Vegan Steez: PlantBasedHippy & Tofu Goddess.

veganism isn't a diet it's a lifestyle
choice yo what's up I've talked a lot lately about tolerance as a fundamental virtue in politics that you can't really get much of anything done without deeply understanding tolerance how to cooperate with others with people who have serious moral differences from yourself and there's a terrible lack of tolerance within the vegan demi-monde these days the purpose of this video really is just a shout out to vegan youtubers who have very very few viewers because they're they're new on the scene I mean when I discovered these two channels I think they had like 10 views each on most of their videos and that's natural when you first come onto YouTube nobody knows you except your friends and family you know a couple people you know in real life and when you're a vegan one of the reasons you get on the Internet is that you don't already know a lot of vegans in real life you don't already have a network of 500 vegans who know you face-to-face so naturally it can be slow and difficult for you to find your audience for your audience to find you so one of the reasons I'm making this video is just to you know promote these channels basically and say hey what's up and you know some of my own viewers will like what they've got to offer but also as I've been preaching tolerance so much lately I mean look the point is not that I agree with these people about everything the point is not even that I agree with them about anything but I can still see some value in what they're doing and I can appreciate what they're contributing to these debates and you know to what I hope is the beginning of a movement the very first steps of a social movement that's going to change the world profoundly in the next 100 years however laughable it might seem in 2016 now we're talking about selfish reasons it's the same if people subscribe to freelee the banana girl and vegan gains and durianrider and all these other begins that people think are really attractive and their lifestyle is wonderful and oh look they're traveling to Thailand and they're going to fruit festival and liqueur all those Instagram photos it's just like so wonderful and I want to be a part of that so hashtag vegan that's not long term veganism that is something that people are attracted to because of the way it looks it's Instagram being a veganism and that's not the future really is that if you are young and single and you're traveling around and meeting vegans and eating all these wonderful foods and documentary in it you can on YouTube and and doing what I eat videos and what I eat photos that's not real thinkin ISM that's not long-lasting you know why is because it's all for you know to be looked at but the thing is plant-based lifestyle goes for a long time because it's about people's bodies the images of animal torture can fade but you know it doesn't fade your image in front of the mirror so this woman is completely fascinating to me her approach to veganism is so profoundly alien to mine and you know she identifies as religious conservative she's a member of the Mormon faith and I gotta tell you I really find it thrilling because my whole life I'm surrounded by left-wing people I never meet conservatives they exist I know the Conservative Party gets a lot of votes so there must be conservatives around here but it's it's totally tantalizing for me to see the world through this woman's eyes instead on her YouTube channel and of course you know she's a vegan and talking about vegan ethics and her whole approach to the question of ethics and everything else is is so profoundly different from mine that as I say it's thrilling I mean what a nice change from the the BS I I heard somebody talks already and now the first half of what she said in this this quotation I just played you of course I agree with strongly appeals of me profoundly where she's saying look Instagram veganism is not long-lasting you know it that's that's you know this kind of lifestyle because Instagram veganism is not long-lasting but of course what's fascinating is she's actually the next step of our argument is that she's also arguing that ethical veganism is not long-lasting she is actually arguing that a a health centered approach to veganism is what will really get people motivated involved you know again I've been talking with a virtue of tolerance there will be many many issues that I would disagree with her about politely but I would tolerate her and if we were actually members of the same social movement or political organization that would be a really interesting dance because I would actually you know be around someone I believe you know she's against having legal access to abortion she's made videos on those topics she is against pornography she you know she has sort of some traditional hardline conservative views I don't want to misrepresent her you can see her YouTube channel etc so she's a vegan but has a very different you know perception of life on Earth from someone like myself or from anyone I ever meet alright let's let us speak a little bit more before I comment further just remember guys that there's nothing wrong with selfish speaking news home animals are a wonderful thing to do to be concerned about and when your plant-based you are also at the same time even if it's unconsciously you are lessening the consumption and the and the slaughtering of animals and so if you want to be as effective and share the message you have to offer to people what they want according to their needs the world will never see epical veganism as mainstream as long as hatred and and discrimination against against me eaters is wrought upon them because you think they're your support superior to them because you live in a lifestyle that is so much better for the earth and so much better for the animals and therefore you're better than them whoo okay look I mean full disclosure I'm I'm sprung this is her view of veganism is totally different from mine but I mean wow I'd be I'd be willing to fake it I'm watching this video and I'm thinking you know what maybe maybe converting to Mormonism wouldn't be