Yeah I'm on my way, little by little. We're in the middle of moving so I'm a little scatterbrained for the moment
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Yeah I'm on my way, little by little. We're in the middle of moving so I'm a little scatterbrained for the moment
To answer the original question, I wasn't vegan because I thought veganism was an uneccesarily extreme thing that only odd people must do.
It was only after several weeks at work where I was bored and had nothing to do, I was running out of things to surf the internet for when, just out of intrigue, I thought I'd look up veganism and why vegans actually existed.
Before that, I'd probably ranked veganism on a par with line dancing or something like that, but within a week or two I was vegan. End of story!
I'm brand spankin new compared to most here it seems...
Fleshless for about year and a half now: Lacto-ovo for the first couple of months, Vegan for the rest.
It started for me when my girlfriend and I broke up, and I moved out (after 11 years together :eek: ) I dove into the computer looking for answers about life. Couple months, hundreds of documentaries, audiobooks, videos of protests, books later.... I got the picture about the world out there, that I had NO idea existed. Veganism was the final step.
Now I'm back with my girlfriend... I shared what I learned (she was already at "that level" before), she became Vegan, and here we are....
a couple of crazy Animals!
Why wasn't I Vegan before I was Vegan?
I was blind.
[QUOTE=Heather]I brought my child up as an omni but now really regret this. I believed that she should eat 'normally' until she chose to do otherwise (I know this is a load of cr*p now, btw). My excuse is that I was very young when I had her and that I would definitely do things a lot differently now. Luckily, she converted to vegetarianism a couple of years ago without pressure from me, and is thinking of becoming vegan but doesn't have the willpower at the moment. She is very much against animal testing and constantly argues with her friends in school about this, so I must have done something right!! :) QUOTE]
I did the same thing with my daughter. I just wanted her to be able to choose. Now she loves meat and I feel helpless to do anything about it. I just have to wait. She is fully aware of why I am going vegan, and she hates the idea of eating animals, but she is full into the "me, me, and me" stage of life at nine years old. She can't quite give up something that she enjoys even though she knows that it's wrong. It doesn't help that her father eats meat and has no intention of stopping. He often says that he would like to, but claims that it isn't possible for him (a load of crap as far as I'm concerned!).
I do the cooking so there are no carcass segments in my house. She eats meat when her dad gets lunch meats, makes burgers, or the occasional roast or when we go to family for supper. still no carcass segments thank goodness.Quote:
Mozbee
Posted by kriz:
The title of the thread kinda makes me laugh! :) It reminds me of the old "which came first, the chicken or the egg." :rolleyes:Quote:
Interesting comparsion you made there, Robin. I've never heard that one before... but, yeah, it's kind of like that - I didn't want meat since the age of 4.
But seriously, I think we are ALL vegan at birth! None of us wasn't a vegan before we became "vegan", we are all just brainwashed by the society we are born in to believe animal products are food. They aren't, and it is only a matter of time for some to realize this truth. Children have natural instincts against meat that are subverted by parents who don't know any better, and the point in your life when you are able to reject this conditioning depends upon how successful the conditioning was. :o
My favorite example is an analogy of Harvey Diamond's, who says if you take a tiger cub and leave him alone in a room with an apple and a bunny, he will eat the bunny and play with the apple. If you do the same with a young human, he will eat the apple and play with the bunny. :p
I agree with you, Seaside...but I want to know whether something exciting will also happen if the persian pomegranate spirit appears on my computer screen? :)
Posted by kokopelli:
I hope so! :pQuote:
but I want to know whether something exciting will also happen if the persian pomegranate spirit appears on my computer screen? :)
Posted by Mozbee:
I think there is a thread on that blood-type diet. You might be interested! :)Quote:
Yes, I'm sure I was born to be vegan...afterall I'm a homo sapien! (Although it seems blood-types do have a bearing on things). :D
Nice quote there, think I'll be using that on some of my signatures!Quote:
Seaside
I actualy disagree. Some kids really do love meat at first taste. My daughter is one. She has always preferred meat to any other type of food from the first moment she had it, although I did introduce it late. I, on the other hand, hated it and would push it around my plate for hours. My brother was the same way.Quote:
Seaside
As to blood types, well, in our case, my brother, my daughter and I are all type O so that rules "natural" taste out. I've read two books about blood type diets and I have real problems with it. It neglects the fact that if a type O person (who, according to the diet, should thrive on mostly meat, yuck!) has been raised a strict vegetarian or vegan switched even gradually to a meat diet then that person would become very ill. Much evidence shows that it depends on what you were raised on not on what your ancestors or fellow type O (A, B, AB) eat. Personally I was pretty insulted to read that I am "naturally" supposed to eat large amounts of meat and would likely shorten my life as a vegetarian. Give me a break!
