Is it vegan to eat roadkill or binned food?

The objection

“If you ate roadkill, or meat from a bin that was about to be thrown out, no animal would die for you. So either that’s allowed, and your rules are arbitrary, or it’s banned, and you’ve proved veganism is about keeping yourself pure.”

The answer

The Vegan Society defines veganism as a way of living that seeks to exclude, as far as is possible and practicable, “all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose”, and says that in dietary terms it means dispensing with all products derived wholly or partly from animals [1]. Roadkill and binned meat break the dietary rule, since they are animal products, but they don’t breach the principle behind it, because nobody bred, confined or killed an animal for the person eating them, and that person pays no one for it. Accepting them on that ground isn’t arbitrary, because it follows the principle the dietary rule is there to serve. A vegan who still turns them down has reasons that have little to do with purity: eating meat in front of other people can make animal products look acceptable, a worry the Vegan Society raises about wearing wool, leather and inherited fur [2], and some people simply don’t want to eat an animal’s body however it died.

Does eating roadkill or binned meat harm any animal?

Eating roadkill or binned meat harms no further animal, because the eater neither caused the death nor pays for another. A deer hit by a car died by accident, and taking it home puts money in nobody’s pocket. Meat in a supermarket bin came from an animal that was killed and paid for before anyone decided to throw it away, and lifting it out sends no money back up the chain. Discarded food is what freegans go looking for: Alex Barnard (2011), whose ethnographic study followed them in New York, describes them dumpster-diving for it in protest against environmental degradation and capitalism [3]. Only some of them eat the meat they find. The freegan.info website calls those who do “meat-eating freegans or meagans”, and describes eating dumpstered animal products as a controversial subject [4]. Whether binned food or roadkill is safe to eat is a separate matter. UK government guidance says use-by dates go on foods that go off quickly, such as meat products, and that eating food after its use-by date could make you ill [5], and roadkill has no date on it at all.

Can vegans use second-hand or inherited leather and wool?

Vegans can use second-hand or inherited leather and wool without paying for any animal’s death, though the Vegan Society warns that wearing them can make such items seem acceptable or even desirable [2]. The money for a charity-shop jacket goes to the charity and none of it reaches a farm or a tannery, and throwing out a grandparent’s coat brings no animal back. The Society’s own example is a fur coat inherited from an animal that died 50 years ago, which it says still suggests that fur coats are attractive and glamorous [2]. Many vegans, it says, feel it best to work towards owning no animal products, replacing them with vegan alternatives as and when they can afford to [2].