A Heartfelt Seasons Greetings from a Long Gone Comrade Who Sincerely Wishes You All Well

I get that it's probably easier now than ever to be vegan, now that more supermarkets offer vegan options and food is labelled, and I get that there are ways to do it cheaply, but surely it still takes a bit of skill learning where and what to buy and how to plan vegan meals? Its not a skill I have. I am not a good cook and it's hard enough trying to plan out meals vegan or not. I mostly rely upon ready meals as does my family and probably most other working class families that due to work don't have the time or energy to plan out vegetarian meals or even meat based meals everyday of the week. Aside from that I am a student living in student accommodation where there really isn't much space for storing veg and I got other things to worry about anyway, and other than that I am underweight and would like to build myself up more which would be considerably harder if I can only eat veg. I do feel guilty eating meat though, not really because I think its wrong, its more thinking about the large numbers of animals that need to be raised and slaughtered to continuously produce it.

Also also, happy new year everyone lol

That's one way of looking at it. But what if there is more than one positive claim, and more than one disbeliever? What's the score here..what's next?

We could try asking the animals whose lives are unending suffering from birth till death that. I think we can guess their answer.

Just imagine living every single minute of every single day of your entire life in fear and extreme pain. Oh, but veggies are boring so let's ignore that, eh?
Seriously, the justifications are so fucking ludicrous it's embarrassing. This should be a discussion about how the problem is tackled, as it would be with racism or sexism, not whether or not it's ok to do it. That is why I'm very strident when posting on this issue - it is not a matter of differing opinions. If I said that, for instance, the mistreatment of prison inmates is ok, I would rightly be told to fuck off. Well, as a principle, this is precisely similar. There is no discussion to be had and I maintain that if anyone can view Meet your Meat and think this shit is in any way, under any circumstances, is acceptable, then they seriously need to do some work on theirself.

Scallywag #32

I’ve tried modifying my diet, though being a vegan is for me well over the top. I enjoy the occasional ready meal though they are grossly over-priced and full of chemical crap. I am a lazy sod, though I do a bit of cooking.

It is very much cheaper cooking for yourself, all you need is one large pot and half a dozen simple recipes. A good winter vegetable soup will give you four meals, more nutrition and at considerably less cost than one ready-made meal. Having shared a flat I appreciate the problems this can engender – however the fact remains - basic cooking skills are life enhancing and ‘politically correct’.

Webby #34

I have never imagined myself as Dr. Dolittle!

Seriously, the arguments you use are valid, though by painting everyone who does not share your zeal as uncaring immoral individuals only discourages people to be reflective about their eating habits.

Cheaper and easier if you know how sure. I agree with what your saying though and yeah they are overpriced shit really plus they are probably doing wonders for my health, at the time being though I think it would be too much hassle trying to change my diet, although I'd like to eat more healthy, more variety also and eventually cut down on meat, but I'd probably still eat it on occasion and I don't think I could ever give up dairy foods.

I eat vegetables and fruit along with fish and birds. Thats it

I just can't buy this. Surely with something this serious you should take the time to educate yourself? There's not much to learn anyway.
As for vegan options - I rarely go anywhere near them. They're full of fat, salt and chemicals, taste like shit and cost a fortune.
Building weight is no problem either, vegan foods have more than enough protein. Nuts, seeds and pulses are Choc full of it. Even many fruits have a fair bit. Buy the right bread, eat brown rice and you'll be full to the back teeth with protein. It's all so simple.

Really can you not accept that this is something people have varying abilities to deal with and sure I can and eventually should learn, but at the time being really its the least to worry about. I mean its easier just to get ready meals, worry about how its affecting my health sure, but at least not have to worry about what I am going to eat, whereas cooking for myself adds a whole other layer of anxiety.

Also you totally don't understand how much hassle it can be for some families to cater for specific diets, my sister tried to be a vegetarian once and it honestly did stress my mum out trying to get her stuff she would eat and figure out how to cater for her. I mean yeah she shouldn't have been left to do that herself, but my family is patriarchal where my mother has the traditional domestic role as well as having to work, so it was a case of I help out as much as I can and eat whatever I get.

