Archive for the 'Animal Rights' Category

A note on my first vegan marathon

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on August 3, 2007
in Animal Rights, Athletics and Fitness, Food and Veganism
. 9 Comments

The San Francisco Marathon I ran this past Sunday was the first marathon I had trained for as a strict vegan. I’ve been flirting with veganism for years, but it was only at the beginning of 2007 that my wife and I made the decision to remove all animal products (including dairy, eggs, honey) from our diet.

When I started “ramping up” my training in May in preparation for the marathon, I was curious to see how my body would respond to 50-60 miles a week of running while eating vegan. I was encouraged, of course, by the example of a variety of other vegan athletes — especially Brendan Brazier, the Canadian 50K champion. I began to use his product, Vega, and I was able to have a long chat with him as we jogged the Mall in Washington in April.

But Brendan, as amazing an athlete and animal rights activist as he is, is more than a couple of years younger than I am. He’s also a professional, and I’m little more than a middle-aged weekend warrior. I hit 40 just as I began this now-concluded training season, and worried that my ageing muscles wouldn’t get replenished on plant-based nutrition alone. Of course, there was no way to find out if an average guy like me could train and run on a vegan diet without trying… so try I did.

After this past Sunday, with another slow-but-steady 3:52 in the bag, I can now say definitively that eating and training vegan is possible. (I wish I could say that eliminating all animal products from my diet made me magically as fast as I was in the late ’90s!) Because I was eating lighter, I was able to sleep less and feel rested — as my body didn’t have to work so hard to digest animal fats. That meant I could get up at 4:30AM, do a middle-distance run, and then give seven hours worth of lecture without feeling utterly exhausted. In that sense, eating vegan did enhance my performance.

I drank my Vega and my hemp protein supplements, but didn’t live on bars and processed “vegan junk” food. I ate a lot of nuts, a lot of dried fruit, a lot of whole wheat pasta. I began to eat vegetables I had once scorned, developing a genuine passion for kale. (I still don’t love broccoli.) I dropped some body fat, but kept my weight at a healthy level. No one told me that I looked gaunt, and I didn’t feel as if I were in a constant state of self-denial. My cravings for meat grew fewer (though every once in a while, I would still feel a pang of longing as I drove by my favorite taco stand). Those cravings are almost gone now.

And here’s the kicker: our household food budget went down. Yes, we bought a lot of organic veggies at Whole Foods (and when we could, at the local farmer’s market). But I also ate out less — instead of buying lunch, I packed it. A packed lunch made up of plant-based food bought at Whole Foods was still cheaper than a processed meal purchased on campus. When people tell me “I can’t afford to be vegan”, I note that my savings off being vegan this spring and summer were enough to (almost) pay for a very nice hotel room in San Francisco this past weekend.

Yes, I’m proselytizing. For reasons of human health and animal rights, I’m a passionate believer in veganism. It ties in to my feminism and my Christianity; long before I embraced a cruelty-free diet, my faith and my belief in women’s rights had convinced me that I am called to do justice and mercy in every action I take. Training for my fourteenth marathon as a first-time vegan was an opportunity to match my language and my life. And saving money in the process was a terrific bonus.

The Winsome Vegan: some long thoughts about judgment, ethics, family dinners and “Hell’s Kitchen”

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on July 17, 2007
in Animal Rights, Faith, Food and Veganism
. 46 Comments

I don’t watch a lot of television, but last night made a happy exception: the last few innings of the championship match of the world cup of softball and back-to-back episodes of “Hell’s Kitchen.” I’m still unhappy about the decision of the Olympic Committee to take softball out of the Games starting in 2012. (Sure, the USA’s women are absolutely dominant. But Manchester United is pretty darned dominant in the Premiership too, and that doesn’t mean that the likes of Sunderland don’t get excited about playing them. Softball ranks just behind American college football and soccer as my favorite team sport to watch, so I’m biased.)

Even when I ate meat, I was never what you’d consider to be a “foodie.” As I’ve written before, in my pre-vegan bachelor days, I could consist for days, even weeks, on food-related products purchased at the local 7-11. Being vegan does force me to be more thoughtful about what I’m eating, but it’s a thoughtfulness born more of necessity rather than pleasure. That doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy my food, I do. But I’ve never had much interest in contemplating exciting new meals. Cooking shows — at least the sort where you are shown how to make something — are stunningly dull.

I do like fashion, and care much more about clothing than food. Hence, I do enjoy “Project Runway.” But I can’t explain why I’m so fond of “Top Chef” and the positively sadistic “Hell’s Kitchen”. Perhaps I just like watching people who are passionate about what they do struggling to perform under intense pressure. I know I’m at my best under pressure, and perhaps it’s empathy born of experience in other areas of life that makes the competitors on these shows so interesting to me. Lord knows, it’s not the food that they’re actually making.

And this brings me back to veganism. In the last four or five months that I have been much more strictly and actively vegan, I’ve been acutely conscious of my own dangerous tendency towards self-righteousness. Self-righteousness is the pit into which many adult converts tend to fall, and those of us who have “prodigal son” narratives (in my case involving a decade and a half worth of drugs, alcohol, multiple divorces and a lot of very unhealthy sexual acting-out) are all the more likely to become tiresomely prudish as we move to amend our way of life. Of course, in our zeal to promote the new “clean livin’” we’ve just discovered, we end up alienating everyone around us. I know I’ve slipped into the role of the prig many times, and as I grow in Christ, I’m all the more determined to not let that censoriousness characterize my thinking or my words about other people’s behavior.

At the same time, when it comes to veganism and animal rights, it’s hard. As someone who does believe that all sentient beings — not just humans — do have inalienable rights to life and dignity, it’s often difficult to find a way to live in loving community with those who find that view preposterous and silly. Watching “Hell’s Kitchen” last night, I saw one group of chefs preparing “bacon-wrapped rabbit” as a special dish. Looking at the strips of bacon wrapped around the little chunks of rabbit, I thought about the animals from which those morsels came. I thought about the hogs I’ve been around and the rabbits I’ve played with. (Lest you think I’m a purely urban vegan, I’ve spent a lot of time in my life on ranches and farms. I grew up around 4-H and FFA and have been to countless livestock shows and auctions. I’m not an urban sentimentalist totally ignorant of the realities of farm life.) I thought about the capacity of pigs to nurture and to protect, and the clear and obvious ability of rabbits to experience fear and pain and pleasure. And in order to continue watching the show, I had to shut down that part of me that wanted to scream “How dare you!” at the aspiring chefs.

