Privilege even in veganism

[hayi]

Recently, I was re-subjected on Hathor to a popular but not universal vegan position: that the only reasons anyone eats meat are tradition and pleasure. That no one eats meat because they must. We can just eat rice, beans and grains in lieu of meat.
That assertion is rolling in privilege. Specifically, the privilege of not having a health

Comments

[randomneses]

I wonder if there will be wank...should I even wonder?

[fishphile]

XD *wonders too*

[popehippo]

I wonder if there will be wank...

Fix'd.

[alouds]

i for one eat meat but i really hope others do not think any less or more of me because i choose to do so

i just don't get why vegans, vegitarians, or meat eaters can't all just get along and stop acting like one is better than the other

at the end of the day we're all human and no matter what we eat it isn't going to change who we are as people

[riotlounge]

They are not going to get along if one side of the debate feels the other is committing heinous acts. I don't personally feel this way, but it is the same way a lot of these debates go. It's hard to reconcile with someone doing something you feel personally criminal. Or unethical.

[alouds]

i understand all of that- i was talking about the pretentious vegans/vegitarians who automatically give you the sideye if you don't live that lifestyle...it's horrible

[lvsinsanity]

It's not even just the privilege of the meat thing. It's also classist, around here attempting to have even a vegetarian diet is freaking expensive!

[pocochina]

So true! I feel like a lot of it is geographical, as well. I'm a city dweller, so 99% giving up meat* is more a budgetary decision than anything for me and a lot of folks I know, but OH MY GOD, THAT IS NOT TRUE EVERYWHERE, and it's really shitty to assume it is. Normally I think the stuff about "urban elites" is way the hell overblown (lol I wish I were elite), but sometimes, not so much.

*I am lucky to get chicken twice a month, but for whatever reason my body won't let me give it up entirely. And obsessing about food and being hungry for days at a time is NOT A GOOD IDEA.

[galhea]

In my area (95% white suburbia) it's not nearly so expensive to get prepared food with meat in it as it is to buy the meat separately. There are a lot of microwave meals, for instance, that cost about $10 for 3 family-size packs that can feed me for a few days, versus buying fresh meat (and veggies) that can cost around $30+ to feed me for the same amount of time, depending on what I pick.

And related to that, I got kind of annoyed when my town began this huge drive for "healthy" food and even made it mandatory in the schools, because it completely ignored the fact that quite a few families can't afford fresh fruit and veggies. Instead of making healthier food less expensive they just banned the unhealthy stuff completely, which really doesn't help, and it's so very privileged even if I didn't expect anything better from middle-to-upper-class mostly-white suburbia.

[lightningxsnow]

Thank you so much for linking to that! I was thinking about the ketogenic diet, which is used for otherwise uncontrollable epilepsy. It requires a really high fat-to-carbs ratio, so there is pretty much no way you can be vegetarian, let alone vegan.

I support animal rights and I don't eat any meat except for fish, but I see a lot of unchecked privilege in vegan/animal rights circles.

[102bb]

Maybe this is because I've never been too fond of vegetarianism, but I find it weird that people who have been instructed to eat meat are under any obligation to explain their meat eating, as if it's unnatural, unusual, or immoral.

Anyway, a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle is definitely a white, upper-class, Western privilege, so idc too much about supporting it, defending it, understanding it, etc.

[nothingbutgold]

this strikes me as a really really inappropriate way to use breeze's work