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(Strawman)
Killing a few bees when collecting honey
Vs
Killing a lot of insects and rodents when plowing/tilling land to grow sugarcane/corn(sirup).
Why discount one but not the other if they are equal?
I assume that for many vegans the specifically exploitative element of farming honey does make a difference to the rather unavoidable collateral damage of agriculture in general (since if we don't want to starve to death; each and everyone of us, vegan or not, will have to accept that those are happening) - but if you assume that honey comes with less suffering than corn syrup you're very welcome to replace them accordingly. Based on your tone I assume you're not a vegan and not actually interested in reducing animal suffering, but I could be wrong.
I am not vegan, but simply trying to understand how honey is bad, but as you say "unavoidable collateral damage of agriculture" or not.
There are many ways agriculture could be less harm, less pesticides, less monotone growing practices, more spread out growing. We do not have to accept these practices to not starve.
I don't think honey collecting is worse than agriculture (even of direct plants for human consumption), so I don't think vegans should discount honey.
I am not vegan, but simply trying to understand how honey is bad, but as you say “unavoidable collateral damage of agriculture” or not.
Is bad as well, we simply have no good way of avoiding it.
Think about it this way: Beekeeping is bad, agriculture is bad. Can we avoid both? No. But can we avoid at least one of them? Easily so. So let's do that - half a win is better than nothing.
There are many ways agriculture could be less harm, less pesticides, less monotone growing practices, more spread out growing. We do not have to accept these practices to not starve.
I agree, which is why many (if not all) vegans strive to support those more sustainable forms of agriculture. But economic constraints are a real thing for many people. Not everyone can always decide to buy the higher quality produce. If we can - good, let's do that. While and if we can't, same thing with the honey: Can we avoid all the problems at once? No, but at least we can do as best as reasonable possible, so let's do that. That's veganism for many people.
I don’t think honey collecting is worse than agriculture (even of direct plants for human consumption), so I don’t think vegans should discount honey.
Even if it's just 1% worse than agriculture wouldn't we reduce a bit of suffering by replacing it? And I mean it's not even like we need honey for anything. We consume too much sugar anyway. Even if honey is exactly as harmful as sugar cane farming (which is debatable), by omitting it we would save not only agricultural resources but animal exploitation as well. Not consuming it is better than consuming it in terms of animal suffering. Since we don't need to consume it, from a vegan perspective I think it's understandable why that's seen as preferable.
I agree with your arguments. We're on the same side of all of this.
I disagree on having to remove one if both are bad. It would be like the trolley problem. 10 people suffer repeatedly indefinitely vs infinitely many suffering eventually. Moving all use to sugar cane will be worse for the environment than spreading some honey and some sugar cane. See my previous monocultulturalism point.
Personally I think honey vs sugar cane is equal, so for me the choice is bad either way. I don't know which is worse, I try to use less, but what I use I feel is ambivalent, so I use both.