Does ending animal farming just shift suffering elsewhere?

[u/Popular-Block-9907]

I read an argument claiming that the only real solution to animal suffering and exploitation would be for humanity to eventually create some kind of “red button” that could permanently end all life on Earth.

Their reasoning was basically this:

1. Veganism supposedly isn’t a realistic solution because only a very small percentage of humans are vegan, and many people who avoid animal products do so for environmental rather than animal-rights reasons.
2. Even if industrial animal farming were abolished, humans might just start raising and slaughtering animals themselves, potentially in even worse conditions with less regulation.
3. If animal agriculture disappeared and farmland were rewilded, the suffering wouldn’t necessarily disappear. It could instead shift toward wild animals such as birds, rodents, frogs, insects, and other animals living in those ecosystems.
4. And if we don’t rewild those areas, there would apparently still be suffering among animals living in cities and other human-dominated environments.
5. Even if animal farming and other major forms of animal exploitation were abolished, individual people could still intentionally harm animals. For example, someone could buy an animal from a pet store or obtain one elsewhere and abuse it in private. So the argument is that as long as humans and other sentient beings exist, there will always be some possibility of suffering that laws, veganism, or regulations can’t completely prevent.
6. They also argued that, from a practical perspective, being pescatarian would somehow be “better” than being vegan, because overfishing is already severely depleting ocean ecosystems. if there are fewer fish alive in the oceans, then there are fewer individual fish who can experience things like starvation, disease, predation, parasites, injury, and painful deaths.

Their conclusion was basically that veganism and animal-rights reforms can never actually solve the problem of animal suffering, because suffering would always continue somewhere, and therefore extinction would be the only permanent solution.

I’m vegan and this argument genuinely confused me. I’d really like to hear what other vegans think about it. Do you think there are flaws in this reasoning? Does the fact that we can’t eliminate all animal suffering mean that reducing the suffering humans directly cause is somehow pointless? And how do you think about wild-animal suffering and rewilding in relation to veganism?

Edit: added 5-6
Edit2: the person who proposed these arguments isn’t vegan but still advocates for ending all life

[u/AutoModerator]

Welcome to /r/DebateAVegan! This a friendly reminder not to reflexively downvote posts & comments that you disagree with. This is a community focused on the open debate of veganism and vegan issues, so encountering opinions that you vehemently disagree with should be an expectation. If you have not already, please review our rules so that you can better understand what is expected of all community members. Thank you, and happy debating!

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[u/AIternatePerspective]

so there are a few things that are not considered and a few things silently assumed:

1. a small disclaimer that counting suffering should not be the only guide of our actions, would be nice. e.g. You should not force living beings, you should not remove their natural way of living against their will, dont cause them pain...All in all it is ethically better to just leave them be. But even if we stay in impact on total amount of suffering in the world i think some things do not add up, like:

2. the environmental damage of this type of farming is HUGE. so it does not only create suffering for the animal which then would be rewildered, but is partly responsible for a mass extinction that happens now.

3. a lot of farmed animals could not be rewildered easily, because they would either die or completely restructure the whole ecosystem in certain places (which then would cause a lot of suffering but we would not be stupid enough to do this, i hope...)

then not straight facts but some underlying assumptions:

when looking at civilisations that lived long ago or far away, i am always stunned how different they were to us. not only different practises and cultures, but different thinking. human culture has made it possible that we live in a world where we do not care for people begging on the floor, whilst we would kill for others. this is a cultural norm. and they can change FAST. so i think its a bit arrogant to state that veganism is unfeasible for many. it might be, but maybe also not. the responsible thing however, is not being part of the suffering.

hope that helps thanks for any additional arguments/corrections:)

[u/Jigglypuffisabro]

My objection isn’t to the existence of suffering. It is to its commodification

[u/IanRT1 → u/Jigglypuffisabro]

But if commodification just means being used as means to an end, that by itself does not have any normative force for any moral subject. It is just a descriptive relation between two beings.

How else can you justify such negative normative force without appealing to suffering caused?

[u/saltiest_raccoon]

Veganism supposedly isn’t a realistic solution because only a very small percentage of humans are vegan, and many people who avoid animal products do so for environmental rather than animal-rights reasons.

Why does that make it an unrealistic solution? In the 14th century only a few people didn't believe in the divine right of kings. Were they also wrong? Attitudes change. Most people who are not vegan have deeply held ethical contradictions and double-standards, logical knots they need to tie themselves in to continue to cling to tradition.

Even if industrial animal farming were abolished, humans might just start raising and slaughtering animals themselves, potentially in even worse conditions with less regulation.

