*please note i deeply value and respect the vegan movement. i am just critical of how humorously it precipitates in online spaces, particularly this one. :)
this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2024
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Me every time a militant vegan says "carnist":
I've never interpreted that as an attempt at an insult, what word do you think is more fitting?
Omnivore, maybe? 🤷
But yeah, pretending that eating meat is an ism IS an insult when coming from an evangelical vegan who considers it morally reprehensible lol
"carnist" has a different meaning than omnivore. It’s used for people who actively defend what they think is their right to consume flesh.
Just like how evangelical vegans actively assert what they think is their right to control the diets and other lifestyle choices of adult humans who haven't asked them to? 🙄
basically the same way we assert the right to tell people to stop using ai, to stop being racist, sexist, transphobic, using planes or heavy cars, giving money to fascists…
chosing to view animals as resources is not about diet, it’s about power over sentient beings and hierarchy of lives based on species.
Holy false equivalences, Batman! Are you going for the record or are you really THAT bad at discerning wildly disparate concepts and levels of severity from each other? 🤦
Now class, over here is a blatant example of the ad hominem fallacy
Nope. They're objectively spewing a large array of false equivalence and my personal comment was directly and logically derived from that and that only.
It was thus logically sound AKA not a fallacy.
Your comment, on the other hand, is a textbook example of a reverse causation fallacy strawman combo:
you portray my criticism of their argument as a personal criticism when in fact my subsequent personal criticism is based on the illogic of their argument and nothing else.
You literally asked if they were that bad at logic while offering no actual refute to what they had to say. But whatever, have a nice day
"Those are not at all equivalent" IS a refutation.
It's not my job to spoonfeed bigots about exactly how my dietary (lack of) choices is different from hating trans and black people while sponsoring fascism 🙄
If your diet includes meat, you are most likely causing the death of an animal. If you believe that killing animals is wrong, then it follows that eating meat is also wrong. As to what is more wrong versus what is less wrong, that varies from culture to culture and age to age. Perhaps they believe that killing an animal is almost as bad as killing a human. Their argument is sound; it is just based on different axioms than yours.
No. Their argument is based on applying their subjective beliefs that I don't share to my actions and as such by definition not sound.
It's a 1:1 equivalent of anti choice people calling abortion murder.
Do you believe that racism or sexism is wrong? Do you think a racist or sexist person would share your belief? Are you not, then, applying your subjective beliefs that they don't share to their actions?
We judge others based on our moral standards, not theirs. To someone who sees the killing of an animal as a great sin, your actions might therefore seem wrong.
You're acting EXACTLY like an anti choice person asking me if I think murder is wrong because I believe in a woman's right to choose 🤦
Not necessarily and not necessarily not, since they're in no way related.
No. Their veganism is actively selected by them based on their subjective beliefs about animals being basically human.
My lack of veganism is not based in ideology.
I don't eat grains based on the belief that insects are worth less than other animals. I eat grains to be sated, for their nutritional value, and for their taste.
Exactly the same reason why I sometimes eat meat.
Or maybe a general opposition to violence, or a concern for the ecological impact of domestic animals, or a fear that it could cause the next pandemic.
This is a weak argument. Based on your abortion example, I'm guessing you are from the US or southern Europe. So, you might know of the Confederate States of America and/or Fascist Iberia / Italy. In those places, were there not people who did not consciously support slavery / fascism, but went along with it because they 'did not have an ideology'? How would you judge them?
Further, on your not having an ideology, do you support the eating of humans? Monkeys? Cats? Dogs? Which animals are haram to you, and which ones are halal?
Ok, that's it. You have officially crossed the line from a zealot spewing increasingly false equivalences to saying that everyone who doesn't agree with you is equivalent to slave owners and fascists.
I'm done indulging your self-righteous hallucinations. Have the day you deserve.
PS: No, I'm not from the US or southern Europe. I chose the abortion example because of complete topical symmetry, not because it's a hot topic here in Denmark. It hasn't been since the 1970s.
I'm not vegan, although I agree with most of their arguments, so I can't be self-righteous about it.
Since English is not your first language, I apologise if my wording was confusing. My point was that accepting whatever is seen as normal, or refusing to make a choice, is itself an action, one that says that you agree with your society's ideology.
I said have the day you deserve. I'm done with your Dunning Kruger poster boy nonsense.
It's quite telling that you're ready to say "control" to describe people arguing that you shouldn't use animals as resources, but not to describe what happens to animals. Or if you would use it to describe what happens to animals, that you think nothing untoward of it. You know what I mean? Either controlling is, as you imply, inadmissable and you therefore become vegan because you mustn't control animals, or controlling is sometimes admissable and you purport carnism.
Also since when is open exchange of ideas and concerns equated with control?
Am I trying to control you if I suggest that you not leave your tap running in California because fresh water is a precious resource in drought-plagued land?
Am I trying to control you if I suggest that you reduce your plastic consumption because we have a major microplastic crisis so severe that human babies are being born with plastic already in their body?
