Why do I torture myself...
Posted by lauranc on Nov 24, 2009 · Member since Sep 2006 · 195 posts
CNN has "No-Turkey Thanksgiving guide".It was the lead story for like two seconds. It is full of veg options for Thanksgiving.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/11/24/vegetarian.thanksgiving/index.html
The comments are, of course, nightmarish to read. One says it is unAmerican to not eat turkey on Thanksgiving. Another hopes a vegan dies of malnutrition. Onr comment wonders why they are talking vegetarians and not soldiers in Iraq. Someone else say that soldiers would never worry about things like this. And several of people wonder why there are doing a story for such a small minority of people. I will say most terrible comments are coming from "firechild"- a troll most likely.
But did I really expect something better? *sigh*
I guess I'm not American.
I'm not American either because I don't promote turkey torture?
I read all the comments. Why DO we do this?
I'm hungry for wild rice now. Mmm.
Talk about vegetarianism or veganism seems to bring out the worst in people. Just a couple of days ago, Credo posted a little clip about Al Gore and Global warming on Facebook. Someone mentioned that he should go vegetarian, to help climate change... people (the meat eaters) got so nasty real quick, name calling and everything....
People were also complaining about veg people shoving their lifestyle down the throats of meat-eaters. Who is out there demanding people go veg? I swear I never see this.
I knew I shouldn't have read the comments. I stopped reading the ones on AOL because, no matter what the story is about, the debate turns political. Now I've been angry all day over it.
People were also complaining about veg people shoving their lifestyle down the throats of meat-eaters. Who is out there demanding people go veg? I swear I never see this.
Right?! I have never understood the defensiveness around this. I lived with two vegetarian children for three years before I became a vegetarian and I never once felt like their passion for being veggie was offensive to me. But when I "came out" as a veggiehead (as we call them in my family), I had more than one friend defend their meat-eating to me, unasked. One even went so far as to outline his very specific way of acquiring organic, grass-fed beef to make sure he was eating the healthiest cow possible. It was weird. I'm thinking, "Okay, but you're still eating the DEAD CORPSE OF AN ANIMAL, who I'm pretty sure would have rather kept on being alive..."
I think people get outraged and defensive because deep down, they can't come up with a convincing argument against vegetarianism, and rather than lose the debate and face their own moral ambiguities, they prefer to play flame-the-veg. Although this could be as naive a conjecture as 'they only make fun of you because they're jealous,' I wouldn't be surprised if there was some truth to it.
People were also complaining about veg people shoving their lifestyle down the throats of meat-eaters. Who is out there demanding people go veg? I swear I never see this.
Right?! I have never understood the defensiveness around this. I lived with two vegetarian children for three years before I became a vegetarian and I never once felt like their passion for being veggie was offensive to me. But when I "came out" as a veggiehead (as we call them in my family), I had more than one friend defend their meat-eating to me, unasked. One even went so far as to outline his very specific way of acquiring organic, grass-fed beef to make sure he was eating the healthiest cow possible. It was weird. I'm thinking, "Okay, but you're still eating the DEAD CORPSE OF AN ANIMAL, who I'm pretty sure would have rather kept on being alive..."
Same thing happened to me. A friend came up and was like "hey are you a vegetarian or a vegan" and when I answered, he went off on all the things I could never have and all the placed I have to go, and I was like "being vegan isn't that hard..." and he just kept going. Now he has made it a point to tell me he is having a fresh turkey slaughtered on Thanksgiving. Needless to say he is no longer my friend. I can't respect people who don't respect me.
there is a vegan from where i live in the article! how exciting.