Individual Responsibility

• work in progress*

A common retort against veganism (or really anything that suggests individuals should change their behavior for the betterment of the world, whether it'd be voting, donating to charity, transitioning to more environmentally friendly lifestyles) is the notion that individuals acting for change is a futile effort given how miniscule one person's action is in the ocean of millions, possibly even billions.

The rationale for this type of thinking is fundamentally flawed, and is often more used as a post-hoc rationalization to not have to change anything about ourselves (and instead pin the responsibility on the government or billionaires or whatever), instead of being a legitimate reason as to why personal actions are pointless.

It's intuitive to think that your actions are negligible since it's hard to grasp the true weight of them when the effects are seemingly invisible, but human intuition is notorious for not being logical.

The Economics

Supply and Demand (and Subsidies)

No matter how you view capitalism, how things are marketed is based on a very simple concept: Supply and demand. As the demand for something increases, the companies who handle that good will adjust the supply accordingly (if possible). If more people want meat, farmers will breed more animals into existence to keep up with the demand, since there is an economic incentive to do so. Or with say fossil fuels, more people drive and use electricity, the companies will cater to that demand. If the companies have a huge supply but no one is buying their stuff, they'll usually move on to other things to maintain a profit.

Likewise, it's important to note this because when people claim that corporations are to blame for the majority of emissions and it has little to do with the consumer, they're kinda forgetting that these corporations aren't releasing all these emissions for the fun of it, they're doing it because people are paying for their products, which has this effect.

We can't be bothered to give a rundown on basic economics, so just watch this video:

To assert that each individual's action is irrelevant is to completely ignore the fact that millions acting would have an objectively massive impact (even people who deny the importance of individuals recognize this). Any non-zero amount of possible harm (or help) ought to be considered; Equating this near-zero chance with zero is inherently incorrect. A common consequentialist perspective on issues goes something along the lines of, "What would the world look like if everyone acted like this?"

It's understandable why it's hard to see how you as one person acting has any effect on the status quo, and it certainly seems all the more pointless when others aren't bothering to do anything, but that does not mean that we should resign ourselves to apathy and inaction. It's important to remember that we're social animals; As much as we like to view ourselved as independent thinkers that aren't influenced by what others say and do, that isn't really the case. We are far more influenced by what others do than we think, especially when it's within the groups we choose to identify with. When we see more people doing something, that makes us more inclined to do it ourselves.

The animal agriculture industry is driven by consumer behavior, so consequentially as a consumer, you are part of this driving force. We can talk all day about how animal suffering and climate change are all the faults of the corporationy corporations in their corporation buildings, but they aren't intimidated in the slightest in your words; They are intimitated by you withholding your money from them. When it comes to capitalism, regardless of what your views on it are, whether you're for, against, or something in between, this fact remains: Your words mean nothing. Only money talks. Want corporations to stop doing horrible shit? Stop paying for them to do so. It is not complicated.

It's a bit of a weird phenomenon. People'll complain about how the government needs to step in to solve climate change (or with animal rights, say there needs to be more animal welfare laws for farmed animals) since individual action doesn't matter, and that's cool and all, but in our Western societies where leaders and legislators are elected by the people, everyone still plays a role when it comes to the voting booth; so no matter how you look at it, the individual citizens still play a crucial role in all this.

Investing in mock meats

If buying animal products is a net evil due to the causing of animal suffering, then buying mock meats may be a net good, since the purchasing of these goods shifts the demand towards them, which in turn encourages more non-vegans to consume them more (and thus displace animal products).

Contrary to what the anti-capitalist ilk of Vegans would say, buying vegan products from otherwise non-Vegan companies (for instance, the Impossible Whopper from Burger King, or Ben & Jerry's Non-Dairy Ice Creams) is incredibly important for promoting veganism since it shifts demand towards the vegan products away from the non-vegan ones.

Of course, support purely Vegan companies too (such as Tofurky most notably, or all-Vegan restaurants if available) is important too, but it's also very important to buy vegan stuff from other companies. Arguably, buying from the non-vegan companies would have a bigger impact, since they have larger influence over the market, have more customer recognition, and they have larger R&D budgets which can make even better alternatives.

https://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=7377&p=49433 https://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=7386&p=49469 https://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=6665&p=48330

Why saying “70% of emissions are caused by 100 companies” is so fucking stupid and wrong

This line is a favorite of the "Your actions don't matter" crowd, and it's a completely misleading statement on numerous levels, so we'll address it here.

On the surface, this seems pretty damning and just serves as more proof that individuals have little impact on climate and it’s all about holding corporations accountable, but this line comes from an article that is a misunderstanding of a study conducted (or more likely, deliberately misreported), and as it’s always been on the internet people are glad to just read the title of the of the article and tout it without context.

