So they're precisely vegan, with fish.
There is no gray area when it comes to veganism. Just because there is no word for that diet, does not mean you can just twist the definition of vegan for your convenience.
You could easily just say your a pescatarian who doesn’t eat dairy or eggs, and that would be more correct.
Vegan Puritanism is totally antithetical to our collective goal of reducing animal suffering. Rather than being motivated by the prospect of claiming moral superiority, our goal should be to help the animals.
You can reduce harm, but you cannot call yourself vegan until you actually eliminate the possibility of eating animals or their products from your life. There is no reason you HAVE to eat fish.
There's no policing body here, but people are rightfully calling the double-standard out here.
Edit: Would also love to hear the ethics of why fish can be eaten when cows/chicken/pigs cannot. Doesn't sound ethically consistent to me at all.
Fish aren’t lesser beings, they are living creatures like anything else.
Just stop saying “vegan except fish”. Say you eat plants and fish. That’s all you have to do.
I don't know why you take offense to someone saying "vegan except for beef" or "vegan except for fish." There is nothing inherently wrong with these statements. It just depends on whether you view veganism as a lifestyle or as a diet, which can vary depending on the context. In the context of a nutrition study, we are obviously talking about the diet, not the lifestyle.
Should the study filter out people who eat entirely plant-based for reasons other than ethics. because according to you, that’s not a true vegan diet.
I think you are largely correct that veganism is a lifestyle, not a diet. But in the context in which my comment was made, it was perfectly reasonable for me to say “vegan except for fish,” because the study was analyzing veganism as a diet, not as an ethical lifestyle.
What you are talking about is the Plant Based Diet, which minimizes but doesn't fully exclude animal products, and is not an ethical framework.
You might as well say "I eat Kosher except for pork". It's nonsense.
Just an observation I have found recently.
I am a pesca-pescaterian, btw.
I've been vegan for 15+ years, and I'm willing to say there are zero health benefits over a healthy omnivorous diet. The people who find one are misattributing it. It's not that vegan is healthier, just that what they were doing before was decidedly unhealthy. For a lot of people going vegan is the first time they actually think about what they eat, read labels etc, which is where most of the benefit comes from.
Everyone is different, but if you weren't actually able to hit protein macros then I think that's a skill that isn't too hard to improve for most people (if they have a decent reason for wanting to go vegan in the first place).