I have vegan acquaintances who won’t go to family holidays where meat is served. I know some vegans who have severed all of their close ties with those who continue to eat animal products. They find it too painful to sit at family meals while those whom they love consume the flesh of creatures equally deserving of protection and care. I’m far too committed to my friends and family, far too interested in far too many different types of people to ever cut myself off from someone over their dietary choices.

With my family, we’ve reached a clear understanding. When we come home for family holidays (such as at Easter this year), we’ll bring our own food. No one will beg us to try “just one little bite” of ham or omelette. In turn, we won’t begin to hector our loved ones with the usual lines: “Do you have any idea how that was made? Would you be willing to eat it if you saw how that animal was slaughtered?” My wife and I not only sit next to meat-eaters, we even help in preparing dishes filled with animal product (as at the Fourth of July, where I spent over an hour cranking out ice cream I would never taste). We’ve made a conscious decision to strike a balance between our desire for loving, harmonious relationship with our families and our own commitment to no longer consume animals in any form.

It’s not as easy as it sounds. Sometimes, the meat eaters around me feel as if they’re being silently rebuked. As they slice their steaks and I spoon in my quinoa and broccoli, they look uncomfortable. I make a conscious effort not to stare at their food, I don’t make disgusted expressions, I don’t use passive-aggressive tactics to communicate disapproval. Nevertheless, I see some folks getting antsy. Often, they’ll ask if I’m “okay” with what they’re eating; I’m always careful to be reassuring.

At the same time, my veganism is not a value-neutral lifestyle choice. Being a feminist and being anti-racist isn’t morally equivalent with being a misogynist bigot. Those of us who fight for justice for women and ethnic minorities want to change hearts and minds and behaviors; we want men to stop abusing women, we want full inclusion for people of color in every aspect of public life. Most of us draw a distinction between someone who says “having toast with peanut butter in the morning is better than having cornflakes, and you can’t judge me for that view” and someone who says “raping women is something I prefer to not raping them, and you can’t judge me.” The latter involves tremendous harm to living beings whose lives have innate value, and so we feel comfortable and right in judging it. So if I believe that pigs and rabbits and cows have a similar innate value to that of a human being, am I not contradicting myself if I reassure my meat-eating friends that they’re “okay with me” when I would never offer that same reassurance to a rapist or a racist?

Yes, I do want a world where we’ve minimized the suffering of sentient creatures. I do want a world where we are all surviving and thriving on a plant-based diet, and I am eager to play a role in helping to create the economic systems and the policies that can make veganism as affordable and pleasurable and easy as carniverousness. The cost to the earth (in terms of water and protein, for example) to “factory farm” cows, pigs, sheep, and poultry is colossal and likely unsustainable. The cost in physical suffering is unspeakable, and I do wish those who eat meat would, at the least, imagine the face of the creature whose thighs or hindquarters they are eating. There can be no virtue in deliberate, willfull denial.

At the same time, I’m aware we live in a world trapped in the famous tension between the Already and the Not Yet. I am Already aware, at least I trust I am, of what it is God is calling me to be. I am Already convinced that I am called, and indeed, we all are called, to eat and drink and drive and make love and buy morally. I am Already convinced that to follow Christ is to live a life of courage and radical compassion; I am Already convinced that to live as an authentic feminist is to see that the exploitation of other living creatures for my pleasure is fundamentally unethical. I am Not Yet at the place where I can live this life perfectly, without the occasional small compromises that expose me and others to the charge of hypocrisy. I am Not Yet at the place where I can make the case for Christian feminist veganism without coming across, at least to many, as a charlatan or a fraud or a deluded prude swept up in religious enthusiasm.

So I’ll keep on keepin’ on; that means being cheerful about an undressed salad at an elegant restaurant while those around me nosh on chateaubriand. That means being unapologetic about animal rights while being warm, engaging, and non-judgmental with those who are unwilling to consider my position to be practical or desirable.

And it means I’m gonna work on another book proposal one of these days. Working title: “The Winsome Vegan: How to Live Cruelty-Free and Love those Who Don’t”.

Dodger dogs

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on June 6, 2007
in Animal Rights
. 25 Comments

Just passing through the house today, I turned on Fox News (a rare event indeed). Saw a story on the attempt by animal rights activists to get the Los Angeles Dodgers to stop selling the eponymous hot dog made by Farmer John; the pigs who are slaughtered to make the franks are kept in tiny cages that are considered more than unusually inhumane.

One Dodger fan was interviewed as he munched on a “dog”; he was entirely unrepentant:

“I’m going to keep on enjoying these”, he said. “Because if you started thinking too much about it, you’d be vegetarian.”

Word, my dear brother, word.

All I ask people to do is think about how what they are eating was made. If they could cheerfully kill and butcher the meat themselves, that’s one thing. But if their enjoyment is contingent upon willful ignorance or denial, that’s something else altogether.

“Death by Veganism”: cheap alarmism at its most repugnant

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on June 4, 2007
in Animal Rights, Food and Veganism
. 21 Comments

Two weeks after people first started sending it to me, let me respond to the infamous Nina Plancke op-ed in the New York Times, Death by Veganism. Commenting on the report of vegan parents in Georgia arrested after the death of their infant son, Plancke opines:

I was once a vegan. But well before I became pregnant, I concluded that a vegan pregnancy was irresponsible. You cannot create and nourish a robust baby merely on foods from plants.

Indigenous cuisines offer clues about what humans, naturally omnivorous, need to survive, reproduce and grow: traditional vegetarian diets, as in India, invariably include dairy and eggs for complete protein, essential fats and vitamins. There are no vegan societies for a simple reason: a vegan diet is not adequate in the long run.

The breathtaking lack of logic in the last sentence reminds me of classic anti-feminist arguments: there are no truly egalitarian societies (and never will be) because women are, in the long run, inferior to men.

Who is this Nina Planck person with her sweeping arguments about nutrition? Well, she has no medical degree or nutrition degree. Here’s her website, and there’s no mention of any professional certification in any health field. She writes cookbooks and advocates for farmer’s markets, both worthy activities — but she writes with the authority of someone who ought to have initials after her name. She doesn’t.

