Going vegan

943: 

If you get past all the obstacles and finally become vegan, the next hurdle is to try talking about it with people who don’t want you to.  One has to speak on the subject as if one loves omnivores-despite-everything. 

Maybe it isn’t our job to educate others directly,  not by persuasion anyway.  Maybe the vegan is merely living out their life as if enacting a play,  we are performing a lifestyle.  We’re on stage.  If there’s an audience then we should be prepared to give them something to watch.  If they like what our veganism does to us maybe they’ll start to consider it for themselves.  So,  our job might be to illustrate the self-benefit of being vegan (health, conscience, etc) and then head straight into the deeper principles,  on which veganism is based.

Certainly,  in our society,  there’s still a concern that becoming a vegan is something to be taken quite seriously. It’s no longer so much to do with health concerns.  Those have been disproved some time ago.  It’s the implications of such a socially-isolating way of life,  affecting many social situations.  A vegan is likely to feel the threat of loss of friends and acquaintances,  because we won’t participate in so many of the social gatherings that are centred on food.  It shows how serious we are,  even at such great cost,  that we still hold fast to our principles.

The trick for us is not to get depressed about it.  On the contrary,  what is acceptable to most people provides the essential contrast that helps solidify our own views.  There’s always going to be some edge for vegans,  at least until many more come on board.  But edge is useful,  it’s good for our creativity.

On a personal level vegans,  because we feel the differences of view so strongly,  we sit between the two uncomfortable emotions of outrage and intolerance of others.  We feel it and we can’t help but show it.  And if we feel it,  others will pick it up.  Alternatively,  if we seem at ease with ourselves,  they will pick that up instead.  For that reason alone we should keep our heads held high (but not too high!),  stop vilifying the ‘terrible omnivores’ for disagreeing with us,  and simply encourage them to talk with us.  Which is easier said than done,  but by keeping dialogue emphasised we give them no chance to see how vulnerable we might be feeling inside.

Maybe we can’t ignore our own discomfort (mainly over our failure to ‘communicate our message’),  but compared with those animals who’re imprisoned on farms,  our discomfort is nothing.  Our greatest challenge is to ignore the negatives and strengthen our support for the enslaved ones.