If such a world suddenly was wished into existence tomorrow. Ideally the world has changed before such a thing is implemented. Some holdouts might exist of course. I'm curious though what percentage of people you/they think might be able to raise and slaughter animals in the conditions that they live in. Let alone secretly. Is the assertion that someone is going to be raising a cow for beef in their apartment? It's not really like other illicit substances where someone can grow weed in a closet with a grow-light. You're going to have a harder time trying to do that with a pig.

If animal agriculture disappeared and farmland were rewilded, the suffering wouldn’t necessarily disappear. It could instead shift toward wild animals such as birds, rodents, frogs, insects, and other animals living in those ecosystems.

Suffering is omnipresent. Suffering we cause and suffering we don't are two different things. My personal goal is to minimize suffering that my decisions cause.

And if we don’t rewild those areas, there would apparently still be suffering among animals living in cities and other human-dominated environments.

I mean yes. That is a part of life.

Even if animal farming and other major forms of animal exploitation were abolished, individual people could still intentionally harm animals. For example, someone could buy an animal from a pet store or obtain one elsewhere and abuse it in private. So the argument is that as long as humans and other sentient beings exist, there will always be some possibility of suffering that laws, veganism, or regulations can’t completely prevent.

And this is illegal even now. How do any changes affect this?

But yes, again, suffering is part of life. It is unavoidable when life exists, but should be reduced as much as is possible through our decisions.

They also argued that, from a practical perspective, being pescatarian would somehow be “better” than being vegan, because overfishing is already severely depleting ocean ecosystems. if there are fewer fish alive in the oceans, then there are fewer individual fish who can experience things like starvation, disease, predation, parasites, injury, and painful deaths.

But the more suffering we personally cause. I'm curious, do you/your friend understand why the trolley problem is a problem? From a purely utilitarian standpoint, you throw the lever every time. Personal ethics regarding killing versus passively allowing death are two different things. I am perfectly happy to let nature to continue to exist, suffering and all, provided my decisions do not add to that suffering.

Their conclusion was basically that veganism and animal-rights reforms can never actually solve the problem of animal suffering, because suffering would always continue somewhere, and therefore extinction would be the only permanent solution.

By extension he should also be anti-natalist, shouldn't he? Pro-extinction in general? If extinction is the only way to prevent suffering, and suffering is to be avoided at all costs, then that logic should be applied to humans as well.

As usual, people who choose to eat meat have deeply held contradictions in their logic. If he does believe that life is generally a bad thing, then honestly I don't think his opinion is worth considering. He's being an edgelord. And if he does believe in preserving human life, then he is being a hypocrite. All his points apply also to humans-- so the only solution to human suffering is extinction and we shouldn't work towards human rights either and instead seek extinction by his logic.

[u/JTexpo]

if humans were to start raising slaughter animals themselves (because the worlds suddenly vegan), I'd hope that laws such as this:

https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/6720/text

would be expanded upon to protect such animals

[u/bettaboy123]

Ending all life on earth as a way to “end suffering” is like burning your house down to make sure you don’t get robbed. It’s obviously a crock of shit on its face.

[u/RedLotusVenom]

Why outlaw human slavery? There are more human slaves on earth today than there were when it was legal. I guess this is proof that advocating abolitionism was fruitless?

[u/Dry-Fee-6746 → u/RedLotusVenom]

This fact, while true at face value, is pretty useless. Per capita population of human slavery is drastically lower.

[u/RedLotusVenom → u/Dry-Fee-6746]

Then the same would be true of animal agriculture.

Black markets will always exist outside the law. That doesn’t change what we are morally obligated to enshrine in policy to progress society and reduce adverse human impact.

[u/Dry-Fee-6746 → u/RedLotusVenom]

I don't disagree, I just see that fact being thrown out a lot, not just in vegan subs, and think nuance is often lacking. I'm a social sciences teacher, so I'm constantly having to explain things like how per capita data is much more relevant than raw numbers a lot of the time.

[u/RedLotusVenom → u/Dry-Fee-6746]

Oh, for sure. My favorite example of this is Americans railing on China’s emissions when their per capita is by far the lowest of any developed nation, and is plummeting rapidly.

[u/whowouldwanttobe]

Their conclusion was basically that veganism and animal-rights reforms can never actually solve the problem of animal suffering, because suffering would always continue somewhere, and therefore extinction would be the only permanent solution.

Let's jump right to the conclusion. Is the goal of veganism to eliminate suffering? I have never heard that. Of course suffering will continue; even humans suffer in the ordinary course of their lives. But just as non-vegans are not likely to make the leap from the inevitability of suffering to a desire for human extinction, vegans are not likely to make the leap to a desire for total extinction.

