HOLD IT! Bee vomit? Honey is bee vomit? This I did not know. I haven't given up honey yet, but after reading about the suffering I am now giving it up...starting....NOW! Okay but seriously...is it really bee vomit?
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HOLD IT! Bee vomit? Honey is bee vomit? This I did not know. I haven't given up honey yet, but after reading about the suffering I am now giving it up...starting....NOW! Okay but seriously...is it really bee vomit?
yeah it's definitely bee vomit
yes, they regurgitate the necter into the bee hive as food for the young bees to eat.
So eating it you are robbing the young bees of their food, like calfs are robbed of their mums milk.!!
Also I believe, bee keepers kill of the access queens that are born. :(
Bees are beautiful little creatures that are quite intelligent, if they find a good source of necter they go back to the hive and do a 'dance' which is telling the other bees where the necter is from.
At work the first thing people ask me is what I don't eat. When I tell them and they hear the word honey, they ask me why. I always get the greatest pleasure seeing their faces when I tell them that honey is 'bees vomit'. Cheers me up no end. :p
I say that, too. Then they say, "eeeeew that is gross". Okay, then why are you still consuming it?Quote:
Aurora
I told my friend yesterday what it is and she said that she isn't going to use it anymore, and shes not a veggie at all! She has pretty much stopped eating meat because of everything I've told her, but shes doing it because shes grossed ou, notbecause she cares. I wish that she cared about the animals, then I could get her on our side.
I gave up honey when I became vegan. Unlike dairy though I have lapsed a couple of times. Once with a bowl of crunchy nut cornflakes and once with an entire box of branflakes :o . I won't do it again.
Oh, for ex crunchy nut cornflake fans, have you tried maple frosted cornflakes by Whole Earth? Yum.
My non-vegetarian friends think that not having milk is weird, but when I said I didn't have honey either they were in hysterics. I tried to explain about cruelty to bees but they laughed even more. Some people just don't think it is wrong to kill insects :(
I too have been laughed at about my abstinence from honey, although I just tell them that it is still a form of factory farming and the bes often get sprayed with smoke to alter their behaviour in order to ensure honey production and killed when their hives are burned etc.
Insects still have brains and nerve endings and are intelligent creatures!
I have to admit I can't ABIDE wasps, although I would never kill one :)
That reminds me of what Tails said in another thread, about being wrongly criticised by friends for using soap dispensers in public restrooms. Really, how many lives will you save by letting your hands stay dirty? I think that sometimes we choose the vegan option only for our own benefit, so that we feel better (like in throwing out leather products, etc), even though it won't make a difference to anybody (animal or otherwise) but ourselves. If the most vegan-friendly food present had a little honey in it, and there was not a lot of choice, then starving yourself wouldn't have helped matters. It may have even made you feel like you're punishing yourself, which might undermine your convictions and threaten your resolve to remain vegan.Quote:
Banana
Bravo for admitting it Banana, even if it means setting yourself up to be flamed :D
When I first went vegan, I still would have foods that had honey as an ingredient. Now, I've cut out honey so that I can be fully vegan.
It's not difficult to give up, you only have to check cereal type things and salad dressings and some teas, really. It's not good for you anyway, gives you cavities. :)
Had a co-op party after a work day, people brought some food and we cooked some, i contributed a fruit cake :) . I sampled ALL four desserts/cakes on offer, and afterward a chap comes up to me and says, there's honey in the cake i made, do you think any full on vegans are about?
To which i could say nothing. I don't eat honey and for someone to bring non vegan food onto the dining table without properly labelling it, (heck, it shouldn't have been non vegan anyway) was incredible to me.
That bad. Where I work we have morning tea once in a while but I never eat the cake. Many people have taken to incuding fruit, like cut melons and strawberries or pineapple which means I can eat them. I just assume that the cake will have something in it that I wouldn't be interested in eating.Quote:
Kevster
Antony
It would have been nice to correct the chap, but quite frankly i was in no particular mood to address him on the matter. And that in itself is a sorry state of affairs, i'm pretty irritated by the lack of respect given to vegans, and he might have got a disproportionate reaction to what he probably deserved.
