“The real question is not whether the cost to you is small, but whether you could do more good for the same small cost.”
From what I gather, the “cost” you are referring too is the cost of forgoing the perceived personal benefit/pleasure of eating meat on a per-occasion basis. However, eating a diet with no animal products or much less meat gets a lot easier over time—and the preference flips. Which is why I don’t think the social cost on a per-meal basis is really that useful.
Also, my perception is that diets that limit or avoid animal foods are driven by a combination of three reasons: 1) concern for animal suffering 2) environmental harm from most meat production 3) health benefits from eating less meat or certain particularly harmful meats. These reasons all provide a benefit of some sort compared to the standard western diet, and the later two aren’t considered here. From my experience, the difficulty of changing my diet to eating a lot less meat was trivial compared to the benefits it brought—especially nutrition knowledge and cooking experience. I eat animal foods on occasion now, but it’s from sources that are at the boundary questions of animal ethics—non-sentient animals (scallops), scavenged foods (freeganism), hunted meat, farm animals not explicitly raised for the purpose of meat consumption, etc. Limited animal foods on occasion can provide most of the nutrition benefit, while averting most of the animal suffering.
eating a diet with no animal products or much less meat gets a lot easier over time—and the preference flips
Does it, in general? Long term vegetarians often say they find meat squicky now, but ex-vegetarians often say wanting to eat meat again was a big part of why they stopped being veg.
“The real question is not whether the cost to you is small, but whether you could do more good for the same small cost.”
From what I gather, the “cost” you are referring too is the cost of forgoing the perceived personal benefit/pleasure of eating meat on a per-occasion basis. However, eating a diet with no animal products or much less meat gets a lot easier over time—and the preference flips. Which is why I don’t think the social cost on a per-meal basis is really that useful.
Also, my perception is that diets that limit or avoid animal foods are driven by a combination of three reasons: 1) concern for animal suffering 2) environmental harm from most meat production 3) health benefits from eating less meat or certain particularly harmful meats. These reasons all provide a benefit of some sort compared to the standard western diet, and the later two aren’t considered here. From my experience, the difficulty of changing my diet to eating a lot less meat was trivial compared to the benefits it brought—especially nutrition knowledge and cooking experience. I eat animal foods on occasion now, but it’s from sources that are at the boundary questions of animal ethics—non-sentient animals (scallops), scavenged foods (freeganism), hunted meat, farm animals not explicitly raised for the purpose of meat consumption, etc. Limited animal foods on occasion can provide most of the nutrition benefit, while averting most of the animal suffering.
Does it, in general? Long term vegetarians often say they find meat squicky now, but ex-vegetarians often say wanting to eat meat again was a big part of why they stopped being veg.