- veganism isnt an inherently white or colonial idea
- veganism isnt bad
- veganism in the west does not represent the practice of veganism overall (im not giving lashings to buddhist monks when i criticize veganism as a movement in the 1st world)
- it shouldnt be controversial to prioritize human liberation
- existing socialist states in the past and present did not endorse veganism and were heavily anthropocentric. if you are a westerner, do not touch this topic with any intention of historical revisionism.
- if youre white but prioritize animal liberation over anti racism and anti colonialism im judging
- i dont ”draw a line” and dont care if some cultures eat dogs or cats
- a lot of non white people are turned off by veganism because we get the feeling that white people care about animals more than us
- ”herbivore” doesnt just mean consumption of plant diet. as a human you dont have a herbivore digestive system or herbivore teeth. you are omnivore even if you choose a plant based diet.
- humans are omnivores.
- abstaining from meat can be good for your health in some cases
- different cultures have different approaches to meat consumption and should be respected
more important notes:
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THE MEAT INDUSTRY HAS TO CHANGE and thats not a question. it is cruel to animals in many ways.
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KNOW YOUR PLACE IF YOU ARE WHITE. i still think of an exchange i saw between a western comrade and a vietnamese comrade where the western comrade insisted the latter was a reactionary because they were opposed to veganism. do not do this ever.
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STOP SUGGESTING VEGANISM AS AN OPTION FOR ENVIRONMENTAL PROGRESS. it is individualist and individualist measures for environmental damage done by huge corporations do not work period
What is this post for
i think that the community is (silently) quite divided on these issues and avoids some of these very important points.
I mean so what if we are divided, I don’t fully understand the reason for the post. We have in general decided to put this devide asside to work to a bigger goal. No matter what your thoughts are or where your lines are, that is what we have done and all bringing this up does is farther open a divide. This post does not seek understanding but seems to admonish, and gatekeep who is even alowed to have conversations about diet. That is in no way productive.
Agian we have by and large on lemmygrad (though not entirely) decided this divide is not one of the primary ones we will argue about.
making a post establishing your opinions as if they are defacto truths is not conducive to adressing issues
I am just wondering why no one ever talks about vegetarianism anymore. It used to be that people would go vegetarian. But the discussion in the West seems to be all about veganism nowadays. When did that switch happen and why?
Because vegetarianism is far more common than veganism in the non-Western world. Veganism itself (not the name but the diet) is not new of course but the popularity of veganism as a trend is relatively recent.
Also, some cultures don’t count fish as meat. I find that interesting too.
for some reason they think that milking cows is rape (really) and are disgusted by eggs because theyre ”chicken periods”. westerners are also way less rural than we are so theyre not familiar with these things
I mean, depends on how you yourself would define rape I guess lol. In my country, it would be illegal to treat cats and dogs the same way livestock is treated - it is a purely subjective and abritraty drawn line. If I held a dog in a cage and (since it seems sensitive to you I will not use the term “anally rape”) continuously forced it to be pregnant by “anally insterting a large metall rod” to keep its cervix in place - I would be prosecuted under animal cruelty laws. It is okay to treat cows this way however… (dw since the animal cant say “no” and only cries out in pain, we cant be sure it isn’t consenting to this anal penetration).
westerners are also way less rural than we are so theyre not familiar with these things
I grew up relatively rural, for the local farmers who held livestock and sold milk - this was exactly what was done to the cows and I witnessed it first hand.
No investigation, no right to speak. You are woefully underinformed on the topic of veganism and have absolutely no business speaking authoritatively on it. Shut the fuck up and read a book.
It isn’t that milking a cow is rape as much as getting a cow to produce milk requires it. A cow has to give birth in order to produce milk, which in any sort of large scale production involves forcefully inseminating the cow, and then taking away its child after birth to take the mother’s milk.
