Imposing on Girlfriends and Boyfriends (vegan / vegans / veganism)

yo what up I might as well just start
this video with an anecdote and then get into the broader question of why I'm talking about this stuff I had a girlfriend and it was a serious relationship we considered getting married we considered a lot of long-term things but she was just my girlfriend and she was not vegetarian she was not vegan and I remember I said to her very simply and bluntly at one point look you're thinking about this the wrong way and fundamentally it's a it's a peculiar kind of racism I said to her you have to take this as seriously as if I had brown skin and I was born in India and I was telling you you've got to follow these dietary rules or nothing you can't marry me you can't really be my long-term girlfriend you can't really have a meaningful relationship with me if you don't live up to these rules and I pointed out to her I said look coz you know she was opposed to this I said you know your whole attitude all of your expectations would be different if I had brown skin M was born and raised in India you know I'm not saying she'd choose to do it but she shrugged her shoulders and think well that's the price of admission that's the cost of entry if this particular man is the man I want to marry then I've got to be vegetarian or vegan or whatever it is and maybe you have to have a certain type of religious ceremony or wedding all kinds of other implications are possible maybe you've got to take off your shoes in a particular way at the door maybe there are all sorts of other magical and religious implications now there are some ways in which veganism is not like any religion in the world there are some ways in which it is profoundly different from any religion in the world but when talking on this level of our personal lives sometimes it can very closely resemble a religion in exactly this way you know love me or leave me and with that girlfriend that was the reason why we broke it off that was the reason why I broke off through issue with her I did make a bunch of compromises but she sent me an email at one point saying you know she tried to be vegetarian for a couple of days not even vegan and you know she hated it and resent it and didn't want to do it I wrote back saying get new boyfriend cuz it's over uh the email was not that short but it really was that decisive because we'd already talked it through we'd already you know laid all the cards on the table um she was smart she was hardworking she had a lot of redeeming qualities that girl a lot of things I liked about her morally ethically she was a pretty despicable person to be perfect you it was not the only issue I mean that were that actually reflected other aspects of her character ethically and morally and you know that that can be attractive a woman it can be attractive to be with a woman who you think is smart and you can recognize she's kind of ruthless you know she's kind of amoral in a certain way but I've got to say I never never looked back and regret that I that I broke up with her and I think she really is the kind of person who would slit a slit a pig's throat I think she's slit a human beings throat without much hesitation and I remember I remember actually being around some some animals with her I remember there was a particular cow that you know she had a history with she knew this cow was not quite a pet cow but she'd known this cow for years and you know because we talked about this stuff so much I asked her I said so would you eat this cow like would you eat this cow if someone else killed it for you and you know it was very emotional for it she said I would I would never eat this countess yeah but you eat different cows every day what says this man anyway this this anecdote is is expanding its utility this video at this moment today the day this video is being uploaded I'm still receiving questions for a Q&A session that I'm doing via patreon so people who are my patrons have sent me questions and they very generously sent me one dollar each thank you for your support I completely intend to take that money fly to Thailand live in luxury fill myself swimming in a bikini on the beach etc um that was funnier than I thought it would be for me and I told the joke by self tragically many of many of the vegans who raised money this way for charity or for activism the actual charity and their actual activism is is going on vacation in Thailand one of my patrons is a guy called Mike on Raw I'll give the link to his channel below this video I think the the tone and nature of his content has changed just recently and he sent me some email I think he's been reconsidering what he's talking about in how he started were partly response to my my videos which is wonderful and he had a recent video just a couple days ago where he was really in a very down-to-earth way reflecting on the misery of him being the only vegan in his family so he's married his wife is not vegan and then beyond that his extended family nobody's vegan you know so aunts and uncles and kids and grandkids and he's in a lot of situations that give him misery I have but anyway thank you I mean genuinely thanks for your support I think he's giving me $1 a month which is wonderful and he's staying in touch with me through patreon so happy to hear from him and he has sent me some questions that I'm gonna ask answer in the Q&A but right now I'm going to respond to that video of his um another friend of mine online who will leave anonymous he at almost the same time just yesterday he wrote to me talking about his family situation and that guy feels bad I mean Mike they're struggling with the same issue feeling bad in imposing arbitrary moral requirements on your family around you so again I don't know if Mike uses exactly these terms of Mike and this other friend of mine just to generalize a little bit they reflect on things like well Who am I to not let my relatives bring meat into my house and how does that actually work do I actually impose a rule on someone okay you're not allowed to cook meat in my kitchen well what if they buy a sandwich or a hot dog at a shop down the street and they just finish eating it in your living room are you gonna kick them out of the house are you gonna make them stand on the porch alright you can hear my windows open actually I don't know if you can hear the birds singing um you know is it like a cigarette where you force someone to stand in the backyard while they smoke a cigarette how does this really work with people you are supposed to love and respect because the reality is the type of moral distinction involved is one of where you're expressing contempt for people you're saying to people one way or another however play ly I don't