Animals would probably have enough food if populations existed they way they should in nature. But natural isn’t how the factory farm industry breeds. They can produce way more animals for food through breeding than if you gave every creature it’s own bottle of Viagra.

The majority of meat produced today doesn’t “even out the population,” because it’s created from an artifical one.

With a worldwide shortage of food, veggie life is the best way to go, since producing meat is so frickin’ expensive and consumes so much energy and landspace we could be growing plant crops on to feed people versus growing food for animals to eat, then slicing and dicing them for food. See how there’s an extra step in between there. The shortest route is usually the best.

If mandatory rules forces animal farmers to raise prices and the demand shrinks, good. If they don’t want it, then you’ll have to think of something else (plant based) to produce.

Oh, and Oprah would keep weight down better if she stayed vegan for life.

Second, another interesting point you raise is the link between animal cruelty and cruelty towards humans. I actually went through the research on this topic a while back and while it’s true that many studies have found correlations, there were no convincing arguments about the causal relationship. So your suggestion that accepting pain and discomfort in animals leads to accepting that in humans simply has no basis in the light of our current knowledge. To me personally, that argument smells a lot like the “marijuana as a gateway drug” argument.