EDIT:

In any case this isn't an excuse for continuing the status quo of having a society where we eat a lot of meat, I agree that that needs to be reduced although disagree that eating meet is immoral and needs to be stopped entirely. Its really just your view that its easy for everyone to switch to vegetarianism/veganism, that I object to aside from biocentric notions of animals and humans being of equal worth or on par with humans.

I don't believe it's a straightforward matter of stridency of discussion styles, although there seems to be plenty of that to go around, for reasons that could be fruitfully examined if people weren't so afraid. It's pure narcissism to only concern yourself with your own opinions, endlessly attacking others for daring to pierce your bubble. The certainty in your own ideas or the ideas of some ideology that appeals to your emotional state and then the furious defense of the so-called facts proclaimed by that ideology as the truth are the tell-tale signs of an intense state of narcissism, with which it is impossible to have any constructive exchange. It's a shame that it's happened so quickly, and it's really boring.

Rationalisations are about the repression of awareness, including self-awareness. They're more powerful than fully conscious lies. From this perspective, one problem with doing things on a local level that is reminiscent of the Hobbesian liberal view of humans as barely tamed ravenous beasts, would be that you might be forced to face the destructive aspects of your own personality, that having been conditioned by capitalism, a part of you just doesn't give a shit or actively enjoys the idea or the spectacle of animal suffering, despite the rationalisations.

The priority is to get rid of capitalism, sure, but to me this involves destroying every layer of it everywhere, internally as well as externally, or if the time ever comes we will fail. Changing systems without changing people is the real bullshit we should address.

Auld Bod, I actually don't think persuading people is of any use at all. The evidence of how fucked this stuff is clear to see. People need to examine themselves and try to understand why they are so cold about it.

FV is absolutely right here. I need to look at why I'm unable to contain my fury and others need to address why they are so compelled to make flaccid excuses for their choices.
Partly, I'm so frustrated at the pitiful, half arsed arguments that always appear whenever this issue comes up, partly it's my disappointment that people that I generally have respect for are just so lame around this issue but mostly I'm upset that, despite accusations to the contrary, I have more empathy for my own species and see this revolting activity that we are collectively implicit in is harmful to our physical and spiritual wellbeing. As FV implies, a revolution without an internal revolution would not be a revolution at all. It would be a fucking disaster.

I might just remind people that contentious debate over this very issue is the reason UV left libcom the first time...

Anyway, Webby, what are your reasons for being a vegan - in the sense of is it political or moral or whatever?

Webby #41
‘Auld Bod, I actually don't think persuading people is of any use at all. The evidence of how fucked this stuff is clear to see. People need to examine themselves and try to understand why they are so cold about it.’

And my point is - you do not persuade people by moral grandstanding. If you are not trying to change people’s minds, what else are you doing? As FV stated:

‘The certainty in your own ideas or the ideas of some ideology that appeals to your emotional state and then the furious defense of the so-called facts proclaimed by that ideology as the truth are the tell-tale signs of an intense state of narcissism, with which it is impossible to have any constructive exchange.’

I feel this is spot on, remembering we ALL live in glass houses.

The simple answer is watch the Meet your Meat video. That's all you need. I feel I can only repeat myself here as it's pretty simple and I've said it many times;

No, it's not overtly political, within capitalism it will never be much more than a gesture, like 'ethical shopping'(lol), but that doesn't mean I have to be absolutely complicit any more than I would want to be complicit in sexism, racism, homophobia or any of the other abominations created, encouraged and utilised by capital's power relations tactics.

