To feel guilted into being vegan??? AIBU?

[CradleMable]

I saw quite a traumatic animal welfare video a few days ago, which had the purpose of trying to encourage viewers to become vegan.

I am not a huge meat lover, but love the occasional beef burger, steak or nice roast dinner. I am a bit of a dairy fiend though, so not sure how I would cope.

However the video pointed towards the awful treatment of farm animals, being separated from their babies after mere hours together, and being slaughtered themselves at a relatively young age, after a life of being exploited.

I haven’t really considered the welfare of farm animals much in my life, if I’m honest, and I feel quite bad for admitting that. Now I’m wondering if what we do to these animals is fair, and I thought posting on here might help me consider both sides to the argument.

AIBU to now feel compelled to drastically change my diet in support of animal welfare?

No animals are being taken from their parents within hours in the UK - it's between 6 and 10 weeks for dairy calves
Sorry, @SpaceRaccoon, that's wrong. Calves are removed from their dairy cow mothers 24 hours after birth. https://vet.ed.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2025-05/Dairy%20cows%20-%20Human%20animal%20relationship.pdf
(From University of Edinburgh, not vegan propaganda.)

I’m a vegetarian because I cannot bear cruelty to animals. It’s very simple really. We all know animals suffer, and we all know the meat industry is disgusting and cruel. I’m also suspicious of the people who work in slaughterhouses. The slaughter industry must be a magnet to sadists and psychopaths.

I’m not a joiner or campaigner by nature, but cruelty to animals is black and white. If someone eats meat, I don’t want to hear them moralising on any other issue. I don’t want to hear their views on Gaza or abortion or anything else. I have no respect for them.

I went vegan nine years after my eyes were opened to the cruelties of the meat and dairy industries. I felt stupid that I had never before considered what was involved in getting meat onto my plate. I was a huge meat eater, I never ate vegetarian dishes.

But I gave up dairy for three months and then gave up meat and I've never regretted it, not once. I'm so much healthier as shown by my regular health checks, my cholesterol is super low, I feel so much better, my digestion and bowels are better. I was so surprised by how much of a difference it's made.

And my only regret is not going vegan so much earlier. I am so glad I'm no longer complicit in the cruelty towards and murder of animals who are living beings who do not want to die.

I no longer see animals as food, and once you make that mental shift everything else becomes easy.

I went vegan nine years after my eyes were opened to the cruelties of the meat and dairy industries. I felt stupid that I had never before considered what was involved in getting meat onto my plate. I was a huge meat eater, I never ate vegetarian dishes.

But I gave up dairy for three months and then gave up meat and I've never regretted it, not once. I'm so much healthier as shown by my regular health checks, my cholesterol is super low, I feel so much better, my digestion and bowels are better. I was so surprised by how much of a difference it's made.

And my only regret is not going vegan so much earlier. I am so glad I'm no longer complicit in the cruelty towards and murder of animals who are living beings who do not want to die.

I no longer see animals as food, and once you make that mental shift everything else becomes easy.

The meat/dairy industry is not what it was even two decades ago. The U.S. is hell, but things are bad in much of Europe too. Very few animals are pasture raised and the suffering that occurs from birth to death has made eating meat untenable for
me. I am struggling with being vegan, but have drastically consumption. I am very healthy—i eat a lot of lentils, beans, tofu, protein pasta, and sometimes fake meat. I miss cheese, but I feel better about acting on my belief that animals have feelings….

Thank you for the replies so far… it’s a lot to consider!

One factor that worries me is i struggle with anaemia. My ferritin is also on the floor. I worry how I would be if I cut out meat, given that I struggle to tolerate the iron supplements.

I think a huge proportion of society would be vegetarian/vegan if they actually had to kill the animals, gut them in order to eat them.

Animal farming is cruel, no two ways about it but folk either are not aware or they push it to the back of their minds. A mcdonalds or a packet of mince on the shelf all neatly packaged seems quite far removed from the reality. All neat and tidy.

Been veggie since I was 10 and yes, iron can be a bit tricky. Iron doesn't just come in a pill, there are gentler versions with no nasty side effects out there. There is a lot of iron added to food though, processed bread and breakfast cereals to name a couple, and of course in some veg.

you “will end up eating much more processed food, food made with ingredients from all over the world...so your health plus airmiles are impacted.”

“Plus soya is a major contribution to deforestation. As is palm oil.”

https://www.greenpeace.org.uk/challenges/soya/

“The UK imports huge quantities of soya and globally some 90% of soya is used to feed animals, including cows, pigs and chickens.”

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jul/20/vegan-diet-cuts-environmental-damage-climate-heating-emissions-study

Everyone is entitled to make up their own mind but those decisions are better made with facts

So yet again another righteous vegan. Go away. Those of us who CHOOSE to be vegetarian are perfectly happy with our choice. And loathe vegan activists trying to remove our choice.

You want to be a vegan be a vegan no one cares but this dramatic ''oh I feel so opressed I feel so guilty what am I going to do'' if someone I know tried this I would tell them it comes across as attention seeking

No point bothering then, is there? Might as well go back to eating the baby cows and chickens as well as having milk and eggs.

Agree. And being vegetarian still has a positive impact.

There's more to just diet too. I haven't bought a single item of make up, skin care, cleaning products that have been tested on animals for over 30 years. It all helps not be part of the cruelty and for the most part has sent positive messages to the makers who now proudly announce cruelty free (and vegan) products.

