Earlier this month, a fundraiser for nonprofits that battle to finish manufacturing unit farming went a bit viral — no less than in a single nook of the web.
Dwarkesh Patel, the influential tech podcaster, introduced on his present that if his listeners donated a collective $250,000 to FarmKind, a corporation that distributes cash to anti-factory farming charities, so would he. They did — after which some.
Thus far, Patel and his listeners — together with Stripe CEO Patrick Collison, skilled poker participant Liv Boeree, and in style Substack author Noah Smith — have raised over $2 million. For the worldwide anti-factory farming motion, which works on a shoestring finances to repair one of many most difficult and uncared for social points of our time, that’s some huge cash.
The motion spent round $260 million final yr in its effort to assist tens of billions of abused land animals and a trillion or so fish (to place that into perspective, New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Artwork spends much more yearly to gather, retailer, and show artwork). So, Patel helped increase the equal of virtually 1 p.c of all the international motion’s yearly finances.
His pitch was easy: This can be a actually large drawback, and charities have been capable of make significant progress on it with little cash, so by injecting even a comparatively modest quantity of additional funds into the trigger, you may make a giant distinction. The group that can distribute the cash, FarmKind, makes the identical pitch, however with a twist that Patel solely hinted at: In the event you really feel dangerous about consuming meat however don’t wish to go vegan, you possibly can have the identical impression by donating to charity as a substitute.
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“It’s like carbon offsets, however on your weight-reduction plan,” FarmKind’s web site states. (Carbon offsets enable folks to pay for an environmental good — like planting timber that take up carbon dioxide — to offset a excessive carbon-emitting exercise, like touring by airplane.)
The idea makes intuitive sense. Most individuals assume the manufacturing unit farms that produce the overwhelming majority of America’s meat, eggs, and dairy are dangerous, however a long time of vegan advocacy have failed to steer greater than 1 p.c of Individuals. Calls to only eat much less meat have confirmed largely ineffective, too. If sympathetic shoppers are unwilling to vary their diets, the considering goes, they might nonetheless assist by supporting cash-strapped organizations working to cut back animal struggling on farms and make plant-based consuming extra accessible.
However I additionally fear that FarmKind’s method, often known as “ethical offsetting,” may absolve shoppers — who individually and collectively maintain energy to cut back the variety of animals factory-farmed for meals — of private accountability.
So, are you able to really offset your meat consumption with a donation? And extra importantly, do you have to?
The wonky math behind offsetting your meat consumption
Annually, the typical American eats round 33 chickens, eight fish, 228 shrimp, one-third of a pig, and a tenth of a cow — for a complete of 269.5 animals. In line with FarmKind, it’ll price you $23 a month to offset the struggling these animals expertise on manufacturing unit farms.
That’s about “the price of a month-to-month Netflix premium subscription,” Thom Norman, FarmKind’s co-founder and director of outreach, instructed me.
This doesn’t imply that should you donate $23 monthly, you save 269.5 animals or assure that another person will go vegetarian in your stead. Somewhat, FarmKind estimates that, with an additional $23 monthly, the animal advocacy charities that obtain your cash can scale back animal struggling by an quantity equal to the struggling skilled by 269.5 animals on manufacturing unit farms.
Take egg-laying hens, for instance. Greater than half of egg-laying hens within the US are indefinitely confined in tiny cages, a apply that represents a few of the worst animal cruelty in our meals system. Animal advocacy teams have efficiently pressured a whole bunch of companies, together with many state governments, to ban these cages. One of many main cage-free advocacy teams, the Humane League, estimates that for each 85 cents they spend on these campaigns, they handle to get one hen out of a cage.
Animal welfare consultants have estimated that one-third of an egg-laying hen’s complete struggling may be attributed to their confinement in cages. With this in thoughts, getting three hens out of cages — which might price the Humane League $2.55 — is, in line with FarmKind, the equal of ending the struggling of 1 factory-farmed hen.
FarmKind makes use of related analyses that try to quantify the struggling of pigs saved in tiny cages, and the struggling inflicted by different merciless practices on manufacturing unit farms.
The group acknowledges that there’s a level of uncertainty in these calculations, and it makes use of extra conservative estimates to account for it. For instance, it’s laborious to estimate the diploma to which nonprofits that work to make plant-based consuming extra accessible interprets to much less animal struggling in the long term.
And there are extra basically unknowable questions — like, on condition that we don’t know what it’s wish to be a hen, do we actually know that cage confinement accounts for one-third of a hen’s struggling? There are extra sensible unknowns, too, like whether or not a charity that has been efficient up to now will probably be efficient sooner or later — after years of success, their campaigns might hit diminishing returns.
It’s straightforward to dismiss these uncertainties as deceptive, and I might additional quibble with FarmKind’s calculations. However what is evident is that the resource-poor anti-factory farming motion might make much more progress with extra money, whether or not it’s labeled an “offset” or not.
