Veganism seems to fall so obviously out of leftist beliefs, there are definitely other ways to get there but even if you are a speciest animal ag is so wantonly destructive, intensive, exploitative, colonial, and abusive to human workers not being against it is a big question mark.
I want to be charitable to people, I understand that deprogramming yourself can take a while, but when people have been aware that veganism is an option for months/years without taking any material steps… I dunno, are you just a treatlerite mad you don’t have enough treats?
Has anyone had any real progress making other leftists they meet vegan? I’ve only managed to get three people to permanently adopt the philosophy in my life. None of those were particularly leftist, just justice sympathetic.
edit: I actually want to hear from other vegans in the vegan comm. Shocking I know.
Hey thanks, that’s an interesting write up.
I feel like I’m the only person in the world who read a paper on zebra fish behaviour modification after apitoxin envenomation and looked up from it to say “Hey, zebra fish modify their behaviour in a way that suggests they are less optimistic about finding food after their lips are envenomed. I think we need to go vegan.”
My wife, who is amazing, just agreed after I explained the paper.
I’ve honestly been quite shocked at how that paper hasn’t worked on anyone else haha.
Can you post a link to the paper?
Might have been this one: https://www.wellbeingintlstudiesrepository.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1051&context=acwp_asie
There was another by the same group I think where they reverse the behaviour modifications by giving the fishies a shot of opiates, and then they stop hiding and rubbing their faces.
edit: I should add why I found this so morally concerning; it hints very strongly at an experience of pain, not just nociception. They don’t just run from a bad stimulus, they nurse the site and become more cautious. Something which is hard to explain except if you suppose that like us they have some persistent emotional state which affects how they judge appropriate behaviours. Additionally rubbing, which is commonly observed in humans, indicates an attempt to sooth a spot after harm.
We were ovo pesco at the time and it just made me realise that if fish, which diverged from land animals how many millions of years ago, likely shared so much in the experience of pain including nursing behaviours and becoming more cautious then either these behaviours are highly convergent and frequently occuring or they are very old. Both hinting that consciousness might be extremely similar between living beings.
In other words, Nirvana lied and fish probably do have feelings and that is a horrifying realisation considering how they’re treated. If fish, what new discovery would I wait for before pleading “how could I have known?” why not just take a proper and coherent stance against suffering and draw the line at the presence of a nervous system since it’s very doable.