Am I trying to control you if I point out that the modern meat industry is ecologically unsustainable, so you're going to have to switch to being vegetarian sooner or later since the meat production will literally collapse itself, so you may as well start now before it's a global crisis?
If I suggest that you not hit yourself in the head with a hammer, is that me trying to control you, or is that just an act of very basic concern for your well being? And if hitting yourself in the head with a hammer becomes trendy, am I trying to control everyone if I suggest that we shouldn't be doing that because brain injuries will make us dumber as a society?
You have to agree that there are at least two types of active, "militant" vegan: the ecological vegan, who focuses on the many global issues arising from the international meat industry, and the meat moralists, who are focused more on the immorality of meat consumption at all.
One of those is leaning toward control.
Veganism is an -ism as well. You're getting worked up about a term that, at its core, just means that a person believes it is normal, natural and necessary to eat animals and animal products. Omnivore on the other hand means that you are able to digest and eat all kinds of food. If someone calls you a carnist, then the word itself is about as insulting as using "vegan" to describe vegans. Whatever derogatory meaning "evangelical" vegans put behind it is inferred from context or tone, not the word itself.
But NOT being vegan isn't. In 99% of cases, it's not an active choice based on values like veganism and indeed all other isms is.
Claiming otherwise while also asserting that it's morally repugnant behavior is a value judgment and a bigoted one at that
Personally, I don't eat meat most days and when I do it's from a LACK of an active choice not to do so, not a choice TO eat meat.
There's just not enough meat free alternatives that 1) taste good, 2) are within my means financially, 3) are filling enough AND 4) are within my severely ADHD-reduced ability to focus long enough to cook for myself.
As explained above, that's just not true. An evangelical vegan calling someone who eats meat a "carnist" is more along the lines of a Protestant from Northern Ireland or Scotland calling a Catholic a "fucking papist".
It's a sectarian slur, basically.
Except for the fact that it's only used in a derogatory context and tone, just like all other slurs.
Or maybe your opinion on what the term means is influenced by your biases about what vegans are like and act like towards carnists? If you interact with vegans on a friendly basis rather than assuming that they're trying to insult you or that they're calling your choices morally repugnant, you may find that it'soften used descriptively rather than to pass judgement. I have personally seen the term used neutrally more often than I've seen it used insultingly. It was also not coined as a slur: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnism by the way, Melany Joy was describing exactly what you mentioned: The pervasiveness of carnism, which makes it an unconscious automatism for many people.
Fixed that for you. Framed like that, the answer is yes: not all vegans are bigots, of course, that would ironically be a bigoted and untrue claim.
All proselytizing evangelical vegans I've ever been in contact with, many of which have been om Lemmy, have either used the word "carnist" as a slur or not at all. With the possible exception of you, though I'm not at all sold on that based on your denials of reality so far.
I never assume in advance. As I said, not all vegans are bigots. None of the few I know IRL are. A LOT of the ones here on Lemmy are, though, and they're always the ones to initiate conflict since I frankly have better things to do with my life than go actively looking for things to be offended by. Unlike said evangelical vegans.
Even if that was the case, that's still misleading as, like I've already explained, not being vegan isn't any more of an ism than being atheist is a religion.
Even if not used deliberately as an insult, it's inherently non-neutral as it infers a belief system that isn't there in 99% of cases and simultaneously lumps everyone who's not vegan together in one group like a fundamentalist religious person would lump everyone who's not a follower of their religion together as "heathens" and "apostates".
It was coined by a vegan activist to generalize about a lot of people who don't themselves consider their lack of veganism a belief system. That Wikipedia article is about as biased towards support for the topic as the one about Israel 🙄
It's a slur coined to lump people who have nothing meaningful in common together in order to make them easier to attack. It's the equivalent of calling undocumented immigrants "illegal aliens".
That's the tricky thing with biases, right? They're formed by our experiences. My experience interacting with vegans has clearly been different from yours, so that may explain why you would think I'm denying reality. Anyway, I hope you can keep an open mind when talking to vegans who use the word carnist. Not all of them are bigots :)
And also by believing unreliable sources like Melissa May and not questioning loaded terms coined to inspire and reinforce biases. Such as "illegal alien" and "carnist".
Probably because you are one yourself and thus aren't the target of their slurs and other bigotry towards people who don't follow their extremist version of vegetarism.
The fact that you blatantly are is another big motivator as well.
I've seen the JBP crowd denounce the consumption of any amount of vegetables as woke and soy.
Yeah, THEY can accurately be described as "carnist", unlike the rest of us.
They're a tiny minority that DO elevate meat eating to an ism.
See the difference?
Honestly, no. It's still just people being mad at each other for no reason.
If you don't see the difference between eating meat at all and not just ONLY eating meat, but portraying eating vegetables as a moral failing, then I just can't help you.
I can explain it to you, but I can't understand it for you.
I don't see the difference between people complaining online and other people complaining online
Yeah, people hurt themselves to own the people they disagree with....but I am pretty sure we are supposed to be omnivores...I don't think carnivore works for us. #NotAnExpert
We are omnivorous by nature, but we can do fine without eating meat if we get the protein from elsewhere.