Stop Treating Native Americans Like Infants (vs. Mexie & Privileged Vegan)
26 November 2017 [link youtube]
With or without good intentions, a lot of left-wing white people seem to talk about indigenous people as if they're not quite human: this seems especially surreal when the linked issues of ecology, health and veganism come up (in the North American political context).
("Mexie" & "Privileged Vegan" are the names of two (other) vegan channels here on Youtube… not really the names of the people… but, hey, I'm often referred to as "à-bas-le-ciel" by the same token.)
Youtube Automatic Transcription
this is my girlfriend's least favorite
kind of video to film with me I've got like one minute of content I've got wanted things I want to say and then I kind of open it up for it of freestyle dance or whatever yeah I think I think you don't like does he feel like pressure it's like if you don't like it we'll just delete it or whatever it's no big deal we just watched a privileged vegan and Maxie two separate videos talking about First Nations issues indigenous peoples issues from from being perspective so I think nobody has ever asked me the question that privileged vegan was responding to privileged vegan was basically spawn respond to the question well if you preach veganism what is your position in preaching veganism to American Indians indigenous Canadians First Nations the creepy a giblet den a whichever tribe or review we want you want to talk about an example so I've I've been in this position I mean I she was not such I don't think she suggested she has any real-world experience of this this was just textbook I think for both of the women both Mexi and they were proceeding but from in a pretty abstract way Mexi may have met and spent time with some some tonight people because she said she was up at bath okay sorry Jasper National Park one of them okay whatever anyone but she's been doing some park life she's been doing some Park living so I you know I don't know but she didn't mention any actual face-to-face interactions people but sure I've been in this position as someone who was known to be vegan and veganism was a big part of my life and it was studying the Kree language primarily also doing other stuff on other Algonquian languages like the Soto dialect of jib white and then also about history and politics and I'm really primarily dressed in the future politics these people not the past but you got to study the past day of the future look uh way back when I was a normal age University students out of an 18 years old or something like that I remember reading my first example of ithi estas ofey and it was actually really disturbing to me so my parents both identified as atheist right but even that kind of fraught with ideological peril in my family so my mother is an atheist but she also is Jewish and the Judaism and the family is really important the Jewish identity and the memory of the Holocaust and all this stuff and politics of Israel and part of the Jewish family is anti Zionist and part of it is pro-zionist but they don't want to admit to themselves of their pros I guess so the Judaism what you know what does it mean to be Jewish if you're atheist you know I mean this this is never resolved right and my father's position on neighthan ISM and God in religion was also more internally contradictory than he wanted to admit to himself or his children but officially we were atheist so atheism in that sense was the default position yes but very rarely and under extraordinary circumstances so yes I went to religious I went to Jewish services yes with my mother and sometimes for other kind of unique reasons and yeah and I remember actually my I made criticisms of the of the Jewish herbs that meant a lot to my mom there's some really interesting discussions she had never kind of seen things the way I did and I did read the Bible and I did yeah my father really encouraged me to go out and on my own independently go to other religious services to kind of take a survey of them because I think he'd done that back in the 1940s or 1950s so he was open and was back in the day but I remember when I tried that when I photos I was really revolted but what I saw you know they weren't doing animal sacrifice or anything but I remember going to a Unitarian Universalist Church and thinking wow I hate this you know hate you like hate you know what I mean like I I really couldn't hang and somebody inoffensive Anglican or you know other Christians I really couldn't do it so that was also interesting for me but no I mean again my father having something my spare but look I remember in university the first time I read atheist philosophy was the philosophy of Holbach and helvetius so the Barone hold on and there were a number of things that were disturbing me about that and is someone who grew up a theist grew up presupposing atheism and you know grew up in an era when the big hit TV show was Seinfeld Seinfeld was a huge hit and Seinfeld is a Jewish atheist you know what I mean and most of the symbols most of the kind of public intellectuals across left-wing or right-wing in Canada they were atheists are close to up we didn't even have nominal Christians really you know like on TV talking about Paul this is the difference between the u.s. and Canada Canada was way more overtly atheistic so you know atheist was resumed as evil in loves here these guys Holbach and helvetius really advancing the the philosophy of atheism at a time when it was it was very contentious and one of the things that disturbed me most of all I was really sitting there trying to figure out what was so disturbing about this the Barranca hobo was an aristocrat in France in the years immediately before the French Revolution when among other things people thought it was a great idea to take aristocrats and you know cut off their head at the neck using a guillotine simplification of what happened here in the front row but this was one feature of it the French Revolution was in part and 80 aristocratic bloodbath and hobo is himself an atheist and he's obviously arguing philosophically that you the reader of this book ought to be an atheist right but he uh he's presupposes that the masses the poor the peasants will always believe in Christianity and that in a sense they ought to you know this is the the opiate of the masses this is what makes them happy this is what makes their lives of drudgery and euro boys night and that really disturbed me and it was really hard to put a finger on it right now this came up in two different countries if you really believe in atheism I know it sounds like a ridiculous that we don't but you know what I mean if you were sincere atheist I think you you must believe that atheism isn't just good for you it's good your mother and your uncle and your cousin people who you may know face that you may know be very hard for them to be this your mother or your uncle they may be very attached to religion but still you really believe if they could do it it would better for them you think it's better for your schoolteacher and the janitor and the farmers and the peasants and ultimately for everyone right and if you don't I find that very disturbing for that very difficult to define look what kind of insane elitism is involved or what kind of dehumanization like don't like you know come on so the barong the whole back I know he's an aristocrat don't you know any peasants don't you have any peasants who were your friend like I'm not joking because even in those kinds of unequal societies these are the people you go farming with you know you to some extent you do business you don't even if there is a big divide socially between you don't need more you could say oh yeah you know I know this peasant called y'all and you know yeah I mean he's a kind of bright guy and you know he maybe he questions things about the church maybe you know so look if if you believe in veganism now what does that mean veganism is better for your personal health it's better for the world's ecology and it's better in terms of ethics simplifying