Lol, Sylkan! I'm also type O, and yet I never liked meat. If it hadn't been forced on me, I never would have eaten it in the first place! My father's also type O, and although he's omni, he isn't a big meat eater; same with my grandmother. My mother, however, is a big meat eater :( , but she's type A.
me too!! ignorance of how easy it was to be..cos i was so passionate bout things..n non realisation of my beleifs of hoow it is wrong to eat animalss or their secretions.noiwit meks me feel sick to think of it!!Quote:
Pooh
Ive just come back from staying at my dads....which tought me alot about ignorance. I kindly cooked him tea: satay vegies and rice......"whats this?" he says, "wheres my meat? wheres the meal?" As according to my dad, and an unfortunant amout of others in the world, a meal isnt a meal with out you "basic" staple: meat.
I explained to him my lifestyle, and my choices along with my reasons. "where do you get your iron?" "do you have an eating disorder" were among many of his stupid, ignorant questions and remarks.
He also thinks that humans are superior to other animals! Do ppl just forget that we are ALL animals? we are all living, breathing being with feeling and souls?
It also frusterates me wen im at scool, and this boy will look at me in disgusting and say " well, wot the hell DO you eat? I mean come on, wot else IS there?"
Some ppl are just ignorant. Thats the only explaination i can come up with for myself at this point in time. I just find it very sad.
Hmm, that's odd. I'm a younger teenager and I think I have a very good idea of what to eat! I don't personally know any other vegans and my vegetarian friends look to me for advice, so I guess I must be very outspoken. :pQuote:
Trendygirl
Same for me, when I pictured veg*ns and AR activists, I always thought of the "crazy people" who would stand outside stores and scream and yell at passersby. My mom would always lock the car doors if we got stuck at a traffic light by protesters. I guess by that, I was taught to be afraid of those people, and that they weren't normal. I also thought of those "hippy" types, and that those were weird people who I had no business listening to anyway. I was never going to be "that type."Quote:
I wasn't vegan because I thought veganism was an uneccesarily extreme thing that only odd people must do.
I think my parents still look at me like that sometimes. :rolleyes:
I fall into this category too! I also didn't know enough about what it truly meant though, and had no idea how to go about making the transition. I felt more safe staying where I was than to do something so horribly wrong in my attempt!Quote:
I wasn't vegan because I thought veganism was an uneccesarily extreme thing that only odd people must do.
I thought it would be impossible to find enough to eat and buy toiletries which at first it seemed it was. But after a few months I had it sussed and don't need to go out of my home town to get everything I need. And this is in Seaford which is only a very small seaside town with very basic shops.
Brighton is up the road for shoes, clothes and vegan places to eat out.
How times have changed:)
i didnt know veganism excited, and knew nothing of vegetarianism. i was an avid, full on meat eater until i watched "meat your meet" and after that, i was vegan. :|
Didn't know better. I try not to feel bad about not becoming more aware sooner, but sometimes I really wish I had at least been vegan since I was a teen.
Good for you FoxyTina! :) When I began seeking out video clips to force myself to see what is happening....Meet Your Meat was one of the first I saw. :eek: <--- I looked like that for weeks after seeing it. Lol! I didn't touch meat again and often had nightmares of Alec Baldwin appearing and telling me: "The video you are about to watch...." Lol!!Quote:
i was an avid, full on meat eater until i watched "meat your meet" and after that, i was vegan. :|
It's ok, Powder! I think it happens when we are ready for the *right* reasons! I was a veggie in my teens because I wanted to lose weight and it was also a "trendy" thing to do. I had no idea on how to eat right and didn't really think much about the health portion of it...I liked animals and wanted to be pencil thin. :rolleyes: It only lasted a year and I felt horrible. When I stopped eating animal products this time, it was with more information and much better reasons! I even saw a nutritionist and am on the right track now. I don't feel bad for when I ate meat because it is an evolution and it also gives me hope that today's meat eating friends and family of mine may also realize what they are doing and stop!Quote:
Didn't know better. I try not to feel bad about not becoming more aware sooner...
Someone recently asked me how long I have been vegan. I just answered, "Since I researched what happens to the animals before I eat them." We can't do better than that, so congratulate yourself for what you are doing today!
