What happened in the vegan community?
I hadn’t heard about any of this until seeing that ToS post.
The long and short of it is, One of the lemmy.world admins demoted a mod of the vegan community over a comment about how cat can be fed a 100% vegan diet with supplements and the cat will be fine.
What an asshole vegan. How stupid can you be to say you love animals and say something as dumb as this
I once gave a vegan friend of mine pause for thought when I pointed out that we probably shouldn’t be keeping pets in the first place if those pets aren’t in their natural habitat doing what their species evolved to do. They had cats.
I have 2 cats but they weren’t born because of me. They’re from a shelter. They can freely roam the woods behind my house and of course they kill a lot of mice (and a few birds).
The other alternatives would be keeping them locked up for life and feeding them cat food from industrialized animal farms, or putting them to sleep. I don’t think those alternatives would be more ethical.So you let your cat out to exterminate local wildlife
And you call keeping them inside away from local wildlife that they can exterminate unethical
yes
A good thought, if you are planning to buy one from a breeder! Don’t do that (unless you are a farmer who needs a very specific breed of working dog). By adopting instead, you can ethically have a companion, imo. The animal life already exists, so by giving it a good home, you’re engaging in harm reduction. Don’t forget to slay and neuter those pets!
what’s wrong with it?
Cats are obligate carnivores. They need meat. A vegan cat is a dead cat.
Cats require a few nutrients which aren’t naturally present in plants, such as taurine. Fortunately, those nutrients are easily synthesised, and added to vegan cat foods in order to make them nutritionally complete.
oh god WHY HAVE A DUCKING CAT?!!! Get a bird or a turtle please!
Look at the research before getting emotional.
While it seems dogs need atleast some meat, the scientific consensus is cats can be healthy with a vegan diet and proper supplementation.
I’m not vegan nor do I have a cat, but this debate interested me and I’ve read a couple literature reviews and big papers on the subject.
Cats aren’t what they were 15’000 years ago. Domestication has turned them into an entirely different species.
The thing I’m wondering whenever I see this discussion is:
Should a vegan have a pet that kills for fun?
Should they keep it inside all day to stop it from killing?
I don’t get why a vegan would want to have a cat at all.
Cats aren’t what they were 15’000 years ago. Domestication has turned them into an entirely different species.
I thought the issue was bioavailability of those nutrients was called into question?
Long pork is often a euphemism for people meat.
So you’re just fine with using and abusing an animal when it gets you what you want. Gotcha.
This is a nice comment explaining why the vegan ideology is just bored people feeling morally superior
sure. but the above post stated with supplements. so if the food is palatable and nutritional to the cat, then what does it matter?
A person understands the reason they’re eating only plants with no animal byproducts. An animal doesn’t. An animal is just confused and irritated that their food was changed for the worse by their owner. If their diet and mountain of supplement pills/powders did not actually meet their dietary needs because it wasn’t an exact match for their regular food or natural prey, they would still end up malnourished. And not every cat’s dietary needs are the same or stay the same as they age.
Malnourished or not, you also wouldn’t be able to stop your cat from finding a mouse or insect which snuck into your home and devouring them to enhance their compromised diet. You cannot make a carnivore vegan, you can only abuse them into living in a way they do not naturally live and do not want to live, until they find a way to avoid you for just long enough to go against your wishes and savage another animal, as is their instinctive nature.
Furthermore, do you really think animals have no joy in what they eat, that that’s only a human quality? Nutrition doesn’t matter to the animal, they just want to eat what they want to eat. Cats almost never turn down an offer of cream or milk despite 90% or more of them being lactose intolerant. It’s not nutrients their body needs or can absorb, and actively makes them feel ill. But they want it anyway because it’s tasty and they aren’t able to consider the consequences of their actions as far in advance as humans can.
Edit: In fact, going off that same point but for humans, you could probably make a human live off some kind of tasteless nutrient bar that gives everything you could need, but it wouldn’t mean they’d enjoy it. Oh wait, we did do that before, as a cruel punishment for prisoners in the US, fucking nutraloaf!
and if it was palatable?
