To ask vegans what's wrong with free range eggs?

[AndyWarholsBanana]

This isn't a TAAT but the raw vegan thread did make me think about the morals of the dairy industry and I can kind of see where vegans are coming from re cows' milk. And obviously battery farming is vile but I can't see how eating eggs from properly free range chickens is cruel. Am I missing something?

If it's an unsolicited challenge, YABU - apart from anything else you're presupposing that they are vegan on ethical grounds which some are not, but more to the point it feels like you're pointlessly calling into question a lifestyle choice that is personal.

While I wouldn't inflict veganism or vegetarianism on children (with all due respect to others, this is a conviction borne of personal experience and not meant to be a incendiary point of contention) I would also tend not to confront adults about their lifestyle choices unless I see actual harm there.

Of course if they are being preachy at you, YANBU have at them - they asked for it.

Before getting pregnant I had a vegan diet at home and relaxed it to a veggie diet when eating out or with friends (unless we were eating at a veggie/vegan restaurant). I'm now just veggie but I still avoid cow milk. For me the it's the whole issue of animals being bred for our use or entertainment. I balance that with what I need as my circumstances change.

On a basic level being vegan means no animal products for food or clothing. Then there is alcohol where animal products are used during the process, would you drink that? Then there are animals in entertainment such as racing, would you place a bet or go to a race? What if a day at the races was a good friend's birthday treat? How about Medicines and vaccines which have used animal testing in their development. Some medicines and vitamins use animal byproducts in tablet casing or the product itself. What if you need to take these? Don't forget toiletries and make up. The product you buy might not be tested on animals but the company that produces it may be owned by a company that does test on animals for an overseas market. What about your pets (if you choose to have them). Would you buy food for them that included meat?

Sorry to go on but there are so many things to take into account in a 'vegan lifestyle' and we all make decisions based on what we need or is right for us at the time. The question of whether you would eat eggs from a back yard chicken would depend on why your vegan in the first place. It isn't a competition and no one is making dietary choices based on what would piss you off.

Would depend on why you're vegan in the first place

Hangs head in shame.....

Differentnameforthis - shouldn't that be unfertilised egg or am I reading it wrong?

If not, then I seriously went wrong in my biology lessons

differentname, it isn't a fertilized egg. Your periods aren't fertilized eggs either, unless you are having a chemical pregnancy every single month.
Someone wasn't paying attention in biology...

I have had a similar conversation with a vegan a while ago, also involving wild bees wax, because an ethical skin care brand was using small amounts of bees wax which resulted in this person boycotting the company.

Their stance was that they can live perfectly healthily without any animal products in their diet, and just having mostly organic plant-based foods.

My counterpoint was that without animal dung to fertilise fields, we wouldn't have a lot of the foods they eat daily. So if you won't eat my eggs because they indirectly support the egg industry, how can you actually eat a lot of vegetables and grains, knowing they have only been grown thanks to a by-product of the dairy and meat industries?

If you really genuinely believe in animal welfare, surely the better thing to do would be support the small scale producers (eggs from a few chickens scratching around in the back garden, milk from the small holders with half a dozen cows for milk) and encourage them?

OP, vegans don't consume - for food or use - anything derived from living creatures. Vegans would not eat eggs because they consist of animal matter. I find it bizarre that someone would ask why vegans don't eat eggs.

The idea of vegans eating eggs is ridiculous - most won't even lick envelope flaps (bone glue), eat honey or wear wool. This is their right, they're not affecting anyone else, and it's not for anyone to question their choices.

I eat meat, but I always think it's really rude when non-veggie people aggressively question veggie and vegan lifestyles and choices and try to 'catch them out'. Genuinely wanting more info and understanding is great, but being off with them is really cheeky, IMHO - we're the ones eating or wearing the products of living things killed for our pleasure or convenience, so we do not have the moral high ground!

Vegans don't eat any animal products, free range or otherwise. That is the point of veganism, they only eat vegatable products.

I think it is quite unreasonable for anyone even to ask the question to be honest!

Sparechange :), that's exactly my thoughts - as an ex vegan. (And I also hope differentname meant UNfertilised!)

I try my best to shop with very local producers now. I buy as much organic stuff as I can and I try to eat as little meat as possible - it's hard because dh and dd are meat lovers so sometimes I feel it makes more sense from an eco perspective to use all the meat up and all eat the same rather than create more waste. But after so long being a vegan I actually don't enjoy the taste of meat anymore.

I think the best anyone can do is shop as ethically as we possibly can.

i am not sure why you are wondering people who dont eat animals or their by products (eggs milk) do it because they want to and why would they start eating eggs again cos it is a happy hen

About 285 million hens are raised for eggs in the U.S., and most spend their lives in battery cages, stacked tier upon tier in huge warehouses.(8,9) Millions of day-old male chicks are killed (usually in a high-speed grinder called a macerator) every year because they are worthless to the egg industry. The wire mesh of the cages rubs off their feathers, chafes their skin, and causes their feet to become crippled.

Broken bones are also common among these birds, who suffer significant osteoporosis, according to the International Veterinary Information Service. A study published in Poultry Science explained that high production hens structural bone is mobilized throughout the laying period in order to contribute to the formation of eggshell.

