West Midlands Vegan Festival 2011

As a vegetarian/vegan, I think it's really important to regularly meet up with like-minded people and remind yourself that you're not alone.  Being a vegan can be somewhat isolating at times; many people view it as an extreme (and incomprehensible!) stance, whilst some see it as a position to ridicule.  There's always a sense of relief, as I've discussed in previous posts, when you go to a veggie restaurant and are surrounded by people that care about animal rights issues/environmentalism as much as you do.

So, with all this in mind, this year I thought I'd cut my Saturday lie in short and visit the West Midlands Vegan Festival.  It was great - you couldn't move for vegans!  (How often do you find yourself in that situation?!)

There were tonnes of food stalls, companies selling vegan products (I tried Kara milk for the first time, and I'm now definitely going to try to switch to this from soya), and lots of animal rights groups/animal sanctuaries providing information on the causes they were representing.


Change Kitchen

 

Forget-Me-Not Animal Rescue get extra points for effort!



Such yummy sweets!! Look them up (link below), they're great.



Goody Good Stuff - anything endorsed by a koala is fine by me.



I also got chatting to a woman who ran a sanctuary for rescued farm animals (author of ...And a Calf Called Reg), and she really emphasised the individuality of the animals she cared for.  Hearing her talk about the animals she'd saved (most notably the story of a mother cow and her calf, who were inseparable because the mother had had all her previous calves taken away from her after only a few days), really confirmed in my mind that I want to do something similar one day.  Though when I told Wenda this, she said to me:  'Make sure you live your life first, because it'll never be the same once you've committed to something like this!'  I found her story and her passion really inspiring (and I also appreciated her advice!).

Another thing the festival encouraged me to think about was the approach that we take as vegans when communicating our values to others.  There was a noticable difference between the majority of stalls, which were cheery and positive, and then those few which had 'meat is murder' t-shirts and bracelets and were offering leaflets with horribly graphic images on them.  I must admit, I found the latter stalls really off-putting, and I didn't stop to look at them.  I just don't think that that kind of aggressive approach does the cause any good, and in fact I wonder how much damage it does to the reputation of veganism - that 'angry vegan' sterotype came from somewhere, afterall.  If people think that becoming a vegan means wearing pictures of mutilated animals on their tshirts and passing out leaflets littered with aggressive slogans, then I can fully understand why more people aren't warming to the idea!

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for bringing the truth to light.  It's so incredibly important that people understand the extent of suffering and brutality in the animal industry, and that they don't close their eyes and ears to the pain they are inflicting by monetarily supporting factory farming.  Nothing is more annoying than someone refusing to hear what you have to say because 'it's too upsetting', ending the conversation with you and then making a trip to Tesco (boooooo!! You know how much I hate Tesco...) to buy burgers for that night's dinner.  As I discuss at length in my post 'The Urgency of Unity', the solution to this problem is so simple: Vote with the pound.

So, I totally sympathise with the frustration that most vegans feel.  Animal suffering is happening on such a huge scale that drastic and aggressive action seems the most obvious route to take.  However, it's in human nature to be drawn to positive imagery and ideas rather than negative ones, and thus it's common sense that charities bear this in mind when communicating their ideas.  Stories of what switching to a vegan lifestyle can achieve, images of happy rescued animals in sanctuaries, the availability of exciting food and fashionable clothes and cosmetics are all much more likely to draw people towards considering veganism as a compassionate, attractive, and practical way of life than bombarding them with upsetting images.  Most charity websites have now changed their approach.  The majority of the images used on the WaterAid website, for example, are positive ones that show the changes the charity has made to the lives of those it has reached.  That's something people want to be associated with and support.  When people are repulsed or upset by images, the natural reaction is to avoid everything to do with that image.  When people experience negative emotions when confronted by graphic images, they associate the distributer of that image with the same feeling.

But still, I know that those upsetting images do have their place and that they need to be seen.  But in what forum?  I guess it's all about having a sensitive and nuanced approached.  It's an incredibly complex topic, but one that I've been thinking more and more about lately.  I feel like veganism desperately needs an image makeover to make it more user friendly!  Ideas/thoughts on a postcard/in a comment, please, my lovely veggie readers.

Peace and love to you all.
xxxx

Cow Lovely!

Another interesting article, this time about the individuality of cows - it's very moooving! (Erm, sorry about that...)