You’re still making them do something they didn’t consent to. They will still chew on bugs and small prey animals (when they get access to them, which isn’t often for indoor cats), because it’s etched into their behavior. They will take every opportunity they get. You can’t make a cat vegan, you can only force a cat on a vegan diet. Can’t you understand the qualitative difference there?
Why have an animal to.torture it? Get a parrot of a fish then. Don’t adopt an animal, that can’t understand, and push stupid human values to it. A person that says wants to “protect” animal should respect nature. but you know… vegans are jot the best at logical thinking
if the animal enjoys the food and it has all the nutrition the animal needs then how is it torture?.
Do you also rant at people who keep their cats inside against their will?
You keep making this logical jump that a cat would enjoy eating shitty food with supplements. They would not. A cat would enjoy some chicken.
I hope the RSPCA, ASPCA, Whatever your countries local equivalent is looks into you with that sort of mindset
I don’t think palatable nutritional vegan cat food exists, at least none with any empirical evidence its safe for cats long-term.
but if it did, would you have any objection?
I would encourage people contemplating it’s use to instead get any of the many herbivore companions instead of trying to make the square peg fit in the round hole.
Gish-gallop
Lol, are you the demoted mod
nope.
My bias is minimal; I don’t practice veganism for myself of my pets.
I think your opinion is completely ignorant. While there isn’t clear scientific evidence that conclude a vegan cat diet is better, there is isn’t clear scientific evidence to conclude it is inately worse. So, is your opinion based in reality or your intuition?
“However, there is little evidence of adverse effects arising in dogs and cats on vegan diets.”
Domínguez-Oliva, Adriana, et al. “The Impact of Vegan Diets on Indicators of Health in Dogs and Cats: A Systematic Review.” Veterinary Sciences, vol. 10, no. 1, Jan. 2023, p. NA. Gale Academic OneFile, dx.doi.org/10.3390/vetsci10010052. Accessed 29 Aug. 2024.
Naturally, organizations such as the ASPCA tend toward caution and advise against vegan diets, but your statement reaches far beyond that point.
Edit: I recognize my comment is a bit condescending. I do not mean to discourage discussion. I am genuinely curious and encourage your feedback. Please let me know if I’m missing something important here.
Cats are obligate carnivores. They have evolved to eat meat and only meat. A vegan diet can and will kill them.
My bias is minimal; I don’t practice veganism for myself of my pets.
I think your opinion is completely ignorant. While there isn’t clear scientific evidence that conclude a vegan cat diet is better, there is isn’t clear scientific evidence to conclude it is inately worse. So, is your opinion based in reality or your intuition?
“However, there is little evidence of adverse effects arising in dogs and cats on vegan diets.”
Domínguez-Oliva, Adriana, et al. “The Impact of Vegan Diets on Indicators of Health in Dogs and Cats: A Systematic Review.” Veterinary Sciences, vol. 10, no. 1, Jan. 2023, p. NA. Gale Academic OneFile, dx.doi.org/10.3390/vetsci10010052. Accessed 29 Aug. 2024.
Naturally, organizations such as the ASPCA tend toward caution and advise against vegan diets, but your statement reaches far beyond that point.
Edit: I recognize my comment is a bit condescending. I do not mean to discourage discussion. I am genuinely curious and encourage your feedback. Please let me know if I’m missing something important here.
My opinion is based on fact. Alex Whittaker did a great takedown of that study, have an ABC brief
That article basically says what the study says. There is no real evidence that a vegan diet is healthier for cat; they point to owner bias as the cause of any perception that these studies show it is healthier.
My point was that there is no evidence that a vegan diet is impossible for a cat. I wouldn’t try it because we don’t know it’s safe, but we also don’t know that it’s necessarily unsafe. I’m just bothered by people who jump to “vegan diet equals dead/tortured cat” because we don’t have any evidence that supports such a dramatic claim.
Nah mate. You literally said " there is isn’t clear scientific evidence to conclude it is inately worse" and then tried to link to a faulty science study that got debunked.
