Articles

Is Veganism A Luxury Of The Privileged?

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Is ‘going vegan’ really easy to do, or is it only a luxury of the priveledged?

The supposed ease of being able to adopt a vegan lifestyle is touted almost as the primary reason for doing it.

Yet, is it really easy to go vegan or is it only easy with privilege?

Take for example a few comments by a self proclaimed vegan identity. This individual gleefully boasts all over facebook about the abuse that they level at those who are still consuming animal products whilst out and about. Yet this person’s partner and pet weren’t ‘vegan’.

How easy is it really?

The truth of the matter is that unless you are a single person earning a relatively modest income, there is a good chance you may struggle with it.
I remember way back in the old days when I was vegan I drove trucks for a living, and one of the jobs that I had was working for a seafood company. I literally spent my day driving tonnes and tonnes of frozen seafood around to supermarkets, restaurants, etc.

After I left that role, I did general freight for a while, and one of the regular deliveries that I had was delivering kangaroo skins to the tanner in Brisbane.

Did those two roles mean that I was no longer vegan? I am sure that there are those who would say that I was betraying the cause and I should have just quit, though it wasn’t as easy as that. Whilst I would have loved to have done that, I still had the usual obligations to contend with.

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Animal Liberation Queensland Gives Up On Other Animals.

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Photo Credit: Rainer Hungershausen via Flickr cc
Photo Credit: Rainer Hungershausen via Flickr cc

If you aren’t a greyhound, don’t expect much help or a campaign out of the Queensland branch of the Animal Liberation franchise.

In what has to be the worst case of dropping the ‘animal rights’ ball that this author has ever seen, Animal Liberation Queensland seems to be single-mindedly focusing on feebly attempting to stop the proposed greyhound track at Underwood in Queensland’s Logan Shire.

Despite being having the words “Animal Liberation” in their name, and having as part of their objective “To abolish man’s attitude of speciesism towards animals”, the group has forsaken all others to get a bit of publicity around greyhounds.

This single campaign to them is that important that they passed on footage, anonymously given to them, to another organisation for them to use, rather than use it themselves.

Now whilst I think it is great that they are sharing footage with other organisations outside of the franchise, I personally think it was a wasted opportunity for them to promote veganism. Something that would have benefited ALL animals.

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Are Single Issue Campaigns Really That Bad?

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Of all the campaigns undertaken within the animal advocacy movement, the single issue campaign is the most common.

Supporters of this type of campaigning justify their continued use by saying things like at least we are doing something, every little bit helps, baby steps, and the old faithful one, the world won’t go vegan overnight.

Whilst there really isn’t anything to argue about when single focus groups launch these campaigns, they do leave a rather unpleasant taste in the mouth when they are promoted by so-called vegan or animal rights groups.

When these groups focus on a single cause as something that is more important than what other animals are enduring, they are literally elevating the status of those animals above all others.

Take for example some of the recent campaigns by local vegan and/or animal rights groups, and how their activities are likely to cause confusion among those who care about animals.

One moment they are protesting Lennon Bros Circus’ use of lions and exotic animals, yet so far I haven’t heard a mention of a protest, let alone media campaign about Hudsons Circus’ use of Macaws, Buffalo, Llamas, Zebras or horses in their shows. Though this could be because their focus is on greyhounds.

This implies that how the lions are kept and used is more important than Macaws, Buffalo, Llamas, Zebras or horses, with a few greyhounds being more important than all of them.

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Hate Speech And Vegan Activism

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James McWilliams wrote a piece on hate speech where he says the following.

But if anything here is clear it’s that language is all too easily used to forge sick cultures of hatred under the guise of normal. People who speak this way about sentient beings who, for all their power, lack the ability to fight narratives with counter-narratives (and thus have no truck in our big verbal mud sling), should have their right to use their words severely curtailed. Their hatred and insensitivity is that blatant. It has no place in civilized society.

Whilst he was referring to hunters and their use language to describe the violent acts they are committing on other animals, it could just as easily be used to describe the language some vegans use when talking about those who are not.

There seems to be an increasing number of people who resort to all sorts of obscenities when leaving comments on facebooks posts.

Somewhere along the path of our ‘awakening’ we seem to have conveniently forgotten that once upon a  time, we were exactly the same as the person who is now copping the brunt of our verbal assault.

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What Will You Actually Save Them From

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This past week I received two emails in particular that both upset and infuriated me at the same time.

The first one was an email from Animals Australia that was asking for donations. The email featured a picture of a bull that I believe is from their recent Gaza/Ban Live Export investigation.

Whilst I don’t really have any issue with Animals Australia asking for money via email, they are a business after all. The bit that infuriated me was the big bold caption that said “Because of you, we will save animals like him.”

Unfortunately for the animals, and regardless of how much money you give to Animals Australia, all they “may” be able to save other animals from, is being killed overseas.

What Animals Australia have conveniently forgotten to tell potential donors is that these animals are designated food animals, and will be killed regardless.

If it isn’t overseas, it will happen here.

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Two Quotes Relevant To Veganism

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Here are two interesting quotes that I came across the other day that I believe those involved in vegan education and animal rights should think about. The first one is by Seth Godin, and the second William Lloyd Garrison The bottomless pit of pleasing strangers You will never, ever run out of strangers. And so, the … Read more

When Foodies Fall

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One of the unfortunate thing about being vegan is that so many people think it is just about food, and very little else.

Making things worse are those who have been able to make some sort of living out of providing ‘food’ advice disguised as vegan education. Whilst I am not denying their ability to make money out of whatever they are able to, I just think it is insulting to non ‘food’ animals.

Because a majority of us have this weird obsession with food, these individuals quickly climb the social media ladder gathering a large defensive following who appoint them ‘vegan educators’.

Though what does it say about the movement, and veganism when these people trip, stumble, and then fall away from veganism completely?

Alex Jamieson made the bold move by publicly declaring that she was no longer vegan, with the ensuing feeding frenzy enamoring her more with her new market and further reinforcing the stereotype of vegans being extremists.

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