you got a friend you know face to face who is a jib way or cream if you know them I mean the vast majority of Creon at you boy people all the health says have seen struggle with obesity I have I have met very good-looking and healthy clean adroit people but I've seen statistics they have a huge obesity epidemic they have huge health problems if you know someone like that and you respect them intellectually you work with them in politics or whatever your situation it however it is you you know these people um if you don't have this kind of aristocratic attitude of total inequality atheism works for me but it could never work for these people for these peasants if you really know veganism works for me you know what I mean if you know that and you you basically regard these people as your equals in terms of intelligence and human biology and everything else yeah how are you not how are you not gonna say to your friend Jean not that I can we have a lot of you know what if John is a Cree from James Bay or something who speaks french let's say you know how are we you not gonna say you know Jean the you know if there's an alternative it's my whole there's an alternative what you're doing again in terms of your nutrition terms of ecology in terms of ethics and everything else yeah in a privileged vegans video she talks about how it's not her place to make judgments about Native American culture but I really don't think that that's an aspect of it I think you can still insist that they go vegan or you know they see at least suggested did you did you to your friends that work reorge yes but I want to answer the the premiums Kate in many cultures I think we would say it is not my place to preach to my own mother that she ought to be vegan in many cultures like including like it's how Italian culture to tell your mother yeah it's disrespectful and you've seen me talking my mama veganism like not that much cuz I've been vegan for so long you know it's not like the first time I was explained to my mom but while we've been together I mean I'm not I'm not a complete [ __ ] about it but I say to my mom you know you've seen it an email you've seen it on skype and a little bit face-to-face saw my mom face-to-face the first time in 15 years we were together but look if someone said to me whether they came from a traditional North African background or an Italian background or you know some Canadians or Americans might say hey you can't you can't talk to your mother but you'd that's not it's not your place to say this to your mother they have a point you know I'm not gonna say no you're just wrong my joy what I mean my relationship with my mother is unequal you know I mean she gave birth to me and she fed me a lot of non vegan foods growing up meat so much you know whatever you know sure you know that I think there's a question there and you know maybe you know I don't talk to my mother the same way I talk to my co-workers here at the University it's true now but you know why so these are human beings they live in the 21st century like all the Korean AG way people I know play video games they Pizza and you know some of them do go hunting once in a while you know white people go hunting to like you know this is this mystery another thing I mean privilege vegans said just in passing she just refer to Native people as as living in harmony with with nature this is in 2017 or maybe the videos 2016 but it's a fairly recent video so 2017 oh but you know whether it's 2016 or 2017 I just freaked out when she said yeah because because I mean melissa is younger than mean this hasn't been as big an issue in her life I paused the video and I went to youtube I said look I'm gonna show you the reality of what a First Nations Reservation looks like today which you're right I hadn't seen a reservation but I had read descriptions and you know what the just you know what the land was like it and why would you I mean there's no reason why you would have been to a First Nations of vision but my point was just look these people they don't have Spears they're not living in caves and you say they're living in houses and they have shops and they you know I mean the there are very real struggles when you get into their water supply and their sewage treatment their access to health care and their policing there one believe me I appreciate and you know I wanted to spend the rest of my life that what the First Nations University to work on those politically they have special political problems but there's an exotic inhere which is ultimately dehumanizing now you know any but then this is what we're talking about we're not talking about an isolated tribe in Papua New Guinea we're not talking about hypothetical isolated tribe in the Amazon rainforest in South America there may be some other we're talking about the Navajo and the den a and the Cree at the achieve way and the Mohawk and you know where they're at now in 2017 so so the actual the actual wording you know it's not it's not your place right and then you just as usual did you you know alright you know what kind of human being would I be like you know I mean like when you know people when you when you're good so I'm going to class with Cree energy way people and some Danai people and some some Lakota people some some some people from the dikko different native people like you know if one of them asks you for advice about breaking up with their boyfriend like there's some totally different rulebook apply because they're First Nations we be like well this is the advice I would give a white why like it makes it makes no sense to me now you don't keep the other side of the conversation is interesting because I did talk to you I did talk to some person should be support people were they raised it and where they said that they really appreciated vegetarianism was normal at the term they used they didn't use term vegan they really thought it was important and they respected it sons came up with context of Buddhism because all of them are talking to a Buddhism they're not a lot several you know it happened several times that they knew that the boma bathroom they wanted to hear more about that you know not something they have a lot of access to growing up where they've grown up and you know they would say things like you know they really appreciate the kind of ecological ethic behind vegetarianism but at the same time they felt like the trapline like going out and hunting on the trapline was like their last connection to their you know their heritage and their ancestors and they felt more than pull and that's and that's real talk like you know what I mean like you know obviously I respond to that also like a human being I'm not gonna throw it in their face yeah absolutely but I suspect that most of what they eat is not hunted of course they eat in McDonald's yeah yeah actual these are real people I knew I there was a McDonald's right around the corner from the university they ate at McDonalds I know it for a fact it's not like that's watched a documentary that was mostly about the east Eastern Canada yeah Native American I'm sorry first nation in the strives yeah you know there were parts of this documentary that we're showing what somebody was cooking in their house and it just looked like typical American fairs you know I guess Canadian fair thanks right bacon yeah so I know that's not yeah that's not the norm you don't know look I mean if if I had stayed on in First Nations Paul that I've mentioned this in other videos I would not have become a vegan activist I would have been a First Nations mostly language and education activist the thing I probably become an education activist probably more than prison education and language education and this kind of stuff but over the probic of an education activist and politics education activist for First Nations who happens to be vegan you know what I mean I mean there's definitely I mean when you're talking about people who have the the struggles they have there is a question I mean well you know veganism is not your first priority