I spent 2 weeks in the UK recently and they are light years ahead of the US in terms of veganism and cruelty free products. I was actually quite shocked about how many options the grocery stores had and how almost every restaurant had a vegan option, or even a vegan menu.
The trend in the US has been to hide the word ‘vegan’ from consumers and bury it in their website somewhere. Not so in the UK. Brands seem super happy about showing which products in their selection are vegan. No list of ‘secretly/accidentally vegan’ products over there, they happily let you know right in the packaging.
People there are generally more aware of veganism too. No need to explain what it is like I constantly do in the US. ‘Can vegans eat eggs?’ What part of ‘no animal products’ don’t you understand?
I was kind of surprised when I traveled to NY and SF from Melbourne. I knew Melbourne was fairly up there in vego/vegan friendliness, but took it for granted that NY and SF would be a cakewalk. Hardly appalling, but there were times I could not eat anything on the menu at some places and I'm only vegetarian, and in many instances I had only a single option. Was a little strange.
Austin, TX had a reputation for being very vegan friendly until COVID hit and many small businesses shut down. Now it’s as bad as anywhere else.
I went on a hike at a national park in Scotland a few months ago, and they had a small cafe there with limited options for everyone. Even they had solid vegan options though. Blows my mind that this cafe was more welcoming than the majority of restaurants in a major liberal city.
The trends in NYC are kinda pro-meat but if you're a day-to-day vegetarian or looking for it, there's plenty. I can definitely see showing up at a NY restaurant and everything on the menu having beef tallow in it somehow.
There is a concept that my maternal grandmother had that they would always having their own husbandry (cows/buffalos) within her village and yes, they didn't eat eggs as well.
My maternal grandfather was a teacher which was a really prestigious job at that time, the only reason that they had their own cows was because of the belief. Reflecting upon it now, I believe it to be a good faith belief, they took care of the animals as well in terms of personal care from what I've heard of stories growing up, my mother still remembers some of the cows/buffalos and their names and other things so that's nice to hear as well :)
I wish this form of Veganism was more well-known. I know a few Vegans who went down a similar path and who were told by a few people they were no longer Vegan. They took the easier path and stopped calling themselves Vegans, which I thought was sad given their objectives when becoming Vegan were clear from the get-go.
It's by definition not vegan to consume animal products. I'm happy that the term is considered so virtuous that people want to self-identify as such (I've even heard meat-eaters say they're vegan "except from time to time"), but I don't think it's intolerant/bigoted to simply look at the definition.
I wish more Vegans were able to accept this form of spectrum that you are talking about. Food is quite a social thing.
JaidenAnimation has done a great video[0] summarizing something like this of her vegan journey and exactly this type of nuance as well, I highly recommend checking it out
Let me give you a personal example as well, I am Hindu and Milk is very very preferred where I live. Due to my taste preference, I dislike Milk but I am really expected to have something milk based so I like Yogurt.
Even just this small act of preference of yogurt rather than Milk which could seem pretty small has genuinely left my relatives asking many many questions and I am sometimes forced to drink milk when I go to people when I would prefer otherwise because of social pressure.
I can probably take vegan yogurt if I particularly want so but we take milk fresh from the milkman who owns the cow in their house. where I live, the way people treat animals in their house is a very ethical point of view, its basically like how pets are except they help in livelihood/income
So I have some sympathies to people who you are talking about. There is enough social pressure from the people around you.
More broadly speaking, Veganism might perhaps land better as a spectrum rather than a binary switch. It has a lot of things going for it which could help its future but at the same time, it gets a large amount of flack from a loud minority and bad clips
Jains in India are heavy consumers of dairy products. They consume honey too. Most of them would avoid vegetables that grow underground and avoid the use of leather. They’re generally a bit closer to orthodox Hindus in practice.
I think veganism in America went through a popular phase, then simply faded as a pop concept. Perhaps your experiences in the UK merely reflect that, there, it is just going through a temporary uptick of fad.
I always found it weird when people confidently speak from the wrong end. And the crab mentality of "it's only good there temporarily, then it'll.be the same shit as here" is tiring.
If you had lived in the UK, you'd understand that it's not about temporary vegan menus in restaurants but about the whole country, even in a chain in the middle of nowhere, having vegan alternatives and packaging for years and years.
That would suggest a fundamental difference in practical ethics between the two cultures.
It sounds like people over there in America don’t do things because they enjoy doing them or because they’re convinced that those are the right things to do, but rather they do them to impress others or improve their social standing.
