Most vegans I have met shop at local independent shops and bakeries where the ingredients are locally sourced. They tend to have money to afford it. I’m not a vegan because it’s too expensive to eat that way and my limited skills limit choices/ variety. I went vegetarian a few times. It gets boring unless cooking is enjoyable - it’s uninspiring otherwise. I can’t give up dairy and eggs. I don’t like the warehousing of cattle and chickens crammed together in cages though. I have never heard of bone char in white sugar or L-cysteine from duck feathers. I think the local bakeries catering to health conscious foodies would avoid processed sugar and is L-cysteine an additive? Because if so most health conscious eaters that buy from healthy food shops avoid that too.
David Suzuki has things to say. I respect his knowledge.
Reducing or eliminating meat from your diet is also much healthier — and delicious! A well-balanced vegetarian or vegan diet includes more fruit, vegetables, nuts and legumes, and so is lower in cholesterol and higher in fibre. Studies show plant-based diets reduce the risk of heart disease...
davidsuzuki.org
Side note one of my favourite restaurants here is vegan. I’ve only been twice - once for my birthday - because it’s fairly pricey. They have a sous chef. The food is amazing, flavourful, filling - you don’t miss the meat at all. They have a baked Mac n cheese that contains no cheese and it’s better than my mom’s (which is really good). Best I’ve ever had actually. They have a bunch of vegetable curry bowls. The desserts using whipped coconut cream are delicious. If I could cook like that, I’d be vegan in a heartbeat. But I cannot, and for other practical reasons, I don’t see it happening. I don’t eat much red meat though.
As for bits of bugs getting into things it’s just something that can’t be avoided but at least vegans are trying to avoid animal products/ biproducts wherever possible. The choice to not eat meat has become political and ridiculous. There’s a degree of misogyny that goes with in anti-veganism these days too - the “soy boi”taunting and stuff. The paleo thing too.
Leave peoples diet choices alone. Don’t politicize them so much. That said, the aversion to eating dead animals is valid. It’s instinctive for some. Once I found out what I was eating as a kid, and it horrified me - perhaps that was an instinct I had that didn’t need to be pressured out of me. I got used to eating meat and enjoyed it only if I didn’t think of where it came from. I’m still like that.
Follow respected science as to whether we need to start adapting and finding alternatives to animal agriculture.
