Crush on Lyle wrote:

> Honey by definition is vegan because it is derived directly from
> animals. But many vegans (or people who claim to be vegans, if you get
> off on identifying hypocrisy in all forms) don't consider it a major
> transgression to eat honey and do so. Many vegans, believe it or not,
> are fairly reasonable people and realize that it is impossible to exist
> on Earth without doing some damage to the environment and killing some
> lifeforms. They still prefer to minimize the damage. Why does it have
> to be all or nothing?--commit suicide or eat meat everyday?

Extremism seems to be what some people prefer. I would put milk products
in the category as honey. You don't have kill a cow to get milk from it,
though cows that stop producing usually end up in someone's oven.


> Only a dumbass vegan would say that veganism is a way of eating that
> should be adopted all over the world, and should have been practiced by
> everyone in the past. It's only viable in a society with the means such
> that people can survive without eating animal products.

The vegans I have known would never espouse it as a way of life for
everyone. It's a rebellious sort of life style that differentiates them
from the rest of the world.


> There a lot of proselytizing vegetarians and vegans whose behavior is
> hypocritical, but I think it's unfair to denounce all of them. (I, by
> the way, am neither vegan nor vegetarian. But I don't resent those who
> are. I don't understand why so many people seem to take it as a personal
> affront.)

I don't take it as a personal front. I just refuse to cater to them. I
once had a vegan show up at our place for a Christmas gathering. My
nephew's daughter, unbeknownst to me, was (temporarily) a vegan. I didn't
know she was a vegan and I didn't know that she was coming. Her father had
put some vegan goodies together for her but forgot them at home. As we were
trying to put dinner for 16 on the table my wife was running around trying
to find something that would suit her diet. This same girl, just a year
and a half later, was sitting across from me at a brunch buffet chowing
down on a plate full of ham, eggs, chicken and fish. Just like every other
vegetarian I have ever known she went back to the pleasures of eating
flesh.