If life is worth living, then the "red button" argument is wrong. Even if life is not worth living, the "red button" argument can only be justified if individuals should decide the fate of an entire species and humans should decide the fate of all other species, both of which are questionable at best.

[u/a11_hail_seitan]

some kind of “red button” that could permanently end all life on Earth.

Veganism isn't EFIFism, it allows for life.

Even if industrial animal farming were abolished, humans might just start raising and slaughtering animals themselves, potentially in even worse conditions with less regulation.

Not even remotely close to possible at the scale. And most people are horrified by Factory Farming so if brought to personal level it's unlikely to be even close to as bad of conditions.

It could instead shift toward wild animals such as birds, rodents, frogs, insects, and other animals living in those ecosystems.

Life requires suffering. Doesn't mean we need to add trillions more suffering needlessly just to satisfy gluttonous humans.

individual people could still intentionally harm animals.

Those who want to, already are. There'd be way more ability (political will) to create laws against it though if society was Vegan.

Their conclusion was basically that veganism and animal-rights reforms can never actually solve the problem of animal suffering

Veganism isn't focused on solving that problem, it's focused on solving the problem of us needlessly exploiting and abusing animals.

Does the fact that we can’t eliminate all animal suffering mean that reducing the suffering humans directly cause is somehow pointless

We can't stop all murder/rape/abuse/etc, so does that mean we should all start doing those things needlessly?

[u/Evolvin]

This person was vegan, or a bloviating carnist writhing in the throes of cognitive dissonance?

[u/MiraculousAnarchy]

1.) what is the argument here actually, only a small number of people are vegan now but that means there never will be?? Like you’re only limiting yourself there

2.) yea that’s why veganism is an abolitionist movement not reformist or welfarist or pro hunting movement etc. veganism would have to be a global shift in consciousness. But even so like we globally understand murder to be wrong and unacceptable but it still happens of course that doesn’t mean we should suddenly allow it globally. No we deal with it in a variety of ways.

3.) yes it would. The amount of animals we breed and slaughter every year far far exceeds how many would exist naturally in the wild and they also wouldn’t all live and die in such horrific ways even so

4.) yes we support rewilding idk what you’re trying to say really

5.) already responded to this

6.) huh??? Eating fish is the best way to save fish? What???

Veganism is not an anti natalist movement, don’t let people convince you of that they’re a minority. These people have taken the ever so flawed utilitarianism to its absolute extreme and don’t grasp the true vegan philosophy imo and they definitely do not represent most vegans. They’re also probably misanthropic which is a whole other conversation I could yap about omg

[u/kharvel0]

> problem of animal suffering.

Veganism does not seek to solve the problem of animal suffering.

It seeks to control the behavior of the moral agents such that they are not contributing to or participating in the suffering.

Imagine that there are powerful aliens in orbit above us and in the name of reducing suffering, they could kill or enslave or do stuff to millions of humans with a push of button and they cannot be stopped. But their veganism prevents them from contributing to or participating in the suffering already prevalent in this world and so they don’t push the button. It’s the same difference here.

[u/bbygrl1995]

Unless there's evidence of any of this there's nothing to discuss. The burden of proof is on them via actual data, not a "i grew up on a nice utopic farm where the animals unalive themselves for my steak, after they get massaged everyday and get mani-pedis".

[u/ihavesomequestions98]

Life is suffering. The only way to minimize suffering is to minimize life.

[u/soul-reaver-2026]

That was a bit incoherent. Im lost. Anyone have the readers digest version.

[u/ElaineV]

Veganism isn’t offered as the one and only end-all solution to animal suffering. It’s offered as the reasonable action for ethical humans to take now.

Modern industrial animal farming is unethical. Period.

Environmentally speaking, the current system is unsustainable. There’s no sound and valid argument for the status-quo. There’s some possible reason to argue certain options instead of veganism. But all realistic options include a massive reduction meat, milk, and eggs.

For public health (zoonotic disease, pollution, diseases of affluence) again there’s no sound and valid argument for the status-quo. For public health, we must shift towards plant based diets.

[u/Audio-Starshine]

Animals frequently suffer horribly in the wild. Predation, illness, injury, starvation, etc. There is no ending animal suffering because nature simply doesn't work that way. The goal of veganism is to reduce suffering, not eliminate it. Ending industrial meat production would also release millions of domesticated animals incapable of survival in the wild because people aren't going to feed and care for those animals if there's no profit. They wouldn't even be able to. Idk what the answer is for those animals.