When white Americans (not speaking for people of other countries or other backgrounds) can just as easily buy and drink oat milk, which doesn’t involve any forced insemination or forced removal of baby animals, it seems like a clearly better option morally speaking.
can just as easily buy and drink oat milk
They can also buy and drink water.
This argument won’t convince anyone who isn’t already vegan because oat milk is not a replacement for milk. It’s just a different product altogether.
The taste and consistency and nutrient content are completely different. At least imitation meat tries to be as close to meat as it can get (which is unfortunately not very close).
Idk that argument helped convince me to be vegan.
Being vegan does mean changing the way you eat for nutrition and it does mean sacrificing the taste pleasure of meat, but I just think the sacrifice is worth it because I am not actively participating in a system that causes billions of animals to suffer.
I don’t think it was necessarily being used as statement directly to convince those people. Rather pointing out the relative privilege of people who can go their local Walmart and choose between at least 5 different products (soy, coconut, almond, oat, cashew) that aren’t dairy milk. As opposed to people living in a rural area of a country that may have more pressing concerns like access to clean water and lack of food availability in general.
People always try to attack vegans by bringing up people in the latter situation, when the attackers are usually in the former and are the ones activists are talking to/about.
People always try to attack vegans by bringing up people in the latter situation, when the attackers are usually in the former and are the ones activists are talking to/about.
I’m sorry, but this is a pretty unfair and distorting characterization. First, if you are talking to people about it online such as in a place like this, you generally won’t know what group someone belongs to without directly asking them about their situation, which is something they’re probably not going to want to share if the plan is to decide whether to lecture them about privilege based on what it is. Second, the act of reminding people that the world is not confined to those who have lots of options does not become invalidated if it’s done by somebody who does have options. These two things together are important, since we are not exactly talking about going to a rich person’s retreat and promoting veganism. Third, there is nothing inherently “privileged” about stores existing near you that have options on shelves if those options may not be something you can afford. Don’t fall for the capitalist narrative that the existence of options in theory is the same as people necessarily being able to freely go for them. Furthermore, mass production, contrary to how capitalism tends to represent it, is not magic. If demand for something dramatically changes, production has to change to meet it. At the same time, if people find that one option is generally cheaper than another (even if it is objectively worse for them) they may go for the cheaper option because that’s what they can afford.
For example, it’s not as bad as it used to be in terms of price and rarity, but where I live, stuff that is not normally gluten-free and uses different ingredients to make it gluten-free (such as pasta or bread) is more expensive than the normal form of it. In theory, you could argue, well then get foods that are gluten-free inherently and this is something I try to do for my health because I don’t do well with gluten, but it’s also harder than it sounds. Between cost, convenience, and existing cuisine culture, options can get narrow very fast. Of course I could mea culpa about how this is a minor issue compared to being food insecure, but that’s sort of beside the point. I am not a monk and have to deal with the inertia of the conditions I live in, not the conditions someone else lives in. Dealing with even a single dietary restriction takes time and energy to be looking at ingredient lists and trying to figure out what all you can eat, much less will want to eat without feeling like you’re doing penance. And that’s not even getting into peer pressures of any sort of gathering where you eat together, or the complexities that fast arise in group meals from even one person having a dietary restriction, much less multiple. These are the kind of obstacles so-called “privileged” people can be up against, even when assuming they want to change in the first place.
If we look at this and shrug and say “well do it anyway, it’s not that hard, others have it worse”, we’re just doing an individualism, not building a society that incentivizes different behavior.
I’m sorry, but this is a pretty unfair and distorting characterization. First, if you are talking to people about it online such as in a place like this, you generally won’t know what group someone belongs to without directly asking them about their situation, which is something they’re probably not going to want to share if the plan is to decide whether to lecture them about privilege based on what it is.
