Pledge to Be Vegan for Lent! "As we do to the least, so we do to Him." Help make this world a kinder place for all God's creatures by pledging to be vegan for Lent. This time of year, many men and women of God will choose to abstain from various foods or practices in observance of Lent, and I am giving up animal products by going vegan. There's never been a better time to cut the meat and other animal-derived products out of your diet. With the huge selection of delicious vegan meats and alternatives to dairy foods and eggs that are available, it's never been easier to go vegan! To take action on this issue, click on the link below: https://secure.peta.org/site/Advocacy?s_oo=_l878arEcQk8B0DtcJJR5w..&id=2847 You have just taken the first step toward a healthier and more compassionate life. Being vegan has never been easier, and we're here to help! For delicious recipes and nutritional information, visit our "Vegetarian Starter Kit" online. A vegan diet is truly a lifesaver: Vegans and vegetarians are less likely to suffer from heart disease, obesity, and several types of cancer, according to the American Dietetic Association. Plus, vegan foods are delicious! The following are our "Top Five Tips for Making the Switch": 1. Make vegan versions of your favorite meals. "Veg up" your favorite recipes simply by replacing the meat with other foods. For example, replace the beef in burritos with beans, guacamole, and grilled veggies, or try vegan beef crumbles from Morningstar Farms or Boca. Make spaghetti with marinara sauce and add roasted vegetables as well as vegan meatballs or sausage (try Nate's brand or GimmeLean). 2. Explore delicious vegan recipes. You'll be amazed by the variety of tasty vegan options, from classic American dishes to Italian and Creole. People tell us all the time that being vegan exposed them to an array of flavors and foods they never knew existed. 3. Try tasty faux meats and dairy alternatives. Sample the ever-growing lineup of mock meats - including vegan burgers, hot dogs, turkey deli slices, riblets, and chicken patties - and the vast array of tasty alternatives to dairy products, like vegan cream cheese, yogurt, and ice cream. Some of the most popular brands include Boca, Gardenburger, Morningstar Farms, and Silk. 4. Sample microwaveable meals and convenience foods. Always on the run? Check out the variety of vegan microwavable meals in your local grocery store's freezer aisle, like Amy's Black Bean Enchilada With Spanish Rice, Fantastic Foods' Vegetarian 3-Bean Chili, and Yves' Thai Lemongrass Veggie Chick'n. There are many quick and easy vegan snacks, including basics like fresh fruit and PB&J and unique options like Tofurky Jerky and Silk Live! soy-yogurt smoothies. 5. Find vegan-friendly restaurants in your area. Whatever your budget and wherever you live, you can enjoygreat vegan meals. Many national chains, like Johnny Rockets, sell tasty veggie burgers and other animal-friendly options. Thank you again for taking the Pledge to Be Vegan for Lent, but there's no reason that your vegan diet has to last only 40 days. During and after the Lenten season, please visit VegCooking.com and GoVeg.com to find all the resources that you'll need to stick with your cruelty-free diet. Best of luck! Sincerely, Jenny Lou Browning Vegan Special Projects Coordinator

Pledge to Be Vegan for Lent! "As we do to the least, so we do to Him." Help make this world a kinder place for all God's creatures by pledging to be vegan for Lent.

 

 

This time of year, many men and women of God will choose to abstain from various foods or practices in observance of Lent, and I am giving up animal products by going vegan.

There's never been a better time to cut the meat and other animal-derived products out of your diet.

With the huge selection of delicious vegan meats and alternatives to dairy foods and eggs that are available, it's never been easier to go vegan!
To take action on this issue, click on the link below:
https://secure.peta.org/site/Advocacy?s_oo=_l878arEcQk8B0DtcJJR5w..&id=2847

