Hey, I agree that many people associate veganism with ‘annoying people’. But that’s actually...more reason to call yourself vegan, if you’re not an annoying person yourself! Break the stereotype, and normalise being standing for vegan values :)
My sense is that a lot of people in EA are against factory farming, but still buy into human supremacy and are ok with free-range farming. Then the 90% approach reflects the appropriate attitude and is fine. But for those like myself who have long-term hopes of ending animal exploitation altogether, I think it makes sense to signal that we oppose all of it. Requiring others to be strict is certainly counter-productive, though. I also don’t think change has to be all or nothing—I actually think it’s really good for people who make exceptions sometimes to call themselves vegan.
To be clear, I want to see factory farming ended, I’m vegan (except occasional bivalves), and co-founded an animal welfare charity.
I’m with you on the goal.
But while all the vegans I know seem to take it as self-evident that being vegan is the best diet choice in terms of social signalling, I’m not convinced.
You’re right that it’s possible to be a non-judgmental strict vegan, and everyone should aspire to be. But in my experience, the average vegan doesn’t meet this standard. And so rather than assuming a marginal vegan will be the best case scenario, I assume they’ll be average, and I think that could be negative.
[Of course, I don’t have good data on how judgmentally the average vegan behaves — but neither do the people who assume they’re positive signaling value. It’s also likely that my and most people’s perceptions of vegans is skewed by a vocal minority. But the result is that omnivores are often very defensive around vegans, even when the vegan isn’t being judgmental and is just silently being a strict vegan. I suspect that for someone to know that you’re a strict vegan and not feel judged would require you to actively demonstrate to them that you don’t judge them. And that’s actually quite hard to do]I’m
My guess is that the people reading the EA Forum are much less judgmental than the average vegan and generally, there will be a selection effect such that people who are actually willing to think reasonably and be 90% vegan won’t be the judgmental ones anyway. So, probably for people here, it’s not harmful to recommend people be non-judgmental strict vegans for signalling reasons.
They’re probably less judgmental than average. Also perhaps poorer social skills on average. Do I back us to have the required tact? :P
But in all seriousness, the answer to “is it positive for social signalling to have an extra vegan EA forum reader” could defs be different to “is it positive for social signalling to have an extra vegan”. I had the latter in mind when I questioned the signalling value
That’s fair. I would love it if we had data on this, and to be honest I am unsure about whether being strictly vegan is always right—my stronger objection to this article was about not being strictly vegetarian. That is easier to do and I think is perceived as less strict, at least in western societies. On the other hand, as I said in another comment I think that it’s very hard to eat meat and fully internalise nonspeciesism at the same time. A true nonspeciesist should be disugsted by meat, because that’s literally a dead body in front of you. So I think it’s worth it to be strictly vegetarian primarily to reinforce your own values, internally—but also for the signalling effect.
Hey, I agree that many people associate veganism with ‘annoying people’. But that’s actually...more reason to call yourself vegan, if you’re not an annoying person yourself! Break the stereotype, and normalise being standing for vegan values :)
My sense is that a lot of people in EA are against factory farming, but still buy into human supremacy and are ok with free-range farming. Then the 90% approach reflects the appropriate attitude and is fine. But for those like myself who have long-term hopes of ending animal exploitation altogether, I think it makes sense to signal that we oppose all of it. Requiring others to be strict is certainly counter-productive, though. I also don’t think change has to be all or nothing—I actually think it’s really good for people who make exceptions sometimes to call themselves vegan.
To be clear, I want to see factory farming ended, I’m vegan (except occasional bivalves), and co-founded an animal welfare charity.
I’m with you on the goal.
But while all the vegans I know seem to take it as self-evident that being vegan is the best diet choice in terms of social signalling, I’m not convinced.
You’re right that it’s possible to be a non-judgmental strict vegan, and everyone should aspire to be. But in my experience, the average vegan doesn’t meet this standard. And so rather than assuming a marginal vegan will be the best case scenario, I assume they’ll be average, and I think that could be negative.
[Of course, I don’t have good data on how judgmentally the average vegan behaves — but neither do the people who assume they’re positive signaling value. It’s also likely that my and most people’s perceptions of vegans is skewed by a vocal minority. But the result is that omnivores are often very defensive around vegans, even when the vegan isn’t being judgmental and is just silently being a strict vegan. I suspect that for someone to know that you’re a strict vegan and not feel judged would require you to actively demonstrate to them that you don’t judge them. And that’s actually quite hard to do]I’m
My guess is that the people reading the EA Forum are much less judgmental than the average vegan and generally, there will be a selection effect such that people who are actually willing to think reasonably and be 90% vegan won’t be the judgmental ones anyway. So, probably for people here, it’s not harmful to recommend people be non-judgmental strict vegans for signalling reasons.
They’re probably less judgmental than average. Also perhaps poorer social skills on average. Do I back us to have the required tact? :P
But in all seriousness, the answer to “is it positive for social signalling to have an extra vegan EA forum reader” could defs be different to “is it positive for social signalling to have an extra vegan”. I had the latter in mind when I questioned the signalling value
That’s fair. I would love it if we had data on this, and to be honest I am unsure about whether being strictly vegan is always right—my stronger objection to this article was about not being strictly vegetarian. That is easier to do and I think is perceived as less strict, at least in western societies. On the other hand, as I said in another comment I think that it’s very hard to eat meat and fully internalise nonspeciesism at the same time. A true nonspeciesist should be disugsted by meat, because that’s literally a dead body in front of you. So I think it’s worth it to be strictly vegetarian primarily to reinforce your own values, internally—but also for the signalling effect.