… unless the person works voluntarily, that is.
Level 8 veganism iirc
Not vegan so correct me if I’m wrong here, but I thought the whole point of veganism was an objection to the non-consensual use of animal products. Humans are aware of the use of their labor and consent to it, exploitation by circumstance notwithstanding.
exploitation by circumstance notwithstanding
yeah that was exactly what i was referring to. as long as we’d rather stay in bed in the morning, we’re not doing it voluntarily. and be honest, do you go to work voluntarily? would you still do it if you didn’t need the money? if so, then yes, it is vegan.
Did you only read the title
The OP was a little vague to me, but I’m also a little drunk.
Consent is a bad metric because it ignores externalities—stuff like economic incentives, implicit threats of loss of basic needs, propaganda, trauma. Someone can be said to consent to exploitation, even if they only did so to continue surviving under oppressive economies/states. I “consent” to have the value of my labor extracted, pooled, and distributed to business owners in the same way I “consent” to the privacy policies (and the sale of my Personally Identifying Information) of the software the company I work for requires us to use (to remain employed)
That’s why I prefer focusing on exploitation. Someone doesn’t have to know they’re being exploited, agree that they’re being exploited, nor even want to not be exploited for it to still be unjust to exploit them and identify when it is happening. Veganism is a stance against animal exploitation.
i do think that “voluntary” is a pretty clear term. would you still do it if it didn’t cost you anything, and it also didn’t get you any physical reward?
Sure you can make that argument under capitalism, where people are deprived of the value their labor created in order to force them to work more so they may survive. Hence why people should strive for communism. If everyone lived vegan people would be compelled to work as they are able in order to not cause undue burden on others, which again would not be vegan.
“From each according to their ability to each according to their need.”
This socialist ideal of providing luxury goods to the poor masses for cheap is exactly the problem. If the world would be more capitalist, we wouldn’t subsidise the meat industries and the poor would be forced to buy beans.
not necessarily, very abridged version:
The tendency of the rate of profit to fall will soon mean that an industry will stop producing said commodity. It can’t anymore if it’s unprofitable. This is where the state has to step in and start subsidizing that industry or buying the commodity themself in order to articially inflate demand in order to keep that industry afloat. See e.g. the “butter mountains” of the EU.
That wikipedia article on “The tendency of the rate of profit to fall” is a horrible introduction btw. If you want to know more you can read “Arbeitslohn und Kapital”/“Wage labour and capital” by Marx himself, much more digestible. And rather short.
The tendency of the rate of profit to fall will soon mean that an industry will stop producing said commodity. It can’t anymore if it’s unprofitable. This is where the state has to step in and start subsidizing that industry or buying the commodity themself in order to articially inflate demand in order to keep that industry afloat. See e.g. the “butter mountains” of the EU.
ahem i just so happen to be very familiar with the whole concept of the tendency of rate of profit to fall (TRPF) and you’re misunderstanding it here. it turns to be unprofitable in the sense that the profit rate approaches zero (for example, exponentially), it does not go negative! companies continue to produce stuff as long as the profit is larger than zero, which it always stays. so they continue to produce stuff indefinitely, according to the model. no state subsidizing involved here.
this is maybe a subtlety here. something can converge towards zero while also always staying positive. check out this function:

Thats the exact opposite of capitalism. Unprofitable business go bankrupt. Then their possessions and their labor force gets absorbed by other companies.
This is to align work with reality.
If politicians would artificially decide what companies to keep someone would have to pay for their mistakes. Markets are much better at this (just read “the use of knowledge in society” by Friedrich von Hayek)
Just like the suffering of animals is unnecessary to feed the planet, we now have to pay for the costs of climate change, because people want to life in a socialist fantasy.
If everyone lived vegan people would be compelled to work as they are able in order to not cause undue burden on others, which again would not be vegan.
i don’t quite get your last sentence. what if the person themselves doesn’t want to work?
If the person doesn’t want to work how will they sustain themselves? They have to rely on other peoples labor without contributing their own. If people don’t want to subsidize someone else then that person would either have to start working “against their will” or take other peoples labor without consent, which you have already pointed out, is not vegan. So if everyone were vegan that person would be compelled to work as they are able in order to be able to remain vegan.
Idk its kinda tortured logic when spelling it all out lol
Nature compells us to work for food anyway, that’s not exploitation and coercion, that’s just survival.
The construct of society is predicated on the idea of “from each… to each…” That saying often gets conflated with left-wing politics, but that’s just the point of animals (humans included) grouping together; after all, what’s the point of living in society if it doesn’t convey any benefits to the individual that they could not provide for themselves? That would be exploitative of the individual. But if they are benefitting, then it is only fair and just to also give back to the society one extracts benefits from, otherwise it is exploitative of the others.
