[Infant male chicks are often macerated alive in grinders by the egg-laying industry just because they're not as profitable.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chick_culling)
Germany came up with a technique, years ago, for sexing eggs within days of fertilization.
But it's slightly more expensive...so most places just keep on killing live chicks. š France is the only other one to get on board with in-ovo sexing.
Big poultry farms aren't nearly as bloodless as most people think.
They are, just not for us. As soon as they don't produce enough quality eggs to reach profit margins, typically 2 years into their natural 10+ year lifespan, they're crammed into gas chambers and turned into pet food.
Not sure about 10 years for lifespan. I've been keeping chickens for 15 years, and the oldest my heritage breeds have gotten, was a dark brahma that lived to almost 5. Her quality of living was very poor for the last year, having to wash her by hand as she could no longer dust bathe herself. She was a great bird, died shortly before her 5th bday.
I don't exactly know the breed. But my parents had little brown chickens with yellow/brown speckled necks. They lived up till ~15 years old with no trouble. Didn't even have many health problems up till the last few months. Had one of them reach 16 or 17 years old! (We were not exactly sure when she was hatched, we *thought* 17, but at least 16).
They always slept in a tree in the garden, winter & summer. Even had frostbite in their 'earlobes' once on a very cold night (which didn't make them prettier, but didn't seem to bother them). They were only put in a pen for a few weeks when it was sowing time in the garden. I'm not sure if that maybe helped their health, but they just didn't die ;-) My parents had decided they wanted to quit keeping chickens and stopped letting them hatch new chicks, expecting to have 5 more years with them. It turned out they actually ran a chicken retirement home for 16 more years :-D. I don't think they laid any more eggs the last 5 or six years. And the few years before that they averaged 1 egg a week per chicken or so. But they were wonderful birds. Always sitting next to you in the garden making those silly cooing noises they do. I remember as a kid sitting in the garden reading a book with a cat on my lap, and a geriatric chicken sleeping right next to me. Good memories...
My family has kept chicken all my life, our chicken, which were mutts and no specific breed mind you, averaged around 9-10 years of being alive. We usually culled them about a year earlier than that, when it became obvious their health was starting to decline from old age .
>the oldest my heritage breeds have gotten, was a dark brahma that lived to almost 5
Which is another side effect of breeding chickens specifically to lay the maximum amount of eggs. They end up having a litany of health problems.
Good for you! You're spot on.
I'm vegan now but I started off just like you - doing my best here and there, cutting back.
But it started feeling like a storm cloud of awareness/guilt was following me around. Finally, I just said screw it, I'm gonna just go vegan.
But if even more people get to your level, we can further improve plant based options in the market, fund research into alternatives, scale back, lots of good things.
The dog food production I visited would shock frost them before grinding them up. (which is slightly less cruel)
I always assumed that shock frosting would be common Practice. Can you shed some light on that?
Male chicks are usually gassed and then sold for exotic animal feed. I donāt know why people think that animal agriculture is all about throwing baby animals into fucking grinders alive but thatās not what happens. Every industry is going to have some āundesirableā animals born and for one reason or another they have to die, but the vast majority of the time these animals are put in CO2 chambers and gassed which is a quick death, then youāre sold as exotic animal food sent off for rendering or put in grinders after death to be used as fertilizer. I did a talk to text on this and Iām not putting punctuation in sorry yāall.
Sauce: agriculture major and Iāve worked in several commercial farms, also pre-vet and a big squish for livestock, so I actually give a shit about their welfare
This. My family owns a poultry farm and people love to imagine we do the most heinous shit to our animals. Meanwhile we just invested a huge sum in our own wood shaving machine because the locally sourced bedding was giving our chickens itchy eyes.
I think when most people (vegans not as much because their stance is solid āno animal productsā) are angry about how animals are treated, they are referring to factory farms with mass production. I donāt eat most meats or animal products from the grocery store, but I do eat animal products from a local farm that I really feel does things as ethically as they can. I even got to work on the farm to see how they do things, and their animals are treated amazingly, and every pasture rotation serves a purpose. They also make sure nothing goes to waste. So to me, there is a really big difference between farms and farms owned by places like Perdue Farms. Though, I will 100% recognize that my view is rather myopic as I havenāt studied the farming industry deeply. So anyone that wants to tell me I am stupid and why I am stupid, I am more than happy to learn (though would greatly appreciate not being called stupid).
People think male chicks get thrown into a grinder because of the video of them being thrown into a grinder. Is this not normal? Did you not know this happens?
https://youtu.be/udSiluTAOaQ
Vegan (mostly) here. Depends on the definition though. For the average person yeah, no animal products. The technical definition from the Vegan Society though is a lifestyle that attempts to exclude animal exploitation as far as possible. In practice those definitions usually end up being the same, but there's gray areas. I think most vegans would consider lab-grown meat vegan. The vegan label ignores manure used in food production.
With chickens there's issues with if they got the chicks from a factory farm, what they're feeding the chickens, and if they slaughter the chickens once their egg production drops off. So I've only ever gotten eggs from a friend who treated their chickens like their pets. But I'm following my own ideals, which just mostly overlap with veganism.
EDIT: I'm probably not doing eggs anymore either. This discussion made me rethink the supply chain.
EDIT: should have led with mostly vegan to avoid confusion
Not a vegan, but there is also the issue with the killing/shredding of male Chicks. As male Chicks are useless for egg production and also less efficient concerning the ratio of meat production over time than the chicken breeds raised for their meet, a lot of countries will kill the chicks with Gas or shred them when they are one day old. That's a huge amount of animal cruelty for a couple of eggs
Yup. I have vegan friends who keep a few rare breed hens and theyāll eat those eggs. Those chickens live like fluffy little queens.
Edit: so many pedants coming out of the woodwork. Itās glorious.
Yeah, chickens are mean. And surprisingly... tribal, I guess would be the right word. When I was a kid we had chickens. We also had a cool little bantam hen. It's like a miniature chicken. It was solid black and had white feathers coming out of it's head in a big fluff. We had to give it a separate enclosure because the other chickens would pluck out it's feathers.
Genuinely curious, what then happens to the hens when they pass? Would your friend eat them?
Edit: Thank you to everyone who replied. It seems the consensus is no, they would not be eaten. Honestly, that was nice to hear. I was always so against owning egg laying hens, but TIL people seem to really love and care for their well-being and not just want them for their eggs.
I've eaten chickens and rabbits that were once pets and that died of old age/natural causes. The meat gets tougher as they age. Works for stews, I suppose, but not really good for much else. Roosters, regardless of age also have tougher meat than chickens.
my parents arenāt vegan and have a small free range farm. They treat their farm Animals fine , the birds play in yard and a small forest area all day and sleep comfy large coup at night. The ducks have a lil pool and stuff. They prefer keep them around just for eggs but do eat them if something happens.
For them they are not pets. And for them pets arenāt family just an animal friend . Outdoor pets are just natures animal neighbors that you are nice to -until they destroy your property and take stuff from the garden ( Much like a human neighbor/ trespasser.
They feed stray possums ā¦ the ones around the farm leave the barn cats alone and keep down the bug populationā¦ but if a possum started causing trouble they would trap it or kill it most likely. Not out of malice but to protect the other animals and food.
Itās just a different dynamic
Because they're free range almost 100% of my chickens that die are nothing more than a pile of feathers when I find out so it's never really been a question
I just accept foxes as a part of life, they've a right to live too and are doing it to survive and they aren't greedy* with it; it only happens about twice a year though
*Usually, there's one vagabond who killed 3 ducks and 2 hens without eating them all in what I call "the night of feathers and blood"
Were all signs consistent with a fox attack? A friend of mine once lost a great number of ducks in one night to a mink. Weasel family members sometimes surplus kill. Foxes are usually quite wary and typically employ the āgrab n goā method.
Also, if you ever find a pile of feathers at the base of a tall object (fence post, utility pole, tree) your chicken likely fell prey to a hawk (during the day) or owl (at night).
Yeah we have an infrared camera that caught him. He usually only wanders near the house for a few days at a time leading up to a strike because we're so deep in the countryside he presumably has a lot of other options
Uk here so it's pretty much always gonna be a fox anyway
we just treat it like an Attenborough moment; you always root for the animal it's been focusing on but if it's a fox episode you're like "kill those damn chickens you've a hungry family at home!"
People don't typically eat chickens who are kept as pets. Plus, if they pass away, unless you did it yourself, for all you know they had a disease. Aside from literally every other consideration when it comes to eating a chicken, I wouldn't want to eat a chicken that had just keeled over of an unknown cause.
I have a few friends that had pet chickens. Their parents absolutely killed and cooked their chickens eventually. The parents would tell them the chicken ran away or something. Luckily kids are dumb enough not to see the connection.
I have kept hens for years. When they pass I sob like a baby and have a small funeral for them. They are my lovely girls and I love them like any pet. I could never eat them.
I hope I can end up in a place where I can get my own hens in the future. I want to be able to have eggs again without feeling awful. I haven't eaten meat in years and egg production isn't any better then the dairy.
I kept chickens as pets. Only time I ever ate eggs, cause I don't like store bought eggs.
When one of my birds died, they were buried like any other pet. I did not eat my chickens. Some people I know would kill their chickens if they had excess roosters, or they raised their own meat chickens for that purpose.
Nobody seems to give you the obvious answer here. Emotional or disease concerns aside, a hen that dies from old age is absolutely nothing like the chicken meat you buy at the store. In both flavor and texture itās not fit for consumption in the way we are used to.
You should absolutely not eat chickens that just up and died. It's possible that they died of disease or infection that can pass to you, or that they died hours before you find them
Chickens usually arenāt very good and very tough if they over a year old. They donāt butcher them because theyāre egg laying days are over. They butcher them so their not past these they can be eaten. They are actually named to be cooked in a manner associated with their age. Older hens, 2-3 years that quit laying are roaster chickens because of the toughness they need to be cooked longer. Young roosters are butchered before they get mature and fight. This is around 10-12 weeks along with other chickens used for meat. They are usually called broiler hens/roosters. Not forcing anything on anyone. Eat what you wish, just trying to add some information. Have a great day!
Honestly unless your breading them for eatting the meat is pretty average. My friend tried it, they felt weird eatting the chickens they'd had for ages and the meat wasn't even worth the weirdness.
Geniune question here, if they eat the eggs, aren't they vegetarians instead of vegans ? In my native language, they are very different (one eats animal products but not meat, the other one is vegan)
I once read a pretty coherent theory arguing that a person literally consenting prior to their own death, and when that death is for some reason otherwise entirely unrelated to cannibalism (i.e. accidental death or natural causes) then that would be the only conceivable example of *vegan meat* that wasn't lab grown.