I was a blinkered veggie!
I was ignorant, complacent, then in denial and then I confronted the truth and was free.
First, I was too young. Then, my controling mother wouldn't let me. Then, I moved in with my dad, and I became vegetarian, then vegan.
I was kidding myself that there was no suffering involved.
I was talking about people eating meat and not being 'enlightened' to some vegetarian friends. One of them casually said "I guess that's how vegans feel about vegetarians" and I realised how blinkered I had been.
I was lucky enough to live in a vegetarian only house at the time. Had I lived where I do now I probably wouldn't have been having those sorts of conversations.
I can relate to all the reasons given above.
I can't quite believe I remained so ignorant for so long. I wish someone had enlightened me years ago - I know I would have listened.
I don't think I've replied to this - :confused:
Well I was too young when I first thought veganism was good at about 7 maybe, then I became a vegetarian for lent i think a few years back, then I stopped drinking much milk or anything, then i went vegan, turned back vegetarian for reasons of my own then vegan again. ;)
I didn't know any better...I grew up being lied to.
I know I'm probably a "wuss" or something, but I've never been able to stomach watching something like "meet your meat." I became mostly vegetarian after just hearing about how animals were treated and, as many of you stated, thought that dairy and eggs were OK because no animal died. Well, I should say that I was in denial about dairy and eggs since I had seen part of a news show that showed the rotten eggs and male chicks being squished (actually, on the special, the chick they showed was "missed" by the crusher thing:eek: ) and my uncle, who used to work in the Agriculture Department tried to tell me about the dairy industry--though he was trying to convince me that being a vegetarian was useless. Then I stopped eating even occasional fish after seeing Finding Nemo. Finally, after my mom's cardiac bypass surgery, I started reading about diet and found The China Study, which outlines how dairy is actually at least as culpable in disease as meat and eggs: that being vegan is the healthiest way to be. Once I started reading, I lost my denial about how the dairy industry treats cows and how it does end up in cows being killed--once their milk production stops and their male calves--as well as the egg and honey industries. So I was in denial and now I'm not and I feel much better about it:D
That's so true about denial! I figured to research the dairy industry would leave me with nothing to eat...so I pretended nothing happens to dairy cows and the chicks from hen houses.
I keep seeing people post about The China Study. I'm going to have to look that up!
:) i was thinking about this the other day, because i remember when i was 14 slagging off a friend for being veggie, saying it wasn't natural etc, because of what i'd been told by family. i feel awful thinking back and i think the main reason is ignorance. then i became veggie from 15 and had been one for 6 years. i wasn't aware of what really went on, if i'd seen pictures and was fully aware i'd have been vegan sooner. i've only just become vegan (4 months) and i wouldn't go back, i know too much now. i feel so bad that i wasn't vegan for longer. i want to raise any children i have as vegan so they can be enlightened from birth :)
Sylkan I am so glad you brought that up. I am a type O and my homeopathic doctor (who is vegetenarian btw) insisted I give up my vegan ways and eat meat. All based on this book about blood types!
I really have never liked meats at all. At first with me it was not because of animal cruelty...sorry to say. I grew up on a farm and my parents raised and slaughtered animals regularly...it had been that way for their parents and so on for as far back as anyone could remember. For some reason though I always gravitated to the veggies and would not eat meat unless forced to...it just seemed to hurt me. Back then I didn't even know such a thing as vegan even existed..ignorance. I was to young to realize that there were other ways of living in harmony with nature and myself.
I was very excited and happy to find that there were others like me as I continued to grow and learn. Or I should say I am because I am still growing and learning. There is a wealth of resources now it seems and no reason I can see to eat meat or hurt an animal for my own pleasure.
BTW now I am looking for a new homeopathic doctor.
[QUOTE=Jane M] I am a type O and my homeopathic doctor (who is vegetenarian btw) insisted I give up my vegan ways and eat meat. All based on this book about blood types!
There is a lot of controversy about the blood type diet so I wouldn't be overly concerned.:D
I went vegan at 20 when I met vegans at university who showed me vegetarianism wasn't friendly to animals. Before that i didn't even know calves were taken from their mothers and killed so we could drink milk!
Liz
That's the frustrating thing kids (& even teenagers) are shielded from so much.Quote:
VeganLiz
For instance, would they really continue to eat those gooey sweets, such as cola bottles, if they knew they contained boiled down animal remains? :(
Or if they were made aware that farms are nolonger like those shown in childrens story books - perhaps they'd all stop eating animals! ;)
At first, I didn't think I had the willpower, and it took me a while to shake off the "you need eggs and dairy" conditioning. Once I researched the nutrition, and found out that hypoglycemics can do fine on a vegan diet, there wasn't any other choice to make. It was only afterward that I found out, thanks to yummy subsitute products, I can still have all my old favorites.
