Seen a lot of posts on Lemmy with vegan-adjacent sentiments but the comments are typically very critical of vegan ideas, even when they don’t come from vegans themselves. Why is this topic in particular so polarising on the internet? Especially since unlike politics for example, it seems like people don’t really get upset by it IRL
I’ve been a vegetarian for 15 years. People IRL often do get offended if you tell them you don’t eat meat. I try my best to avoid saying it because it often leads to being lectured about proteins. Everyone suddenly becomes a nutritionist when you explain why you don’t eat meat.
Yeah. I try not to mention it to people if I can avoid it. I work construction and am surrounded by manly men tring to out man each other. I had one guy offer me bear jerkey and got bent out of shape when I declined. He wouldn’t stop. He just kept on me about why I didn’t eat meat. After about an hour of him asking again and again why I don’t eat meat I said “meat’s another word for dick and eating dick is gay”. As problematic as it was, it worked.
It never cases to amaze me that a 250pound dude with a 40oz soda in one hand and a mouthfull of gas station pizza thinks he has the responsibility to lecture me about nutrition.
“meat’s another word for dick and eating dick is gay”. As problematic as it was, it worked.
It’s both sad and hillarious that this worked. I wonder if you created a new vegetarian as well
Probably not but I like to think it’s created a feedback loop going on in his head endlessly. “Meat is manly. Meat is dick.'”
We need to take the small victories
As a life-long vegetarian, this has been my experience as well.
My dad always acts like i’m close to dying because i’m vegan. I work out every day, he eats meat 3 times a day and even his vegetables are unhealthy as fuck. He’s so overweight that getting into his car is super exhausting. Pretty weird if someone like that gives you tips on how to eat right.
Why do they believe you only find protein in meat?
Lots of people are really stupid
And we’ve been (forgive the pun) fed propaganda by the industrial farming and food industry for generations, not to mention the religious right.
You are not wrong. I am vegetarian for about 15 years and I’ve literally have had a father of a friend yell at me. He was telling vegetarians aren’t real and if anybody would actually not eat meat for a couple of months they would die because they would be missing vital nutrients only found in meat. He was yelling at me to stop telling lies and be truthful.
The things he’s eating often didn’t eat any meat. Hehe.
Generations of marketing.
Some essential amino acids are difficult to find in adequate quantities on a vegan diet. If you don’t vary your protein sources or make sure you are getting the right amino acids, then you may develop a deficiency, which can lead to poor health or even be fatal.
I have read that this is largely a myth based on a book from the 70s, and that while there are varying proportions of amino acids in different vegan protein sources, there is still enough of each so that you could easily get everything you need.
I read this in a book years ago that I don’t remember the name of, but found a source instantly
Ya, it’s probably more correct to say any concerns are overstated. And I probably didn’t help by saying “difficult”. It’s not difficult, just not as simple as eating any meat. And like I mentioned, as long as you’re varying your protein sources, you will be fine.
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I know plenty of vegans and they’re all healthier than average. I don’t know any who have had issues with nutrition.
I have a hard time hitting my protein goal and maintaining correct macros even with meat. I have looked at vegetarian options and I don’t see how anyone could do it without just slamming multiple protein shakes a day. Which would destroy my digestive system. I’d probably be ok when I’m not bulking but I’d have to do a ton of research and basically forget about fast food options. If someone could lay out a vegetarian diet for me that would work I’d be more than happy to give it a shot but I don’t have time to make that effort myself.
I’m what I call “mostly vegetarian“ which means that I choose to not have meat, but will eat small portions on occasion. And boy does that just piss off people like no other. Worse is I get it from both sides, to either commit in full or just give in to my natural instincts and consume more red meat.
Sometimes I just want a salad. Sometimes I want some bacon crumbles on that salad. Sometimes I want 3oz of fish with a plate of veggies. But what I can tell you is 3/4 of my plate will have healthy veggies or fruit.
Just tell them you have alpha-gal, then they’ll leave you alone easier
I did get offended when, after a very successful date, I went to a shawarma place with her and we both had a super awesome shawarma with lots of meat. For the next date I made some pizza rolls with salami and she confessed that she actually doesn’t eat meat.
I still tease her about that when I meet her nowadays.
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From what I have seen, it more stems from the activism vegans are engaged in more than the actual veganism.
