On Activism, vs. Vegan Gains, Tofu Goddess, Modvegan.

just chit-chatting with some people and
ask yourselves discord live and the question was asked you basically asked well what do you mean when you say you've lost he asked first what do you mean when you say you've lost faith in veganism as a movement what's going on and I he went on to ask well positively what is it you would expect vegans to be doing more of I'm gonna give you an example back in the day when I first started talking to tofu goddess another being youtuber she's Canadian citizen I'm a Canadian citizen so I said look let's get organized and let's lobby the school boards in Canada let's get organized she was getting a degree in education so I forget masters in education she was gonna become a schoolteacher say okay let's go around and challenge the fact that in the classroom students are taught that cow milk is part of a healthy diet this kind of thing let's actually get out there and say no as a matter of scientific fact eggs are not healthy cow milk is not healthy and it's it's immoral for students it's other stuff and there's also a question about meat and dairy companies paying money so that they can advertise to students in the classroom that's a form of activism really getting awareness there was another vegan youtuber called them Maude vegan and I talked to her about getting organized to actually do public outreach and education and then also ultimately some kind of legal challenges about leather so leather doesn't just pollute the rivers it also pollutes your home there are toxic byproducts that the leather actually sheds it's remarkably toxic as an actual southern so it's actually a minor threat to your health as someone if you are someone who owns leather and wears leather it damages your health but of course it also damages the health of a lot of the workers the employees who make the leather and there are other stages of production where there are questions of contamination pollution so to do public outreach and education and to start lobbying on that start pressuring for political and social change and it never happened now those are not the two worst examples those are two of the most positive examples those are two of the only [ __ ] people who ever even discussed with me the possibility of doing something in real life to make a difference and sure it's it's with regret that I've got to look back at the last five years and say nothing ever happened those people talked to me for a short time and they pursued a certain level of fame or notoriety here on YouTube and you know then just petered out it basically it was at the time when I was coming back to Canada I was like okay great I'm finally coming back to Canada from China which is a big sacrifice you know I was trying to get my own projects going in terms of vegan activism and the very few people who would ever talk to me about through his thing in real life or even meeting with me in real life every single one of them think doubt and sure that included vegan gains that included Richard you know so you were asking he was asking him a minute ago what what happened to me was Joseph well in some ways nothing happened that I never slept with Richard's girlfriend or something like we didn't have a conflict of that kind but you know right so I was in China packing up to move back to Canada and I act she had a list of people to buy gifts for like a gift so when he come back so hey I bought you this when I was living in China Richard was on the list and one day he just freaked out and said sent me a message saying you know aisel your videos about racism you're like qat racist you're basically always saying that other people are racist and it keeps people racism and just I don't want to talk to you like [ __ ] you and he blocked me that was the end of covers mic drop and he blocked me on Facebook and never spoke to me again another thing yes yes said a few things to me since then since then he threatened to sue me for example he threatened to sue me and get my videos deleting him my channel TV now and so he's been even more hostile censor um but yeah long story short so if you ask why am i disappointed with veganism as a movement and those aren't the most negative those levels positive examples because at least there was a one time there was the potential there at one time there was a potential for something positive it happened through collaboration with Richard vegan gains through collaboration with Marvin in through collaboration with tofu goddess with a lot of other people that was never even a chance no of never matter of never manifest this yeah no a lot there were a lot of people we did some videos where people picked up on like they thought there was a flirtatious vibe between us so a lot of people think she and I weren't really she was not but no and I'm by the way I don't even think she ever liked me or anything I don't think that was a real component just not doing so like what you're talking about is like doing like some really good things in the wall and getting veganism trying trying to do something right yeah yeah yeah but like what do you think about the idea like sure that's cool you know it's like it's like it I thought I was like raping me five times a week and then I and then I stopped doing that great I mean I completely don't you me I completely know what you mean the thing is it's not just that I want to put out the fire if my own house is on fire if someone else's house is on fire and it's burning down I also want to help I want to take responsibility for that I want to make the world a better place so you know I love in religions like Buddhism and Hinduism historically vegetarianism just became centered on one's own personal moral purity on one's own karma which is like saying oh I only care if my own house is on fire right and that's not my perspective my perspective is hey I care about all of our homes I care about the whole city it'll kind of you want to look at it ultimately the whole world right so like yeah if I personally I'm not killing any cows just to simplify of it yeah okay that's nice but if my next-door neighbor is killing cows if every day I go to work and all of my co-workers are killing it easy obviously it's merely of kind of a tokenistic or symbolic thing that I may be resolved you know to never to never do that kind of harm myself so the next step would inevitable is that you reach out to other people and say look I'm vegan won't you be vegan too I feel this isn't just a moral obligation for me I think it's a moral obligation for everybody so that's one that's the the kind of human to human face to face you know element of it but then of course you scale it up I mean just just as amusing example the fire because the fire is impersonal it's just a force of nature what everyone that's a chemical reaction or anyone say it's a it's a hazard but you know there's there's a when you scale it up talking about the mass you know social economic cultural phenomenon which is in some ways just raging like a fire unchecked you have to say well there are all these other things we have to do to stand up and challenge this fire most people don't even think leather is an ethical