Context: The practice of killing animals in Germany requires legitimisation under the Animal Welfare Act, which permits inflicting harm on animals only for a "reasonable cause". The legal prohibition on the killing of day-old chicks demonstrates that this law can serve as a powerful legal instrument. Until now, the consumption of meat has served as a largely unquestioned justification for the slaughter of animals. However, in Western societies, an increasingly discourse in animal ethics challenges the prevailing practices of animal husbandry in general and slaughtering animals for meat specifically. In a parallel development, the production of cultured meat (CM), a process of cultivating muscle cells in a bioreactor, is progressing, with first products available in the US and Singapore. From a consumer perspective, CM faces several challenges, such as the naturalness preferences. If, however, CM meets consumer expectations regarding price, taste, and appearance, it may be accepted as regular food. Therefore, creating a future scenario in which CM competes with animal sourced meat opens up the question, if slaughtering animals for meat is still regarded as a reasonable cause once functionally equivalent substitutes are available. Objective: This study examines from a consumer perspective whether the availability of CM influence the perceived legitimacy of killing animals for food. In a second step, we investigate whether animal-friendly pasture-based systems contributed to landscape conservation foster greater legitimacy, to assess whether concerns about animal ethics can be mitigated by more sustainable forms of animal husbandry. Methods: We conducted a hypothetical online survey experiment with informational treatments and analyzed responses from 1,696 consumers in Germany. Results and Conclusion: The results reveal a significant decline in the acceptance of killing animals for food when CM as an alternative is available. However, this decline is mitigated if animals also serve additional purposes such as landscape conservation. These findings highlight how CM could disrupt the meat market and shift societal views on the ethical justification for animal slaughter, while also showing that ethical acceptance remains contingent on husbandry conditions and the broader societal benefits of animal farming
