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Most noteworthy for me is the fact that more Americans think that porn (52%) and homosexuality (39%) are wrong than spanking children (23%) and being ultra wealthy (18%).
π€‘ country
https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2026/03/19/what-do-americans-consider-immoral/
Murder animals at scale in the most horrid conditions? 4%
Watching consensual videos of naked people? 54%
Truly a moral dystopia
That is a separate issue from just eating meat in general. We are completely capable of having ethical production of meat and other animal products.
The problem isn't the consumption of meat but the needless waste encouraged by the capitalist system that necessitates the unethical overproduction of it.
I used to agree with you, but then I went to r/vegancirclejerk and heard the classic joke "We just barbecued up the family dog for Christmas dinner. He was well loved, he had a happy and healthy life. So it's ethical to eat him."
Now I think the only ethical way to enjoy meat is with consent. Like in The Restaurant At The End Of The Universe.
The restaurant at the end of the universe has genetically engineered animals that want to be eaten. I donβt know if that is consent but itβs definitely unethical. Imagine genetically engineering woman to want to sleep with you. Creepy af.
The Dish of the Day is engineered not only to want to be eaten, but also to be intelligent enough to express informed, non-coerced consent. It can speak, it can understand the concept of mortality, it knows exactly how it will be cooked and which parts of its body will be used for which items on the menu. It has a complete understanding of the situation and is very happy to be eaten. If you don't want to eat it, it will be disappointed. Nothing bad will happen to it if it does not agree to be eaten, it wants to be eaten of its own free will.
It's an ideal ethical situation. The Dish of the Day hasn't been coerced, abused, tricked, or taken advantage of. The only room for ethical objection is in the breeding process, but I'm inclined to trust that the breeding was more or less ethical, given the great ethics of the parts we actually see. That's inductive reasoning, but it's the best reasoning we have on that process.
Okay? And? I had rabbits and pigs as pets. We ate them when their time came. What's different about it being a dog? Dogs are no more special than any other animal just because we have an arbitrary emotional attachment to them.
As long as the animal was given a good life and, when time came for slaughter, they were killed in an ethical manner then there is no moral or ethical issue.
Humans are omnivores. We eat other animals. It is no more unethical than if any animal eats another animal.
You're right, dogs are no more special than other animals. Hearing that simile made My heart realise it's wrong. For My head to realise it's wrong, I had to accept that killing is usually very painful, and most humans, if given the power to kill for profit, will optimise the ethics out of the process.
I make exception for traditional Indigenous Australian hunting practices. Indigenous Australians have a social system to ensure the killing of animals is done ethically and humanely. You see, if you want to hunt an animal, you need to get permission from the person whose totem is that animal. That person considers that animal their siblings, their family. Their duty is to hold sacred knowledge about that animal and to monitor the populations. And they can't eat their totem, because that's cannibalism. That person has the authority to say when you can hunt their totem, and how many you can kill. They can't profit from the killing because they can't eat their totem. So the system has checks and balances to prevent corruption. I'm okay with meat eating within that system because it controls against the consequences.
But the white capitalist system has no controls, it just causes suffering. So I'm not okay with traditional European methods of husbandry and slaughter. I might reconsider after capitalism is overthrown.
So you agree then with my original point that the ethical question lies with the production of animal products and not with the consumption of animal products? Glad that's settled then.
Yeah, I judge people for eating meat because it's symbolic of support for factory farming. It's the same as how I judge people for reading Mein Kampf (outside of an academic context), even if they pirated it.
That is an incredibly shortsighted view to blame the consumer instead of the producer. It's incredibly lacking in class consciousness. It is in no way "symbolic support" of factory farming. People need to eat and are constrained by the society they live in. Do not blame the victims of society for needing to participate within it in order to survive. Focus your blame onto those actually doing the harm.
Reading Mein Kampf doesn't mean you support what is said by it. It is actually beneficial to have read it so you can better understand the argument of your opposition to dismantle it when arguing against them. Again, your take on this is shortsighted and arbitrarily judgmental.
Edit: people downvoting have no understanding of the concept "no ethical consumption under capitalism".
"No ethical consumption under capitalism" is not an excuse to engage in avoidable, harmful consumption.
Wasn't that pretty much the exact logic used by a bunch of slaveowners? "I oppose the institution of slavery, but it's a systemic problem. Sure, I could free my own slaves, but that wouldn't really fix anything." Surely there's a line to be drawn somewhere.