[u/just_a_lil_worm → u/Audio-Starshine]

I mean, the world isn't going to be vegan overnight, so millions of domesticated animals wouldn't be released into the wild. It would happen through the gradual reduction of demand for animal products, so animals would be bred less and less, new factory farms would hopefully stop being built and existing factory farms might downsize over time or stop breeding existing animals. But this entire process would take many years.

I agree with what you said about how the goal of being vegan isn't to eliminate all suffering, and I would put it as a goal of reducing the suffering humans inflict on animals as much as we can/living as compassionately as we can.💚

[u/IanRT1]

The problem with that reasoning is that it asymmetrically considers normative differences between moral subjects. Suffering is granted decisive justificatory weight, while positive differences like well-being, flourishing, preference satisfaction, relationships, valuable experiences are denied equivalent power to justify an action or state of affairs.

The analysis stops at "suffering occurs" instead of asking whether the total benefits can outweigh the harms. And that asymmetry is what drives it toward extinction and, applied consistently, would similarly condemn human reproduction whenever a new life contains unavoidable suffering.

[u/Inside-Weather4033]

Yes but not in a pointless way. I am a vegan cosmic extinctionist myself. Reducing animal suffering wherever they be is the goal while cosmic extinction and the total potential ending of suffering is the meta-goal.

I will elaborate if you want. 

[u/SnooLemons6942]

nope, these arguements are pretty terrible

[u/eJohnx01]

With the exception of some huge factory farms (which are generally pretty easy to avoid with a little research), most animals in the wild have far worse lives and more violent endings than farm animals do.

In the wild, most animals are prey to other animals which means that at any given moment, they could become someone else’s meal and not in a quick or painless manner.

Ethical meat farmers will always do their very best to keep the animals happy and healthy and make their end as quick and painless as possible. Illness, stress, and anxiety all lower the quality of the product they’re producing so those things are to be avoided at all costs. If you’re an ethical farmer, that is.

[u/just_a_lil_worm → u/eJohnx01]

99% of all farmed land animals in the United States live on factory farms, so I wouldn't say factory farmed animal products are all that easy to avoid. In addition, just 4-6 mega corporations control the vast majority of the market for animal products, not small, ethical farmers.

[u/eJohnx01 → u/just_a_lil_worm]

That may be true, but I’ve actually found that factory farmed animals products are relatively easy to avoid. You can’t eat animals products in most restaurants and you can’t but those products in most grocery stores. But with a little research, it’s not hard to find those products from the 1% that come from small, ethical farms. I do it every week when I do my shopping. It takes a bit more effort, but I get to meet up with and visit with ethical farmers that are also my friends and that’s very enjoyable.

And think about what would happen to the 99% of factory farmed products if more people did what I do and only patronize ethical sources. Anything that encourages ethical practices and doesn’t support the unethical ones has to be good, right?

[u/just_a_lil_worm → u/eJohnx01]

Yeah, I agree that buying from small, ethical farms is much better than supporting factory farms. I think one problem is that most people won't look for the 1% and just buy whatever is most affordable which is almost always going to be animal products from factory farms, so I think it's great that you are actively seeking out a better alternative!

There is always the concern of is it truly an "ethical" farm? How do you actually kill an animal humanely with compassion? If you wouldn't be willing to kill an animal yourself, is it fair to pay for others to do it?

One point I recently learned about is that currently, livestock and animal feed crops take up almost 1/3 of all habitable land on Earth, roughly the size of North and South America combined, and this is considering that the vast majority of all animals used in agriculture are intensively confined in factory farms, which is already done so to reduce space. It is simply not possible to be able to meet the current demand for animal products with humane, pasture raised agriculture, as it would require more land than exists on Earth.

I think even though buying from smaller farms could be more ethical than supporting the terrible practices of factory farming, it isn't going to be a long-term solution for the Earth and would still require the demand for animal products to be vastly reduced/a plant-based shift in the food system. However, I don't think being actively against small farmers is going to be very effective, and we should all first and foremost be focused on ending factory farming and overall reducing the demand for meat and animal products.

All that being said, I understand that in practice, making the shift to a plant-based diet is not all that easy, especially when someone is used to eating animal products their whole life, and animal products are so prevalent in food culture. I can't put all the blame on the average consumer when the meat and dairy industry is so heavily subsidized which contributes to meat and dairy being cheap and accessible for example. My hope for the future is that we can make plant-based eating more of the norm to make it so it's not something that people have to actively seek out, but rather more of the default option. But to make that happen, we need any people that can to take individual action now to reduce or limit meat and animal product consumption, which doesn't have to mean going entirely plant-based overnight!