but it would come up all the time with all the people I work with em it's like most vegans and most jobs if you work in a shoe store everybody else in the shoe store knows you're vegan you know what I mean now did you preach it to them I mean it depends do they want to hear about it you know if you're working on a humanitarian project to help the curry or the Ojibwe or to do prison education or whatever it is people are gonna know you're vegan you're gonna talk about it and unless you have that aristocratic mentality like oh this is not this is not something for you peasants this is something just for for me and people like me yeah just recently you were talking about I think living you know generally living in Laos and Cambodia you didn't expect people to respect that you were vegan so I don't know did you have that same attitude with when you were interacting with creative people you know I remember even when I was a little kid I remember saying to my teachers and once even to uh to a supply teacher who was really freaking out the supply teacher yelled at us he was on it yeah she was on his way out of the classroom and he said tell me sir why don't you kids you know respect teachers he was he so he was a temperature switch eater and I said to him respect is earned so I just met you like I've known you for 45 minutes I said to respect sir I had some particular snotty thing I said it as a kid you know it's it's not like ordering a pizza I think I was literally what I said - it's not look it's not like ordering B's it doesn't get here in 30 minutes or it's free you know I said you know respect isn't all right you can tell what kind of us didn't know but you know um you know that that cuts both ways I don't like if I literally show up you know remote village in Laos as part of a humanitarian project I don't expect them to respect me you know what I mean and I've mentioned you mentioned YouTube at least some of the things you know why did people start to respect me because I went out and chopped lumber with them I carried lumber home I would have participated in farming rice you know what I mean I never did actually but went over to the rice field it was just not there at the right time or right circumstance to participate in the actual rice farming you know and that all that was linked to the diet people would say things like oh you know people say things like oh I'll bet he eats a lot of meat and then other people working like no actually it's amazing eats none at all really how much rice does he and like I did I eat like twice as much rice is that the Lao people was working on and then they'd be like oh well like um how much timber can he carry I bet he can carry about twice as much as enough they're like no he's twice as much right he carries about a third more or Timor's this is true you know they were regarding me as like a beast abut they were like evaluating me like it like an ox like a domesticated animal from really you know it was like well if you feed him twice as much rice can he lift twice as much lumber or something this is carrying carrying lumber up on your shoulder you know so the weight the weight ultimate is in your ankles so no I can't I can't lift that much compared to the the Lao farmers but yeah you know but you you do that stuff you know you you live that life with them of course I was I was also teaching English you don't seem Antarian mark you know I'm very supposed to be you know a teacher so maybe they respect you because you're a teacher maybe they respect you a bit because they see you doing the work they see you trying and other stuff I did you know what was also a pal a scholar I know about history and Buddhism and this ancient language so some people might respect you for your scholarship they just see you reading in a this ancient scriptures but other things I did like in one village this I didn't say nothing to of the villages that did humanitarian work on you know I climbed up the side of a mountain or whatever a big hill and I made a map of the town you know I just used my you know limited artistic skills to make a reason why everybody and and everyone was blown away by that these guys came around and you know sorry I mean this is bizarre like I can't say these are earth they live in the jungle but all these people have cell phones all of them have used computers you don't I mean like you know it's they all have motorcycles so this is not like you know tribal jungle people and some stairs have but I remember those days coming really studying the map just being really impressed like wow you know and they'd never seen a map but the town they lived in you know I mean they thought of maps is something only importance that he said you know so you know what respect is earned and I don't even in the commentary on vegan gains and other vegans and stuff and this kind of fragility so many Canadians have who do you you know don't you who I think you I am you know who do you think you are and this kinda thing I think when you go into the situate why would these people respect you you know what kind of respect to you are you looking for respect is earned and you you can you can earn that respect and you know reciprocally with that don't don't show them any fake respect I mean yeah I'm gonna respect someone just because they're poor like if you're a part of the Khmer the humanitarian project that help the poor that's great but you know don't there's there's there's still human beings you know right I'm sure you said you said it in this video already like that you know why would you treat them any differently if you're going to recommend veganism to anybody else in Canada why would you not recommend it to native people especially when and also you know she said like it's not our place to evaluate the problems that are in yeah on reservations why not like why can't evaluate it yeah why can't we you've got some great suggestions maybe you could help yeah yeah and I I think veganism is a really good suggestion for yeah because they're struggling with obesity and I I know the type of food that they have is very unhealthy so like you know I'm sure they're but but also like you know I think in the same way that if you talk about recommending vegan as your own mother you're gonna deal with the particular problems in your mother's situation so my mother does have particular health problems and I have problems with habit and everything else you know what I mean whenever you get to that level of phases little sure like if you say you can recommend veganism to native people the same way you can any other person well but by the same token they also have unique circumstances that you don't I mean all are also true of white people on a face-to-face basis right you know I mean like when you deal with a particular person this is my mom this is her situation this is her culture this is her living situation or whatever there may be particular problems you know what I mean and for sure I mean whether you're dealing with urban first nations Cup which are now that the majority of Native people they move to cities to get jobs there are more creepy 'pl living in Vancouver Vancouver British Columbia can than any other point in the map in Canada and they're not indigenous they're there they're foreigners to that part of Canada but because that's where there are jobs that's were there opportunities so they move to they move to Vancouver BC so you know you get urbanization and then they're living in the city the same as white people or if you're dealing with remote reservations or what have you sure and you know that sure there are special considerations but that would be true of any particular white person you deal with face to face also yeah yeah and you mentioned that was somewhat dehumanizing to say this you know you know Susan reference to atheist atheism like this is what you read when you're first entering college but it's not in it's not in that way like the religion is the opium of the masses like the you know people are too stupid really to be atheists like stupid people