Perhaps the simplest way to approach the complexity of veganism as a diet versus a discerning ethical choice can be answered in these three words: Couldn’t. Shouldn’t. Wouldn’t!
Here’s how:
One can empathise with people who are afflicted with serious food allergies: Who experience life-threatening reactions to otherwise potentially nourishing eats!
It stands to reason that these allergy suffers couldn’t eat certain foods that put them at risk of inflicting bodily trauma.
Then there are gluten intolerances and sensitivities, for instance, which can leave many feeling bloated and uncomfortable
So to feel optimal, suffers shouldn’t eat gluten.
As a vegan, what’s wearing thin is being asked, “Are you allowed to eat cow’s milk, eggs, fishes, chickens?”
Yes, we’re allowed to eat anything!
Yet we wouldn’t eat animals, or their secretions. And no, ethical vegans are not on a life long diet, but rather follow through on their beliefs of non-violence through their daily choices, which includes food selection!
Yet as much as we might emphasise that ethical vegans choose not to eat our fellow beings, we’re often met with a look of mistrust.
This is when we need to show compassion and perhaps even remember a time when we too thought it to be a diet of deprivation.
Society at large teaches, encourages and supports us into believing, trusting and placing our hope in diets.
Diets allow us to buy into an egocentric, quick fix remedy rather than to re-examine what our society at large teaches us is ‘normal, natural and necessary’.
As vegans our continuing exploration, re-thinking, un-learning, re-education can reward us by reclaiming a deeper, more healthful and environmentally sound way of nourishing our bodies. And save animals!
It’s that complex, and it’s that simple.
“As a vegan, what’s wearing thin is being asked, “Are you allowed to eat cow’s milk, eggs, fishes, chickens?””
I get told all the time, “Oh you can’t eat this”. To which I reply, “Yes I can. I simply chose not to, the same as there are foods you chose not to eat.”