You can’t work on laws to restrict meat eating without getting the public onboard first. Our democracy is flawed, sure, but we don’t live in an autocracy. Vegan activists do work day in and day out on lobbying for legislation. California just the other day banned octopus farming.
But that worked because the public was broadly onboard with it because of the recent public understanding of how intelligent octopodes are. If California somehow passed a restriction on meats like pork, beef, chicken, etc., then the entire state would immediately riot and kick the legislature out, completely undoing the restriction.
May I ask this… Would you decide to gradually change your lifestyle to a less cruel one when the vegan arguments seem to be correct or would you rather wait for a law against eating meat?
Me personally? I don’t care about cruelty, so what would get me to change is a law that says I must. Or legal/economic incentives.
I do care about the environment, so I don’t eat beef. But that’s not common. Most people who don’t care about animal cruelty also don’t care about the environment.
Sounds like you should be working on laws to restrict meat eating. That’s typically how we handle injustices on a society wide scale.
You can’t work on laws to restrict meat eating without getting the public onboard first. Our democracy is flawed, sure, but we don’t live in an autocracy. Vegan activists do work day in and day out on lobbying for legislation. California just the other day banned octopus farming.
But that worked because the public was broadly onboard with it because of the recent public understanding of how intelligent octopodes are. If California somehow passed a restriction on meats like pork, beef, chicken, etc., then the entire state would immediately riot and kick the legislature out, completely undoing the restriction.
Good point.
May I ask this… Would you decide to gradually change your lifestyle to a less cruel one when the vegan arguments seem to be correct or would you rather wait for a law against eating meat?
Me personally? I don’t care about cruelty, so what would get me to change is a law that says I must. Or legal/economic incentives.
I do care about the environment, so I don’t eat beef. But that’s not common. Most people who don’t care about animal cruelty also don’t care about the environment.
Well, yes. That sounds reasonable at first.
But also, think of the broader public reaction, if governments started banning meat / animal products / whatever industries that exploit animals.
I do not think most people would be fine with a government mandated ban on those goods/practices.