"Svend" (svend)
12/13/2019 at 03:35 • Filed to: None
0
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"Svend" (svend)
12/13/2019 at 03:35 • Filed to: None | 0
| 15 |
Trying not to be , how do you Americans say it?, yes, triggered.
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Give the Gift of Understanding this Christmas
Around one in every 10 Kiwis avoids meat most or all of the time – so there’s a good chance you’ll be sharing Christmas with a vegetarian or vegan this year. It could be your son, who’s vegan because he cares about animals; or maybe it’s your sister, who’s giving vegetarianism a try for the sake of the environment. You may not fully understand their decision, but you love them, so you want them to enjoy Christmas as much as everyone else, right?
What can you do to help ensure Christmas Day is enjoyable for all of your family members? You might think the key is preparing the right sort of food – and we’ll give you some tips for that! – but the most meaningful thing you can do is show them you care.
Christmas can be a challenging time for vegetarians and vegans, because a lot of the food that typically gets shared involves animals – for example, most Christmas meals feature a turkey as the centrepiece. Most other days of the year, vegetarians and vegans can easily avoid situations where lots of meat is consumed; but at Christmas, they often feel torn between wanting to avoid meat, and wanting to be with family and friends.
If your loved one is an animal lover, seeing meat can bring back memories of animal abuse they’ve witnessed, such as slaughterhouse footage that convinced them to change their lifestyle. These intrusive thoughts can be upsetting, and can make their experience of Christmas much different to that of the meat-eaters sitting at the table with them.
Likewise, many meat-eaters find vegetarianism and veganism confronting. It’s easy to feel that your traditions, like eating ham, are being rejected when a member of the family chooses not to partake in them. But if the vegetarian or vegan in your life is choosing to share Christmas Day with you – even knowing that meat will be served – you can take it as a sign that they love you, because they probably know it’s going to be a bit challenging.
One of the best Christmas gifts you can give to the vegetarian or vegan in your family is understanding . Feeling accepted by one’s family is important – and because decisions around food often connect to vegetarians’ and vegans’ values, it’s important that you accept their choices around food . This in itself doesn’t mean that you have to go vegetarian – you have to choose to do that – but it does mean that you should accept that their decision is right for them.
There are practical things you can do to help your vegetarian and vegan family members enjoy Christmas Day. Communicating that you want them to feel happy will let them know that you care. If you talk to them beforehand and ask them how you can accommodate them, you’ll probably find that they arrive more relaxed. Also, plant-based catering is probably easier than you think it’s going to be! If you want to prepare food that everyone can eat, your loved one will likely have some suggestions, and know some good recipes. ( !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! for recipes that can be enjoyed by everyone, including vegetarians and vegans, !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! for a list of Vegan Certified snacks you can buy.)
Another tremendously helpful thing you can do is be an ally. You don’t have to be vegetarian or vegan yourself to support a family member who is. An ally is someone who helps to keep someone else safe. Here are three things you can do to be an ally to a vegetarian or vegan on Christmas Day:
crowd out unwanted comments and unkind jokes make sure they get enough food to eat share their food with them
It’s easy to spot unkind jokes, but it can be difficult to determine whether or not a comment is unwanted. It can also be difficult to challenge people when they make such comments – so we suggest that, in these situations, you respond with positivity. Saying ‘I really like that vegan chocolate you brought!’ or, ‘I admire your commitment to the environment’ within earshot of those making hurtful comments can be a way of supporting vegetarians and vegans. It communicates that they, and their choices, are accepted.
Making sure that they get enough to eat can also make a big difference to their day . It isn’t much fun being hungry, especially when you’re in a challenging environment. At most Christmas gatherings, there is usually a lot less food that vegetarians and vegans can eat, so it is important to ensure that they don’t miss out. If possible, make sure that they get served first. They probably won’t jump to the front of the queue – so why not do it for them? You can say, ‘I know Sarah can’t eat everything here, so I just want to make sure she doesn’t miss out.’ Ask them what they’d like to eat, and make sure you give them generous portions. (Remember, they might not have the chance to go back for seconds.) An act as simple as this could mean more to them on Christmas Day than any present they might receive.