Also, "blaming the consumer rather than the producer" seems like a very backwards way of applying class consciousness. The consumer generates the demand. If a farmer, the worker who produces the meat, quits his job, the demand will still exist and will likely be filled by someone else. But if the consumer quits demanding it, then it'll cause production to be reduced.
Of course, there are larger systemic solutions that we ought to look at, but that's not either or, any more than it would be either or to criticize a slaveowner for not freeing their slaves while at the same time calling for systemic change.
That's a disingenuous comparison that doesn't take into account class based analysis of the two situations. Consumers, who are of the working class, do not have direct control in how their meat was produced. They can only indirectly make choices based on what is available and accessible to their circumstances. They don't own the farm and ethically sourced meat is usually prohibitively expensive to many consumers. The slave owner is an OWNER, with direct control over the labor practices, who directly makes the choice to employ slavery or not. The slave owner is the one who controls the production so the responsibility lies with them.
Don't buy into the myth of supply-demand. If you quit buying the meat, the capitalists will still sell to those who support the harmful treatment and just have the difference subsidized like they currently do. Supply-demand logic puts the responsibility on the consumer; it is propaganda by capitalist owners to shirk off their responsibilities for producing ethically and sustainably. Just because a demand exists doesn't necessitate that others labor to fill that demand. Only because we exist in capitalism that incentivizes the pursuit of profit above all else does it justify that kind of logic because a demand unfulfilled is one that hasn't been exploited for profit. If workers owned the farms, and decided to only produce ethically and sustainably, then people who demand more than what is available can go shove it or start hunting for themselves.
So if I bought a shirt made from cotton picked by slaves, that would've been perfectly fine? If I buy chocolate harvested with child labor, or blood diamonds, that's all fine?
This whole production-focused morality is entirely self-serving and has nothing at all to do with class consciousness. Many people involved in the meat industry are workers just trying to make a living. You just don't want to deal with the inconvenience of these issues yourself.
Even if it's theoretically possible to create a system that doesn't depend on supply and demand, it is very much a thing in the world we actually live in.
Complete nonsense. If they could just "get more subsidies" whenever they felt like it, they'd get them now, until they couldn't get anymore. Which is... where we're at. This is magical thinking.
Even if one particular worker-owned farm decided to do that, it wouldn't change anything. The consumers looking for cheaper meat would simply go to the farms willing to use harmful treatment.
Why does that logic only work one way and not the other?
Go read the other thread where I've already typed my opinions over the topics discussed and also maybe try reading theory. You'll learn a thing or two about the reductive-ness of arguing over individual action of consumers instead of placing the blame on
If you think focusing on the owners and how they control the means of production is not based in class consciousness you're not worth talking to.
Sure they do. My meat was not produced. You have this power too.
Disbelieving that consumer demand influences production is a wild take that doesn't absolve you of responsibility for that which you consume.
Not understanding that production induces demand is something that people who have never read theory or studied economics fail to comprehend.
You didn't consume meat. That doesn't change the fact that meat was produced and has gone to waste. Happens every year. Look into food waste statistics. Yet somehow the companies that know they are just throwing products in the trash still overproduce and come out making profits off of it. You'll never change the system by focusing on inconsequential, individual action. The only way to solve the issue is to take control of the system first.
Quit it with your misplaced blame. The responsibility lies with the ones who own the means to which the product was produced. Ya know, the whole "means of production" thing? Maybe learn about it and the fundamentals of how it works instead of gobbling up capitalist propaganda that lies about how it works to shift the blame onto consumers.
This sounds incredibly naive. But ill bite, where can i read about how production is entirely unswayed by demand?
it will be interesting reading how doubling of halfing consumption will have zero effect on an industry despite countless examples of the opposite occurring in real life
Regardless, the issue of meat isnt a problem with the system, since there's no ethical consumption of meat. Unless you propose taking over the means of production to burn it down.
Kropotkin's "Conquest of Bread". Start there. And FYI, I never said it is entirely unswayed by demand, only that demand does not influence it in the way that capitalist realism propaganda of supply-demand makes it appear to.
There are ethical methods to the production and thus consumption of meat. They do exist. So piss off with this claim that there is no ethical consumption of meat. There is nothing inherently unethical about the consumption of meat. Humans are animals and part of the wider ecosystem and our consumption of meat is just as ethical as when any other animal consumes another for its sustenance. The issue is entirely with the system and how it incentivises certain methods over others due to arbitrary societal structures.