Is it moral? Well, I guess so but not just for morality's sake. I believe that this cruelty is detrimental to our culture, it marks our race out as cruel and barbaric and rightly so but isn't that what we anarchists are about, bringing an end to cruelty, exploitation and the violence that is used by capital to secure it's power? The wilful myopia of those that dismiss this as a topic even worthy of discussion demonstrate, as does the video, how deep in the mire of entitlement and misguided self interest our culture has become. To see what happens to food production livestock and say yeah, but veggies are boring, so I'm unwilling to consider changing or making a small amount of effort to educate myself is the result of desensitisation of the utmost power. This is so out of whack with revolutionary vision of how we could live as a species that the mind boggles. And it turns my stomach. I don't see that as me taking the moral high ground, it's a natural reaction to the cold ad callous stance being presented to me. If a vegan diet is boring(and it's not by the way) then that's just too fucking bad! Jimmy Saville found healthy consensual sex boring but that doesn't make it ok that he was a kiddy fiddling corpse fucker.
Almost all of the objections(excuses) have no grounds in reality. I respond to them and act like a dick out of frustration at how pitiful they are which is my defect that I would like to change about myself. I just don't know any other way of dealing with them other than derision because they are so flawed that they don't really warrant s serious response. Is this egotism on my part? I don't think so but I will no doubt be accused of it.
The idea RG proposed that it's alright for me coz I happen to like vegan food is typical of this - making daft assumptions to excuse yourself doesn't make you right. Before changing I ate meat and cheese every single day, it was rare to have a meal without animal produce in it. Fuck, I'd even start the day with a chunk of cheese if I didn't have time to prepare breakfast. Saying it's easy for me coz I have a few quid is equally laughable. There is nothing cheaper to eat in the UK than rice and potatoes. Don't like rice or potatoes? How about pasta, noodles, bread. I go to Tescos and get 8 apples for a quid, if I get to Aldi they're even cheaper. FFS, even in Waitrose you can buy a bag of penne that will generously feed six for a quid. Of course there's loads more cheap food but I'm not Jamie fucking Oliver, so I'm not gonna write a book on it, I'll just say one further thing; condiments.
Science gets bandied about on both sides, prehistoric man, teeth, hunter gatherers etc but I don't give a shit about that. The point is that we're at a stage in our history where the consumption of animal foods is totally unnecessary. So why the fuck would we do this shit other than for selfish reasons? It just doesn't stack up.

You're right, UV ditched Libcom coz she just couldn't stomach the attitudes on here. Libcom has lost a valued poster as a result. Maybe she should have stuck around and accepted it but this means a lot to her and causes her a great deal of pain. It is understandable that she has made the choice to ditch Libcom. Right now I feel like fucking it off too - I want to engage with real honest feeling people, not the dogmatic machines that many present as on here, at least when this topic arises.
UV's posts were put here in good faith, I speak to her every single day either by text or phone and know that she hasn't looked in on Libcom since she did the OP. Do we really want to create the sort of atmosphere that caused this? I realise that my style of posting often doesn't help but when presented with such hateful nonsense as has been seen on other threads and to a lesser degree here it's very hard to know how to react other than with belligerence.

So, does that explain my reasons???

That's a question I'm asking myself right now. It seems impossible to have a reasonable conversation about this and I'm well aware of my part in this. I think though, that 'moral grandstanding' is a little unfair and inaccurate. I guess it's kind of like this, I'll be going to Dover on the 30th to demonstrate my total revulsion at the views of the fascists and to show solidarity with the migrants and refugees that are the target of their hate. I dare say that like has happened on Libcom I will become abusive with those that I am so at odds with.

DP

Agreed, this was implicit. I was going to use 'we' instead of 'you' but that always sounds a little too close to a liberal primary school teacher talking down to infants and makes me throw up in my mouth a wee bit.

if the emphasis isn't on the person making the claim then there is no way to distinguish some shit someone just made up from things with masses of evidence behind them. trying to shift the burden of proof to the person disbelieve is popular with conspiracy theorists and related types for a reason

stop saying things a "full of chemicals" as a equivalent to "bad stuff" everything is made of chemicals.

no amount of cooking skill is every going to make cooking your own food easier than say just shoving a pizza in the oven

If there are two contradictory 'positive' positions, why don't they both require evidence? If a claim is denied, there is just as much 'onus' (what is this about?!) on the 'disbeliever'. So unless we're only interested in this weird, puerile point scoring, perhaps you might to like to provide some?

Ignore my previous post, you're clearly in this for the points

Righto.

this is particularity annoying, along with the idea that all animals are the same, a lot of what vegans claim depends on the assumption that bees and chickens and cows and humans all have the same basics experience of the world, which is so absurd.