I think there’s nothing wrong with explaining your ideas and why you believe them to those willing to listen, but I can see why pushy activism for any cause can get annoying quickly. There are often Jehovah’s witnesses outside my local supermarket, for example, but they only give you a pamphlet if you specifically approach them
It’s not just pushy, it’s judgemental and vitriolic
Oh, you eat meat, murderer? Your shoes are made from the skins of defenseless creatures. The sugar you’re so callously adding to your coffee was processed with ground-up bones, you unredeemable monster.
Even the arguments for veganism that aren’t built on animal cruelty still take on an air of moral superiority. Don’t you care about the planet and future generations? How dare you trade carbon emissions for the temporary comfort of a bacon cheeseburger!
The vegan movement has always been associated with anger and contempt, even if it is justified.
There’s also the ‘guilt by association’. Look at organisations like PETA: they even complained about things like the treatment of entirely fictional animals in video games, like Palworld. Basically, you can’t even argue that ‘they look like real animals so it encourages real-world mistreatment’ like they usually do.
That does not make you look particularly sane. I’m sure they do good work as well, but that sort of thing isn’t helping their cause.
Saying PETA is representative of vegans is rather like using Antifa as an example of liberals, or Info Wars for conservatives.
Which is exactly what everyone does. At least in the US. And every side is equally wrong about it.
The loudest voices always draw the most attention. And I don’t know any other vegan voice that’s as loud as PETA’s. That’s kind of the problem.
PETA might do something good by accident. They kill 60-70% of the pets they receive for donation, so I guess the lucky 1/3 that don’t get the ax are a good thing.
In my experience, your first sentence sums it up nicely.
They assume a moral high ground because they’ve adopted a diet that is generally deemed healthier and better for the environment (I don’t always agree with this).
But unless they’re also doing all the things we could all do better (e.g. not buying new, not upgrading the the latest and greatest, not taking 40 minute showers, not eating out every second day), they’re only somewhat less guilty of environmental damage than the average person, but they’re taking a generally undeserved “holier than thou” position and then shoving it down your throat. This isn’t everyone, and I don’t really care what you eat, but these are the vegans that get under my skin.
Eh, I can see it both ways. Like, nobody is, or can be, perfect. That doesn’t mean they don’t have a valid moral argument for the good choices they make. They’re trying to be a better person, and I think it’s fair to help other people recognize the poor decisions they are making. Climate change especially affects all of us.
On the other hand, you’re 100% correct. Nobody can lay exclusive claim to the high ground, so anybody acting superior is probably an asshole.
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Also I would always listen to you, I may not agree or take your advice, but I will listen to you
It would be someone being less of a hypocrite so you would not be seen as as annoying as the other option
PETA was giving away free coloring books one time so I decided to order some for my kids thinking it would be good for them to hear from all sides.
One of the pictures was three people standing over a turkey dinner with the most horrific caricatures you can think of absolutely salivating over how juicy the turkey was going to be.
I shit you not.
I had to trash the sons of bitches.
Really killed that group for me, I always that people were exaggerating about them and how bad they are.
They killed that little piece of me.
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I will go and shoot the next dog I see. You won’t judge me for that, right?
Yes, good example. It is precisely that sort of judgemental strawman bullshit that gives vegans a bad rep.
And it’s history stems from religious ideology.
Edit: oh you downvoters. Go look it up. A woman had a vision from God that said “don’t eat things with faces”. Dead serious - that’s where it started.
All the sciencey justifications today are post-hoc rationalization.
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The UK has a high rate of veganism, and part of that is attributed to the fact that the major vegetarian and vegan organisations in the UK generally recommend persuading people by offering them delicious food that is also vegetarian/vegan and saying it’s more ethical. On the other hand, the equivalent organisations in the US tend to lean more towards recommending telling people that eating animal products is unethical, and it’s difficult to accuse someone of unethical behaviour without being insulting. It also doesn’t help that multibillion-dollar organisations have run successful smear campaigns against groups like PETA - everyone’s heard of the time they took someone’s pet dog and killed it, but most aren’t aware that it happened once and gets reported on as if it’s news every few months, or that it was an accident as the dog’s collar had come off and it was with a group of strays, and got muddled with another dog, so was put down weeks earlier than it was supposed to be, bypassing the waiting period they had specifically to avoid this kind of mistake.
PETA has a lot more fucked up behavior under its belt than the one time they “accidentally” euthanized a dog they stole from someone, and much of their bad behavior has been very much maliciously intentional. Here just a small sample.
ETA: A few more, because why the hell not? Fuck PETA.