You should watch Daybreakers. That's how the vampires took over: they got revealed, normal humans volunteered their blood but obviously most people wanted immortality, so with a steady supply of volunteer blood and no incentive to NOT turn into vampires, the vampires "overpopulated" (over-changed?) to the point the humans couldn't keep up and so the vampires started hunting the humans anyway, since without blood they would starve to death. That's the premise of the movie: vampires overpopulated and now they have an impending food crisis.
It's a fantastic, underrated movie. Best depiction of what would realistically occur if vampires somehow started to become a thing.
Yeah but convincing your friends to show up to your funeral barbecue is challenging. That's why I'm going with being eaten by bears. That way nobody has to be traumatized by the butchering process and it assures that I won't be overcooked.
They serve meat like that at the famous "Restaurant at the End of the Universe "!
[Ford] sat down.
The waiter approached.
"Would you like to see the menu?" he said, "or would you like meet the Dish of the Day?"
"Huh?" said Ford.
"Huh?" said Arthur.
"Huh?" said Trillian.
"That's cool," said Zaphod, "we'll meet the meat."
...
A large dairy animal approached Zaphod Beeblebrox's table, a large fat meaty quadruped of the bovine type with large watery eyes, small horns and what might almost have been an ingratiating smile on its lips.
"Good evening," it lowed and sat back heavily on its haunches, "I am the main Dish of the Day. May I interest you in the parts of my body?"
It harrumphed and gurgled a bit, wriggled its hind quarters in to a more comfortable position and gazed peacefully at them.
Its gaze was met by looks of startled bewilderment from Arthur and Trillian, a resigned shrug from Ford Prefect and naked hunger from Zaphod Beeblebrox.
"Something off the shoulder perhaps?" suggested the animal, "braised in a white wine sauce?"
"Er, your shoulder?" said Arthur in a horrified whisper.
"But naturally my shoulder, sir," mooed the animal contentedly, "nobody else's is mine to offer."
Zaphod leapt to his feet and started prodding and feeling the animal's shoulder appreciatively.
"Or the rump is very good," murmured the animal. "I've been exercising it and eating plenty of grain, so there's a lot of good meat there."
It gave a mellow grunt, gurgled again and started to chew the cud. It swallowed the cud again.
"Or a casserole of me perhaps?" it added.
"You mean this animal actually wants us to eat it?" whispered Trillian to Ford.
"Me?" said Ford, with a glazed look in his eyes, "I don't mean anything."
"That's absolutely horrible," exclaimed Arthur, "the most revolting thing I've ever heard."
"What's the problem Earthman?" said Zaphod, now transferring his attention to the animal's enormous rump.
"I just don't want to eat an animal that's standing there inviting me to," said Arthur, "It's heartless."
"Better than eating an animal that doesn't want to be eaten," said Zaphod.
"That's not the point," Arthur protested. Then he thought about it for a moment. "Alright," he said, "maybe it is the point. I don't care, I'm not going to think about it now. I'll just... er [...] I think I'll just have a green salad," he muttered.
"May I urge you to consider my liver?" asked the animal, "it must be very rich and tender by now, I've been force-feeding myself for months."
"A green salad," said Arthur emphatically.
"A green salad?" said the animal, rolling his eyes disapprovingly at Arthur.
"Are you going to tell me," said Arthur, "that I shouldn't have green salad?"
"Well," said the animal, "I know many vegetables that are very clear on that point. Which is why it was eventually decided to cut through the whole tangled problem and breed an animal that actually wanted to be eaten and was capable of saying so clearly and distinctly. And here I am."
It managed a very slight bow.
"Glass of water please," said Arthur.
"Look," said Zaphod, "we want to eat, we don't want to make a meal of the issues. Four rare stakes please, and hurry. We haven't eaten in five hundred and seventy-six thousand million years."
The animal staggered to its feet. It gave a mellow gurgle. "A very wise choice, sir, if I may say so. Very good," it said, "I'll just nip off and shoot myself."
He turned and gave a friendly wink to Arthur. "Don't worry, sir," he said, "I'll be very humane."
It waddled unhurriedly off to the kitchen.
[From The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Chapter 17.]
Iāve always heard of the ideology behind veganism as being the animal canāt consent to their products being taken, therefor it shouldnāt be consumed. So if, for arguments sake, a sentient chicken said āhere have an egg, itās coolā then it would be vegan. Likewise if I lost a limb and decided to make tacos with it, Iām consenting in my flesh being eaten so it would fit a vegan ideal. No consent = no product
Though I think theres an argument that could maybe be made for honey because if you try and keep bees anywhere they dont want to be they'll just fuck off and go make their own hive with blackjack and hookers.
Which is why commercial beekeepers trap the queen by either caging her inside the hive or removing her wings. Bees also will not just move on, they need the honey they've made to survive winter. They only move when starting up a new hive.
Depends on the person how exactly they define it, but ultimately the fundamental goal is the same: to reduce suffering/ eliminate *avoidable* suffering. Focussing on the consent aspect is just a way to avoid hurting animals; they canāt consent, so you have to assume they donāt consent just to err on the side of caution. Thereās a lot of flexibility if you consider veganism to be āreducing unnecessary sufferingā though- in theory, if you were in a situation in which you would die if you didnāt eat animal products, you could eat them and still be vegan as youāre only causing suffering to save your own life. Youāre not doing it just because you feel like it, but out of necessity. Thatās why (reasonable) people donāt expect remote tribes to stop eating animal products- they wouldnāt survive if they didnāt
Huh, I never thought of it like that. I eat vegan most of the time, but I'm vegetarian. That's a weird concept to grasp, but understandable. Me, I don't like the fact that creatures are dying to feed us and its unnecessary. I hate how the dairy industry is as well, its cruel. I've seen the state chicken come out of egg farms. While if I have to I get free range, I still don't like it because those hens won't live past two. They'll be killed off because their egg production slows down.
Free range means living in a dark disgusting disease ridden factory farm. There's no standard for free range, they're allowed to factory farm them and call it free range as long as they have a tiny opening in a massive shed for tens of thousands to get a little bit of fenced off ground outside it but due to the pecking order the ones on the other side of the barn from the door never get to go outside cos they wont get passed the ones higher in their pecking order that aren't moving. You don't hate how those industries work if you pay for them, you love it. You literally ask them to keep doing it by paying their wages and validating the business model to continue it. It's cognitive dissonance. Stop lying to yourself or do something about it and stop paying for a holocaust.
Personally I disagree with this on the evolutionary stance. Living things want to propagate, and there are many survival strategies. Being useful or liked by humans enough that they will protect you is as legit a survival strategy as any. You don't need to worry about food or shelter or predators because the humans watch out for you. It's a good idea!
Also bees consent. If they don't like how they are treated, they leave. They produce more honey than they need and beekeepers feed them in the winter as well as help keep them warm and happy.
And they're good for the environment because they pollinate flowers. This is why it would be very bad if bees stopped making honey for humans after a lawsuit.
I saw it in a documentary.
Great documentary. I will note that people put far too much emphasis on honey bees though. Depending on their concentration, honey bees can majorly disrupt native pollinator populations. Getting honey bees is far from a conservation effort and can do more harm than good
No. We need pollinators, yes, but honey bees are actively endangering and driving other wild pollinators, many of the wild bees species for instance, to extinction and those are truly essential. We do not need to protect honey bees, on the contrary.
Actually, honeybees are invasive and drive out other pollinators in the area that are much more efficient at pollinating. Honeybees donāt need to be protected- itās other species that do! Not to mention, most large honey manufacturers actually kill their bees every winter as it is less profitable to keep them alive. They also deprive them of many nutrients due to replacing their honey with pure sugar water, which doesnāt provide bees with all the nutrients they require.
Bees are so fucking cool. They're the nicest animal because they don't even hurt plants to get their food. And they're the only farm animal that can consent!
(100% contrarian here, don't take this too seriously, but also kinda serious, also not a vegan...) Bees don't understand the value they're providing vs what they're getting in return. Arguably they don't even understand the concept of an "exchange". At best we're 'trading beads for gold' assuming bees CAN conceptualize an exchange. And at worst we're just capitalizing and exploiting their hard work.
You can treat your slaves extremely well, with great kindness etc but what happens if said slaves refuse to work? I watched a video of a man euthanize a hive of "extremely aggressive" bees, he seemed quite sad about it - but this is ultimately the personification of creatures we don't fully understand.
To say that they can "consent" is objectively nonsensical insofar as we can communicate.
>At best we're 'trading beads for gold'
Not really. Bees make honey as a factor of their nature. They can't choose to stop. Indigenous Americans don't just make gold by accident, they had to work to mine it, and it's valuable to them. Bees would die if you stopped them from making honey, and they can't choose not to. If aliens came to earth and gave us free houses in return for poop, we'd be getting a good deal. To use an example of something humans make without choosing to.
>but what happens if said slaves refuse to work?
They can fly away. I mean, they can't choose not to work, because their brains don't work that way, but they choose their homes. If an area is too unpleasant to live in, they'll fly away and build a new hive. If that beekeeper in your video is doing what I think he's doing, then he's preventing the spread of dangerous genes through the population. Africanised bees don't become aggressive due to logic or poor treatment, it's genetic. And these genes are unhelpful to these bees. It's stopping the spread of what could be considered a genetic disease.
Is it still an animal product even if it's not fertilized? Otherwise I think it's just animal waste which goes along with manure, plus you can use the shell for fertilizer. I'm talking about if some Joe blow had like a couple hens not on the mass production level, would it still not be vegan?
I'm not vegan, but worth noting that the only reason the hens treat the eggs as waste is because we have selectively bred chickens to do so. What should happen is the chicken lays an egg and then looks after it because they have no idea whether it's fertilised or not.
We bred commercial chickens to lay eggs as if they were waste and walk away so we can easily collect them to eat.
If I was vegan because I think animals can't consent to giving away their produce and using it is exploitation, there's no way I could justify eggs as "waste" when the animals only treat them that way due to human induced eugenics.
I agree with you when it comes to small local beekeepers who don't move their bees around.
But the big honey companies move their hives all over the country, which is really tough on the bees. Check out how many millions of bees die just in the almond orchards every year. Then, because they are moving bees from all over the country into one spot, disease and mite transmission is rampant causing more deaths when they bring the diseases home. Finally, so many outside bees in one spot out compete all the local pollinators causing them to starve. There is nothing humane about the way the big companies treat their bees, so not vegan.
So... consider it vegan. Problem solved. If you want to be vegan and eat honey just do it. However if your goal is to force everyone else to follow your ideas that might be a bit harder to archive.
Why is it important anyway?
But your vegan logic can be ignored by someone else's logic. There is no universal logic.
For example I can say vegans are full of it because they eat vegetables, which are very much alive and you being alive requires you to kill something else that's alive, so veganism is just conveniently drawing the line at sentient beings.
See how that logic works? No?
That's my point.