I’ve had this conversation with a lot of people irl that I am more familiar with, not necessarily talking about people online that I don’t know. The general vibe online though is that people are attacking Inuit seal hunters for their choices, and I can tell you that the demographic of Inuit seal hunters either doesn’t exist or is infinitesimally small on places like Reddit and not anything activists actually care about on a practical level. But, connecting to point 2:
Second, the act of reminding people that the world is not confined to those who have lots of options does not become invalidated if it’s done by somebody who does have options
The problem I am speaking to is people who do have options using the people who don’t as an excuse to not do something they are capable of doing themselves. By mischaracterizing animal rights activists as specifically targeting people like indigenous communities or people who need to use food banks, they handwave away the substance of arguments to dismiss the idea of doing anything differently outright based on a false perception of a movement attacking minority groups.
Third, there is nothing inherently “privileged” about stores existing near you that have options on shelves if those options may not be something you can afford.
There is to the degree that it is possible to choose to sacrifice something else to make this decision, if possible. That doesn’t mean everyone can do so or that I am dismissing the fact that these alternatives can cost more money. Anecdotally, oat milk is 2 dollars a gallon where I am at. Someone wanting to switch here is paying essentially the same price as dairy milk, barring issues of availability in their specific stores. That isn’t the case everywhere, but it is a legitimate and effective thing to point out to people living in my area.
We are very aware of differing material conditions. Some people are minors and can’t choose what they eat. There are medical conditions. Access issues. Everyone has their own hurdles they either can or can’t eliminate if they want to change. I’m not saying “just do it”, I would say “examine the actual reasons why you are not doing it and evaluate if it possible to given your conditions”.
Veganism isn’t a death cult or a poverty cult, nobody is telling people at food banks to leave the milk behind. I’m saying boomer grill dads who can afford to throw neighborhood barbeques in their backyard have a choice and part of the mission is to convince them to make that choice. Or for my area, wealthy families in general. Someone this well off in another country may not even be able to make that choice because the options literally don’t exist. Plant-based milks are only just now entering the market in some countries, or haven’t yet.
Veganism isn’t a death cult or a poverty cult, nobody is telling people at food banks to leave the milk behind. I’m saying boomer grill dads who can afford to throw neighborhood barbeques in their backyard have a choice and part of the mission is to convince them to make that choice. Someone this well off in another country may not even be able to make that choice because the options literally don’t exist. Plant-based milks are only just now entering the market in some countries, or haven’t yet.
But “boomer grill dads” are the least likely to listen to any of this. I’ve seen how those types can talk and you aren’t going to move them by saying that they are privileged or that they have options or whatever. So I don’t understand being told, in effect, “it’s not you, it’s the boomer grill dads” but then the tactics that I tend to see used have nothing to do with how those people actually are. Some of them are straight up reactionary in general and moving them on veganism is the least of social concerns. Some of them are staunchly into meat and the taste of it, and seem to associate it with masculinity, so there’s a lot to unpack there. They are a bit like the rich people in class struggle. They are among the last ones I would expect to voluntary change, even if it’s made convenient to do so.
We need to make it convenient to do the right thing and that requires political and logistics power. Persuasion without broader social change can only go so far. I don’t mean to sound insulting when I say this, but I’ve yet to see anything from vegans that looks actually effective on a tactics level (granted, I am perhaps not seeing the more effective stuff). The general strategy/hope seems to be that upon reaching a tipping point of amalgamated individual choice, the world will cross over an event horizon into being vegan. But this has never been how broad social change gets enforced in a society.
Most modern dairy farms now veer away from separating the calf from its mother, both because of the inhumanity, and the fact that a calf consumes roughly 1 gallon of milk per day, while a cow can produce nearly seven gallons a day. With the amount taken by a calf essentially inconsequential, many nations are also starting to implement keeping the calf and mother together as law.
Do you have a source on that? I am not aware of, and unable to find, any nations that have actually banned the practice of cow calf separation. I’m also not aware of any farms that allow calves to stay with their mother, would be very interested in learning more about this.
