I interrupt my regularly scheduled bitching about cashew milk to bring you some food for thought from another corner of the Internet.
First, check out this article from the L.A. times where Alexandra Le Tellier suggests that teaching your child to go vegan is an effective way to effect change because they will be growing up with the habits that will help our planet.
The juicy stuff is in the comments (check them out here.) My favorite quote is a tie between Lisa Shaw Osh, who maintains that:
"Lying to your children so they'll eat rotting corpses, blood & pus filled breast milk and hen menstruations is wrong."
And an anonymous poster with the cute nickname Maya Pinion, who maintains that:
"it <sic> seems like it's the skinny people who have every freakin allergy or food intolerance known to man."
As a sort-of-sometimes-bad-raw-foodist, my consumption of animal products has dropped astronomically. After a past miserable four-month attempt to go veggie while overconsuming eggs and fish and constantly feeling horrible, I can now eat inadvertently vegan for multiple days without even realizing it. I am still not advocating cutting out animal products, and I do not currently believe that you can have a healthy diet without incorporating animal products of every kind. I will not go raw for 3 days unless I know that there is a juicy hamburger at the end of the tunnel. The way my body feels both when I consume mostly plant foods AND when I do eat that burger tells me that I am doing something right.
The ethical question I pose to you actually has nothing to do with diet. Is there any kind of result that justifies our using a wide variety of means to show/explain/persuade/force our lifestyle on someone else? (Think diet, religion, friends making bad decisions, etc.)
When you look at veganism as a personal choice, religion, diet, or lifestyle then yes it does seem unethical to persuade someone else to follow you. To me veganism is not about any of these things. I've gotten every misleading/mean thing said about veganism in those comments thrown at me and after a few years I'm over it. It's not a radical ideology or a religion! I also don't do it for health. People can eat a plant-based diet and be super healthy but so can people eating a few animal products too like you.
ReplyDeleteVeganism to me is about justice for animals, humans, and the earth. Everyday it's gaining more and more recognition as a social justice movement and not a personal choice or religion.
Nathan Runkle from Mercy for Animals recently wrote "It's been said that social justice movements go through four distinct stages before gaining widespread acceptance: first they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, and then you win. Well, consider the fight on." (with the meat, dairy, and egg industries) Right now the animal ag industry is actually fighting back by pushing "ag-gag" bills to make it a criminal offense to expose animal cruelty at their factories. Twisted right? Two states have already passed the bill.
So to answer your question yes I think it's ok to talk about and explain our lifestyle to someone else when the result is potential justice for others. Just try not to sound like a pushy asshole!
I love the concept of a social justice movement. That takes it to a whole other level of justifying your actions and it's definitely more effective to do so by not being a pushy asshole!
ReplyDeleteAccording to ABCnews, as of February an 'ag gag' bill was signed in Iowa and similar legislation was pending in New York, Minnesota, Illinois, Missouri, Indiana, Nebraska and Utah. Yikes!
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/ag-gag-bills-stop-undercover-animal-abuse-investigations/story?id=15816805#.T-Iyihytk1U