[Interview:] Real Veganism vs. the Chiang Mai Permanent Vacation Mentality.

ivana shin um what
why were you inching my were you at the bike fest or were you just have to just happen to be there at the same time like what what drew you there good question I have answered it before but I'm happy to answer it again so I've been in and attaching my for more than ten years unlike everyone else in this equation I speak the language I speak Thai with a heavy lotion accent I lived in Thailand Laos Cambodia for years I was a real scholar a real specialist in that field I realized my CV is boring but you can read you know I sent you a copy of my resume you can look that over I studied those languages of state as histories I studied that political politics of that region both ancient and modern I did a ton of research at the humanitarian work NGO work whatever you want to say I have a meaningful connection to the history politics and languages of that region including the city of Chiang Mai itself and that is deeply threatening those people because they don't they're shallow hippie tourists doing self-indulgent nonsense so that is part of the tension of the situation I already knew the city of Chiang Mai I'd been there before why I arrived when I didn't left I did which had nothing to do with the festival was that I had a job in China and could Ming China where I am right now and I was signed up to start language classes that I'm taking right now and I needed to do paperwork and I needed to go to a hospital some of the paperwork is done at a hospital get my Chinese visa and order etc so there were really practically for me there were about two ways I could do that one would be going by a Chiang Mai the other would be going by a nan Chi and BN Chen I can get into details that are kind of meaningless but the reality was I had a list of practical reasons to be in Chiang Mai for just a couple of days Chiang Mai has a Chinese Embassy as a good Hospital that I know where they both speak English and speak Thai I could speak in uptight I get by at that Hospital where I could get all that stuff done and I could then get a direct flight from Chiang Mai to Kunming which is exactly what I did above and beyond that I had fans in Chiang Mai durianrider isn't the only one with fans in Chiang Mai there were people in shame I wanted to meet me and so I went there that was another reason to be in Chiang Mai rather than taking slightly different route going from Bangkok to could Ming and I did meet up with them I never attended a single rato four events I never gatecrashed I never showed up at anything uninvited I created my own events where I met people who already knew me on the internet and wanted to meet with me it was it I never once showed up at any of durianrider of freelee's events I never instigated anything in any way in that sense but simply the fact that I exist is a deep challenge to their authority I've mentioned some of the reasons for that already I mean you know if you dig around the other reasons have to do with the pseudoscience of their diet I'm one of the only people who came out strongly and said on the issue of Crohn's disease Crohn's disease is an incurable disease translation it is a disease for which there is no known cure and what durianrider has said about Crohn's disease is false and here he was deeply threatened by that and he made a video directly responding to me and denouncing me on that several months ago I'm sorry I forget how many months ago that is you can you can get the date if you need it by searching his YouTube channel your search for Crohn's disease and you'll see the video he's way enough where he again claims he curated so on that kind of issue like you know I also clarified they claim that garlic contains a neurotoxin that is false I don't know if you've ever eaten garlic garlic does not contain a neurotoxin so there were various hard issues of science as well as politics on which I've really been a very different voice within the vegan movement as I could say I mean you know real people do real things so yeah the fact that I exist at all is in some way a threat to him and they responded accordingly but no I actually I actually wasn't there to instigate the kind of ludicrous conflict that durian writer himself did instigate I know you mentioned that it's a kind of a small community in chiang mai from your experience can you sort of describe who you you know of living there like what what that whole situation is as you know it in terms of vegans vegan expats living in chiang mai ok ok yeah look there are there are three types of people there ok there are people who are so young that this really is tragic and this really is a cult-like movement that's going to devastate them for the rest of their lives okay and you can be as polite about that as you want to be but I talked to a young woman who dropped out of high school and moved to Chiang Mai to join this social circle shall we say now let's let's not use the word cult okay you know you tell me anyone who dropped out of high school and doesn't and your ignorance of what this isn't going to impact the rest of your life I know I know two examples I think both young females who dropped out of high school I think so maybe I'm misremembering one one for sure who I interviewed on my own channel so you can see that injury on my channel and we talked about and she's very philosophical better than when I interviewed my channel other people dropped at a college other people just decided not to go to college so there's some people at a young age where that's what impacts them and you tell me what future they really have I hope they wake up some of them do some of them turn their lives around and get a new perspective and take on a new direction others don't okay then there are middle-aged people who earned it you know like they had a normal job up to a point and for some reason they fell into this ideology and sacrificed everything join the social circle now there's an example there's a channel called Joe vegan so just Jo a space vegan and he and his wife talk honestly about the fact they're in our disillusion they're not true believers they use the word cult they say they're no longer cult members but they just fell in love with this idea they quit their jobs they sold all their furniture they bought bicycles and they ran away to Chiangmai I think there's one year ago then was last year's festival they were true believers in this and then they had a kind of disillusionment experience where they woke up and they themselves say like you know they make videos talking about this what were we thinking like but what was our plan for the future but those are mature adults I believe they're over 30 years old I'm guessing their age these completely feel so even then it's kind of sad but the consequences are less serious and then finally there are people who are more of a retirement age who are making this choice and I guess for them the consequences are the least serious because you know I guess you know I guess for them going on permanent vacation maybe has no such percussions however I got to tell you something um I I thought my own grandmother was a bad person because when she retired she just decided to play tennis and basically not to give a damn about the real world or its problems I think that we all should do our part to make the world a better place and I think we should work damn hard to figure out what our part is that's one of the reasons why I'm vegan and even if you're not vegan I think you should feel positive motivated what make the world a better place and what is so sick about the ego trip behind this permanent vacation cult is that they pretend they're saving the world they pretend they're making the world a better place when really they're living a life of total self-indulgence and that's the incongruous contradiction at the heart of this for all three age groups yeah so I want to actually take a step back for a second you said in your interview with the light winds that suing durianrider is not about your ego it's about veganism and what you were what you just said reminded me of that um can you explain that a little bit yeah you got all day [Laughter] Ivana Seon