There’s some common joke about how to tell if someone’s a vegan, where they’ll just tell you first thing and then tell you to do the same right after. Or maybe that second thing first. In any case, that’s how people get blocked on the social things. The big thing here is people generally don’t want to be told how to eat, unless they’re devoted to a religion with dietary restrictions, or figuring out chopsticks, or are a baby learning about eating in general which even that comes with some difficulty, or other scenarios like that. Another relevant thing is people probably don’t want to be spammed with pictures of animal abuse, such as part of why I hardly watch broadcast TV because some channels seriously put on one of those “donate to this shelter or we’ll shoot this dog in the face” type sob stories every fucking commercial break. Either that or “donate to this hospital or we’ll pull the plug on this deathly ill human offspring”, or even “donate to this asshole who doesn’t even need any more money and also wants to deport anyone who’s not white and straight, or else the Communists will steal your wife”. Or all three even. The commercial breaks keep getting longer.
Despite all that, I’m in favor of the whole vegetarian and vegan thing, despite not being either, and people should feel free to do that if they want, and also discuss it with others, ideally not in a jerk-like manner like with any other subject really, but if the target is an even bigger asshole then feel free to tear them a new one at least for the catharsis factor. The big thing is making people want to do it. I swear it seems like the “usual” US nuclear family of 5-ish humans of various age eats a minimum of one cow’s worth of harvestable beef a week. I may be slightly off on that figure, and a family may be well beyond convincing if that’s somehow an underestimate. Meanwhile my usual week might be once or twice at most, and not even with any beef, and also including fish as an option. Significantly less often than the “usual” and probably less often than the actual average. I even go weeks without without really realizing. And given my experience with trying out modern meat substitutes on occasion, I feel like I could likely succeed at going vegetarian if I decided to commit, mainly running into potential difficulties at certain restaurants without close enough alternatives that I might end up at during my travels. Or if a place has really good fried chicken for instance, such as many places in Japan.
Vegan, on the other hand, would be far more difficult for me, mainly due to the whole dairy thing. Key things like ice cream, cheese, yogurt, and milk itself. While there’s been massive progress on the fake realistic meat front, probably helped by how processed the actual thing ends up in a lot of cases, I still have some hangups about dairy substitutes, but part of that is not having tried a lot of the latest things, partly due to the other part of it often being expensive, so I have to be in a certain mood to try things I’m concerned I may be disappointed in. And while I don’t intend to go vegan at the moment, I’m more just wondering how well the alternatives are going in case I do want to move more toward less animal products, or mitigate the potential impact of ending up lactose intolerant, however that happens.
One thing I have tried is alternatives to ice cream. It turns out there’s some great ones, depending on how much someone minds a slight nutty or even coconutty aftertaste, which fortunately I do enjoy those flavors. So they figured that out, to the point where I might deliberately pick it over a usual cream one depending on my mood and what flavors they have. I’m less convinced about yogurt though, since the ones I’ve tried so far were a bit off in flavor or texture. There’s also the whole probiotic side to those as well that needs to be kept for the whole benefits of that, whatever they are. I’ve been a bit particular about yogurt since the increase of the Greek style in popularity, which on its own seems overly thick and chalky to me compared to whatever the other stuff is.
As far as cheese and milk itself, I don’t really have much experience with those substitutes, but I should get to it sooner than later. I have had things that are “supposed to be like cheese” that are clearly not. For example there’s these yeast-based protein flakes as a topping or something that add more of an umami flavor than anything remotely cheese-like. But I’ve seen vegan cheese that looks like actual cheese. I just have to be able to find it when I’m in the mood for it, since I swear it gets lost either in the cheese and/or meat sections, or some remote section all on its own for the vegetarian and vegan crowd. As for milk, in terms of having it directly with food instead of being an ingredient in something, there’s how it is on its own, and how it is flavored, mixed in hot and cold drinks, and in cereal. It’d be a more in-depth sort of test. At least that’s usually easier to find, it tends to be near the regular milk. Plus I’m aware of the frequency it’s used in daily coffee orders, like with the stereotypical paragraph that has to be given from the usual business-type person to any barista that doesn’t recognize that particular person, so there’s definitely some precedent here.
For vegetarians and vegans overall, I think a great way to get people on board is to find good recipes and share those as an interest, including alternatives to things that usually contain meat or dairy, just to drive a better alternative picture further in the mind of people who might otherwise think that all of those diets that start with “V” only involve a few bland salads with a side of waving signs around at a local McDonald’s instead of a job. Again, because this is food, being antagonistic about it isn’t going to appeal to the selfish side of people that tends to go along with the hungry side. I’m thinking as an example, going about like, “here’s this kick-ass lasagna I figured out, also it’s vegan/vegetarian, and my non-veggie friends love it”. Just that when posting the actual recipe to a website, let people skip the novel that precedes it about how it came to them in a vision while they were traversing the mountains of some unpronounceable place in the days of yore in search of an ancient treasure, et cetera.
I’m also not saying this approach will work for all activism, but food is a particular thing and ideally a good method to make friends over, not eat them. If someone keeps saying to “go vegan” to everyone, and if someone else asks “why”, they should be able to explain why and how without things going horribly wrong and potentially resulting in cannibalism, which is very much not vegan or vegetarian. And for anyone who wants to reach out to me specifically about this sort of thing, keep what I’ve said in mind. I have my methods I’m working through and I’ll decide if I’m crossing any thresholds, I’m just open to good food ideas in general.
I guess back on the animal welfare thing to wrap up, for anyone looking for a pet, I’d check the shelters first. Plenty of pre-owned makes and models who are just as or potentially even more adorable than the new ones straight from the factory, for low prices they’re practically giving them away because they’ve got an overflow of stock, and they even come pre-fixed and pre-vaccinated usually. Everything must go to a good home. Seriously, if I end up wandering a pet goods store that has some guest cats from the shelter on display, it takes some willpower for me to not be all “I want all these cats right now”. It’s unfortunately not practical for me at the moment. Or for a lot of folks. Adopt responsibly.