The Selective Compassion of Speciesism

"Kids Can Be Cruel"

A vegan mum posted in a local mixed "vegetarian/vegan" group on Facebook about an uncomfortable incident at a party which she had just attended with her vegan youngsters. Apparently, other kids (including the host's own offspring) decided to make a game out of catching and killing frogs around a pond on the property. The vegan mum's children were horrified and expressed as much to her when they went to tell her what was happening. She then raised the issue with the host and the host vaguely re-directed his kids who, then, started catching and killing various insects. The vegan kids distanced themselves from what was happening and went off to play by themselves. When the non-vegan kids then went back to killing more frogs, the vegan mum simply packed up her youngsters and left. She shared her experience with the local mixed "vegetarian/vegan" discussion group, saying that she wished her kids had more vegan friends to avoid situations like these. 

On Purporting to Define Monsters (or Necessity)

Many immediately weighed in, myself included. The vegans were obviously horrified since part of being vegan means rejecting that it's in any way a big joke to treat other sentient beings as existing for our own amusement or pleasure. We don't want to be a part of any avoidable actions or processes which involve treating other beings as things -- never mind causing those beings harm or even taking their lives. We could all definitely feel empathy for these poor kids who ended up witnessing these acts. And if these others non-vegan kids were in any way deliberately trying to upset the vegan kids (and from the mom's story, it sounded as if some of them were well-aware of the vegan kids' discomfort), it does make it feel a bit more gross. That said, how many times have vegans witnessed adult non-vegans taunting vegans with pro-animal use comments and anecdotes, disturbing photos, memes, etc. on social media (and how often are they not just shrugged off, but often actively cheered on by other non-vegan adults on the sidelines)? Like grown-ups, kids can be jerks.

"Psychopaths!" was a term brought up by many in the discussion thread to describe the kids. "Monsters!" was another. Many pointed out that serial killers often start out as kids who engaged in behaviours involving cruelty to animals. Quite a few people who joined in the discussion condemning the actions opted to self-identify as non-vegans, singling out what had happened as "unacceptable" and insisting that their non-vegan kids would never have done anything similar:

"You don't have to be vegan to have compassion. There was no need for those kids to be killing those frogs!"

"I'm not a vegan, but I would never let my child kill another animal like that."

"My kids eat meat but would never do anything like cruel! Those kids were killing those frogs for fun! They were ENJOYING it! Their parents should be reported to the authorities!"

"This isn't a vegan issue! These kids are sick in the head!" 

I pointed out that living in a pretty overwhelmingly rural Canadian province means that a lot of the parents at that gathering probably indulge in hunting or fishing and find great joy in either of these acts, sometimes even bringing beer along to add to their fun. Furthermore, many parents get absolutely giddy about bringing their kids along with them to teach them the "thrill of the hunt" or to teach them how to catch and kill fish; the kids in turn often feel great delight at getting praise and approval from their parents. These kids end up more or less killing animals for pleasure, as well -- theirs, as well as their parents'. 

"It's not the same thing. Most of the people who hunt or fish do so because they need the food. At the very least, the meat is eaten or given to family and friends and it doesn't go to waste." 

So if the kids at the party had ended up cooking and eating the frogs, I asked, would it have made it more OK for them to have been killing the frogs? A non-vegan replied that it would have been "unnecessary" killing since "there was already food at the party". I pointed out that some people hunt and fish when their freezers are already full of food. A lot of people go out and purchase meat when their cupboards are already full of beans, grains, nuts and seeds and others foods and purchasing that meat is (following that line of thinking) unnecessary since there's "already food at the party" (or in the pantry, in this case). 

On Arbitrary Justifications

To call a killing unnecessary -- and thus wrong -- if whomever is killed doesn't end up eaten, but ethical if the being who ends up killed can be eaten (i.e. and not "wasted") just seems odd. And it's weird to discuss "waste" when already dealing with abundance. The fact that you can kill and eat a being doesn't mean that you need to kill or eat that being and the fact that you can doesn't mean that you should. At the end of the day, neither those frogs at the party, nor a fish caught with a hook, a deer shot with a gun, nor a pig stunned and slaughtered by a human ultimately cares whether or not he or she ends up -- or could end up -- in someone's belly. 

