When it comes to vegan outreach, vegetarians must be the low-hanging
fruit. I think that for vegans - especially when you start out as a vegan - you become
interested in veganism, you decide you want to quit eating dairy & eggs, and need
to stop wearing leather and things like that - that becomes something that's
interesting to you. You wonder why the vegetarians in your life aren't also
vegan, and there have been a lot of great videos done on this people talking about
this issue but one video that really stood out to me when I first saw it
was Koi Fresco's video on the topic when he said that it is pointless
being vegetarian.
quite simply put the illusion that being a vegetarian by
doing these things is better than the environment is a complete falsification
and a outright lie.
And I think that that viewpoint is very common among vegans.
It is a very common viewpoint, and one that has become so common and ubiquitous that
it's kind of the way vegans approach this issue without even thinking about
it. So, if you're vegan already, you often talk with the vegetarians in your life
and if being vegetarian was totally pointless, your goal is to show your
vegetarian friends they're completely in the wrong. And so today, what I'm going to
be doing is I'm going to be talking about why I think that is a
mistake - why I think that we need to look at this in a bit more nuanced way, why we
need to approach this topic with a little bit more psychological nuance, and
really think about it in a different way. But first, if you enjoy this video please
be sure and give it a thumbs up, and also subscribe or like the ModVegan page on
Facebook so you don't miss another video.
One of the favorite tactics of vegans to take when they're approaching
vegetarians is to say, "what you're doing is worthless. You think you're doing the
right thing, but actually you couldn't be more wrong. Giving up meat is not enough,
you're actually doing worse maybe by eating milk and dairy and cheese and
eggs then you would be if you were still an omnivore."
And this is a really classic response, as I said before, it's really exemplified in
Koi Fresco's video about veganism and vegetarianism, and it's a problem. I think
that the way that we approach this - it may make sense to us - if you're a vegan
already it may make sense to you - but does it make sense to your audience.
You know, Maya Angelou once said that "people will forget what you say, people
will forget what you do, but they will never forget how you made them feel."
And when vegans tell vegetarians that what they're doing is worthless,
vegetarians are going to remember that they felt like vegans did not care about
them, and did not feel that they contributed to anything of value. That's
the way that message makes vegetarians feel, and as someone who
has friends who have been lifelong vegetarians - many friends that have been
lifelong vegetarians - I noticed that vegetarians often feel
like, you know they made this decision years ago, they decided to stop eating
animals. And often I think it's really important to recognize how vegetarians
come to that viewpoint, and as point number one - I want us to think about
how people came to this decision; how vegetarians came to the decision to be
vegetarian. A lot of people come to vegetarianism out of instinct. So
recognize that whether it's through religion or whether it's through
instinct, a lot of vegetarians come to this idea on their own. They come to the
idea just on their own that they don't want to eat animals. And it's a very
personal decision. It's one that a lot of people come to on their own, or perhaps
through religion. But often on their own they'll come to the idea that they
don't want to eat animals. They come to that decision on their own, and this is
especially the case before we had the social media presence that we do today
as vegans. But when you're talking to people who've been vegetarian for a long
time, many of those people came to this
decision on their own. It was a moral decision that they achieved on
their own without, you know, the benefit of YouTube, without the benefit of
social media. They came to this decision on their own, and that's very significant.
When you come to a decision on your own, you have a more personal connection with
it. You really understand that it's wrong because a lot of these people saw their
pet, saw a cow or a pig or a chicken, and thought "you know what these animals
aren't that different and I don't really want to do that - I don't want to take a
life." So that's a very profound decision and I think it's one that vegans - we
really need to respect and we need to recognize the profundity of
coming to that kind of decision on your own. It really shows someone who's
capable of thinking freely, and being able to look at the world without really
any input from social media, things like that, and be able to say: "this is a moral
wrong. I don't want to participate in this anymore, therefore I am no longer
eating animals." So, especially if you have a friend like that, recognize that first
and be prepared to listen. And that's my second point: we need to be prepared as
vegans to listen. When you come across any new idea - and I think this is
especially true of vegans - when you come across the idea of veganism, especially
if you're new to this you've never been vegetarian before or anything like that,
you tend to have this feeling that you've discovered something new. You want
to share it with everyone, and it feels like a truth that you know that you want
to share with other people. And that's great. But it also means that you tend to
have this feeling of "specialness" - of the priority of your ideas over other people's.
And it's very important to give space to other people's ideas. And that means
listening. Listen to the friends that you have. If you have vegetarian friends who
maybe aren't vegan yet, listen to them. Ask them about why they became
vegetarian, and really listen. Don't listen just with the goal of pushing
veganism on them. Listen to them as people. Listen to their reasons and
really understand what the reasons are behind that. Because that's going to be
very important for establishing a connection. And especially when this is with
friends, you also want to NOT make them feel immediately morally convicted
in a negative way by the fact that you've gone vegan.
You don't want it to feel like a division between you and your friends. If
you - if you want to in any way continue to have these relationships, and you want
to even have an impact on them and their lives, you need to maintain that bond of
communication. And the best way to do that is by listening. I am NOT a great
listener. It's something that I work on every day. But I really do try when it
comes to these kinds of differences to be sure and pay attention - to be sure and
listen to the people that I'm talking to, to understand the reasoning behind their
decisions. Because often those decisions were very heartfelt, and they were taken
in a time when that person was really open and really thinking about these
different ideas. And by listening to them you're going to understand better why
they made those decisions. And if you are a vegan advocate, you're going to be able
to better discuss this thing with them, to be able to better share your own
opinions in a way that works and meshes with the ideas that they have already.
