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Culture War Roundup for the week of December 25, 2023

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It is very easy to source ethical meat and not very expensive either. Treating it as some kind of unfeasible or cumbersome solution is so strange to me. If we want to reduce suffering then surely that must be an easier ask than asking people to eschew meat entirely.

But that's kind of the point isn't it? The vegans don't really want to reduce animal suffering, they want to be on a moral crusade. Veganism isn't an intellectually principled moral stance, it's a religious one.

Veganism isn't an intellectually principled moral stance, it's a religious one.

Some of 'em. It's the zeal of the convert problem, where for some people it is an all-or-nothing crusade. And if you're basing your veganism on the suffering of sentient others, of course it's appalling to them.

It really is the equivalent of the abortion debate, though vegans may not wish to see it in those terms, but they can both consider abortion to be a human right and Constitutional right and healthcare because of bodily autonomy and the foetus is not a person, and object to meat-eating because even if animals are not persons, they're sentient or sapient or both. One question is a matter of private personal morality and the other is plain observable fact and nothing to do with personal morals other than "you should be horrified by this scale of torture and murder".