ARCO's Abolitionists - A Vegan Forum

Hi, y'all:

Long time no see.

Anyway, a vegan recently contacted me. She didn't know any other vegans so she was really happy to be able to talk to a "fellow in the struggle". While talking about a variety of things, she asking lots of questions she had regarding veganism and also some cooking tips, she asked me about cigarettes. I had to say that I was not very versed on the subject of animal experimentation in general, but even less in the case of smoking experiments.

Anyway, I'll have to study about it.

Though, while I was thinking on things to tell her, I started thinking about the land that is used to grow tabacco. I gotta say, maybe I'm way off here but, doesn't growing those plants take away land for wild animals to live in? I mean, we have to grow food for ourselves, granted. But a trivial thing as tabacco... do we need to use land for that? Maybe I'm wrong... Can anyone shed some light on this?

The conclusion, if I'm correct, should be that we ought to stop smoking... just for the sake of other animals.

Though, I really agree with Liberación-Igualdad on this one.

Ok, see you around...

Veganomante wrote:Hi, y'all:


Though, while I was thinking on things to tell her, I started thinking about the land that is used to grow tabacco. I gotta say, maybe I'm way off here but, doesn't growing those plants take away land for wild animals to live in? I mean, we have to grow food for ourselves, granted. But a trivial thing as tabacco... do we need to use land for that? Maybe I'm wrong... Can anyone shed some light on this?

Well, I never like the "it is trivial, therefore, we mustnt do it" argument.

I mean ... well, if you say I don't need tobacco, I tell you that you don't need tea! So you tell me that I don't need soy! And I tell you that you don't need Coffee !

All of them need land to grow. And we need none of them for survival and well being essentially.

From a broader perspective, it must be said that everything we do displaces animals. Even our agriculture displaces animals and kills thousands of them. I think it is just the way we have built our society. Our actions will always harm some animals. Fact of life to me.

I know where you are coming from, but if we extended your argument, we would not just have no tobacco plants, we also have no theme parks, no movie theatres, no exotic beach resorts, no poppy fields, no forest resorts etc .... That is the problem. Can we draw a moral line to limit our actions in some way as you suggest? I am not sure.

On a personal level though, I would strongly urge my friends to quit smoking, simply because in the net equation, smoking is just not worth all the harms we incur - health, resources etc etc. I am not judging any smokers here though.

Kevin_Pietersen wrote:
Well, I never like the "it is trivial, therefore, we mustnt do it" argument.

I mean ... well, if you say I don't need tobacco, I tell you that you don't need tea! So you tell me that I don't need soy! And I tell you that you don't need Coffee !

Ok, I understand the argument. But I also don't think we should extend that to everything, like a general basis. I mean, we do tell people (I mean, I do and have seen many others do it) that they don't need to eat animal products to be healthy. In other words, animal products are unnecesary, therefore there's no reason to continue eating them (after considering that other animals are sentient beings and all of that). If animal products were essential for human health, I think this would be a bit of a different movement. I mean, you could still argue that, been as it is, you should also consider eating humans. Ethically correct, but sociologically a little bit different. So the "it is unnecesary" argument works perfectly with veganism.

Kevin_Pietersen wrote:From a broader perspective, it must be said that everything we do displaces animals. Even our agriculture displaces animals and kills thousands of them. I think it is just the way we have built our society. Our actions will always harm some animals. Fact of life to me.

I don't like to say that we will always do something, 'cause I don't know what'll happen in the future, but I understand the point. And today, we cannot stop polluting or killing other animals, even if it is accidentally. Though, obviously that shouldn't stop us from minimizing that harm as best as we can.

I understand the difference between smoking and eating cheese: direct and indirect involvement. I'm just saying that if I don't need to do it, if it harms animals, and I can stop it, then I shouldn't tell myself that "we'll always harm other animals" just to continue smoking or doing anything similar. (Not that you're saying that).

Kevin_Pietersen wrote:I know where you are coming from, but if we extended your argument, we would not just have no tobacco plants, we also have no theme parks, no movie theatres, no exotic beach resorts, no poppy fields, no forest resorts etc .... That is the problem. Can we draw a moral line to limit our actions in some way as you suggest? I am not sure.

