I escaped the Reddit regime a little while ago. I consider myself a marxist-leninist-MZT. Vegetarian and vegan for a few years. I've a lot of thoughts on how marxism and veganism are connected. Never wrote them down. I'd like to start smth like a club for marxist vegans to develop our own proletarian theory. Most vegan theory I found is either openly bourgeois (Francione is a literal TERF) or revisionist (anti-China, anarchist, libertarian). How about fixing this?
I'm sorry if I have different opinions, I get the vegetarian part, simply not eating meat, some people I knew were vegetarian, but completely vegan? Not eating eggs, drinking milk etc? How does that work I don't see how is that even possible? But I (and a lot of people I know) simply cannot live without meat.
Well I do a lot of physical labor, so during a work day I eat: a bowl of oatmeal, two veggie wraps with a soy+pea protein shake, a large bowl of fried beans and rice, and then a second soy+pea protein shake before bed. No milk or eggs required.
cannot live without meat? how so?
Idk I'm simply omnivore I guess. My body genuinely misses something if I go without it or fish for extended periods of time. A lot of people I know can't.
cravings won't kill you. you're conflating a desire and a need.
I mean, we're apes, so we're definitely natural omnivores without a doubt, I guess that explains it.
Omnivore means you can eat meat, it does not mean you need to eat meat.
Well guess what I prefer it and dislike most plant based stuff except few fruits and vegetables.
this is genuinely what toddlers sound like. "i don't like broccoli, i want chicken nuggets!"
Yeah I hate broccoli, but this'll shock you, I never eat chicken nuggets either, I love it classically cooked/roasted, particularly wings and legs. But just because I love potatoes, watermelon, oranges, grapes and peach doesn't mean that I love every single plant and that my diet has to consist exclusively on it.
It could go the other way: ''I want to eat only plants and force it upon others just because I dislike meat and can't comprehend the fact that human beings are omnivorous and ate meat since we came to existence''.
I'd recommend you to explain this stuff to a Polar or Grizzly Bear... Actually don't, bad idea, try it with Raccoons and Crows instead for starters and see how it goes.
o...kay? but that still doesn't make it a requirement for you or anyone else. it's just something you like. you can live without it just like every vegan does.
i'm not forcing you at gunpoint obviously, just pointing out that your reasoning is completely silly
It's not that, it's natural for humans, we're omnivores by nature, being vegan is a choice yes.
yes, as is choosing to kill living beings in order to eat their flesh. you are making a willing choice to contribute to more suffering in the world.
Plants are also living beings, your point is...
What did your ancestors do? Did they eat grass all the time or did they hunt Mammoths and Deer? I never: poached, killed endangered species, tortured innocent animals, wasted food, encourage slaughterhouses or hunt species on the brink of extinction. So no.
You wouldn't mentally survive 2 days in the Balkans I swear to Christ.
Actually, we might be opportunistic omnivores. Animals that we might otherwise think of as herbivores, like deer and rabbits, will occasionally eat meat when they crave it and when a scavenging opportunity presents itself.
Yeah even some herbivores take some meat from time to time, even Elephants did it.
so it isn't a need, it's a craving. you "can't live without meat" the same way a lib "can't live without Hogwarts Legacy".
also, apes are mostly frigivores and dont eat meat. biologically speaking we are also frugivores. what kind of omnivore needs to cook, cut, and season the meat before eating it, and then still have stomach and heart issues afterwards? we aren't biologically designed to chew nor consume meat. if we were, we'd be able to pick meat right off the bone of a dead animal and eat it then and there, and not have any kind of issues about eating raw meat or too much cholesterol.
This is literally bullshit comparison and I'm not even going to waste my time explaining why.
Baboons, Orangutans and Chimps absolutely eat meat and fish. Also Grizzly who is an omnivore but eats fish and hunts deer and moose all the time. We can't eat grass, bamboo and leaves from trees either so what's your point? We are biological omnivores and meat(if not animal meat, then fish) has many proteins and calories. So yeah you can't force me like my father's side of gosh darn conservative and religious family(even they ate fish) because I don't actually and never liked plants except some fruits and few vegetables like potato at all.
I mean, just like a substance or sugar withdrawal.
But it's not same, substance is mostly damaging, meat is healthy and I love it while I dislike most of plant based food except fruits and some vegetables.
I don't think it's particularly healthy to think of the life of your fellow animal as disposable simply for the sake of your own pleasure.
I don't see other apes or Grizzly for that matter thinking about fish while they're eating it.
I feel for apes, canines, reptiles and of course endangered species, obviously no one should touch them. But we simply eat livestock and fish and did since prehistory, it's normal.
Are you really going to turn to Travis the chimpanzee for your moral compass?
That one was on drugs. My moral compass would be bear, don't try to present me like an Orca or Mantis in terms of it.
Someone has to kill and prepare your meat, though, and it's mentally and physically unhealthy. Don't forget the worker.
There are people who's job it or live at village and do it frequently without any problems. I'm from Balkans, here is weird if you don't eat meat(or at least fish), it's completely normal to us.
Based on the mental illnesses that are associated with slaughter work, I don't believe they do it "without any problems". They are able to cope with the harm they're doing to themselves, but fundamentally we all empathize with animals and it hurts to hurt them.
I've killed animals. I fucking hate it and I won't do it again if I can help it. It hurts.
Don't do it if you hate it. But here in Balkans it's completely normal for livestock and fish, including hunting, it's day to day life in village.
Don't get me wrong because we obviously hate poachers and there's always an uproar when innocent wild animals are harmed or endangered, but eating livestock is normal, people get weirded out when you don't.