need religion or something you know people say this but it's kind of the opposite for at least more I guess more in Maxie's video saying that native people are more angelic or something like really they have this innate like yeah came up in video that's a the sustainability illusion right yeah right that that yeah she was talking about it Mex he was talking about the form of government and you know was really influenced by communists and like just far left look people in Canada sure so um yeah I don't know yeah I'm not gonna tell you where you're going with it well yeah I do think there is a there's a parallelism you know the sustainability Lucien you see that even in traditional Chinese literature was reading your what is it six records of a floating life and so on you know there's this common thing and varan the whole block is doing it which I suppose like oh these people their life has been unchanged for centuries these people there's they're living sustainably they're living in harmony with nature you know um eating bear meat eating the flesh of an apex predator is that sustainable how look if you have a tiny tiny population that's constantly collapsing due to internecine war due to outbreaks of plague you know spread out over the land okay people I guess people can eat their meat you know what I mean but like you know we as vegans don't think it's sustainable it'll make sustainable enough for people eat cow meat cows eat grass bears are an apex carnivore do you really want to glorify or defend a lifestyle of eating apex predators eating bear meat eating eagle meat sir I've read direct descriptions of creepy bleeding eagles also you know the sort of that's a flesh-eating bird Falcons and eagles in this kind of thing you know but they virtually every animal on the horizon you know what I mean what is the utility this idea of sustainability you know what I mean I think it really is just this kind of fetishization of the ring we can use a left wing term like other ring you know of a traditional lifestyle that's almost irrelevant to the to the conversation you know and I just wanna say I mean I do have sympathy with the yearning to maintain cultural traditions and I do have something when I talk to you know Korean aji away people who said like well they feel like this is the only contact AB with their tradition that's really sad but you know what there are other forms of meaningful contact with the tradition like the language which is a lot of hard work like really gaining fluency and ability in a native language like Korea Raja where Mohawk right that's very meaningful like you know sculpting like sculpture you know like even the religion anonyme reviving the traditional religion like the music anatoly's I went to protests where we had native people playing the drum but nobody could sing any lyrics and Creed the music is linked to the language if the music is gonna be meaningful you have to actually you know speak in practice language is very powerful form language practice to you know to learn and recite lyrics there's there's a lot here that can be meaningful on course history and politics there are so many things that can be meaningful and you know for sure I mean I'd like to imagine in the future at least some native groups will be confident enough in that identity and feel they have a lot of meaningful connection that heritage without having to kill a bear and eat its flesh you know but you know that that's my positive aspiration and I have had conversations like that face-to-face with First Nations people who thought it was a really interesting and fresh perspective because of course a lot of what they're used to hearing is really just condescending insincere from left-wing right be I'm going with its thinking you know of course I'm not making excuses for what you know what colonialism and the genocide that happened but you know this this making native and indigenous people in North America ought to be angels it's also like it's pretty ignorant to think that they wouldn't just because they hadn't reached a certain level of development in their civilizations like to think that they wouldn't have reached this level of unsustainability as well time well you know in what you know what are their are their cultures that have maintained sustainability like look' I think I think in general I mean you know if if you don't have a culture that actually reifies sustainability favorite or you know if there isn't a conscious you know awareness of sustainability because you know history of Easter Island if you've never heard of Easter Island please Google a check a Wikipedia article indigenous people who DeForest at the island destroyed their ecology their population collapse to attorney the island could could no longer support the population that was on it right in general the the history of the ancient civilizations of the of the Near East sorry the most the most ancient Mesopotamia I but gave my students less than this but now I'm forgetting up you know this is the oldest the oldest civilization to achieve urban populations and so on you know you know and the deforestation and then silt in the rivers and what have you you know unsustainable farming practices I you know very broadly speaking the growth of the Sahara in North Africa the destruction of what used to be inhabitable land that included not the cattle grazing cattle grazing was a huge part of the destruction in ancient ancient times you know the expansion of this desert and transformation of of northern Africa northern Africa everyone everyone knows that that's where human beings evolved but now it doesn't support human life so it's a great irony that's that's where the actual species were a member of but we destroyed our own homeland in an ecologic level so I mean ancient peoples pre-modern people's to call it sustainable when they themselves aren't pursuing sustainability if you're talking about sustainability that's that's but it may be achieved from us because of plague because of war because of just low population you know again and again and I mean anyway even that figuring out what were the population levels before they were decimated by Europeans are very very difficult map to do a very interesting research to do by the way but you know we did have examples of native peoples living in in urban populations but you know I just say it I guess it would be something like you know racial harmony okay I mean like do you really want to describe ancient Egypt as having racial harmony or do we want to say they they regarded ethnic differences in a different way than ourselves you know I mean like what you know if you're not if they from their perspective aren't actually espousing and pursuing a philosophy of whether it's cosmopolitanism or racial harmony or sustainability or what-have-you to a sign if roosevelt perspective there's an etic versus emic distinction here that is I think a bit problematic to use a word our friends on the left will all recognize it's it's problematic yeah but no I mean what in what sense you know eating bear in what sense is eating there you know sustained and you know again if you know those people if they're your friends if they're having heart attacks and they're getting cancer and they're struggling with obesity and they're asking you well what do you do comes up again you work in a shoe store everybody the shoe store knows you're vegan you know I mean even if you don't preach it you know I've mentioned that before I'm like being gay you know you may have you can be gay and your co-workers don't know you're gay when you're vegan everybody knows you're vegan you know every time they go to a coffee shop with you you say no no I don't do milk only do soy milk with it you know I mean whatever your situation is comes up all the time so if you share your life with Native people if you're doing anything positive for Native people are with Native people and you just treat them as your equals then inevitably you're gonna have those conversations with them as equals and you're gonna give them approximately the same advice you'd give a white person with the differences being the same type of differences between the advice you give your mom and the advice you give your uncle or the advice you give your coworker you know that maybe there are some differences but they are idiosyncratic in the and the truest sense the word