Who does say you can have a healthy vegan pregnancy? The medical advisory team at Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, which includes pediatricians, nutritionists, and gynecologists on its board. Here’s a letter to the Times from vegan nutritionist Dr. Amy Joy Lanou. An excerpt:

I am a nutritionist who testified as an expert witness for the prosecution in the criminal trial of the parents of Crown Shakur. As the lead prosecutor in this case told the jury, this poor infant was not killed by a vegan diet. He was starved to death by parents who did not give him breast milk, soy-based infant formula or enough food of any kind.

Well-planned vegan diets are healthful for pregnant mothers and their infants, as well as for older children, according to a large body of scientific research. Contrary to Ms. Planck’s assertions, there are healthy plant-based sources of docosahexaenoic acid, or DHA; calcium can be absorbed about as readily from soy milk as from cow’s milk; and soy does not inhibit growth.

Studies have found that vegan children are within the normal ranges for weight and height, and I personally know vegan mothers and vegan children who are healthier than many of their omnivorous peers.

When my wife and I attended PCRM’s gala fundraiser in D.C. in April, we met several couples with young children who are being raised vegan. The children laughed and played and ran around, looking slender and healthy and cheerful. One woman we talked to had been vegan throughout her two pregnancies, with smashing success. Though I may not know as many folks as Dr. Lanou, I can certainly — anecdotally — think of many kids who are growing up vegan and healthy and happy and fine.

I assume Nina Planck is not a shill for Big Ag. But her misrepresentations of the vegan lifestyle (which she suggests is fine for adults but irresponsible for children) has already done serious harm. Those who are committed to veganism as a multi-generational way of living, those who are committed to raising children from conception without food sourced from any animal other than a human mother, deserve to have the full story told.

My wife is committed to a vegan pregnancy. We are committed to raising vegan kids, with careful medical supervision from doctors and nutritionists who are committed to the welfare of children and the well-being of the earth they will inherit.

For more on vegan pregnancy and children, go here.

Killing Kangaroos and rejecting Beckham

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on May 30, 2007
in Animal Rights and Sports
. 10 Comments

I’m saddened to learn that shoe manufacturer Adidas has successfully lobbied the California State Senate to permit the importation of kangaroo skin for use in the production of soccer (football) boots. Here’s the Los Angeles Times story

After years of assertive lobbying by Adidas, the California Senate voted Tuesday to legalize the import and sale of kangaroo skins so that soccer players can buy shoes made from the marsupials’ coveted leather.

Of the 55 species of kangaroos in Australia, six are commercially harvested and exported, and would be allowed if the bill is approved by the Assembly and signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Those species include red and eastern and western gray kangaroos.

Animal activists are fighting the proposal, which they say will lead to the deaths of endangered kangaroos because hunting is done at night and the species are difficult to differentiate. They also object to the rules of kangaroo hunting, which dictate that if a mother is killed the baby must be killed as well.

PETA’s press release is here, and it notes that David Beckham chooses to wear synthetic leather rather than anything made from animals. After being contacted by animal rights organizations, Beckham (who had not realized his Adidas Predator boots were made from kangaroo hide) chose a different shoe to wear.

The Times article notes that Beckham’s new team, the Los Angeles Galaxy, joined Adidas in lobbying the state Senate for passage of the kangaroo skin bill. Given that their future star has rejected kangaroo hide, and has gone on record explicitly against other footballers wearing kangaroo kit, this seems a poor choice on the part of the Galaxy.

The bill, SB 880, now goes to the state assembly. Californians, please contact your assembly member. (Contact info, and info on how to figure out who represents you, is on the left hand side of the page.)

Short race report, and two links on faith and veganism

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on May 28, 2007
in Animal Rights, Athletics and Fitness and Veganism
. 0 Comments

I haven’t run many short races in recent years. On a whim, I did the Fiesta Days 10K in La Canada this morning; it’s quite a hilly course (with all the uphills in the second half, which is what I like). I had two goals — break 45 minutes for the race, and run the second (uphill) half faster than the first. I missed my first goal, finishing in an unofficial 45:06, but did (by my rough calculations) do the second half about fifteen seconds faster than the first.

When I was younger, I would run fast early and hang on at the end; now, far wiser (if far slower) my goal is not to get passed in the final third of any race I run. Today, I was more than six minutes slower than my personal best on a certified 10K course (38:49, back in the day when I was a skinny, nervy thing) but I had lots of fun. And no one passed me at the end.

Also, I just joined the Christian Vegetarian Association. Would have done it earlier, but somehow didn’t know about ‘em. Thanks to reader “Jay” for the link. The CVA reminds me that the literal reading of Genesis 1:29-30 would seem to support the notion of the vegan diet as “God’s best.”

Read through CVA’s faqs here, and check out the Society of Ethical and Religious Vegetarians as well.

Happy Memorial Day.

Live Strong Day

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on May 15, 2007
in Animal Rights, Links and Science
. 4 Comments

Amanda Marcotte is helping coordinate the internet presence of the Lance Armstrong Foundation. The LAF, famous for their LiveStrong campaign that saw 40 million Americans don yellow wristbands, is annoucing that tomorrow, May 16, is LiveStrong Day. Lance and his supporters will be lobbying Congress for greater support for cancer survivors and their families.

The biggest priority of the LAF, I am happy to say, is expanding access to health care for millions of uninsured Americans. The Lance Arrmstrong Foundation is also eager to expand early screening, taking note that cancer deaths could be reduced by at least a third with early detection. And of course, the LAF wants to fund more research.

As a rule, my wife and I only support medical charities that receive the Humane Seal of approval, meaning that their research does not involve any use of animal subjects. Next to our own Matilde Mission, there is no charity nearer and dearer to our hearts than the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. They created the Humane Seal program.

The Lance Armstrong Foundation, I am sorry to say, still funds research that uses animal subjects. Yet I am happy to say that the LAF has a history of funding many of the projects of the PCRM. PCRM is eager to extoll the cancer-fighting benefits of a vegan diet; in recent years, their vegan nutrition classes have received direct support from the LAF. I am delighted that that support seems likely to continue.

