Have you ever had dinner with friends and a Vegan was in the middle of the group? If you have, I’m pretty sure, actually I’m certain, that a significant part of the conversation centred on animal rights or the moral dilemmas of consuming animal products. All you wanted to do was enjoy your dinner with great company, but then this person had to bring the topic to the table. What you expected to be a pleasant evening became an excruciating debating session on a topic that adds to your already overflowing, privileged, guilt buckets.
Why can’t these vegans relax, have fun, and enjoy life like everyone else? Why do they ALWAYS have to make everyone feel guilty?
What exactly is going on in that skull of theirs?
What is Veganism?
Vegans are people who really, really, care about animal rights and the environment. They try to live in a way that decreases the negative impact that their lifestyle might have on living matter.
- Vegans do not eat any animal meat (chicken and fish are animals too!).
- Vegans do not consume any products originating from animals: so no milk products, no gelatine and no honey.
- Vegans do not buy any product that is created out of animals: so no leather, no wool, no down and, of course, no fur.
By doing this, vegans remove the majority of their part in society’s cruel exploitation of animals.
How do Vegans view what you view?
Steak is an appetising dish?
Vegans see an animal farmed in horrific conditions and clumsily slaughtered at the end.
Fish is a delectably nutritious meal?
Vegans see an animal caught with thousands of other aquatic animals that will senselessly die and their corpses thrown back into the ocean, squeezed together, drawn for kilometres and then brought on deck just to suffocate to death.
Milk is a delicious, healthy drink fortifying your bones?
Vegans see an animal artificially inseminated every ten months, for the entirety of their shortened 5 -7 year lifespan (a cow’s average lifespan should be 20 years). Every single time a cow gives birth they are separated from their calf right after birth. This painful separation is so that the milk it produces can be sold instead of being used to nourish its young. The cow will suffer life-long living in unsanitary, extremely cramped conditions, and pumped with hormones just to be butchered when it does not produce enough milk to stay profitable. You can read more about the consequences in term of physical pain and emotional pain for cows.
Leather is a beautiful, high-quality material?
Vegans see an animal farmed, often in China or India, where animal welfare laws are either non-existent or not enforced. In countries such as these there are no penalties for places like fur farms where rabbits, dogs, cats and other animals are often skinned ALIVE.
Isn’t that an Extreme Image?
Most of the time when we encounter animals they are loved pets in our homes, or grazing in a field alongside the road, or on farms when we are walking through the countryside. These animals seem to live a happy life. Their lives can’t be that bad, can it?
Using animals to feed and clothe ourselves is something that we have always done. We have been farming them for more than ten thousand years so that we can benefit from them on a much higher scale, so how could it be wrong? Nobody makes mistakes for so long do they?
Think about it, not everything that we considered as necessary ten thousand years ago is considered relevant today. Technological and scientific progress such as the invention of the printing press, electricity, the internet have changed the way we live dramatically.
Penicillin and other medicinal cures have been discovered and are being researched to prolong our lifespan, and faux meats are being created with all the needed proteins (check out the innovative Beyond Meat project funded by Bill Gates at http://beyondmeat.com/about ). Agriculture gave humans the opportunity to feed ourselves without having to hunt any animals. It made it possible for us to survive on only fruits, vegetables, and cereals.
The reason we eat animals is because we enjoy their taste, and they have been passed down culturally as a part of our diet. Like any other animal on the planet, we have no need to drink any milk after our first few years on earth. Yet, we enjoy drinking milk and we adore eating cheese, so we keep on doing it even if there is no necessity. And, of course, there is no debate about whether we need leather to produce things like sofas, shoes and bags. Thousands of different materials exist which would serve the same purpose, as well as many fake leathers that look and feel exactly the same. But, leather has also been passed down culturally as a favourited durable and luxurious fabric.
Do you think that perhaps we should rather use these viable alternatives, instead of cruelly killing over 50 BILLION animals, like we do every single year?
Should Animals have Rights?
We are just one of the 8 million species that are living on the planet, we have grown up believing that we are the superior species. This is a notion not shared by vegans, we believe that we need each other to survive (and so does science), therefore we should treat all terrestrial beings with respect.
Today, many people consider humans as being entitled to equal rights. We believe that differences in gender, ethnicity, race or religion are invalid motives to abuse someone.
Not so long ago, what we now view as a cruel and barbaric was seen as ordinary, humans were enslaved for our convenience. White people considered black people as inferior and just decided that they could buy and sell them, forcing them to live in unspeakable conditions. Their freedom was removed, they worked and died according to the whims of whoever ‘owned’ them.
Does this sound familiar?
Why Should I Change?
Vegans believe that industrial animal farming is extremely similar to the slave trade. The slave trade was considered acceptable. However, there were people that were against it, speaking up and trying to make those around them realise the consequences of their actions. They were hoping to open up their eyes to the atrocities being committed all around them, hoping for a better world.
In my 33 years of existence, I’ve never met anyone who has told me that slavery was acceptable, and that the convenience brought by slavery was worth the pain and horror that was inflicted on these people. If you were to have dinner with a person supporting slave trade, I am sure that you would also react strongly to what he says and would try to make him realise that it is wrong. Just like this, vegans try to change your mind to make you realise the consequences supporting the animal industry. It’s as simple as this.
How to Survive Your Next Dinner With a Vegan?
Hopefully now you understand a bit more why vegans are so passionate about talking about the animal industry. I will never be able to convince you that slavery is acceptable, and so to you will never convince a vegan that farming an animal is acceptable.
Many times it is not even the vegan that brings up the topic, they are led by inquisitive questions to defend their eating choices. Many vegans will tell you that they have answered the same questions countless times. It is enjoyable to them if they are asked out of curiosity, rather than cynical or contemptuous jabs from meat eaters. So if you would rather not hear about the topic, don’t ask them why they are a vegan, why they don’t eat animals, or why they don’t wear wool when obviously shearing a sheep does not hurt it, because you will have to face the answer that you most probably will not like.
If you are really interested in understanding what industrial animal farming is, here are some links to short, factual videos and articles. It’s certainly not easy to watch, however, you will probably discover many things that you will wish you had known earlier:
- Factory farming: http://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/factory-farming
- Milk production: http://www.peta.org/features/dairy-industry-cruelty
- Leather industry: http://www.peta.org/features/leather-industry
- Egg industry: http://www.peta.org/features/egg-industry-cruelty
I would like this essay to be an opportunity to thank my beloved friend Inge. She made me realise years ago that many animals were suffering because of my habits and that it was actually a lot easier to change your habits than most people think. She advised me to read Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer, an investigation into animal farming. While reading it, I decided to become vegetarian and a few years later vegan.
Fortunately, she is also a good writer. She corrected this article and removed its grammar mistakes.
I want also to thank my friend Alexandre who became vegan with me. We supported each other cooking vegan at home and it made this journey even easier.
Finally, I would like to thank my family, which has also been supportive by cooking meals according to my values and listening to all my vegan sermons.