Although chickens can live for more than a decade, hens raised for their eggs are exhausted, and their egg production begins to wane when they are about 2 years old. When this happens, they are slaughtered. More than 100 million spent hens are killed in slaughterhouses every year.

For any ”happy” female chicken living in someone’s garden, her male siblings have been killed as soon as it is possible to check that he is male. This is probably what happened to them:

It was videos like that iiii that turned me Vegetarian (and now working towards Vegan)

Dead male chicks are also sold as feed for various animals, so whilst they may not be of benefit to egg industry they do serve a purpose as food to others.

My reason for being vegan is that I don't want animals to be killed for food unless there is no alternative and I certainly don't want them to be treated inhumanely under any circumstances.

In both the dairy and egg industry animals are treated inhumanely and are killed. In the egg industry, even the free range industry, male chicks are killed almost as soon as they hatch as they will not lay eggs. A free-range hen will begin to lay fewer eggs as she gets older and eventually stop and hens who aren't laying frequently will usually be killed. So although on the face of it one might assume there is nothing unethical about eating a free-range egg if you look a bit deeper then if you find killing animals unethical (as most vegans do) you cannot really justify eating eggs.

So my reason for not eating egg is that eggs still contributes to the mass killing of thousands of male chicks (similarly eating dairy contributes to the killing of thousands of male calves), something I don't want to be a part of. True vegans don't eat any animal products, for which they will have their own reasons, but it isn't always black-and-white and a few 'vegans' might be happy to eat animals products (eg: free range eggs) under certain circumstances. I had a friend who called himself vegan but would hunt for rabbits at certain times of the year and eat the rabbit he'd shot. I call myself a vegan but actually I am happy to eat honey and sweets containing cochineal (a red colouring made from ground up beetles which isn't vegetarian let alone vegan) because truthfully I just don't really care about insects, I will happily swat a mosquito or wasp that is bothering me. Technically I suppose this means I'm not a true vegan or even vegetarian, but it is much easier to call myself a vegan if I want to ensure I won't be given a meal containing meat, eggs or dairy.

I think being vegan is all about doing the best you can. I don't buy any products that have been tested on animals or wear leather etc. But I will accept medicines that had been. I don't value animals above me so when it is my life or theirs I choose mine. I don't however value a particular hair product over their life.

Vegans aren't one big entity. Just because one vegan doesn't have a well thought out answer for every ethical question does not mean all vegans are stupid. If that vegan has not questioned what you eat why not leave them alone to think what they want. If they shout Meat is Murder at you then they are fair game

a questions for the vegans no i am not going to ask if you wil eat an egg what is the bee wax thing about ?

I have two vegan friends (they are married) who keep their own pet chickens and eat their eggs. When they stop laying they are still kept as pets. They won't eat any other eggs or foods containing eggs though.

They don't have any boy chickens.

MrsJay, bees wax and honey are exploitative to bees, apparently

"are the chickens we eat all female?"

No, but nor are they the chickens that lay the eggs that you eat. Like with cows (which come in 'beef' and 'milk' varieties, and most farms have one or the other) there are lots of different breeds.

Table breeds of chicken are selected to put on lots of weight, and generally don't lay large numbers of eggs; all the eggs from these breeds are fertilised and hatched out, and both males and females are raised to a size that is worth eating (this is before the age at which they start laying eggs), a few (mainly female) are kept to an older age to breed from.

Egg breeds are selected to lay lots of eggs, and have relatively little meat on them; most of the eggs are unfertilised and sold as eggs, some are fertilised to raise the next generation and of these all the females will be kept to lay eggs but most of the males are not needed so are killed within a day or so of hatching.

Mrsjay, the bees and wax thing is the same as the rest of the thing about chickens eggs - using animals for our own gain basically, exploiting them for our use, and perpetuating the idea that we are above animals as a species etc. All the same. You could have an egg or a lump of beeswax literally fall from the sky and ethically a vegan would probably still refuse to use it as it is an animal product and ANY animal product sustains and encourages the idea of the use of animals for human benefit.

Headfirst, they are not technically vegans if they eat those eggs, even if they call themselves that.

I tried vegan cake several times. Boggin'.

Fairylea, but surely if you take that dogmatic approach to its logical conclusion, vegans shouldn't be eating any vegetables that are grown using fertiliser which is derived, or just is, from farmyard manure?
That is using commercial animal farming to create food, and using animals for human benefit?

"AwfulMaureen Wed 19-Feb-14 08:40:12

DH would. He calls himself a vegan because generally he eats no meat, fish or dairy and he's against farming....he considers it to be the en-slavery of animals. BUT he would, if hungry enough hunt and kill a wild animal
"
Wouldn't he just nip to the shop? :o

I'm sick of having the egg = baby chick argument. Yes, I think people do think that. Presumably they also think they're pregnant each month.

Right! The egg thing. I used to buy free range eggs in happy ignorance. Then someone I worked with kept hens so I started buying them from him. Then we both left and I have no one to buy from and have gone back to shop eggs. We get through loads of eggs and I would much rather buy them from someone - anyone on this thread fancy sending a regular delivery? :o