I became vegetarian at 13, as soon as I really became aware of the connection between a sheep in a field and the lamb on my plate. I always thought being vegan would be too hard, and I never thought to research the dairy industry (assuming that because the animals didn't die, it would be ok).
It was only just before Christmas that I finally did a bit more research and realised what a fool I'd been all these years. I can only equate it to a religious experience, I feel like I've been enlightened, and now I can never go back. I don't crave any dairy products at all, becoming vegan has been the easiest transistion I could have imagined. I'm just ashamed I buried my head in the sand for so long, and didn't do it sooner.
I 'realised' at about age 7 someting wasn't right about meat, but I didn't know about vegetarians and thought I just had to eat meat. At 13 I went vegetarian. When I met my husband he ate meat, but turned veggie just a few months later. He said my just not eating meat was enough to make him realise he didn't want to eat it either.
We went vegan a couple of months ago.
Up untill recently I thought cows just made milk anyway, I had no idea that they are constantly inpregnated duh!!! Then a couple of years ago I met an animal rights activist and I went on a few demo's with him. He told me he was vegan and when I realised the truth I was horrified but too lazy to change my habits. Then I went to a local vegan food fayre run by the activist I just mentioned. The food was delicious and my husband and I realised once and for all we had absoultely no excuses. We started eating more and more vegan meals, swapped our milk, yoghurts etc and we are almost vegan. I say almost because we still have some leather belts and shoes that we can't afford to throw out. I also use sudocream on my daughter and I recently had a steriod injection when my hand siezed up with arthritis.
I was vegetarian for many years, then began to eat organic meats when I visited my parents - they live in a rural area and it felt good to support the farming families, many of whom are passionate about making changes. I went along like this for some years until it became impossible to continue kidding myself that organic farms are happy, fun-filled earth-bound answers to Arcadia. I don't think that all meat is categorically murder. I do however think that all the meat commercially available to us at the present certainly is, organic or not.
Its difficult to be direct when it comes down to why or why we shouldnt eat meat. Guess meat producing is an industry where farmers make profit as they have bein doing for generations. Consumers think meat and other animal products are vital for health and cheaper then vegan products apparently.... The debate between reformists and activists is endless.
At the the end of the day animals have us vegans and veges if they didnt i can imagine there will more reduced numbers of endangered animals out there.
Its easier to cope with animal suffering if you are surrounded by at leat one vegan friend, coz when your not i guess it drives you insane.
i've been vegan for about 3 weeks...before that i was washing down my bacon sandwiches with meatshakesQuote:
Unregistered
the catalyst? one accidental viewing of "meet your meat" the decision was instant
but here i am - 36, intelligent, well-read, relatively liberal, and most of all compassionate...so what the hell took me so long? Answer - the information was never placed in front of me and i never sought it out...simple as that really.
The issue never gets any positive or constructive media coverage, so people are walking around in the world open to the idea (like myself) but never make the change because the information never finds it's way into their laps.
I even have 3 friends who are Vegan, but they've always avoided the subject like the plague. Now they're kicking themselves in the nuts wondering if they could have converted me years ago.
I'm wondering the same thing. I really don't know if a verbal discussion of the issue would have converted me, and i kind of doubt it. Verbal discussions with me are often objective, distant, logical discussions of abstract concepts. And when things get argumentative, people sometimes feel entrenched, lose objectivity, and take up the opposing arguments like they were actually their own...when really they aren't...they're more-or-less playing devil's advocate, but don't recognize it because they're being defensive.
Now a verbal discussion of the issue and a followup email with some links to online information would have probably convinced me.
Anyhow it's an interesting study, because we all know damn well that there's a whole world full of compassionate, intelligent meat eaters out there that would be willing to go vegan if only we could figure out how to present the information to them.
I’d say complete ignorance on my part. I did not think about what I was eating too much, although I was picky as all hell. The first 18 years of my life I ate the same things over and over pretty much. Then I went lacto-vegetarian (eeeew, gross, I know), again still being ignorant. Then all of the sudden I woke up a little over six years ago and stopped eating that crap, too. After becoming vegan, I began consuming a much larger variety of foods and eating has never been easier. We have thousands of choices and are the most creative eaters in the world.