AIBU to be irritated by people who describe themselves as Vegetarian yet who happily eat fish!

[Housewife2010]

I know several friends & work colleagues who describe themselves as Vegetarian, but they eat fish. Why not just say that they don't eat meat? I didn't think that a fish was a plant!

• Asking for the veggie option = fine.

• Using the term 'vegetarian' to explain the requirements of a child with ASD who doesn't want to eat meat = fine - as long as you aren't asking for fish. Otherwise it's confusing caterers and hosts, just say 'he doesn't/can't eat meat'.

• Calling yourself a vegetarian when you eat

meat or fish = a big fat lie that rebounds on actual vegetarians.

• Confusing vegetarian and vegan - a mistake or misunderstanding. Vegetarians eat dairy and some of them eat eggs, vegans don't eat either.

I can see how all you hardcore veges would hate all the fake veges jumping on your bandwagon.

If plants don't feel pain, how come aspirin stops their 'pain response', huh?

Jasmonic acid serves the same purpose that prostaglandin serves in animals. Production of jasmonic acid in one injured plant triggers its production in neighbouring plants (that's your beetle thing).

Additionally, plants release a sharp burst of electrical activity when cut - which triggers a release of jasmonic acid in neighbouring plants. This has been likened to a cry of pain.

Plants have no central nervous system, as far as we know, so the word "pain" shouldn't be used to describe these reactions. They are remarkably similar to the pain mechanism in animals, though ...

Hi i am new to adding things on here. I often get asked if i am a vegetarian when we are out if i order a vegy meal. The problem i have is that i am allergic to fish and beef and i just eat pork (bacon or chops) i do not like the other meats and only eat poultry of cicken and turkey. My body's system can not take it.Most of the work meals i went to only have beef so i get stuck with pasta and vegetables. The only time i could eat beef was when i was pregnant in 2003 with my daughter. This time i am having a son and i can only eat my normal food no fish or beef i get sick quickly. He loves his potatoes and all the vegetables which is good midwife said i have lost weight. 14 weeks to go and already he will not let me sleep in peace.

errr, as we all know, fish is an animal and vegetarians don't eat animals & animal products, including 'invisible' ones such as gelatine etc.

oh and as a person who only eats fruits & veggies, i don't wear leather, buy leather bags, sofas etc.

people do ask me if i eat fish. and i explain them that vegetarians only eat fruits and vegs and as far as i know, fish is not vegetable :)

YANBU. People ask if DS is vegetarian, which he is to all intents and purposes, except he could eat fish, so he isn't truly vegetarian. I use the word 'fishatarian' which is obviously incorrect but 'pescetarian' sounds wanky.

YANBU

Trouble is if you're not a vegetarian people assume that you'll eat any meat. I don't usually like to eat great big hunks of meat because it seems like you have to chew forever and I don't really like the taste.

I'm picky about the meat I eat because of tatse rather than ethics.

i was a veggie for years, and then a few years ago starting to eat fish occasionally (salmon, haddock and sardines basically). I still say that I'm vegetarian if someone asks in the context of what I might eat, because most fish I don't eat and it saves them cooking/ serving something I then say 'oh but I don't eat that' once it's on the table... I know I'm not but it's too boring to start explaining what I do/ don't eat in specifics.

ravenAK, you are my dietary rationale twin - and I totally agree with you that these days I would have chosen to still eat meat but only that with humane provenance!

I have not eaten meat or poultry for many years and I have to admit that I (quite without thinking) describe my eating habits to people as "I'm basically vegetarian but I do eat fish"...

Now before I am lambasted by you veggies, allow me to explain myself. When I decided not to eat any more meat or poulty in 1988 the technical term was "pesco-vegetarian" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pescetarianism and anyone who didn't eat meat was considered a bit of a wierdo or "going through a phase".

Indeed, I did spend a fruitless first few months using that term but not one person had a clue what I was talking about - not even my veggie friends! In order to describe it in terms that people could understand and thus avoid being served up with chunks of meat or chicken I came up with the above phrase which has simply become my automatic answer.