From what I know, this is still very widely practiced in the USA, and if anything, some small scale farmers prefer a foster system where multiple calves (2-4) suckle from one mother cow they are essentially assigned to, but is not necessarily their birth mother.
That’s fair! I currently live next to a lot of dairy farms because of work so I have had to learn… a lot… about the process from the local farmers. But I have seen the practice of avoiding separation mentioned quite a bit on the news in Eastern Europe hence the many, since a lot of the local farmers unions seem agreeable to abandoning the practice. I’ll find some Belarusian sources
Also American dairy farms are notoriously decrepit.
Ah that is very interesting! I hope they do abandon it. I cannot say I am at all surprised that Eastern Europe would be far ahead of the USA in terms of ethical farming practices.
The issue with eggs is also not “chicken periods ew”, it’s that factory farmed chickens are kept in horrible conditions, bred to lay more eggs than is naturally healthy, deprived of nutrients needed to recoup from laying those eggs, then slaughtered in the end. If they aren’t already ground to paste as chicks.
Even “backyard” chickens have these issues and can easily die from laying too many eggs/too large of eggs that get stuck on the way out. And are also slaughtered. All the “free range” stuff is marketing PR to cover up the abuse.
Literally nobody outside a sanctuary in the US is paying for elderly chicken vet care.
These issues are what spawned the word Vegan and The Vegan Society in the first place, as the vegetarian orgs they were originally part of refused to acknowledge that milk and eggs were part of the same horrific industry as meat production.
i feel like making a post about veganism when you dont understand basic concepts of veganisms was a shitty thing of you to do
At the end of the day veganism is a boycott. In that regard, it is basically as individualist as BDS (or similar boycott movements). Sure, that alone isn’t likely to bring larger systemic change, but I do think it can be a very beneficial piece of the larger strategy.
There is an unfortunately large number of liberal vegans who genuinely don’t care about the lives of oppressed people around the world (I’ve seen people argue against being pro-Palestine and post ridiculous propaganda puff pieces for the IOF in the vegan subreddit, which is a horrible place). But I think human liberation and animal liberation can both be supported at the same time without one detracting from the other
(I’ve seen people argue against being pro-Palestine and post ridiculous propaganda puff pieces for the IOF in the vegan subreddit, which is a horrible place)
the vegan subreddit is one of the main reasons i consider stop calling myself a vegan and instead of stating something like “i stand against animal explotation”
I think if you go by subreddits, you’ll not want to associate yourself with basically any community or movement. /r/buddhism is entirely vibes-based people who have not read a single piece of Buddhist philosophy in their life, /r/games is full of miserable misogynists who hate their own hobby, /r/vegan is extremely reactionary when it comes to anything outside animal exploitation issues and lack any social etiquette, etc. That’s just
Leaving moral consideration of non-human animals aside, just by the laws of thermodynamics, a vegan diet requires significantly less energy than a diet that relies on factory farming and is therefore more conducive to efficient resource usage. I don’t see how reforming factory farming in favor of better animal welfare would do anything but drastically intensify this discrepancy. The world is not large enough to have cattle that aren’t being treated akin to torture if we’re eating anywhere near the amount of meat we are now. If we use free-range guidelines for all currently existing cattle (probably not that great for animal welfare since its a meat industry designation) a preposterous percentage of earth’s arable land would need to be dedicated to cattle grazing. So its obviously and unquestionably the case that veganism is better for the environment than a diet that relies on factory farming of animals and the idea that we could reform the meat industry to be morally upstanding is unrealistic. The old utility of cattle was transforming calories that couldn’t be eaten by humans (grass and similar plants) into calories we can consume (meat products). That’s no longer necessary. GMO soy can grow just about anywhere grass and plants consumed by cattle can.
So there is essentially no reasonable argument for meat consumption beyond cultural sensitivity–a completely legitimate concern mind you. That argument is fine until people have to choose between upholding traditional dietary habits and making sure everybody has enough food. We presently produce enough food globally to feed everyone currently on earth. I dont think we are at the point where mandating veganism is necessary to feed the planet. I personally am not a vegan. But if the global population grows sufficiently, we will eventually reach that point.
