For You
One of the more interesting topic I discuss with people is why exactly they formed their vegan belief system. Some point out that they saw a documentary of Youtube video showing the horrors of animal agriculture, but that just points to our gut reaction, not necessarily the logical backing making us change our lifestyles. With that being said, where do you personally derive your beliefs from? Do you hardline certain deontological sticking points like exploitation? Do you just care about the relative net impact on creatures and their ability to thrive? Or is it something else entirely?
Personal Viewpoint
Personally, I draw my entire ethical world view on broad utilitarian viewpoints. So if a chicken were to suffer because of something I did, I must have done something wrong. Equally, if a chicken were to thrive because of something I did, I did something good. However, I do not think about the exploitation nor commodification of that chicken, because those are anthropomorphic ideas that they likely do not care about. Sure, commodification and exploitation are usually wrong because they excuse people’s actions, but, it seems to me that there are some niche cases where these qualities, which we often find as bad, are in fact morally neutral.
I think I realized that after seeing a video of someone who saved several hens from factory farms who were still producing eggs, and continued to use the eggs for their personal usage (feeding carnivorous animals and supplementing their own diet so far as the chicken did not have any physical stressors). I tried to look at the situation objectively to find some issue with the chicken being malnourished, abused, or made to do something they didn’t like. But alas, the hens involved had no medical issues, were able to thrive in a safe and comfortable environment, and were nutritionally supplemented to ensure their well being (i.e., no nutritional deficiencies). Plus, carnivorous animals got a meal so less animals as a whole were harmed.
The humans involved in the prior example did not need to consume the chickens eggs, but doing so posed no ethical issue, so for me, it was ethically neutral - a non issue.
Other Example
If you still want to read, here’s another example of my views. I personally avoid wool as I know where it comes from and the suffering that must be inflicted in our system. However, I acknowledge that there are ways in which wool can be a viable fabric while still allowing for thriving lives for sheep.
First, I think about a normal house dog. They usually hate getting a hair cut when they’re younger because they are scared of the razor. After you get a razor with a cooling blade mechanism and get them exposed to it, they learn to not be afraid of it and instead enjoy the experience since the hair cut doesn’t actually provide any physical pain. For that, I feel no moral qualms with giving them a hair cut because they seems to enjoy or be unbothered by it. If I put in the effort to utilize the hair I cut off in a meaningful way, it’d be fine to do. Especially because I just throw it away otherwise.
Equally, a sheep “wool” is simply their hair. Some breeds have the genetics to grow more or less, but growing it and having it removed do not have to bring about harm - we just do it because we value cheap goods year round far more than their livelyhoods so we adopt cruel standards. If I were to some day have some sort of homestead, where I raised sheep from their adolescence all the way to their death of natural causes, and continued to give to shave their wool, I see not problem with doing so. Given that they are well fed, not hurt in the process, and were given access to natural pastures that they can use to thrive. In fact, I’d argue that is a good thing to do as I’ve taken care of them their entire life (protection from normal predators, warm home, access to food, etc) without harming them in the process.
TL;DR exploitation and commodification are usually bad, but I find the reason for them being bad to be the harm (direct and indirect), not just the fact that they are exploited.
I’m a vet student in the Netherlands, and here vets have a legal obligation to treat an animal in need. That being said, the interpretation of this law is quite lackluster. For example, farm animals are way more likely to get euthanized not because treatment is impossible, but because making money off of the animal is impossible. A farmer won’t spend more money on an animal that has become economically unviable and the vets are happy to comply.
In fact, and that’s my main point, they effectively have to comply. Sure, vets can refuse to do something they think is immoral. But if you have a vegan moral system, you simple can’t be a vet (at least not one for farm animals). You can’t provide the services the customers ask for.
I partly agree with jerkface@lemmy.ca that vets don’t care about animal wellbeing. They care selectively about some animals. They only care about preventing suffering they think is unnecessary, and that is where the problem lies. Because way less is necessary than non-vegans think, since animal agriculture does not need to be profitable because it does not need to exist.
Probably you are right. I don’t know vets who work in with animal farms. But I think that not all vets are the same.
I assume you are one of does who care about the animal wellbeing?
Yes, and unlike 99% of my peers I care as much about the wellbeing of a pig as that of a dog. To me it’s just indefensible to help an industry do immoral things to pigs that not a single one of us would condone if done to dogs.
Unlike OP I’m not just interested in wellbeing though, but also animal rights. So I would still oppose painless slaughter for example.
One reason is that again, most of us take issue with the painless killing of a young healthy dog. Imagine someone who has their dog painlessly killed every time they go on a holiday, and then buy a new one afterwards. Is that fine? I don’t think so.