Getting Rid of the Demand is Key in Animal Rights
Post written by VegBlogger. Follow me on Twitter.
Many people believe that if you want animal exploitation to stop that you should
boycott, protest or strongarm places like marine parks and restaurants, among others. While they do take part in serving up animals and/or making them perform, the bottom line is that they are a business. They exist because the demand is there.
When it comes to such things it is really basic Business 101. If there is a demand, there will be a supply. Do away with the demand for the product or service and the supply will cease to exist.
Telling KFC they need to stop serving chickens or they need to be more humane to them does not get chicken off the menu. In order to get chicken off the menu you have to get rid of the demand for it. You do this by reaching the people. The people are the ones that you need to focus on. They need the information presented to them in a way that will not offend and send them running quickly to the nearest hamburger stand.
Let's say that tomorrow KFC closed their doors because of pressure from animal rights (or welfare) groups. A month later there would be a new fried chicken restaurant chain to take it's place, because the demand for it would still be there.
When people decide that they want to adopt a more compassionate diet (or they choose to stop eating animals because of the environmental impact or what it does to their own health), then the demand goes away as well.
Places like KFC and McDonald's are not inherently evil, they are just businesses that see an opportunity to cash in on meeting people's demands for cheap meals. And it just so happens that the people want those meals to consist of meat, more often than not.
It's kind of like the "don't hate the player, hate the game" type of idea. Telling restaurants to stop serving meat is a waste of time, really (although asking them to add a vegetarian dish isn't!). You need to get people to stop ordering animal foods and they will automatically follow suite.
Likewise, telling Sea World to stop keeping dolphins and whales in tanks and making them perform, is a waste of time as long as there is a line of people waiting to pay admission and get in.
Get rid of the lines and you get rid of the tanks. Get rid of the demand for buckets of chicken and you get rid of restaurants serving it. The focus needs to be on getting the info to the people, not the businesses that are meeting the consumer demand.
You have some great points here... My concern though is that "demand" is greatly supported by government bailouts and subsidies. For example the dairy industry would have collapsed if not for the intervention of government creating "demand" by buying close to a billion pounds of "cheese" and goodness knows how much milk. And they do this with all animal products. They also fund "studies" and "technology" to further enable animal use. It actually comes down to the point of getting rid of the "demand" of corrupt representation that allows for these "favors". We need new economics via a new political system. That's a difficult reality.
Posted by: Bea Elliott | 05/02/2010 at 10:14 AM
Bea, thanks for your comments. I totally get what you are saying and agree. I think all the bailouts and subsidies are a huge problem. But the government doens't make people line up to by the subsidized cheap fast food burgers, people love them! And they don't make people keep taking the dairy and cheese products. They could buy and subsidize those products all day, but if the American people refused them, they too would stop subsidizing them, because they would know nobody wants them. Problem is, the demand for them (especially cheap meat and dairy products) is so high. Why? It starts with educating the public. People have been lead to believe they need lots of protein and the best way to get it is meat/dairy (and lots of dairy for calcium). You and I know that's false, but others have not been so enlightened. Get them the info and the demand will let up, then so too will production.
Posted by: Jacqueline | 05/02/2010 at 12:10 PM