Something else that can make a vegetarian or vegan feel accepted is when other people share their food. Making sure you try at least some of the food they eat is a great way of subtly letting them know that you accept them and their choices . If you like the food, be sure to tell them! If you don’t, try something else instead. (Just because kombucha isn’t your sort of thing doesn’t mean you won’t like the crisps!) Remember, most of the food you eat is vegan anyway – vegetables, fruits, grains, nuts, and even many of the processed foods you buy are vegan-friendly – so don’t be surprised if you end up enjoying theirs!
Everyone deserves to enjoy Christmas! With a lot of love and a little bit of thought, you can help make this Christmas special for the vegetarians and vegans in your life.
OR they can get on living their own life, they made a choice to not eat meat, why should it be the meat eater that makes them feel better about making the choices the,
What if a C arnivore gets i nvited to a veg an party, is it not on the host of the party to make sure the carnivores needed are taken care of.
farscythe - makin da cawfee!
> Svend
12/13/2019 at 05:53 |
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on that note....i think ill make a pork roast later
the missus can have instant ramen :)
(shes got a tummy bug and is on a liquid diet)
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Svend
> farscythe - makin da cawfee!
12/13/2019 at 06:09 |
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Ooh, sorry to hear that. I hope she’s feeling better soon.
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farscythe - makin da cawfee!
> Svend
12/13/2019 at 06:12 |
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better to have it now and get it over with than having it next week i reckons
we’re going home for christmas....last time we get to without having to leave europe looks like
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Svend
> farscythe - makin da cawfee!
12/13/2019 at 06:23 |
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So true, wise one.
Have a safe journey all.
CalzoneGolem
> Svend
12/13/2019 at 07:46 |
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My vegetarian roommates made a tofurkey one year. It was fucking amazing. That is all.
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Svend
> CalzoneGolem
12/13/2019 at 08:35 |
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Which is great, but they didn’t make or request that you do anything such as what the New Z ealand Vegetarian Society has put forward.
Textured Soy Protein
> Svend
12/13/2019 at 09:31 |
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This article popped up in my google suggestions the other day and yes, it’s definitely insufferable. I wish vegans in general were a little less insufferable.
But, this is not the right reaction :
OR they can get on living their own life, they made a choice to not eat meat, why should it be the meat eater that makes them feel better about making the choices the,
What if a Carnivore gets invited to a vegan party, is it not on the host of the party to make sure the carnivores needed are taken care of.
Vegetarians and vegans don’t eat meat for valid reasons.
Most meat-eaters are not carnivores. They’re omnivores who are perfectly capable of eating vegetarian and vegan food.
Whatever someone’s dietary restrictions might be, inviting them to your house and then saying, effectively, “ you can come but I have no interest in accommodating your dietary restrictions,” is being a bad host.
When I host omnivore friends and family I ask them if they’re ok with eating my vegan cooking. Usually they’re cool with it and I go out of my way to ask what kind of food they enjoy so I can make vegan stuff they’ll like . But if they need to have meat I’m open to them bringing something for themselves.
All that I ask in return if I’m a guest somewhere is this same treatment. I don’t expect to be catered to in some crazy way, but it’d be nice to have something available to eat. I always offer to bring something vegan in addition to whatever they’re making in order to not be an imposition on them.
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Svend
> Textured Soy Protein
12/13/2019 at 09:55 |
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I’m not saying,
“you can come but I have no interest in accommodating your dietary restrictions,”
What I’m saying is respecting someone dietary practices works both ways.
The article I referred to is full of stuff implying we should old them to high regard and that we as non v egans are wrong and will learn/change soon enough.
If your loved one is an animal lover, seeing meat can bring back memories of animal abuse they’ve witnessed, such as slaughterhouse footage that convinced them to change their lifestyle. These intrusive thoughts can be upsetting, and can make their experience of Christmas much different to that of the meat-eaters sitting at the table with them.
