Any introduction to chaos theory should change your mind, but it convinces you that your actions have consequences at the cost of never being sure what they are.
There are people who have tried to investigate this thoroughly. My understanding is that there is a direct correlation between your actions an the supply.
> "If someone gives up 1 lb of chicken, total consumption falls by 0.76lb in expectation."
The mechanism is simple: if the stores are 100% responsive to your demand, your purchase directly affects supply. If they are not 100% perfect, they still have a mechanism through which they buy in bulk. So, roughly speaking, you might have a 1% chance of triggering a batch order for an extra 100 lbs when you purchase 1 lb of meat. And the same goes up the supply chain.
I'm usually of the same mind, but this is one scenario where individual action actually can help. For example, driving less won't significantly affect climate change even if most people do it, since the biggest contributors are industrial processes.
On the other hand, nearly all of the animal cruelty from factory farms stems from people buying meat from them. So if most people eat less meat, then factory farms actually will suffer.
Maybe hang out with some cows, pigs, sheep, lambs etc for a lil while. I don't mean in a mass farm with 1000s. In a place where there are one or 2 you can get to know as individuals.