Vegan diets for cats are notoriously difficult due to the fact it runs completely counter to the diet a cat has evolved to process. If you’re so dedicated to the vegan ideal that you will attempt to force an obligate carnivore - key word obligate - to consume a diet completely contrary to its digestive system then why are you keeping a pet in the first place?
if cats are carnivores then why does mine eat corn every chance it gets, sometimes going for fresh corn over refrigerated steak?
Same reason people sometimes chew on paper.
Actually if you’re american, corn is also in cat food because it’s freaking everywhere so cats can associate it with food
Jesus, stop downvoting someone for asking a question what the fuck is wrong with you people
this is a very emotive issue. apparently cats have to consent to everything. and their life with humans must be 100% natural. otherwise it is animal abuse.
Oh, you were downvoted because people correctly detected a sealion.
potentially. I have no idea what this means.
Me neither but now that I do I’m very happy so thank you.
This is 100% not an innocent question.
What’s wrong with depriving a cat of something it has evolved to need and can die or be in bad health without?
My bias is minimal; I don’t practice veganism for myself of my pets.
I think your opinion is completely ignorant. While there isn’t clear scientific evidence that conclude a vegan cat diet is better, there is isn’t clear scientific evidence to conclude it is inately worse. So, is your opinion based in reality or your intuition?
“However, there is little evidence of adverse effects arising in dogs and cats on vegan diets.”
Domínguez-Oliva, Adriana, et al. “The Impact of Vegan Diets on Indicators of Health in Dogs and Cats: A Systematic Review.” Veterinary Sciences, vol. 10, no. 1, Jan. 2023, p. NA. Gale Academic OneFile, dx.doi.org/10.3390/vetsci10010052. Accessed 29 Aug. 2024.
Naturally, organizations such as the ASPCA tend toward caution and advise against vegan diets, but your statement reaches far beyond that point.
Edit: I recognize my comment is a bit condescending. I do not mean to discourage discussion. I am genuinely curious and encourage your feedback. Please let me know if I’m missing something important here.
Well I understand you point for sure. Mine is just larger than just the diet. If you are so vegan that you would force your diet into.you pet, shoud you have a pet at all?!! Isn’t that captivity?? Why is it better?? And why even have a cat if you know there are other types of pets that are vegan by nature?
If it’s a one in a 1000 cases that the cat was inherit and can’t be rehomed than that cat is too old to adapt into a new diet without being very distressed. So why torture an animal if you are a lover? And if it’s a new animal… well get a turtle or a bird or none, since vegans are against animal exploitation and captivity.
I’m sorry but I get really angry when people come with the “Rules only apply when it suits me” shit
Well I don’t follow any “vegan” practices, so I can’t really help with the motive part. I think we (internet discourse) often put “vegans” in a box that doesn’t really allow for the nuances of individuals. It’s not like there is a doctrine that the “vegan” follow, at least not that I’m aware of. So can you be “vegan” and care for a pet? I don’t know, but I expect different people will give different answers.
Again, you’re making a giant leap to torture. My point was that current scientific consensus is a vegan diet does not necessarily equal torture. So, I’m wondering why you think it does.
the vegan society has a definition of veganism
Nothing excludes the care of pets. It does exclude “animals for food” “as far as is possible and practical”. One could definitely extend this to animals for a pet’s diet, but I’d argue it’s not practical for cats because we don’t yet have solid evidence that says it’s safe. I just don’t think it’s rational to flatly liken it to torture.
If that’s really the vegan philosophy, dont get a cat. Use an animal-free alternative, like a cushion.
some people would argue the keeping of pets is exploitation
deleted by creator
Gish-gallop
Wtf is happening in the comments. Why are people getting so insane over this topic over and over again? If there’s cat food out there that’s nutritional complete, cats like it, and it happens to be plant based - so what? The only two reasons to object are if someone is 100% convinced such a product doesn’t and cannot exist or if they’re entirely ideological about it. And if we have to apply the naturalistic fallacy that only the natural way can be morally okay, why of all things argue about pet food? I really, really don’t get it why people get so intensely emotional about it.
If there’s cat food out there that’s nutritional complete, cats like it, and it happens to be plant based - so what?