I think the most important point in the communist context is to remember primary vs. second contradictions and all that jazz. In some places, the biggest priority regarding food is food sovereignty and undoing the damage of imperialism. Climate change is a major issue, yet China is not a purist who has never contributed to it; however, they have over time become a role model for developing and implementing renewable energy. Issues always need to be understood in relation to other issues, not as artificially isolated attributes of a society. Isolating and then clumsily trying to fix can result in a “treatment of symptoms” mentality that misses the forest for the trees. This is itself an ideal though. In practice, people can only do their best with the limited time and resources that they have. So ideal understanding before implementing solutions is often not going to happen. But we can still build and improve on systems that try to bake holistic understanding and practice in, over time. Understanding and practice themselves are processes to work on, in other words, not to expect purity from.
Lol pipe down
Addendum: STOP FUCKING COMPARING ANIMAL AGRICULTURE TO THE SHOAH.
Incredibly uninformed and frankly bizarre post. This is the ultimate exemplar for “no investigation, no right to speak”.
im not giving lashings to buddhist monks when i criticize veganism as a movement in the 1st world
You’re in no position to criticise anything if you show that you have absolutely no understanding of it. You have no understanding of what veganism is, poor knowledge on the health aspect, dreadfully ignorant or misinformed about animal agriculture, and no understanding of vegan movements in the west or the global south.
I don’t understand what gave you the confidence to make these statements in your post and comments.
You’re just saying this cuz your white /s 😂
They self admittedly make “vague and inflammatory” posts. I think they’re just naive and in need of a social outlet.
I will just say that many of these points reek of internet-only discourse. How many organized vegans/MLs have you actually discussed these questions with?
From my experience there is considerable overlap between organized marxists and organized vegans. The same people that I’ve worked with locally in projects (with much success) regarding the use of local arable land, repurposing livestock farming to more sustainable non-animal practices, and change in regulation/policies for directing funds for such local sustainable (and non-animal-exploitative) projects are the same people that I see in pro-palestine marches, that organize for “change in regulation/policies for directing funds” to US arms companies or to divest from Israel. They are the same people that are or have been brutalized by police for both environmental and anti-imperialist activism.
I have never in my life met either a vegan ML or a non-vegan ML who is, claim or hold any of these beliefs (and believe me I have discussed this topic at length with many people IRL):
white but prioritize animal liberation over anti racism and anti colonialism
it is controversial to prioritize human liberation
I have also never heard a diamat argument that animal liberation is the primary contradiction in the world, neither locally or globally, so it only makes sense that this is not something that is being prioritized in AES states:
existing socialist states in the past and present did not endorse veganism and were heavily anthropocentric. if you are a westerner, do not touch this topic with any intention of historical revisionism.
I find it improbable someone would come with this argument in any serious discussion of the topic.
STOP SUGGESTING VEGANISM AS AN OPTION FOR ENVIRONMENTAL PROGRESS. it is individualist and individualist measures for environmental damage done by huge corporations do not work period
The same way being an ML is individualist if all you do is read some books and dont organize. Non-organized vegans at least change their habits.
The current capitalist mode of agricultural production creates a massive metabolic rift and is an incredibly inefficient use of land and caloric yield. Pointing out that we must transition away from animal-exploitative and resource-intensive agriculture is a structural critique, not an individualist one. Just as we organize for a transition away from fossil fuels, we must organize for a transition away from industrial animal agriculture. Veganism as a movement is broader than simply the results of many individuals “voting with their wallets”.
So many of these veganism threads seem so out of place to anyone who has ever discussed them IRL with other organized leftists. And the points made by lemmygrad users against veganism in these threads are ones I’ve only ever seen in (made up/imagined?) arguments online.