However, 22 years on and times have changed - I guess people do understand a lot more about different dietary requirements these days so maybe I'll try pescetarian for a while and see how it goes. If that doesn't pan out, how about "semi vegetarian"?

So, yanbu I suppose, and I apologise if my behaviour has led to any veggies being presented with fish - I was just trying to avoid being given the food I have chosen to reject. All I can say in my defense is that I didn't do it to blacken the name of vegetarianism and I'll never do it again m'lud!

oi, hideycatownerperson, I went veggie in 1987 and as far as I'm aware the only people who thought it was weird were boring middle aged or elderly adults whose opinions I didn't care about.

Now I am a boring adult of a certain age... oddly enough I consider my own opinions quite sensible and rational.

everyone can eat what they want.

Why should other people be consistent, when I myself am not?

I do not eat bugs (was offered them in Thailand and mexico(, or dog (China(, or squirrel, or even veal.

Everyone draws the line somewhere.

MiladyDeSummer I think the only problem with you calling yourself vegetarian (besides the fact that you aren't) for most people on here..Is it confuses the word. Again people think I am being fussy because I won't just eat a bit of chicken. Or have some sort of casserole and pick the chicken out (I hate that most of all...

You either are a vegetarian or you aren't... It would be like me saying I'm a sometimes virgin because I haven't had any for a couple weeks!

lol at not eating bugs. I am having visions of a market in China with lots of interesting food on display!

I try not to eat meat but I do eat fish (so long as someone else cooks it because I don't really have a hand with fish). I try to have a vegetarian diet but I like sushi now and again and I sometimes eat a steak.

I was never that wild about meat but occasionally I like it.

I tend to have stopped listening at all when I hear the word 'vegetarian'

I would define vegetarian as not eating anything with a face. So YANBU.

I like the face or heartbeat definition. But wouldn't people then assume you'd eat oysters or worse? Blergh...

Anyway several more sober articulate posters have put across my point very succinctly. It's certainly true that it gets very boring describing / listening to the ins and outs of a weirdy diet where fish and chicken are eaten rarely and then only some types and only if cooked in a certain way zzzzzzzz - it's like hearing about other people's dreams in detail So for that reason they use it. "More or less vegetarian" I think was the phrase.

But yes I do see that it's easier to keep the term for actual vegetarians so as not to do them a disservice. I have been served fish (because DH mentioned that I eat some types) and couldn't even stand to look at it so when people have gone to a lot of extra expense and trouble it is very embarrassing.

Also toying with MiladyDeMoreOrLessAVirgin as a name-change. Thanks for making me chuckle when I opened this thread in dread sanielle!

sanielle

i am not a vegetarian at all - in fact I'm a rampant carnivore - but I don't eat haddock, cod or tuna because they are critically over fished, and we will be lucky to have any left in 20 years.

For goodness sake, there is nothing wrong with ANY of the fish in the fish mongers - why focus on cod, haddock and tuna to the point of destroying this planet's biodiversity?

the people who turn their nose up at me eating a tasty little wild rabbit (and serving it to my children!) are the very same ones who say "Oh, I only like cod" - as if they could magically taste the difference between cod and pollack once it has parsley sauce on!

Yanbu, I'm a "proper vegetarian" (no meat, fish, gelatine, leather, only free range eggs) but I have in the past been offered fish or chicken as the vegetarian option because people get confused about what vegetarian means.

Same as Marjee, been a V for many years, don't wear leather, check for gelatine etc I often get offered fish in restaurants as a vegetarian option.

I suppose the difficulty is that people have different principals. I would count myself as a "proper vegetarian". I've never eaten meat or fish, but I eat eggs and dairy, gelatine and I wear leather. That's because I don't like the taste of mean/fish, but I'm not really a veggie by morals - my parents were veggie when I was a child and it stuck. Interestingly (or not ) out of my 6 siblings and me, I'm the only one who has never eaten meat or fish.

oops principles