The most egregious thing about it is, that wasn’t even the conclusion of the study; The actual conclusion of the study was that 100 corporations are responsible for 71% of *industrial* emissions, not emissions wholesale. There are emissions not included in that, primarily agricultural (which accounts for roughly a quarter). Including all emissions, these corporations are responsible for roughly half of all them, and here's the kicker: 88% of all those emissions are due to their consumption.

Let’s also take into account that many of the companies included in the list are not even western. Looking at the top ten, only two of them are in Western countries, and only one of them is in the top five. It's VERY unlikely that these countries are going to listen to the cries of highly priveleged Westerners.

If all these corporations were to shut down their operations tomorrow, that isn’t going to eliminate our energy needs. If they aren’t replaced with something else, millions of people will die, and for those that don’t, life would be a miserable existence.

There's been a rising wave of environmentalists who think that fighting climate change would require the destruction of capitalism, but fighting climate change as far as energy is concerned shouldn’t be about stopping corporations, it should be about stopping usage of fossil fuels and shifting over to clean forms of energy, particularly nuclear energy hint hint.

Why do you think these corporations are releasing so many green house gases? For the fun of it? You don’t think giving them money incentivises them to burn more coal? Millions of people taking hot showers everyday, driving cars, blasting heat and AC, doesn’t add up a little?

https://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=7381&p=49458 https://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3819 https://philosophicalvegan.com/viewtopic.php?t=2806

Share of Group Culpability

Consequentialism based exclusively on individual behaviors can become murky when we deal with behaviors that require group effort to have results, particularly when we assume it as a given that the group either will or will not do something.

Take, for example, the execution with ten gunmen firing on a target:
If we assume that nine gunshots would be just as lethal as ten, and that every gunman will certainly fire if he has no moral reason not to, then all of the gunmen will fire and nobody is at all culpable for the murder.

This can be shown by looking at it from the perspective of any one gunman: if the others fire then the target will certainly die either way, so there's no reason not to fire. Since we know the other gunmen are in the same situation and equally without moral reason to fire, we know they will fire.

Thus, the gunman fires and is free of blame in the murder. The exact same reasoning is equally viable for every single gunman, each having nine others who would fire if he did not leaving him blameless. Thus, following that reasoning, in the end nobody is culpable for the murder and it is without moral significance to individual action.

Obviously that should raise some serious red flags.

This is similar to the unexpected execution paradox:

A prisoner is told that he will be executed some time in the next week, and the execution day will come as a surprise. He reasons it could not happen on the last day, Friday, because then he would know it was coming and it would NOT be a surprise. And once Friday is ruled out, he knows it can't happen on Thursday because then it wouldn't be a surprise. Then he reasons it could happen on Wednesday when Thursday and Friday are ruled out, and so on it couldn't happen on Tuesday, Monday, or Sunday.

Thus the prisoner reasons he will not be executed because there's no day on which the execution could occur.

The punchline is the the executioner comes for him on Wednesday, and the prisoner is taken completely by surprise.

The first and most obvious problem with ignoring individual culpability is metaphysical: this absolute determinist view of the situation (e.g. that nine gunshots will certainly be as lethal as ten, or that the other gunmen are completely predictable) is actually a mistunderstanding of statistics, and even physics as a whole, see Small Chance of a Big Difference below for more discussion on this.
However, even in the context of this implausible world-view, we can understand a notion of shared culpability for group actions.

If ten people, collectively, commit murder we don't have to call them all innocent, but can equally call them all guilty or understand that they all have a share of guilt (all 1/10th guilty of the act).

This essentially reflects the consumer situation in animal agriculture, where large groups of consumers have a very significant net effect together, and share the burden of blame between them for being part of that. Likewise, large groups of vegetarians or vegans have a significant net effect of reducing demand for meat (and harm to animals), and as innovators as increasing demand for alternatives which facilitates early adopters, which facilitate majority adopters, etc. Each person in that group shares the credit for being part of something good and reducing harm.

In cases of asymmetry, distribution of guilt becomes less clear.

For example, in the Mob Boss and Hitman scenario.

If the Mob Boss did not order the hit, it wouldn't happen period. If the Hitman refuses the job, there's likely another after him, and so on, so it will still happen.

And yet both are required for the murder to occur -- if there were no Hitmen period, Mob Bosses would be left powerless to murder people.

It's clear that the Mob Boss is more responsible, because he makes up 100% of his end, but it's not clear what share of the responsibility the Hitman has. It's plausible that every person willing to kill somebody for money (whether or not they ever actually do it) in fact shares that burden, because it's the pool of potential Hitmen that provides the guarantee for that side of the equation. Since that pool is probably very large, the Hitman is significantly less culpable (if there are a hundred willing would-be Hitmen in line, we can say he's 1% of his end).

