A response to Larken Rose's video on dishonest vegans.

Hey peoples.. How's it going?

Since I've been tagged On Facebook and since I respect his views on anarchism and since he seems decently open minded to discussion I will address certain points Larken made in his video using non violent communication to the best of my ability.

Before we begin you can watch his original video here where he explains his positions.

• #1 A majority of vegans who comment on your posts are being intentionally dishonest and they know it.

I don't think this is true, but I admit I'm not in the minds of the people you refer to. I think most of these people probably just aren't as articulate as you and haven't thought things through in the same way.

• #2 The word murder doesn't include non humans.

This is only true if you strictly limit yourself to the legal definition.
I can murder a friend at a video game, doesn't mean I harmed them physically at all. Or I can murder a bean burrito, yet there's no clear victim there? It all depends on how you use the word and I think vegans are generally using it correctly for the most part.

For example.. Do you think people should only use the word "judge" in a legal sense? No one can judge anything unless it's related to law?

Well.. I'm a poet and I use words all kinds of ways, they don't have to conform to one strict area anyways.

• #3 You said someone could have been run over and thus it's meat, a substance.. Not murder.

Well.. It depends.. By inference, what was the intent? Maybe the person got run over on purpose without a self defense justification and it was murder. Furthermore when vegans say that I think it's different in that the intention with meat is always to kill cause you can't necessarily have it without killing it unless you eat roadkill or do other weird things.

Oh and a cannibal eating a corpse on the side of the road is not the same either as it is finding/scavenging as weird and creepy as that is, though people who hunt or pay for animals to be murdered.. Are directly causing it even if they don't directly do the killing. Legally people are arrested for ordering hits on other humans, same sort of principle. When you pay for someone to die, you're partly causing that. Similar also to how politicians ordering others to kill on their behalf does not absolve them of guilt or responsibility. The Nazi argument of "just doing our job" wasn't good enough at the trials.

• #4 Carnism isn't a religion

Based on my understanding of the word "religion" the word just means basically a set of beliefs about existence and I think we all have this to different degrees even if you don't have a name like "Christianity" or "Buddhism" to represent such.

Saying it's not a religion because people have just sort of done it naturally for thousands of years.. I think.. Is an interesting point, but.. Here's what I would say.

For some.. Who have studied it in some form and taken a position.. It is an active belief system. For those who have not, it's more of an unconscious religion, a "habit".. But nonetheless, a choice was made by them at some point to do such even if they don't fully understand it, so it may be much more limited in articulation, and not have a technical name.. Though.. Even people who unconsciously act a certain way are doing that because of beliefs that have formed at some point that they hold.

Not sure how you can say carnism doesn't "mean anything" when you literally have people who are eating ONLY meat and who refer to themselves as carnivores or carnists because of things they have learned and beliefs they have formed. I think we need to make the distinction here as I did above between unconscious believers and active ones.

I would say the same thing about belief in government. Those who study it and actively believe and defend it are conscious of such and those unconscious while not as clear in their understandings, still follow very similar beliefs.. Even if they haven't thought very deep about it.

This is one of the powers of mainstream religion, it hits a lot of people on a basic "faith" and "trust" level where they just do it because those around them do it almost as a tradition cause their family were Christians so they are and they don't really understand why.. But.. Nonetheless believe similar things and similar to how people treat animals.. They develop certain belief systems even if it's not conscious and on the surface.

• #5 People say you can't be a true anarchist without being vegan and you disagree.

First you say anarchy deals with humans but no where in any of the definitions I've ever read have I seen the word human.

More modern definitions refer to a rejection of political or religious systems though to take it's oldest known etymological meaning that I'm aware of it just means "no rulers" doesn't say.. "no human rulers" now.. It's up to you how you wish to interpret this word. But.. If you rule over others, then.. Is it just bad when others rule over you and humans? And not bad when we do it to the animals?
Why must we draw the line at humans? Why can't we extend our love and compassion in regards to anarchy to all sentient beings within reason?

You used an example of swatting a mosquito, peoples opinion on this vary but mine is that it is self defense. They are attacking you and could potentially have some kind of virus. I think it's okay to defend yourself to extreme levels in such cases.

You say vegans don't know what the words mean, but words are one of my main things so let's feel free to get deep into the meaning or potential meaning of words.

I'd just like to say the general popular definition of veganism is essentially "A philosophical belief system that attempts to reduce unjust harm done to animals within reason".

If you consider that humans are technically animals as well.. Why would just about virtually anyone disagree with such in that light? In that light both anarchy and veganism fit each other like a glove. They essentially mean almost the same thing. Don't infringe on others unless you have really good reason. Like self defense/survival.

