Veganism

I actually do understand vegetarianism a little bit (them animals be cute) so let's avoid discussing that.

Veganism is cutting off all animal products as well as meat from your diet, like dairy and eggs. This eliminates a lot of things from your menu. My question is, is it really worth it? Is it all right to keep those things in your diet and eat them in moderation, or are they really that bad for you? What is their impact and how significant is it?

@ Post 38: Yes, I did start this thread because of the guy that I mentioned here.

edited 8th Feb '11 3:53:37 PM by snowfoxofdeath

I'm a former vegan (very briefly, but a vegan nonetheless).

Veganism is more than food choice; it's an ideology. Some say that there is a vegan trifecta: health, environment, animal rights. Most vegans start off with one piece of the trifecta. I was motivated by animal rights.

Is veganism really healthy? I don't have much knowledge about nutrition, but one of the things that helped me quit veganism was the fact that ex-vegans say that resuming meat consumption made them feel the best that they had in decades. One thing that all vegans know is that the vegan diet is notably lacking in vitamin b12. The vegan diet can also give you a disease if you have a genetic predisposition (I forget what it's called. . . something about cells).

Veganism obviously has positive health qualities. It prevents obesity and heart disease, and some other stuff that I can't remember right now. My conclusive opinion is that health is an iffy subject for veganism.

Is veganism really worth it? For people who fervently believe in the vegan ideology, yes, it is worth it.

edited 6th Feb '11 5:51:07 PM by Grain

Couldn't you achieve most of the same things by just balancing your diet properly?

Well, when you look at some aspects of the dairy system, like what happens to all the male calves and that sort of thing, not to mention battery farms for chickens - I can see how someone who was dedicated to animals rights enough to become vegetarian could also become vegan.

But then again, you could probably assuage your conscience by buying free range eggs.

As far as I can see, it makes it incredibly difficult to eat out. Almost everything contains butter, eggs, or some sort of animal product.

edited 6th Feb '11 5:33:54 PM by LoniJay

You're talking about the smallest part of the vegan trifecta: health.

I can't give very informative answers about health veganism because I was never a health vegan. I myself find the concept of vegans who don't care for animals/the environment rather confusing. Vegans who only care about health are a minority. Some vegans actually acknowledge that veganism is unbalanced nutritionally, but persevere for the sake of animal rights.

You could easily find a whole bunch of articles arguing the healthiness or unhealthiness of veganism through Google.

But then again, you could probably assuage your conscience by buying free range eggs.

Some vegan-minded people eat humanely farmed animal products.

As far as I can see, it makes it incredibly difficult to eat out. Almost everything contains butter, eggs, or some sort of animal product.

Living a literally 100% vegan lifestyle is impossible in the modern world. Animal suffering is used for everything, from food to clothing to public transportation to films. The idea of veganism is to lessen consumption of the products of animal suffering as much as reasonably possible. PETA says that it's okay to eat foods will small traces of animal products, because that helps animals more than eating a cheesesteak.

edited 6th Feb '11 6:08:18 PM by Grain

But Cheesesteaks are just so fucking tasty...

Well you have to also look at the original sources for those philosophies. It's almost a natural consequence of the environment. Take Tibet for example, if most people weren't vegetarians, it's not like they can raise some animals to eat. That area is totally useless for agriculture beyond subsistence farming, which is why they were so poor for so long too compared to areas closer to the major rivers (like the Yellow River). I feel that justification came far afterward.

Health concern I think is probably not so great. A good balanced diet makes more sense.

Animal rights wise, depends on your beliefs/religion. If you're buddhist then of course you can't eat animals because murder is straight up wrong. If you're janist, it's even more strict. If you're a north america, killing people is part of your daily routine :)

It's not too hard to get the required vitamins and nutrients on a vegan diet if you keep everything balanced, and use supplements to help out.

Except that it's highly difficult to find vegan supplements. Most of them contain gelatin, which is an animal by-product, or the vitamins are obtained from animal by-products.

A lot of vitamins are made with fish oil.

^^This took 30 seconds to find on the internet, and that's because I have a slow connection. Fully vegan supplements can easily be found in any good health store. They're kinda expensive, but if you think ahead you can offset the balance with cheap and fresh vegetables from a farmer's market or a CSA.

edited 6th Feb '11 10:19:00 PM by Funnyguts

I personally have a knee-jerk dislike of vegans, but that really only applies to the militant or evangelical vegans. I kinda get sick of the "meat is murder" crowd because not everybody can be vegetarian, let alone vegan, and they refuse to take that into account.