As for taking joy in killing other animals? If it's wrong (according to those non-vegan parents) for children to take pleasure in killing frogs, why should the joy children (and adult) humans obtain from hooking fish by their mouths or using other weapons to steal the life from another being be any different? And why should the joy or pleasure they experience from eating or otherwise using a being whose life was taken by another individual be any different? That life was still taken for their pleasure, even if the taking of it wasn't directly at their own hands. Some argue that people who fish or hunt don't want to see an animal suffer -- that they don't derive pleasure from that, yet how often do you hear people sharing their tales of favourite fishing outings were great and lengthy struggles are involved as the fish fights desperately for his or her freedom? Or the excitement they feel when the animal they're hunting realizes they're being followed and becomes anxious and fearful?

Compartmentalization is such a strange thing. When it comes to other animals, we work hard to convince ourselves that one of two very similar things isn't really what it is -- that it is somehow significantly different from the other -- until it eventually becomes so ingrained in us, we just never bother giving it another serious thought. We don't bother reexamining the reasons we tried to convince ourselves that it wasn't what it really is in the first place. Shooting a stray dog is wrong; shooting a deer is OK. Eating a cat is wrong; eating a pig is OK. So many of us take things like these as givens without asking whether they really make any sense. We don't stop to ask why. We just take it as a given because we think it's easier that way, when actually it takes what's really simple to most of us on some level or another and convolutes it. When someone decides to go vegan, it's usually in a moment of great clarity where someone finally gets it: A dog is a pig is a cat is a boy is a parakeet is a chicken. A member of one species shouldn't somehow deserve more than a member of another species just because we think it's our right to impose labels on them according to how we decided they're best used by us.

At least this is what vegans realize and what vegans desperately hope that their friends and family -- their neighbours and coworkers and acquaintances -- around them might eventually realize. We hope that they, too, might become aware of the cost of speciesism to those whose ability to live their lives on their own terms truly matters dearly to themselves and to recognize them as the sentient beings they are instead of continuing to view them as things existing for human use and pleasure.

The Least You Can Do

On Punching

Very many years ago, a vegetarian acquaintance would regularly try to drag me into an argument. He would attempt to force me to pass judgment on his vegetarianism (and this would almost always happen after he had consumed a number of beers). He would press on and on and always present me with the same two options: I should either 1) roleplay to embody a "preachy judgmental vegan" stereotype to give him the fight he wanted so that he could come out swinging, or 2) I should placate him by telling him that he had indeed most certainly fulfilled his ethical quota for the critters and had no reason whatsoever to bother with the "extremist" idea of going vegan. The most I would do (after failing repeatedly to change the subject) was to try to tactfully explain again what he already knew was the position I held (i.e. that going vegan is the very least we owe to other animals – that it’s a starting point) and to repeat to him that I had zero interest in arguing with him, particularly when he was drunk and spoiling for a fight.

The thing is that he followed the posts on my blog's Facebook page and he took personally each thing I wrote about how dairy/egg consumption is really no different from the consumption of meat. He processed these posts as if I were directing them specifically at him. and instead of trying to understand why there's no real ethical difference between consuming one animal product or another, he felt insulted and resented me. And times like these he’d come out swinging, trying to push me into that same old corner, knowing that I meant him no ill will and that I'm not a confrontational person and also knowing that I'm not a liar. It had become personal to him for reasons that had little to do with me and everything to do with him and I refused to be some sort of emotional punching bag to let him work through those feelings. Yet, as calm as I attempted to remain, he would simply punch harder to try to provoke me, saying things like: "So you think you're a better person than me because you're vegan and I'm not, don't you?"