Where the Lance Armstrong Foundation calls for early detection programs, for better support for those living with cancer, for immediate attention to the plight of the uninsured, I stand with them in full support. Where the LAF funds research on animal subjects, I withdraw that support. My adored father died of cancer last year, I held him in my arms on the day he passed. But if anything, his death only strengthened my opposition to animal research and testing. Even if it would have extended my Dad’s life, I remain steadfastly opposed to all forms of vivisection. I blogged that story here.

If you are considering donating to the LAF, please include a note with your donation asking that your money not be used for research programs except for those where animal subjects are never used. Lance Armstrong is a symbol of vibrant good health and radical commitment to personal transformation; I have long been in awe of his drive and his dedication. The LAF’s past support for PCRM programs is encouraging, and I don’t think it’s out of the question that the LAF could choose to fund research using non-animal subjects (a field growing by leaps and bounds). Your support for that shift may well help.

Whatever your views on animal testing, let’s applaud the commitment of the Lance Armstrong Foundation to helping people fight cancer and lead healthier, longer, happier lives. Let’s Live Strong indeed, and let’s Live Cruelty-Free to boot.

Veganism, feminism, eating disorders and guilt

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on May 14, 2007
in Animal Rights, Feminism, Food and Veganism
. 11 Comments

So the posts about veganism (and eating disorders) that dominated this blog last week are getting lots of hits, which is nice, and some fairly strong criticism. Maia at Alas, A Blog took issue today with what she sees as my obsession with self-control in this post of mine from one week ago.

Maia writes:

Eating disorders are not just about reasons, they’re not just about appearances, they’re often also about morality and control. Hugo doesn’t acknowledge that veganism can feed the food/control/morality connection, which is central to an eating disordered mindset. For someone with a tendency to trying to exert control through self-denial of food (which is rarely a small percentage of a female population), any language around veganism which emphasises self-control and morality is going to make things worse. I guess I’ve more experience of this than most; I’ve spent a lot of time in a scene where there are quite a few vegans and lots of young women. I’ve despaired every which way at the policing and limiting which young women do to each other can happen take on a radical hue, and still be just as damaging.

And in the comments, “batgirl” says:

Actually, a lot of people with EDs become vegan because it’s another way to control eating and because it’s more socially acceptable to be vegan than to be anorexic. If a person eats only salad during a social dinner, someone will nearly always ask, “Why are you eating only salad? Aren’t you still HUNGRY?” If the person says, “I’m vegan,” then questions usually relate only to veganism, but if the person gives any other answer, some rude asshole will accuse them of having an eating disorder and then everyone at the table will jump on the “omg you’re skinny you should eat blah blah!” bandwagon.

I see the problem. In my women’s history class, we talk about when “moral language” first became part of our food discourse. Though there are a few flashes of it in the nineteenth century (see the literature of the Seventh Day Adventists, Sylvester Graham, etcetera), it really only takes firm root in mainstream culture with the coming of the 1920s, when the first wave of the dieting craze hit American women. The 1920s is when we first see girls’ diary entries talking about “being good’ and “being bad” because of eating decisions. And of course, the goodness or the badness to which these women refer has nothing to do with the justice issues around how the food came to their table, but whether or not the food was fattening.

As a feminist deeply concerned with the self-image of the young women with whom I work, as a man who has battled his own eating disorder and exercise addiction, I am intensely aware of how destructive guilt over food choices can be. But as a vegan committed to animal rights, committed to saving animals from being slaughtered and eaten, I do think how we eat is sometimes a fundamentally moral decision. Most of my feminist colleagues agree that buying clothes made by women and children who are exploited in sweatshops has moral implications; why don’t we also concede that eating meat or poultry produced on factory farms raises similar moral questions?

The problem, of course, is that eating disorders and body dysmorphia are doing devastating damage to millions of women. There is a way in which what we eat — and what our bodies look like — is infinitely more personal than what we wear. Introducing a moral dimension to food or sex is different than injecting it into a discussion about what sort of cars we ought to drive or whether air travel is justifiable. Because feminists work so damned hard (as I blogged in my laudatory review last week of Courtney Martin’s book) to help women overcome their own self-loathing, it’s understandable that there’s huge resistance to the claims of veganism.

Even when vegans don’t explicitly challenge the eating habits of others, our very explanations of why we do what we do (or don’t eat what we don’t eat) often make other folks defensive. I’ve learned that no matter how polite my tone, when I tell some folks “No thanks, I’m vegan” they hear it as judgment directed at them. I don’t point accusingly at their burger, mind you, but when I am asked to explain why I became a vegan, I do mention a belief in preventing as much cruelty as possible undergirds the decision. And some folks argue with me, and others shrug, and some folks seem hurt. I don’t know how to set boundaries any more gently. I will not eat meat or dairy or eggs for the sake of people-pleasing, any more than I would accept an invitation to a bachelor party at a strip club for the sake of bonding with other men. And when I decline invitations to the latter (I’ve had a few in my day) and when I tell folks “I don’t eat anything that has a face or came from a creature that has a face”, they sometimes feel judged. And more often than not, I’m not trying to make them miserable — just trying to explain why it is I won’t join them in what they’re doing.

So Maia’s post has me convinced that there has to be a way for those of us who value both animal rights and feminism to advocate veganism without triggering those folks who have eating disorders. My pro-feminism wants a world where women live happily incarnate in their bodies, feeling healthy and happy at any size. My pro-feminism wants them to eat in response to the perceived needs and desires of the body, not to deny themselves because they believe that self-denial is, in and of itself, a fundamental virtue. I’ll say it again: self-control and self-denial are not prima facie goods. Where they become goods is when they help us not hurt other living things. My veganism does advocate self-restraint as a virtue when it comes to making food choices, not because I want women to be thin but because I want them to stop eating slaughtered flesh. (Yes, I would rather them eat free-range eggs than eggs from caged chickens; any step towards justice is in the right direction.)

I’ve called out the animal rights movement for its sexism before. Though I support the overall agenda of PETA, I called them out more than two years ago for their sexually exploitative advertising:


The problem with using sexuality to make a political point is that it reinforces the notion that the body is a commodity designed not for our own delight and for sharing pleasure with another, but for selling a product or an idea. When we commodify the bodies of living things — young women or animals — we see them as existing for our own use and we lose sight of their immense value as part of God’s complex and unique creation. Though the animal world is indeed violent, we humans do have the free will and the means to change our diet, change our habits, and change the way in which we interact with our fellow creatures. This means moving towards a cruelty-free life, and also, I think, towards a life where human and animal bodies are seen as precious and worthy of protection, not exploitation and commercialization.