- https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/03/petas-terrible-horrible-no-good-very-bad-history-of-killing-animals/254130/
- https://www.boredpanda.com/anti-peta-hate-rant-dear-tumb1r/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic
- https://speakingofresearch.com/2013/02/08/a-lesson-in-hypocrisy-as-peta-cries-foul-over-one-cats-death-while-secretly-killing-hundreds-more/
- https://www.foxnews.com/us/peta-shelter-was-a-slaughterhouse-group-claims
- https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/peta-taking-pets/
- https://petakillsanimals.com/
It doesn’t strengthen your point to link Fox News and the literal website for the smear campaign I mentioned: https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=PETA_Kills_Animals
As for PETA putting down lots of animals, that’s no secret. It’s really easy to get people to donate to a no-kill animal shelter, so there are lots of them. However, when you’re a no-kill animal shelter, and you’re full of animals you can’t kill, or are asked to take an animal that can’t be ethically be treated with anything other than euthanasia, you have to turn the animal down, and it ends up wherever will take it. Usually, that ends up being a PETA-run shelter. When a PETA-run shelter is being given all the rejects from everywhere else, it’s obviously going to end up putting lots of animals down. It’d be better for PR if they didn’t, but less ethical, and they prioritise the ethics above the PR.
If you look at one of your more reliable sources, the Snopes article, it backs up what I’m saying, and not what you’re saying. It corroborates the story from my original post, lists another incident where PETA staff were accused but not convicted, and then discusses that they put down a lot of animals in their shelters, and how it includes healthy animals. The only controversy there is the definition of adoptable - a healthy stray kitten is theoretically adoptable, but if you get ten times as many kittens in a week as you do people wanting to adopt a kitten, 90% of them won’t get adopted, and your shelter will get quickly overcrowded if you insist on ignoring that fact.
I’m no fan of Fox News in general myself, but just because we don’t like them doesn’t make everything they publish false. And yeah, the PETA kills site clearly has an agenda, but their agenda is to try and save animals from PETA’s “love.” There’s sensationalism on that site, but there are also numbers, many of which come from PETA themselves.
I linked the Snopes article knowing that it supported points from both sides. The point in linking that article is that it’s despicable that any of those reports of PETA’s disgusting behavior are true at all.
You know what no-kill shelters try to do when they don’t have space? Coordinate with local foster programs, coordinate with other shelters to see if they have space. There are other alternatives besides taking in a perfectly healthy animal and dropping it in the euthanasia queue.
I’m quite sure there are quite a few things PETA has been accused but not convicted of. When you’re a group of assholes as big as that, you get pretty good at skirting the fine lines of what’s legal and what’s not. They’re hardly the first example of groups like that.
And yeah, the PETA kills site clearly has an agenda, but their agenda is to try and save animals from PETA’s “love.”
Their agenda’s to make PETA look bad so people don’t become vegan or demand higher welfare standards from meat producers, and they can continue selling meat to Americans of such low standards that it would be illegal in the rest of the civilised world.
You know what no-kill shelters try to do when they don’t have space? Coordinate with local foster programs, coordinate with other shelters to see if they have space. There are other alternatives besides taking in a perfectly healthy animal and dropping it in the euthanasia queue.
As I said, they can’t do that once the foster programs and other shelters are full, too, and then overflow into PETA-run shelters because they’re the ones that still have a capability to receive more animals after they’re full. There aren’t enough shelters to keep every animal in good conditions until it’s either adopted or dies of natural causes, and no amount of coordination can magically create extra capacity.
I’m sure PETA shelters would have more capacity if they didn’t prefer to see an animal dead than a pet. They have significantly higher kill rates than any other shelters, and have made their stance pretty clear that they’re against animals being pets. No wonder they just keep killing them.
Check my comment history about 3 posts back to see my interaction with peta
think there’s nothing wrong with explaining your ideas and why you believe them
That’s actually not the problem. The problem are those who repeat themselves ever louder, even to people who have expressed disinterest.
Have you heard about our lord and saviour of our sins?
Do-gooder derogation Basically, some people perceive others’ moral choices as criticism or as some kind of bragging.
Fascinating! Thank you for this article. It exactly describes what’s happening: “oh, you think you’re better than us? I’ll have another steak!”
If you accept that there are moral/ethical problems with eating meat (contribution to climate change, health concerns, animals being killed and eaten, whatever), and choose to eat meat anyway, and encounter a vegan, what has to happen?