kind of video to film with me I've got like one minute of content I've got wanted things I want to say and then I kind of open it up for it of freestyle dance or whatever yeah I think I think you don't like does he feel like pressure it's like if you don't like it we'll just delete it or whatever it's no big deal we just watched a privileged vegan and Maxie two separate videos talking about First Nations issues indigenous peoples issues from from being perspective so I think nobody has ever asked me the question that privileged vegan was responding to privileged vegan was basically spawn respond to the question well if you preach veganism what is your position in preaching veganism to American Indians indigenous Canadians First Nations the creepy a giblet den a whichever tribe or review we want you want to talk about an example so I've I've been in this position I mean I she was not such I don't think she suggested she has any real-world experience of this this was just textbook I think for both of the women both Mexi and they were proceeding but from in a pretty abstract way Mexi may have met and spent time with some some tonight people because she said she was up at bath okay sorry Jasper National Park one of them okay whatever anyone but she's been doing some park life she's been doing some Park living so I you know I don't know but she didn't mention any actual face-to-face interactions people but sure I've been in this position as someone who was known to be vegan and veganism was a big part of my life and it was studying the Kree language primarily also doing other stuff on other Algonquian languages like the Soto dialect of jib white and then also about history and politics and I'm really primarily dressed in the future politics these people not the past but you got to study the past day of the future look uh way back when I was a normal age University students out of an 18 years old or something like that I remember reading my first example of ithi estas ofey and it was actually really disturbing to me so my parents both identified as atheist right but even that kind of fraught with ideological peril in my family so my mother is an atheist but she also is Jewish and the Judaism and the family is really important the Jewish identity and the memory of the Holocaust and all this stuff and politics of Israel and part of the Jewish family is anti Zionist and part of it is pro-zionist but they don't want to admit to themselves of their pros I guess so the Judaism what you know what does it mean to be Jewish if you're atheist you know I mean this this is never resolved right and my father's position on neighthan ISM and God in religion was also more internally contradictory than he wanted to admit to himself or his children but officially we were atheist so atheism in that sense was the default position yes but very rarely and under extraordinary circumstances so yes I went to religious I went to Jewish services yes with my mother and sometimes for other kind of unique reasons and yeah and I remember actually my I made criticisms of the of the Jewish herbs that meant a lot to my mom there's some really interesting discussions she had never kind of seen things the way I did and I did read the Bible and I did yeah my father really encouraged me to go out and on my own independently go to other religious services to kind of take a survey of them because I think he'd done that back in the 1940s or 1950s so he was open and was back in the day but I remember when I tried that when I photos I was really revolted but what I saw you know they weren't doing animal sacrifice or anything but I remember going to a Unitarian Universalist Church and thinking wow I hate this you know hate you like hate you know what I mean like I I really couldn't hang and somebody inoffensive Anglican or you know other Christians I really couldn't do it so that was also interesting for me but no I mean again my father having something my spare but look I remember in university the first time I read atheist philosophy was the philosophy of Holbach and helvetius so the Barone hold on and there were a number of things that were disturbing me about that and is someone who grew up a theist grew up presupposing atheism and you know grew up in an era when the big hit TV show was Seinfeld Seinfeld was a huge hit and Seinfeld is a Jewish atheist you know what I mean and most of the symbols most of the kind of public intellectuals across left-wing or right-wing in Canada they were atheists are close to up we didn't even have nominal Christians really you know like on TV talking about Paul this is the difference between the u.s. and Canada Canada was way more overtly atheistic so you know atheist was resumed as evil in loves here these guys Holbach and helvetius really advancing the the philosophy of atheism at a time when it was it was very contentious and one of the things that disturbed me most of all I was really sitting there trying to figure out what was so disturbing about this the Barranca hobo was an aristocrat in France in the years immediately before the French Revolution when among other things people thought it was a great idea to take aristocrats and you know cut off their head at the neck using a guillotine simplification of what happened here in the front row but this was one feature of it the French Revolution was in part and 80 aristocratic bloodbath and hobo is himself an atheist and he's obviously arguing philosophically that you the reader of this book ought to be an atheist right but he uh he's presupposes that the masses the poor the peasants will always believe in Christianity and that in a sense they ought to you know this is the the opiate of the masses this is what makes them happy this is what makes their lives of drudgery and euro boys night and that really disturbed me and it was really hard to put a finger on it right now this came up in two different countries if you really believe in atheism I know it sounds like a ridiculous that we don't but you know what I mean if you were sincere atheist I think you you must believe that atheism isn't just good for you it's good your mother and your uncle and your cousin people who you may know face that you may know be very hard for them to be this your mother or your uncle they may be very attached to religion but still you really believe if they could do it it would better for them you think it's better for your schoolteacher and the janitor and the farmers and the peasants and ultimately for everyone right and if you don't I find that very disturbing for that very difficult to define look what kind of insane elitism is involved or what kind of dehumanization like don't like you know come on so the barong the whole back I know he's an aristocrat don't you know any peasants don't you have any peasants who were your friend like I'm not joking because even in those kinds of unequal societies these are the people you go farming with you know you to some extent you do business you don't even if there is a big divide socially between you don't need more you could say oh yeah you know I know this peasant called y'all and you know yeah I mean he's a kind of bright guy and you know he maybe he questions things about the church maybe you know so look if if you believe in veganism now what does that mean veganism is better for your personal health it's better for the world's ecology and it's better in terms of ethics simplifying you got a friend you know face to face who is a jib way or cream if you know them I mean the vast majority of Creon at you boy people all the health says have seen struggle with obesity I have I have met very good-looking and healthy clean adroit people but I've seen statistics they have a huge obesity epidemic they