Because the vegan cat food that claims to be nutritionally complete isn’t. Whenever these brands have their products studied they turn out to not be nutritionally complete. Feeding them to a cat is abuse.
So they should simply start producing one that is. Problem solved. No law of nature prevents us from supplementing the right amount of taurine and b12, so there is no reason to be irrational about it.
It’s actually more complicated than that. Of the like 6 studies done since the 90s, several found that cats didn’t absorb supplements in the same way, ie with a supplemented diet for taurine they would not find taurine in the cats plasmas after 6 weeks
And that’s the problem with this whole “but it CAN be done! I’m special!” Attitude. It leads to comments like yours that boil down to “the magic capitalism machine should just make it happen cause of course it’s possible” when the tiny amount of research done found that it’s only questionably possible, and is mostly a shitty idea.
It’s this pushing shitty ideas because someone feels like a moral superior I’m tired of.
Taurine should be the easiest to supplement, since it’s already widely synthesized to supplement traditional pet food with. Three decades old studies really shouldn’t be the only thing we’re looking at before we’re going at each others necks about something.
It’s this shitting on new ideas because someone feels like a moral superior I’m tired of.
And ironically this is exactly what vegans are often blamed for btw. People turn off their brain, get all emotional, and feel justified on hating someone for muder, abuse, and torture (all claims from this very comment section) without the slightest bit of nuance. I just searched for “vegan cat food nutrition study” and very randomly picked the first search result, which brought me to a study from 2023 showing that cats fed a vegan diet were overall even healthier. So at the very least we have to agree that this isn’t as clear cut as many here claim with utmost confidence.
You found a study where they asked cat owners to self report all the data. As demonstrated in this thread and others, vegans are divorced from reality when it comes to what cats actually need to eat, so I’d say that’s not the most reliable source.
Additionally:
“This research and its publication open access was funded by food awareness organisation ProVeg International (https://proveg.com). AK received this award ID: Oct2019-0000000286”
Riiiiiiiight….
Then look for a recent study yourself. I certainly won’t waste my time, since I hardly believe you would chance your mind even with the most robust data available. You’ve made up your mind.
There’s no reason why supplementation shouldn’t be possible. After all we’re already doing that. Obviously we can test for it (since so many people in this comment claimed that vegan brands were tested and found to be insufficient), so nothing stops us from putting taurine into the cat food to the point where it reaches the required amounts. It’s that simple. If you need to stay offended than for all means keep going. Just know that you behave just like the vegans you’re so annoyed about, and it’s showing.
If only this was readily researchable…
But yeah, animal cruelty gets people het up. This is the internet, don’t fuck with cats
What should stop a company from supplementing the right amount of all the nutrients listed? The article simply claims it’s not nutritionally complete, but that would only be an argument against the brands currently available and tested, not against the idea in principle.
Studies have shown that cats do not absorb adequate amounts of these nutrients from synthetic supplemented versions, it’s why vegan pet food that is technically nutritionally complete in the bag isn’t when it’s in the cat.
Vegans should instead opt for a non-carnivorous pet
That’s bullshit and you know it, otherwise you would have at least attempted to back up that claim.
A very short internet research attempt shows: Synthetic taurine is considered efficacious for use in cat, dog and carnivorous fish.
Maybe no one in the history of the internet has argued about this and it’s just time for people to duke it out. I thought everything was settled about cats by now, but maybe not.
I’ve seen this exact argument before and it was just as heated. Ironically the same people getting annoyed at vegans for being emotional and judgemental are incredibly fast to scream abuse and murder when it comes to cat food.
okay, thanks. fairrr
Good
Vegans do a better job of pissing everyone off about a pretty sensible topic than any community I’ve ever seen
their vitriol is…weird. if they just said “i prefer…” not many would be bothered.
“you’re a murderer.” does tend to ruffle feathers.
Forreal, longtime vegan here… Vegans (online mostly) annoy me more than most people. I swear we aren’t all jerks! I’m probably a major sell out, I don’t even have a problem with hunters.