My veganism and my feminism are both rooted in my understanding of Christ’s call to follow Him. They are both rooted in the prophet’s cry to “do justice and love mercy”. At times, the consistency between a commitment to women’s rights and animal rights is obvious; at other times, there is apparent dissonance. But with time and effort and a willingness to listen and explain, I am confident that the inconsistencies between the messages can be resolved.

A long and confessional post about veganism, transformation, smugness and judgment

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on May 8, 2007
in Animal Rights, Body, Christianity, Feminism, Food, Sexual ethics and transformation and Veganism
. 43 Comments

I’m still thinking a lot about the post immediately below this one, and the problematic relationship between veganism and feminism.

Let me reframe the dilemma, as I see it. Feminists are rightly concerned that too many women are too worried about their bodies, too anxious about fat. We are saddened by the huge amount of time and energy our sisters put into the pursuit of an unrealistic, cruel, unattainable ideal. (Let me say again how well Courtney Martin summarizes the problem). Part of the solution, of course, is helping women to see their appetite for food as fundamentally good. Feminism, at its core, rejects the notion that our longings to be full, to be satisfied, to have pleasure, are sinful and need to always be repressed.

But veganism demands intense scrutiny of labels. While it demands that scrutiny and mindfulness in the name of avoiding cruelty rather than in the pursuit of thinness, the end result is that the compulsive dieter and the vegan may both end up spending a great deal more time than the average person thinking about what they “should” or shouldn’t eat. Both the vegan and the compulsive dieter will have a hard time at restaurants, as they study the menus in hopes of finding something that in the first case has no animal product and in the second case contains the least amount of fat.

There’s another problem, one I’m fighting against in my own life right now. Mythago, who bluntly tells me where I’m right and where I’m not, periodically calls me on both my myopia and my condescension. Though it stings when she does it, I’m old enough to know that we learn more from honest critics than we do from our enthusiastic supporters. As someone who has set himself up to be a role model, who teaches and mentors, I am in regular need of having folks who point out the myriad ways in which I continue to fall short. And one big way in which I continue to fall short is around my continued tendency to quietly judge.

When I first became serious about being a male feminist, I quickly grasped that one of my chief “jobs” would be working to hold other men accountable. I understood I could no longer laugh along at the degrading humor, no longer (ever) darken the door of a strip club, no longer enable another man’s casual mistreatment of the women in his life. I lost more than a couple of guys from my life as a result. And today, one of the hardest things I have to work on is my tendency to judge those men in my peer group (I am easier on teen boys) who continue to lead lives that I view as secretive, irresponsible, chauvinistic. I often find myself quietly — and not so quietly — seething at these guys. Why haven’t they seen the light? How can they still do what they do?

Last Thursday, I stopped at a magazine stand to pick up the May issue of Track and Field News, my subscription having expired. I stood in line to buy my beloved collection of statistics and meet reports; two men (a bit older than me) were in front of me, one with a porn magazine. Perhaps to offset the “shame” of what they were doing, the pair were engaged in that boisterous bonhomie that so many guys use to cover guilt or insecurity, joking about the bodies of the models in the magazine. And while on some days I might have said something, last Thursday my stomach was upset and I was underslept. I just had no energy for an argument. So I stood there and I judged these two, feeling ever more smugly superior as I did so. And while it briefly felt good to judge, I walked away from the newsstand feeling even more nauseated than before, upset at my own temporary inability to love these men. I committed murder in my heart, if only for a moment, on Robertson Boulevard last week. And though it doesn’t happen often, it does occur often enough that I realize I need to be honest and open about this quiet, viciously judgmental streak.

It shows up around food these days too. It’s hard not to judge what other people put in their mouths. It’s not the “don’t they know that will make them fat” judgment, it’s the “don’t they know how that sausage was made” judgment. It’s the “don’t they understand how much pleasure they’re getting from another creature’s suffering” judgment. Sometimes, particularly when I myself am tempted by meat, I find myself flooded with a temporary but intense hostility to those who “don’t get it.” That hostility, alas, is accompanied by a feeling of superiority. Like most repentant libertines who turn to Puritanism of one form or another, I am unpleasantly prone to periodic bouts of holier-than-thou smugness!

But I know to my core that it is possible to live a life of radical justice without consistently condemning (in word or thought) those who fall short of that mark. I write this confession today because I see this tendency to judge, this periodic smugness, as another serious character defect to overcome. Living a spiritual life isn’t about achieving perfection, it’s about peeling another layer off the onion. A better image would be to say that our character defects are like layers of blankets thrown over a lamp. In order to reveal the maximum amount of light, we have to peel off one blanket after another. The light gets progressively brigher the more layers we lift, but there’s always still another one to remove. I’ve removed the blankets of reckless womanizing, drug and alcohol abuse, chronic disregard for my impact on those around me. The current layers that need to be lifted involve the bigger sins of pride and judgment and condescension. I’m making progress, but somedays, especially when I’m hungry or tired, it’s really hard.

So I want to apologize to those whom I have offended. I have worked so hard to create a very different kind of life for myself. I’ve worked hard to match my commitment to justice for women, justice for children, justice for animals, justice for the earth, with my own behavior. I’m by nature drawn to extremes, of course. To paraphrase Goldwater, extremism in the defense of the defenseless is no vice. But that extremism for me is about making a maximum effort to bring about change. It’s not about violence of any kind, and violence can be physical, it can be verbal, and yes, it can even be psychic. I don’t hit people and I don’t call them names, but sometimes in my head, I call down curses on my enemies that would have the psalmist gasping. (I do like the psalms so much, for just this reason.) And though King David himself called on God to break the teeth of his enemies, I’m convinced that God wants better than that from us.

Jesus calls us to live lives of love and justice. I’ve come so far in terms of working to embody that justice in my day-to-day life, in how I eat and make love and spend money. Now I need to redouble my effort to love, delight in, and enjoy the company of those who do not share my values or commitments. I need to work harder on overcoming my judgment of my brothers with their porn magazines or my sisters with their hamburgers (or vice versa). I have been where they are, and God’s grace was poured out on me. I am no better than they, and though I can try and model a different way to think about sex and food, in the end, all of this transformation is meaningless if I don’t genuinely love them.

