Public Service Anouncement: I am a vegan

Gosh! After one of your best (if not closest in terms of actual physical distance) friends tells you they didn’t know you had gone hippy it’s time to shout a bit louder. I am a Vegan, and I have been since March 2005.

What does that mean?? Well lets see…

veg·an
Pronunciation: ‘vE-g&n; ‘vej-&n, -”an
Function: noun
: a strict vegetarian : one that consumes no animal food or dairy products —veg·an·ism
/’vE-g&-”niz-&m, ‘vej-&-/ noun

In other words I don’t eat or use (knowingly) anything derived from animals. Of course that’s not necessarly true in practice but that can come later. Let me explain whyfore first. Cruelty is bad, mkay! I don’t care if it’s Bob the annoying guy at work, some Islamic person intent on blowing up a U.S embassy or livestock. You shouldn’t maim and or torture stuff, it just ain’t karmic.

Of course, that doesn’t mean I actually object to the use of animal produce, or even the killing of animals. At this point most people think I am loopy, but I can explain. Really. For me veganism is the path of least resistance to achieving non-partisipation in cruelty. I still wear leather shoes, because I bought them before I was vegan and don’t see the point in doing a deservice to the cow that gave up it’s hide. (Also I don’t think anyone will spontainiously decide to go vegan after seeing me not wearing leather good in the street, my conviction is my missionaryism not my dress sense)

“But, what about that killing animals stuff? Isn’t that a little strong for a Vegetarian let alone a Vegan?!” I hear you asking. Well actually no. I don’t like the torture of animals, but death doesn’t have to involve torture. The modern factory farm does, but that’s all the way through, not just at the end. If you eliminate torture I’m an omnivore just like everyone else. Not that Veganism hasn’t be awesome for my health.

To explain a little more, animals can’t see the future. The can’t imagine it, they just don’t know it’s there. They live in the now, with a little instinctual planning thrown in. Yes they can react to if I do x I will get y reward after a period of time, like Pavlov’s dog. That doesn’t imply they understand anything beyond the now. If you kill a person you take away their hopes and asperations, they imagined they could have been something, they could have enjoyed something, and that can no longer be. You kill an animal and you end it’s constantly changing now. As long as you don’t make it’s now bad in the process of killing it I don’t see a problem. Of course, this is just my humble deduction from stuff I’ve read.

If you are reading this and think I’m a total bastard feel free to prove me wrong. It’s been known (and more than once).