It doesn’t sound right to me, I mean a culture can’t be so totally obsessed with the self.
Right, but that would mean the „Don’t tread on me” motto is also a type of persona assumed (like veganism) by people who like being perceived as tough and unruly because that’s respected.
(I guess „persona” would be a better word for it than „the self”.)
I think you've pinpointed the reason, although unintentionally: the US is so focused on culture wars that people can't visibly follow a vegan diet without being attacked for it.
You forgot 'signalling' which is what people in the West - not just the USA - are tired of. I know I am tired of it and I'm neither an American nor in the USA.
Stating that a whole country has problems with virtue is rather stigmatising and something you'd complain about if it were about any country in what some have taken to call the "global South".
> You forgot 'signalling' which is what people in the West - not just the USA - are tired of.
No, that's implicit. If I'm tired of rock music, that mostly comes into play when I'm exposed to it in some way.
> Stating that a whole country has problems with virtue is rather stigmatising
Speaking of, someone expressing their virtue -- and caring for the well being of sentient beings simply is, it's a capacity, and it annoys the people who lack it, because it raises the question why they lack it -- isn't automatically them "signalling" anything. That's just an attempt to stigmatise it.
If we don't have empathy with victims of that, who cares what we are "tired of"? We can torture animals, but don't stigmatise us, and don't talk about how you try to avoid feeding the systems that lead to animals being tortured. You can talk about how much you like your other new hobbies, but not this one. You cannot even wear a pin. Because we're so tired and you're so oppressive, with your virtue and your signals. Have empathy with my fear of empathy, basically.
I'm not even vegetarian but I'm more tired of that than them, because it's both evil and stupid, and projects that on vegans.
> something you'd complain about if it were about any country in what some have taken to call the "global South".
Many things play into this. One is the hesitation to punch down versus a superpower that spent many, many millions to signal, to broadcast, their virtue into the whole world for decades.
Oh you went with the "rather" instead of the "quite" that's interesting. Anyway if vegans want to say "I am vegan" you'd profit from taking just a second to ask yourself why you get reflexively pissy about it.
The sibling comment has more eloquent advice, but I'll add that you're neck deep in an echo chamber if that's how you react. Being vegan, mentioning that a country is difficult to live in as a vegan, in a thread about veganism, is not about signaling. Ask the next vegan who'd been to a Global South country instead of imagining people in your head: if it was a pain, they'll say it was a pain, there is no commentary about virtue in there.
It's been everywhere for decades - that's not the point. It's fadishness that is what may be going on here: restaurants are the tip of the spear of new trends.
Yeah sure. The world is full of (working) right-wing propaganda. People with "differences" (be it skin color or food taste) won't be catered for. So veganism will probably falter like DEI or other progressive initiatives.
But right now I don't think it's the case yet in the UK.
Not providing vegan options is morally equivalent to forcing Jews to have pork or non-Kosher meals or Muslims pork or non-Halal meals; it's mean spirited, insensitive, and/or disrespectful treatment. Plus, there are many major religious/ethnic groups that skew towards mandatory and high probability of veganism.
PSA: Meat ag is a danger to us all just on rational grounds: antibiotic resistance (bacteria evolution), pandemics (viral evolution), air-water-soil pollution, and climate change. For most Westerners, we have all kinds of food choices that are perfectly nutritious without inflicting all of the risks of unnecessary demand for meat. It will hopefully be eventually viewed in the distant future with such disdain and repugnance as cannibalism or consuming pets or exotic animals.
> It will hopefully be eventually viewed in the distant future with such disdain and repugnance as cannibalism or consuming pets or exotic animals
Hm, I fundamentally disagree and I sincerely hope there will ever be a time when meat consumption is viewed as equivalent to cannibalism. That sounds like a society I wouldn’t want to be a part of.
I’m surprised you’d come to such a drastic conclusion. I have nothing but respect for your right to eat the diet you choose, but it’s a shame that isn’t something you’re willing to extend to others.
You chose to throw in your two cents without addressing or admitting the facts, just to criticize and rationalize your own inaction.
When lifestyle choices put others at risk of pandemics and untreatable diseases, it becomes my problem. This makes you yet another normalized deviant projecting your unsustainable lifestyle choices on others and trying to shame others who dare to criticize abominable practices. Furthermore, predominant repugnant views of many people currently include enabling the genocide of Palestinians and Lebanese, death penalty, fossil fuel usage, and animal slaughter... these are no good.
And why don't you or anyone eat their pets? Besides distance, utility, and/or cuteness, there's no fundamental difference between wildlife, livestock, and pets when it comes to inflicting suffering.
