Veganism is forgettable

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Coming on heavy about the need to be vegan can work, but only with some. I think many more are put off, even put off for life, by that approach. In short, vegans who try to shame and blame waste their best chance to make an impact. We simply come across as being better-than-you. And if we blow it here, we also blow it for other activists. If we throw caution to the wind, if we’re willing to do anything, say anything, to make what we say unforgettable, that crude approach will be seen through. It makes us easily dismissible.

I suppose the truth is that out of convenience people try to make us as forgettable as possible. It’s the defence system used to keep us in reality, in the world of likelihood. It’s like going to see a highly emotional love story at the movies and then forgetting it as soon as we hit the street, when we plunge back into the real world where practicality and pragmatism are supreme. There is a part of the every-day-self which deals with being shocked, and we even enjoy being ‘wow’-ed. Surely we sometimes go to the movies for just that. We let ourselves be moved, shocked, inspired, carried away, but it isn’t meant to stick too securely. It’s just an ephemeral story and we forget the ‘universal message’ in it. On that same level most people regard the ideals associated with vegan principle.

People know that vegan diet is about food and animals, but beyond that their own un-interest stops them going further, to make changes to their present reality which they might regret later. We might look ahead and ask our self what it would be like to be vegan, but then not be able to see enough self discipline to maintain such a radical change. And on yet another level, especially if you’re older, you’ll concede that it’s “too late to change anyway”.