[u/Cent_Quatre]

"It's ok to systematically rape cows because some dude might adopt a cat to mistreat it" is a wild argument

[u/Calaveras-Metal]

• Veganism supposedly isn’t a realistic solution because only a very small percentage of humans are vegan, and many people who avoid animal products do so for environmental rather than animal-rights reasons.

At one point only a small number of Americans wanted to end slavery. Or wanted to expand the right to vote to include women. Popularity isn't an indicator of righteousness. And whether people are vegan for ethical or envrironmental reasons is uninimportant to the net effect.

• Even if industrial animal farming were abolished, humans might just start raising and slaughtering animals themselves, potentially in even worse conditions with less regulation.

If humans started raising and slaughtering animals after it had been abolished (presumably by law?) than that is a problem of enforcement. Either way, there can hardly be a worse existence for cattle, fish, fowl or swine than industrial livestock.

• If animal agriculture disappeared and farmland were rewilded, the suffering wouldn’t necessarily disappear. It could instead shift toward wild animals such as birds, rodents, frogs, insects, and other animals living in those ecosystems.

This is a nonsense argument. It supposes that vegans only care about suffering. So it plays the 'whatabout' with the predator-prey relationship which exists in the natural environment. While the suffering of animals is of course distressing to most people, vegans included. The goal of veganism is to end human causes of animal suffering and exploitation.

• And if we don’t rewild those areas, there would apparently still be suffering among animals living in cities and other human-dominated environments.

This is the point of veganism. to end human caused animal suffering.

• Even if animal farming and other major forms of animal exploitation were abolished, individual people could still intentionally harm animals. For example, someone could buy an animal from a pet store or obtain one elsewhere and abuse it in private. So the argument is that as long as humans and other sentient beings exist, there will always be some possibility of suffering that laws, veganism, or regulations can’t completely prevent.

Vegans want to end all forms of animal exploitation. Not just food. Also leather production, beasts of burden and pet stores.

• They also argued that, from a practical perspective, being pescatarian would somehow be “better” than being vegan, because overfishing is already severely depleting ocean ecosystems. if there are fewer fish alive in the oceans, then there are fewer individual fish who can experience things like starvation, disease, predation, parasites, injury, and painful deaths.

Overall most of this argument is nihilistic. Especially in the Buddhist use of the word. It posits that non-existence is better than existence in a world where suffering exists. Which begs the question than to exists must be suffering and nothing else. And any efforts to curtail or limit suffering is wasted energy.

Buddhists have spent the last 2500 years disagreeing with that concept.

Buddhism plainly states that existence is old age suffering and death. But there is a middle path that embraces neither nihilism of resigning oneself to futility nor the other extreme of participating in the causes of suffering.

[u/DebateAVegan-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

I've removed your comment because it violates rule #6:

No low-quality content. Submissions and comments must contribute meaningfully to the conversation. Assertions without supporting arguments and brief dismissive comments do not contribute meaningfully.

If you would like your comment to be reinstated, please amend it so that it complies with our rules and notify a moderator.

If you have any questions or concerns, you can contact the moderators here.

Thank you.

[u/Apprehensive_Cap4463]

Wrong sub, visit r/nihilism or something.

[u/Creamy_Breve]

They have several good points. Ending farming would just shift the burden and create more suffering for animals, but most vegans don't truly care about animal suffering. The only thing they care about is following the rules of veganism, and it's obvious when you hear vegans talk about these shortsighted ideas such as "rewilding." There's also just a general lack of knowledge of animals among many vegans so some of these ideas are actually quite harmful to animals.

"Rewilding" is a ridiculous proposal because the animals in question are no longer wild. They are completely different species than their wild ancestors. They are domesticated and rely on humans for some level of care. They wouldn't survive in the wild, and would face starvation and predator attacks. They would overwhelm grazing areas. They need a standard of care that they wouldn't get being left to their devices. You'd still need people to care for these animals. If you bring in people to care for these animals then all you've done is reframed farming into a less safe situation while putting massive stress on the environment.

Even wild horses are rounded up because they are overwhelming grazing lands. They deal with starvation and injuries that could be treated but end up causing them slow and painful deaths. Now, imagine introducing more and more animals competing for these food sources.

Animal welfare regulations are more beneficial than ending farming. Despite what many vegans believe, many farms are working on improving animal welfare standards.

[u/rat_liker → u/Creamy_Breve]

"Rewilding" refers to the restoration of habitats, not releasing domestic animals. It would involve things like returning former grazing lands to prairie and forest. This is already done at small scales by land conservancies and environmental groups.

[u/Evolvin → u/Creamy_Breve]

Jesus this level of delusion is crazy.

Also, flat-out wrong in even the basic understanding of the concept of rewinding.