NC for this as friend knows I'm on here.
A close friend of mine is a vegan, let's call her VF. I love her and she's wonderful. But shes become very preachy about veganism and it's getting to me. It really is constant. It seems like nothing else matters - non-vegans are ruining the planet. She has said she is depressed because those around her (presumably me) don't see the damage they are doing to the planet. From what I understand, for her it's more about the environment than about animal welfare.
I have no problem with veganism- but VF drives everywhere, goes on probably on average of 4 long haul holidays per year and has a dog that she feeds meat. All of these things have an environmental impact too.
We have a car but it gets used maybe once a month- we walk, cycle or sometimes use public transport. We have maybe 1 or 2 holidays a year and very occasionally fly longhaul. We buy local and seasonal. We don't eat meat often but when we do we buy very high welfare meat. We do however eat a fair amount of seafood. We probably eat meat/seafood free meals about 50% of the week. We do consume a lot of milk a lot but we have a toddler. (She was pretty harsh when I switched DC from breast milk to cows milk at 1 year old, not to mention that fact that having DC is hugely damaging to the planet).
Our milk is from a local organic dairy, is delivered in glass bottles which are reusable. I think the milk travels less than 10 miles. Her almond milk is sold in non recyclable cartons, is made from almonds that are grown in and then flown all the way from California, where they have frequent water shortages.
I'm not sure I can agree that drinking almond milk is saving the planet here!
She will eat foods containing palm oil but not eggs. We get a lot of our eggs from my FIL who has chickens. He spends a lot of time keeping the chickens safe - I know a lot of people with chickens and they regularly get killed by foxes. They give FIL eggs and he keeps them fed and safe from the foxes - seems like a mutually beneficial relationship to me? If they were "liberated" they would be dead in hours. How is eating their eggs worse than eating palm oil which is having huge environmental impacts? (I'm not denying that lots of hens are kept in awful conditions - and I wouldn't buy their eggs). We all make our own judgements about what we think is wrong or right on these types of things - I don't believe there is an objectively right or wrong answer. But she does. Obviously there are lots of issues at play here but I feel like she thinks being vegan gives people the right to constantly criticise others. It's more complicated than that.
VF recently made some comments about someone we know who is on a very low income, and eats a load of cheap processed food (evident as she posts pics of her weekly shop and almost every meal her an her family eat on SM). VF was criticising her, saying she doesn't care about the planet etc. I pointed out that she was a single mum and on a very low income which makes things hard food wise and pointed out that she did not own a car and has never even left the country, so was doing her bit for the planet in her own way.
I would never dream of preaching to anyone about lifestyle, but it's mostly what VF talks about these days I feel like it's reached the point where I want to point out that it's not all as black and white as she believes it to be. I'm sure if I do she will see it as a personal attack on her ideology (whereas when she criticises my way of life that's fine because I'm murdering the planet).
AMBU?