You can accept that they are making a better choice, but then you have to accept that you’re making a worse choice. Most people are cowards and protect the ego at any cost. Rather than shrugging and saying “yeah, i should eat less meat. Good for you taking the high road”, which requires accepting that you’re not being the best, you can instead grab onto any reasons why no it’s really them that sucks. That’s easier, more comfortable, and doesn’t require any painful introspection or changes.
It’s the same mechanism when people get mad at cyclists, pedestrians, people who go to the gym, people who don’t shop at Walmart, whatever. They’re doing something that makes you feel bad in comparison. Most people are terrible at that and will lash out instead of doing anything productive.
Alternatively, or maybe additionally, people are really tribal, and once they adopt the idea that vegans (or cyclists, or people driving small cars, or people wearing sandals, whatever) are in the outgroup, then they enjoy being hostile to them.
People are ego driven emotional morons. All of us. Me, too. It’s terrible.
I’ve never once in the last decade seen a single vegan post other than recipes. What I do see is constant posts about how “vegans are always throwing it my face/holier than thou”, “I’m gonna eat extra meat because vegans make me feel bad”. I really don’t think vegans are the problem, I think these fools fall for every single piece of beef industry propaganda that comes across their screens.
Holier than thou attitude from new vegans whose world view changed overnight and cognitive dissonance on the part of non vegan with the need to deflect than to make substantial changes.
It’s a first world hill to die on, and many of the people who espouse veganism are only able to do so because of their own privilege.
It’s a combination of smugness and “I’m better than you” and the lack of awareness that everyone had and continues to benefit from a world that has always used animal products. The Industrial Revolution basically ran on steam engines and leather belts, for example.
I have absolutely no problem with the idea that using fewer animal products and eating less meat is a good idea. I also recognize that feeding the world’s growing population is probably going to involve insects being more widely used as a food source.
Vegans literally are suggesting solutions to the growing population because in almost every situation, it is much more efficient by land and water use for people to eat plant-based rather than meat. It’s only a “first world hill to die on” if you think poor people can’t eat plants. Sorry but I don’t think this is a very accurate take…
“Meat from herd mammals” is not at all the sum total of use of animal products. Should we all be eating less beef? Sure, I can get behind that. None? I’m okay with that, too. What about eggs, cheese, butter - and that’s only referring to things we eat, not things we use for other purposes.
“Suggesting”
Proceeds to lecture
People also continue to benefit from the work of slaves in the past and even present. What’s your point? Do you think slavery is ethical? Is someone choosing to avoid products created from slave labour not a more ethical choice?
What privilege? Meat is the most expensive food out there. Eating rice and beans isn’t really showing privilege
Those aren’t the vegans that most people are talking about. Being poor and having to eat vegan is different from being vegan because you want to stand out from everyone else with your vegan black bean soy burger with vegan cheese on a vegan sprouted whole wheat bun. If you can afford the overpriced “vegan” versions of typically non-vegan foods, and complain about your struggles being vegan, that’s privilege.
When you’re poor, you don’t advertise the fact that you’re eating vegan. You just make rice and beans because it’s the absolute cheapest food available. You’ll take meat and non-vegan when it’s available. But at the very least, you’ll survive on rice and beans. It’s generally not something that people are proud of.
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They explicitly said that he was only judging the people only being vegan to be vegan so they could act like that
The implication is that this is common. I don’t think even one vegan is vegan just to show off some kind of privelege. This is just a childish and unrealistic caricature that does not exist in reality.
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You’re going to have to quote me what I said, we are too far into the thread.
I don’t doubt what you said, I just don’t know what I said. lol
I didn’t say that. I said if you’re buying the vegan substitutes and advertising that fact, that makes you privileged. I’ve seen it many times. There are even some in this post. People that eat vegan because they have limited choices don’t advertise it. People that want to feel superior over others will express how much of a vegan they are.
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Congratulations, you’re finally getting it. They are two different people. There are people that eat vegan because they have no choice. Those people are not privileged. There are people that call themselves vegan and make sure everyone knows they are vegan. Those are the vegans the original comment was talking about, which someone took offense to. That’s why I pointed out the difference.
It took a little effort, but at least you got there.