issue they tend to think fur is which is kind of interesting but it's name is a hey wait you know what leather is an ethical problem it's an ecological problem it's even a health problem for you I want you to know and then I want legislation even if just taxes imagine if we could just get a 10% tax on leather and people really saying look leather has to be phased out it has to become a thing of the past so it's a big cultural and economic turning point so I'm never gonna make that happen by just being focused on my own personal purity you know my own home or something I've got to do it by reaching out to others yeah so III just say that's inevitable but of course on a kind of strictly logical level of course you're correct veganism only requires that you personally desist from this this immoral act sure that's true yeah I would never say that someone is not vegan because they're not making the further effort to help other people or to help animals to health plant that's this is true but as you know cocaine is vegan you can be vegan to be a cocaine addict doesn't mean it's good yeah depressing you got another movement I could join instead you got a better suggestion really awful right at last couple last couple days talking to a lot of Communists end of the talk II do I talked to one conservative and several right before it where I wouldn't go talk to one person who was really extreme right when I've talked to people from different movements and I think a lot of those people are desperate to cling to something that makes them feel like they're making the world a better place and they're not what they're clinging to is is [ __ ] horrible you know it's like if you think about the ocean and you have drowning men clinging to driftwood you know but some of them are deluded and think that this driftwood is a god like the Communists and the fascists they believe in this [ __ ] piece of driftwood and you know right yeah yeah yeah and I'm just not deluded enough to look at these look at these ideologies and see it that you're trying to make a difference to change things veganism do you think you're doing a little bit of a pot I mean other beings are doing through there's a great way to reach other people Yeah right what we'll look the Internet does harm also writes the Internet is really damaged my life okay good great great point great point but uh so already this human scale you want individual human scale there's the mass social scale to that that's a good example in a mat I think another exam acts hysteria things like that can spread to do that's that's in the mescal but on the human one-to-one scale you know I've been applying for jobs when my employers Google my name one of the top results is nor vegans channel nor vegan saying aisel Mazar makes excuses to support a rapist it's something like that it's like you know it and now of course that that already looks bad if English is your first language what if Chinese is your first language so I've had that kind of defamation and denunciation of me on the internet from other vegans it's never been meat eaters I've never been facing that Casta it's fun with including vegan games no remember vegan gains threatened to sue me I've never had a meat eater threatened assume have never had a meat eater threatened to shut down my channel it's other vegan stream of [ __ ] but look on a human level you know yes I was one of the people talking about it honestly look vegans come with the internet to get laid they come on the internet for sex money fame so they don't have to feel so alone you know I feel isolated you feel powerless you want to have friends you want to fall in love you know I don't I don't think that's evil at all I think that's it that's a totally legitimate part of it and that that's that's hypothetically the most pause bar today so after five years it's been more than five years have been on youtube I would say I have one friend one real-life friend as a result of this YouTube channel one in the whole world he's a period of the channel is for his first name is Muhammad so he's actually appeared in the chaplain we've met in real life and work we're friends there were maybe two people who I'd consider close friends by facebook on length like just like we've never met but we do have we do have messages back and forth and you saw it was so sorry I mean this just gives you idea and then I've already sent you in terms of other activists or organizations it's it's like it's zero now in the past so just one or two people where there was some hope of collaboration working together but it's it's really that bad so look that's not zero outcome you could say well gee if what if during these five years I hadn't been on the Internet at all then I wouldn't even have those few friends right and I've gotten laid through YouTube it's certainly improved my well okay no okay wait let's even wait let's even let's even challenge that let's even [ __ ] challenge that maybe okay I I I've gotten late because of this youtube channel but if I didn't have this YouTube channel then I would have been making more of an effort to connect to people face to face not meeting women you know through the internet not meeting women through veganism I would have met different women and it would have forced me to compromise and work with you know I was at University of Victoria it would have forced me to socialize with and make connections with people who happen to go to my University or happen to be in my gym of course 98% of them or 99% are not vegan it'd be something else you have in common that you were stood out so I don't even know that it really is possible I would have been better off not you know not having my set my sex life of my social life being dominated by this [ __ ] failure of a movement this way it's failed so far doesn't mean it's always gonna fail but so far last five years I see a lot of failure sure oh yeah yeah one of the most exciting things is that is that a political movement you look I live in Taiwan right so in in Taiwan veganism as a diet is way more successful than in America or anywhere in Europe we were either number one or number two in the world for veganism the highest rates of veganism in the world are basically Taiwan there are a couple of specific towns within India not India as a whole where it's a linked to religion and then basically the city of Tel Aviv in Israel those are the big success stories for veganism so this is absolutely one of the most but guess what as a movement in terms of ecology ethics and politics it's dead but I believe I live in a small town with more than 30 vegan restaurants there could be 50 vegan restaurants here I'd like I don't think anyone's counted them all they're more than 30 vegan restaurants here veganism as a diet is huge vegan activism zero and what was that used to be in a big city still in Taiwan Gaussian just down the road zero and I was really going and asking I was really trying to meet vegan activist and find out what was going the movement absolutely zero so this is just my warning you yeah there can be products there can be economic activity but it's important to remember that this is a very different question from the progress of the movement