Honey

[brimstoneSalad]

But what exactly makes in unethical? Is it the way the bees are treated? Does it hurt bee populations, or help them because the bees are being bred?

Bees are already bred for pollination, bees aren't going anywhere. There will always be professional pollination services and bee sellers for farmers who need them. Non-honey-producing insects are also sold for pollination and other services.

Taking their honey likely hurts them by creating nutritional and immune stresses, which causes the bees to die off and need to be replaced so frequently. Without taking their honey, bee colonies would likely survive longer and not need replacing. This is an issue that needs more research, but in no way is harvesting honey beneficial.

[iirtriiiokn]

I checked, because her mom is actually pretty heavy into alt-med. But no, actual doctor.

She probably chose a doctor friendly to altmed. There are even anti-vax doctors, if you look hard enough.

Is it unethical, though?

I would say so, because there's no reason for it at all.
If you legitimately need something, there can be an argument for it. Even if it helps in any way at all. But honey doesn't do anything for digestion, it's pseudoscience. Alt-med itself is unethical, altmed with animal products is even worse.

It's reasonable to use bees to pollinate crops to produce healthy food, even if the bees suffer a little, there's substantial human benefit. It even makes sense to go ahead an eat something (like bread) with honey in it if there's no convenient alternative (it's probably even better to eat whole wheat bread with honey than white bread without -- the honey is not what makes it better, though, it's better in spite of the honey).
There's no credible benefit to human health from honey, and just intentionally adding straight up honey to something doesn't make sense. It's sugar. Just use corn syrup.

Vegans eating honey isn't something I'm likely to go out of my way to complain about, since it's a minor issue, but that doesn't mean it isn't wrong.

But what exactly makes in unethical? Is it the way the bees are treated? Does it hurt bee populations, or help them because the bees are being bred?

http://www.adaptt.org/veganism.html# (Just click on bees and honey.)

[EquALLity]

But what exactly makes in unethical? Is it the way the bees are treated? Does it hurt bee populations, or help them because the bees are being bred?

Bees are already bred for pollination, bees aren't going anywhere. There will always be professional pollination services and bee sellers for farmers who need them. Non-honey-producing insects are also sold for pollination and other services.

Taking their honey likely hurts them by creating nutritional and immune stresses, which causes the bees to die off and need to be replaced so frequently. Without taking their honey, bee colonies would likely survive longer and not need replacing. This is an issue that needs more research, but in no way is harvesting honey beneficial.

The bees are dying out, though.

Does it actually do that? Is there evidence for that?

[EquALLity]

She probably chose a doctor friendly to altmed. There are even anti-vax doctors, if you look hard enough.



I would say so, because there's no reason for it at all.
If you legitimately need something, there can be an argument for it. Even if it helps in any way at all. But honey doesn't do anything for digestion, it's pseudoscience. Alt-med itself is unethical, altmed with animal products is even worse.

It's reasonable to use bees to pollinate crops to produce healthy food, even if the bees suffer a little, there's substantial human benefit. It even makes sense to go ahead an eat something (like bread) with honey in it if there's no convenient alternative (it's probably even better to eat whole wheat bread with honey than white bread without -- the honey is not what makes it better, though, it's better in spite of the honey).
There's no credible benefit to human health from honey, and just intentionally adding straight up honey to something doesn't make sense. It's sugar. Just use corn syrup.

Vegans eating honey isn't something I'm likely to go out of my way to complain about, since it's a minor issue, but that doesn't mean it isn't wrong.

But what exactly makes in unethical? Is it the way the bees are treated? Does it hurt bee populations, or help them because the bees are being bred?

http://www.adaptt.org/veganism.html# (Just click on bees and honey.)

Do you have a non-biased source that doesn't reference a page that says we're "stealing" honey from bees?

[brimstoneSalad]

The bees are dying out, though.

Bees are not dying out, colonies are dying out and then being replaced by commercially bred bees.

Does it actually do that? Is there evidence for that?

We're talking about replacing bees' honey largely with corn syrup or sugar water, and some supplemental pollen.

http://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=801&hilit=colony+collapse&start=20#p8725

This is the core of the issue. Bees produce honey, then the honey is taken away and replaced with sugar and other stuff, which the bees have to reprocess into honey again but which is generally recognized to be nutritionally problematic.
The bottom line is that honey harvesting isn't really about making anything and providing a net yield, it's just swapping something out (which turns out to be worse for humans AND the bees). The modern process is less efficient than just eating sugar. AND, as it turns out, less healthy.

There's no good argument for eating honey. Like sugar, it's relatively useless nutritionally, but it's also filled with potentially dangerous pathogens, less efficient than producing and using the sugar directly, and contains much more fructose, which makes it nutritionally inferior to sucrose from a human health perspective.

[...]