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The privilege is being able to choose to eat that way out of a sense of morality or fashion rather for the reason that it’s literally all there is to eat. The privilege is being able to turn your nose up at perfectly edible food for no other reason than that it’s got a bit of egg, honey, or butter in it without having to worry about starving to death. The privilege is also having access to such an abundance and variety of food that you can maintain a vegan diet year round and not have to fear that you won’t meet all the calorie, protein, and vitamin requirements you need to stay alive and healthy while much of the world is in a constant struggle to scrape together enough calories of any kind to stay alive.
that’s great, but most vegans you speak to will tell you that we aren’t telling the people who lack the privilege we have to go vegan. we’re asking our neighbors, our bosses, our friends - people in similar if not the very same life circumstances as us - to walk a couple aisles over from where they buy the meat in the grocery store and buy some beans instead.
people love to bring up the privilege thing, but i would argue that it is entirely irrelevant. the entire point of veganism is to do what is reasonably possible and practicable. not to tell people who don’t have the privilege to be so discerning about their diet that they are going to hell or something.
Thank you for saying this in a way I was unable to muster.
Maybe they mean privilege wrt education? As i understand it, it takes a non-zero amount of knowledge about nutrition to substitute meat completely and not be deficient in something. But I’m a life-long omnivore so I may be wrong
There’s also the privilege of living in a location where vegan alternatives are readily and frequently available, vast swaths of the US are in what’s known as “food deserts”, locations where “residents’ access to affordable, healthy food options (especially fresh fruits and vegetables) is restricted or nonexistent due to the absence of grocery stores within convenient traveling distance” (https://foodispower.org/access-health/food-deserts/) these locations also tend to have high obesity or diabetes rates due to the fact that the only food easily and cheaply available is high in sugar. Add in things like the increased price for even simple vegan foods (like rice and beans) and you might be starting to see the picture, as much as some people would LIKE to be vegan it is literally not possible for them without either taking on substantial additional costs or completely upending their life.
A lot of the reason people who are otherwise pro-vegan (like myself) tend to dislike online vegans is that they will, consistently and smugly, while in a location and economic position where its easier to get vegan options, berate people for eating animal products without ever considering the possibility that its MUCH harder to get non-animal product based foods in certain areas
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Well, that’s getting into the difference between veganism and vegetarianism.
That aside, although meat is expensive from a cost and input perspective, it is a very efficient and dense source of calories and protein.
Outside of a first world or industrial agricultural setting, they also have the advantage of being able to convert food sources humans cannot eat into one we can, while to a great degree being able to tend to themselves.
Goats, sheep and chickens can have large numbers managed by a few children with sticks, and also produce non-vegan animal byproducts which can be sold for cash.
This is also before hunting is considered.While vegetarianism and veganism can be practiced outside of a first world context, and indeed have been for thousands of years, they do come with sacrifices that are significantly easier to make with more money or in a post agricultural region.
Eschewing cheese, eggs and honey is not a difficult thing to do for me if I wanted, but there are places where that’s just leaving good food uneaten, or money unearned.That’s I believe what’s being referred to when it’s called a privilege.
Except meat is the least efficient protein source. You need land to grow animal feed, which largely could be used to grow crops to feed humans. You put in like 100 calories to get 1 calorie out.
Not all land is suitable for crop cultivation, which was the point I was making. In subsistence or low tech farming areas, animals forage on land unsuitable for crop production and eat food unsuitable for human consumption. They’re not eating feed, they’re eating wild weeds and grass we can’t. They’re eating insects, miscellaneous seeds, small plants and whatever they find.
Do you think that if you’re farming to have enough food to feed your family and maybe some leftovers to sell, that you’re going to choose to produce something markedly inefficient in comparison to other options?
Subsistence farmers today aren’t stupid. They’re not wasting 90% of their food because they want a hamburger. They raise goats and chickens because they feed themselves and you let your kid who’s too young to do heavy work follow them with a stick to keep them from wandering off. They raise cattle and donkeys because they can forage, and what they can’t forage is more than made up for by using them to work the land or as beasts of burden.There’s a reason we domesticated animals. We didn’t just immediately start giving them feed corn and locking them in cages.
It’s a privilege to be able to ignore a readily available source of food.
It’s a privilege to live in a society where we set aside land to grow huge amounts of food to feed our food.
It’s a privilege to not have to know specifically where your food is coming from.It’s kind of ignorant to think that people who don’t have those privileges must be foolish enough to choose what you think is an inefficient option, and to not consider why they would make that choice.
Vegan: no animal products. No butter, no eggs, having to be well-informed (as others have stated) and know about the content of every bit of everything you buy, and making choices on that basis instead of on cost.