that bad as I say look it's great for me to really see these profoundly different approaches what she says here is is almost 180 degrees opposite to me although again I sympathize and this is someone you know obviously I wouldn't just tolerate somebody like this I'd be really happy to be cooperating in the same same movement with people with these these very different approaches very different values but she is problematizing the ego trip that I myself have talked about on this channel in the past of vegans believing that they're superior to non vegans but again if we're really being honest and we're looking at history there's no doubt that type of ego trip certainly is part of the ugly side of the caste system in India it's part of the long history of vegetarianism in both India and China and if we use China as a less prejudicial example yeah you're damn right there are people and if we get in medieval China but still in modern China there are people who believe they are superior because they practice a vegetarian diet and that's partly for supernatural reasons and partly for ethical reasons and what-have-you they take pride in that and reciprocal with that pride no doubt is a type of sneering contempt for their co-workers or their colleagues who instead are eating dead pigs on a daily basis so I see that as inevitable I see that as problematic but I think if we're really being honest with ourselves and looking at history what lessons we're gonna draw from that and how we're gonna cope with that as a movement I think is much more nuanced and never to reason why ethical veganism is not really effective is that even though people go vegan for ethical reasons which is very good because we don't because vegans don't contribute to the consumption as meat a meat is that people may not have understanding of nutrition and a whole rounded diet Wow so there are so many interesting facets to this from my perspective she is pointing out that you know one of the weaknesses of the health based approach is that it you know you have to promise outcomes you know you can't actually promise people that if they go vegan they won't have a heart attack some vegans have heart attacks yes there's a lower rate of them etc you can't promise people that if they go vegan they won't get cancer you know you can be vegan but you live in a city with terrible air pollution and you get lung cancer you know it it does the scientific research indicates that it helps to be vegan there were health benefits to being vegan but this is not really a simple case where you can deliver on those kinds of promises so she's aware of that she's aware of that weakness but she still seems totally firm in her conviction that it's the it's the health based approach it's what you can see in the mirror as she says that's going to motivate people to become vegan and remain vegan the long term now I do disagree with her and what's fascinating to me is as a religious conservative she herself is someone whose whole life is shaped by ethical commitments and the people around her you know her husband her family and so on she expects them to live lives that are strongly motivated by ethics and ethical commitments so to use one issue that she talked about her channel she is morally opposed to pornography so she's asking people to never look at pornography for ethical reasons there's not a health reason it's not you know there are none of these other issues there that's a straight case of ethics and she obviously believes that people can live their whole lives can live for decades or something refusing pornography for these ethical grounds so you know why is it then that when she turns her attention to veganism where she obviously does have a very meaningful ethical engagement with if you watch more of her videos you'll see she talks about hunting she talks with many ethical elements and she obviously has a real real engagement with the ethics also but she feels the the ethics are a weak argument now again maybe my difference from her it is the the awareness of other religions and other examples I mean in the history of India with a much weaker footing than veganism has today you have both vegetarian and semi vegan groups you know Hinduism and Jainism that were able to sustain themselves not just for centuries but for millennia from definitely more than 2,000 years these religions motivated people to maintain vegetarianism or sometimes closer to veganism as a kind of personal ethical identity as something that defined you and defined your bloodline to find your grandparents and to find your grandchildren that those dietary restrictions and those ethical principles should be things you practice with real pride and it worked and they didn't have any health arguments um you know they didn't know about the rates of cancer or anything else medieval India ancient India so again partly my view is actually shaped by ethics and religion although different religions I'm a former scholar of tera vaada Buddhism of the Pali language of Southeast Asian languages of history of Asia in general so I've seen tremendous longevity and tremendous durability actually an impure ly ethical approaches to these same issues and you know so it's interesting for me to imagine she only sees weakness in that predominantly ethical approach and is say if we're being honest about it there's also an element of pride there right there's not just not just being ethical but being publicly ethical being proud of those ethics of saying I am vegetarian or I am vegan this matters to me this is part of who I am and I'm proud that my parents were vegan or and I'm proud that my children or grandchildren vegan it's very easy to see that you know the politics of identity he is wrapped into that and I would go so far as to say that these impulses overlap she talks about the difference between seeing footage of animals in a slaughterhouse and what you see in the mirror but once veganism becomes part of your identity ethically once ethical then you see that in the mirror you know the same way that someone in India is proud of being a Brahmin is proud of their caste status and sees that as part of