Claim: "Cruelty" and "Abuse" are such strong words to use here

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Animals are given a good life, why are you using the terms "abuse" and "cruelty", isn't that overstating it?

Problems With This Argument

1. Most carnists don't follow their own ethics

Most people will agree that factory farming is abusive and cruel but will then ask about animals that are free-range/cage-free/grass-fed/well-kept/whatever. This is another canard about how all the animals they eat are locally sourced from their uncle's farm or whatever. This is essentially nobody. If it is you then, great, read on, but otherwise, if you agree that factory farming is cruel but don't actually follow that ethic at all, then exit this page and make a different bad argument against veganism.

2. Killing animals is unethical

Does anyone read the story of Nick Bostrom's Dragon-Tyrant and go "Well, you know... the people being trucked off to be sacrificed were given a good life. I'm siding with the dragon on this one." Of course not. Killing animals is unethical under any reasonable system of ethics, and other irrelevant facts are just that - irrelevant.

3. If it's unethical and unnecessary, it's by definition cruel and abusive

When we think about being "cruel", it is specifically that it's unnecessary and purely for your own enjoyment. You're not trying to save someone else's life by making a regrettable sacrifice, that's not "cruelty" by most people's standards. But just like we would say it's cruel if you beat that dog chained in your basement purely because you find some enjoyment in it, just the same way, you don't need to pay someone to throw baby chicks alive into macerators or slit the throats of animals but you do so because you find enjoyment in eating meat. This is all the same type of animal abuse, and it doesn't really matter if you're standing in the same room as the animal when it's being abused or not.


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[Claim: "Cruelty" and "Abuse" are such strong words to use here](http://www.carnist.cc/abuseword)