The fact that over-harvesting of honey may be involved is a reason to stop it, even without proof positive, because honey provides no actual advantages beyond a very slight subsidization of the cost of food from flowering plants (which is not any advantage to vegans, because at best you're taking money from one pocket, and putting it (after the honey man's cut) into the other).

Consider the standards for evidence based medicine. It must be both safe AND effective.
In the case of veganism, at minimum we should be obligated to ask only if something is harmless OR useful.

If something is useful, it may be enough to just show that it's not very harmful, or show that it's unlikely to be very harmful (in excess of its usefulness) -- like medicine.
However, if something is useless, a greater burden must be put on showing that it is also harmless. In the case of honey, that burden has not been met.

See the precautionary principle: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precautionary_principle
Which applies even more when a practice is useless or worse (as is the case of honey).

Honey is worse than merely useless in that it is actively unhealthy, and yet through misconception and dishonest marketing promoted as a healthier alternative to sugar.
Honey is worse than merely useless in that it is wasteful in agricultural terms. We can produce comparable or superior sweeteners in every regard with greater efficiency than honey affords.

At best, honey may be blameless for CCD, but this has not been proven (and is extremely unlikely, since our practices drastically affect bees lives). We don't really know for sure what's causing it, so anything that might be causing it must be suspect.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colony_collapse_disorder

The mechanisms of CCD and the reasons for its increasing prevalence remain unclear, but many possible causes have been proposed: pesticides, primarily neonicotinoids; infections with Varroa and Acarapis mites; malnutrition; various pathogens; genetic factors; immunodeficiencies; loss of habitat; changing beekeeping practices; or a combination of factors.[9]

The red bold cause is directly related to increase honey consumption and harvesting by humans (and replacement with sugar and other substitutes).
Orange causes are more indirectly related or more speculatively related, including increased exposure/less enzymatic breakdown, and changing the mediums for pathogens that bees are exposed to through food source replacement, inbreeding for production, etc.

Among those, loss of habitat and mites are pretty much the only things that seem unlikely to have any serious direct relation to honey harvesting (I could be wrong on that though).

A 2015 review examined 170 studies on colony collapse disorder and stressors for bees, including pathogens, agrochemicals, declining biodiversity, climate change and more. The review concluded that "a strong argument can be made that it is the interaction among parasites, pesticides, and diet that lies at the heart of current bee health problems."

Put up the proof that honey harvesting is harmless, or show me proof that honey is a health food. But in either case, the burden of proof lies on the honey advocates.

[iirtriiiokn]

But what exactly makes in unethical? Is it the way the bees are treated? Does it hurt bee populations, or help them because the bees are being bred?

http://www.adaptt.org/veganism.html# (Just click on bees and honey.)

Do you have a non-biased source that doesn't reference a page that says we're "stealing" honey from bees?

Sorry for the late reply...

It says we're stealing honey, because we literally are. Bees don't just make it for fun, or for humans, they make it for themselves. They use honey as food and hive insulation. Ever seen someone try to take honey from wild bees? They get attacked by bees, because the bees don't want them to take their honey. You know how modern beekeepers take the honey without getting attacked by bees? They have to spray smoke all over them to calm them, so the bees don't try and defend their honey. It's so clear that bees don't want you to take their honey, so that means when you take it, you're stealing, and stealing is unethical, that's one of the unethical things about eating honey.

Another unethical thing is how queen bees have their wings ripped off, beekeepers do this so when the hive tries to relocate, the queen won't fly with them, so the hive can't relocate. So basically, bees are trapped living in a place where they have to live for their whole lives, and they can't relocate, and the stuff they work hard to make for themselves, is regularly stolen. Also as you might imagine, getting your wings ripped off, must be extremely painful.

What's biased about this source? I'm sure Gary would love it if it was somehow ethical to take and eat honey. Why would he be biased against something that he knows is ethical? It's because it isn't ethical.

[brimstoneSalad]

Also as you might imagine, getting your wings ripped off, must be extremely painful.

I have doubts about that. Insects respond very differently to damage (basically ignoring it). Losing a limb seems to be more annoying or confusing (when they have to modify their gaits) for them than painful. It doesn't mean they like it, of course, but it may not be good to describe it as painful. Think of it more like you using crutches to walk, and somebody taking them away. Just because the act isn't painful doesn't mean it's nice.

Bees respond aggressively to any molestation of the hive. They may not realize honey is being taken; they don't seem to keep good track of it.
In wild hives, honey will often spill or drip from them in times of plenty (the bees collect it again later).

If you could take some without stirring them up, and take a small enough amount that it wouldn't negatively affect them, it could be fine.
Taking so much you have to replace it with sugar, and potentially cause a colony collapse, doesn't make sense and is arguably kind of cruel.
The most important point to remember is that the health buzz about honey is hooey. There's no reason to choose honey over sugar, corn syrup, or another sweetener.