The Death of the Vegetarian | Hacker News Reader

The Death of the Vegetarian

telegraph.co.uk

23 pointsindigodaddy34 comments

I have stopped reading articles titled "the rise of" and "the death of". They are either pure clickbait, or a story about a dozen people.

This one is no exception.

As a lifelong vegetarian, the article is spot-on. At least with respect to the replacement of vegetarian options with vegan options in restaurants (in the US vegetarian options are dwindling and vegan options rising). And also very much so with regard to the overall disdain of the vegan community of vegetarians. A typical vegan has less respect for a vegetarian than even a meat-eater.

"Considering the vast abyss of our Galaxy, and sweep of our solar system and even just our wide world, it doesn't seem like I really eat much cheese."

Hmm, as a lifelong vegetarian, I guess I haven't noticed (or possibly cared about) any vegan scorn, but I don't have any problem eating the dishes on the menu marked V-for-Vegan, so in general the trend seems fine to me (with the possible exception of vegan cheeses, which are not very tasty, but worse, not very nutritious either; and fake meats, which are sometimes nutritious but I just find odd).

I think the menu trend makes sense. "Vegetarian" has so many permutations that I think it'd be hard for a restaurant to mark a dish that way. "Vegan" has a much more well defined definition.

I don't think anyone would look at a menu item marked vegetarian and expect anything else than it not containing meat. People say they're vegetarian but eat fish sometimes, etc. but it's different for an actual meal. Nobody would call fried fish a vegetarian meal.

If it were in an Indian restaurant you would expect the vegetarian option to also not contain eggs, as eggs are considered meat for many Hindus. On the other hand, in a Thai restaurant the vegetarian option might contain shrimp paste.

As a meat-eater, I definitely respect vegans more because they have a clear ideological reasoning and don't rationalize. Vegetarianism seems really milquetoast in comparison, assuming it's not done for health reasons. It's the dietary equivalent of what an enthusiastic reader of The Economist is to politics: no real plan, just continuing with the status quo without really understanding why.

What do you see as vegetarian rationalization?

It seems reasonable to me that someone may have no trouble with animal products so long as they don't involve killing or inhumane conditions.

Well, that fact that the dairy industry is very inhumane and involves killing animals.

There isn't really an animal-using industry that involves humane conditions. Most justifications to the contrary are usually in bad faith, such as citing mom and pop farms or whatever as if that were even remotely the bulk of the sourcing. Even the fact of breeding animals specifically for harvest is already terrible, no matter if it's done by a kindly old couple or not. You would never treat a being whose life you value in this way.

> assuming it's not done for health reasons

Do you have more respect for health-conscious cannibals than those that just like the taste?

The reasons never matter; it's what is done that matters.

It's not about the reason, but rather the act of living in an authentic and bold manner and not making up excuses to assuage your guilt. You can respect one trait of the person while not approving of them in general. And sometimes more respect will really just mean less contempt, all else being equal.

So if there are any feelings of guilt, you can't respect them, then you can only respect sociopaths.

No, guilt is fine. Trying to avoid or sidestep the guilt through rationalization decreases respect. Though if we are talking about sociopaths, the base respect is low enough that it doesn't make much of a difference.

I'm a lifelong vegetarian. I agree the ethics of eggs and dairy aren't great. FWIW I primarily eat eggs from chickens I know personally.

I've been a vegetarian since I was a child. My parents are not. I went to public school and had government subsidized school lunch. A no-dairy meal with sufficient calories was simply not an option. It was also generally much harder to maintain a vegetarian diet say 20 years ago than a vegan diet today."Salads don't make friends."

I'm basically just set in my ways now and live with the hypocrisy. Until they perfect the CRISPR bugs that make casein from plants I'll continue to eat cheese made from animal milk.

own a pair of leather boots, purchased new as well. It's not fair to the cow, but they last 5x as long as any comparable shoe made from synthetic material. Do I contradict myself, very well then blah blah blah

https://64.media.tumblr.com/e238fe868189a39c4903ce7b7bb1a7b7...

Such a refreshing comment.

I get it. I'm default vegan but bought some brie to enjoy tonight as a treat, wear leather shoes etc.

People want to be black and white. Sometimes just reducing the harm on yourself and animals and the environment to a large degree is enough, while still being able to enjoy and benefit from them just a bit here and there

>I get it. I'm default vegan but bought some brie to enjoy tonight as a treat, wear leather shoes etc.

You are not vegan.