have huge health problems if you know someone like that and you respect them intellectually you work with them in politics or whatever your situation it however it is you you know these people um if you don't have this kind of aristocratic attitude of total inequality atheism works for me but it could never work for these people for these peasants if you really know veganism works for me you know what I mean if you know that and you you basically regard these people as your equals in terms of intelligence and human biology and everything else yeah how are you not how are you not gonna say to your friend Jean not that I can we have a lot of you know what if John is a Cree from James Bay or something who speaks french let's say you know how are we you not gonna say you know Jean the you know if there's an alternative it's my whole there's an alternative what you're doing again in terms of your nutrition terms of ecology in terms of ethics and everything else yeah in a privileged vegans video she talks about how it's not her place to make judgments about Native American culture but I really don't think that that's an aspect of it I think you can still insist that they go vegan or you know they see at least suggested did you did you to your friends that work reorge yes but I want to answer the the premiums Kate in many cultures I think we would say it is not my place to preach to my own mother that she ought to be vegan in many cultures like including like it's how Italian culture to tell your mother yeah it's disrespectful and you've seen me talking my mama veganism like not that much cuz I've been vegan for so long you know it's not like the first time I was explained to my mom but while we've been together I mean I'm not I'm not a complete [ __ ] about it but I say to my mom you know you've seen it an email you've seen it on skype and a little bit face-to-face saw my mom face-to-face the first time in 15 years we were together but look if someone said to me whether they came from a traditional North African background or an Italian background or you know some Canadians or Americans might say hey you can't you can't talk to your mother but you'd that's not it's not your place to say this to your mother they have a point you know I'm not gonna say no you're just wrong my joy what I mean my relationship with my mother is unequal you know I mean she gave birth to me and she fed me a lot of non vegan foods growing up meat so much you know whatever you know sure you know that I think there's a question there and you know maybe you know I don't talk to my mother the same way I talk to my co-workers here at the University it's true now but you know why so these are human beings they live in the 21st century like all the Korean AG way people I know play video games they Pizza and you know some of them do go hunting once in a while you know white people go hunting to like you know this is this mystery another thing I mean privilege vegans said just in passing she just refer to Native people as as living in harmony with with nature this is in 2017 or maybe the videos 2016 but it's a fairly recent video so 2017 oh but you know whether it's 2016 or 2017 I just freaked out when she said yeah because because I mean melissa is younger than mean this hasn't been as big an issue in her life I paused the video and I went to youtube I said look I'm gonna show you the reality of what a First Nations Reservation looks like today which you're right I hadn't seen a reservation but I had read descriptions and you know what the just you know what the land was like it and why would you I mean there's no reason why you would have been to a First Nations of vision but my point was just look these people they don't have Spears they're not living in caves and you say they're living in houses and they have shops and they you know I mean the there are very real struggles when you get into their water supply and their sewage treatment their access to health care and their policing there one believe me I appreciate and you know I wanted to spend the rest of my life that what the First Nations University to work on those politically they have special political problems but there's an exotic inhere which is ultimately dehumanizing now you know any but then this is what we're talking about we're not talking about an isolated tribe in Papua New Guinea we're not talking about hypothetical isolated tribe in the Amazon rainforest in South America there may be some other we're talking about the Navajo and the den a and the Cree at the achieve way and the Mohawk and you know where they're at now in 2017 so so the actual the actual wording you know it's not it's not your place right and then you just as usual did you you know alright you know what kind of human being would I be like you know I mean like when you know people when you when you're good so I'm going to class with Cree energy way people and some Danai people and some some Lakota people some some some people from the dikko different native people like you know if one of them asks you for advice about breaking up with their boyfriend like there's some totally different rulebook apply because they're First Nations we be like well this is the advice I would give a white why like it makes it makes no sense to me now you don't keep the other side of the conversation is interesting because I did talk to you I did talk to some person should be support people were they raised it and where they said that they really appreciated vegetarianism was normal at the term they used they didn't use term vegan they really thought it was important and they respected it sons came up with context of Buddhism because all of them are talking to a Buddhism they're not a lot several you know it happened several times that they knew that the boma bathroom they wanted to hear more about that you know not something they have a lot of access to growing up where they've grown up and you know they would say things like you know they really appreciate the kind of ecological ethic behind vegetarianism but at the same time they felt like the trapline like going out and hunting on the trapline was like their last connection to their you know their heritage and their ancestors and they felt more than pull and that's and that's real talk like you know what I mean like you know obviously I respond to that also like a human being I'm not gonna throw it in their face yeah absolutely but I suspect that most of what they eat is not hunted of course they eat in McDonald's yeah yeah actual these are real people I knew I there was a McDonald's right around the corner from the university they ate at McDonalds I know it for a fact it's not like that's watched a documentary that was mostly about the east Eastern Canada yeah Native American I'm sorry first nation in the strives yeah you know there were parts of this documentary that we're showing what somebody was cooking in their house and it just looked like typical American fairs you know I guess Canadian fair thanks right bacon yeah so I know that's not yeah that's not the norm you don't know look I mean if if I had stayed on in First Nations Paul that I've mentioned this in other videos I would not have become a vegan activist I would have been a First Nations mostly language and education activist the thing I probably become an education activist probably more than prison education and language education and this kind of stuff but over the probic of an education activist and politics education activist for First Nations who happens to be vegan you know what I mean I mean there's definitely I mean when you're talking about people who have the the struggles they have there is a question I mean well you know veganism is not your first priority but it would come up all the time with all the people I work with em it's like most vegans and most jobs if you work in a shoe store everybody else in the shoe store knows you're vegan you know what I mean now did you preach it to them I mean it depends do they want to hear about it you know if you're working on a