Thanks, ill have a look.
it feels like youve backpedaled. Consumers /do/ influemce production, just not as much as you think I think they do.
To match your tone, piss off with thid claim that unnecessary killing is ethical. "animals do it, and we are animals, therefore its ethical for is to do" is a lazy argument that doesnt stand up to 20 seconds of thought.
Just because you didn't understand the original argument doesn't mean the clarification of misunderstanding means I'm backpedaling.
People need to eat and animals are food. Get over yourself with your arbitrary moral judgements.
I'm vegan. I can't eliminate My unethical consumption, but I can reduce it. I can make better choices. They might not be good choices, but they're better than just participating in the system.
I'm also making an effort to use Indigenous bush medicine in consultation with the local Indigenous clans. I've consulted with the totem holder about the plant I use for My allergies. That way, I'm not engaging with capitalism at all to treat My allergies. I'm using the traditional communist economy. Medicine literally grows out of the ground for free all over the place, and all I need to use it is knowledge and respect. Knowledge and respect are free!
And how you personally choose to reduce it is your prerogative. Regardless, you cannot eliminate it entirely so you should not be arbitrarily judged for the ways you do or do not limit yourself.
As well, it is great that you have the opportunities to choose alternatives but you also need to realize not everyone has those opportunities or the disposition to utilize them so they also should not be judged for that. Knowledge is free but the education to know how to appropriately and effectively use that knowledge without inadvertently harming yourself is usually not free barring extenuating circumstances, such as yourself having a local indigenous clan willing to teach you. Medicine grows out the ground but so do poisons and many medicines are also poisonous if prepared improperly.
If people have the opportunity and ability to utilize alternative, ethical sources then, by all means, they should do so but I'm not going to sit and arbitrarily make judgement about someone outright if they don't. I don't know them, their capabilities or circumstances.
Fair point but I want to offer a correction. We don't have tribes where I live, we have clans. Tribes and clans are different. Tribes have a chief, clans are governed by consensus. That's how it was explained to me by My Indigenous teachers, the words are likely different in other countries.
Also, I consider a person's disposition within their control. If someone doesn't know the issues with meat, that's fair. But once they've had a decent conversation with a vegan like Myself, it comes down to their willingness to learn. A vegan diet is pretty cheap. Bread, potatoes, rice, noodles, pasta, all the cheapest foods are vegan. I know what poverty is, I've been homeless. I had to eat meat when I was homeless because it's what they served at the shelter. I let My ethics wane for survival. But they waxed again when I got back on My feet, and I feel entitled to judge anyone who has it better than Me, had a chance to learn the facts, and isn't vegan. Which is most people in My country. At a certain point, ignorance becomes a choice. We've all got rectangles in our pockets containing the sum of knowledge.
Apologies, my assumption is that tribes/clans is synonymous enough to be used interchangeably but with that explanation I'll change it.
True, but my opinion is that if you are not directly doing the harm, then the degree of separation from the act of harm is entirely arbitrary per individual. I'll only judge someone for the harm they directly cause. The root of the problem is still the system, not the consumers within that system who have little to no power to directly influence it. The animals have already been killed in unethical fashion. Letting their body rot on a shelf instead of it being nourishment for someone is far more disrespectful towards the animal that had to die. We all have only so much we can do before we make concessions for convenience and how each individual decides that is up to them so long as they do not directly commit harm in doing so.
Like, even if it doesn't sell, there are still enough people that do not even object to the horrible treatment of these animals that companies, through the capitalist system, will just mitigate the impact on their profits by having it subsidized. They already account for waste, so they will simply adjust to it. There are also plenty of arguments against agricultural practices to how many of these vegan alternatives are produced themselves that you're not actually mitigating harm, you're just choosing a different product that was produced through equally harmful and unethical practices.
So, no, none of us are able to judge the other because, at the end of the day, we still exist in the capitalist system unless you and the community which produces your goods is entirely self sustaining and independent of the capitalist system. So we shouldn't waste our time judging each other and instead focus on building and providing these alternatives to people within our local communities, through intensive and organized labor action, where we actually have the ability to control and affect it.