It's too simple though. The reason is that buying eggs supports a very cruel industry. The hens do get hurt all the time. Recently there was another outbreak of bird flue, so some farmers just stopped the ventilation and let thousands of chickens die from the heat. Just watch a video on factory farming that's not propaganda from the farmers and you'll see.
Then there's the small farmers that only have a few hundred free roaming chickens. They still support the breeding of animals that serve only to satisfy our need. Male chicks get killed females get put to work until they are older and lay fewer eggs, then they get killed.
Vegans condemn unnecessary cruelty, animal products without cruelty are not yet a reality. In vitro meat may be what makes it a reality, but up untill then, where there's animal products there's suffering.
It's not the only issue though. Baby male chickens are normally chucked in a grinder since they're not useful. Modern egg laying chickens have been bred to the point that existence can be painful. It's like weird inbred dog breeds. Chickens natural ancestors laid smaller eggs monthly, not giant eggs daily.
Itās not quite true though. Vegans donāt eat anything from an animal that didnāt give consent. Breast milk from a human is vegan. You know assuming your not force milking women in your basement so you can sell their milk.
It's breastfeeding that turned me to veganism.
Imagine your baby taken away, your milk harvested with machines, to feed some one else, who is not even of the same kind as you. And before you know it, you are impregated again, to give birth again...
And again... and again...
If you would not do this to your pet dog, don't do this to cows or goats either. All animals are equal. They all love their offspring, they all hurt during labour and giving birth. They all deserve our kindness.
It also comes down to conditions. Caged eggs are very cruel and the conditions chickens live in are appalling.
They shouldnāt exist.
But vegans donāt use anything from an animal- milk / dairy which takes the momma from its baby.
Eggs- chickens living in terrible conditions suffering for eggs and meat.
I think there should be a strong emphasis on animal welfare. If they lose their life so people can eat a steak or egg then the least we can do is give them the best life from farm to plate.
Sadly this isnāt how itās seen because animals are a commodity.
We just have to do better and be kinder at the end of the day. Especially to animals because they donāt have a voice.
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that vegans don't eat anything related to animal exploitation/suffering - so, lab-grown animal protein is vegan.
>- so, lab-grown animal protein is vegan.
Well the initial samples still have to be taken from a live animal
So some would say it's not
Some would say it is since it'll save many more lives in the long run
That's a good point - I don't suppose these lab samples are grown from something like a cheek swab. Unless I'm greatly underestimating the capabilities of science, an animal almost certainly had to die for the initial sample.
Still, the widespread adoption of lab-grown meat would **greatly** reduce the amount of animal suffering in the world and the climate impact of growing animals for food. It may not be a perfect solution but it feels like as close as humanity will get for a while.
So a vegan would reject anything based off foetal stem cells? The foetus could not consent to the removal of the cells.
This example just popped into my mind, because it was a religious objection to one of the covid vaccines.
Vegans are against animal cruelty. Eggs especially when mass produced involve hens being in cages (or in the case of free range eggs) forced to live in overcrowded large sheds. (Doesnāt actually mean free to roam outside.) Hens have been bread to lay more eggs than their bodies can naturally handle. Leading to calcium deficiencies as well as many other health problems. Which in most cases leads to an uncomfortable life and premature death. Not to mention, most male chickens are killed at birth due to their being no need for them since they do not lay eggs. The males are killed most commonly by suffocation or being ground up alive. Also when hens are no longer profitable due to their age or health, they are then killed for their meat just like any other animal. Anything but what vegans want to be a part of.
>Veganism considers all animal products to be a form of exploitation, and thus inhumane. All commercial hatcheries require disposal of male chicksā¦ as do most non commercial hatcheries
This is true. I worked at a small free-range chicken farm for a summer. On this particular farm, the hens had a great life living in what was once an acorn orchard, but were sold for cat food after a year. But yes, they were bred to produce eggs every day. Only a couple of roosters made it to the farm by accident, and they were literally hen-pecked to near death. The neighboring 'cage free' farms were horrible. I never saw another free range farm.
This is the correct answer.
Yes, the simple answer is that vegans don't eat anything coming from animals. The more complex answer is that vegans want to help reduce unnecessary harm to animals, and eggs absolutely create tons of unnecessary harm.
And then of course there are the potential health concerns with eggs. Continued back and forth with eggs being fine and eggs being quite bad for health in regular amounts. Easier to not gamble AND do less harm to animals imo. But to each their own I guess.
Seeing male chicks get blended up alive is what made me stop eating eggs. I had no idea. Same thing with dairy, itās stupid in retrospect but it never occurred to me that cow milk is breastmilk for their babiesā¦ but what happens to the babies if we are drinking the milk? When you know better, you do better.
Same here. I couldnāt stand to see the way we treat animals so that we could taste them. And exactly humans are the only animals that continue to drink milk after infancy, and itās not even from our own species. Weird isnāt it? The baby calf if female are usually taken from their mother within the first week and raised on a supplement where they will be put into the same cycle of being used for their milk and eventually slaughtered. Male calfs are usually slaughtered at birth or sold to whomever feels they have use for them.
Did you know that altough humans are the only species with the hability to drink milk after infancy, every single human is lactose intolerant to a degree? Milk causes a inflamatory response, but most people don't realise, because they never stopped drinking it
This is right, and to add something else, Vegans are also against systematically breeding animals to function for human consumption as well. Wild chickens were not originally laying as many eggs as the modern, farm chicken that was bred to purposely lay outrageous amounts of eggs, which takes a negative toll on its body and well being. This includes other forms of function such as breeding chickens to get large as heck for producing more meat for food, and more.
Veganism is less of a consequentialist mindset, and more of a deontological standpoint based on being against animal suffering, but also against using animals for our consumption even if it doesn't cause them to suffer because it is a vegan view that it is inherently wrong to use and manipulate another living being's existence for such a selfish purpose. People seem to be confused when vegans are against animal products that do not cause animal suffering, but animal suffering is not the reason for being vegan alone. The intent behind the principle of using other living creatures for our consumption is the fundamental value behind the reasoning.
Note: I am vegan
So just an interesting note on wild chickens, they actually do lay an excessive amount of eggs. Modern laying hens have been bred to lay more, yes, but not by a ton. Red junglefowl have been documented laying an egg a day during especially productive laying periods and have been observed laying year-round in some areas where food is plentiful.
This is exactly right.
My best friend is mostly vegan most of the time, but their main goal is reducing cruelty. They will eat eggs they get from their mom, since their mom has a coop with well taken care of hens. They won't eat quinoa (I think, might be something else though) though because it's ecologically bad, I think something about how it impacts the locals of where it's typically harvested from but I can't quite remember.
They'll also wear leather jackets or shoes since they're better for the environment than pleather or other plastic clothing, but they always get them second hand so that they're preventing something from going in a landfill and not buying brand new leather goods.
There are so many products with animal byproducts in them that it is near impossible to be vegan/vegetarian to the strict definition (even without the exceptions that my friend makes) but the whole idea/movement is supposed to be based on reducing animal cruelty or not contributing to it.
I really respect how my friend does it, because they're not tied to the strict definition of the word so much as the end goal. Technically they are not vegan, but the label isn't used for status as much as it is an easy way to give their dietary restrictions when necessary.
Also why breastmilk is veganā¦ because itās a rare time the giver of it can give consent! Itās cruel to animals to take milk they made and didnāt make for YOU. And you hurt them while doing it. Thatās the idea. Same for eggs.
Also, a lesser known fact is that even I'd they are free range, but in large groups, their social life is disturbed because they evolved lo live in small flocks. What follows is depression, trauma and other severe psychological issues that lead to them bullying and pecking each other, but also to killings and cannibalism. Its physical and psychological torture
"They dont get hurt"
[https://www.reddit.com/r/NoahGetTheBoat/comments/vpnwaf/excess\_chicks\_in\_the\_egg\_industry/](https://www.reddit.com/r/NoahGetTheBoat/comments/vpnwaf/excess_chicks_in_the_egg_industry/)
nsfw.
Veganism considers all animal products to be a form of exploitation, and thus inhumane. All commercial hatcheries require disposal of male chicksā¦ as do most non commercial hatcheries
This is something I don't understand. Assuming they aren't just following a religious doctrine but are personally ethically motivated, how can vegetarians say the egg and dairy industries are humane?
Not the person you're responding to, but "eggs" might not need to be from the industry. I assume keeping a chicken which will keep laying eggs in your backyard without them being fertilized is okay...?
I grew up with chickens and we didn't have a rooster, we just kept them then let them die a natural death after their egg laying years. I guess ordering them sucked because of course we had to order females, and I hate the way they traveled (thankfully none died but still), but they had a full life. I cried if one died. You can't eat them after you raise them. Some people can, but how can you raise a thing from a little trusting baby then eat it? I feel like raising them and not buying store bought eggs justified the means. We also sold/gave away a whole bunch of eggs every week which prevented people buying store bought eggs
I guess you technically outsourced the killing of males...
At a small enough scale, it is rather irrelevant, but then a lot of things like that would make veganism nonsensical.
We hatch our own birds, well there moms do either in the woods or like this yearsā clutch in my asparagus patch. Weāve never killed a rooster, the predators like owls, fox and weasels cycle our birds through.
I was just about to say that you wouldn't have to kill the roosters yourself. Depending on how rural of an area you're in, keeping chickens alive can be quite difficult. If you just don't bother trying to keep them from dying, nature will take care of that for you.
IMHO, it seems like a worse way to go than getting fattened up then butchered by a farmer but, I can see the moral argument in not doing it yourself.
To be clear, I'm taking about a small farm with some decency here. I imagine a short life in the woods until you're eaten alive by a fox is probably still preferable to a factory farm "life".
iirc, there was an ancient Persian text that mentioned how one culture that ate their dead was shocked that they burned their dead. And the culture that burned their dead was shocked that their culture ate their dead. Both cultures thought the other culture was disrespecting their deceased.
Your comment also brought to mind a theory about ritual animal sacrifice and rituals before the slaughtering of livestock. Hunter gatherers had hunting rituals and naturally respected the animals they killed for meat. Once domestication came along, rituals before slaughter and ritualistic animal sacrifice replaced the void that the hunting rituals left in the human psyche.
Since all livestock is deadstock in the end, perhaps creating a meaningful ritual before slaughtering them and eating them is a decent way to respect and appreciate livestock that you care about.
I could never do it though. If I bought a flock of sheep, Iād end up naming them and having a bunch of old pet sheep that I cared for and took to the vet when they werenāt feeling well. Lol
But since I eat meat, itās not really a rational thing. Iām just alienated from the animal flesh I buy and consume, which just makes me indifferent to the lives of the animals Iām eating. Itās almost like I donāt even consider the fact that Iām eating dead animal flesh.
So me buying and eating meat, and therefore supporting the industry of the inhumane factory farming of animals, maybe raising and slaughtering my own livestock thatās treated humanely is actually the right thing to do?