Here the asymmetry reflects that in the consumer:producer relationship.

If the consumers (buying and eating the meat) do not demand it, it will not be produced; farmers will farm something else, the industry is not going to waste time and money making meat nobody wants (unless the government is paying for it, but that's another issue). Consumers as a group share 100% of their end, with roughly a 1:1 ratio of individual share of guilt for each animal eaten. However, if the farmer or slaughterhouse worker refuses to produce it, there's likely another after him, and so on who will do it and fill the demand. Due to the increased mechanization of animal agriculture and the small number required to carry it out, and the large number of potential people who would do it, individual culpability on that end is very low.

With a system of culpability that understands that morality is an artifact of choice, the ratio of culpability can be shifted even more when we understand that consumers choose to eat meat, but that those participating in the industry may have to do their jobs in order to earn enough money to live. When there is no choice for one of those involved, they are relieved of culpability to that extent and it's shifted to the other side just as if it were an automated process doing the act.

In the Mob Boss example, if the Hitman is under duress and he or his family will be killed if he doesn't do the job, the Mob Boss holds virtually ALL of the responsibility, because he's the one with the choice and has made an offer the Hitman can't refuse.

So here we understand that consumers are almost entirely responsible for the harm being done, and they share it among themselves with none of them being blameless.

There is one factor providing some relief to that culpability, but few people would admit to it: advertising. To the extent that any individual consumer is a mindless drone, obedient to the commercials which have commanded animal product consumption, his or her choice may be limited. Pretty much the only argument against individual culpability is if a consumer admits to having no free will due to being manipulated and controlled by advertising and forced to purchase and eat these things... in which case, the blame falls upon the psychopathic advertising firms that are pushing these things (like those that did the same with Cigarettes in the past).

However, this is not only an uncommon argument (since most people don't want to dismiss their own free will), but also an empirically weak one given the number of people who have shunned those products and gone reducetarian, vegetarian, or vegan -- including people who struggle with obesity and overeating (which is not an excuse to overeat on animal products).

Rule Consequentialism

People are extremely bad at making consequential analyses, not only because we are terrible at risk assessment (e.g. people who don't want an airbag because despite the overwhelming likelihood of it being life saving in an accident they're worried about the minute chance of it misfiring and hurting them), but because we're incredibly good at rationalizing and tend to succumb to cognitive bias in favor of doing what we wanted to do.

It's very easy to inflate or deflate risks of imprecisely known consequences, and appeal to ignorance to confuse consequential calculus.

As such, the best form of consequentialism in practice for human beings is probably a rule consequentialism which helps avoid these issues of individual bias and rationalization by evaluation action relative to adherence to general rules rather than individual assessment.

Here Rule Consequentialism avoids the pitfalls of ignoring individual responsibility, as in the execution example in the previous section, and without having to assess shared culpability. It asks what people should do generally.

One important rule is generalizability

"You must be the change you want to see in the world." -Mahatma Gandhi

Small Chance of a Big Difference

Because of the nature of production and distribution having a high level of grandularity (only capable of scaling up or down orders by cases, for example) one person buying more or less meat may or may not make a difference.

For example, if a store orders one case of 1,000 sausages every week, and half of them are purchased and half thrown out, then one more person buying a sausage, or even a hundred sausages, makes no difference to the number ordered and the number of animals killed.

However, due to the same issue, there's a chance of one person (the one order that causes the store to order an entire extra case) making a much larger difference.

If that same store were buying one case of 1,000 sausages and selling 1,000 sausages every week, and you bought even one extra sausage, the store might buy two cases the next week and because of your purchase of one sausage 999 extra sausages were ordered and wasted.

The question of effect comes down to how close the existing demand is to the threshold of increasing or decreasing the highly granular order quantity, and this is a virtually unknowable number (even people working at the store may not know this).

The same kind of granularity travels all the way down the production line, with the number of animals scaled up or down in the thousands or even millions based on national and international demand.

It could come to pass that 999 vegans do nothing, but then ONE vegan saves millions of animals.

As previously explained (Above) it doesn't make much sense to deny responsibility to other involved parties, but even if we do so and take their actions for granted, we have to understand that we do not have zero chance of making any difference, but a small chance. However, that small chance also comes with an extremely large difference (as large as the chance is small). Statistically it works out to be a good wager.

Since the future consequences of any action are never certain due not only to lack of knowledge but to inherently indeterminate factors like quantum influence on chaotic functions (the quantum butterfly effect), that means ALL consequentialist ethics are based on probability of good outcome. This makes it impossible to deny the virtue of attempting good by playing a part in a movement with statistically good outcomes.