It's all well and good if your religion forbids it, or if your personal moral code forbids it, or if you just don't like meat. I just hate it when someone starts thinking that their personal choices should affect my personal choices.

For those people, veganism is much more than a personal choice. For you, it's not a big deal. For them, it's like fighting for human rights. They refer to the oppressed ones as "non-human animals."

Imagine things from the vegan perspective: having total empathy with animal suffering. Google animal suffering and look at the images. Total empathy.

edited 6th Feb '11 10:31:19 PM by Grain

Yeah, that's the other thing that tends to drive me nuts about the militant vegans. A cow is not a human, and I personally find it a bit repulsive to worry more about animals when billions of humans are suffering across the globe. Being vegan is expensive. I would much rather see people send money to charities than waste it on overpriced food.

Also, as far as environmentalism goes, it's generally better for the environment (and by extension, animals) to eat locally grown foods, and to eat what's in season. Same goes for choosing clothing made of animal products and other natural fibers over the oil industry by-product that is polyester.

Some animal rights activists are anti-speciesists, which means that humans aren't intrinsically superior to other species. From an anti-speciesist point of view, the most important issue would be to stop the most suffering possible. There are already charities to help needy humans, but literally nobody is trying to end the massive (and it really is massive) institution of animal suffering except them.

It may also be more important to stop animal suffering because humans benefit from animal cruelty, so they would be guilty hypocrites if they did nothing. In contrast, few people really want humans to suffer.

That said, not all animal rights activists are anti-speciesists.

edited 6th Feb '11 10:48:40 PM by Grain

^^Few vegans care only for animals, and assuming that we don't do other things as well when possible (such as not eating locally) is unfair. And if your vegan food is primarily fresh fruits, vegetables, and grains then it can be cheaper than an omni diet.

edited 6th Feb '11 10:48:17 PM by Funnyguts

@Grain: Yeah, that's where I disagree. I simply cannot wrap my head around the concept that it's more important to save two rabbits than one human, because two lives saved is better than one.

It completely boggles my mind.

@Funnyguts: It's impossible to be a healthy vegan in most parts of the world without relying on imported foods and vitamins. Importing products means that you're contributing to pollution and the oil industry's rape of the environment.

edited 6th Feb '11 10:52:32 PM by DrunkGirlfriend

A person could support animal rights while giving more money to human charities than the average person.

The vast majority of food, at least in the US, travels an average of 1,500 miles to get to its destination. We're already importing everything. And there are definitely places in the world where it's harder, but that doesn't mean that the only possibilities are "eat meat" or "pollute".

@Grain: Yes, but I still find it ridiculous that anybody would donate money to PETA instead of, say, Doctors Without Borders.

 ^*

@Funnyguts: That's because the average person doesn't eat local. I make a solid effort to buy local meats and vegetables. I try to buy items that are manufactured in America. I try to buy clothing made entirely of natural fibers. I eat vegetables that are in season when possible, and in the winter that drops down to almost nothing.

I'm not ashamed to say that I own a leather jacket with fleece lining, because to buy something of similar warmth and function, I would have to buy synthetic. Something made of leather or fur will degrade in a landfill, something made of synthetic fabric will not.

edited 6th Feb '11 11:09:32 PM by DrunkGirlfriend

What about Vets Without Borders? A compromise!

PETA is terrible in almost all aspects and should be avoided. I don't know much about VWB, though.

(I'm unfortunately not in a position to donate money to anyone or anything right now due to lack of job. Hopefully soon.)

Veganism is in theory quite laudable as an attempt to minimise animal suffering but it smells of lost effort; if you care about animal rights simply doing the easy choices (no meat, avoiding animal products with cheap and not too inconvenient alternatives) and saving some money and time to helping the cause of animal welfare instead of doing everything you can to avoid everything that involves animal use in some way is much more efficient in actually helping animals. But the cause of animal rights itself has some feeling of lost effort as well since the money and time could be used to help those humans whose lives aren't better than factory farmed animals'. It's certainly better than doing nothing but when it begins to take more than trivial amounts of time and money it is inefficient in making the world a better place.

If you want to feel warm and fuzzy, absolute veganism might do a good job but if you want to actually help animals and/or humans, it's better to let some small details slide and look at the big picture, where you can do the most good with the least investment.

There's really no such thing as absolute veganism. Most vegans aren't trying to literally abstain from every product that relates to animal suffering.

edited 7th Feb '11 3:51:32 AM by Grain

Some animal rights activists are anti-speciesists, which means that humans aren't intrinsically superior to other species.

Oh God equality.