(no subject)
wowzers.
http://community.livejournal.com/veganism/1087914.html?nc=111
someone wrote the following to me; i should've included the information i put in the responses in the original post.
get out of this community if you want help not being vegan. why dont you try asking for hep being vegan in a foreign country before decisiong to throw away 6 years. everything youve stood for and worked so hard for 6 years is going to be crap now, everyone will cal you a hypocrite and if you ever go back to vegan people wi just augh at you "sure just another phase". read vegan freak it might help you.
my response:
i feel it would be a serious affront to the indigenous people who have opened up their homes to me and have lived the same way, raising and slaughtering their own animals, for thousands of years, if i said, "oh, thanks for opening up your culture to me, but i think i'll only take from it what i feel comfortable with, because i am much more enlightened than you about the treatment of animals." i am not throwing away six years--is the value of veganism only in being a purist? in being able to call yourself a vegan, rather than the animals you've prevented from being eaten? veganism is not about me, it's about animals, so your telling me that i'm throwing away six years because there will be four months of my life when i'm not a vegan is absolutely ridiculous. as far as being called a hypocrite and people laughing at me, a) i don't hang out with people who would do such things--my friends are a little more sensitive and broader-thinking than that, and b) why should i care who's laughing at me? again, these decisions are not being made for me or them.
their response:
well dear im sure as much as you are eager to learn about their culture they are eager to learn about yours. i know this for a fact, my bro in law spent years in mexico and they were eager and happy to eat american food and learn about our culture. obviously your not going to go there and act like paris hilton and scream about slaughtering a chicken but its not impolite to say no thank you to actually eating it.
veganism is about saving the animals and doing the best you can and thats not what your doing, a true vegan does not eat animals for 4 months because your in a foreign country.
you should care who is laughing at you because you will not be taken seriously as a vegan because you wil not be them. when i see peope sitting in jail for the things theyve done to help animals and see someone like you it makes me really sad and this is why veganism isnt spreading as much as it could. meat and dairy are like sides in mexico not main ingredients, you can easiy eat raw or vegan and be poor and grow all of your own stuff, its not like raising your own animals is the easiest (or cheapest) way to feed the family. mexico could thrive as a vegan country with so much land to grow on.
i just urge you to really think about this decision, im not trying to insult you, i would just hate for you to kick yourself forever for four months of a "cultural experience" i would feel guilty for life.
my response:
i guess i should've made more clear what i'm doing in mexico. i'm going to be living with indigenous campesinos--people who have lived a certain way for thousands of years. and i can tell you without a doubt that they are not at all interested in me bringing them american culture. american and european culture have been being shoved down their throat for the last 500 years--and only recently did it not become fashionable for it to be done with the barrel of a gun (although that certainly happens as well). these are the people who took up arms on january 1, 1994, the day NAFTA was signed, because they knew it was going to be a death sentence for them if they continued to allow themselves to be at the mercy of this "american culture." these are the people who, because of the extravagant lifestyle that is american culture and the increasingly americanized character of life for middle class mexicans, the poorest people in the country, live in the worst conditions in all of mexico despite living in one of the most resource rich areas. for me to come to mexico and say, "here, experience some of MY culture" is laughable, because my culture has been pushed on them since columbus landed on this continent.
as for the true vegan comment, i have no qualms with whatever you or anybody else wishes to label me as. like i said, i don't eat this way so i can affix the label to myself. and why are you worried about my eating humanely raised animals for four months out of the probably ninety years of my life that i'm going to be a vegan? why don't you put your energy more towards trying to convince people who will eat meat every day for the rest of their lives, rather than worrying about my purity?
like i said, i have thought about this decision, and i've come to the realization that some things are bigger than ideological purity and veganism itself. i'm not going to feel guilty for life, because that would insinuate that the way these indigenous people have lived for thousands of years is backwards and incorrect, which is a completely ethnocentric viewpoint.
http://community.livejournal.com/veganism/1087914.html?nc=111
someone wrote the following to me; i should've included the information i put in the responses in the original post.
get out of this community if you want help not being vegan. why dont you try asking for hep being vegan in a foreign country before decisiong to throw away 6 years. everything youve stood for and worked so hard for 6 years is going to be crap now, everyone will cal you a hypocrite and if you ever go back to vegan people wi just augh at you "sure just another phase". read vegan freak it might help you.
my response:
i feel it would be a serious affront to the indigenous people who have opened up their homes to me and have lived the same way, raising and slaughtering their own animals, for thousands of years, if i said, "oh, thanks for opening up your culture to me, but i think i'll only take from it what i feel comfortable with, because i am much more enlightened than you about the treatment of animals." i am not throwing away six years--is the value of veganism only in being a purist? in being able to call yourself a vegan, rather than the animals you've prevented from being eaten? veganism is not about me, it's about animals, so your telling me that i'm throwing away six years because there will be four months of my life when i'm not a vegan is absolutely ridiculous. as far as being called a hypocrite and people laughing at me, a) i don't hang out with people who would do such things--my friends are a little more sensitive and broader-thinking than that, and b) why should i care who's laughing at me? again, these decisions are not being made for me or them.
their response:
well dear im sure as much as you are eager to learn about their culture they are eager to learn about yours. i know this for a fact, my bro in law spent years in mexico and they were eager and happy to eat american food and learn about our culture. obviously your not going to go there and act like paris hilton and scream about slaughtering a chicken but its not impolite to say no thank you to actually eating it.
veganism is about saving the animals and doing the best you can and thats not what your doing, a true vegan does not eat animals for 4 months because your in a foreign country.
you should care who is laughing at you because you will not be taken seriously as a vegan because you wil not be them. when i see peope sitting in jail for the things theyve done to help animals and see someone like you it makes me really sad and this is why veganism isnt spreading as much as it could. meat and dairy are like sides in mexico not main ingredients, you can easiy eat raw or vegan and be poor and grow all of your own stuff, its not like raising your own animals is the easiest (or cheapest) way to feed the family. mexico could thrive as a vegan country with so much land to grow on.
i just urge you to really think about this decision, im not trying to insult you, i would just hate for you to kick yourself forever for four months of a "cultural experience" i would feel guilty for life.
my response:
i guess i should've made more clear what i'm doing in mexico. i'm going to be living with indigenous campesinos--people who have lived a certain way for thousands of years. and i can tell you without a doubt that they are not at all interested in me bringing them american culture. american and european culture have been being shoved down their throat for the last 500 years--and only recently did it not become fashionable for it to be done with the barrel of a gun (although that certainly happens as well). these are the people who took up arms on january 1, 1994, the day NAFTA was signed, because they knew it was going to be a death sentence for them if they continued to allow themselves to be at the mercy of this "american culture." these are the people who, because of the extravagant lifestyle that is american culture and the increasingly americanized character of life for middle class mexicans, the poorest people in the country, live in the worst conditions in all of mexico despite living in one of the most resource rich areas. for me to come to mexico and say, "here, experience some of MY culture" is laughable, because my culture has been pushed on them since columbus landed on this continent.
as for the true vegan comment, i have no qualms with whatever you or anybody else wishes to label me as. like i said, i don't eat this way so i can affix the label to myself. and why are you worried about my eating humanely raised animals for four months out of the probably ninety years of my life that i'm going to be a vegan? why don't you put your energy more towards trying to convince people who will eat meat every day for the rest of their lives, rather than worrying about my purity?
like i said, i have thought about this decision, and i've come to the realization that some things are bigger than ideological purity and veganism itself. i'm not going to feel guilty for life, because that would insinuate that the way these indigenous people have lived for thousands of years is backwards and incorrect, which is a completely ethnocentric viewpoint.