Strange paradox. Related to Faux Meat Fast Food: Vegans and Vegetarians, it’s not about you. Whenever a new meatless, vegan or vegetarian product becomes available, the question to ask (if you’re interested in helping animals), isn’t … “Will this be suitable for vegans or vegetarians?”
Nope.
Think about it. For the sake of animals, WHO CARES IF THEY EAT THIS, right? They’re not contributing to demand for meat, no matter what.
The question to ask is “Will this be attractive to meat eaters?”
That is, how will it compare to the traditional meat options (price, nutrition and taste-wise)? Will it be good enough so that meat eaters will choose this instead?
The paradox I see is that regular meat eaters are the ones who have the power to make a difference for animals, with their food choices. Not vegans and vegetarians!
Billions of chickens and fish are killed every year because of the demand driven by regular meat eaters in the USA alone, imagine for the whole world. However, once you dramatically reduce your consumption of chicken meat and/or begin following other reducetarian / vegan / vegetarian strategies, you’ve already jumped off the hamster wheel!
That being said … those of us who have already jumped off the hamster wheel, we can still make a positive difference! We can offer tools and tips, encouragement for choosing more animal-friendly alternatives, while BEING STRAIGHT WITH PEOPLE. That means being candid about the pros and cons … no one likes being lied to! This can help people feel confident about trying some things and seeing what they can do!
Even if all the people on the hamster wheel SLOW THINGS DOWN (versus, jumping completely off the hamster wheel), it will still make a big difference. For example, if demand for chicken meat were to decline by 90%, it could save 100 billion chickens per year, every year, from suffering a cruel fate! That’s something we can all get behind.
Best part of all: Not even one person in the world would need to be vegan or vegetarian to make it happen! 💓
This goes out to all the Vegans and Vegetarians who like to complain that faux meat options on the menu are not suitable for them because of contact with animal fat from the frying oil. For the sake of being your friend and wanting to help you get food that you like, we care. 💓. Of course, we do! However, for the sake of animals (which is supposedly the reason for why some of these people are vegan or vegetarian), we don’t care. Of course we don’t.
When a fast food restaurant rolls out a new fake meat option, if our interest is in helping animals, then it’s not about whether vegans and vegetarians will eat it. And that’s why, if you are a complaining that you personally will never eat the faux meat from a fast food restaurant because you think the fast food corpora is evil or because they are frying it in the same oil with animal foods, you will see some people telling you kindly to shut the F up. Bottom line: Vegans and Vegetarians, it’s 100% not about you.
This was adapted from my January 9, 2022, post in Let’s Go Vegan-ish. This was in response to comments from vegans and vegetarians about KFC Beyond Meat nuggets.
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