He knew that I certainly didn't (and don't) view myself as a "better person" than anyone else simply because I am vegan and they're not. We're not stick figures living in that simplistic a world. Nobody is vegan because they think they're better than another individual; if anything, people generally tend to go vegan for a completely different reason -- precisely because they don't see themselves as being any more important than other beings. We don't see our pleasure and convenience as trumping the interests of those other beings and we do what we can to avoid participating in -- or contributing to -- any facet of their exploitation.

Then Crunching

At some point in this attempted argument, my vegetarian acquaintance would (predictably) try to number-crunch: I had been a vegetarian for around 12-13 years and had only been vegan for a few years at the time these confrontations occurred. He would remind me that he had been vegetarian for over 25 years and that he had obviously done "much more" for other animals in all those years than I had during my shorter stint as a vegetarian (and even shorter stint as a vegan). "You've been vegan for an hour," he'd say. "I've saved far more lives than you and you'll be lucky to ever catch up." I'd point out to him that veganism is not -- and never has been -- a contest and that veganism is really not about past actions, but is about what you're doing now and how you’ll proceed moving forward. And if what you're doing now involves choosing to continue to treat other animals as treats existing for your convenience or pleasure, you're really missing the point about what it is that we owe other animals. But he was convinced that he has doing his "part" and was doing "enough" and that there was no need for him to even weigh going vegan. (Never mind that every single meal he consumed included cheese or eggs.)

More Crunching

Every once in a while, people message me through this blog's Facebook page to ask me for suggestions for places or organizations to which they can donate money. Around a year ago I got into a discussion with one of them. He told me outright that he had "a lot of respect for people who choose to go vegan" but that it just wasn't something he felt he could do because of its "inconvenience". He told me that to "compensate" for this, he would donate at least a few hundred dollars a year "to groups like PETA" but that he wanted to give a little bit extra that year, so wanted my recommendations. 

I pointed out to him that throwing money at PETA was a complete waste and that his dollars would be more useful in the hands of small vegan-run sanctuaries or to grass-roots groups engaged in educating others about veganism and in helping people become vegan. I also told him that if he really wanted to make a difference, going vegan himself was the least he could -- and should -- do. I asked him if there was any way I could help him sort out what he felt was inconvenient about going vegan. He told me that he didn't really want "to feel bad about [his] personal decisions" and he thanked me for providing him with the names of a few groups and sanctuaries. He messaged me again a few weeks later to report how much he had paid to whom and to thank me again for the suggestions. He joked that he felt better after having paid "[his] annual guilt money".

In the End

Is it great that a couple of small sanctuaries in need received a few hundred dollars they had not been expecting? Sure. But what about when the person donating the money is one of the reasons farmed animals end up in these sanctuaries in the first place (the fortunate ones, anyway)? It becomes no more than a sort of self-imposed "meat tax" where the person tries to make themselves feel better about choosing to continue to be part of the problem.

Is it great that someone chose to eschew eating meat while continuing to consume dairy and eggs and perhaps even in larger quantities than before? Not really. You're just shuffling stuff around on your plate and kidding yourself since we all know there’s as much suffering and death in the dairy and egg industries as there is in the meat industry – even more so.

At the end of the day, it’s sort of nonsensical to try to convince yourself that you’ve taken steps to chip away at a problem while deliberately choosing (easily avoidable) actions and (easily changed) habits which contribute to that very problem. While it may make you feel you’re doing something, throwing money at other animals and/or shuffling parts of them around on your plate won’t substantially change anything at all for them. You still view and treat them as things existing – in some form or other – for your pleasure and convenience instead of viewing and treating them as beings with rights and interests of their own. And for all those who would insist that any semblance of change, any well-intentioned gesture (even if misdirected or self-delusional) should be applauded as a “baby step” instead of described as what it actually is (i.e. walking in place while going nowhere), you’re missing the crux of the issue. Until we realize, accept and act upon the fact that other animals aren’t ours to use, we’re just crunching and shuffling while going nowhere. It’s when we do realize that we owe other animals so much more that it becomes clear that the logical first step to take – the starting point – is to go vegan.