Reduce meat and diary is good for your health
and the planet

buying as ethically as you can helps the animals. be willing to pay for decent meat - game is often more “natural” than cheap beef or chicken

choose your own path - mine is meat once a week
becuase I find my body seems to need it, fish a few times and a bad cheese habit but oat milk

Sounds a very uncomfortable life. Full to bursting with milk. Being bred to be a milk bearer doesn’t make it any nicer.

My husband asked me to buy him some chicken wings today. I got a pack from the supermarket which had some writing on about the chickens being treated well...they were slaughtered and stuffed in a plastic tub 🤢

All I can say is that every vegetarian and vegan that ever ate meat has felt like you do.

It's shit because you now have to decide between what you want and what you feel is right. The hardest part is the choice, once you decide and make a few swaps it just becomes your life and for most people, it isn't their whole personality.

But it is such a personal choice and it's OK to give yourself time.

Don't overcomplicate it in the pursuit of perfection or doing things "right".

As long as you don't eat a load of upf shit, you'll be eating the same food as most of the rest of the world: rice, beans, pulses, lentils and veg. Coupled with a multivitamin, you'll be fine.

Its barbaric and can’t understand people having such thick skin to the suffering of animals for a taste!

But - speaking as one vegetarian to another - don't you find the animal welfare justification for vegetarianism a bit hypocritical?

The dairy industry is pretty horrendous and even free range eggs aren't usually cruelty free. If we really cared about animal welfare, then the only logical approach is surely to go vegan?

As things stand, I don't actually want to go vegan so I'm not, but I do realise that it eliminates any kind of moral high ground that I might be able to claim as far as vegetarianism is concerned.

Everyone is different and I don't judge what others eat. I'm unconvinced that eating high welfare standard meat a couple of times each week is any less morally acceptable than using supermarket dairy products etc.

Arguably, we were all guilted at some point into being vegetarian/vegan. I don't know anyone who is vegan for any reason other than animal welfare. For me just the entire concept of animal products is abhorrent, and illogical. We eat cows/sheep/pigs but not horses/dogs/cats? Why? We KNOW that pigs and octopi exhibit high intelligence but we'll torture them so we can eat them? Why? Cows can have best friends, pigs are as smart as a toddler, sheep recognise each other - what gives us the right to deem them 'less' than us?

I mean, it's up to you but I'm very bored of hearing all the same arguments. Yes we're omnivores but that actually means we can survive perfectly well on vegan diets - not that we need to eat animal products. Yes, soya is indeed bad for the environment but over 90% of soya is used for animal feed not human consumption. Yes, no foodstuff is victimless, but at least I'm trying to minimise the victims my food has. Yes, airmiles on food, but I don't see you worrying about that in your diet while you're eating your Balinese seafood, European cheeses and New Zealand lamb. Yes, we do need to take an iron supplement and a bit of vitD/B12 but probably so do you Ms Omnivore and actually if you're in the UK a lot of your food is fortified anyway (for good reason) so your diet may not be as balanced as you think. Yes, I'm absolutely sure you do eat only local, grass fed, sung lullabies meat, you never ever just grab whats on offer in tesco and you check the provenence of every sandwich, and you never have a latte with bog standard mass farmed milk and you personally track down the farmer responsible for the meat at every restaurant you attend and make sure they're all nice ruddy faced farmers with happy little storybook animals skipping round the fields AND I bet that because the animals know you only shop in the local butchers (like fuck you do) they feel much less fear in the packed death lorry and abattoir.

We're not righteous - I know I'm not perfect but at least I'm bloody trying! We're just bored off our tits hearing you all rationalise animal cruelty in service of your tastebuds. Do what you want but don't bore the shit out of me trying to make yourself feel less guilty. Nowadays, eating animal products, and certainly eating meat, is unnecessary, cruel and irresponsible re the environment. You want to do it, fine, but don't kid yourself it's anything but that!

I am not a huge meat lover, but love the occasional beef burger, steak or nice roast dinner. I am a bit of a dairy fiend though, so not sure how I would cope.

RE this bit, I felt similar about steak so I just stopped eating chickens. Didn't make much lamb anyway. Then stopped eating pigs. I never had a "last steak", I just found that one day despite fancying the taste of one, the idea of actually eating it was really unappealing, so there was no need for willpower.

Just start where you feel able and see where you end up on your journey. There's no shame in making the changes you feel good about and seeing where you end up. You're your own person and you don't need to be a "barbaric meat eater" or a "perfect vegan".

We're all just here to do our best so be gentle with yourself.

Apologies, this went on longer than intended and was definitely triggered by yet another fucking wedding this weekend where some insufferable bore interrogates me about my diet (and no, I don't tell anyone but the waiter always goes 'and who's having the vegan risotto/salad/random slice of roasted vegetable') and spends the entirety justifying to me why they eat meat.

But yes, as others have said, baby steps. Try only eating meat when you're out, or cutting them out one at a time. I think milk and eggs are actually the hardest ones to give up - hardest to adjust to oat milk in tea and eggs are in so much!!

people do relise that to grow there vegan diets a lot of wildlife dies due to your crops being grown and more needs for crops means more crop fields but less area for our native wildlife least with meat production wildlife can live along side can bet more wildlife is killed and shot to grow crops than meat animals

Ten times or more less wildlife dies for a veggie diet than a meat one

thats significant

why

becuase it takes ten times less land

Snap! Was about to post this the environental destruction caused by the cropping of soy beans and lentils is huge. And it kills all the little insects when they spray the fields. No animal can live on it.I read somewhere, and now I can't remember where, that more animals are killed by a vegan diet than an omnivore diet. Obviously these animals are crickets and grasshoppers and such so not sure if they count to a vegan. Though they do worry about bees.