this post was submitted on 20 Nov 2025
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Per the title. If an animal dies out in nature without any human involvement, shouldn't it be considered vegan to harvest any of the useful parts from it (not nessicarily meat, think hide), since there was no human-caused suffering involved?

Similarly, is driving a car not vegan because of the roadkill issue?

Especially curious to hear a perspective from any practicing moral vegans.

Also: I am not vegan. That's why I'm asking. I'm not planning on eating roadkill thank you. Just suggesting the existence of animal-based vegan leather.

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[–] commie@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 14 minutes ago
[–] Draedron@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 52 minutes ago

Vegan just means causing as little animal suffering as possible. Us existing in a capitalist society causes suffering for animals. But where it is possible to avoid it, it should be avoided is what vegans want. Like if a vegan drives a car and a squirrel runs in front of the car the person does not suddenly stop being vegan

[–] billwashere@lemmy.world 6 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

I would think driving a car is not vegan because it’s fueled by dead dinosaurs.

[–] msage@programming.dev 3 points 6 hours ago (1 children)
[–] billwashere@lemmy.world 2 points 25 minutes ago

It was a lame attempt at humor since it’s called fossil fuel… I know oil primarily came from ancient algae and plankton that died and sank to the ocean floor.

[–] FatVegan@leminal.space 13 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

If you don't like broccoli, why don't you eat it when it's half rotten?

[–] falseWhite@lemmy.world 3 points 1 hour ago

You missed this part in the post:

"not necessarily meat, think hide"

[–] VitoRobles@lemmy.today 3 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

This. When I was a kid, I asked this same question and it took me years to fully wrap my head around it.

The ELI5 - When we pick food, we often pick it when it's the most fresh. We want the freshest apples, the healthiest corn. That also applies to meat. We kill animals at their peak, and harvest them for meat.

When you die, it's because something is rotten. Lung. Heart. Cancer. Its part of aging. If some part of your body was rotten enough to kill you, that means that was circulating through the rest of your body. Say that a rabbit was killed by poison gas. Would you eat it, if technically, the poison was mostly in its lungs?

[–] iii@mander.xyz 4 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

We kill animals at their peak, and harvest them for meat.

That's not the case. There's even different words to the meat depending on the age the animal got slaughtered. There's no single "peak".

[–] dysprosium@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 3 hours ago

What if I was the killer using the poison gas

[–] over_clox@lemmy.world 5 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

I've wondered about this myself since like age 7, when our otherwise perfectly healthy horse Sissy got struck by lightning while standing under a pine tree out in the field in a storm. 😢

Living out in deer hunting country, they could have given the neighbors a shout and basically be like hey the meat's fresh, y'all come help cut it up and stock like 10-20 freezers for free..

🤷

[–] Bluewing@lemmy.world 2 points 37 minutes ago

You probably don't want to eat horse meat these days due to the drugs that are often given to horses, (mostly wormers). They tend to not flush out of the horses system no matter how long you wait.

[–] Fleur_@aussie.zone 7 points 22 hours ago

Because animals that died naturally are animals

[–] python@lemmy.world 7 points 22 hours ago

Really depends on which lens of veganism you view it through. I usually judge things by the economic lens, where veganism is the response to capitalism incentivising the exploitation of animals. It's probably one of the easiest ways to think about it, but essentially it goes like "As long as you don't pay money for exploitation, you're fine"
So roadkill would be fine. Saving food that would be thrown out is fine. Shoplifting is fine. Served the wrong thing at the restaurant- Complain and get your money back. Second hand down jacket from a relative who would have thrown it away otherwise - gross but fine. Stealing chickens from a factory farm and eating some of their eggs- fine. Et cetera.

I don't think that sort of logical line can be applied to anything but individuals though. I still wouldn't be buying leather from a company that claims to only use roadkill, as my money would still be a financial incentive to expand the operation.

[–] toomanypancakes@piefed.world 73 points 1 day ago (11 children)

Hi, ive been vegan for a bit over 10 years. I don't think animal parts are for us to use at all. I'm not really sure why you'd harvest animals at all, I don't think normalizing the commodification of others' bodies is a good thing to be doing. If you really can't live without animal parts, that's probably the least harmful way of acquiring them. I wouldn't recommend eating anyone you find lying on the ground though, that sounds like a good way to contract horrible diseases.