You have just taken the first step toward a healthier and more compassionate life. Being vegan has never been easier, and we're here to help! For delicious recipes and nutritional information, visit our "Vegetarian Starter Kit" online.
A vegan diet is truly a lifesaver: Vegans and vegetarians are less likely to suffer from heart disease, obesity, and several types of cancer, according to the American Dietetic Association. Plus, vegan foods are delicious!
The following are our "Top Five Tips for Making the Switch":
1. Make vegan versions of your favorite meals. "Veg up" your favorite recipes simply by replacing the meat with other foods. For example, replace the beef in burritos with beans, guacamole, and grilled veggies, or try vegan beef crumbles from Morningstar Farms or Boca. Make spaghetti with marinara sauce and add roasted vegetables as well as vegan meatballs or sausage (try Nate's brand or GimmeLean).
2. Explore delicious vegan recipes.
You'll be amazed by the variety of tasty vegan options, from classic American dishes to Italian and Creole. People tell us all the time that being vegan exposed them to an array of flavors and foods they never knew existed.
3. Try tasty faux meats and dairy alternatives.
Sample the ever-growing lineup of mock meats - including vegan burgers, hot dogs, turkey deli slices, riblets, and chicken patties - and the vast array of tasty alternatives to dairy products, like vegan cream cheese, yogurt, and ice cream. Some of the most popular brands include Boca, Gardenburger, Morningstar Farms, and Silk.
4. Sample microwaveable meals and convenience foods.
Always on the run? Check out the variety of vegan microwavable meals in your local grocery store's freezer aisle, like Amy's Black Bean Enchilada With Spanish Rice, Fantastic Foods' Vegetarian 3-Bean Chili, and Yves' Thai Lemongrass Veggie Chick'n. There are many quick and easy vegan snacks, including basics like fresh fruit and PB&J and unique options like Tofurky Jerky and Silk Live! soy-yogurt smoothies.
5. Find vegan-friendly restaurants in your area.
Whatever your budget and wherever you live, you can enjoygreat vegan meals. Many national chains, like Johnny Rockets, sell tasty veggie burgers and other animal-friendly options.
Thank you again for taking the Pledge to Be Vegan for Lent, but there's no reason that your vegan diet has to last only 40 days. During and after the Lenten season, please visit VegCooking.com and GoVeg.com to find all the resources that you'll need to stick with your cruelty-free diet.
Best of luck!
Sincerely,
Jenny Lou Browning
Vegan Special Projects Coordinator

World Day for 'Farmed Animals' (October 2) is morose because the tragedy of animal agriculture is needless and cruel

Unlike World Vegetarian Day (October 1, which is happy and festive), World Day for 'Farmed Animals' (October 2)  is more morose, on the spirit of remembering genocides and holocausts because of the sheer needless tragedy of meat production in the modern world.

Corey Wrenn's critique of Vegan Outreach literature

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A critique of Vegan Outreach literature

September 6, 9:37 PMRoanoke Vegan ExaminerCorey Wrenn

                   Downed calves:  direct result of the dairy industry.

 

Popular utilitarian welfarist group, Vegan Outreach, maintains that in order to help non-human animals now, we must adopt a strategy which aims to reduce suffering, regardless of means.  However, there are critical inconsistencies, misconceptions, and outright misuses of terminology which undermine any real benefit to non-human animals.  Despite their self-designation as a “[…] nonprofit organization dedicated to reducing animal suffering by promoting a vegan lifestyle,” Vegan Outreach in fact hinders veganism with notions of extremism and promotion of reductionism or vegetarianism.

Veganism as Extremist

Vegan Outreach states in their 2009 “Why Vegan” pamphlet:

Being vegan isn’t about being perfect or pure—it’s about reducing suffering (14).
 

The 2002 version states:

Being vegan isn’t about avoiding a list of ingredients […] (14).
 

The 2008 Guide to Cruelty-Free Eating furthers that veganism can be difficult:

[…] especially if you try to change too fast or hold yourself to too high a standard.  The important thing is to do the best you can (30).
 

It’s a good thing that society doesn’t hold the same low standards for rapists.  It would be great news for molesters everywhere if they could avoid moral obligations by simply doing the best they can.

Remember:  Continuing to eat cheese while avoiding meat and eggs does much more good than scrapping the whole idea because you can’t be completely consistent (Guide to Cruelty-Free Eating 30).
 

The implication in the above quotes is that veganism is somehow difficult, unobtainable, militant, or even utopian.  Rather than defining veganism as a moral refusal to participate in violence or the absolute baseline required for taking the exploitation and use of non-human animals seriously, veganism, is instead framed as one of many opportunities for reducing suffering.  In effect, this statement refutes the moral necessity of veganism and opens the door to reductionism.  If veganism isn’t about being perfect or pure, what’s the harm in sneaking a donut with your morning coffee?