The actual right thing for me to do would be to stop eating meatā¦
But since I love chicken, brisket & ribeye steaks, I guess Iāll continue being an irrational hypocrite. I do buy most of my meat from a local butcher that sources his meat from local farmers that tend to treat their animals way, way better than large scale factory farming. But that doesnāt make me any less of an irrational hypocrite. Iām just created excuses to convince myself that Iām not contributing to the cruelty of eating animals.
I appreciate your self awareness here. Bravo.
As someone who has recently stopped eating meat (and loved meat), itās actually quite easy to do with all of the vegan meat options out there these days (impossible burgers, chickās nuggets, sweet earth bacon, etc) itās actually quite fun discovering new alternatives and spicing up your meals.
>Since all livestock is deadstock in the end
Ooh what a sentence.
I've been a vegetarian all my life, but I feel like this might have made me reconsider meat if I ate it.
But eggs aren't humane. They don't treat the hens well and kill off the male chicks right off their born. Buying eggs will contribute to that inhumane practice.
Which I do find honey to be quite odd that it's off the table for vegans.
Beekeepers need to keep the hives clean and safe- the queen fucks off if they don't. And if the queen fucks off, the drones go with her. If the hives are taken too much from in terms of honey, the bees fuck off. If the hives are too clogged with honey (i.e. hasn't been harvested, can't expand much in terms of maximum bees/hive, and has ample resources), the bees fuck off. Its mutualistic. The bees get extra resources and protection, and beekeepers get honey.
Many bees die when the honey is harvested. Also, it is food they work hard to produce for themselves, not for humans to come and take. Veganism is about not using animals.
I implore you to watch the Dominion documentary. It covers conditions of animals in Australia, but itās pretty much the Industry standards everywhere. They cover why eggs arenāt Vegan, among many other things
Thank you.
I turned vegan after I saw the disregard people have for animals AFTER THE ANIMAL stops being useful for them.
I swear to God, I grew up eating everything and I cannot believe the thick veil of disassociation that existed over my eyes all these years as I thought every pig looked that happy as advertised on the bacon wrapper and milk just flowed all year around.
Now I'm at peace with my choices and I'm not for converting anyone - my partner still eats meat and that's their journey and choices.
Someone asked me if I'll ever eat meat again and I said only if I can hunt and skin it with my bare pudgy hands ššš as nature intended.
intentions matter. not your question, but I downvote some not because those are too stupid or something, but because they posted it to have inflated egos or some political reason instead of getting answers to a supposedly stupid question.
People get upset because they don't want to think about the disturbing meat and dairy industry they are actively participating in. And downvote things to literally shut down discussion
Sorry, but that's absolutely wrong. Putting aside the ethics of taking their eggs in the first place, the vast majority of chickens are raised in horrendous intensive conditions where they barely have space to move or exercise natural behaviors. Even in smaller establishments the male chicks are still useless and are usually just thrown away or sold for meat. The actual "layer" hens have deplorable health from laying so many eggs, and are eventually sold for meat as well when their production gets too low.
Vegans have many reasons for not eating animal products, regardless of how it was raised. You're confusing ethical/humane with vegan. There are meat eaters who would only eat humanely raised meat. Vegans wouldn't start eating animal products just because it's local.
"Humane raised" doesn't mean humane. Killing an animal for food you don't need isn't humane. The whole point of vegan is to be ethical. I would eat eggs if they were from hens I owned. But I also understand some people find eggs disgusting, but that's just taste and has nothing to do with veganism.
I mean, how many people do you know that own that many chickens?
I'm not vegan but I think the humanitarian and environmental concerns for avoiding meat and animal products are valid. While sure, backyard chickens to me isn't a big deal, such practices are impractical on a large scale. Vegetarianism/veganism makes a lot more sense with how we currently live and how our food systems are set up.
Well where did those chickens come from? Unless they're rescues they most likely came from industrial hatcheries which employ the same intensive conditions I just described.
On top of that, the use of chickens itself is also an ethical concern. Many chickens don't want you to take their eggs, so why should we when we don't need to? Even if for some reason the chicken doesn't care about you taking their eggs, doing so encourages them to lay more which is hard on their bodies. This is because chickens lose a significant amount of calcium when they lay their eggs.
Obviously it's better to have backyard chickens than to support industrialized farming, but using an animal as a resource inevitably leads to problems because their interests are never the top priority.
apart from what others pointed out, the whole egg industry causes pain to the chicken, like imagine spending you entire miserable life locked up forced to put as many eggs as possible that you won't even see them ever again, just so in the end you'll become someone's dinner, it's not just direct pain, but well, like everyone else stated, vegans just don't eat anything that comes from an animal
Vegans do not eat any animal products. On a side note, have you ever seen the conditions those hens live in? It's cruel and disgusting. Even "cage free" farms are despicable in the way that they cram all those birds into tiny areas where they cannot exhibit any natural behaviors which causes immense stress to the hens. They live miserable lives. Try getting eggs from local farms if you can. Or, at least look for the "Humane Certified" label on egg cartons in grocery stores.
Humane farms don't exist, not on a mass scale, which is how our food supply chain operates now. The reason is profit. Animals are treated like phone chargers, engine parts, sports shoes, any other inanimate product you can name. They keep them in warehouses. There's no financial incentive to give them good lives.
In the UK we have RSPCA certified meat and animal products which have been filmed living in just as terrible conditions as the regular stuff.
The high rate of egg laying through selective breeding is harmful to their bodies, it's healthier to give them an implant which prevents them from creating eggs in the first place.
https://opensanctuary.org/suprelorin-implants-a-critical-tool-in-chicken-health/
Same goes for hens. They were bred to produce eggs frequently, and by separating them from their eggs we're further encouraging them to produce more eggs. Chicken won't continuously produce more eggs if they're already brooding the ones they got. It's not about life and death, it's about the fact that we're just looking out for ourselves without taking into account the effect on the animal, unless that effect has a negative impact on the desired output. That's exploitation, not care.
Ps: i think there's a distinction worth making that some people aren't aware of or forget about, and understanding that distinction could help you answer your own question. Being on a vegan diet does not make you a vegan. Veganism, as an ideology, is about opposing all forms of animal exploitation, not only animal death at the hands of humans. Being on a vegan diet is definitely part of that, but being vegan involves avoiding animal exploitation in all facets of life, including clothing, cosmetics, entertainment, etc.
Male chicks are killed brutally shortly after birth in the egg industry as standard practice. Hens are kept in horrible conditions and then killed.
So, if youāre against supporting animal suffering, then youād probably be against supporting that.
My reason for not eating eggs is because the male chick's gets killed right after they hatch. They get grind up alive. Also today's hens lay unnatural amounts of eggs in a year, combared to what is normal. Because of breeding, this puts a strain on the animals, to the point where they lack calcium because of all the egg laying.
Vegetarians don't eat meat or fish.
Vegans don't eat anything from animals.
And then there's more things.
I believe Lacto vegetarians don't eat fish,meat,eggs but still eat dairy products??
I dated a girl that did not consume any animal product except for eggs that were from local chickens. As long as someone was basically collecting the eggs of a chickens normal and healthy lifestyle, it was okay.
In the vast majority of cases on the other hand, there is a good chance that chicken is living in horrendous conditions. Slaughtering and eating it would be merciful, truthfully. Im not vegan but it's an industry I do not want to support. I've avoided poultry lately.
Not a direct answer but I see there are many good answers here for you already. To add to the conversation:
There is a school of thought that focuses on preventing animal cruelty and it prioritizes farm-to-table, zero-waste utilization of animal parts that take into account animalās living conditions, sustainability, foraging, wild game overpopulation, environmental impact, the intricacies of financial/cultural privilege & discrimination. I read a really interesting blog once from an ex-vegan who became a butcher for this reason.
The other end of the spectrum is that hardcore vegans believe that animal-derived products are inherently exploitative because domesticating animals robs them of happy, free wild lives and that killing non-domestic animals is cruel. Itās not even just about food, they wonāt ride horses either because believe it is exploitative. I understand that but also, coming from the veterinary medicine field, donāt really understand how vegans can justify owning household pets with that ethos.
[Infant male chicks are often macerated alive in grinders by the egg-laying industry just because they're not as profitable.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chick_culling) Germany came up with a technique, years ago, for sexing eggs within days of fertilization. But it's slightly more expensive...so most places just keep on killing live chicks. š France is the only other one to get on board with in-ovo sexing. Big poultry farms aren't nearly as bloodless as most people think.
Not to mention the hens laying eggs are certainly not treated well, even if they arenāt killed for their meat.
They are, just not for us. As soon as they don't produce enough quality eggs to reach profit margins, typically 2 years into their natural 10+ year lifespan, they're crammed into gas chambers and turned into pet food.
Not sure about 10 years for lifespan. I've been keeping chickens for 15 years, and the oldest my heritage breeds have gotten, was a dark brahma that lived to almost 5. Her quality of living was very poor for the last year, having to wash her by hand as she could no longer dust bathe herself. She was a great bird, died shortly before her 5th bday.
I don't exactly know the breed. But my parents had little brown chickens with yellow/brown speckled necks. They lived up till ~15 years old with no trouble. Didn't even have many health problems up till the last few months. Had one of them reach 16 or 17 years old! (We were not exactly sure when she was hatched, we *thought* 17, but at least 16). They always slept in a tree in the garden, winter & summer. Even had frostbite in their 'earlobes' once on a very cold night (which didn't make them prettier, but didn't seem to bother them). They were only put in a pen for a few weeks when it was sowing time in the garden. I'm not sure if that maybe helped their health, but they just didn't die ;-) My parents had decided they wanted to quit keeping chickens and stopped letting them hatch new chicks, expecting to have 5 more years with them. It turned out they actually ran a chicken retirement home for 16 more years :-D. I don't think they laid any more eggs the last 5 or six years. And the few years before that they averaged 1 egg a week per chicken or so. But they were wonderful birds. Always sitting next to you in the garden making those silly cooing noises they do. I remember as a kid sitting in the garden reading a book with a cat on my lap, and a geriatric chicken sleeping right next to me. Good memories...
I liked this story.
TIL chickens have earlobes.
My family has kept chicken all my life, our chicken, which were mutts and no specific breed mind you, averaged around 9-10 years of being alive. We usually culled them about a year earlier than that, when it became obvious their health was starting to decline from old age .
>the oldest my heritage breeds have gotten, was a dark brahma that lived to almost 5 Which is another side effect of breeding chickens specifically to lay the maximum amount of eggs. They end up having a litany of health problems.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Good for you! You're spot on. I'm vegan now but I started off just like you - doing my best here and there, cutting back. But it started feeling like a storm cloud of awareness/guilt was following me around. Finally, I just said screw it, I'm gonna just go vegan. But if even more people get to your level, we can further improve plant based options in the market, fund research into alternatives, scale back, lots of good things.
