Welcome back to Eight Years In, and welcome back to our questions for vegan series. We’re taking all of those questions that might annoy vegans, and answering them honestly. I find today’s question very stimulating and involved, because it involves so many twists and turns. We’re talking about the animals and how they might be affected by the world going vegan overnight.
How we get there
Lots of vegans wish that being vegan was more normalized in society today. And in fact, many may even wish that the whole world was vegan. And so, it’s no surprise that meat eaters might get this impression from talking with a vegan. Especially if they talk about why the person went vegan or anything even remotely similar.
And I’ve mentioned this before on my site, that often “why are you vegan?” quickly becomes “why should I go vegan, according to you?” It’s just one of those mental leaps that we commonly take. If someone is talking about how good something is, we often translate that into what it might mean for us. And if this is something you’re seriously considering, then you might want to check out my post entitled “The only time I’m going to tell you why you should go vegan”. Wordy name, I know. You can find it here, if you’re interested.
But I think the question we’re discussing is the next iteration of this mental leap. The brain goes, “Okay, you’re vegan. You think that veganism is a good idea. So what about me? What about the rest of the world? My gosh, what if everyone went vegan overnight?” And I’ve got to admit, that’s a really interesting thought process since we don’t usually apply it to anything else.
Why it’s odd
Usually, we don’t do the extra step of wondering what would happen if the whole world immediately did this good thing that someone’s talking about. Like, if someone says “running is good for you”. We don’t think, “Can you imagine how crazy the streets would be if everybody started running, all at once?” And you may be thinking, “veganism and running are really different things. Especially since we’re talking about ethical veganism, not a plant based diet.” That’s a good point, but when you look at ethical concepts, it’s equally odd.
For example, we often consider murder wrong. (Which I’d argue is correct.) But what we don’t see is a bunch of people defending serial killers because overpopulation would be so much worse if they didn’t exist. So it is a really strange mechanism, if you ask me.
How (I think) people get there
So even though it is a strange question, I think I may be able to understand why people get there. Often, a vegan will talk about how important it is to stop being complicit in an animal’s use, abuse and death as far as supply and demand goes. So if I really pick apart this question, I think that’s what people are truly asking about. The extended effects of supply and demand.
And it’s actually common for vegans to talk about what might happen if the world went vegan. (In the sense that it’s actually possible for us to feed our entire planet’s population. If we all adopted a plant based diet instead of an animal based one, that is.) So perhaps it’s us vegans who are priming people’s brains to think about the whole world being vegan.
A Vegan World
Now this might sound super pessimistic coming from a long-term vegan. But I don’t think I’ll see a vegan world in my lifetime, or anything close to it. Maybe that is too pessimistic. Veganism has grown in popularity quite a bit since 2013 when I first made the switch. But after years of being a vegan, I’ve learned to be quite cautious about people’s interest in veganism. (In order to not get my hopes up too much or come off as too annoying to those around me.)
Regardless, the idea of a vegan world just seems unrealistic to me at the moment. It’s hard for me to go along with it when people ask me about the whole world going vegan overnight. It seems way too far fetched that I might ever see a vegan world in my lifetime. Or possibly even at all. It’s like, my brain won’t even let me compute the proposed situation. And maybe that makes me seem dismissive to the askers of the question. But I’m not trying to be, I swear.
An overnight switch
That being said, it’s not just the idea of a vegan world that makes this question difficult for me to go along with. It’s also this idea of the inclusion of “overnight”. Let me explain why.
I’ve listened to a lot of people discuss their journeys to veganism online over the years. And a very large portion of people who do decide to transition to veganism do it just as I said, a transition. Which means that a lot of people (maybe even most people) who are deciding to go vegan don’t do it overnight. Some take months or even years to fully make the switch.
You may not think this is an important piece of information to know in order to properly answer this question, but for me it is. Because then that makes me wonder, what sort of thing could possibly happen to make the whole world choose veganism overnight? I’m not asking for the sake of my own activism (although if I could cut through cognitive dissonance that surely, I would). I just think that something so drastic might have an impact on the state of the world in this scenario, and in turn, what we do with the animals.
If it is shown that many people moved by their conscience take a longer route to veganism, what would have to happen to make the entire world go vegan overnight, including the ones who callously mock us today? I feel like it would have to be something humongous. And possibly something that would take away our free will. Short of an alien invasion where they promise to spare us only if our whole planet goes vegan, I really can’t think of anything.
Just answer the question, would animals take over?
