I'm a vegan, and I do think that a 90% reduction is much more preferable than no reduction. But I do think you are right that some vegans take too purist of a stance.Fpoiuyt wrote: But even then there's nothing wrong with an individual eating meat/dairy every now and then: it doesn't contribute to animal suffering. And if everyone reduces their meat/dairy consumption only by 90%, that's a huge improvement. Lots of vegans, I gather, are purists: they would say that a 90% reduction is morally comparable to no reduction at all. But it seems obvious to me that a 90% reduction is a lot closer to a 100% reduction: it's basically a victory.
I think that is an important point though that applies to many issues of human conduct. It seems people too often take an "all or nothing" type of stance. For example, consider all the "zero tolerance policies" that various organizations have. For example, some schools treat bringing a loaded gun to school the same as bringing a plastic knife to school. This purist type of thinking is often fallacious and counter-productive.
For the case at hand, we can save more animals from suffering by convincing 100 people to cut their their meat-eating in half than by convincing 2 people to cut it completely. But a purist approach would cause us to incorrectly value the 2 people's complete change as more than the 100 people's half change, which is clearly incorrect.
Thanks,
Scott