Nevertheless, once the other full on vegans have left after the week-end, i'll be letting people know that it is unacceptable to me, while i live in this house.
Part of the reason why I'm vegan is because I don't agree people should make money out of things they don't own. This is why I wont eat honey.
I just had a very brief "conflict" with my nephew about this. I still wear my leather shoes (most of which I've had for at least a decade) and he asked why I was wearing leather if I've gone vegan. I assured him that I would no longer buy any leather shoes, but I am not going to discard those that I already have as I'd see that as more of a waste. I will NOT buy any more leather shoes now though:eek:Quote:
Yoggy
i have the same thing... i am not going to waste the leather, because then it's even worse imo, the animal died and then was wasted even further... however, there r certain animal product things i will no longer wear of mine (those that i can give away)
I'm not sure I understand a few posts here, too, CC. I don't think like the sound of "contracts" between animals and people. Animals can't consent to their sides of the "bargain". After all, neither honey nor wine are essential for human survival, so the bees should be left alone to pollinate the flowers of their choice. :)Quote:
ConsciousCuisine
Well, eventually its a crusade we can make after all the newly available arable land from no-longer-animal-based agriculture: beekeeping.
Alot of crops require introduced hives (moved thru the season) to be commercially viable. The hobby apiarist is not a focus of concern to me. Rather, the major honey producers are a source of many problems. It just shows all the connections we make to our lifestyle. Right now I am greatly worried about the palm-oil plantations killing Orangutans on Borneo. How bitterly ironic that my vegan marg may be contributing. I take my decisions based on the facts as I see them. We all do.
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ConsciousCuisine
I've had that before...never thought it could be used like honey. Could I find that in a grocery store?
Did you ever write Amy's? I did and they said they "haven't found a suitable substitute for honey." I find that a bit disheartening, as there are many substitutes.Quote:
mophoto
Some of you seemed surprised, but I too have seen some products claim to be vegan, but they contained honey (Amy's doesn't do that).
Yea. Honey is an animal product. Therefore it is not part of the vegan diet.Quote:
ConsciousCuisine
I use pure organic maple syrup or fruit concentrate to sweeten stuff.
I have also come across "vegans" who eat honey. It is up to people what they eat but no way is honey vegan. Even before I went vegan I used to buy honey from small local producers but I don't buy it now and if something has bee products (honey, propolis, beeswax) in the ingredient list I don't buy, because bee products are not vegan.
I was browsing on veganessentials.com this afternoon & came across a product called "Just Like Honey Gluten-Free Rice Nectar" - it's made up of brown rice syrup, chicory syrup, maple syrup & natural vegan flavours & claims to be honey-flavoured. If anyone is really hankering for the honey flavouring perhaps this could be a good option for you?
Diana
akaredarcher
Honey = animal product
sounds simple to me.
whether your the size of a blue whale or a small ant your still an animal.
In my opinion of course hehehe
Brown rice syrup is great.
Has anyone ever tried this?
http://www.veganessentials.com/catal...ice-nectar.htm
Just use agave nectar and be done with it.
Honey is as dead as fur.
My brother is a beekeeper/researcher. Hanging around his 'hives' for a while was enough to convince me how unnatural and cruel honey is. Let's control these amazingly communicative wee little animals (sorry - insects) who are working for their queen and steal their regurgitated hard work. They won't know any differently. Smoke 'em, squash 'em, pin 'em, trick and manipulate 'em.
So I'm browsing through the latest issue of VegNews and I see that a fellow board member had their views with reagrds to honey published on page 18. Congrats. I was glad to read over what other vegans think about the consumption of honey outside from this forum. Basically, they all felt the same way, that honey is NOT vegan, and they're right!
I just found date molasses at my local middle eastern grocer. It is so delicious! Who needs honey? :)
That sounds really good, stickydate. I think I will Google to see if I can find out how to make that.