And those rectangles of knowledge have just as much misinformation as they do information and the majority of people do not have the education or cultural upbringing to influence their perspective of said (mis)information needed to be able to accurately tell the difference.
They will adjust to it by making less. Because that's how price signals work! This is extremely basic economics.
When people stopped buying pet rocks, did the company continue making them? Are there still as many pet rocks being made today as there were in 1975, and they're just piling up in a warehouse somewhere, as they get bigger and bigger subsidies from the government? You know as well as I do that's not how anything works.
And those arguments are nonsense. Producing meat means growing vastly more food to feed to animals which you then eat, so even if growing vegetables was comparable in harm to the meat industry, it would still be more ethical to be vegan because less food would have to be grown.
If you honestly believe they will just make less the. You have clearly never read an ounce of theory. Your methods have been written about in theory time and time again by many authors of leftist literature and all state that it is reductive and counterproductive. That's absolutely not how prices work. That's capitalist propaganda telling you that's how prices work so they can shirk off their responsibilities of being the ones who set the price in the first place.
Pet rocks are not a necessity like food and are not comparable in the slightest. People don't need pet rocks. People need food, and as long as people need food, capitalists will sell what is edible and control the markets to where they will always ensure they are profitable because they control the means by which these necessities are produced. They already subsidized the agriculture industry to keep their products profitable for business owners of these factory farms. It will be incredibly naive to believe that they won't just do more of the same of what they are already doing to ensure their control over the markets.
If we got rid of meat and went entirely vegan without ending capitalism, the capitalists will just overproduce your vegan products with unsustainable practices and literally nothing will be solved. We will still be destroying the environment in the endless pursuit of profits and any waste will just be balanced out. They already own the land. They will use the land if there is even the chance they can make a profit on it. Changing what they use the land for changes nothing except now people get to feel morally superior having denied the people access to animal products. So yea, we won't be directly killing them anymore but we will still be burning their house down and they will die regardless as a result.
But whatever. You want to continue justifying your arbitrary judgment of the working class and misplacing blame away from the owners of industry, go ahead. Continue beating each other up over insignificant individual action so you can feel morally superior to someone else instead of focusing on class based action to take back the means of production and providing alternatives (actual alternatives to access these things, not just substitutions for those things) to each other without judgment of how they get through this dystopian society.
I'm done with this argument.
Again, you're making this a false dichotomy. We can go vegan and fight capitalism at the same time. Avoiding unethical products and encouraging others to do the same is in no way an endorsement of capitalism.
Even if we overthrew capitalism, either we would have to keep factory farms going or we'd need a drastic reduction in meat consumption. Because they don't just do cruelty for shits and giggles, they do it because it's efficient.
You go ahead and tell yourself whatever lies you have to as you run from the truth. Fucking, Reaganite supply side "class consciousness."
You're the one making the false dichotomy between "keep factory farms" and "going vegan". There is in fact a middle ground you are ignoring.
Yes, they do it because it is efficient for making obscene profits for the owning class. Once the working class has control of production we will no longer be constrained by arbitrary concerns about efficiency for the sake of producing obscene profits. We overthrow capitalism and change our methods of production away from factory farming to more ethical and sustainable models because we will then have the control and authority to do so. Ecological science proves that this is entirely possible. We simply do not currently employ these practices because of the interests of capitalists blocking their accessibility through their control over our societal structures and the means of production.
Please, for the sake of our collective future, read theory.
That's not how any of this works. Remove money from the equation: factory farms produce more meat per labor hours. If you're not reducing meat consumption, then you're calling for a massive increase in the amount of farm labor.
How? You gonna force people to work on these farms? How are you gonna get that labor?
I think you don't understand what the word "efficiency" means.
I do. What theory is it that will provide me with a convincing argument for why it's actually perfectly fine for me to buy chocolate harvested with child labor? Be specific.
Atlas Shrugged?
Just because a demand exists doesn't mean we need to fulfill that demand
Yes, it is the most efficient per man hour it isn't the only method available that can fulfill our needs while also being ethical and sustainable. Once we, the working class, control the means of production, we can choose scientifically proven alternatives that are both sustainable and ethically while also providing more than enough to meet our needs because we now have the authority and control over our means
How will I get people to work on farms? I don't need to convince them. Those who want to work on farms will labor to do so because they know we need food and, if we want a functional society at all, other people also need food so they will labor as needed to produce that food along with others in their community who willingly choose to labor so in ways that meet their needs while also being ethical and sustainable in their methods because they have the authority and control over the means of production to be able to do so with nothing incentivizing them to needlessly over produce. Remove money from the equation and we are no longer burdened by the interests of profit that necessitates the need for unsustainable production.
