline.
Vegan values are in line with a reduce harm approach, which is a “more moral” life style but adds the additional axiom of not knowingly consuming animal products.
So, yes. someone could have a highly specialized diet that includes road kill and trash, and the potential amount of “harm points” associated with their diet could be less than a typical vegan diet.
but based on every definition of veganism. Vegan Society, Dictionary, and colloquial. Vegans abstain from consuming animal products IN ADDITION to living a lifestyle that reduces harm.
Liam Anthony
also, in an extreme survival situation. ethics, principles, morality, values, etc…. isn’t typically someone’s main concern. And I am assuming that if they made it through that EXTREME situation they would go back to being a vegan. and I wouldn’t hold it against them.
Footsoldier
I’d also add that the desert island scenaro may be consistent in a human context: if you are stranded on an island with no other food and there is an old man with you who is almost dead anyway, you have two choices:
– kill him and eat him and fuck morals
– don’t eat him and all die and keep your morals
this applies in a human or animal context because it is survival. Meat eaters cannot argue from this perspective though because the are generally not in a survival context.
Liam Anthony
I really like how you used counter culture to describe veganism. First time I’ve heard it explained like that.
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Reg Flowers
Me: I’m making my first video and the topic is freeganism so asking youtubers whether [or not (they read it wrong to fatal miscommunication results] they would eat waste animal products would they consider it moral?
Reg: Yeah I’m like I don’t feel like I want to, if you’re asking because you want to know what I think me personally I feel like anytime I present flesh from an animal or a product that came from an animal as food I’m buying into and promoting maintaining an attitude that animals are objects right so yeah I just I don’t want to it’s to me I don’t see that as that’s not it’s not a question of like whether it’s it’s moral to eat it or not moral to eat it it’s to me it is not food it’s not food so why would I wouldn’t eat it any more than if you know a person fell dead in front of me I didn’t kill them it would be edible if I cooked it what I do it what I do it I wouldn’t do it because I not see a human being s food so however if someone brought me a glass of breast milk that I might you know I might consume that because I at least that’s food right that’s fruit it’s a foodstuff it’s intended to be consumed right so I don’t know I don’t know about the whole freaking thing
Me: whether or not they eat animals themselves, like Food Not Bombs tabeling rescued food
Reg: now I’m a big fan of Food Not Bombs and I don’t know cos are you part of Food Not Bombs Food Not Bombs at least in Detroit and the group that I’m familiar with they I think because they want to provide food that most people that that isn’t alienating they lean towards products that are vegan and in my experience at least the group of Food Not Bombs that I was working with I have worked with and the Food Not Bombs that provided food to the to last year’s pedagogy and theater of the oppressed conference all of that food was vegan but they they will often include things like bread even if that bread has like trace milk products in it so that’s not you know I’ve I’ve not known of a Food Not Bombs meal that contained animal flesh however and like I said the experience I have with Food Not Bombs the event that they were catering for us was the event that they were catering for us was was vegan so listen you know I’m looking down at my phone and I’m seeing that it’s ringing and I think I want to grab this call I’m not gonna actually grab it but I’m gonna call this person right back at someone calling me from Detroit probably looking for me to return so all of that said it’s been great hanging out with all of you today it’s been an interesting it’s been an interesting live stream I bet this is gonna get I feel like this was gonna this one’s gonna get a lot of views
Me: Yes vegan or vegetarian in the mandate website the founder of it came up with the term freegan
Reg: yeah I mean I think I think it’s definitely worth having a conversation about
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ModVegan
Freeganism with ModVegan
https://youtu.be/rrQSOCMyK9o?t=40m35s
What’s your thoughts on eating plant-based foods that are fried or cooked with animal products for removing say cheese from a pasta salad and then eating the pasta