Veganism is about doing the most that is possible and practicable. We probably kill insects just by walking, but it's not reasonable to never move again to avoid that. Similarly, driving a car for many people is a necessity to be able to access goods and services, and its not at all practicable to avoid driving for them.

Ultimately, veganism is a moral stance about reducing harm to others as much as you can. It's not a competition, so don't feel like you have to be perfect at it to do good.

[–] OfCourseNot@fedia.io 24 points 1 day ago (1 children)

We probably kill insects just by walking, but it's not reasonable to never move again to avoid that.

There's this Hindu sect whose adherents wear veils, sweep the floor before them, and/or tread very slowly and carefully to avoid injuring, killing or eating any small insects. As you said, it's about doing as much as you can, but if it were a competition they'd win for sure.

[–] FoxyFerengi@startrek.website 27 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (4 children)

I think you mean Jainism? It isn't Hindu.

They also have a very strict vegetarian diet, they won't even eat root vegetables so burrowing insects aren't disturbed

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[–] kkj@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

If you don't make a moral distinction between humans and other animals, it seems difficult to justify scavenging with any logic that couldn't also be used to justify grave robbing, cannibalism, or even necrophilia.

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[–] save_the_humans@leminal.space 1 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

I had a teacher in high school ask me to bring him a deer if I ever hit one on my way to school.

[–] Mesophar@pawb.social 3 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago)

I had a teacher in high school do the same thing. He'd also note the sides of the road on the way to school so he could find fresh roadkill on the way home.

Made some great venison jerky.

[–] allo@sh.itjust.works 0 points 14 hours ago (4 children)

Why don't you eat humans if they've already died?

[–] DiabolicalBird@lemmy.ca 11 points 11 hours ago

Because I'm not allowed in the morgue anymore.

[–] JandroDelSol@lemmy.world 12 points 13 hours ago

prion disease lol

[–] webp@mander.xyz 2 points 11 hours ago

Because of the karma loss 🙄

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 5 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (1 children)

I would totally try it if it was legally allowed and there wasn't a risk of diesease from eating human flesh. 🤷‍♂️

And, if in a situation like the Donner Party: That's generally what happens. They don't kill someone just to eat 'em.

[–] allo@sh.itjust.works 1 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

i hear children taste the best. maybe we should adopt a system of indefinitely milking mothers while eating their children like is done with cows. Double Bonus. Tastiest meat plus milk.

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 4 points 14 hours ago

They have to die on their own tho. And I'm not sure it would be safe to eat unvaccinated children who died of preventable illnesses.

[–] Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world 30 points 1 day ago (4 children)

To me it’s not a matter of ethics but a matter of health. Unless you saw the animal die from something that clearly isn’t disease I wouldn’t trust meat I just found laying around.

[–] tyler@programming.dev 39 points 1 day ago (2 children)

It doesn’t have to be edible. Glue, gelatin for skin mimicry, clothing, and bones for weapons, etc are all non-edible uses of animals.

[–] Semi_Hemi_Demigod@lemmy.world 21 points 1 day ago

Good point. I forgot vegans included all that stuff and not just eating animal products.

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[–] toebert@piefed.social 17 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'm not vegan myself but I had asked a similar enough question to a vegan friend a while ago and liked his answer:

He said for him it's 2 parts, 1 is that while the animal that died may not have been harmed by humans, the ecosystem that relies on scavenging carcasses will be hurt if humans effectively start removing their entire food source (same way we have driven species to extinction by hunting).

The 2nd part is that with humans everything with even the tiniest loop hole will get abused.. Imagine that we say this is okay. Today it may be the odd naturally deceased animal, in a month it'll start including animals "killed accidentally", in a year it'll be someone farming animals with some weird way of culling them so they can claim it's still natural causes by some twisted logic.. at the end of it we'd just not be able to trust any of it anyway so it's easier to not even entertain the thought - the energy to figure it all out would be better spent on improving alternatives.

[–] Nomad@infosec.pub 2 points 3 hours ago

Slippery slope argument. Much more valid today then you would think. Its my primary go to to argue against deportation of immigrants for whatever reason.

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