Meat, Dairy, Porn: some preliminary thoughts on women, dieting, veganism, guilt, pleasure and exploitation

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on May 7, 2007
in Animal Rights, Eating disorders, Favorite posts 2007, Feminism, Food, Veganism and Youth
. 36 Comments

I mentioned this morning that I am reading Courtney Martin’s Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters. I’ll try and say more about it once I’m finished, as I’m only through the first couple of chapters. It’s a grim go, early on — story after story of the bright, the beautiful, the dazzling consumed with self-loathing and tortured by body dysmorphia. It’s not a new story, but for those of us who have been dealing with this sort of thing for a while, it’s always a bit disheartening to realize that things aren’t getting any better. Still, a fuller review coming next week.

I was thinking about Courtney’s book a few minutes ago. Mondays are my long days here at the college; I teach four classes, and in order to fit those in as well as office hours, I get here around 8:00AM and won’t leave until close to 9:00PM tonight. Mondays, it goes without saying, are hard days to be a vegan. When I run in the mornings I rev up my appetite for the entire day, and though I try and pack a lot of food (nuts, fruits, veggies, tofu, juice) it only gets me so far sometimes. In the old days, I would go and grab a burrito or a chicken bowl at the “El Pollo Loco” franchise across the street. It filled me up if nothing else.

Half an hour ago, feeling peckish, I wandered into the little student cafe by my building. Tons of things to eat, but so few completely vegan choices. I settled for a little pre-packed bowl of melon and papaya (I’ll try and recycle the plastic container) and another banana. I thought about the slice of greasy, cheesy sausage pizza, and for a moment, I really wanted it.

There’s a trick to living a strictly vegan life. First off, as reading a book about eating disorders reminds me, I have to draw a bright and clear line between self-denial for the sake of self and self-denial for the sake of justice for my fellow creatures. I tell myself — and everyone else who will listen — I am NOT on a diet. This is not a temporary plan to lose weight, or something I’ll give up once marathon season comes to an end. This is a lifestyle choice — not to take into my body any animal products at all, to eat “raw” as much as possible, to avoid preservatives and high fructose corn syrup and all the rest of it. Whether it makes me thinner or fatter, makes me more pudgy or more defined, it can’t be about me anymore.

The funny thing is that being strictly vegan (off honey entirely) means that I am more attentive to what I eat than at any time in my life since I was crash dieting fifteen years ago. Back in 1992, I dropped from 175-145 the summer and fall after a divorce; on my 6′1″ frame, the 145 looked awful. I lived on small portions of junk food, and had no consciousness at all about whether or not animals were involved in producing what I was eating. I just wanted to have a body devoid of fat. Back then, I counted calories and fat grams obsessively. Today, I largely ignore fat and calorie information and read to make sure that what I’m eating is entirely plant-based and devoid of hidden dairy or egg traces. (Damn that sneaky caseinate!) I’m once again radically concerned with everything that goes into my mouth — but for a radically different reason.

But it’s hard not to focus on diet so much and not also think about how eating vegan (and doing a whole mess of runnin’) affects my physique and my overall appearance. The “is this about my ego, or is it really about the animals” question pops into my head almost every day, reminding me, as they told me in AA, to always “check my motives.” For anyone who has had an eating disorder, which I have certainly had, to move from casual vegetarianism to strict veganism is an experience that requires some regular self-examination.

It’s also hard to fight the urge to judge what other people put in their mouths. When I was exhibiting anorectic behavior, I got high as a kite on the bittersweet drug of self-denial. I did judge folks who ate a lot and didn’t work out. I spent years unlearning all that judgment, especially for my role as a feminist professor and youth mentor. I didn’t want the young people I worked with to torture themselves, to feel that overwhelming guilt over what they put in their mouths. I’ve wanted them to understand that they have a God-given right to joy, to delight in their own flesh. I’ve been adamant that feminism, food, and pleasure are all linked.

My feminism and my veganism, therefore, are in an uneasy alliance. On the one hand, they are natural allies. As many others have pointed out, there’s a link between patriarchal exploitation of women and human exploitation of animals. Men have used women to do unpaid work for millenia, and humans have used animals in the same fashion. The bodies of women are seen as “fair game” (a hunting reference) for predatory men, and pornography celebrates the idea that men are entitled to take delight (visual or otherwise) in the flesh of women who have little or no say in the matter. The meat industry teaches us that cows and pigs and fish exist solely to bring delight to our taste buds and satisfaction to our bellies. In patriarchal culture, the bodies of women and the bodies of animals exist to be consumed. Feminist veganism rejects the exploitation and abuse of living things; it counsels radical self-denial on the part of the consumer as a tool for liberating the consumed.

But women, particularly first-world women, eat plenty of meat. They also feel guilty about it, as Courtney Martin reminds us. The feminist in me wants the young women in my life to enjoy food, to reject the destructive cult of thinness. The vegan in me wants to curb and redirect the appetites of these very same young women. I don’t want them to have the pizza, the burger, the Milky Way bar, the mahi-mahi — not because I don’t want them to have pleasure but because that pleasure comes at the expense of a confined and tortured dairy cow, or a fish who died a slow, gasping death.

While historically meat and fish consumption might have been essential for survival, few Americans today would drop dead if they were forced to go vegan. They’d find life rigorously hard, at least many of them would. Hard, perhaps, in a way not dissimilar from the way a compulsive dieter finds her life hard. But the difference would be in the purpose of the self-denial.

So many feminist voices want our daughters and our little sisters to be less obsessed with calories and fat grams. We want our daughters to love their bodies, to delight in their flesh. We want them to stop readiing labels, and just eat what they want to satiety. But for me — and for other vegan feminist voices — that delight in guilt-free eating is highly problematic when it involves the exploitation of the victims of factory farming. Pleasure is a good. Overcoming crushing, unnecessary guilt is a good. But living, eating, and buying cruelty-free is also a powerful good.

There’s a book to be written here, or at least a longer article. I’ll muse on it some more. But I’m thinking that the phrase radical self-denial on the part of the consumer as a tool for liberating the consumed pretty much sums up my position on meat, dairy, and porn.

UPDATE: Stentor, who shares many of my concerns, has an interesting take here.