respect you and I don't love this about you it's something that really brings about terrible conflict and again for both of them both Mike I think part of the struggle is this unease about the arbitrariness of it like they're comfortable with the statements of principle above veganism but then when we get down to practice okay so you're already married to this woman but now you've become vegan again this is why coming back to my anecdote this is why the comparison to religion is significant if somebody gets married to me and then I convert to a new religion afterward she is entitled to complain that this is not what you signed up for okay if I get married to someone as an atheist and then for some mysterious reason I become passionate about Buddhism and I'm all the way into tera vaada Buddhism I overnight I convert to Protestant Christianity all of a sudden a boy you know Martin Luther gee you know yeah is this all of a sudden this really does it for me and change my whole life that's ground from my perspective I think that's a reason to get divorced for somewhat a fundamental change in who you are such as converting to a new religion after the marriage they didn't sign up for that that wasn't in the contract they married you for the person you were and the beliefs you had and the values you had and the ethics you had at the time you got married now a lot of other things are much more slippery maybe you got married to someone before they became a gambling addict after you've been married for five years they get addicted to gambling that's a gambling is not a religion but it can transform your whole life for the same way whoo all right that posters about to take off all right I don't know oh by the way I really wondered if I should have like a patreon contest and give that poster for to someone for free certain to someone in the mail or if I should roll it up and take it with me to China but no it's coming off the wall already so we'll see what happens with my my my poster that's been in the background all this time look it's real this this stuff it's not deep but it's real these are the issues we all really struggle with I just made another video the other day that has arbitrary in the title I think part of the key here is really being comfortable with what's arbitrary in your life and admitting to everyone involved that because something is arbitrary doesn't mean it's evil doesn't mean it's wrong it also doesn't mean it's perfect doesn't mean it's perfect solution but yes in the same way that a Hindu living in Western society has to draw up a bunch of lines there was a real controversy in India when the technology of the bicycle was first introduced to India and Hindus thought the bicycle was immoral and nobody should be allowed to buy one because the seats were made out of leather this is obviously reflecting the era they didn't have plastic bicycle seats yet and there were public protests in the streets there were pull it whose political organized opposition there was an anti bicycle movement and as a vegan I can relate now ultimately that movement lost because at that time the bicycle was such a fundamental advance in in whatever you want to say civilization technologically it was really a breakthrough something you know something relatively poor people could use and at a time when the only alternative was riding a horse you know bicycles were really a big deal for a long time so the bicycle nevertheless did proliferate in India and people did use leather seats cow leather and that contradiction existed within Indian society despite the opposition to it yes there are arbitrary lines we have to draw anytime you buy a product that has sugar as an ingredient you probably know this it could in theory be non vegan sugar and it might not be there are some trace ingredients some people say well can you buy Cheerios Cheerios is a breakfast cereal can you not buy Cheerios when there's some incredibly small percentage way less than 1% that might be non vegan derived etc ultimately yes for your own life you have to make those arbitrary distinctions and you have to impose it on others the art the irony is the arbitrary distinctions you make in your life you don't impose on strangers you don't impose on people you hate people you despise people who disagree with you impose those those arbitrary distinctions most on the people you love you know in this guy's case his wife who isn't vegan and who married this guy before he became vegan she didn't sign up for this and now all of a sudden maybe he's in the position of saying look if it's in my kitchen I won't tolerate this because it's immoral if it's being bought with my money I won't tolerate this because it's immoral it is hard it's hard and I think really one of the one of the most honest things you could say to her is look you have to take this as seriously as if I had brown skin as if I were born and raised in India and it's really worth questioning why do we take that so seriously we're talking about right and wrong we're talking about moral and immoral why would it matter if my ancestors were vegan if I can say to you Owen to my family for 1,000 years everyone has been vegetarian some people in India can boast that way their whole family's been vegetarian 4000 years I can't nobody nobody in my family's vegetarian nobody in my family's be but the truth is if something is right or wrong now today if it's a positive difference we can make now that's what's Matt in matters that's what's important that's priceless that's what's tremendously important and actually the question of what somebody did a thousand years ago is almost completely meaningless by contrast you know this is about the difference we can make and the potential we have as individuals as a family as a couple or what have you and I know I know it sounds like a trade an overused phrase but I think the way out of this is keeping it real as being a hundred percent honest with yourself being a hundred percent honest with your loved ones and saying look I recognize the contradictions I recognize that doesn't make sense like asking you to smoke a cigarette on the porch and not in the living room there's some people like that with alcohol but they say look if you go and get drunk in a bar that's fine but I'm not gonna let you drink alcohol in my house you know especially if they're an ex-alcoholic a lot of people feel that with it say they don't want alcohol in their lives they don't want this purchased with their own money etc you can recognize look this is arbitrary it's not perfectly rational it's not a purpose system it's not a perfect solution but I love you I respect you I need you to respect this and come along in this journey with me and if you can't you got to get a new boyfriend