Enjoy!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jul/07/cows-best-friends

I find it hard to understand that sometimes the very people who appreciate the individuality of these animals are also the ones farming them.  With this in mind, I'd like to flag up another excellent post from the Not One Sparrow website written by Lauren Merritt (the post is originally from her website, which Ben cites). Lauren addresses the issue of the good shepherd and how this ideal conflicts with the cruelty of factory farming.  Thanks for sharing this with us, Ben!

http://www.notonesparrow.com/blog/2011/7/7/the-good-shepherds.html

Peace, love, and vegan grazing.
xxxx

Animals as Individuals

Every morning, after dragging myself out of bed, I head straight downstairs to put on the kettle. This used to be motivated only by my need for a comforting cuppa to help me recover from the trauma of getting up (I am the eternal student!), but since moving house in December my morning cup of tea has become a bit more of an event. This is because - and this may sound mundane - when making my tea I have a perfect view of the bird table in my neighbour’s garden. Despite only having been here three months, I already recognise the dozens of different characters that congregate there each morning, and look forward to seeing (and of course, hearing!) them as I walk down the stairs. It is sometimes the favourite part of my day, and I feel really blessed to be party to this little scene every morning.

This post is about recognising the beauty in each and every creature, and it is inspired by an entry I saw on Not One Sparrow a while ago called ‘Unforgettable Faces’. It featured the wonderfully expressive artwork of Sam Dolman, who attempts to capture the individuality of farm animals in touching portraits. (His work can be seen here):

http://www.samdolman.com/paintings

My veganism is driven by a variety of factors, one being my belief that it is important (and joyful!) to see every animal as an individual with a unique personality. If you look closely enough, most animals show character traits that would make them worthy of a Dickens novel. Our tendency to see the unique personalities of animals is manifested in the numerous examples in literature, film and art work of the characterisation of them as human-like, especially when these works are aimed at children. This speaks of a childlike relationship to animals that is defined by interest, compassion, and innocence, and it is one that many of us never lose. I think that appreciating and relating to creatures in this way allows us to connect with them on a deeper level, and it is this personal connection that partly fosters our compassion for them. There are numerous examples throughout history of violent regimes dehumanising a collection of individuals in order to persecute them, and this de-individualisation is undoubtedly evident in the factory farming industry. In this system, animals become homogenised factory parts - merely cogs in a machine that grinds out meat.

Within this system animals lose their identity as individuals, and with their personalities brutally and systematically stripped away from them they become – to the majority – food, not friend. A psychological disconnect allows people to detach from the reality of where the meat on their plate has come from. Most people could not watch a lamb chasing its brothers and sisters in a field on a summer’s day and then kill it. After watching it for no more than a minute, that lamb will have become an individual to the onlooker. It will have displayed a personality. Maybe it will even have earned itself an affectionate name. We have an innate desire to relate to our fellow creatures personally; after all, naming God’s creatures was an important part of our role as stewards of creation.

Of the individual personalities Sam captures in his paintings, Ben DeVries writes:

‘What better way to encourage people to see these valued creatures of God as worthy of our attention and care, especially when they are so often reduced to a faceless number (among billions of others forgotten) in the factory-farming system?'

I couldn't agree more with the sentiment Ben expresses here. A lack of emphasis on the importance of appreciating the uniqueness of every individual, both human and non-human, has always been a problem for humanity, and also for the church. Beautiful and infinite variety can be witnessed in God’s creation, and yet Christianity as an institution can, at least in my experience, feel somewhat claustrophobic. Variety of belief and conceptions of God are not always celebrated or welcomed.

I sometimes feel like God is very far away, and those who are close to me know that I struggle to read the Bible or go to Church. These are seen as the most obvious and conventional ways to feel close to God, and an important part of developing your faith. For some reason, however, these ways of relating to God just don't really work for me. I feel closest to God when finding joy in His creation and sharing this with those around me. This is my way of feeling connected to God, of sharing things with Him, of finding a bit of peace, and I think it's a shame that we don't explore this way of relating to God more. I'd like to think, inbetween sessions of moaning about how late the bus is, or pondering for the millionth time what career path I should pursue, that I take the time to admire and wonder at every unique little character I come across and happen to share my brief time on this planet with.

Now, for all my talk of fluffy children's characters I could be accused of arguing for cuteness as a qualifying factor for compassion. This is not my stance at all. I am trying to articulate that perhaps seeing an animal as an individual, with its own thoughts, fears, and experience of pain and of joy, is an important aspect of developing a more compassionate attitude to non-human animals. Far from being cutesy and cuddly, the fight for animal rights is one about politics, ethics, and ultimately an expression of what our values are. Do we value justice, peace, and compassion that extends outside of our own species? This is what it really comes down to, and I simply cannot see any other answer than 'yes' for those of us that believe in a loving and merciful God who remembers every sparrow.

Please do check out the incredible series of posts on Compassionate Eating on Not One Sparrow’s blog; I really cannot emphasize enough what an honor it is to be writing about this cause alongside them.

Peace and love. Cook some vegan cupcakes, walk to a nearby field and watch some spring lambs bounce about. Feel cheered. :)

xxxx

p.s. Just to prove that compassion knows no species, look at this critter I trapped and freed from my old flat a few months ago (after much screaming, obviously...) I'm not sure if my kindness was fuelled by a respect for creation or a fear that his friends would come and get me if I hurt him!