Even then, how many of the products you buy and use every day have depended on animal products for their manufacture? I’m willing to bet that a fair amount of human labor consumes and uses animal products to sustain themselves, even if there are no animal products in the thing you’re buying. I don’t think it’s fair to compartmentalize that away from purchasing decisions. The people who put your flat pack MDF furniture in a box, did they have a chicken sandwich on their lunch break? The people who are paving the roads and maintain the rails on which the products you ultimately buy, are they wearing leather boots?
Everyone depends, to some degree or another, on the use of animal products, either as food or for some other purpose. Even vegans.
Edit: Like I said above, reducing dependence on animal products is probably a good idea, but people who believe they have eliminated their dependence on animal products are patting themselves on the back for something they simply cannot accomplish.
The people who put your flat pack MDF furniture in a box, did they have a chicken sandwich on their lunch break?
Congratulations on synthesizing truly the dumbest argument I have ever seen in my entire life.
Can you explain what’s wrong with this argument? As a relatively disinterested observer it seems reasonable to me.
Being Vegan is a choice for yourself so it’s a fallacy to argue that others are not Vegan, and saying it doesn’t help to try to make a difference unless everybody does it is also a fallacy.
So the argument is based on no less than 2 obvious fallacies. This should be pretty obvious, so question is if you are just a troll?I’ll say that this reaction does nothing to make me think you are approaching this with any objectivity.
The argument, to me, seems to be that it’s impossible in the modern world as things stand to actually totally avoid animal products. That would seem like an issue that Veganism should be concerned with.
I see your point, I think, about it being an individual choice. But though I have heard of things like vegan shoes, I can see how saying those are vegan when you may not control all the inputs seems problematic.
Regardless, your response was so unpleasant that I don’t think I’m much interested in continuing.
Yeah no reason to go to the moon if we can’t visit other planets yet. That’s the kind of logic you are arguing.
The vegan argument is to not contribute to animal suffering, you can’t control what other people do.
And avoiding suffering doesn’t help because there will still be suffering is about as stupid as it gets.deleted by creator
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If you’re okay with compartmentalizing that out of the production of goods and services you use, that’s a you thing.
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Veganism is not about completely eliminating every use of animal products no matter what. It’s about reducing animal suffering and their exploitation as long as it’s possible and practicable.
“Veganism is a philosophy and way of living which 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 by extension, promotes the development and use of animal-free alternatives for the benefit of animals, humans and the environment. In dietary terms it denotes the practice of dispensing with all products derived wholly or partly from animals.”
From https://www.vegansociety.com/go-vegan/definition-veganism
Found it interesting to discover that the money here in the UK is made from animal parts - I think certain notes contain tallow? Definitely seems like it is impossible to fully exclude animal products from your daily life unless you go off the grid and try to be an entirely self sufficient vegan homesteader, which, while extremely difficult and likely dangerous is still an option open to those preaching a vegan lifestyle. Vegans often do not actually practise their philosophy as far as is practical and possible, they all draw the line somewhere so far as how willing they are to sacrifice their comfort and convenience. Like there are no fully vegan cars - the glue is animal based, even if you opt out of a leather interior. Public transport or taking a job you can walk to are alternatives in the UK if you actually cared about benefitting from animals as little as possible, but few vegans will make sacrifices which are actually inconvenient once you get down to the nitty gritty
Imo being a vegan so far as diet and basic lifestyle changes goes is fairly easy for some people (they don’t really like meat to begin with, know how to cook and enjoy it, no real health issues, disposable income) but the real test of how much they actually believe in these ideas is in if they consistently give up more niche forms of animal exploitation wherever they can
I think “the money is made from animal parts and there are no fully vegan cars so you’re arbitrarily picking and choosing when to be vegan” misses the point of ideological veganism. I’m not a vegan, but I believe the goal for ideological vegans (in contrast with those who are vegan for medical reasons) is to minimize suffering and exploitation within reason for the specific reasons you said. No one can be 100% free of animal parts unless they become an off-the-grid self-sustained homestead.
Vegans know that. But most come to the conclusion that just because you can’t live 100% animal free doesn’t mean you can’t try to get to 80% because you want to live your life in a manner you consider morally and ethically consistent with your collective ideologies. You get as close as you can within reason depending on the various constraints of your individual circumstances. “I am still a vegetarian, and I try to be a vegan, but I occasionally cheat. If there’s a cheese pizza on the band bus, I might sneak a piece,” to quote Weird Al Yankovic.