Maybe we shoudn't have any of those, hehe

But, I understand we you're coming from too, and there might be something (actually, many, many things) that I really like that could be consider unnecesary and, therefore, that I should stop doing. Yet, not because I like them means that I shoudn't consider all of this.

I'm just saying we should give a thought to the "unnecesary" issue.

Thanks a lot for your reply, it really got me to think. I'm waiting for another, I'm sure I must have missed something.

Regards

PS: I replaced "trivial" with "unnecesary" because I looked it up and it didn't mean quite what I thought it did. It doesn't make a difference since you understood the same thing, which I can see by the fact that you used "need" when refering to the tobacco-tea-soy-coffee example.

I could be wrong, but I think tobacco is a resource-intensive crop. I believe it requires a lot of irrigation and possibly pesticides?, plus it leave the soil in bad condition. Tobacco farmers found themselves in bad situations because of this. In fact, I think they actually needed subsidies.

I recall reading an account in one of those Stop HLS pamphlets about the immediate reactions of beagles to the smoke they were forced to inhale. They struggled piteously to get away from the masks that were used to force them to inhale the smoke at varying concentrations, and some seemed to be extremely nauseated, etc. Apparently it was not a pleasant experience for them. And in the bigger picture, their bodies were undoubtedly ravaged by the effects of megadoses of the various components of cigarette smoke. Failing organ systems make life miserable.

Of course, I'm sure none of this is news to you or anyone else here, just adding a little reminder.

Veganomante wrote:Ok, I understand the argument. But I also don't think we should extend that to everything, like a general basis. I mean, we do tell people (I mean, I do and have seen many others do it) that they don't need to eat animal products to be healthy. In other words, animal products are unnecesary, therefore there's no reason to continue eating them (after considering that other animals are sentient beings and all of that).

I think a similar point was raised on an earlier thread. What is the difference between eating meat and driving a car and spewing out Co2? Both are harmful to animals.

It was pointed out that the latter cannot be limited by moral laws because from a deontological point of view, driving a car is not immoral, since there is no direct violation of the rights of any beings. I am thinking that this applies to your example as well. Is that right? What do you think?

Both the car and a tobacco plantation improve the "quality" of our life - such a claim cannot simply be dismissed by pointing out that tobacco causes cancer and all that. So if driving my car at the expense of innocent polar bears is morally fine, then so should tobacco plantations. Animal products on the other hand necessitate the direct violation of animal rights. That is the critical difference i believe. (However, that does not help my unease about what we do to polar bears when we drive cars. I mean ... we are sharing this planet right?) What ya think?

Veganomante wrote:If animal products were essential for human health, I think this would be a bit of a different movement. I mean, you could still argue that, been as it is, you should also consider eating humans. Ethically correct, but sociologically a little bit different. So the "it is unnecesary" argument works perfectly with veganism.

If animal products were essential to maintain human health, then I would NOT be vegan, and I would not demand that others be vegan either. However, I would limit my consumption of animal products to the minimum limits that satisfy the hypothetical health requirement. I also think it is reasonable to say that this new health baseline would replace our current Vegan ethical baseline.

Veganomante wrote:I understand the difference between smoking and eating cheese: direct and indirect involvement.

oops, sorry, i forgot you'd written this bit. Please don't mind my unnecessary lines above referring to this point.

Veganomante wrote:I'm just saying that if I don't need to do it, if it harms animals, and I can stop it, then I shouldn't tell myself that "we'll always harm other animals" just to continue smoking or doing anything similar.

Agreed. It works well with cases of direct violation of rights I think, like the one above where I wrote that "it is reasonable to say that this new health baseline would replace our current Vegan ethical baseline."

But with indirect cases of abuse like car driving and smoking, although personally I'd go your way - minimize harm, I do not think we can draw up a moral law on this.

I mean, if we switched species (say, i and you were two sinking polar bears), I don't think we could morally expect another species (say, polluting human beings) to limit the quality of their life (automobiles, industries, buildings etc), simply because their present lifestyle and development is hurting us in an indirect way (with no direct rights violation). I think It is a bit like how herds of two different wild animal species fight for territory.

Regards,
KP

Good analysis, Kevin. We ought to try to minimize harms in the activities that indirectly harm others, even if that means minimizing those activities, but the moral imperative inherent in avoiding rights violations isn't there with respect to activities causing indirect harm or negative side-effects.