humanitarian project to help the curry or the Ojibwe or to do prison education or whatever it is people are gonna know you're vegan you're gonna talk about it and unless you have that aristocratic mentality like oh this is not this is not something for you peasants this is something just for for me and people like me yeah just recently you were talking about I think living you know generally living in Laos and Cambodia you didn't expect people to respect that you were vegan so I don't know did you have that same attitude with when you were interacting with creative people you know I remember even when I was a little kid I remember saying to my teachers and once even to uh to a supply teacher who was really freaking out the supply teacher yelled at us he was on it yeah she was on his way out of the classroom and he said tell me sir why don't you kids you know respect teachers he was he so he was a temperature switch eater and I said to him respect is earned so I just met you like I've known you for 45 minutes I said to respect sir I had some particular snotty thing I said it as a kid you know it's it's not like ordering a pizza I think I was literally what I said - it's not look it's not like ordering B's it doesn't get here in 30 minutes or it's free you know I said you know respect isn't all right you can tell what kind of us didn't know but you know um you know that that cuts both ways I don't like if I literally show up you know remote village in Laos as part of a humanitarian project I don't expect them to respect me you know what I mean and I've mentioned you mentioned YouTube at least some of the things you know why did people start to respect me because I went out and chopped lumber with them I carried lumber home I would have participated in farming rice you know what I mean I never did actually but went over to the rice field it was just not there at the right time or right circumstance to participate in the actual rice farming you know and that all that was linked to the diet people would say things like oh you know people say things like oh I'll bet he eats a lot of meat and then other people working like no actually it's amazing eats none at all really how much rice does he and like I did I eat like twice as much rice is that the Lao people was working on and then they'd be like oh well like um how much timber can he carry I bet he can carry about twice as much as enough they're like no he's twice as much right he carries about a third more or Timor's this is true you know they were regarding me as like a beast abut they were like evaluating me like it like an ox like a domesticated animal from really you know it was like well if you feed him twice as much rice can he lift twice as much lumber or something this is carrying carrying lumber up on your shoulder you know so the weight the weight ultimate is in your ankles so no I can't I can't lift that much compared to the the Lao farmers but yeah you know but you you do that stuff you know you you live that life with them of course I was I was also teaching English you don't seem Antarian mark you know I'm very supposed to be you know a teacher so maybe they respect you because you're a teacher maybe they respect you a bit because they see you doing the work they see you trying and other stuff I did you know what was also a pal a scholar I know about history and Buddhism and this ancient language so some people might respect you for your scholarship they just see you reading in a this ancient scriptures but other things I did like in one village this I didn't say nothing to of the villages that did humanitarian work on you know I climbed up the side of a mountain or whatever a big hill and I made a map of the town you know I just used my you know limited artistic skills to make a reason why everybody and and everyone was blown away by that these guys came around and you know sorry I mean this is bizarre like I can't say these are earth they live in the jungle but all these people have cell phones all of them have used computers you don't I mean like you know it's they all have motorcycles so this is not like you know tribal jungle people and some stairs have but I remember those days coming really studying the map just being really impressed like wow you know and they'd never seen a map but the town they lived in you know I mean they thought of maps is something only importance that he said you know so you know what respect is earned and I don't even in the commentary on vegan gains and other vegans and stuff and this kind of fragility so many Canadians have who do you you know don't you who I think you I am you know who do you think you are and this kinda thing I think when you go into the situate why would these people respect you you know what kind of respect to you are you looking for respect is earned and you you can you can earn that respect and you know reciprocally with that don't don't show them any fake respect I mean yeah I'm gonna respect someone just because they're poor like if you're a part of the Khmer the humanitarian project that help the poor that's great but you know don't there's there's there's still human beings you know right I'm sure you said you said it in this video already like that you know why would you treat them any differently if you're going to recommend veganism to anybody else in Canada why would you not recommend it to native people especially when and also you know she said like it's not our place to evaluate the problems that are in yeah on reservations why not like why can't evaluate it yeah why can't we you've got some great suggestions maybe you could help yeah yeah and I I think veganism is a really good suggestion for yeah because they're struggling with obesity and I I know the type of food that they have is very unhealthy so like you know I'm sure they're but but also like you know I think in the same way that if you talk about recommending vegan as your own mother you're gonna deal with the particular problems in your mother's situation so my mother does have particular health problems and I have problems with habit and everything else you know what I mean whenever you get to that level of phases little sure like if you say you can recommend veganism to native people the same way you can any other person well but by the same token they also have unique circumstances that you don't I mean all are also true of white people on a face-to-face basis right you know I mean like when you deal with a particular person this is my mom this is her situation this is her culture this is her living situation or whatever there may be particular problems you know what I mean and for sure I mean whether you're dealing with urban first nations Cup which are now that the majority of Native people they move to cities to get jobs there are more creepy 'pl living in Vancouver Vancouver British Columbia can than any other point in the map in Canada and they're not indigenous they're there they're foreigners to that part of Canada but because that's where there are jobs that's were there opportunities so they move to they move to Vancouver BC so you know you get urbanization and then they're living in the city the same as white people or if you're dealing with remote reservations or what have you sure and you know that sure there are special considerations but that would be true of any particular white person you deal with face to face also yeah yeah and you mentioned that was somewhat dehumanizing to say this you know you know Susan reference to atheist atheism like this is what you read when you're first entering college but it's not in it's not in that way like the religion is the opium of the masses like the you know people are too stupid really to be atheists like stupid people need religion or something you know people say this but it's kind of the opposite for at least more I guess more in Maxie's video saying that native people are more angelic or something like really they have this innate like yeah came up in video that's a the sustainability illusion right yeah right that that yeah she