If you want to argue that we need to eat animals for health reasons we can get deep into that science and the theories involving that as well, though I think it seems kind of clear that we don't need animal products for health reasons. And there's a lot of history for this. Thousands of years.

In fact according to recent research it looks like our paleo ancestors were almost entirely plant based and barely ever ate animal products contrary to what so many "paleo" people want to think about our "primitive caveman" sort of history.

According to fossil evidence our paleo ancestors ate 99% plants and rarely ate animal material, similar to how our ancestors in the animal kingdom do as well if we "evolved" from them or "adapted" or were "domesticated" even. So I mean.. If you really look at the history it shows us much more as plant eaters than as many would like you to think. Eating such large amounts of animal products is a "new" thing.

• #6 NAP doesn't make sense with animals cause coyote and prey.

Predator animals need to eat meat to survive biologically, humans appear to have the free will choice to kill or not kill sentient beings.. Why not choose to not kill sentient beings?

I've never met anyone who suggested the NAP applies to all species as animals seem to be incapable of philosophizing about such moral issues like we can.

Maybe they can philosophize like us and we just don't know cause we don't speak their language, but.. I've never seen vegans trying to argue that lions shouldn't kill and eat to survive and if you look at how predators DO survive.. They aren't fat and obese like so many people, they eat virtually everything and are "surviving", if we can survive in similar fashion without killing any beings AND it's likely more healthy for us as well.. Then.. Why kill animals, waste extreme amounts of resources and possibly make ourselves sicker due to the risk of many well studied potential side effects as well..?

Should you save the mouse? Probably not. That's nature. Predator animals have moral justification with needs to survive.

• #7 No one considers all beings equal.

I think some people truly do, it would take a while to get into the spiritual/psychological aspects, but.. I'm not one of those people. I do value sentience more. That doesn't mean we shouldn't respect that with less sentience at all, it just means.. If I can save a human or an animal, I'll pick the human.. Unless perhaps.. It's a psychotic politician or something.. Then maybe I'll save the animal. heh.

You used the same sort of example with choosing to save an ant or a dog to argue that ir almost seems like we shouldn't be compassionate because some creatures will die. Though just because some bugs might die when I go for a walk, does not mean I should be justified to go kill other animals.

It's a minimalist approach, try to reduce your unnecessary harm done to others as much as possible WITHIN REASON. No society should not stop and grind to a halt cause of termites or anything like that, some insects who invade your property you probably should kill, but that doesn't mean we should also just say.. "AH dang, we can't stop some death, thus.. We should kill more, or it's okay to kill more cause of that other death".

That's what is called argumentation from futility. IE.. Some will die and there's nothing we can do to stop it, thus that means we can go kill as much as we want.
At least that's how it sounds the way you argue it, though I don't think you believe that as you show compassion for animals in other areas.

• #8 You argue something like that killing animals doesn't cause suffering.

Saying killing an animal without pain doesn't cause suffering isn't necessarily true, it might have family that will suffer because of the loss and you taking their family from them.
It might even cause other animals in that family to starve or die or be preyed upon and killed because they didn't have their family support and help you took from them.

And taking a life is arguably worse than causing suffering, at least if you're suffering you're still alive.
Taking a life is the ultimate thing you can take from someone other than their "soul" and I don't necessarily mean that like most people probably do in regards to "souls", I mean more like your "value system" and individuality and what makes you "you".

Also generally I think these people are referring to factory farm conditions and the insane amount of suffering there as opposed to hunting when it comes to the "suffering" thing. Though.. I wish people would be more clear too, but it's not just vegans.. People cling on to cliche sayings in virtually every movement.

• #9 You say natural has nothing to do with something that is "moral" or not.

And while this subject is much more complex and deeper in my opinion I sort of agree, yet earlier it seemed like you argued as one of your reasons that killing animals or causing their suffering isn't wrong is because it's just "something" we've been doing. Please correct me if I'm wrong, I don't want to portray your position unfairly. Though I seem to remember you saying that..?

• #10 Hunters reduce suffering.

Not sure how. Unless you think humans need to play god with nature and manage their populations? Otherwise they only cause it.

• #11 An easy life is some kind of justification to dominate others in examples of lazy cows and pet cats and dogs and such.

Many vegans disagree with me here and think it's okay to own pets and such, but I personally think all sentient beings should be free to live their natural lives.

My only exception which is a gray area is medical companion animals since I do value humans more.. I think seeing eye dogs and such could be justified on some level. Though I disagree with people owning other beings just cause they are lonely or need a friend.

And... Could we use the same justification for human slaves? That they get treated well and free medical care and food and shelter..? Or is individual freedom more important? I think consent is important here, and since you can not get consent from animals or ask them what they think, it is unethical. I think they'd rather be free. But hey.. Maybe some would wanna be slaves.