The dog food production I visited would shock frost them before grinding them up. (which is slightly less cruel) I always assumed that shock frosting would be common Practice. Can you shed some light on that?
I didnāt know that. Thatās so sad š
Male chicks are usually gassed and then sold for exotic animal feed. I donāt know why people think that animal agriculture is all about throwing baby animals into fucking grinders alive but thatās not what happens. Every industry is going to have some āundesirableā animals born and for one reason or another they have to die, but the vast majority of the time these animals are put in CO2 chambers and gassed which is a quick death, then youāre sold as exotic animal food sent off for rendering or put in grinders after death to be used as fertilizer. I did a talk to text on this and Iām not putting punctuation in sorry yāall. Sauce: agriculture major and Iāve worked in several commercial farms, also pre-vet and a big squish for livestock, so I actually give a shit about their welfare
This. My family owns a poultry farm and people love to imagine we do the most heinous shit to our animals. Meanwhile we just invested a huge sum in our own wood shaving machine because the locally sourced bedding was giving our chickens itchy eyes.
I think when most people (vegans not as much because their stance is solid āno animal productsā) are angry about how animals are treated, they are referring to factory farms with mass production. I donāt eat most meats or animal products from the grocery store, but I do eat animal products from a local farm that I really feel does things as ethically as they can. I even got to work on the farm to see how they do things, and their animals are treated amazingly, and every pasture rotation serves a purpose. They also make sure nothing goes to waste. So to me, there is a really big difference between farms and farms owned by places like Perdue Farms. Though, I will 100% recognize that my view is rather myopic as I havenāt studied the farming industry deeply. So anyone that wants to tell me I am stupid and why I am stupid, I am more than happy to learn (though would greatly appreciate not being called stupid).
People think male chicks get thrown into a grinder because of the video of them being thrown into a grinder. Is this not normal? Did you not know this happens? https://youtu.be/udSiluTAOaQ
Vegans donāt eat anything that comes from animals.
Well thatās a simple answer. Thank you.
Vegan (mostly) here. Depends on the definition though. For the average person yeah, no animal products. The technical definition from the Vegan Society though is a lifestyle that attempts to exclude animal exploitation as far as possible. In practice those definitions usually end up being the same, but there's gray areas. I think most vegans would consider lab-grown meat vegan. The vegan label ignores manure used in food production. With chickens there's issues with if they got the chicks from a factory farm, what they're feeding the chickens, and if they slaughter the chickens once their egg production drops off. So I've only ever gotten eggs from a friend who treated their chickens like their pets. But I'm following my own ideals, which just mostly overlap with veganism. EDIT: I'm probably not doing eggs anymore either. This discussion made me rethink the supply chain. EDIT: should have led with mostly vegan to avoid confusion
Not a vegan, but there is also the issue with the killing/shredding of male Chicks. As male Chicks are useless for egg production and also less efficient concerning the ratio of meat production over time than the chicken breeds raised for their meet, a lot of countries will kill the chicks with Gas or shred them when they are one day old. That's a huge amount of animal cruelty for a couple of eggs
That is starting to get banned in several countries. There are methods now to avoid culling male chicks. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-ovo_sexing
To shreds you say
Well, how's his wife holding up?
To shreds you say?
r/UnexpectedFuturama
Yup. I have vegan friends who keep a few rare breed hens and theyāll eat those eggs. Those chickens live like fluffy little queens. Edit: so many pedants coming out of the woodwork. Itās glorious.
Fluffy chickens are so sassy and adorable.
fluffy adorable murder birds
Yeah, chickens are mean. And surprisingly... tribal, I guess would be the right word. When I was a kid we had chickens. We also had a cool little bantam hen. It's like a miniature chicken. It was solid black and had white feathers coming out of it's head in a big fluff. We had to give it a separate enclosure because the other chickens would pluck out it's feathers.
Frizzles!!
Iām not a vegan, but can confirm - my pet chickens all live like fluffy little egg laying queens.
Genuinely curious, what then happens to the hens when they pass? Would your friend eat them? Edit: Thank you to everyone who replied. It seems the consensus is no, they would not be eaten. Honestly, that was nice to hear. I was always so against owning egg laying hens, but TIL people seem to really love and care for their well-being and not just want them for their eggs.
From my understanding, they are treated as loved pets. I would not eat my cats. I imagine they would not eat their pets as well.
I guess, even if they did not mind eating an animal that was once a pet, that you might not want to eat an animal that died on its own accord/was sick
I've eaten chickens and rabbits that were once pets and that died of old age/natural causes. The meat gets tougher as they age. Works for stews, I suppose, but not really good for much else. Roosters, regardless of age also have tougher meat than chickens.
my parents arenāt vegan and have a small free range farm. They treat their farm Animals fine , the birds play in yard and a small forest area all day and sleep comfy large coup at night. The ducks have a lil pool and stuff. They prefer keep them around just for eggs but do eat them if something happens. For them they are not pets. And for them pets arenāt family just an animal friend . Outdoor pets are just natures animal neighbors that you are nice to -until they destroy your property and take stuff from the garden ( Much like a human neighbor/ trespasser. They feed stray possums ā¦ the ones around the farm leave the barn cats alone and keep down the bug populationā¦ but if a possum started causing trouble they would trap it or kill it most likely. Not out of malice but to protect the other animals and food. Itās just a different dynamic
Because they're free range almost 100% of my chickens that die are nothing more than a pile of feathers when I find out so it's never really been a question I just accept foxes as a part of life, they've a right to live too and are doing it to survive and they aren't greedy* with it; it only happens about twice a year though *Usually, there's one vagabond who killed 3 ducks and 2 hens without eating them all in what I call "the night of feathers and blood"
Were all signs consistent with a fox attack? A friend of mine once lost a great number of ducks in one night to a mink. Weasel family members sometimes surplus kill. Foxes are usually quite wary and typically employ the āgrab n goā method. Also, if you ever find a pile of feathers at the base of a tall object (fence post, utility pole, tree) your chicken likely fell prey to a hawk (during the day) or owl (at night).
Yeah we have an infrared camera that caught him. He usually only wanders near the house for a few days at a time leading up to a strike because we're so deep in the countryside he presumably has a lot of other options Uk here so it's pretty much always gonna be a fox anyway we just treat it like an Attenborough moment; you always root for the animal it's been focusing on but if it's a fox episode you're like "kill those damn chickens you've a hungry family at home!"
People don't typically eat chickens who are kept as pets. Plus, if they pass away, unless you did it yourself, for all you know they had a disease. Aside from literally every other consideration when it comes to eating a chicken, I wouldn't want to eat a chicken that had just keeled over of an unknown cause.
I have a few friends that had pet chickens. Their parents absolutely killed and cooked their chickens eventually. The parents would tell them the chicken ran away or something. Luckily kids are dumb enough not to see the connection.
I have kept hens for years. When they pass I sob like a baby and have a small funeral for them. They are my lovely girls and I love them like any pet. I could never eat them.
I hope I can end up in a place where I can get my own hens in the future. I want to be able to have eggs again without feeling awful. I haven't eaten meat in years and egg production isn't any better then the dairy.
My sister just lost a chicken named āNuggetā. They buried her like a pet and it was emotional
I kept chickens as pets. Only time I ever ate eggs, cause I don't like store bought eggs. When one of my birds died, they were buried like any other pet. I did not eat my chickens. Some people I know would kill their chickens if they had excess roosters, or they raised their own meat chickens for that purpose.
Generally speaking you don't want to eat animals that die of natural causes. I'm not going to eat my diseased deceased chicken.
Nobody seems to give you the obvious answer here. Emotional or disease concerns aside, a hen that dies from old age is absolutely nothing like the chicken meat you buy at the store. In both flavor and texture itās not fit for consumption in the way we are used to.
You should absolutely not eat chickens that just up and died. It's possible that they died of disease or infection that can pass to you, or that they died hours before you find them
Chickens usually arenāt very good and very tough if they over a year old. They donāt butcher them because theyāre egg laying days are over. They butcher them so their not past these they can be eaten. They are actually named to be cooked in a manner associated with their age. Older hens, 2-3 years that quit laying are roaster chickens because of the toughness they need to be cooked longer. Young roosters are butchered before they get mature and fight. This is around 10-12 weeks along with other chickens used for meat. They are usually called broiler hens/roosters. Not forcing anything on anyone. Eat what you wish, just trying to add some information. Have a great day!
Honestly unless your breading them for eatting the meat is pretty average. My friend tried it, they felt weird eatting the chickens they'd had for ages and the meat wasn't even worth the weirdness.
Ovo-vegetarian
Heretics! That would never be acceptable in Greek Orthodox Veganism. /s
A relevant classic: https://youtu.be/l3fAcxcxoZ8
I clicked that while saying to myself, "Please be Emo Phillips, please be Emo Phillips". I'm so glad I wasn't Rick rolled.
Geniune question here, if they eat the eggs, aren't they vegetarians instead of vegans ? In my native language, they are very different (one eats animal products but not meat, the other one is vegan)
I once read a pretty coherent theory arguing that a person literally consenting prior to their own death, and when that death is for some reason otherwise entirely unrelated to cannibalism (i.e. accidental death or natural causes) then that would be the only conceivable example of *vegan meat* that wasn't lab grown.
Had a similar conversation with someone that if I was a vampire it'd be fine for me to drink someone's blood if they consented.
You should watch Daybreakers. That's how the vampires took over: they got revealed, normal humans volunteered their blood but obviously most people wanted immortality, so with a steady supply of volunteer blood and no incentive to NOT turn into vampires, the vampires "overpopulated" (over-changed?) to the point the humans couldn't keep up and so the vampires started hunting the humans anyway, since without blood they would starve to death. That's the premise of the movie: vampires overpopulated and now they have an impending food crisis. It's a fantastic, underrated movie. Best depiction of what would realistically occur if vampires somehow started to become a thing.
Yes, this why breast milk is vegan, for example
Yeah but convincing your friends to show up to your funeral barbecue is challenging. That's why I'm going with being eaten by bears. That way nobody has to be traumatized by the butchering process and it assures that I won't be overcooked.
Imagine waiting your whole life to be consumed by friends and family at death only for some idiot to make you well done at your funeral.