was talking about it Mex he was talking about the form of government and you know was really influenced by communists and like just far left look people in Canada sure so um yeah I don't know yeah I'm not gonna tell you where you're going with it well yeah I do think there is a there's a parallelism you know the sustainability Lucien you see that even in traditional Chinese literature was reading your what is it six records of a floating life and so on you know there's this common thing and varan the whole block is doing it which I suppose like oh these people their life has been unchanged for centuries these people there's they're living sustainably they're living in harmony with nature you know um eating bear meat eating the flesh of an apex predator is that sustainable how look if you have a tiny tiny population that's constantly collapsing due to internecine war due to outbreaks of plague you know spread out over the land okay people I guess people can eat their meat you know what I mean but like you know we as vegans don't think it's sustainable it'll make sustainable enough for people eat cow meat cows eat grass bears are an apex carnivore do you really want to glorify or defend a lifestyle of eating apex predators eating bear meat eating eagle meat sir I've read direct descriptions of creepy bleeding eagles also you know the sort of that's a flesh-eating bird Falcons and eagles in this kind of thing you know but they virtually every animal on the horizon you know what I mean what is the utility this idea of sustainability you know what I mean I think it really is just this kind of fetishization of the ring we can use a left wing term like other ring you know of a traditional lifestyle that's almost irrelevant to the to the conversation you know and I just wanna say I mean I do have sympathy with the yearning to maintain cultural traditions and I do have something when I talk to you know Korean aji away people who said like well they feel like this is the only contact AB with their tradition that's really sad but you know what there are other forms of meaningful contact with the tradition like the language which is a lot of hard work like really gaining fluency and ability in a native language like Korea Raja where Mohawk right that's very meaningful like you know sculpting like sculpture you know like even the religion anonyme reviving the traditional religion like the music anatoly's I went to protests where we had native people playing the drum but nobody could sing any lyrics and Creed the music is linked to the language if the music is gonna be meaningful you have to actually you know speak in practice language is very powerful form language practice to you know to learn and recite lyrics there's there's a lot here that can be meaningful on course history and politics there are so many things that can be meaningful and you know for sure I mean I'd like to imagine in the future at least some native groups will be confident enough in that identity and feel they have a lot of meaningful connection that heritage without having to kill a bear and eat its flesh you know but you know that that's my positive aspiration and I have had conversations like that face-to-face with First Nations people who thought it was a really interesting and fresh perspective because of course a lot of what they're used to hearing is really just condescending insincere from left-wing right be I'm going with its thinking you know of course I'm not making excuses for what you know what colonialism and the genocide that happened but you know this this making native and indigenous people in North America ought to be angels it's also like it's pretty ignorant to think that they wouldn't just because they hadn't reached a certain level of development in their civilizations like to think that they wouldn't have reached this level of unsustainability as well time well you know in what you know what are their are their cultures that have maintained sustainability like look' I think I think in general I mean you know if if you don't have a culture that actually reifies sustainability favorite or you know if there isn't a conscious you know awareness of sustainability because you know history of Easter Island if you've never heard of Easter Island please Google a check a Wikipedia article indigenous people who DeForest at the island destroyed their ecology their population collapse to attorney the island could could no longer support the population that was on it right in general the the history of the ancient civilizations of the of the Near East sorry the most the most ancient Mesopotamia I but gave my students less than this but now I'm forgetting up you know this is the oldest the oldest civilization to achieve urban populations and so on you know you know and the deforestation and then silt in the rivers and what have you you know unsustainable farming practices I you know very broadly speaking the growth of the Sahara in North Africa the destruction of what used to be inhabitable land that included not the cattle grazing cattle grazing was a huge part of the destruction in ancient ancient times you know the expansion of this desert and transformation of of northern Africa northern Africa everyone everyone knows that that's where human beings evolved but now it doesn't support human life so it's a great irony that's that's where the actual species were a member of but we destroyed our own homeland in an ecologic level so I mean ancient peoples pre-modern people's to call it sustainable when they themselves aren't pursuing sustainability if you're talking about sustainability that's that's but it may be achieved from us because of plague because of war because of just low population you know again and again and I mean anyway even that figuring out what were the population levels before they were decimated by Europeans are very very difficult map to do a very interesting research to do by the way but you know we did have examples of native peoples living in in urban populations but you know I just say it I guess it would be something like you know racial harmony okay I mean like do you really want to describe ancient Egypt as having racial harmony or do we want to say they they regarded ethnic differences in a different way than ourselves you know I mean like what you know if you're not if they from their perspective aren't actually espousing and pursuing a philosophy of whether it's cosmopolitanism or racial harmony or sustainability or what-have-you to a sign if roosevelt perspective there's an etic versus emic distinction here that is I think a bit problematic to use a word our friends on the left will all recognize it's it's problematic yeah but no I mean what in what sense you know eating bear in what sense is eating there you know sustained and you know again if you know those people if they're your friends if they're having heart attacks and they're getting cancer and they're struggling with obesity and they're asking you well what do you do comes up again you work in a shoe store everybody the shoe store knows you're vegan you know I mean even if you don't preach it you know I've mentioned that before I'm like being gay you know you may have you can be gay and your co-workers don't know you're gay when you're vegan everybody knows you're vegan you know every time they go to a coffee shop with you you say no no I don't do milk only do soy milk with it you know I mean whatever your situation is comes up all the time so if you share your life with Native people if you're doing anything positive for Native people are with Native people and you just treat them as your equals then inevitably you're gonna have those conversations with them as equals and you're gonna give them approximately the same advice you'd give a white person with the differences being the same type of differences between the advice you give your mom and the advice you give your uncle or the advice you give your coworker you know that maybe there are some differences but they are idiosyncratic in the and the truest sense the word