Because that's kind of the essence of good communication is developing this
kind of rapport. And so, even if you've been friends with someone for a very
long time, it's really important to make sure that those those paths of
communication remain open, that you remain connected to this person. And the
best way to do that is by listening. If someone is been working their whole life,
as I just mentioned, on being a vegetarian amidst a world that is not
vegetarian, and this is out - especially - out of a personal moral conviction,
telling them that what they do is completely useless is very hurtful. And
that's important to keep in mind. But secondly, it's important to keep in mind
that it is not even true. So not only is it hurtful, it is untrue. If someone is
no longer a meat eater, they are no longer consuming animals. So they are making a
difference. They are reducing the demand for animals, and they are increasing the
demand for other products that are not animal related. Now those products could
be - and unfortunately sometimes are - other animal products, like dairy and milk,
and that's something that we want to address as vegans who want to try and
help that person to move away from those things and towards plant-based options.
But we first need to recognize that those people have made an effort, and
that effort is significant. It is meant to reduce the death of other animals, and
even if it isn't always reducing that number explicitly - and I think that most
of the time it actually is - even if it's not a huge difference,
it still is a difference, and we need to celebrate that and validate that
those people have made a good decision. But we can take - if we if we do actually
make that step of appreciating and validating the decision that they've
made - we have the room to start to encourage other options. My next video on
Saturday is going to talk about this in a little bit more detail, but what we
need to do is to encourage them to embrace other options. A lot of
vegetarians became vegetarians - and I mean, I'm speaking for my own personal
experience - but if you get to be my age, you know you're 35 and you know people
who've been vegetarian a long time - a lot of those people became vegetarian at a
time when veganism was either very poorly understood - it was not even a
thing that they'd ever even heard of - and so a lot of them aren't familiar with
the new products that are on the market. Many of them are just vegetarian because
of a personal conviction, and so what they don't do, is they don't often seek
out a lot of the information that vegans know already about - on social media and
things like that - about new products. So they may not know about the products.
And so, the final step that I would encourage is really encouraging your
vegetarian friends to try new things. If someone is vegetarian, it really helps to
encourage them to try new things that they may not have discovered before.
There are a lot of really great products. And I mean, start out with the good
products. Start by telling your vegetarian friends about things that you
know are just as good as alternate versions...the animal versions of those
products that are just as good or much much better. For example, if you know from
someone who is vegetarian who likes mayonnaise, you might want to suggest a plant-based
version. Personally, I eat Hellmann's vegan mayonnaise because it's fantastic -
it used to be called "carefully-crafted" and now I think it's called vegan. That -
the Hellmann's vegan mayonnaise is just as good as the original. If you have
access to Just Mayo, Just Mayonnaise it's also at least as good as the
animal-based product, and it's one of those things that if you were to try it
side by side, you would never notice the difference, except that I mean - in my
opinion - the Just Mayo, Helmann's vegan versions actually have a much cleaner
taste - they're actually much better, I think, for many applications. Things like
that are a really good place to start. Obviously you can also start with things
like margarine. You can mention the fact that there are great options that are
out there. Here in Canada, we have Becel vegan margarine, and there are other
options in the United States. And then there's always options like Earth
Balance and things like that that are just as good, have that nice, you know, fresh
Creamery taste, but without any of the animal products. So getting people to try
those things is really important, because a lot of vegetarians have not tried
animal free products in a long time, because they became vegetarians years
ago, so they may have tried - you know - a couple of terrible vegan cheeses and
then stopped. So these people may have not tried those products in a very
long time. If you have vegetarian friends, encourage them to share
delicious foods with you, because a lot of times those people have not tried
these products in a very long time . It's worth encouraging them to try those
products, and I would definitely encourage you if you're vegan to try
sharing some of these products with the vegetarians in your life. Let them try
them. Try things like cashew cheese which is delicious. I know in the US, Miyoko's
Creamery is also amazing. So, have people try those things, try them with
you, and have them try a cashew cream cheese and things like that. And just be
open. Because I think when you think about vegetarians, usually people become
vegetarian either because a religious conviction - as I mentioned at the
beginning - something like growing up as a Hindu, things like that.
Or perhaps they came to it on their own through an ethical conviction. And so, by
showing them that they can even take that further in a delicious, healthy way,
is much more effective, I think, than telling someone that their efforts are
worthless. I find the psychological value of
telling someone that a lifetime of effort has been completely in vain is
not beneficial. And while I understand the people who feel like that's a great
approach, I think they're seriously mistaken. When someone has taken an
effort like this on their own, and especially - longtime vegetarians that have
been doing this, you know 20-30 years, telling them that they have done nothing
in their lives is not an effective way of reaching out to those people. Try to
celebrate the decisions that they made. Celebrate the compassion that they've
shown throughout their lives, and show them that there are other options.
Because I think honestly vegetarians are some of the most open and willing to try
new things. We need to be willing to share with them, and to do so in a
compassionate, friendly way. What do you think about this video? Let me know in
the comment section below. Let me know about some of your experiences with
vegetarians in your life. If you're a new vegan, how has it been talking to the
vegetarians that you know. What do they think about it? What has been your
experience? I'd really love to know, and I'd love to know if any of you have had
any success speaking with the vegetarians in your life about switching
away from animal products. Because I genuinely think that we need to focus on
this low-hanging fruit of vegetarians first. I I think that it is all too
tempting to condemn vegetarians as having done nothing, that they need to go
vegan. But it is a huge mistake in my opinion. I'd love to hear yours. Let me
know in the comment section below. If you enjoyed this video please be sure
and give it a thumbs up, subscribe, like it on Facebook, share it with a friend
and let me know what you think! Because I would love to hear from you, and I will
see you in my next video. Take care. Bye!
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