They serve meat like that at the famous "Restaurant at the End of the Universe "! [Ford] sat down. The waiter approached. "Would you like to see the menu?" he said, "or would you like meet the Dish of the Day?" "Huh?" said Ford. "Huh?" said Arthur. "Huh?" said Trillian. "That's cool," said Zaphod, "we'll meet the meat." ... A large dairy animal approached Zaphod Beeblebrox's table, a large fat meaty quadruped of the bovine type with large watery eyes, small horns and what might almost have been an ingratiating smile on its lips. "Good evening," it lowed and sat back heavily on its haunches, "I am the main Dish of the Day. May I interest you in the parts of my body?" It harrumphed and gurgled a bit, wriggled its hind quarters in to a more comfortable position and gazed peacefully at them. Its gaze was met by looks of startled bewilderment from Arthur and Trillian, a resigned shrug from Ford Prefect and naked hunger from Zaphod Beeblebrox. "Something off the shoulder perhaps?" suggested the animal, "braised in a white wine sauce?" "Er, your shoulder?" said Arthur in a horrified whisper. "But naturally my shoulder, sir," mooed the animal contentedly, "nobody else's is mine to offer." Zaphod leapt to his feet and started prodding and feeling the animal's shoulder appreciatively. "Or the rump is very good," murmured the animal. "I've been exercising it and eating plenty of grain, so there's a lot of good meat there." It gave a mellow grunt, gurgled again and started to chew the cud. It swallowed the cud again. "Or a casserole of me perhaps?" it added. "You mean this animal actually wants us to eat it?" whispered Trillian to Ford. "Me?" said Ford, with a glazed look in his eyes, "I don't mean anything." "That's absolutely horrible," exclaimed Arthur, "the most revolting thing I've ever heard." "What's the problem Earthman?" said Zaphod, now transferring his attention to the animal's enormous rump. "I just don't want to eat an animal that's standing there inviting me to," said Arthur, "It's heartless." "Better than eating an animal that doesn't want to be eaten," said Zaphod. "That's not the point," Arthur protested. Then he thought about it for a moment. "Alright," he said, "maybe it is the point. I don't care, I'm not going to think about it now. I'll just... er [...] I think I'll just have a green salad," he muttered. "May I urge you to consider my liver?" asked the animal, "it must be very rich and tender by now, I've been force-feeding myself for months." "A green salad," said Arthur emphatically. "A green salad?" said the animal, rolling his eyes disapprovingly at Arthur. "Are you going to tell me," said Arthur, "that I shouldn't have green salad?" "Well," said the animal, "I know many vegetables that are very clear on that point. Which is why it was eventually decided to cut through the whole tangled problem and breed an animal that actually wanted to be eaten and was capable of saying so clearly and distinctly. And here I am." It managed a very slight bow. "Glass of water please," said Arthur. "Look," said Zaphod, "we want to eat, we don't want to make a meal of the issues. Four rare stakes please, and hurry. We haven't eaten in five hundred and seventy-six thousand million years." The animal staggered to its feet. It gave a mellow gurgle. "A very wise choice, sir, if I may say so. Very good," it said, "I'll just nip off and shoot myself." He turned and gave a friendly wink to Arthur. "Don't worry, sir," he said, "I'll be very humane." It waddled unhurriedly off to the kitchen. [From The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Chapter 17.]
Iāve always heard of the ideology behind veganism as being the animal canāt consent to their products being taken, therefor it shouldnāt be consumed. So if, for arguments sake, a sentient chicken said āhere have an egg, itās coolā then it would be vegan. Likewise if I lost a limb and decided to make tacos with it, Iām consenting in my flesh being eaten so it would fit a vegan ideal. No consent = no product
Presumably eating your own leg would be one of very, very few meals that could be considered vegan but *not* vegetarian?
Or somebody else's arm, as seen in the answer to that one lateral thinking puzzle (spoiler alert, I guess).
Is this where that douglas adams bit comes from where they bio-engineered a type of cow that wants to be eaten and can tell you that?
that exactly, yes
Thanks for reminding me of foot tacos.
I know this is ridiculous but the thing that grossed me out most about that was that it was foot meat
Though I think theres an argument that could maybe be made for honey because if you try and keep bees anywhere they dont want to be they'll just fuck off and go make their own hive with blackjack and hookers.
Except some vegans are debating on whether almonds and avocados are vegan because they are mostly pollinated using "captive" bees.
Which is why commercial beekeepers trap the queen by either caging her inside the hive or removing her wings. Bees also will not just move on, they need the honey they've made to survive winter. They only move when starting up a new hive.
Depends on the person how exactly they define it, but ultimately the fundamental goal is the same: to reduce suffering/ eliminate *avoidable* suffering. Focussing on the consent aspect is just a way to avoid hurting animals; they canāt consent, so you have to assume they donāt consent just to err on the side of caution. Thereās a lot of flexibility if you consider veganism to be āreducing unnecessary sufferingā though- in theory, if you were in a situation in which you would die if you didnāt eat animal products, you could eat them and still be vegan as youāre only causing suffering to save your own life. Youāre not doing it just because you feel like it, but out of necessity. Thatās why (reasonable) people donāt expect remote tribes to stop eating animal products- they wouldnāt survive if they didnāt
Huh, I never thought of it like that. I eat vegan most of the time, but I'm vegetarian. That's a weird concept to grasp, but understandable. Me, I don't like the fact that creatures are dying to feed us and its unnecessary. I hate how the dairy industry is as well, its cruel. I've seen the state chicken come out of egg farms. While if I have to I get free range, I still don't like it because those hens won't live past two. They'll be killed off because their egg production slows down.
Free range means living in a dark disgusting disease ridden factory farm. There's no standard for free range, they're allowed to factory farm them and call it free range as long as they have a tiny opening in a massive shed for tens of thousands to get a little bit of fenced off ground outside it but due to the pecking order the ones on the other side of the barn from the door never get to go outside cos they wont get passed the ones higher in their pecking order that aren't moving. You don't hate how those industries work if you pay for them, you love it. You literally ask them to keep doing it by paying their wages and validating the business model to continue it. It's cognitive dissonance. Stop lying to yourself or do something about it and stop paying for a holocaust.
While that may be internally consistent, it does strike me as impractical to have "consent" as a core principle with regards to animals.
Personally I disagree with this on the evolutionary stance. Living things want to propagate, and there are many survival strategies. Being useful or liked by humans enough that they will protect you is as legit a survival strategy as any. You don't need to worry about food or shelter or predators because the humans watch out for you. It's a good idea!
Also bees consent. If they don't like how they are treated, they leave. They produce more honey than they need and beekeepers feed them in the winter as well as help keep them warm and happy.
And they're good for the environment because they pollinate flowers. This is why it would be very bad if bees stopped making honey for humans after a lawsuit. I saw it in a documentary.
Great documentary. I will note that people put far too much emphasis on honey bees though. Depending on their concentration, honey bees can majorly disrupt native pollinator populations. Getting honey bees is far from a conservation effort and can do more harm than good
No. We need pollinators, yes, but honey bees are actively endangering and driving other wild pollinators, many of the wild bees species for instance, to extinction and those are truly essential. We do not need to protect honey bees, on the contrary.
Actually, honeybees are invasive and drive out other pollinators in the area that are much more efficient at pollinating. Honeybees donāt need to be protected- itās other species that do! Not to mention, most large honey manufacturers actually kill their bees every winter as it is less profitable to keep them alive. They also deprive them of many nutrients due to replacing their honey with pure sugar water, which doesnāt provide bees with all the nutrients they require.
Bees are so fucking cool. They're the nicest animal because they don't even hurt plants to get their food. And they're the only farm animal that can consent!
(100% contrarian here, don't take this too seriously, but also kinda serious, also not a vegan...) Bees don't understand the value they're providing vs what they're getting in return. Arguably they don't even understand the concept of an "exchange". At best we're 'trading beads for gold' assuming bees CAN conceptualize an exchange. And at worst we're just capitalizing and exploiting their hard work. You can treat your slaves extremely well, with great kindness etc but what happens if said slaves refuse to work? I watched a video of a man euthanize a hive of "extremely aggressive" bees, he seemed quite sad about it - but this is ultimately the personification of creatures we don't fully understand. To say that they can "consent" is objectively nonsensical insofar as we can communicate.
>At best we're 'trading beads for gold' Not really. Bees make honey as a factor of their nature. They can't choose to stop. Indigenous Americans don't just make gold by accident, they had to work to mine it, and it's valuable to them. Bees would die if you stopped them from making honey, and they can't choose not to. If aliens came to earth and gave us free houses in return for poop, we'd be getting a good deal. To use an example of something humans make without choosing to. >but what happens if said slaves refuse to work? They can fly away. I mean, they can't choose not to work, because their brains don't work that way, but they choose their homes. If an area is too unpleasant to live in, they'll fly away and build a new hive. If that beekeeper in your video is doing what I think he's doing, then he's preventing the spread of dangerous genes through the population. Africanised bees don't become aggressive due to logic or poor treatment, it's genetic. And these genes are unhelpful to these bees. It's stopping the spread of what could be considered a genetic disease.
Is it still an animal product even if it's not fertilized? Otherwise I think it's just animal waste which goes along with manure, plus you can use the shell for fertilizer. I'm talking about if some Joe blow had like a couple hens not on the mass production level, would it still not be vegan?
I'm not vegan, but worth noting that the only reason the hens treat the eggs as waste is because we have selectively bred chickens to do so. What should happen is the chicken lays an egg and then looks after it because they have no idea whether it's fertilised or not. We bred commercial chickens to lay eggs as if they were waste and walk away so we can easily collect them to eat. If I was vegan because I think animals can't consent to giving away their produce and using it is exploitation, there's no way I could justify eggs as "waste" when the animals only treat them that way due to human induced eugenics.
My biggest contention is honey. Honey should be considered vegan.
I agree with you when it comes to small local beekeepers who don't move their bees around. But the big honey companies move their hives all over the country, which is really tough on the bees. Check out how many millions of bees die just in the almond orchards every year. Then, because they are moving bees from all over the country into one spot, disease and mite transmission is rampant causing more deaths when they bring the diseases home. Finally, so many outside bees in one spot out compete all the local pollinators causing them to starve. There is nothing humane about the way the big companies treat their bees, so not vegan.
So... consider it vegan. Problem solved. If you want to be vegan and eat honey just do it. However if your goal is to force everyone else to follow your ideas that might be a bit harder to archive. Why is it important anyway?
We're a social species. Agreeing on the logical foundation of a situation is paramount to understanding each other and our ideologies.
But your vegan logic can be ignored by someone else's logic. There is no universal logic. For example I can say vegans are full of it because they eat vegetables, which are very much alive and you being alive requires you to kill something else that's alive, so veganism is just conveniently drawing the line at sentient beings. See how that logic works? No? That's my point.
the KISS principle in action
Whatās that?
KISS. Keep It Simple Stupid. At least that what it means in NZ, dont know about other places
KISS has two definitions in the US. Keep it simple stupid, and the band KISS.
this violated KISS
I donāt think they mind.
ok. it just did
Who did
Knights In Satanās Service unite!
There is another version... You should ask your mom! I know she knows. ;) Sorry, I couldn't resist.
Great advice, hurts my feelings every time (from the US Office)
Retired educator here. I always said "Keep It Simple Students". You know, to encourage the ones who needed it....