A note about leather, veganism, and the slow pace of transformation

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on April 24, 2007
in Animal Rights, Food and Veganism
. 20 Comments

I’ve been promising more posts on the vegan life, and here’s another one. Today’s topic: what to do about leather. First, a general update:

I’m as close to being fully vegan as I’ve ever been. No eggs, no dairy, no meat, no fish. More fruit, more vegetables, more nuts, more seeds. I’m wary of how easy it is to turn into a “junk-food vegan”; I take it easy on the wheat products and the textured soy protein. There’s a limit to how much soy I want to pump into my body.

I pack a lot of snacks wherever I go. When I was simply vegetarian, I could always count on being able to find a protein bar or a prepacked salad somewhere. Being vegan means being very intentional about what I have with me; I don’t like being caught with no vegan options in the midst of an afternoon snack attack. Careful planning — careful shopping, careful filling of tupperware with nuts, fruit, and other fun things — helps prevent the tempttion to fall.

As for leather: I own a lot of it. I have a dozen pairs of nice leather shoes, leather belts, a leather wallet, a suede jacket. I don’t have the resources to immediately replace them all. I am committed to not buying any more leather items, and to asking my loved ones not to give me anything leather. As these items wear out, I can replace them one by one with vegan alternatives. But it seems wasteful to throw them all away, and I can’t afford to instantly replace them all even if I were to give them to charity. I’m aware that as a teacher and youth leader and “public vegan”, wearing leather sends a mixed message. My goal is to get to the point where I’m not wearing any animal product (and that will mean, I suppose, foregoing the pleasures of a silk shirt or boxers). It will mean not only buying vegan clothing, but doing my best to ensure that the human producers of that clothing were well-paid. It narrows my shopping options, but I’ve found some excellent sources for good things. In the meantime, I’ll have some leather on me more often than not.

I am a great believer in incremental change. I ran a 5K before I ran a marathon. I gave up alcohol and drugs before I gave up cigarettes, and I still haven’t given up caffeine (and may never do so.) I gave up reckless promiscuity before I gave up “flirting”. I worked on meditating for five minutes before I tried going for ten. And I gave up red meat before I gave up chicken, and I gave up chicken before I gave up cheese. I’ve given up buying leather before I’ve given up wearing it. Progressing in slow stages works for me.

Those who don’t want to see us change will be eager to point out where we’re not yet perfectly consistent. They try and convince us that we must do everything perfectly, or not at all. They try and discourage folks from making positive changes by emphasizing that it will be hypocritical not to change everything all at once. Their goal is to keep us stuck, to keep us believing that transformation is too difficult, too painful. They scare off the aspiring vegan by saying, “If you still wear leather, you’re a fraud.” Well, no. If you still buy leather, you might want to think about your values — but continuing to wear a useable item until it is no longer so is hardly proof of weak principles, only of financial limitations.

My veganism, like my feminism, like my faith, is rooted in the cry of Aslan at the end of the Narnia books: “Further up, further in.” There’s always more growing to do, and it won’t be finished for a long, long time.

A long post about PCRM, veganism and gettin’ evangelical

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on April 16, 2007
in Animal Rights, Body, Environmentalism, Food, Science, Traveling and Veganism
. 23 Comments

My prayers this morning go out to all those affected by the Virginia Tech shooting tragedy. I have a few Hokie alumni in my family (though far more who went to UVA), and I know a couple of folks still closely associated with the Blacksburg campus. I know that several of my readers are Hokies, and my thoughts and prayers are especially directed towards them.

It’s spring break (Pasadena City College has what must be America’s latest spring break), and I’m in our little study at home. I was in Virginia yesterday, if driving from the District to Dulles in a downpour can be considered being “in Virginia”. (We did find some great vegan Ethiopian food in a little strip mall in Ballston.) My wife and I spent the weekend in Washington attending the Art of Compassion gala to raise money for and celebrate the accomplishments of one of our very favorite charities, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.

What I love about PCRM is that more than any other animal rights outfit, they adopt a holistic approach to personal and global transformation. PCRM is one of the leading organizations advocating vegan diets for all. Backed by a growing network of hundreds of doctors and nutritionists across the USA and Canada, PCRM is reaching out to millions through increasingly savvy media campaigns. (My wife and I are particularly pleased with — and particularly interested in supporting — PCRM’s brand-spankin’ new Spanish-language campaign.) PCRM also campaigns against the use of animals in medical research, and has played a leading role in developing alternatives. (PCRM helped create “Digital Frog” to help end school dissections; they’ve helped popularize TraumaMan to replace the use of live animals in emergency medical education.)

Most animal rights organizations — and Lord knows, they all do fabulous work — want to save animals. The folks who run PCRM, led by the remarkably energetic and charismatic Dr. Neal Barnard, want to do the same. But saving animals is about more than stopping a seal hunt, or shutting down a few fur farms or puppy mills. (All very worthy causes, mind.) PCRM’s point is that what is good for animals is also good for us and for our planet. A balanced vegan regimen requires far fewer natural resources to produce than a meat-and-dairy laden one. And the health benefits of veganism (or even its softer form, lacto-ovo vegetarianism) are sufficiently well-demonstrated as to be nigh on undeniable.

The world says: “Children need milk to build strong bones”. The world says “Beef is the best source of iron and protein, especially for women.” The world says “Without animal research, we can’t make necessary medical breakthroughs.” The world says “A vegetarian or vegan diet is too boring, too miserable, and too time-consuming for the average modern person.” And carefully, with painstakingly documented research, PCRM works to disprove all of these deeply-held myths. (PCRM helped expose the roots of the Vioxx tragedy: what had proved safe in animals turned out deadly for humans. Animal testing too often makes animals suffer and tells us nothing about what works for people.)

Sigh. This post is turning into an infomercial. That’s not what this blog is supposed to be about, and I apologize. This is how I feel after retreat weekends with my youth group, or after a men- against-rape training. I feel inspired and invigorated, and more than usually evangelical!

