this post was submitted on 13 Aug 2026
164 points (83.6% liked)
Perry Bible Fellowship
1069 readers
148 users here now
This is a community dedicated to the webcomic known as the Perry Bible Fellowship, created by Nicholas Gurewitch.
https://www.patreon.com/perryfellow
New comics posted whenever they're posted to the site (rarer nowadays but still ongoing). Old comics posted every day until we're caught up
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Interesting way to blame individuals for capitalism.
When did capitalism force you to eat meat? You did it because you wanted to.
When did capitalism make me personally kill those animals?
By eating them you demand for them to be killed.
I am not judging you for that, if you want to eat meat then you can. But stop trying to blame someone else for your own actions.
By wearing clothing you demand for children to be enslaved and to die at an early age. By driving you demand for the middle easterners to be killed. By owning anything made of wood you demand the Amazon to be clearcut. By drinking coffee you demand women are killed. By eating a banana you demand South Americans are brutalized to death. This is your logic applied in full.
I think the fact is that most of the things you listed are true, to a certain extent, though you do not carry the sole burden of every chicken. (And in the context of the comic, the specific species there imply that he was an avid hunter and did, literally take the lives of those creatures himself. He was, perhaps, also a farmer.)
There is "no ethical consumption under capitalism" and "the only way to live a life free of sin is not to live at all" (sin here defined as "actions causing negative externalities"). Every action has consequences, but I think it's just about understanding that we do carry some culpability for the far-reaching consequences of our actions. Trying to minimize those with the resources we can afford should be a touchstone for all of us. We probably shouldn't be buying a bunch of chocolate, not only because the vast majority of chocolate is FULL of DEEPLY unsafe levels of lead and cadmium, but also because much of it is produced with slave labor.
However, the person hounding you above needs to see to their own house. If they are so high and mighty as to try to shame you (which, make no mistake, they were absolutely doing despite their claim to the contrary, then it is they, not you, who should be ashamed.
When it comes to how you eat, many vegans claim moral superiority because they have the privilege of time and resources to be able to afford a vegan lifestyle. Most of them respond that all it takes is switching to plant protein and buying fruits and veggies, but then they conveniently leave out that not everyone has the luxury of time necessary to perform proper meal preparation for their families. I'm a pescetarian, and I believe that I have to be mindful of the systems I support by continuing to live... Full stop. I don't need to shame a bunch of people to make my own choices seem more holy. It seems like the commenter above thinks they do. We are, all of us, part of systems of exploitation. What we need is education, so that we all understand the systems in which we take part, so that we can grasp which systems are necessary (for now), which can be replaced, and from which we might cut ourselves loose to end them. You have clearly already been educated on these systems, so that dude lecturing you serves no purpose save their own self-aggrandisement
So it is true that we contribute some small part to the demand for meat when we purchase it but, to quote my favourite book: "You have to do whatever you can't not do".
If that means considering the moral effects of every choice, then you must do so. If that means trying desperately to survive in a world run by Corpocratic Christofascists bent on the subjugation of all life for their sole benefit, then you have to do what you must to live.
There is literally no way to eat meat (i guess lab grown but that's very recent, though arguably might be further developed if not capitalism) that doesn't involve killing an animal. It's not capitalism. The horrible living conditions somewhat are, but still nothing is forcing you to eat meat at all.
And yes by buying ultra cheap clothing you're demanding labor exploitatipn. Probably the biggest difference with meat though is that it's not even more expensive to not eat it lol. Buying meat from animals that actually had a decent life is, but that's not the only option.
I eat meat myself but your argument just doesn't hold.
Buying any commodity is exploitation. As soon as we have a world where meat isn't a commodity, then yes you are correct, but until then it doesn't.
I would say that that's more if those products are bought new. The moneyless Buy Nothing sub-economy/movement helps a lot.
Clothes and cars are a bit complicated since they are often essential, and the more ethical options are more expensive so not everyone can afford them. I'd still say those who could buy the more ethical options ought to do so.
Meat and coffee are resource intensive goods with cheaper alternatives which cause way less suffering.
So yes, paying people to mistreat humans without need is cruel. Paying people to brutalize animals to death is cruel too. One logically can't justify the other.
Where have we gone wrong that people always feel the need to argue for putting animals into literal death camps, of all things? I just wish people would strive to make the world a less cruel place for once, but that is just too much to ask for in this society.
almost no one does this though. a few people do.
It's an entire industry. https://animalclock.org/
stalking me, now?
I thought you blocked me
Another assumption without evidence, shocking.
I am correcting your deadly disinformation for everyone else's benefit.
you said goodbye forever. so you just lied, I guess.
what I said is true
Slaughterhouses use brutal force to kill animals.
yep. most people dont work in slaughterhouses
It's not too much to ask for a kinder society, but asking doesn't make it one. The only way we stop mass animal cruelty is by revolting against our capitalist oppressors that make commodities of living things. I look forward to when we can live in a society that can systemically reject it.
That would be great, we can agree on that. The capital only seems to grow more powerful though, but the whole system is also unsustainable and therefore inherently unstable, so we'll see.
I think the changes that will bring down factory farming first will be climate change combined with resource inefficiency increasing the price (we can already see this happening), while plant based alternatives become more normalized, tasty, widely available, and cheaper relative to meat (there has been a lot of progress on these in the last 10 years, at least here in Germany).
An avian flu pandemic also seems likely at some point and would accelerate the transition.