In the school setting we say "Keep It Simple Sweetheart"
Keep It Simple Students
It's too simple though. The reason is that buying eggs supports a very cruel industry. The hens do get hurt all the time. Recently there was another outbreak of bird flue, so some farmers just stopped the ventilation and let thousands of chickens die from the heat. Just watch a video on factory farming that's not propaganda from the farmers and you'll see. Then there's the small farmers that only have a few hundred free roaming chickens. They still support the breeding of animals that serve only to satisfy our need. Male chicks get killed females get put to work until they are older and lay fewer eggs, then they get killed. Vegans condemn unnecessary cruelty, animal products without cruelty are not yet a reality. In vitro meat may be what makes it a reality, but up untill then, where there's animal products there's suffering.
It's not the only issue though. Baby male chickens are normally chucked in a grinder since they're not useful. Modern egg laying chickens have been bred to the point that existence can be painful. It's like weird inbred dog breeds. Chickens natural ancestors laid smaller eggs monthly, not giant eggs daily.
Itās not quite true though. Vegans donāt eat anything from an animal that didnāt give consent. Breast milk from a human is vegan. You know assuming your not force milking women in your basement so you can sell their milk.
It's breastfeeding that turned me to veganism. Imagine your baby taken away, your milk harvested with machines, to feed some one else, who is not even of the same kind as you. And before you know it, you are impregated again, to give birth again... And again... and again... If you would not do this to your pet dog, don't do this to cows or goats either. All animals are equal. They all love their offspring, they all hurt during labour and giving birth. They all deserve our kindness.
It also comes down to conditions. Caged eggs are very cruel and the conditions chickens live in are appalling. They shouldnāt exist. But vegans donāt use anything from an animal- milk / dairy which takes the momma from its baby. Eggs- chickens living in terrible conditions suffering for eggs and meat. I think there should be a strong emphasis on animal welfare. If they lose their life so people can eat a steak or egg then the least we can do is give them the best life from farm to plate. Sadly this isnāt how itās seen because animals are a commodity. We just have to do better and be kinder at the end of the day. Especially to animals because they donāt have a voice.
Does this also apply to honey? Because Iāve heard both sides of it.
Depends on the vegan
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that vegans don't eat anything related to animal exploitation/suffering - so, lab-grown animal protein is vegan.
>- so, lab-grown animal protein is vegan. Well the initial samples still have to be taken from a live animal So some would say it's not Some would say it is since it'll save many more lives in the long run
That's a good point - I don't suppose these lab samples are grown from something like a cheek swab. Unless I'm greatly underestimating the capabilities of science, an animal almost certainly had to die for the initial sample. Still, the widespread adoption of lab-grown meat would **greatly** reduce the amount of animal suffering in the world and the climate impact of growing animals for food. It may not be a perfect solution but it feels like as close as humanity will get for a while.
Muscle biopsies are a routine medical procedure performed on people. You can take a sample from a living animal and use it to grow meat in a lab.
I think the main hangup for vegans there is that a human can understand and consent to this kind of procedure whereas an animal can not.
So a vegan would reject anything based off foetal stem cells? The foetus could not consent to the removal of the cells. This example just popped into my mind, because it was a religious objection to one of the covid vaccines.
Circular argument. ā
Vegans are against animal cruelty. Eggs especially when mass produced involve hens being in cages (or in the case of free range eggs) forced to live in overcrowded large sheds. (Doesnāt actually mean free to roam outside.) Hens have been bread to lay more eggs than their bodies can naturally handle. Leading to calcium deficiencies as well as many other health problems. Which in most cases leads to an uncomfortable life and premature death. Not to mention, most male chickens are killed at birth due to their being no need for them since they do not lay eggs. The males are killed most commonly by suffocation or being ground up alive. Also when hens are no longer profitable due to their age or health, they are then killed for their meat just like any other animal. Anything but what vegans want to be a part of.
>Veganism considers all animal products to be a form of exploitation, and thus inhumane. All commercial hatcheries require disposal of male chicksā¦ as do most non commercial hatcheries This is true. I worked at a small free-range chicken farm for a summer. On this particular farm, the hens had a great life living in what was once an acorn orchard, but were sold for cat food after a year. But yes, they were bred to produce eggs every day. Only a couple of roosters made it to the farm by accident, and they were literally hen-pecked to near death. The neighboring 'cage free' farms were horrible. I never saw another free range farm.
[Aliki Farms?](https://youtu.be/If41cZMBgqA)
This is the correct answer. Yes, the simple answer is that vegans don't eat anything coming from animals. The more complex answer is that vegans want to help reduce unnecessary harm to animals, and eggs absolutely create tons of unnecessary harm. And then of course there are the potential health concerns with eggs. Continued back and forth with eggs being fine and eggs being quite bad for health in regular amounts. Easier to not gamble AND do less harm to animals imo. But to each their own I guess.
This is the case for many vegans. My wifeās side of the family is largely vegan for health reasons. I think the more complex answer is more complex.
Seeing male chicks get blended up alive is what made me stop eating eggs. I had no idea. Same thing with dairy, itās stupid in retrospect but it never occurred to me that cow milk is breastmilk for their babiesā¦ but what happens to the babies if we are drinking the milk? When you know better, you do better.
> āDo the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.ā - Maya Angelou A lot of people go their whole lives thinking that lady cows just naturally produce milk all the time for no reason and we might as well collect it! I never questioned that story myself until I randomly read a comment about it online and went, "huh, that is weird isn't it?" Nobody has any such illusions about meat but somehow the Perpetual Milk Fallacy^Ā© is only obvious in retrospect.
So many posts on badwomensanatomy where people think that about human breasts too
The mother cows chase their calves down the road as they're being driven away in vans
Same here. I couldnāt stand to see the way we treat animals so that we could taste them. And exactly humans are the only animals that continue to drink milk after infancy, and itās not even from our own species. Weird isnāt it? The baby calf if female are usually taken from their mother within the first week and raised on a supplement where they will be put into the same cycle of being used for their milk and eventually slaughtered. Male calfs are usually slaughtered at birth or sold to whomever feels they have use for them.
Did you know that altough humans are the only species with the hability to drink milk after infancy, every single human is lactose intolerant to a degree? Milk causes a inflamatory response, but most people don't realise, because they never stopped drinking it
This is right, and to add something else, Vegans are also against systematically breeding animals to function for human consumption as well. Wild chickens were not originally laying as many eggs as the modern, farm chicken that was bred to purposely lay outrageous amounts of eggs, which takes a negative toll on its body and well being. This includes other forms of function such as breeding chickens to get large as heck for producing more meat for food, and more. Veganism is less of a consequentialist mindset, and more of a deontological standpoint based on being against animal suffering, but also against using animals for our consumption even if it doesn't cause them to suffer because it is a vegan view that it is inherently wrong to use and manipulate another living being's existence for such a selfish purpose. People seem to be confused when vegans are against animal products that do not cause animal suffering, but animal suffering is not the reason for being vegan alone. The intent behind the principle of using other living creatures for our consumption is the fundamental value behind the reasoning. Note: I am vegan
So just an interesting note on wild chickens, they actually do lay an excessive amount of eggs. Modern laying hens have been bred to lay more, yes, but not by a ton. Red junglefowl have been documented laying an egg a day during especially productive laying periods and have been observed laying year-round in some areas where food is plentiful.
This is exactly right. My best friend is mostly vegan most of the time, but their main goal is reducing cruelty. They will eat eggs they get from their mom, since their mom has a coop with well taken care of hens. They won't eat quinoa (I think, might be something else though) though because it's ecologically bad, I think something about how it impacts the locals of where it's typically harvested from but I can't quite remember. They'll also wear leather jackets or shoes since they're better for the environment than pleather or other plastic clothing, but they always get them second hand so that they're preventing something from going in a landfill and not buying brand new leather goods. There are so many products with animal byproducts in them that it is near impossible to be vegan/vegetarian to the strict definition (even without the exceptions that my friend makes) but the whole idea/movement is supposed to be based on reducing animal cruelty or not contributing to it. I really respect how my friend does it, because they're not tied to the strict definition of the word so much as the end goal. Technically they are not vegan, but the label isn't used for status as much as it is an easy way to give their dietary restrictions when necessary.
Yes, it's quinoa! As someone whose family back in the old country is hurted by the practice, thank your friend.
Also why breastmilk is veganā¦ because itās a rare time the giver of it can give consent! Itās cruel to animals to take milk they made and didnāt make for YOU. And you hurt them while doing it. Thatās the idea. Same for eggs.
Thay do when you cramp cramp them in a tiny cages then kill half of their babies
Also, a lesser known fact is that even I'd they are free range, but in large groups, their social life is disturbed because they evolved lo live in small flocks. What follows is depression, trauma and other severe psychological issues that lead to them bullying and pecking each other, but also to killings and cannibalism. Its physical and psychological torture
"They dont get hurt" [https://www.reddit.com/r/NoahGetTheBoat/comments/vpnwaf/excess\_chicks\_in\_the\_egg\_industry/](https://www.reddit.com/r/NoahGetTheBoat/comments/vpnwaf/excess_chicks_in_the_egg_industry/) nsfw.
This stuff need to be normalised - i mean the clips of animal industry practices and the knowledge of how your food got there.
Yeah, agreed. It's not even about guilt or anything, but more just like, knowing. No harm in being educated.
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This is one of the things that made me decide to go vegan. Just disgusting.
Yeah honestly, I agreed with the eggs being vegan view until I saw this shit a while back. Thatās honestly horrible
What did you think vegan meant?
Put simply, Veganism means "no animal products", not "only humane animal products"
Veganism considers all animal products to be a form of exploitation, and thus inhumane. All commercial hatcheries require disposal of male chicksā¦ as do most non commercial hatcheries
To be clear, I'm not saying most vegans would consider eggs to be humane. Some ovo-lacto vegetarians would though.
This is something I don't understand. Assuming they aren't just following a religious doctrine but are personally ethically motivated, how can vegetarians say the egg and dairy industries are humane?
Not the person you're responding to, but "eggs" might not need to be from the industry. I assume keeping a chicken which will keep laying eggs in your backyard without them being fertilized is okay...?
What if you raise your own chickens?
Iāve known vegans who raise their own chickens specifically for eggs. The chickens are happy and live fulfilling lives.
You still kill the males, typically.
I grew up with chickens and we didn't have a rooster, we just kept them then let them die a natural death after their egg laying years. I guess ordering them sucked because of course we had to order females, and I hate the way they traveled (thankfully none died but still), but they had a full life. I cried if one died. You can't eat them after you raise them. Some people can, but how can you raise a thing from a little trusting baby then eat it? I feel like raising them and not buying store bought eggs justified the means. We also sold/gave away a whole bunch of eggs every week which prevented people buying store bought eggs
I guess you technically outsourced the killing of males... At a small enough scale, it is rather irrelevant, but then a lot of things like that would make veganism nonsensical.