Nonetheless, there’s the thornier query as as to if a social motion ought to encourage folks to donate to offset the hurt they’re inflicting, reasonably than to cease taking part in it straight.
The case for and in opposition to meat offsets
FarmKind’s reply to that query is an unequivocal “sure,” and it’s one rooted in ruthless pragmatism.
“We all know that individuals general are literally actually on board with the concept manufacturing unit farming particularly is horrible,” Norman of FarmKind instructed me. And animal advocacy teams have a tendency to present shoppers one factor they’ll do to assist: scale back or get rid of their meat consumption.
It hasn’t labored. Within the US, charges of vegetarianism have stagnated. And whereas many individuals say they’re actively decreasing their meat consumption, most are most likely mendacity or fooling themselves. American per capita meat consumption has elevated lately.
In a greater world, it might be simpler to steer folks to vary their diets. However on the earth we’ve acquired, the subsequent neatest thing, in line with Norman, is to complement the animal advocacy motion in order that it could win extra campaigns to cut back animal struggling on manufacturing unit farms.
As as to if meat offsets let folks off the hook, morally talking, Norman mentioned he’s unsure. He doesn’t know whether or not donating may make individuals who in any other case would’ve diminished their meat consumption chorus from doing so and even improve their consumption. However he says that individuals donating to FarmKind aren’t deciding between going vegan or donating to offset their meat consumption. “Usually, they’re considering, ‘Ought to I offset or ought to I do nothing?’” Norman mentioned Plus, he added, getting folks to donate as a primary step may make them really feel part of the motion and cause them to take different actions, like consuming much less meat or volunteering.
I posed the query of offsets to Tyler John, a thinker and philanthropic advisor who’s thought deeply about animal ethics, philanthropy, and carbon offsetting. John is sympathetic to FarmKind’s technique and agrees that the animal advocacy motion wants to present the general public extra choices to take part past simply altering their diets, and that donating to the trigger ought to be one in every of them. However whether or not or not that may really offset a person’s meat consumption, he mentioned, is “a really difficult empirical query.”
He worries that the concept of meat offsets might additional reinforce how little people worth the lives of animals raised and slaughtered for meals. Few folks would contemplate it morally sound to abuse a canine and offset that hurt by donating to an animal shelter, however that is primarily what meat offsetting entails.
“In circumstances the place we’re morally outraged, we don’t assume that offsetting can wipe away the issue,” John mentioned. “It’s solely in circumstances the place we’re morally disengaged and don’t care that a lot concerning the ethical situation that we predict offsetting is okay.”
We can also’t “offset our approach out” of the manufacturing unit farming drawback, John mentioned, as a result of even when everybody have been to offset their meat consumption, the meat business would nonetheless increase and slaughter tens of billions of animals — albeit in modestly higher situations — yearly.
The dispiriting actuality that meat offsets power animal advocates to reckon with
After I first realized about FarmKind, I instinctively winced at the concept the struggling of farmed animals could possibly be offset with a donation equal to a month-to-month Netflix subscription. I nonetheless wince at it once I take into consideration the character of that struggling. Billions of animals are trapped in cages — their tails, testicles, and beaks minimize off with no ache reduction — and overcrowded into noxious warehouses, pressured to reside in their very own waste. I believe that ought to be met with a much bigger response than parting with $23 monthly.
However, then, I take into consideration how the undertaking to finish manufacturing unit farming, drastically scale back meat consumption, and shift the world towards a extra plant-based meals system will doubtless be a centuries-long one, and I can see meat offsets in one other mild.
We’re solely about 50 years into the trendy animal rights motion, and the present political, financial, and social situations are such that the motion’s major targets are nonetheless far out of attain. What’s in attain is decreasing the struggling of animals unfortunate sufficient to be born into the manufacturing unit farm system and slowly normalizing plant-based consuming. However these can solely be achieved by a much bigger, higher resourced, extra highly effective animal advocacy motion. A sympathetic public might, on the very least, chip in to construct that motion, and the success of Dwarkesh Patel’s fundraiser suggests there are lots of people keen to assist on this approach.
I don’t know should you can really offset the struggling and demise of 1 animal on a manufacturing unit farm by making many others endure rather less. However I do know that to be an advocate for animals in 2025, you must settle for that most individuals agree that manufacturing unit farming is horrible however are unwilling to do what is required to finish it. You then have to satisfy them the place they’re, which is painfully removed from what animals want.
A couple of years in the past, carbon offset skilled John Holler instructed Vox that it’s extra useful to consider carbon offsets as merely “a device for routing cash towards good issues,” like inexperienced vitality and forest conservation, reasonably than as a real offset of your individual carbon footprint.
“You’re buying carbon credit to contribute to international decarbonization,” he mentioned, “not making a declare in opposition to your individual emissions.” We must always take into consideration meat offsets in the identical approach. They don’t — and might’t — absolve humanity of its abuse of billions of animals, however they do assist to construct a greater world that many people wish to see however can’t but convey ourselves to appreciate.