Veganism, Part 1

As part of my personal campaign on behalf of animal rights, I adopted a vegan lifestyle. Many of my friends now know this about me. Those who do not, remain unaware not as a result of my unwillingness to tell them, but perhaps because they do not conceive of a life nourished on something other than meat and cheese. This reluctance in considering an alternative way of life to the one in which a person was reared, is not uncommon.  Humans seek constancy in all that they do. After all, what are we if not a species obsessed with binding chaos? When the opportunity of change comes by, too often we let it pass. We can tolerate so much upheval in the ocean we sail, but we will never abandon ship, so to speak.

I have, no doubt, at times, been a nuisance to friends and family with my constant invective against the factory farming industry. Those same friends have, perhaps, felt that my own way of life is somehow a condemnation, or at least a disapprobatation, of their own. I assure them, it is not.

But with time, I’ve found myself becoming more pertinacious in my support of veganism, indeed more outspoken. Feeling, as I do, this call to duty, I am always attempting to gain the ear of those who have yet to consider the implications of the way they consume. There are many implications. And it behooves us as a thinking people, to comprehend the consequences of our actions. It is incumbent upon us to own the chain of cause-and-effect that we, ourselves, set into motion.   

In truth, the vegan lifestyle comes packaged with a speaker’s platform. It is intended to agitate, as much as it is to fulfill. I make no mistake that I quite enjoy being vegan, that I am less at-odds with my own heart, which always advises me to do the right (if not the intelligent) thing. It feels good to live out one’s convictions, unapologetically. 

A vegan who chooses not proclaim the cause, is  one, perhaps, who chooses the lifestyle for its benefits to health. I myself, am firmly on the animals-rights side of things. I care little for the fact that an all-vegetable diet is salubrious (though it is), and am more concerned with ensuring that our own species’ contentment does not detract from the contentment of another species.

So many encounters with skeptics of the stubbornest kind, has possessed me to consider that the formulation of a new argument in favor of veganism, is no less than absolutely necessary if the movement is to gain ground.

There are, of course, the traditional arguments. I would be remiss not to mention them. But my objective is not to exercise old ways of thinking. Rather, I believe there is a way of framing the argument for veganism, and more generally, for animal rights, that will appeal to those who have otherwise considered these concerns unimportant.

In parts two and three of this post, I will set forth the more traditional arguments for veganism. In my forth posting, I will attempt to articulate my own, personal reasons and adapt them to the greater whole. By this endeavor, perhaps, people will elevate the cause of animal rights to a higher place in their consideration.