Honestly as a linux nerd sometimes I feel like us open source folks have a similar problem
You do a bunch of work and make sacrifices to accomplish living in a way you feel proud of! Wonderful! And then you turn around and antagonize people who don’t invest all their time and energy in the issue that you personally really connect with…! Oh… Wonderful… 🙃
As someone who’s been working tech for two decades, the more assbaggy the linux user the less they actually know.
i believe you, it’s something to do with being online.
Almost like ruffling feathers is the point when you truly believe most people are being murderers. You don’t change society by being polite.
Activism isn’t about being polite as much as effecting change, which vegans are doing the opposite of through much of their online presence.
Lots of activists change society by passing legislation, organizing political action and peaceful protests.
Irritating other people with half-baked personal invective won’t get you anywhere productive.
You don’t change society by making yourself look like a dick and making everyone just want to ignore you either
A lot of us are murderers in that way. Or accomplices, whatever. The thing about vegans specifically is that there’s not any moral need for it. The goodness to animals would make you vegetarian. Not having cheese or eggs is not the slightest bit morally better.
Eh kinda. The working conditions of cows and chickens is pretty horrible. I could see not wanting to be involved in that.
But personally, I’m going to worry about improving the working conditions of humans first.
I mean, you can do both. They’re not mutually exclusive.
Look, if I have to work 8-5 with an automatic milker attached to my junk, so do the cows.
Well now I’m wondering if you ever had an actual conversation with a vegan, because they actually have good reasons for this. A vegan diet is simply the most consequential idea if you want to minimize the necessity for animals to die, at the very least (even if we ignore the various ways of exploitation) because male chickens and calves obviously have to be killed in order for these industries to function.
I’ve had conversations with vegans, and when one said that honey isn’t vegan because it’s produced by an insect (they said animal, but that’s incorrect), I stopped pretending that (at least some) vegans have any logic to their arguments.
Wait, why is there no logic in there? Insects are animals, and honey is made by bees, which are insects and thus animals.
If you believe you shouldn’t use animals for your food production, which is a reasonable definition of veganism, then you shouldn’t eat honey.
I mean, fine if you do eat honey too, but I don’t really see your point here.
I don’t think bees are killed for their honey.
I could be wrong though.You might be mixing up vegetarianism and veganism. Vegans also don’t drink milk or eat eggs. You don’t need to kill a cow or a chicken to get either.
Some vegans feel any animal explotation is wrong, even down to taking the honey the hive created for their colony. Bees are in the animal kingdom, beside plants and fungus category. Also, over harvesting, moving hives to rent out pollinators is creating hive stress and together with nicotine seems to account for a lot of hive collapse/death. We have a growing hive collapse problem, that will end badly for the world if it continues
You really just have no idea what you’re talking about, huh?
Watch the documentary above and tell me that dairy and eggs have “not the slightest bit” of ethical concern for animal products other than meat.
that YouTube video sucks and you should post a trigger warning when you link gore
But aren’t you the one advocating that this is okay? Why do I need a trigger warning for something so deeply and obviously ethical?
your deeply biased YouTube video is notoriously traumatizing, with the production house that made it providing aftercare tips. viewers report sleeplessness, nightmares, vomiting, lack of appetite and depression.
you are acting irresponsibly
I don’t have a problem with openheart surgery, but I don’t link videos of it without a tag
I feel like I’m being trolled right now. It’s a documentary which is expressly about the extensive, systemic animal abuse that happens in the industry, and the first instance of that is over 5 minutes in. Did you not expect gore? Is this not like the most fundamentally obvious thing you could possibly expect from such a documentary?
Edit: oh, comment history tells me that I am being trolled. Interesting. Have a nice day.
It’s because they don’t actually give a shit about animals, they just want to feel morally superior.
Same as anyone wanting to ban x, y, or z “for the children”.
Same as people who want to stop using a perfectly good term because they think it might be offensive to such-and-such group, despite never actually consulting any members of such-and-such group.
This is an absurd take. Vegans have to sacrifice a lot. I absolutely love animals and it’s insane to me that someone can’t see the amount of torture and murder of animals there is out there.
I decided to cut out, as much as is reasonably possible, anything that was made by or is these animals. I don’t do this because I want to feel superior, I do it for the animals. Most vegans don’t do this for attention. Just because you see some vegans shouting online doesn’t mean we’re all like that.
