Myth #35: “But vegans kill animals while harvesting.”
The critical difference is this — there is absolutely nothing in the harvesting of edible plants that requires the sacrifice of any sentient animals. Yes, it is true that some animals are inadvertently killed during planting and harvest, and while this is indeed regrettable, it is in no way a direct consequence of veganism. Indeed, vegans do their best to avoid causing these harms when they garden & harvest, while it is meat & dairy consumers who actually demand that those same harms ensue.
Even more poignant, far more animals are intentionally murdered by the meat & dairy industry (after leading horrific lives, no less) than vegans incidentally kill during gardening. And in addition to that truth, far more plants are harvested (well over ten times as many) to feed meat & dairy livestock than would ever be harvested by a world filled with vegans, meaning that many more animals are killed by meat&dairy-based harvests than by vegan ones.
Yes, it is true that unintentional injury & death is sometimes the result of vegan farming. And yet vegans are working to eliminate causing such pain & suffering … We may not be perfect, but at least we are trying. As such, if you are sincerely concerned about minimizing animal cruelty and maximizing animal well-being, then you must go vegan.
Current status of this Myth: Disproved
Justification it provides for eating animals: NONE
“If we all went vegan because we cared morally about nonhumans, that would necessarily translate into methods of crop production that would be more mindful of incidental and unintended deaths.” ~ Gary Francione
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