(1) An inmate is not allowed (essentially, by the society) a specific diet dictated by his/her belief; and,
(2) A poor person cannot afford (essentially, because of the society) a nutritious and delicious meal dictated by his/her needs or wants.
What are the differences between them? Are there differences at all?
(1) is a negative liberty: freedom from being forced to eat a certain diet. (2) is a positive liberty: actual ability to eat a certain diet. Western society is still mostly blind to the latter type of liberty.
Similarly, everyone is free to own a home, but ensuring everyone has the means to actually do so is just not something politicians will even talk about, and is often labelled as "communist" or some other kind of thought-terminating label. Everyone is free, some people are just freer than others.
Well of course. If you want to know what a "right" is, legally, you need to reverse it.
For diet it is quite reasonable: a duty for certain products to be available for purchase (it does make clear that this right does not exist. A few vendors go out of business and your right to eat vegan goes with them)
For owning a home, this would be a duty for everyone else to build you a home, satisfying your requirements. One thing everyone agrees on is that other people do NOT have the right to force you to work. But that is the only way governments would be able to guarantee a right like this.
And, of course, one of the rights people demanded is the right to not participate in any right or duty that goes against your beliefs ... it is, of course, totally impossible to have this right and either of the other ones in society, or your rights would become very brittle indeed.
> For owning a home, this would be a duty for everyone else to build you a home, satisfying your requirements. One thing everyone agrees on is that other people do NOT have the right to force you to work. But that is the only way governments would be able to guarantee a right like this.
That's not how it works. The state isn't forcing doctors and nurse to cure you, it's collecting taxes from everyone to pay willing doctors and nurses to cure the population. Similarly, they could hire construction workers or buy homes and provide them for the general population.
Actually where I'm from the state has indeed decided budgets have priority over rights. In other words it works exactly as you say, as you suggest. So first BIG caveat in right to medical help is that only X people get treated for particular things, as budgeted. Even if the equipment and doctors are available (but of course those are getting "right-sized"). Even goes for access to GPs (there's a massive shortage of GPs, but the government is lowering the number of doctors)
You are number X+1 that needs treatment? Sucks. There's a waitlist. Which in a few cases is pretty bad. You have had a stroke and the doctor wants an MRI, to check for bleeding. The MRI machines are being synergized (meaning a bunch of smaller hospitals only have access by moving patients to a bigger hospital). They can't book a surgeon without confirmation of bleeding (well not without entering the waitlist at the end, without priority, and with a stroke in progress you might as well just book an undertaker). In the best case now you're being moved (you pay for this), potentially with a ripped artery. Best of luck.
There's also more temporary accidents, such as refusing to hire foreign doctors, even where that means parts of the country have to do with insufficient capacity in certain departments or even (in the mountains for now) zero capacity. In theory anything with a waitlist over 2 months is considered insufficient capacity, but if you take that definition, close to 40% of all departments have insufficient capacity. And it's getting worse (Ukraine war, tarriffs, EU lending, Iran war, ... all resulted in extra savings and less capacity)
The same is happening in schools. The law clearly states you have the right to kindergarten < 2km from your home, primary school <10km and secondary <20km). For "special needs" education this has become a total joke, even in parts of the capital this is no longer available. But even in normal schooling none of those are still reality. Or other issues, like the fact that the government guarantees temperatures in schools above 18 degrees, and below 32 degrees (heat index, not pure temperature. Essentially it's 32 degrees at 100% humidity, goes up with 1 degree for every 10% humidity drops). Kids have that right in education. Aside from the free school for EU expats' children in Brussels there isn't a single primary school with air-conditioning. Not even the one the royal family uses for their children. The temperature hit 40 degrees, apparently over 45 degrees in some classrooms. They did discipline some teachers for teaching in the grass outside of the classroom after parent complaints, of course.
That's also a way to look at rights, I guess. Namely that they are "weak guidelines" and you don't have any way to enforce them against the government and everything just completely erodes over time.
I guess it's true what they say: you can pay market price or you can have shortages. Pick your poison.
The trend in the US has been to hide the word ‘vegan’ from consumers and bury it in their website somewhere. Not so in the UK. Brands seem super happy about showing which products in their selection are vegan. No list of ‘secretly/accidentally vegan’ products over there, they happily let you know right in the packaging.
People there are generally more aware of veganism too. No need to explain what it is like I constantly do in the US. ‘Can vegans eat eggs?’ What part of ‘no animal products’ don’t you understand?