well I know this is very controversial but for me personally I think that it just depends on you as a person I think that it’s about such that you don’t want to obviously advertise animal products I certainly um I think that it’s important to like if someone’s serving an animal product and you eat it because it’s there I think that’s a really hard argument to make that you’re doing something good for veganism by doing that I think that’s a very hard argument to make that it’s but it’s a super good thing to do that but for the example the other day my husband ordered a vegan burger and they brought it and she was annoying cuz restaurant goes all the time and we usually send it back this time you just peeled it off and ate it because you didn’t want to just throw away the burger so you know otherwise speaking so he doesn’t mind if it touches his food I couldn’t do that because I’m really lactose intolerant so I wouldn’t be able to eat it anyway we need music I think it depends on the person you know if you can just take it off do that I don’t really believe in wasting food I think if you can see from wasting food that’s a good thing and you have to kind of judge the person you’re working with to like sometimes if you’re talking to someone and you know it’s going to especially if you’re at someone’s house Bikram made something for you and it’s got cheese on it and you can easily take it off it’ll be way less offended if you just take it off and if you like tell them to pick it back you know use your common sense and your do what’s right for you for your health and and as far as the oil goes again I think that’s a personal issue I think it has more do with your your disgust response I personally am okay with it I don’t think that it’s hurting any extra animals so I have no problem with it like I ordered a burger and fries the other day a company here in town started their a burger place I think it’s called like flame burger or something and they just added a vegan burger with a vegan bun and the fries are or no it’s the burger with cooked on the same grill that’s with the other burgers but I was like you know it’s okay because I’m telling them that this is an important thing and I’m encouraging them to make more of it I think Gary Yourofsky has a similar stance on those kinds of things weed stuff when I can but I’m not gonna be too fussy on it you know like I said for cooking someone on the the same grill um I have like a couple specs or something I mean this yeah it’s not – I mean you you want to encourage them to keep doing a vegan product I mean yeah you can make the suggestion oh maybe you could do this but I mean yeah yeah I think you know you want to encourage them you know if you if you’ve got to be a good kind of example of a vegan as well if you go in there and just be nice and polite and stuff and you know you kind of respect the fact that they’re trying I think that’s a really good thing to do yeah I think you know we need to help them help us kind of you know yeah I think is the main thing
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Ethologic (Tim)
Love this answer by Ethologic on Freeganism
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6eMF8LNpSMw
Longer transcript below
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jxiQXaNjns
Chris Hines:
Ethical vegans, if you were an ethical vegan that was suddenly like a bad thing, it was like damn these ethical vegans.
Liam Anthony:
So Tim knows this, I have been going nuts about this topic for the past week, you know like full-on rampage.
So there’s a there’s a few things, so the comment on the Vegan Cheetah, so I think the Vegan Cheetah when he first introduced this idea of the Vegan Umbrella, I think he just did a really piss-poor job explaining what he actually meant by that. I think all he was trying to say is hey if somebody’s trying to be vegan what we should do is encourage them to the best of our ability to get to full-on veganism.
Because this was during this whole time with Jeff Nelson and Veg Source and Nina and Randa and all this type of stuff where, and Tim I sent you that documentary with Donald Watson and all that stuff, veg stores which is great documentary, where you know people were complaining that vegans were telling people they’re not vegan and bla bla bla you should be ashamed of yourself and it’s crazy shit and I think that’s really what it was about.
But vegan cheetah is like fucking what like it just got all fucked up you know what I’m saying? Yeah because the way I look at it you have veganism and it’s a polarity right so you’re trying to bring like a magnet to you know full-on veganism. And I think what he was trying to say is that there are gonna be people who get pulled but they’re only gonna make it here, you know what I’m saying because of their attraction to it, yea the Overton Window exactly.
But I think it’s important for the magnet not to lose its power and have those principles and its one action, you know what I’m saying? Because you’re pulling you people through that spectrum right?
And but so that’s the first thing, the second thing is I only ever see these controversial figures like and we’re not trying to cause drama here, this is just we’re analyzing what’s going on in our community, so we’re not trying to speak poorly about Vegan Cheetah, etc.
Tim:
Well we have to be self-reflective to improve yeah.
Liam Anthony:
Sure, but these people like Vegan Cheetah, Unatural vegan, your favorite friend Philo, all these people. You know they’re the only ones complaining about us ethical vegans, like trying to be super militant and all this type of stuff and it’s just like wait wait wait wait wait what’s going on? Cause like I don’t see this, I don’t see this is happening at all.
The only reason why I’ve been up in arms recently is because that guy made a video where he purposely just ate one of his friends leftover chicken wings and was like oh no I’m still vegan, it’s like no you’re not dude.
