If every human being on Earth turns vegan, won’t it create a problem in the food chain?

This popular meme, Ego-System vs Ecosystem, helps support the vegan argument on the food chain. It shows that our food chain consists of a zillion elements. It also shows that the only species that has been dominantly exploitative are humans!

We are no longer in a world of scarcity or lack of tools and knowledge. The day is not too far when pills would replace food in terms of adequate nutrition. With science advancing at the current rate and human consciousness expanding with every passing day, it isn’t a stretch to appeal to fellow humans to simply replace the animal derived products in their lifestyle with the non-animal derived ones.

But what’s exactly stopping us from taking the leap?

Worried that you might disrupt the food chain by going vegan? Well, it’s a myth and can be busted in the blink of an eye!

Let me present to you the vegan argument on the food chain myth.

1. Is the current chain “natural”?

A food chain is one where all the species are interdependent. Hence the word ‘chain’, isn’t it? Where in our lifestyle are we connected with other species or with any aspect of nature in a way that our relationship is interdependent?

Do you think feeding and tending to the animals who are bred into existence just to be tortured, tormented, and murdered can be rationalized as them being dependent on us? When it comes to having animals exercise their right of dependency on us, we do not let them have the bare necessity of liberation. We force them to depend on us by artificially impregnating them and by feeding them only so that we can make money out of their vulnerability.

Strictly speaking, in nature, symbiosis is meant to be a two-way street. How often is it that you come across a news headline “45 year old man dies after tiger attacks him” and go “Oh that’s quite natural!”? With the level of evolution from being barbarians to highly sensitive beings in terms of emotions, can we really justify our exploitation of animals using a mere excuse of what happens in nature?

If a hungry tiger came running towards you right now, you would run and run for your life and do everything in your capacity trying to evade the attack. Not just that, you would then find ways of fencing localities and other areas to avoid a tiger’s entry into that area.

Hence the notion of “interdependency” in the human-animal “food chain” is merely a utilitarian construct. It only helps capitalism fuelled by animal abuse, traditions based on cruelty to animals, and the violence on our plates to continue.

2. Artificial breeding is at the centre stage of the human-animal “food chain”

Taking on from the previous vegan argument on the food chain myth, let’s explore artificial breeding of animals further.

Unlike in the wild where animals mate and reproduce naturally, animals raised for consumption and “use” by various industries in the current day world are artificially bred into existence.

Yes, the flesh of the animal you’ve eaten on that special occasion last month was most likely from an artificially bred animal.

With the growing shift towards the vegan lifestyle and changing demand patterns, fewer animals will be bred into the ecosystem. By the time demand completely moves away from animal-based choices, there will only be a tiny fraction of the billions of animals who will be in existence.

Those who cannot survive in the wild can be adopted and given shelter by compassionate individuals and groups who I am certain will be in plenty 🙂

3. From “food-chain” to climate change and pandemics?

Animal species have existed on the planet looonnng before humans arrived. Can’t debate this fact, can we?

Can you believe that nature survived mass extinctions and extreme conditions and still managed to exist with neutrality when humans did not even come into existence?

How come one specific species of animals did not end up overpopulating the other? This is because overpopulation is not a part of the “natural” phenomenon!!

Nature and all other species can survive perfectly well without human beings being involved in the food chain, or ANY other natural chain, for that matter!!. But here we humans have entered the scene and simply moved everything around.

It is no secret now that the forced entry of humans into the “food chain” is the cause of climate change and pandemics!

High time to undo our actions, eh?

4. Can we REALLY tolerate food-chain?

Hunting an animal with bare hands, chasing them down and ripping their flesh open, salivating at the smell of the prey’s blood – do all of these sound “normal” human acts?

If someone resorted to an act even remotely as “gruesome” as any of these, there would be protests urging authorities to take action against them. But this is EXACTLY what a “food chain” entails.

It’s time to ask ourselves: “If we cannot tolerate gruesome acts, how and why are we still contributing to something that involves so much of suffering when as a species we are progressing in terms of addressing and challenging social and cultural constructs such as discrimination?”

5. “Veganism is a win-win for everyone!”

Ever wondered how might that be true? Here’s how!

A non-vegan lifestyle, specifically the dietary part of it, consumes way too many resources in terms of food, land, and water. A vegan world will pave the way for natural greenery to come back into our lives through the regrowth of forests and green beds. It will also lead to many more herbivores thriving.

Now I know this must sound ridiculous because we’re here discussing how veganism could disrupt the food chain by increasing the herbivore population. But think of it!

All the destructive activities that we humans partake in are causing an extreme imbalance in the ecosystem of the wild. This has led to the starvation of several carnivorous animals. As a result, also combined with other human atrocities such as trophy hunting, poaching, and so on, different species are slowly starting to decline.

People ask questions like – How much does going vegan reduce your carbon footprint? Does being a vegan help the environment?

Think of what can happen if all these adverse actions are addressed and fixed! We have already seen how Mother Earth is glowing with humans under Coronavirus Covid-19 lockdown. Earth will go back to abundance and we’re all going to have greener countries and fresh water lakes.

La la la la la la… Hey! Seriously, tho!

6. But what about my food?!

Over the course of our conversation on the food chain in the context of the vegan argument to support it, you must have guessed the answer to this question. But if you haven’t yet, here’s the answer. Go vegan!

Vegan lifestyle is that of abundance and not of restriction. There about a hundred varieties of dairy, egg, and meat alternatives. There are thousands of dishes along with an exorbitant access to whole food such as fruits, vegetables, legumes, and seeds.

It is to be noted that the amount of food crops grown for feeding artificially bred non-human animals, combined with the food that is currently consumed by human animals, could feed 10 billion people. That’s more than the world human population!

If the animals bred for our consumption are taken out of the equation, can you think of the wealth in terms of food that all human beings can enjoy? No more death by starvation.

Too good to be true?

Do take a moment to do the math for yourself – 7 billion animals bred each year and to be fed constantly so as to pump up their weight and 7.5 billion human beings in existence with disturbing numbers of starvation deaths every year.

What would happen if the whole world became vegan?

Abundance!

Summary: Food chain vegan argument

The world ain’t going vegan overnight, mate! As optimistic as it may sound when said out loud, the chances of the entire population of the world turning vegan overnight are quite bleak.

You might ask, “What about the billions of animals who will all be parading the streets while humans won’t have anywhere to go?” Given the size of the human population, the change curve will be much flatter than we can visualize in our head.

With that, I rest my case here. I hope the vegan argument I put forth to help burst the food chain myth has provided pointers to think through this important issue deeply. Until I see you in our next article, give it a thought.

About the author, Sowmya Lakshmi

“I have been vegan since 2013 and it originated from my love for animals as I could no longer make sense of the disconnect between my love for them on one hand and my actions that were contributing to their harm on the other hand. I eventually decided to take it upon myself to spread the message of veganism as widely as possible as I realized that veganism paves the way to animal liberation.”