I’d say most people, including vegans, have more than one goal in life. The “lines in the sand” you’re referring to are at the intersection of their goal to minimize suffering and their goal to, say, keep living. Like if a vegan were told by their doctor, “If you don’t start eating meat, you’ll die from this weird disease,” the vegan likely wouldn’t be like, “Well, I might as well indulge in eggs and milk and all other animal products now since I can’t be 100% vegan” and chow down. They’d probably eat just the amount prescribed by their doctor, because they still don’t like eating meat because its origins bother them.
I would be totally fine with them drawing their lines wherever if they let other people do the same, but many vegans will take the stance that consuming animal products or meat is always wrong, and never justified, no matter what. Many vegans actually would disagree that it is justified to eat animal products if a doctor recommended it, they’d say there are no nutrients found within those products which can’t be found in plants. They’d also be against eating gifted non-vegan food, many are against feeding cats a nonvegan diet too
Um… Ima call bullshit real quick. I don’t think you have ever met a single person who is as you’ve drawn in your cartoon here.
Also, why would a vegan or vegetarian be obligated to eat an animal-based product just because it was a gift? That would be weird as fuck. You don’t eat sausage or cheese? Here’s a sausage and cheese basket. It’s a gift; you have to eat it.
And finally, you are suggesting that vegans kill cats. Cats are obligate carnivores. Vegan cat owners know this. A “vegan cat” will not survive long. Suggesting vegans force cats to be vegans is just an absurd falsehood.
Re: vegan cats, they actually can do well on a properly planned/supplemented vegan diet, although more research is needed. If you’re against nutritionally complete vegan kibble, you should be against all kibble
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9860667/ The Impact of Vegan Diets on Indicators of Health in Dogs and Cats: A Systematic Review (2023)
“However, there is little evidence of adverse effects arising in dogs and cats on vegan diets. In addition, some of the evidence on adverse health impacts is contradicted in other studies. Additionally, there is some evidence of benefits, particularly arising from guardians’ perceptions of the diets. Given the lack of large population-based studies, a cautious approach is recommended. If guardians wish to implement a vegan diet, it is recommended that commercial foods are used.”
TIL
The same reason people hate leftists, feminists, trans athletes, “gamer girls”, people on welfare, blacks, etc. An image the right cultivated of the group, out of convenient easily-hateable annoying people in it that they could use to create a generalization/stereotype out of. It’s something that’s able to happen to any group, I could portray any hobbyist or activist in this way the same exact way as these “annoying” groups are portrayed, but the right is particularly willing to just flat out lie, slander, and cheat their way into making countercultural/anti-status-quo groups look as absurd as possible, to the point that the majority of the population falls for it (even those that don’t consider themselves to be conservative).
I’ll make a comparison. Conservative/“anti-sjw” thumbnails often have a picture of some angry-looking rainbow haired woman, usually the same few, in order to be like “look how irrational and crazy these feminazis are, she must hate men so much” and like 4 out of 5 of those times it’s a picture of a woman that was protesting a literal neo-nazi gathering or something, not some sort of radical crazy man-hating feminist. But the internet has conditioned the average person to look at someone like that and immediately think they’re an irrational “feminazi”, and conservatives showing these pictures everywhere and making 100 videos on the same person makes people subconsciously believe they’re rampant and have a massive (and bad) grip on society.
Same kind of thing happens with vegans, you have the same 10 or so internet vegans people use to portray veganism that conditions people to think poorly of the concept “vegan”, and when these influencers are confronted about it they say “I don’t hate veganism, I just hate the annoying vegans” then they go onto Twitter to complain about the vegans and how they’re irrational for not eating meat and their brains must be de-evolving or something. They know what they’re doing, but they can hide behind plausible deniability, and the majority of viewers fall for it.
Because of the trope that vegans are pretentious twats that publicly chastise anyone not vegan.
Like most things it’s one of those situations that’s blown out of proportion and the vast majority of us will never interact with a preachy vegan. I’ve encountered many vegans in the wild and they’ve most all been decent people, and I love picking their brains for decent vegan or vegetarian foods. I don’t mind vegan/vegetarianism, it’s just not easy to do well, so it helps to talk to people who do it for real. That said, I have encountered a few that are on the preachy side, but whatever. They’re no different than the tool who has the “eat tasty animals” bumper sticker and the like.
