What is a vegetarian?

[french frank]

I was slightly puzzled about the outcry from 'vegetarians' about the new £5 note. Vegans, yes, but why vegetarians? If they shun milk, butter, cheese and eggs (and leather goods), aren't they vegans?

[Richard Tarleton]

I was slightly puzzled about the outcry from 'vegetarians' about the new £5 note. Vegans, yes, but why vegetarians? If they shun milk, butter, cheese and eggs (and leather goods), aren't they vegans?

This outcry reminded me rather of the Indian Mutiny, and cartridges.... Was that just careless reporting? (like birders being called twitchers )

Attempting to help a neighbour's daughter with vegetarian recipes that could safely be eaten by a vegan (which she professed to be), and discussing the matter with her, made it clear the extent to which it can be a lifestyle, as opposed to dietary preference, issue.

[french frank]

This outcry reminded me rather of the Indian Mutiny, and cartridges.... Was that just careless reporting? (like birders being called twitchers )

This morning there was a 'vegetarian cafe' that had, with regret, banned the fivers. Maybe they did mean vegan.

Attempting to help a neighbour's daughter with vegetarian recipes that could safely be eaten by a vegan (which she professed to be), and discussing the matter with her, made it clear the extent to which it can be a lifestyle, as opposed to dietary preference, issue.

There are all sorts of reasons why people profess to be vegetarian, some of which make sense, some don't. But those who claim to be "strict vegetarians", I don't understand. If you're "strict" about it, you become a vegan. I was even (very briefly and for practical reasons only) a fruitarian. But now I eat what I like, moderately, and with concerns about the issues involved.

But you're probably right - they meant vegan.

[jean]

This outcry reminded me rather of the Indian Mutiny, and cartridges....

There have been several different sets of objections - the first I heard was from Hindus because the tallow used is made from beef fat. Presumably their objection was based on the cow being sacred, not that it might be a source of pollution.

I too thought of the Indian mutiny and the pork fat on the cartridges, but I heard of no objections from Muslims.

I was reminded of some of the more orthodox of the Jewish girls I taught who used to refuse to lick the labels they were supposed to stick in their school textbooks for fear the glue might not be kosher.

But nobody has to lick (or to bite) banknotes, do they?

.

[jean]

This morning there was a 'vegetarian cafe' that had, with regret, banned the fivers. Maybe they did mean vegan.

Vegetarians do admit animal products such as cheese or eggs, but these don't involve the killing of the milk- or egg-producing animal itself.

However I often have to remind them than the consumption of milk by humans does involve the death of the baby animals who would otherwise have drunk it.

[french frank]

However I often have to remind them than the consumption of milk by humans does involve the death of the baby animals who would otherwise have drunk it.

I was poised to make just that point.

[umslopogaas]

#5 jean, I think that might be true of ancestral cows, because they produced much less milk than modern dairy cattle, and if some of it was removed for human consumption, there might well not have been enough left to feed baby cows. But I think modern cows produce so much milk that we can have as much as we want. In fact, my understanding is that cows must be milked every day to drain the udder, so to speak. They could never produce enough babies to drink it all.

Re. the fivers, this sounds completely bonkers to me. For a start, how many other daily objects that we handle are produced by processes that involve the use of animal products? More to the point, vegetarians are not being asked to EAT the fivers, only handle them. Will they also refuse to handle a tin of oxtail soup?

Concerning milk butter and eggs, the strictest will not touch them, because they object to the use of animals to provide human food. I once had a student who took this extreme view, and I always thought she looked most unhealthy, though she seemed to cope OK. My sister is part vegetarian, she refuses red meat and chicken, but will eat fish. The logic of this escapes me, but for the sake of family harmony I have not pursued it. It may be simply an issue of marital harmony, her husband is a keen fisherman.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Re. the fivers, this sounds completely bonkers to me. For a start, how many other daily objects that we handle are produced by processes that involve the use of animal products? More to the point, vegetarians are not being asked to EAT the fivers, only handle them. Will they also refuse to handle a tin of oxtail soup?

Some of them may well do, in the same way that some refuse to touch leather goods (that they are also "not being asked to eat") - that is their decision. It will be less "convenient" for them to be able to refuse to handle bank notes, though - especially if the new methods of producing the fivers also spread to other denominations.

Why is tallow an essential component of the new notes? (If it isn't, then the true "bonkers-ness" is in using it in the first place.)

[umslopogaas]

My understanding - which may be wrong - is that the notes dont actually contain animal products, but that they become contaminated on the surface during the production process. No doubt there are alternative non-animal products that might be used, but I doubt if de la Rue, or whoever prints bank notes, will be persuaded to change to them to satisfy a few veggies.

Good point: is it just fivers? And if its all bank notes, then vegans are going to have to shop where they accept cards, or cheques. Or save loads of coins. But ... they are also likely to have surface contamination of traces of animal products, having been handled by people like me, who are just thinking of a nice fry-up of lamb chops for dinner.

A thought - do vegans reject honey? It is an animal product, but if we didnt eat it, we wouldnt keep bees, so if we all became vegan and refused honey, we'd be responsible for the non-existence of millions of bees.

[pastoralguy]

My sister is pretty sour about Mrs. PG's mink coat despite the fact that she smokes and owns a beagle. When I point out that Beagles were exploited to test smoking in the 70's she doesn't see the irony of her position.

[jean]

A thought - do vegans reject honey?

A vegan friend of mine won't eat it (but she does wear leather shoes).

...if we didnt eat it, we wouldnt keep bees, so if we all became vegan and refused honey, we'd be responsible for the non-existence of millions of bees.

there should be plenty of wild ones - it's not only the ones we breed for honey that pollinate our crops.

Though with the current dangers to bees, it might not be wise to rely on them.

[Pianorak]

But nobody has to lick (or to bite) banknotes, do they?

.

Which, apparently, is beside the point. One statistician calculated that one cow would have had to be killed to provide the tallow for the X-millions of banknotes to be produced. It's the killing of this one cow which appears to be the issue.

[Richard Tarleton]

#5 jean, I think that might be true of ancestral cows, because they produced much less milk than modern dairy cattle, and if some of it was removed for human consumption, there might well not have been enough left to feed baby cows. But I think modern cows produce so much milk that we can have as much as we want. In fact, my understanding is that cows must be milked every day to drain the udder, so to speak. They could never produce enough babies to drink it all.

The point about modern intensively reared dairy cows, surely, is that not only are they selectively bred to produce huge quantities of milk (at the cost of unnaturally frequent pregnancies and greatly shorter lives) but male calves are killed at birth (as an unwanted byproduct) and female calves removed from their mothers unnaturally early in order to maximise the availability of milk for human consumption. It's pretty appalling from an animal welfare point of view. I took it that this is what jean was referring to.... Extensively reared beef cattle have a better time of it.

[umslopogaas]

#11 jean, that is very strange ... the leather she is apparently happy to wear involved the death of a cow - it would have died anyway to provide us with steaks, but none the less, you cant get leather without killing cows. Whereas the honey she wont eat is produced by bees which are farmed for the purpose. True there are still wild bees, but they can only produce a small fraction of the honey we require.

And #12. pianorak, you dont even have to kill one cow specially to provide the necessary tallow, you could get all the tallow you want as a by-product from the local slaughterhouse.

[umslopogaas]

#13, Richard, rather than being killed at birth, arent male cows raised for a short time, then slaughtered for veal? But I agree, its a grim business all round, the price we seem happy to pay for cheap dairy products.