Vegucated

Last updated on: April 23, 2015 at 6:07 am by Ambaa Choate

Vegucated 2015-04-22T12:02:46-04:00 Ambaa Choate

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I’ve had this movie Vegucated on my Netflix queue for ages but I finally actually watched it earlier this week. I found it quite convincing. It is about not only vegetarianism but actually veganism, which means not eating or using any animal based products. That means avoiding meat and eggs, obviously, but also milk, yogurt, cream, cheese, etc.

(there’s also follow up video updates on Youtube)

It struck me that in our modern world it doesn’t make sense to me to be vegetarian if I’m not also vegan. In the past killing and eating animals would obviously be harmful to the animals but using other animal products wouldn’t be. There was a time when I think humans and animals helped each other out and had a good balance. Maybe that’s still the case some places. But not in America.

In America there are extremely unethical and harmful practices used for getting milk, for example (and then that leads to butter, cheese, yogurt, etc.). I have had ethical concerns and concerns about the environment that I try to suppress. It is hard to keep suppressing when watching this movie. Although really Hindu vegetarians are already way ahead of the game avoiding meat and eggs. I have never avoided eggs before (they aren’t generally considered meat in American vegetarianism), but I’ve known for some time that egg laying chickens are mis-treated and that male chicks are brutally killed at birth since they won’t be egg producers. I also have fluctuations when it comes to meat eating. I’ve found it very challenging to stay vegetarian in American culture (not so much finding veg options as avoiding non-veg temptations). I also never had an issue with eating fish but this movie helped me see that fish eating is a problem too.

Veganism also means changing the soap and makeup that we use to avoid animal testing and ingredients made from animals. When I eat vegetarian I’ve never gone beyond that to the rest of my lifestyle before.

I’m not sure about how possible it is to be Hindu without milk-based products, but I’m considering giving it a try! And perhaps I can take some different steps like making sure that I get ghee from an ethical source.

I do feel uncomfortable with choosing unnatural and manufactured products over the natural version. That’s a sticking point for me. It makes me think of the margarine debates. When margarine first came out it was supposed to be so much healthier for you than butter. It had a lot of support, buzz, good press. My dad was skeptical. Because he knew what partially hydrogenated oils were. He knew what trans-fat was. No one who wasn’t a scientist knew about that in those days. And low and behold, several years later it comes out that margarine is terrible for your health. Absolutely much worse than butter.

So that experience makes me skeptical of creating substitutes for more natural items. But something like whipping cashew nuts to make cream I have no issue with. So I guess it depends on how naturally the substitute is being made.

Another challenge for me of veganism is that I feel like it’s hard to know where to draw a line when it comes to ethical concerns. Once you’re saying you don’t want to participate in the cruelty towards animals then you have to start wondering about the working conditions for human beings providing you with the plant-based products. For me the movie helped me see that it’s not just ethics at play here. The environmental cost of animal products is huge and our consumption of animal products is making it difficult to sustain feeding the world’s population. Both of those things ease when people become vegan so it is helpful for people as well as for animals.

I’ve changed a lot about how I eat to try to manage my infertility and PCOS. Since I’m already doing way more cooking for myself and focusing on health I may try to take some steps towards veganism. I never before thought that I would even ever consider veganism. But now it seems like a goal to aim for.

There’s support and information at http://www.getvegucated.com/

Hindus are great partners in this cause and it makes a lot of sense for us to join in the vegan movement. Check out this crowd funding book project created by a woman named Priya Cynthia Kishna… https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/vegan-artbook-mild–2

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