The meat and dairy industries have been pumping out propaganda for years, mostly aimed at right-wing dudes. It’s just kind of part of right-wing culture at this point to kneejerk react to veganism with tired old tropes and stereotypes.
It was worse back in the 90s and early 2000s.
I don’t hate veganism. It’s a dietary choice and that’s fine. What I hate is vegans. They’re always pushy and judgmental and hateful and sometimes even destructive in their activism. They’re an annoying group of people and I just don’t want to have to deal with them.
Instead of whimsy anecdotes, how about something with a bit more science behind it: https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Do-gooder_derogation
This is so frustrating. People saying “Oh I just don’t like those self-righteous vegans”. Thing is, it doesn’t really matter what vegans say or how reasonable/logically sound it is, the knee-jerk reaction is always the same.
Speaking as a life-long lacto-ovo vegetarian who did a ten year stint as a vegan (I’m 30), it’s because there is a subset of the vegan population that’s very gung-ho about their diet and wants to proselytize about it, and no one likes being told what they should eat. When you remark on people’s diets, people tend to get annoyed and defensive about it.
I grew up being told that my food looked yucky, how I can’t call something meatballs since it doesn’t contain meat, how since I don’t eat protein I’ll die, so on, so forth. It got annoying fast, so now I don’t generally discuss my diet unless it makes a contextual sense. e.g. when planning a restaurant outing with people - though to be frank I often just avoid social situations where food plays a role.
I think where the big clashes really happen is when someone has made veganism/eating meat a core part of their identity, having that criticised, however gently that might be, will cause friction and often cause people to double-down on it; even though they may know on some level that the criticism might even be valid. You can see this in the fat pride movement as well.
Bingo!
It’s the “identity” thing that fouls up so much today.
“You have to accept everything do because it’s my identity”.
Um, no, I don’t have to “accept” anything about you. Nor do you have to “accept” anything about me. Hell, I figured this out when I was five. Fine, you don’t like something about me? Then I won’t waste my time with you. Thanks for making it clear.
I don’t think we view this quite the same way. I don’t see a problem with something being a defining part of someone’s identity, because it’s not up to me to decide how other people ought identify. We all have identities so on some level everyone identifies with something. Just because say, you and I don’t get how diet can be an significant part of someone’s identity, doesn’t invalidate it being significant for someone else. It just means that we haven’t lived the same life and that’s fine.
In a way we do have to accept other people’s identities, because what else can we do? We can’t force change on others, all we can really do is acknowledge the situation and then choose whether or not we want to continue interacting with them.
It doesn’t really get problematic until you have someone that does try to force things on others. My mother was one of those militant vegans, and she lost a lot of friends for it. She’s the reason I am vegetarian, and the reason I was vegan for a long time. Back then I never had much choice in either regard.
Being vegan wasn’t even really a defining part of her identity. Her trying to force it on others was also less about trying to change others, and more about trying to place herself in some sort of morally superior position to them. She pretended to care about their health and the environment - hell on some level maybe she genuinely did care - but it really was more about making herself look and feel better about herself because she was (and is) a deeply insecure person pretending to be otherwise.
As a final aside; what I’ve written above is what I consciously believe, but I’m obviously not an infallible person. I’m an extremely cynical, nihilistic, and definitely a judgmental person. I try my best not to be, and to see things from the perspective of others, but some days I succeed better than others.
I said this on another thread posted by a very antagonistic vegan: Acting holier-than-thou, smug, and hostile is not a good way to convince people of your arguments. It pushes people away and biases them against you and the argument you’re making.
Far too often I see vegans outright shaming and harassing people for choosing to eat meat, or acting smug and superior because they are making “the right moral decision” and everyone else is lessor for thinking otherwise. I often see them call people “stupid” and “lazy” for not making the same choice they did.
Now, if I came here acting the same way, but I was championing eating only meat and shaming others for eating vegetables, I’m sure vegans would be upset for the same reason.
It’s gotten bad enough that a lot of people (admittedly myself included) are put off by vegans and their arguments. Not because the arguments don’t have merit (they certainly do) but because enough vegans have acted antagonistic or smug that they get shunned for it when the discussion gets brought up, because it’s what has become expected.
If you really want people to listen to you, you need to frame it from a friendlier and more down-to-earth position and not come across as hostile. The human mind tends to close itself off immediately when faced with hostility. This doesn’t just apply to discussions about veganism, but any discussion in general really.