It's delicious, especially on vanilla soy ice cream
:) I will have to look for it! I may live in a small island but thank goodness, we have a Middle Eastern store. :DQuote:
stickydate
Depends what you're intentions were. If you had no interest in eventually replacing your non-vegan cosmetics to vegan stuff, then I'd call you a strict vegetarian. If you DID have intentions of using vegan cosmetics but are trying to use up your non-vegan stuff, then I'd consider you to be vegan.
I still use some non-vegan cosmetics from my non-vegan days that are still good to use and I will replace them with vegan alternatives when I need to. And I still consider myself vegan.
see here
http://www.veganforum.com/forums/sho...t=plant+fields
for a discussion on that very topic
I'll be honest...when I first became vegan honey didn't even cross my mind till I saw people talking about it on this forum. I have a box of cereal that has honey in it (it's one of the last ingredients).
I'm going to finish eating the rest of it because I can't afford to throw away food. I don't buy anything with honey in it but I wasn't as strict about it as I was about milk and eggs. After hearing all the stuff about honey I'm going to be just as strict about it from now on.
I never kill bugs that make their way into my room unless they catch me by surprise so it makes no sense for me to eat honey.
Hi, yes I scoop up all insects on a piece of paper and put them outside, and I don't use pesticides in my yard or on my house plants. I believe it is wrong to abuse any life forms, animal or insect. :)
There is no other type of vegan, vegans do not eat animal products, bees are animals, therefore vegans who eat honey intentionally are not vegans at all.
Even if you don't think taking honey from them will harm them you are still stealing from them, they don't collect that stuff for fun you know.
To answer your questions -
No I don't only buy organic food, I'd like to be able to and try to grow as much as I can myself but I cannot be held responsible for the methods used by the farmers who produce my food any more than for buying things from meat eaters and therefore giving money towards the death of the animal that will be their dinner.
I don't use pesticides, there are alternatives, companion planting for instance.
I will scoop insects up onto a piece of paper and place them outside. What do you do with them?
Yes, I do buy organic food only, and I do not use pesticides. I don't kill insects inside my home. Granted, I live on a boat, and don't get any, but I never used to when I lived in a house.
I don't knock people who use honey, and I don't think any other forum members knock people who use honey either. What I want to know from people who insist on using honey, and claim vegans are being too extreme when they exclude honey from their diet, is why? Honey is such a minor part of any omni's diet, why argue to keep it? There's no comparison to the arguments about lack of protein by excluding meat, or lack of calcium from excluding dairy, the two most popular, and bogus, reasons for continuing to eat flesh and milk. There is no major nutritional component to honey in the human diet, and absolutely no care whatsoever needs to be taken to ensure that its nutrients are replaced by suitable plant-based foods. It may seem like too trivial an item for vegans to argue about, but it is also an extremely trivial item for anyone else to insist on including it in the diet. Unlike giving up cheese, for example, which many people are addicted to, giving up honey is so incredibly easy, why cling to its inclusion in the diet, and call people who won't eat it extreme? It comes from animals, it is utterly unecessary to human survival, and its just plain silly to make such a big deal out of it.
i like bees, i used to never eat honey when little as i thought it was mean to steal. but i was told to drink milk to be strong :S i too agree that there cannot be a vegan who eats honey by choice, its different, say, by accident or finishing cereals you already have when you decide to go vegan, throwing out food doesnt help people, animals or the environment.
i met someone a while back who proclaimed to be vegan, but had honey in their tea. to me, that by choice, is like the vegetarians who eat fish.
it is so easy to cut honey out of the diet anyway. as for insects, its hard, walking down the pavement may kill sereral or none. in the flat i get my OH to remove bugs (i have a totally irrational fear of bugs, and i am so ashamed, though i love watching them, and we go spider watching sometimes) as for food, we shop at a local greengrocers, due to the supermarket produce been rubbish, and no organic local produce for mileswe dont drive either to get there.there is an unofficial organic farm shop but being 4 miles out and not on a bus route, thats saved for the days when rucksacks, wellies and a craving for organic marrows occurs :D