We need to remember that the harder capitalism tightens its grip, the more contradictions it creates, and the easier it will be to raise peoples awareness.
I see that happening in the US too, and the govt subsidies are slowly disappear which has helped prop it up as long as has affordability-wise. I see eating meat quickly becoming less accessible today in the US, and like many commodities it's going to become one for the bourgeois only. The alternatives are getting better for weening people off, but there is definitely aΒ counter-culture to it too.
I feel like there can be steps in between that we aren't utilizing while the meat industry still exists whether or not we want it. I have have had roommates that would not be happy with chicken nuggets, no fake ones would do. So I started making them myself, with a lot of vegetable filler, and eventually weened the meat down over 6 months down to <25% + a little chicken stock, and that was only from my local grocery store. I feel like if I had access to any form of actual production, I could have gone lower, about ~10% (this is when they started to notice and I had to dial it back). There were 4 of us, so we effectively had 3/4 vegetarians in the house, and I feel strongly that if vegetarians approached it like this, we could pare down the amount of actual meat intake to about 5% of what we have today rapidly, and then it'd be much much easier to entirely end meat usage because our microbiomes aren't screaming for it in the way they do now.
personally meat that's been tenderized through animal cruelty is the whole point!
you can't imagine how hard I get while gnawing on a thick juicy steak. sometimes I'll even use the juice from the meat as lube when I fuck tomorrow's roast and blast ropes into the creamy center. it's even better when I stuff some warm veal up my asshole.
since most cabbageheads want to make normal everyday eaters into monsters, I'll play the villain you made up in your mind.
It's not the first time in history where everyday people contribute to a very inhumane industry. These industries are usually not perpetuated by consumers who want to be evil. They are perpetuated by consumers who are somewhere between uninformed and complicit, usually somewhere in between.
I don't think that the average meat eater is a monster. It's very normalized to buy factory farmed products without knowing and thinking about the cruelty that animals had to endure for it.
Many people know that there are instances of cruel treatment, but assume that these are just a few bad apples and that this has nothing to do with the products they buy. This is partly wishful thinking, partly just too abstract in their head to influence buying decisions, partly complicit, to varying degrees.
If someone knew quite a bit about the unimaginable suffering caused by the industry though, and continued funding it without thinking "well, that's not good, it would be better if would stop contributing to that", then this is malicious behavior. What else could I conclude?
So I would attribute varying responsibility to the consumer, based on how much they know, and on how easy it would be for them to choose alternatives.
The exact same number of animals will die today whether or not I choose to have a burger for dinner. This is not something within an individual's control. If you want this to change, it has to happen at societal level.
you seem to be using some pretty heated phrasing that states otherwise...
I saw it more as a vegan thing but I follow
That's also blaming individuals for capitalisms crimes.
I don't see how an individual eating meat is capitalism, but I'm sure someone will try to explain it poorly
The bones are their dollars
We are talking about the comic. This person didn't personally kill all those animals, someone else did. Sure he benefitted from it, but that doesn't make him the killer. If we operated on that logic, he's killed millions of global south people as well. Where are they? Are their lives somehow not worth mentioning?
Yeah, like a few for things you can't really avoid then maybe. But no one is forcing you to eat steak.
Other economic systems also eat meat.
"Don't you get it?! I was forced by the CEO of NestlΓ© himself to consume brutally killed animals. I am just a little girl who can't do anything at all."
Pretty sure people have been eating meat long before capitalism.
See my other comments in this thread
Like the one where you confuse the concept of markets with capitalism? Seems to be a pattern on your flawed understanding.
All I see is you doubling down on this flawed argument.
I don't think I am, but I'm open to seeing your correction!
Okay, well like I said humans eating meat predates capitalism by quite a few millennia. Hope that helps.
Not sure how that is related to your statement about markets, but your other point is easy to answer: we have to think about the conditions humans existed in. We lacked science, all the innovations we have in the farming industry, the ability to specifically analyze what nutrients we could be lacking. Without these, our ability to dial in a diet was lacking, famines were unpredictable, and in general we could only deduce what was needed to a certain degree. Meat helped shore up those short comings. Today, we know why people crave meat: their microbiome is accustomed to it, there is a societial pressure to eat it, it's affordable and overall accessible. Those previously listed limitations are no longer: we can plan a 100% healthy meal that covers everyones needs and with a centralized plan we can appropriately farm what is need for everyone. However the current systems are not designed to accommodate everyones needs, it is focused on generating commodities, so until we can stop the system that forces people to be dependent on meat, we cannot stop the meat industry from existing.
I hope that made sense!
Capitalism sold you meat. That didnβt occur in a vacuum. We were eating meat before capitalism was involved.
Do you think most people today would go slaughter their own animals for food if the other option was picking up vegetables and other easy options at the store? Most people don't have the stomach or tools to kill a cow, chicken, or pig and prep it.
I think that's more a side effect of people largely not living an agrarian lifestyle anymore since folks literally did that for thousands of years. Though you often times did also just get s butcher for larger animals since they were professional and often did it in exchange for a share.
I can't legally keep my own chickens where I live, otherwise I would.
I had to put down my rabbit, I had to crush my pet spider under my heel. I sure as hell can take out a chicken that I've raised explicitly to be food, and if I can't... Well, my wife grew up on a micro farm, where they raised their own cows and chickens, she definitely can slaughter an animal and butcher a carcass.
Yes.