That's basic anarchist theory. Read Kropotkin.
And to your strawman argument:
Do people want chocolate? Yes. Has chocolate been produced and resources consumed for its production? Yes. Does the person in question have access to ethically produced chocolate? We don't know their individual circumstances so the benefit of the doubt will say no for sake of argument. Does not buying the chocolate change the fact that a child labored for its production? No, it just means they don't get chocolate while the chocolate and resources/labor goes to waste and the shrink is written off through taxes and insurance. The capitalist still wins and you've done nothing to change things. Congratulations.
If your argument ever is necessitated with "if only everyone suddenly just stopped doing X" your argument is shortsighted and lacking in effective praxis and just an attempt to gain an arbitrary feeling of moral superiority to boost your own ego in the fact that others aren't choosing to behave exactly the way you do. It's reductive and counterproductive trying to shame people over insignificant, miniscule personal choices in how they find what little enjoyment they can in this dystopian, capitalist society they have no individual power to change.
No. I don't have to be specific for the argument that I am making. Your lame attempt to appeal to specificities is just you trying to avoid engaging with the point by attempting to dictate the scope of my argument so you can pick apart the vagaries of how specific my hypothetical would be to make my argument fit your narrow, arbitrarily defined requirements. So quit making up strawmen and try having a class based analysis over the systems that dictate the circumstances in which situations take place in. If you'd actually read theory, you know how to.
I'm done talking with someone who clearly doesn't understand shit. If you have read theory you didn't understand it.
Jesus Christ. Actually justifying buying products with child labor. No wonder anarchism is so popular with Western "leftists."
So then, much less meat gets produced, which means much less meat gets consumed, which means, people will have to make major changes to their dietary habits. And given the unlikeliness of convincing everyone of cutting out the vast majority of meat from their diets, those of us who actually understand that situation should probably just cut it out entirely.
Fuck off simpleton.
You don't understand jack shit and it's readily apparent.
Lol.
If only I read theory, I'd understand how much the children yearn for the mines.
What incredibly self-serving bullshit. The fact that you call yourself a leftist disgusts me. You're a consumer and nothing more. Everything else is just to justify your habits.
While you are right, it is still not possible to produce meat ethically in the quantities we need it.
We absolutely can. Ethical and sustainable practices are possible. Once workers control production, those who do the labor can choose to stop laboring if we start to become unsustainable.
People can't consume what isn't produced. People will make due with what is available thanks to our innate bias towards convenience. Those who desire it as to produce it themselves will already be doing so and they will only produce so much. Without the need for profit driving them, they will have no incentive to employ unethical nor unsustainable methods and do needless labor just to fulfill people's gluttony. In a leftist society, they will produce it as they are most comfortable in doing so (from each of their ability) and the product will be equitably distributed through different systems of collective ownership as dictated by that community (to each of their need)
If they run out of meat, too bad. Laborers will tell people to wait till we can get more in an ethical and sustainable way or get to hunting it yourself, because they collectively control the land and resources from which it is produced and won't be quick to agree to let a few individuals force them to be wasteful with those resources or labor on their behalf against their principles without good reason. The rare few who do decide to go hunt it would be statistically negligible.
If every store ran out of pork due to a mass shortage, most people wouldn't start going try to hunt boar to eat pork. They would just get something else and deal that there is a shortage.
?
What's the confusion? We can produce ethically and sustainably. This is a fact.
People cannot consume what isn't produced. This is also a separate fact.
Put them together with an understanding of logic, as explained, and you'll see that if we control the production then we control the rate of consumption.
So you are saying we cant produce ethically with the rate of current consumption?
No. You're flipping the logic to suggest that consumption controls the rate of production. You didn't understand what I said at all or didn't read it.
I'm saying that with the current system which dictates the incentives behind production is causing us to over produce through unethical and unsustainable methods and people are simply consuming what is available, because people need to eat and they can only eat what has been produced. That is a physical, material limit of life. If society was restructured to where the workers owned the means of production and the profit incentive was done away with then the rate of consumption would logically have to be lower as a result, because people physically cannot consume what isn't produced.