I think what happens is these people are just like projecting, you know what I’m saying, yeah that’s like these channels these people on what wherever you know it’s like they’re the ones tell, they’re the only ones I’m seeing telling people telling other vegans how they should be behaving,
Tim:
They’re trying to they’re trying to feel better about their actions and so yeah the best way to do that is to create a community that that condones your actions, yeah right well if you can get a bunch of people saying oh yeah we’re vegans who also be checking sure that’s cool yeah like ii have that now you feel comfortable because you’re insulated in your little sub community yeah and you know it is pretty absurd
But when i hear that kind of argument see i started thinking about like like i showed you that that jeremy site for video is let you gotta watch documentaries yeah I mean this guy go around him and his friends they’ll spend the whole night they figure out the case out different places like behind the Trader Joe’s that has the dumpster outside so they can access it because a lot of these grocery stores now you learn a lot about how that the food wait like this if anyone hasn’t seen it the documentary I’m Frankie was called dive it’s not a vegan documentary it’s just a food way to documentaries and it’s about a free uh guy by the name of Jeremy ciphered who goes around casing out different grocery stores that he knows are gonna have like good holes throw out food and they just go through those dumpsters and he gets all the food to feed his family this way but not just that he gets enough food to like feed several homeless shelters yeah all from just dumpster dive yeah all from dumpster diving and to me someone doing that has the highest ethics and so I want them in our pan
Liam Anthony:
Like or me, it’s like, so what I say to that, for me, it’s like what I say to that is; yeah dude they are in our camp, it’s more so that they’re in a different country though, right? We may have different things, but we have a very similar goal and although like there’s no reasons why we can’t you know
Tim:
It’s like a UN of ethics
Liam Anthony:
Exactly it’s part of that Overton Window you know so but in groups
Tim:
I mean because I think that’s even more ethical depending on what your values are but I think there’s definitely an argument but that’s more ethical ultimately
Liam Anthony:
Maybe
Tim:
But Liam makes a really compelling argument and if that I don’t know what you’re driving at Chris is that um you wouldn’t be fine with people eating corpses human quarters Remmy they’re dead so if you’re dead you don’t possess a body right you don’t have body because you’re so the body becomes a sub without without the life without life a subject becomes an object would you guys agree with that a core to me yeah it’s not a person but it still has meaning somebody else well I mean but if they’re dead just becomes animal matter at that point that’s just the way I see if they’re dead the person’s gone the person for the person to be a present consciousness and life needs to exist so without those two things there’s no person left and it becomes it goes from being a subject subject to an object but even still even if even if we agree that’s truth we would never agree that it’s okay to eat corpses because it would normalize cannibal do cannibalism forget the health argument with normalize cannibalism so Liam’s argument essentially become we shouldn’t be normalised in eating roadkill or eating any animals no matter how we get it because you’re normalizing it you’re making you’re saying it’s okay to do this in our culture and you should never make a statement that it’s okay to eat dead bodies so and I agree with him even though I do support people doing the freeganism thing because I’d rather not see all those animals just go into a dumpster when there’s humans who are starving to death like it’s it’s not a tenable choice it’s certainly not the best situation to be in but you know if you watch this documentary I think you’ll be more sympathetic to it because you see the fucking amount of food this guy pulls out of dumpsters and it’s all good food you’re like holy shit all of this is just getting thrown into landfills well there’s people starving to death so a better solution would be to go dumpster diving get all the meat get all the vegan stuff you keep the vegan stock send the meat to zoos.
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Interesting exchange that they referred to on twitter:
https://twitter.com/Liamdoesit/status/939659694943166465
(bit difficult to follow as they don’t stick to one thread, and limited by characters)
Liam Anthony @Liamdoesit
are you vegan if you knowingly consume animal products. I.e. Eating your friends leftover chicken wings?
Ethologic
Replying to @Liamdoesit
- I don’t like the dichotomous options. Was your friend going to throw those out? Is it merely the consumption of the product that is the problem? What if you gave the chicken wings to your dog instead of you directly consuming them?
Liam Anthony
Another example of why vegans shouldnt own pets.
Ethologic
Again, I disagree. Do you think a shelter dog is better of dead? What if the shelter dog is instead adopted by a meat eater? Will the dog eat more or less other animals in that scenario? You’re missing a lot of nuance.
Liam Anthony
Exploit is to use as a resource and gain benefit from. Vegans don’t look at animals as a resource. Dead or alive.
Liam Anthony
You can say eating road kill is ethical. But you can’t say it’s vegan.
Ethologic
Dead things aren’t subjects though. You can’t exploit a subject that is dead, by then it is merely and object.
Liam Anthony
…… Bro. You can exploit a resource. You can exploit new technology. You can exploit the fast check out times at DMV A as opposed to DMV B.To exploit is to take advantage for your benefit. has nothing to do with conciousness of what ur exploiting.
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Liam Anthony
Vegans don’t view animals as products. Their corpses, included.
Ethologic
And eating roadkill doesn’t make it a product. I’m not talking about a market around eating corpses.
Liam Anthony
I didn’t say it was a commodity to be traded and sold. Although paleo is getting popular. I said you are using it as a resource to derive benefit from.
Ethologic
I think you’re drawing unnecessary absolutes. If we followed your strict definition of veganism, no one could be vegan.