Those are plastic things, you can change them like any habit. The discipline we must acquire to organize effectively is already more difficult than just not eating animal products. It is even a passive act! For me there was no real difficulty whatsoever, just a period where I learned new recipes and my palate adapted.
It is also something where if you don't see value in changing the habit, you will focus on reasons to not do it. This is normal. But if you were vegan, which is an ethical orientation towards animals, you'd be more motivated to find a way to make it happen.
Bruh where did you get idea I want to change anything in the first place? This isn't a sweets and chocolate situation you have to choose to stop when you're getting to fat, this is natural and completely normal diet of human beings.
I'm not a herbivore.
I implied that you didn't and that this was why you were focusing on barriers. If you had a vegan ethical stance you would be able to find a way.
I'm not following your logic. But appealing to normative or historical practice is not enough on its own and is, for example, how reactionaries justify themselves.
I am and it was easy.
Guess what I don't, because I'm an omnivore and I don't want to change natural food chain just because 1% tells me to do so. That's the first mistake of vegans, thinking that every human WANTS to change natural diet and become like them oh so much but they just can't because they're ''addicted'' to natural food like it's a heroin or cigarette.
Because reactionary ideologies who harm and kill millions of people is the same as eating fucking chicken and drinking milk, give me a break.
That doesn't change the fact that humans are natural omnivores, that's just your personal choice of diet and you're acting like you got off drugs or became sober for that. And also doesn't change the fact that that plants are also living things which you eat and further damage ecosystem.
I've just been reading your responses and I think one point you might want to be careful with is "Human Nature" as if it's a fixed static thing. Humans are capable of all manner of things in our natural form, but that does not automatically mean that those things are inherently good, healthy, or moral. According to just basic natural ability, and simple evolutionary strategy, every man should go around impregnating as many women as possible in order to propagate his DNA to the next generation. This was what our ancestors used to do, and it's what many animals do in nature all the time, which is completely biologically feasible. However, as humans we are uniquely capable of rational thought, and we have the ability to rise above simple animal behavior, which is why the average person won't go around killing each other's children and taking each others mates. It's an extreme example but I was hoping to maybe give you some idea of how the "Nature" talking point can be twisted to justify things that any normal person would see as absurd.
Because being a natural omnivore is exactly the same as mass murder, cannibalism andremoved obviously...
You don't what? I don't understand what you are saying.
I actually said you did not want to twice already. Very first thing I said, I think...
Though nothing in modern diets under capitalism is particularly "natural". All of our foods are technologically developed, including basically all of our crops over thousanda of years, mostly through artificial selection and hybridization.
Hmm, did I say that?
Hmm, did I say that?
I would be happy to discuss the science of trophic levels, human behavior, and diets if you are interested. Calling a modern diet under capitalism "natural" doea not really make sense, though.
I am? How so?
Everyone knows plants live, this ia not news to any vegan and it is not inconsistent to eat them. Animal agriculture is far more negatively impactful on the environment.
I don't have any stance in the first place, that's what I meant, I'm just eating like 99% humans at any point at history.
Bruh I don't eat diets ''under capitalistic companies'', don't eat fast food and the like, I eat food brought fresh straight from the village.
You're acting like you accomplished some huge goal worth of every praise like getting sober or stopping using drugs or lost a lot of weight, when all you did is literally just change diet and try to force other people into it.
A chicken raised by grandparents on yard in village is more environmentally friendly food source than a plants imported from across the country or from abroad.
You're actually not, though! Historically, humans were hunter gatherers with a diet fairly different from yours, I would bet. Think about what you would be eating if you needed to forage between the Euphrates and Tigris some handful of thousands of years ago before widespread agriculture. And then consider that humans were out there doing human things for hundreds of thousands of years before that. They weren't eating storebought nitrogenated steaks from generations-bred, cornfed cows! Domesticated cattle did not even exist. There were Aurochs.
That is not a quote of anything I said. I'm saying that we live in capitalist societies with industrialized agriculture and our foods have been highly modified by humans. How do you define a natural diet? Does it include twinkies? Sweet corn? Winter Wheat? What does it really mean to call a diet natural or not?
Actually, I said it was easy for me. That is the opposite of what you are saying I said.
How am I trying to force other people into it?
That depends on how it is fed. If you ever provide it with feed, this statement is probably false. And the vast, vast majority of chickens are given feed.
Is every chicken you eat a backyard chicken not prpvided with feed?
I do, we just don't have to hunt for a long time now that we have livestock, I'm eating as 99% of humans in a sense that I'm a omnivore, which is natural for human beings and other apes.
Natural as in I don't eat junk from McDonalds and other capitalistic companies, I eat stuff brought straight from the villages.
You literally are(you are currently doing it) by going and moralizing, guilt tripping and annoying about this stuff, go and attack companies, poachers, animal traders and people who endanger near extinct species if you want to do something truly noble and leave normal people alone.
Guess what, it isn't, they don't provide it with it. Most are explicitly against it.
The biggest problem is overcoming societal pressure. The second biggest is the period when you have to relearn what to eat
The point is there is no pressure, plus I'm introvert, quite the opposite since the stupid father's side of family tried to force us to feast when we were kids. It's simply natural need. But I wouldn't want to change my diet in the first place unless I get too fat which thankfully never happened as I'm quite skinny at 60kg.
It's not trivial, but lots of people do it. There are substitutes if you really miss like cheese, but there's also a whole fucking world of delicious vegan cuisine. Indian is a good place to start. It can seem scary to give up a bedrock sort of comfort like a kind of food you eat, but it can actually be kind of freeing to realize that you don't actually need it. I'm not vegan, but I started to not eat meat during Lent a couple years ago and it was a pretty revealing experience. I recommend it to people.