The problem with duck and cover guerilla posting from a heavily defended position is that you're often too busy accumulating points and keeping score to hold all aspects of the plot in your mind:

#41

So was it too much like hard work to provide the evidence? What was your motivation in posting at all if that's the case?

vegan propergander is no solution to anything

excuse myself for what?
besides, you clearly have weird tasts in food

you cant live on carbohydrates alone, of cause you can live on beans and rice for a vary long time before you die of B12 deficiency. but is that kind of diet really worth living on?
food has two functions to provide nutrition and to be enjoyable.
you cant have low price and nutritious food and ease of preparation and good flavour and vegan, no one has denied that vegan food can be healthy or that i can be cheap, but to be all the necessary things is much easier with dishes that contain meat.

that was obvious when you spent pages defending someone promoting lies about nutrition last time.

you said

and jef costello

and i'm saying that if you believe this to be true then its up to you to proved the evidence because its vary difficult to prove a negative. i'm not sure what the purpose of your agument here is? do you genuinely believe that people should be able to assert any bullshit they want and then its up to other people to prove it wrong?

Sums up everything I hate about american liberal politics.

Didn't know this, but I do feel wrong for commenting on this thread when it was supposed to be a new years thread and when the general forum is supposed to be for light discussion anyway, so sorry if I've upset anyone.

Sorry also to Webby and others who have strong opinions over eating meat, I don't find it fundamentally wrong to eat meat, but I can respect those who do.

I really hope that no one is seriously considering leaving the forum.

[b]webby[/b]

You're comparing eating meat to child abuse? GET THE FUCK OUT, YOU STUPID, NASTY LITTLE MAN

Scallywag

It's crossed my mind a lot recently, due to the obnoxious behaviour which Webby seems to enjuy.

That....that was fucking amazing. I might just add that, at least in American terms, those ideas - certainly "specieism"- would be viewed as radical. The people in that video, assuming it's not just and amazing joke, would be far more likely to view themselves as anarchists than to vote for the Democratic Party, I'm afraid.

Webby, so your argument basically seems to be that the pain and suffering animals experience doesn't justify the enjoyment/nutrition that humans gain from eating them. That is a moral argument.

So, like this for example:

I think there're a lot of problems and assumptions just in this one sentence. One, the ability to cook and preserve meat played a huge role in the success of a humans as a species. I'm not sure something that enabled our species to thrive can be dismissed so quickly out of hand.

You could argue that it's the industrial/capitalist meat production is barbaric (and it is) but, again, I think that's a different from arguing that humans have some basic moral imperative to stop eating eat. I speak as a (lazy) vegetarian, but I don't think we as workers or consumers should be blamed for the production processes laid down by capital. Or, to put it another way, if - under capitalism or outside of it - we could reduce animal suffering to a bare minimum, would you still advocate a vegan diet?

Finally, I have trouble finding the slaughtering of animals (which has occurred throughout the entire history of humanity) analogous to the exploitation and violence of capital. Meat consumption occurs throughout the animal kingdom and there's no question that, biologically, humans are omnivorous. And exploitation, in the sense of the extraction of surplus value, doesn't occur when an animal is killed for food.

I might also point out that in post 45 you effectively compared meat eaters to fascists. That might be why charges of moral grandstanding are getting leveled, man...

Scallywag, Auld Bod and Factvalue - thanks for proper engagement whether I agree with you or not.

Fleur - I will treat your vile accusation with the absolute contempt that it deserves. Save your steel toecaps for some other poor bastard.

Chilli - how the fuck did you figure that one out??? I used the fascists as an example of people I don't expect to change but that I do want to be vocal against. That is hardly accusing people of being as bad as fascists for eating meat, is it. Come on mate, your smarter than that aren't you?

Radical Graffiti - hahahahahaha! Fucking hell, do your research before you start posting or you're gonna look like a right fucking numpty. Oops, too late!
Ah, the good old protein argument, what a load of old tosh. I am on a HIGH PROTEIN regime at the moment due to liver failure, under the supervision of an NHS dietician. It's a piece of piss.
B12. Ever heard of yeast extract or other derived products?
But here is the dumbest of all - I clearly have weird tastes in food! Of all the drivel I've seen posted on this topic by the likes of yourself, this tops the fucking lot. What does it even mean? So weird food includes bread, pasta, fruit, vegetables, soup, potatoes( you know, the things that the weirdest of all foods, fries and chips are made of). How about peanut butter or jam? My gran used to like jam, what a fucking freak she must have been! Oh, and of course takeaway food like chinese, noodles, curry, pizza. Weird shit dude.

I could dismantle your arguments(lol) and barely engage a braincell, so utterly devoid of any basis are they but that would be like shooting fish in a barrel, and as a liberal, lifestylist hippy I clearly would never do such a thing as kill da poor little fishy wishies would I?