Flexitarian vs. Vegetarian

Suppose our goal is to reduce overall meat consumption. Would it be better to become a vegetarian, who eats no meat, or a flexitarian, who eats a little meat? A recent Aeon article by Alberto Giubilini makes the case for flexitarianism.

Vegetarian: no meat, always.

Flexitarian: no meat, sometimes.

A recent Aeon article by Alberto Giubilini makes the case for flexitarianism. Suppose our goal is to reduce overall meat consumption. If we become vegetarians, sure, we won’t be eating any meat ourselves. But, we will also be implicitly or explicitly encouraging others to become vegetarians as well. That’s a tough sell for many people across the world.

Instead, if we just become flexitarian and encourage others to simply join us in eating less meat, then we’ll end up convincing more people and thereby reduce meat consumption overall by a greater amount.

It’s a counterintuitive, but plausible argument. Check it out at this link:

https://aeon.co/ideas/why-vegetarians-should-be-prepared-to-bend-their-own-rules