• #12 You say you would forcibly intervene in cases of I think cat torture or exotic animals being hunted.

If you would forcibly intervene stopping someone from torturing cats or any animal really, why treat farm animals different? Pigs are as smart as young children and smarter than dogs according to some research.
Even birds and fish are really smart.. I'd say...If we can live healthy without hurting other sentient beings, why not give it a try..?

• #13 You suggest some vegans act like they have principles they don't and sort of put themselves above others on a pedestal.

I personally got into helping others to help others, not to put myself above them.. And I think most people are similar, but.. I'm not in their minds.
And also.. Would you say the same about other moral issues..? Even just regular theft? You are stealing animal lives if it's not necessary for health?

You rail against authoritarians all the time it seems like? Now I'm not trying to be mean but take a second and look at your reflection.. Try to genuinely look at yourself from our perspective here.. You rail against humans controlling each other, yet don't speak out against how we treat the animals? Why is it not okay to rule humans, but it's okay for you to rule animals and take their lives for non survival reasons?

Do you believe in the golden rule? Much like anarchy it doesn't apply to just humans.. "Don't treat others in ways you would not like to be treated" doesn't say human in there anywhere, it says "others" animals are "others". So if you wouldn't want to be killed or harmed for taste pleasure, then maybe you shouldn't do it to other sentient beings.

A survivor of the WW2 concentration camps became an animal rights activist and said something like.. He thinks that the "Exploitation of animals is the gateway drug to exploiting humans" and quite a few other famous people have said things like.. "There would be no wars if there were no slaughterhouses".. Are you open minded that our mistreatment of animals can carry over or bleed into our treatment of humans as well?

Are you aware of PITS? Slaughterhouse workers get something like PTSD but it's caused by direct harm done to others and makes people mentally sick and according to FBI studies crime rates go up in those areas new slaughterhouses go in and you can read interviews from slaughterhouse workers where after a bad day they joke about murdering their boss in the same way they kill animals all day.

Do you think it's possible that the desensitization to animal abuse could be linked in ways to the desensitization of humans abusing other humans?
If people valued and respect life so much that they wouldn't even kill a fly if they didn't need to, how likely would we be to go off to far off lands and bomb people in such ways they do?

If animal abuse tends to spill over and become human abuse, should that alone not be enough reason to stop harming animals?

You know one of the most common tactics of militaries to sort of brainwash the troops is to dehumanize their enemy and reduce them to animals. The Jews were likened to rats, the native Americans likened to wild animals and this happens in probably virtually every major conflict.. They have to dehumanize and reduce their enemies to animals in order to kill them easier.. Now.. What if we valued animals so much that we wouldn't even want to harm a rat? Would it be so easy to send us to kill other humans like rats? Just ponder it for a while please. Thank you.

• #14 You make points about plants and animals being similar or the same in their value or claim to rights of life.

The difference between plants and animals is sentience. A lot of it. The same reason you would run over an ant instead of a dog. And animals must feed on plants as well, so even if plants DID have some sentience, it would still be much less and kill less. It's a minimalist approach to do less harm, not to illogically eliminate it all completely which is almost certainly impossible.

• #15 You express that you would get physical even in regards to cats being tortured or exotic animals killed.

If you want to reduce unnecessary suffering of animals, why do you continue to defend the seemingly clear unnecessary consumption of certain kinds of them? Furthermore.. Animal agriculture threatens our entire species in numerous different ways according to numerous studies and is extincting countless species on a regular basis, it's the biggest cause of deforestation and species extinction and water consumption and land usage and so many things.. If you really care about exotic animals, you should be right there with us more than it seems like you are.

Have you ever made a video about how vegans are trying to help save exotic animals like the ones you said you would get physical for? Seems like you have a certain bias but I could be wrong. I don't follow you that close. Maybe you have made a video where you congratulated vegans for trying to save exotic animals?

Now to end this.. If you read it, thank you for reading it.
I appreciate you trying to encourage people to speak more clear and communicate better.

Sorry you feel like you deal with so many dishonest vegans. I think most are just not as articulate as you or I and are coming from a place of love and trying to protect others and the planet.
I don't think as many people are being as intentionally dishonest as you suggest, I think they just don't speak as well as you.

But I encourage you for opening dialogue on this and for being decently civil about it all. Many vegans could indeed speak more clearly I agree. But.. You could say the same about almost any group. Still a good reminder though!

There's some decent honest good vegans out there, and myself and others are happy to try to discuss this in civil manner with those who are genuinely interested in conversation. And..
It is a passionate subject. I understand. I used to be a sort of "militant vegan" with my language and lost some friends, but I feel like I'm much better now at communicating more peacefully and more often these days I hear people saying they agree with me, rather than joking about how good bacon tastes.

Anyways.. Peace and thank you again for your time.