We can't confuse the idea of seeing the world as less black and white, and outright changing definitions.

You wouldn't say "Oh I'm default teetotaler, but I bought a bottle of gin as a treat for tonight"

If you want to identify as vegan, that's probably because you see the label as having some value. But for it to have value, it must mean something!

Who cares? That person does far more than most to reduce animal harm and environmental impact. They called themselves default vegan, which is a lot like saying "I don't usually drink".

A lot of people doing mostly the right thing is a lot better than the same people thinking it's pointless to try.

Exactly. If you think about that with every breath we take and step we take we are “killing” organisms without even knowing it, the “just do the best we can” approach starts to become the most reasonable one— else it’s easy to get a bit crazy about things.

I just find the rationalization amusing, though I doubt it will matter either way. Since the rate of adoption of this diet is so slow, and the relative proportion of daily meat-eaters keeps growing as countries develop, we'll either face the consequences or find a technical solution long before it has an impact.

> (in the US vegetarian options are dwindling and vegan options rising)

I think you must mean "option," singular. In most restaurants, not counting salad, if a veggie entree is there at all, it is one single menu option.

It should be easy to eat vegan or vegetarian, and easy to eat healthy in general, but it definitely is not. For some twisted reason (greed, probably), there is at least a little animal product and copious amounts of salt, sugar and weird chemicals in nearly everything. What we need is a crazy vegan/vegetarian billionaire to come along and flood the food market with healthy food options, so you'd have to go out of your way to eat crap, pretty much the opposite of the way it is now and has been for a long time.

How often do you go out to restaurants?

If I go out I want to indulge myself, not calorie count.

> How often do you go out to restaurants?

Leas and less, and I live in a rural area with many horrid examples, but I like Americana grills, and I order off the menu because there is nothing on those menus without meat, usually ordering a cheesesteak without the meat, add some more peppers and mushrooms to compensate. There actually is a vegan/vegetarian restaurant in this one horse town, but like all others I have experienced, the menu tries too hard to be interesting, unrecognizably so, and the menu items are 3-5 times more expensive than a burger, fries and a coke, which I no longer eat. They only serve pasta cold in salad, leaving that whole pasta world that could easily be vegan unaddressed. And I definitely don't care about too many calories, the major concern here is not getting enough calories. If not for bread, rice and pasta, which I eat at home with whatever fruit and vegetables I have that haven't spoiled, I would have starved long ago. The tomato is the most versatile fruit I know, and I eat slices as though they were raw meat.

Ok. Your post seemed to be coming from a health perspective.

I don't really want my restaurant food being healthy, I want it to be nice I can eat healthily at home.

But then I don't mind expensive restaurants. Id rather have something expensive and nice occasionally than having something I could have cooked better myself.

I wish I could eat your food. The fact is, I'm not creative. What do you eat at home?

All sorts.

My vegetarian repertoire is limited though.

I would recommend yotam ottolenghi's mejedra https://mustardwithmutton.com/2015/09/22/ottolenghis-mejadra...

More generally I would just look out for recipe books that inspire you, once you've learnt a few different cusinines and have all the spices etc you get a feeling for what works. My 'creativity' just comes from creating something from the food that's in the fridge.

Italian and Indian tend to be the best cuisines I've found with regards to not requiring meat. Far Eastern is ok too, if you eat shrimp paste, oyster sauce etc.

Thanks!

You made some pretty wild claims there, about the vegan community as a whole, and then about a typical vegan.

I don’t really see why a vegan option isn’t considered vegetarian. Does it have to contain milk, eggs or honey to be acceptable?

When I was vegetarian, I ate at vegan places for years without really being aware of the difference - all I cared about was not eating meat, and I don’t remember thinking “this doesn’t feel complete without cheese” or anything.

It's a throwaway line, but I take issue at the idea that you can't get vegetarian meals in a tiny French village. Any traditional culinary setup is going to have at least a plurality of vegetarian options due to meat not always having been affordable and people experimenting with what they have. It's only when you weaken the link between food and cultural history that you end up with a lopsided menu (or maybe you are in a specific situation such as surviving on mostly seal blubber for generations), so you're paradoxically more likely to run into vegetarian problems in modern restaurants as described in the article than in a place with traditional cooking.

Yeah, in a small Italian village you're just as likely to find vegatable-only food.

In a weird way, it's become harder to eat traditional vegetables (say, edible wild weeds salad) than some tropical import.

https://web.archive.org/web/20220627132530/https://www.teleg...

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