‘I'm A Vegan And It's Hard For Me To Be Close To Anyone Who's Not'
I went vegan with my partner Nate on November 9, 2019. Today, I can’t imagine being with someone who’s not vegan—and I find it difficult to relate to people who don’t share our lifestyle.
It wasn’t always this way: Growing up, I ate meat, but I was never quite sure if I agreed with it in principle. I even went vegetarian a couple of times—once when I was about 10 and then again when I was 18—because I started questioning why it was okay for an animal to have died so that I could eat it.
But both times, I ended up quitting because I figured if everyone else around me was eating meat, then surely it couldn't be that bad. I certainly never thought I'd go vegan.
Then, last fall, Nate and I decided to do some research on veganism after his parents started talking about potentially going fully plant-based.
The more we looked into it, the more we learned about why people go vegan, and we both started to realize the huge impact that eating animals has on our planet.
We began asking ourselves questions like: Is it really moral for someone to raise an animal so that they can kill it and eat it?
From then on, we just couldn’t look back. It was like an epiphany. Over just a few days, we used up whatever food we had left in the house. There wasn’t much to get rid of, so we practically went vegan overnight.
Going vegan with Nate has made it easier because we’ve learned to change up what we eat and cook together, and we discuss all of the issues that come along with becoming vegan, including how to talk to people who don't want to listen to the reality of it.
We’re always trying to open up people’s minds to going vegan.
What’s funny is that, more often than not, when someone finds out we’re vegan, they immediately try and justify eating animal products with an excuse, like, “I’m trying to eat less meat,” or, “We only eat fish these days.”
I think it’s sad because it shows that these people feel guilt about eating meat but choose to ignore it. I also question why so many people like to place a hierarchy on the animals we should and shouldn’t eat. Why is a cow or pig more worthy than a fish or chicken?
One of the most eye-opening things I like to tell people is something I recently came across on an Instagram post by @cheesyveganlife. It challenges you to replace the word “veganism” with “kind(ness) to animals.” This helps people realize how they sound when they give excuses for not being vegan, like “Stop forcing ‘kindness to animals’ on me,” and, “I could never be ‘kind to animals,’ I love cheese too much.”
Some of our friends have actually gone vegan after we explained to them why it’s so important to us.
Others just give the same kind of excuses as everybody else. I always remind myself that someone surely must not understand the severity of it all if they choose to not be vegan, but it’s definitely hard to maintain a relationship with someone who claims to recognize our reality and then still chooses to eat animal products.
I haven’t cut anybody off after they’ve expressed their views against veganism. It definitely creates some distance, though—as I’m sure it would for anyone who finds out their morals don't match up with someone else’s.
It’s such an important thing to me that, if someone has a completely opposing opinion, it’s really difficult to ignore that.
Now I can’t even imagine dating someone who is not vegan.
If Nate told me he wasn’t going to be vegan anymore, first I would check that he was okay, because it would be hard to believe that! Then I would listen to why, because something huge would have to happen for him to go against it, and I would want to understand.
But if his explanation didn’t change my mind, I don’t think I could stay with him. I strongly believe in veganism, and if you don’t, your lifestyle would so completely contrast with my beliefs that it would be very hard to live with that every day.
If I were to go through the dating phase again, I would definitely look to date vegans. That said, I wouldn’t rule out someone who's respectful of and open-minded to the whole situation—the goal being to change their mind!
I just don’t think I could be in a relationship—actually, I know I couldn’t be in a relationship—with someone who isn’t vegan.
A post shared by MARNIE (@marnieheree) on Dec 31, 2019 at 9:23am PST
Veganism is more than just a diet.
It’s a way of life, and it’s recognizing the things in your life that have consequences that impact animals and the environment.
I don’t believe people should have more rights than animals.
We share this planet with animals, so I don’t believe it’s okay to play with them like toys, choose when they die, impregnate them, or force them to live so we can take their milk.
We are more than capable of being healthy and happy in the world without doing any of those things.
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