!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!
so it is important to ensure that they don’t miss out. If possible, make sure that they get served first.
etc...
I totally get dietary requirements, me and my sister were coeliacs from birth with us now starting our forties, we’ve been in remission for some 20-25 years.
I enjoy cooking and when living with our make different foods for their requirements, some are by choice, some are dietary musts and some are just odd (eg my brother in law who will only eat fish & chips, ‘pot noodles’ (instant ramen in a pot) and KFC.
So this christmas while cooking 13 different foods for christmas dinner, I’ve got to make him some fish & chips.
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Textured Soy Protein
> Svend
12/13/2019 at 10:12 |
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This is much more reasonable than how I read your original response. All good. And, like I said before, the article itself is insufferable. That’s exactly the kind of shit I don’t want to do as a vegan.
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Svend
> Textured Soy Protein
12/13/2019 at 10:43 |
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Sometimes what I want to write doesn’t come out exactly how I’d like it to and reading stuff online can be read differently to how it’s intended.
There are lots of vegan and vegetarian things going on, protests outside abattoirs, farmers being har assed, vegans turning up at restaurants that serve steak and harassing customers, etc...
In many ways veganism has overshadowed Brexit by a long way.
Tesco a large supermarket chain here in the U.K. released an advert for vegetarian foods with the story going of a father narrating, saying his 9-10 year old daughter came home saying she doesn’t want to eat more and that ‘while he loves meat, he loves his daughter more’, and so he changed the meat out of the casserole and replaced it with meat free Cumberland sausages. Farmers got wound up saying Tesco was ‘demonising’ eating meat.
I don’t know about you but if I had a kid that suddenly came home and said they weren’t eating meat again. the first thing I’d do is sit them down and ask why? what has changed? etc... and not just go, ‘okay, we;ll get some vegan sausages and I’ll stop eating meat too, because I love you’.
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Textured Soy Protein
> Svend
12/13/2019 at 10:51 |
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Yes, it’s easy to have things be harsher than intended on the internet.
As for the Tesco ad, even if you weren’t inclined to join the kid in going vegan, why would you feel the need to question their decision to stop eating meat?
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Svend
> Textured Soy Protein
12/13/2019 at 11:03 |
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Because with a kid you need to q uestion certain behavioural , nutritional, etc... acts. Yes they could of watched a greatly informative documentary, they could of read it in a book and understood what it was saying or their teacher explained it to them, but at the same token it could of been any one of these that didn’t explain it e nough or she didn’t understand the whole thing or just little Kevin that’s in your daughter’s class who likes to wind people up, took great pleasure in making her feel scared of something. Just like if your daughter came home and said she was stopping playing football.
You ask to find out why they are doing it and to understand that they in fact know why they are doing it.
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Textured Soy Protein
> Svend
12/13/2019 at 11:30 |
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Yes, generally speaking when a kid wants to make a change like that it’s good to ask why they want to, in case something else bad is motivating the change.
But, there’s nothing inherently wrong with a kid wanting to be vegan, as long as they still eat a diet that meets their nutritional needs. If they understand what they’re getting into, the next move should be to support and enable their choice .
Who knows, maybe the Tesco dad did all that and there just wasn’t room for that conversation in a 30 second spot.
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Svend
> Textured Soy Protein
12/13/2019 at 12:08 |
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1, But, there’s nothing inherently wrong with a kid wanting to be vegan, as 2, long as they still eat a diet that meets their nutritional needs . If they understand what they’re getting into, 3, the next move should be to support and enable their choice .
1, True
2, also very true. Many kids think you just stop eating meat and don’t address that certain nutrients will need to be sourced elsewhere.
3, Which is why you need to make sure they know what they are getting into and you can support them appropriately.
Farmers just feel let down as the supermarkets have always said they’ve got the farmers backs, but now the supermarkets are jumping on the vegan ticket many students are on. Farming is one of those industries that can crash in weeks depending on tastes.
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CalzoneGolem
> Svend
12/14/2019 at 13:11 |
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Yeah. That's how reasonable people act.