I certainly value my life, why should other lives not be valued? I would not want harmful treatment to others of other species. Most won’t change from their ways to not contribute to such, I am aware. It is still what would be very well for all of us in general to do. We do not have to contribute to the misery and slaughter of many animals being used, we could be much healthier, and not contribute to more land, water and resources being used with greater waste left, as environments are worsened and many species go extinct with the contribution. I really found tasty meals with this way I have, to continue with, and have been doing very well with it for well over a decade.
Ive sort of become a vegetarian. But I have 15 chickens running around on a half acre and they give me plenty of eggs.
I’ve always wondered how vegans would feel about this scenario. Like they are against animals being harmed and thus choose not to eat animal products but what about an individual with chickens who takes care of them and enjoys the eggs they produce?
So far, every vegan I’ve asked about this reacted positively.
My spoiled girls get to run around a big yard eating ticks and bugs and seeds. Sometimes I give them the popcorn gravel. (The kernels and half-popped bits left over) They help me turn over my compost pile and they process some of the stuff I add to it. Sometimes I sit outside with them because they are fun to watch. Chickens have personalities.
And after all that, they still give me eggs. I eat them, and sell them to others who will eat them, because the alternative is to throw them away, which feels wasteful.
There’s actually another alternative. In the wild chickens often eat their own unfertilized egg to regain the calcium and other nutrients they lost from it. Chicken breeds used lay way more eggs than they would in nature making these losses kind of severe for bone health (10-15/yr in nature vs ~285/yr for commercial hens). A lot of sanctuaries give things to chickens to reduce that egg laying rate and then at that reduced rate feed them back their own eggs (doing so at the unnaturally high egg-laying rate is believed to potentially create issues)
Copying my comment from elsewhere to reply here:
In the wild chickens often eat their own unfertilized egg to regain the calcium and other nutrients they lost from it. Chicken breeds used lay way more eggs than they would in nature making these losses kind of severe for bone health (10-15/yr in nature vs ~285/yr for commercial hens). A lot of sanctuaries give things to chickens to reduce that egg laying rate and then at that reduced rate feed them back their own eggs (doing so at the unnaturally high egg-laying rate is believed to potentially create issues)
Ironically there are some honey farms or dairy farms, chicken egg farms that have much better quality of life for those animals than we do for some vegan workplaces and how we treat our fellow humans who produce the “vegan” food.
The meat, dairy, etc. are actually particularly harmful to human workers
Together, poultry slaughtering and processing companies reported more severe injuries to the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) than many industries that are popularly recognized as hazardous, such as sawmills, industrial building construction, and oil and gas well drilling
Revealed: exploitation of meat plant workers rife across UK and Europe
There is evidence that slaughterhouse employment is associated with lower levels of psychological well-being. SHWs [slaughterhouse workers] have described suffering from trauma, intense shock, paranoia, anxiety, guilt and shame (Victor & Barnard, 2016), and stress (Kristensen, 1991). There was evidence of higher rates of depression (Emhan et al., 2012; Horton & Lipscomb, 2011; Hutz et al., 2013; Lander et al., 2016; Lipscomb et al., 2007), anxiety (Emhan et al., 2012; Hutz et al., 2013; Leibler et al., 2017), psychosis (Emhan et al., 2012), and feelings of lower self-worth at work (Baran et al., 2016). Of particular note was that the symptomatology appeared to vary by job role. Employees working directly with the animals (e.g., on the kill floor or handling the carcasses) were those who showed the highest prevalence rates of aggression, anxiety, and depression (Hutz et al., 2013; Richards et al., 2013).