Put another way: no one should be obligated to participate in society, but then society should likewise have no obligations to the non-participants.
Nature compells us to work for food anyway, that’s not exploitation and coercion, that’s just survival.
Not all of us ahem bourgeoisie ahem
The construct of society is predicated on the idea of “from each… to each…”
of course, however what makes a societies differ is exactly what gets filled in to the “…”
“from each slave to each slavemaster” -> slavery
“from each serf to each lord” -> feudalism
“from each worker to each owner” -> capitalism
“from each person (according to their ability) to each person (according to their need)” -> socialism 😄
what you’re describing is just capitalism with extra steps
Veganism is extremely capitalistic, because it relies on supply and demand to change the amount of animal suffering that is/was produced.
Veganism is simply not taking part in animal suffering, you’re thinking of “animal liberation” which is the active part.
And yes one way to reduce animal suffering is to leverage basic market laws about supply and demand. But buying and selling isn’t capitalism. People in every socialist nation ever have bought and sold stuff, and when stuff wasn’t in demand the supply reacted accordingly. If you want an introductory book I can recommend some (earnest, not trying to be mean, it just seems like you don’t know the definition of the terms you’re using).
But there is also direct action, adoption of rescued animals and maybe some other stuff I can’t remember right now that people that take part in animal liberation do.
Buying and selling with a currency is capitalism. If I would just get a meal ticket from the communist party might, I might trade away more of my belongings, but thats not the same market vegans try to address.
This is not how communism works, how any socialist society operates, I’m sorry but you’ve completely fallen for the propaganda and are living outside of reality.
The fact that “Buying and selling with a currency” is not capitalism is also very clear from the fact that we were buying and selling with a currency under feudalism, under slavery, currency predates capitalism by millenia.
Would make more sense if post was talking about slavery, not labor. Labor is compensated.
Compare the GDP of your country to earned income, do a tiny bit of math, discover what portion of the workforce are slaves.
Mm, so if a worker creates added value, that makes the worker a slave? Interesting theory.
When GDP is three times earned income, labor is being undercompensated so much that approximately two-thirds of the workforce is enslaved, yes.
I will try rephrasing it: its a nonsensical, fucking stupid proposal that gdp should equal earned income, and that somehow if the two are not equal then the difference amounts to slavery.
Do you care to elaborate, why do you even think these two should be the same, and what the difference has to do with slavery, as it relates to the actual meaning of that expression, not random things you don’t like.
yeah but do you go to work voluntarily? would you still do it if you didn’t need the money? if so, then yes, it is vegan.
I go to work for money (in the job I chose), and I get money, i call that a fair deal. If I was owned by someone, was forced to work, and would not get paid in return, I would be a slave.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but if your work’s payment feels like a fair deal, you’re very privileged when compared to the average human
Edit: even being able to choose your job is a privilege…
i mean, i only asked whether you go to work voluntarily, and whether it could therefore be considered vegan.
The only way someone can work voluntarily is if they have the option to not work and still live with some semblance of comfort and security.
This means that almost all people are obliged to work.
I am pretty sure that all my vegan friends are also against slavery, so they are consistent.
And if not also no problem, vegan meal helps the environment
We are also riddled with pesticides (perfumes, deodorants), bred in captivity (social/gender/sexual norms) and - if you’re going to consume us either way - our caloric and nutritional values are abysmal (compared to our alternatives).
CW holocaust stuff
if you’re going to consume us either way - our caloric and nutritional values are abysmal (compared to our alternatives).
Well you can still make leather from human hide and other human-based products. That’s what the nazi’s did with their prisoners. The whole work camps where basically human agriculture where they were maximising the profit the could gain by minimizing the cost of sustaining the labor-power. They were calculating how much calories people need in order to do exactly the work required and nothing else so they could save penny’s on food. That’s why they started experimenting with human leather, in order to recoup some of the costs by creating commodities from the corpse a laborer left behind etc. It’s really was the same mentality that goes into dairy farming or chicken or really any animal agricutlure ever.
Yeah, soap too 😢
Disgusting zionism
When the Holocaust survivors arrived in Israel from the inferno, they were attacked as “sabonim” (Hebrew slang for a naive person but also for “soap,” a reference to Nazi experiments to make soap from Jewish fat) or “sheep to the slaughter”; feeble exilic Jews, pale Ashkenazi nebbishes who shouted in their sleep.
In germany we have the saying: „to wash you hands in innocence.“ I guess thats what that was about.
no that’s biblical https://de.wiktionary.org/wiki/die_Hände_in_Unschuld_waschen look at “Herkunft”