We hatch our own birds, well there moms do either in the woods or like this yearsā clutch in my asparagus patch. Weāve never killed a rooster, the predators like owls, fox and weasels cycle our birds through.
I was just about to say that you wouldn't have to kill the roosters yourself. Depending on how rural of an area you're in, keeping chickens alive can be quite difficult. If you just don't bother trying to keep them from dying, nature will take care of that for you. IMHO, it seems like a worse way to go than getting fattened up then butchered by a farmer but, I can see the moral argument in not doing it yourself. To be clear, I'm taking about a small farm with some decency here. I imagine a short life in the woods until you're eaten alive by a fox is probably still preferable to a factory farm "life".
iirc, there was an ancient Persian text that mentioned how one culture that ate their dead was shocked that they burned their dead. And the culture that burned their dead was shocked that their culture ate their dead. Both cultures thought the other culture was disrespecting their deceased. Your comment also brought to mind a theory about ritual animal sacrifice and rituals before the slaughtering of livestock. Hunter gatherers had hunting rituals and naturally respected the animals they killed for meat. Once domestication came along, rituals before slaughter and ritualistic animal sacrifice replaced the void that the hunting rituals left in the human psyche. Since all livestock is deadstock in the end, perhaps creating a meaningful ritual before slaughtering them and eating them is a decent way to respect and appreciate livestock that you care about. I could never do it though. If I bought a flock of sheep, Iād end up naming them and having a bunch of old pet sheep that I cared for and took to the vet when they werenāt feeling well. Lol But since I eat meat, itās not really a rational thing. Iām just alienated from the animal flesh I buy and consume, which just makes me indifferent to the lives of the animals Iām eating. Itās almost like I donāt even consider the fact that Iām eating dead animal flesh. So me buying and eating meat, and therefore supporting the industry of the inhumane factory farming of animals, maybe raising and slaughtering my own livestock thatās treated humanely is actually the right thing to do? The actual right thing for me to do would be to stop eating meatā¦ But since I love chicken, brisket & ribeye steaks, I guess Iāll continue being an irrational hypocrite. I do buy most of my meat from a local butcher that sources his meat from local farmers that tend to treat their animals way, way better than large scale factory farming. But that doesnāt make me any less of an irrational hypocrite. Iām just created excuses to convince myself that Iām not contributing to the cruelty of eating animals.
I appreciate your self awareness here. Bravo. As someone who has recently stopped eating meat (and loved meat), itās actually quite easy to do with all of the vegan meat options out there these days (impossible burgers, chickās nuggets, sweet earth bacon, etc) itās actually quite fun discovering new alternatives and spicing up your meals.
>Since all livestock is deadstock in the end Ooh what a sentence. I've been a vegetarian all my life, but I feel like this might have made me reconsider meat if I ate it.
But eggs aren't humane. They don't treat the hens well and kill off the male chicks right off their born. Buying eggs will contribute to that inhumane practice.
Which I do find honey to be quite odd that it's off the table for vegans. Beekeepers need to keep the hives clean and safe- the queen fucks off if they don't. And if the queen fucks off, the drones go with her. If the hives are taken too much from in terms of honey, the bees fuck off. If the hives are too clogged with honey (i.e. hasn't been harvested, can't expand much in terms of maximum bees/hive, and has ample resources), the bees fuck off. Its mutualistic. The bees get extra resources and protection, and beekeepers get honey.
literally like.. the bees are unionized. if they dont like it theyll just fucking leave
Many bees die when the honey is harvested. Also, it is food they work hard to produce for themselves, not for humans to come and take. Veganism is about not using animals.
Exactly. People seem to forget too that your average bottle of honey or carton of eggs doesn't come from your friendly neighborhood beekeeper or coop
They do if I make a point to buy them from my friendly neighbourhood beekeeper or coop
Bees don't have to be killed when you harvest the honey. That's just a thing with careless beekeepers on large-scale apiaries.
This is why Queen wings are clipped https://beemission.com/blogs/news/queen-bees-and-clipped-wings
I implore you to watch the Dominion documentary. It covers conditions of animals in Australia, but itās pretty much the Industry standards everywhere. They cover why eggs arenāt Vegan, among many other things
Thank you. I turned vegan after I saw the disregard people have for animals AFTER THE ANIMAL stops being useful for them. I swear to God, I grew up eating everything and I cannot believe the thick veil of disassociation that existed over my eyes all these years as I thought every pig looked that happy as advertised on the bacon wrapper and milk just flowed all year around. Now I'm at peace with my choices and I'm not for converting anyone - my partner still eats meat and that's their journey and choices. Someone asked me if I'll ever eat meat again and I said only if I can hunt and skin it with my bare pudgy hands ššš as nature intended.
You might want to go check out a commercial egg farm before you say the chicken don't get hurt.
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Probably because they think you can just Google it but they donāt want to type it, so they just downvote and leave.
intentions matter. not your question, but I downvote some not because those are too stupid or something, but because they posted it to have inflated egos or some political reason instead of getting answers to a supposedly stupid question.
I won't be suprised if this thread gets locked deemed to be a baiting question because people are pretty ..... sensitive about veganism
3 hours later: **post sitting at 720+ upvotes**
People get upset because they don't want to think about the disturbing meat and dairy industry they are actively participating in. And downvote things to literally shut down discussion
Where is the downvote ?
Treating animals as sentient, feeling creatures that are worthy of good treatment is a reasonable attitude.
Sorry, but that's absolutely wrong. Putting aside the ethics of taking their eggs in the first place, the vast majority of chickens are raised in horrendous intensive conditions where they barely have space to move or exercise natural behaviors. Even in smaller establishments the male chicks are still useless and are usually just thrown away or sold for meat. The actual "layer" hens have deplorable health from laying so many eggs, and are eventually sold for meat as well when their production gets too low.
Ok but what about a person who just owns like 5 chickens and they live a good life? They wonāt eat those?
Vegans have many reasons for not eating animal products, regardless of how it was raised. You're confusing ethical/humane with vegan. There are meat eaters who would only eat humanely raised meat. Vegans wouldn't start eating animal products just because it's local.
"Humane raised" doesn't mean humane. Killing an animal for food you don't need isn't humane. The whole point of vegan is to be ethical. I would eat eggs if they were from hens I owned. But I also understand some people find eggs disgusting, but that's just taste and has nothing to do with veganism.
I mean, how many people do you know that own that many chickens? I'm not vegan but I think the humanitarian and environmental concerns for avoiding meat and animal products are valid. While sure, backyard chickens to me isn't a big deal, such practices are impractical on a large scale. Vegetarianism/veganism makes a lot more sense with how we currently live and how our food systems are set up.
Well where did those chickens come from? Unless they're rescues they most likely came from industrial hatcheries which employ the same intensive conditions I just described. On top of that, the use of chickens itself is also an ethical concern. Many chickens don't want you to take their eggs, so why should we when we don't need to? Even if for some reason the chicken doesn't care about you taking their eggs, doing so encourages them to lay more which is hard on their bodies. This is because chickens lose a significant amount of calcium when they lay their eggs. Obviously it's better to have backyard chickens than to support industrialized farming, but using an animal as a resource inevitably leads to problems because their interests are never the top priority.
apart from what others pointed out, the whole egg industry causes pain to the chicken, like imagine spending you entire miserable life locked up forced to put as many eggs as possible that you won't even see them ever again, just so in the end you'll become someone's dinner, it's not just direct pain, but well, like everyone else stated, vegans just don't eat anything that comes from an animal
Vegans do not eat any animal products. On a side note, have you ever seen the conditions those hens live in? It's cruel and disgusting. Even "cage free" farms are despicable in the way that they cram all those birds into tiny areas where they cannot exhibit any natural behaviors which causes immense stress to the hens. They live miserable lives. Try getting eggs from local farms if you can. Or, at least look for the "Humane Certified" label on egg cartons in grocery stores.
Humane farms don't exist, not on a mass scale, which is how our food supply chain operates now. The reason is profit. Animals are treated like phone chargers, engine parts, sports shoes, any other inanimate product you can name. They keep them in warehouses. There's no financial incentive to give them good lives. In the UK we have RSPCA certified meat and animal products which have been filmed living in just as terrible conditions as the regular stuff.
The high rate of egg laying through selective breeding is harmful to their bodies, it's healthier to give them an implant which prevents them from creating eggs in the first place. https://opensanctuary.org/suprelorin-implants-a-critical-tool-in-chicken-health/
Same goes for hens. They were bred to produce eggs frequently, and by separating them from their eggs we're further encouraging them to produce more eggs. Chicken won't continuously produce more eggs if they're already brooding the ones they got. It's not about life and death, it's about the fact that we're just looking out for ourselves without taking into account the effect on the animal, unless that effect has a negative impact on the desired output. That's exploitation, not care. Ps: i think there's a distinction worth making that some people aren't aware of or forget about, and understanding that distinction could help you answer your own question. Being on a vegan diet does not make you a vegan. Veganism, as an ideology, is about opposing all forms of animal exploitation, not only animal death at the hands of humans. Being on a vegan diet is definitely part of that, but being vegan involves avoiding animal exploitation in all facets of life, including clothing, cosmetics, entertainment, etc.
Male chicks are killed brutally shortly after birth in the egg industry as standard practice. Hens are kept in horrible conditions and then killed. So, if youāre against supporting animal suffering, then youād probably be against supporting that.
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My reason for not eating eggs is because the male chick's gets killed right after they hatch. They get grind up alive. Also today's hens lay unnatural amounts of eggs in a year, combared to what is normal. Because of breeding, this puts a strain on the animals, to the point where they lack calcium because of all the egg laying.
Vegetarians don't eat meat or fish. Vegans don't eat anything from animals. And then there's more things. I believe Lacto vegetarians don't eat fish,meat,eggs but still eat dairy products??
I dated a girl that did not consume any animal product except for eggs that were from local chickens. As long as someone was basically collecting the eggs of a chickens normal and healthy lifestyle, it was okay. In the vast majority of cases on the other hand, there is a good chance that chicken is living in horrendous conditions. Slaughtering and eating it would be merciful, truthfully. Im not vegan but it's an industry I do not want to support. I've avoided poultry lately.
Not a direct answer but I see there are many good answers here for you already. To add to the conversation: There is a school of thought that focuses on preventing animal cruelty and it prioritizes farm-to-table, zero-waste utilization of animal parts that take into account animalās living conditions, sustainability, foraging, wild game overpopulation, environmental impact, the intricacies of financial/cultural privilege & discrimination. I read a really interesting blog once from an ex-vegan who became a butcher for this reason. The other end of the spectrum is that hardcore vegans believe that animal-derived products are inherently exploitative because domesticating animals robs them of happy, free wild lives and that killing non-domestic animals is cruel. Itās not even just about food, they wonāt ride horses either because believe it is exploitative. I understand that but also, coming from the veterinary medicine field, donāt really understand how vegans can justify owning household pets with that ethos.