Yeah, I guess I should clarify that I only meant the terminally online ones
Based on the post they were spreading misinformation and being really unsightly, calling not vegans things akin to slurs like “meaties” or some shit. I don’t know the full story though.
Vegans have hilarious nicknames, they seem to spend quite a bit of time on it
My favorite is “carnist”, make me feel like a dinosaur.
“Forbidden carnal knowledge” is my favorite
okay, thanks
Is “meatie” or “carnist” really a slur though? Those seem benign at worst and mildly accurate at best. Who is throwing a fit over that?
“No no, you have to protect the feelings of “meat eaters” and “carnivores” by using the full word.” ??? Like… why is this the hill people die on?
I agree that feeding a cat a vegan or vegetarian diet is still animal abuse, though. They’re not omnivores like us. They’re obligate carnivores, and pretending they’re not is abusive.
I did say akin to slurs, it’s not a slur no, it’s more comical than anything lol
I think they use Carnist. Something ive definitely never heard anyone say in person.
They’re still doing it, being That Arsehole in other threads as well. Baity troll either terminally online or fifteen.
Vegan 2.0 was released recently and the attention it received led to a private equity buyout. Vegan® is now a trademark term and you need that ® or it’s in violation. I hear they are about to release a line of fake-vegan® meat for people who want to look vegan but like the taste of cow.
Vegan As A Service, coming soon
Sometimes I’d like to see civilization collapse just so I can watch the smug ones starve when they refuse to hunt or fish when there’s not enough vegetables to survive on. Not so high and might when survival is on the line, are you, Jerry.
Is eating lab grown meat vegan?
Not yet. Growing cells in a lab still requires fetal bovine serum which is obviously an animal product. There is work going into replacing it with a synthetic alternative but, to my knowledge, noone has been successful yet.
Thanks for the informed reply.
You seem knowledgeable, is the FBS clonal? Like can it grow more undifferentiated or does it need to be continually harvested?
FBS doesn’t contain cells. It’s a chemical/protein mixture used to grow various cell cultures. On It’s own it doesn’t do anything. It just contains most of the things that growing cells need.
I actually know very little about it though. Check out The Thought Emporium on youtube if you want a better look at how it is all done. They do all sorts of fun stuff like engineering yeast to produce spider silk, growing neurons and using them for basic computation, making a meat berry, and using a genetically engineered virus to cure their lactose intolerance for a while.
Edit: Also that youtuber did some testing on replacing FBS and the growth medium with other substances with some sucess. If I remember correctly, they found that for growing regular muscle cells they could replace like 60% of the FBS needed with egg yolk without harming the cells. But that’s still an animal product so it’s still not exactly vegan.
fetal bovine serum
That sounds awful. :( Hurry up, science!
Depends who you ask:
some would say that it’s vegan as long as no animal has suffered or been deprived for your meal, meaning that lab grown qualifies.
Others, such as the crazies in the vegan circle jerk community, believe that as long as it’s ever been in the same zip code as a leather belt, it can never be vegan.
That last one is exaggerated, of course, but nowhere near as much as you’d hope…
“a person who does not eat any food derived from animals and who typically does not use other animal products”.
not by that definition
Very few can say that they truly exist without ANY trace of animal products in their lives.
ꓰѕѕеոtіаꓲꓲу tһіѕ tһrеаd соոѕіѕtѕ оf νеցаոѕ tһаt аrе
- ꓖіѕһ-ցаꓲꓲоріոց аոd
- ꓢеа-ꓲіоոіոց
I couldn’t appreciate the visual sea lion anymore.What is gish galloping, which I would also appreciate a visual reference for if available.
Gish galloping is talking over the person you’re arguing with to tire them out and / or interrupt them
Commenting with long text walls asking someone to refute this or that or respond to a series of questions is usually the online equivalent of that
You ever see those comment chains with vеgаns constantly responding to someone until the person they’re responding to gives up, that can be considered Gish-galloping
Obviously with online comments you can’t talk while another person is talking