Last month, Stentor at Debitage put up this post: Moral Relativist Anti-Vegetarianism. Stentor, a trained amateur philosopher, has pointed out more than once that I have an exasperating habit of making sweeping moral statements — and promptly disavowing the idea that I am actually proselytizing, claiming at times that “this is just me.” He’s right. The truth is that a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle almost always is about making a universal moral claim. Stentor writes:

So what makes vegetarianism especially threatening whereas diversity in other parts of life evokes less hostility? One inescapable part of the picture — which unfortunately vegetarians spend a lot of time disclaiming in a usually futile effort to avoid the proselytizing charge — is that vegetarianism is a moral position. Aside from the small number of people who are vegetarians purely for health or henotheistic religious reasons, to become a vegetarian is to implicitly endorse a non-relativistic moral code*. Second, vegetarianism is threatening – becoming a vegetarian involves a significant change in a fairly fundamental part of one’s lifestyle. Third, vegetarianism is realistic. For all the joking about how life wouldn’t be worth living without bacon, vegetarianism is within reach of the majority of developed world adults. (It’s not without hardships for some, and I’m not endorsing a purely personal-lifestyle-change-based policy, but the fact remains that most North Americans could drastically reduce their meat consumption if they really put their minds to it.) Adding to the realism is the surface plausibility of the vegetarian position — it’s comparatively easy for even a committed omnivore to understand what makes vegetarians think they’re right. Bold emphasis is mine.

Stentor is frequently right, and here, he’s dead on. I realize that on this blog, I write about many things: diet, feminism, faith, exercise. As a progressive evangelical writing for a general audience, I’ve deliberately disavowed Christian proselytizing in this space. Do I wish more people would pursue a personal, transforming relationship with Christ? Yes. Do I believe that no one can be saved without consciously forming that relationship? No, I don’t. Do I wish more people — especially men — would embrace feminist principles of egalitarianism in every aspect of their public and private lives? Yes. Do I want every man (and woman) to stop using porn, to stop objectifying women, to stop the economic, sexual, and physical exploitation of their sisters? Yes.

So the question I’m wrestling with is this: does my veganism correlate more closely with my feminism or my Christianity? If it’s like my Christian faith, it’s a “personal choice” — one among many. I do believe that my Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim, Wiccan, animist, and atheist friends will be saved (though how, exactly, is not something I can always articulate.) I do believe that I am called to follow Christ, but I also believe that others follow Him even as they call Him by other names. What would make the world a far better place isn’t necessarily everyone becoming Christian; what would make the world a far better place is if everyone actually lived out the principles of their faiths and creeds. But if every man and woman on this planet saw women as equally worthy of dignity and respect, as equally entitled to share in resources and in decision-making, as equally prepared to lead, as equally deserving of being seen as a whole person — then heck yes, the planet would be better off. Feminism is, in that sense, essential.


And I’m prepared to start arguing that vegetarianism (or better yet, veganism) has the power to bring about tremendous change. It will improve the health of the individual and of the planet, and it will exponentially reduce the unnecessary suffering of sentient, conscious creatures. So yes, I’m going to risk alienating still more readers with a more explicit commitment to veganism here on this blog.

In the end, I’m trying to follow ever more closely Forster’s maxim: “only connect.” What I wear matters. What I eat matters. Everything we do connects us to other living creatures. Every darned thing I do every day matters. And my brothers and sisters, the same does go for you too. Every dollar you spend is a vote. The food you buy, the clothes you wear, the words you speak: these impact the world. And I’m asking you to consider making the best possible choices in your public, private, educational, familial, sexual, and economic lives.

My commitment to full veganism is relatively recent (I’ve been a vegetarian for longer.) It’s been a slow evolution rather than an instant decision. Like most lasting conversions, it has come gradually rather than in a flash of light. But you’re gonna be hearing more on this blog about animal rights, veganism, and how they connect to faith and feminism.

More about my PCRM weekend below the fold. Continue reading ‘A long post about PCRM, veganism and gettin’ evangelical’

Being vegan…

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on March 1, 2007
in Animal Rights, Body and Vanity
. 10 Comments

…is hard to do while working out. I hadn’t realized that most of my bars and protein supplements contained milk solids until last week. I hadn’t realized I have to give up my beloved Altoids, as they contain gelatin. Oh, blissful ignorance, I do miss you!

I’m pumping in a lot of Vega. It’s actually pretty good, though Eloy, my office colleague, thinks it looks disgusting. It’s not bad, and it takes care of lunch.

In terms of training, I think I’ll shoot for the San Francisco Marathon in July. If I can get some speed work done, and get my weight back down around 165 (ten pounds below where I am right now), I might be able to do a nice clip…

But dang, even as a happy vegan, I miss the Altoids.

I love rodents, but…

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on March 1, 2007
in Animal Rights and Fun
. 10 Comments

It’s a very busy morning. I have a post germinating that may get up later today. I’m a bit sleepy, and one reason is that the mice in the attic kept me awake again last night.

Here’s the problem: we have little nocturnal creatures living in our attic, scurrying around and chewing things. We worry that they may be doing damage up there, and they drive us nuts with their noises at night. (We wear ear-plugs to bed). On the other hand, we’d rather be kept awake than pay an exterminator to kill them; we would endure great expense and discomfort rather than harm a single whisker on a single rodent.

We could use sonar to drive them away, but our chinchillas would also be affected. We don’t want to do anything that could kill our night-time guests above, and we won’t cause discomfort to our chinchillas. If anyone has any entirely non-lethal, non sound-based suggestions for gently encouraging the rats and mice in the attic to seek other accomodations, that would be great.

If you’re contemplating getting an animal… now is the moment.

Published
by
Hugo Schwyzer
on January 19, 2007
in Animal Rights
. 10 Comments

Today, I’m hitting all my blogging stops. I blogged earlier about Christianity, feminism, and sex education (three subjects near to my heart); now, it’s on to animals.

If there’s one thing that exasperates me, it’s the destructive things that a small number of folks who claim to love animals do. And in Southern California, there have been few more tragic stories than what happened with Noahs Ark Rescue in Long Beach. The shelter was raided last summer by police after reports that animals were living in horrific conditions. The operators of the shelter are now in jail. The Noah’s Ark people claim that this was a politically motivated raid; the city denies it, but the animals (all cats and dogs) are caught in the middle. Many still await adoption, and they wait at the city animal shelter which does euthanize.

If you are able to rescue (we can’t, loaded as we are with chinchillas who don’t mix well with cats and dogs), please, please consider visiting Long Beach and adopting a desperate little one. A link to more info is here.