Honestly, right now I think online the lines between harmlessly being capricious and vulnerable around people we are close enough to or get along with well enough to be playful with and antagonizing strangers to grief their real life as a tool of social coerscion and to stifle conversation have long been deliberately blurred on the internet.
I dunno if there’s any going back ever from that in discourse. Because trolling has become so normalized that people online sometimes end up with a sort of tortured hierarchy for it since at this point there are such things as professional trolls. And frankly plenty of people are losing a sense of playful indulgence in others these days.
FWIW I read you as saying rather ambiguously “I like to see what I can get away with” or something of that ilk initially. Now I’m reading it as “I like to fantasize about owning vegetarians as hard and with as much comic skill as these guys.”
All right? Speaking only for myself as a reader, I don’t know how much the distinction actually even matters to me.
The reader experience here though sets up a comparison of myself to you before a statement that you love trolling in real life though and that’s literally the first sentence so it’s tough not to let it completely bias me as a reader to anything you say after. Could sound ominous or just be careless, but since it’s literally the first thing you said the subject now the whole post is about your psychology and how you treat your friends instead of how funny you think the skit is.
I mean unless you just posted this to trigger some vegans or something? That’s always fun.
You are, of course, free to make your posts as personal or impersonal as you like. In the past, you have written about things that are deeply meaningful to you personally, and that has resonated well with the community. In this case, I think that the matter of being an absurdist joker in general kind of got muddled up with the more specific topic of a retort to use on vegetarians, and that impeded the usual resonance.
As you say, we do not really know you in real life, but we are getting to know you within the bounds of this community. Please do not get discouraged that this conversation has gone sideways. All you have to do is be authentic to yourself. And if you see something neat or interesting or funny, but that is not deeply meaningful to you, it is fine to present it as just something that is neat or interesting or funny.
That’s really the crux of it. Mindful choices, based on one’s place in the world, will differ in detail but the basic premise needs to be there: think before you act, because everything you do has consequences to others.
It’s nice that you have more respect for vegans now, but this sounds like an echo of the stereotype that they’re preachy and judgemental. I’ve known many who see it as a personal choice of their own, not something they want to impose on others.
If we stopped artificially inseminating farm animals, and stopped aiding them significantly in giving birth without dying or killing the baby, they wouldn’t actually be able to reproduce anyway.
We seem to agree that isn’t the case, so I’ll skedaddle
My immediately-following sentence talked about the fact that there were wild versions of most farm animals, which haven’t been bred to be incapable of living and reproducing on their own.
Turkeys, for example, which can’t fly when they’re bred for their meat. Not only is that a danger to being able to stay alive at all, who’s going to want to mate with such losers?
But yes, cows/cattle are the big concern, because they are the biggest source of meat and other products and cause the most environmental cost. And they do not reproduce domestically any more without significant human intervention.
I think I quoted your claim pretty accurately. You didn’t specify cows, you said farm animals. You didn’t say they they cant survive without human care, you specified they would be unable to breed without human intervention. That’s true, sheep grown for wool have a limited lifespan without us because eventually they’re a giant ball of wool.
I agree with what you are saying now, but I was originally replying to the post where you said they were incapable of reproducing on their own, rather than living and reproducing on their own.
Weirdly, whenever anyone tries to “trigger the vegans” it seems like the people who actually get triggered are the ultra-pro-meat crowd, who feel the need to remind us of how tedious they find vegans, primarily by being tedious themselves…
Sounds like that’s a problem in your head, not with the vegans you meet. Why would you think that unless they come out and say they are judging you, and then if you do meet that one judgemental vegan, assume it of all other vegans?
Maybe because one feels uncomfortable with eating animals, but has not done anything about it. I mean, I eat meat, but I know it it very problematic and I judge myself when encountering someone that has taken steps away from that.
Maybe some other people externalize that feeling and think the vegan is judging them?
Sure, but again, that’s in your head, not based on anything the vegan said to you… which is what I meant by “that’s a problem in your head.” And as an omnivore, I agree about judging ones self on this issue. But that’s not the problem at hand - the problem is projecting it onto vegans and acting like their are the most judgemental lot of people since church grannies.
And use it to lash out at others to make themselves feel better…
I never understood the vegan hate. I’m not vegan, but it’s a perfectly valid diet, and arguably better in many ways. Will you occasionally come across a vegan who’s a little overly aggressive about it? Sure. But there are also men who think wiping their ass after they poop is gay. I’m not going to assume every straight man I meet is like that. So why would I assume every vegan is an asshole? It’s also getting a little too close to things like, “well I don’t mind gay people as long as they aren’t in my face about it,” which really means you want the gay people to stay in the closet and never mention it. I suspect many people’s perception of some vegan’s being too aggressive about it is really this. You just don’t want to hear about it at all.
My only issue with vegans is situational. When I am planning a get together, guests need to warn me ahead of time they are vegan. This way I can at least prepare stuff or pick a restaurant where they won’t feel like the odd ones out.
I have zero problems with well done tasty vegetarian food. Southern Indian cuisine being my favorite in that category. Most ground meat and chicken fingers/nuggets available in stores are such garbage anyway that I am happy to switch to the fake vegan versions for health/environmental reasons.
For the record, the first time I heard about veganism was from a vegan who was a little preachy, but how do we define “preachy”? They harped on about it for a while, but maybe they were just offering more information because they thought I was interested, maybe they were newly vegan and like a religious convert wanted to share their belief. I have since learned this is the exception not the norm.