their identity and they remain vegetarian for that reason in the same sense I think that veganism as an ethical principle becomes part of your identity it does become part of what you see in the mirror because you take some pride in it so this is a very stimulating for me to see these contrasting views from from other vegans with such different political values but I presume in in her condemnation here I mean she's taking a much more unilateral approach of saying look any sense of superiority vegans feel over non vegans is bad and evil well that's that's obviously that resonates much more with a Christian sense of humility and Meo well humility can be useful up to a point - but I do think that you know taking pride in that identity the same way she's talking positively about taking pride in health and fitness I don't think that's totally misplaced any any kind of ego trip is dangerous any kind of ego trip and get out of control but again so for me this just fundamentally raises a whole lot of issues that I think are really worth thinking about veganism isn't a diet it's a lifestyle choice the words we choose carry such great significance so there's one word that's kind of floating around - the vegan movement and it's the word lifestyle and it's usually used in the sense that veganism isn't a diet it's a lifestyle choice it isn't a lifestyle choice I mean but I imagine lifestyle I don't imagine it Marxism and I don't imagine feminism you know I picture rock climbing kale salad and yoga and all those things are great don't get me wrong about trying to bash on anyone's hobbies but lifestyle just does not carry the same weight as political ideology which is what veganism is all right so this is of self-evident integers to me and you know she makes a very simple strong point here this is a brand new youtuber called the tofu goddess why do so many people cling to this idea of lifestyle as opposed to using a stronger phrase like political ideology obviously it's because some people would be terrified of the implications of really thinking about veganism as a political ideology as she just said herself they would they would be they would be terrified to think of it as something equivalent to Marxism it's not without reason but people find that scary and I think when you look into it even deeper in some ways what's going on in veganism is more like caste identity in the history of India you know vegans do want to get married to other vegans vegans want to raise vegan kids so that's even deeper than Marxism because you know all kinds of Marxists don't force their kids to be Marxists and don't have to marry a Marxist they don't form a separate social class to quite that extent now some do some take it that far but with veganism it's true in some ways this is as serious as any political ideology and in some ways it's even more serious and that's why you get people discussing to what extent is it like a religion or to what extent is it like a cult and those are really important questions I mean so my contribution here in just these five seconds is to say well one reason why people want to instead promote it as a lifestyle is to avoid asking themselves those hard questions because if it's a lifestyle we get to kind of go off to Dreamland and not worry about those things in their implications now the other big reasons that you've heard me talk about on this channel before are of course you know money Fame I was reading recently some comments from a young woman who's promoting veganism on YouTube in this lifestyle way the weight loss the permanent vacation that's etc and she was absolutely thrilled that she was now earning four hundred dollars a month allegedly from her YouTube channel believe me for a lot of people that is going to shape what you say and how you say it that's going to shape your message profoundly so if you can make $400 a month selling a lifestyle selling a weight loss I mean if you can make 35 dollars per book selling a diet ebook that's gonna convince a lot of people to package this as a lifestyle and not as a political ideology and let's keep it all the way real if you were to package veganism much more like Marxism do you think you could make $35 a book selling a book about that do you think you could get this kind of again fame money power respects preaching by the internet so those are the shallower questions but they are also significant ones that shape both what we're really doing and how we're perceived in what we're doing here in digital the digital sphere of vegan activism so look guys I hope you enjoyed this peculiar podcast and I hope I've introduced you to two new vegan channels that you probably haven't heard of before and all you guys if you love me if you know what if you like what I'm doing if you have some interesting point two disagreement with me where you want to debate something I said you guys who have your own YouTube channels you know shout it out man live your truth put it up online there's so much that's worth knowing about worth learning about worth sharing you know there's so much that we have to contribute let's not be tearing each other down over who's wearing too much makeup who can benchpress more weight or you know shallow nonsense we're definitely in just the first baby steps of you know a social and political movement that I hope is going to change the world in the next 100 years we're looking back on and happened learn from the last 100 years when if we're honest vegetarianism did not make a goddamn thing happen in this world you know during the last 100 years we've seen the triumph of animal agriculture the expansion of factory farming on a scale that's baffling and impossible to imagine globally even within India even within China even within Sri Lanka even within Thailand all the Buddhist countries got on the bandwagon along with the you know America and Europe in adopting factory farming that's been the history of the last hundred years looking at it the next 200 years we've got a lot to think about a lot of tough questions to ask ourselves a lot of problems to identify and then you know we got to roll up our sleeves and make something happen