Liam Anthony
My strict definition of veganism? Don’t knowingly consume animal products. Boom. You’re vegan. I don’t think that’s so strict.
Ethologic
And, again, it is about exploiting animals, not consuming them. If you exploit animals in any way, per your definition, you’re not vegan. Therefore, if you eat any plant that requires insect pollination, you are not vegan.
Liam Anthony
Eating road kill is a direct action that can be avoided.
Ethologic
You don’t need to eat, apples, guave, cauliflower, cashews, almonds, pistachios, pomegranates, peaches, nectarines, avocados, onions, oranges, green beans, sunflower oil….. shall I keep going?
Liam Anthony
Vegans don’t eat animal products
Ethologic
All of those are plants that require bee pollination. How is exploiting the labor of insects vegan, but eating the already naturally dead corpse not?
Liam Anthony
By any definition vegans don’t consume animal products. If you want to consume animal products. You ain’t in the club.
Ethologic
I don’t care about the club. I care about ethics. And again, if you eat almonds, or any of the other plants I mentioned, you’re not vegan by your own standard. Unless the exploitation part doesn’t matter.
Liam Anthony
This is why I don’t like the vegan society’s definition of veganism. I take a more Jeff Nelson approach. Anyone who doesn’t knowingly consume animal products is vegan.
Ethologic
I hate their definition. For all the reasons you just laid out. In any case, you do know now. So are you going to stop eating those things or are you comfortable with supporting some animal exploitation?
Liam Anthony
Insects who pollinate plants are engaged in a win/win relationship with us. They do their insect thing. I get avocados. There’s nothing win/win with your friends left over chicken wings.
Ethologic
Okay, but someone could claim that about all animal agriculture. Who are you to decide what is a win-win? And it is a win-win for me to eat my friends leftover chicken wings if they were going to be thrown away anyhow, which was my initial contention with your question.
Liam Anthony
Wasn’t win-win for the chicken. Eating that chicken communicates to your friend that the behavior of ordering chicken and consuming is ok. Don’t underestimate the power of group membership.
Ethologic
And in your scenario, the chicken has already become an object, and I would not be creating an incentive to produce more. And I can say eating meat is okay while also maintaining that intentionally killing animals for food is wrong.
Liam Anthony
And I would argue that is a shit way to convince people to quit looking at animals as a products.
Ethologic
Again, I could say the same about almonds. I think reducing your contribution to the industry that directly exploits animals is what matters. In fact, you may be able to convince more people because it may actually appear to be less extreme than strict veganism.
Liam Anthony
Also, to get very pedantic. If your goal is to live as morally as possible. And morality is about not causing harm. Consuming Animal products causes harm to the individual. Which is easily avoided by not consuming said animal.
Ethologic @TimJIvey
Replying to @Liamdoesit
If a guy jumps on a grenade to save his comrades, has he done something immoral?
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Liam Anthony
Replying to @TimJIvey
Vegans don’t view animals as products. Their corpses, included.
Ethologic
That’s an assertion. Is eating roadkill better or worse than killing an insect? What about a plant? It seems you’re implicitly arguing it’s worse to consume something that is dead than it is to consume something that is alive.
Liam Anthony
That’s literally the definition of exploitation.
Ethologic
It is wrong to exploit a brick to build a house?
Liam Anthony
It’s still exploitation. And vegans don’t view animals as a resource to gain benefit alive or dead.
Ethologic
Again, you’re making assertions. You’re not the President of Veganism Liam. lol
Liam Anthony
Look at ever definition of veganism
Ethologic
“As far as practicable and possible…” You can cause LESS animal exploitation by eating roadkill than you could from eating many plant foods.
Ethologic
So if the goal is to avoid as much exploitation as possible, eating roadkill is a very viable option.
Liam Anthony
Read the rest of the page of the vegan society bro. They clear state vegans don’t consume animal products of any kind.
Ethologic
But they do! That’s my point. You are directly exploiting the labor of insects. To me, it is far worse to knowingly exploit a living animal than to exploit an already dead animal.
Liam Anthony
Clearly you are missing the point of my argument. I’m not arguing the ethics of a person who consumes road kill. There is more to life than trying to reduce harm. Vegans are a group of people who value not consuming corpses. If you consume corpse you ain’t apart of the club.
Ethologic
You’re not getting my point either. Who gives a shit about being in a club? I already said group membership is irrelevant to me if not for ethics. You’ve basically just convinced me that veganism isn’t about making the most ethical decisions. I’m no longer Vegan.
Liam Anthony
But what do I do with my membership jacket?
Ethologic
lol
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