Sneaking that whey-tainted donut might be acceptable for Vegan Outreach:

For instance, it can be prohibitively expensive and time-consuming to shun every minor or hidden animal-derived ingredient.  More importantly, avoiding an ever-increasing list of these ingredients can make us appear obsessive, and thus lead others to believe that compassionate living is impossible. This defeats our purpose:  ending cruelty to animals!” (Guide to Cruelty-Free Eating 2008: 24)
 

Apparently having moral consistency and absolute abstinence against an evil is obsessive.  Does the same go for child abuse, rape, murder, or cannibalism?  Would it be acceptable to beat a child to avoid appearing obsessive?  Is it impossible to completely abstain from beating a child?  Of course it is, and there’s nothing obsessive about holding abstinence from violence and wrongdoing as the absolute baseline.

Vegetarianism and Reductionism as Progress

We can already see progress in just the past decade—public concern for farmed animals’ interests and condemnation of factory farms, as well as more vegetarians, near-vegetarians, and vegetarian products (A Meaningful Life:  Making a real Difference in Today’s World 2008: 14)
 

Is reductionism and vegetarianism really progress?  Is the underlying moral injustice being addressed if we continue to participate in non-human animal use?  Is the focus on factory farms and the ignoring of exploitation in “humane” farming progress?

Despite the organization’s name, “Vegan” Outreach, the organization is merely an animal advocacy organization which utilizes veganism as one of many tools to reduce suffering:

In order to prevent the most suffering, it’s important we each take an approach we can sustain.  After reviewing this booklet, some people may decide to go vegan immediately; others may choose to eat fewer animal products and explore more vegetarian meals.  […] …veganism is best viewed as a tool for reducing suffering (Why Vegan 2009:  14).
 

The notion of veganism, vegetarianism, and reductionism as mere tools is perhaps most evident in their publication and distribution of the “Try Vegetarian!” pamphlet:

[…] eating vegetarian is likely the most effortless—and enjoyable!—way to have a profoundly positive impact as often as every day” (Try Vegetarian 2003).
 

As an organization that openly advocates vegetarianism, is it really appropriate to operate under the name, “Vegan Outreach?”

Vegan Outreach’s 2008 “Guide to Cruelty-Free Eating,” intended for meat eaters, vegetarians, and vegans alike, presents a results-based approach:

When you first discover the reality of modern animal agriculture, avoiding all producers from factory farms might seem too big a change.  But don’t be overwhelmed—just take small steps.  For example, you could eliminate meat from certain meals or on certain days.  As you get used to eating less meat and find alternatives you enjoy, it may become easier to eliminate meat altogether (Guide to Cruelty-Free Eating 2008: 3).
 

As a vegan outreach organization, it seems strange that veganism is not promoted as a baseline, but here, reductionism is suggested to be morally acceptable and consistent. Furthermore, this statement specifically targets factory farming.  Support of “humane” farming, then, could logically be assumed by readers to constitute a “small step.”  After all, it’s all about reducing suffering, right?

Ultimately, living with compassion means striving to maximize the good we accomplish, not following a set of rules or trying to fit a certain label.  From eating less meat to being vegan, our actions are only a means to an end:  decreasing suffering (Guide to Cruelty-Free Eating 2008: 3)
 

Can reduction of suffering ever truly be accomplished and can abolition of non-human animal use ever be reached so long as so-called vegan organizations maintain that the exploitation of non-human animals is sometimes acceptable?

For every person you persuade to become vegetarian, dozens of farmed animals will be spared from suffering each year! (A Meaningful Life 2008: 23)
 

The argument that vegetarianism somehow makes a real difference for non-human animals is an empirical fallacy.  There is no continuum whereby vegetarians necessarily progress to veganism.  Further, vegetarianism does nothing to challenge the property status of non-human animals.  Often, vegetarianism causes more suffering than it reduces in that many vegetarians simply replace non-human animal flesh with non-human animal excretions.  Milk, eggs, and other non-flesh non-human animal products involve far more suffering than that of flesh.


Veganism as the Moral Baseline

Vegan Outreach posits:

The question isn’t, “Is this vegan?” but, “What is best for preventing suffering?” (Guide to Cruelty-Free Eating 3)
 

The answer to that question is:  “GO VEGAN.”  Veganism is the only moral choice if we truly want to reduce suffering, respect the moral standing of non-human animals, and ultimately reach total abolition of non-human animal use.  There’s nothing hard about it, there’s nothing obsessive about it, and there’s nothing inconsistent about it.
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