So a lot of times, when people ask us about the whole world going vegan overnight, it’s followed by asking if animals would take over the world if we stopped eating them and using them for our cheese or leather jackets (or whatever). Which, if I’m answering honestly, is very unlikely. Think about all the animals we don’t breed and kill. They haven’t just taken over simply because we leave them alone. No offense, but this isn’t Planet of the Apes.
I don’t even really know what people envision an animal takeover looking like. Like, they won’t overthrow our government or anything like that. Do you mean they’d impede traffic and trample a bunch of people if we set them all free? Is that what you’re afraid of? Do you mean they’d eat all our food? (Because they kind of already are. That’s how we keep them alive long enough to slaughter.)
Supply and demand, part 2
So I’ve already mentioned that an immediate vegan world is quite unlikely. And you certainly don’t have to worry about the whole world going vegan just because you’ve chosen to. (I learned that one the hard way.) But I think it’s worth considering a more likely version of this question about a vegan world. “What would happen to the animals if the world went vegan, slowly but eventually?” Because the trend of veganism is upward, and has been for the last couple years now. Assuming that this will continue (which yes, is an assumption), what will we do with the animals once the whole world is vegan?
And I want to assure you that it really wouldn’t be as bad as you’re thinking. That’s how supply and demand works. The less people buy animal products, the more that production of them will be forced to slow, because it will no longer be lucrative. In fact, you can already start seeing evidence of this happening as some of the larger producers of animal products are beginning to sell plant based products, to get in on some of that growing revenue. And we have to remember that it’s not just vegans who are buying these plant based and vegan products, but also people who are transitioning, vegan-curious, or who just plain want to try new things. As far as I’m concerned, that’s quite encouraging.
At any rate, my point is that by the time the whole world is vegan, supply and demand will have been trickling itself out for a while so there really won’t be just a ton of animals for us as a society to deal with because we’ll have stopped breeding them to be killed. It seems that on average, cows that are slaughtered for beef are around one or two years old, while chickens, for example, are slaughtered around 47 days old. So hypothetically, the turnaround time that we’d have after not breeding animals to be slaughtered anymore wouldn’t be all that long anyway.
How can you talk so nonchalantly about animal death?
It’s usually about this point in the conversation where I point out that it’s true, what we as a society might ultimately decide to do if we all decided to stop eating animals would be to kill off the rest of them that are still around. I like to tell myself that there might be a day when we decide we’re done and that we’re going to find homes for every last farm animal in farm sanctuaries and with adopted parents to live out the rest of their lives undisturbed.
But I really don’t have that much faith in society as a whole. Because we love shoving off responsibility and avoiding extra work. And putting together a program like that to make sure every last animal would be housed, happy and fed, would be work. So honestly what’s more likely is that animals will continue to be killed and used for products that people buy less and less until you just can’t find them anymore because people stopped buying them. In other words, they’ll be killed, probably.
This really tends to rub people the wrong way. They’ll get upset and ask me how I can be okay with that idea. And that’s when I get kind of curious. Why does the idea of animal death after the whole world going vegan bother you more than the idea that you are indirectly calling for more animal death by choosing to eat meat? If I may be frank, it seems kind of odd that you all of a sudden take issue with that in this scenario. Why choose to care about the animals now? I mean, they’re getting used and slaughtered already, what makes this scenario so upsetting to contemplate?
The truth hurts
No, I’m not okay with it. Not in the sense that you mean, anyway. Of course it bothers me to think that these animals don’t get a chance, even as the consumption of them is on the decline. It’s like they almost won the lottery on timing, only to get slaughtered anyway. That’s super sad. But their lives aren’t worth any more or less than the chicken whose leg you ate for lunch today.
And yet, I’ve got to tell you, the idea of this scenario actually fills me with hope. Because then at least, this very long chapter of animal use and abuse would be coming to a close. These animals would be victims, just like all the rest. But at least we would be able to say that they were the last.
If these hypothetical animals being killed bothers you, due to us not wanting to take the time to feed and house them, that’s all the more reason for you to consider veganism. Then you no longer have to contribute to the use, abuse, and slaughter of animals for your taste buds, entertainment, and/or fashion. And if the time comes within your lifespan where the whole world decides to go vegan at once and we have a bunch of animals that we don’t know what to do about? Well that’s when we’ll need your activism the most. But make the first step first, and go vegan, okay?
There’s a really interesting post about this topic from treehugger, if you want to know more about what would happen if the world went vegan, and you can find that here. And if you want to read about more common questions that vegans get asked (that get a little old after a while), then go look at this post where I have a whole list of them. As always, thank you for reading, and have an amazing day.