The Vegan Diet: "A Hideous Thought"

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By being inconsistent about what is and what isn’t important, we fog up our value system … of course! But life isn’t just about clarity. It’s about risks being taken, improvements being made, and testing ideas to see if they work, and then whether to follow them up.

Now, to be fair, ideas can sometimes fog things up too, and we get caught between Utter Absurdity and the Unrealism of Perfection. It seems logical that the starting line is somewhere in the middle, with something simple and achievable. The practical, common sense, down-to-earth way has to be clear. And efficient, but mainly locked onto one ‘parent’-principle. A principle we can prod and poke but can’t ignore, since it’s a universal principle. In the constant prodding and poking and questioning, we are surely looking for answers.

So, starting where starting lines start, it’s ethically logical that food’s a good place, a logical beginning (whilst knowing that it’s based on a bigger principle). Plant-based diet - to meat-eaters, the logic is impenetrable – “it’s seditious what you vegans are saying”. We make them feel nervous about us. “What are they on about?” Theirs is a mixture of annoyance and incomprehension, but on reflection it must, even to them, seem nonetheless, logically simple-albeit-uncomfortable.

A friend of mine, Mary (who died recently at ninety nine and three quarters) used to say she admired our vegan principles but the idea of our diet is a “hideous thought”. She’s not alone. So many people only know the food they know. They try to imagine what a vegan food regime must be like, and shudder.

A small side-track here: Going vegan means obstacles which need to be ironed out, if the logistics of food appears difficult, it is no longer difficult the further you go along, but it presupposes an interest. Somehow, vegans probably need to get (a bit) interested in food and kitchens and the practice of making meals. Tasty and healthy vegan food isn’t always easy to produce, 365 days a year. And there’s a time factor concerning food too. Vegans need to bring a lot of things ‘up’ from raw ingredients to make a meal. This means dinner takes half an hour instead of the usual short time needed to make a basic carnivore dinner. Yes, I’d say that adopting some sort of interest in the kitchen is a must for self-catering vegans. End of this side-track.

With far fewer years of ‘being fed’ by others, younger people are less afraid of experimenting with new food regimes. However, the big block is almost in-built. Every day of one’s life, there’s the relentless propaganda about animal foods. Many young people are torn. They know what’s going on. They are the most well-informed generation ever. But what they learn then can’t be unlearned.

One may not like the way things seem to be going. And if you’re over fifteen, you know enough (about what they do to farm animals) that you don’t want to hear any more. Further information will only confirm what you’re still be able to forget.