Man, baby cows have no right to be so friggen cute.
That’s a weird statement. If you want to talk about rights on c/vegan, how about this: Humans have no right to steal milk from other animals and do terrible, terrible things to obtain it. Or, those calves - and the ones that were not saved from the horrors of the dairy farm - have a right not to grow up in what’s essentially a concentration camp
(Edit: Every downvote makes me smile because it represents an omnivore thinking - at least once today - about how their choices impact adorable bovine, like these baby calves. That’s real, unlike the “baby cows have no right to be so cute” guilt-copium)
Its a figure of speech… People are downvoting you because you’ve construed a sincere, positive thing to say as a personal attack on your ideology…
All I meant is that baby cows are really cute…
I came to your space with a thought I hoped would allow me to connect with folks with whom I don’t share a lifestyle choice, albeit a lifestyle choice and ethical framework I really respect. “Baby cows are really cute”.
Its worth reflecting on whether the way you’re engaging with this issue you care about is going to alienate people and close them off to your perspective, or actually yield the kinds of changes in the world you hope to see
I get you’re angry, but I feel like you’re prioritizing taking your anger out on people over engaging with them in a way that might be productive in progressing the state of the issue you’re angry about.
Hope you have a good day, I’m sorry to have made your day more angry than it would have been otherwise.
Thanks for your reply, Cris. We get a lot of non-vegans driving by here and making dumb, speciest comments.
I can now tell you’re not one of those; your heart’s in the right place. But your casual invocation of rights confused me. If you’d said what you meant, “baby cows are really cute,” we wouldn’t be having this discussion.
I’m neither angry nor trying to proselytize here. And I couldn’t give a hoot about how many non-vegans downvote me for speaking the truth about non-human animal suffering. I regard this as a for us/by us community, and I communicate in it accordingly - this is not the place for eyewash about how humans treat and think of non-human animals. This is a place to cut through denial and have honest discussions about subjects that are really important and sometimes really grotesque.
I commend you for your open-mindedness and I hope to see you back here again, if you so choose. You have given me some to think about in terms of how best I can meet people at all stages in their transition to veganism (including completely closed off to the idea).
My only ask of you would be to consider your c/vegan audience next time in your phrasing. We here do not believe there is any justice to the status quo of non-human animal agriculture, and we are witness to horrible things perpetuated on large-scale by our species. So casually talking about “rights” is fraught. Again, I would not have objected to “baby cows are so cute.”
I’m sorry if this seems overly complicated. But you’re in an unfamiliar cultural space. If I was in your shoes, I wouldn’t beat myself up for making a small honest mistake, and I’d listen more than I talk.
Have a good day as well, as happy Winter Solstice (depending on where you are :)
It’s a figure of speech or rhetorical framing I use pretty often in jest. I frequently describe it as being unfair to other artists that Abba is so good at making music along similar lines 😅 (its kinda fucked up tbh, like if you make music what can you even do? Be better than Abba?)
Sometimes things get mixed up and communication falls apart, especially over the internet, it happens :) I’m always happy to participate when it comes across my feed, I’ve had a number of really helpful interactions with folks on lemmy about how to be most effective in hopefully moving towards reducing animal product intake and being more selective in the sources I get said animal product from as kind of a “someday” goal, in spite of eating disorder and budget challenges. There have been some really helpful folks! (Which reminds me I actually still need to go reply to one of them from a little bit ago…)
I don’t think it’s overcomplicated, different spaces have different cultures and different sensitivities, that makes perfect sense. I do think that if vegans weren’t so guarded against hostility most folks would probably have a hard time missing the sarcasm in my use of “have no right”, but I also know a lot of people engage with vegans in a way that sucks ass, which does tend to make people guarded. And it does make sense that my comment could be interpreted as guilt and defensiveness about my eating habits (though personally I think being cute is a poor metric for whether things deserve compassion- I think plants are cute and love giving them names, and superficially ugly animals aren’t more deserving of cruelty than cute ones)
Happy winter solstice to you too!! I didn’t even process it was today, my sleep disorder will get a little easier with each day until summer now :))))
Because I’m not a big fan of Abba’s music, I’d never really thought of them as musical geniuses, but you’re right. I just listened to “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!” and realized that Madonna sampled it in “Hung Up,” which I thought was an original beat. I love that beat. It reminds me of bonus levels in Sonic 3 on Sega Genesis from my youth lol
The synth parts of Gimme gimmie gimmie are a fucking BOP, theres a particular flourish that really reminds me of the triumphant sound of zelda. There’s a goofy “parody” that Brian David Gilbert (a silly youtuber I like) did where it’s Victor Frankenstein singing about lonliness not in needing a lover, but in creating a living companion for himself out of body parts- “gimmie gimmie gimmie a maaan after midnight, won’t some bodyhelp me come and dig up a graaaave 🎵”
Its amazing, highly recommend. It’s part of a super fun series where he interprets Abba songs as being sung by classic horror villain
I’ve actually never heard hung up, I’ll have to go give it a listen!
Edit: https://youtu.be/sABdtEaKMYE?si=BhTYrLxjKMPkxkcw it starts out slow and moody and slowly builds into a wonderfully silly jam-of-a-song, highly recommend
I thought this was c/vegancirclejerk for a second after reading that reply 😂
I feel you’re watering down vegan perspectives on c/vegan, but maybe you don’t see this as a space for philosophy, activism, and solidarity
^People need to be called out when they perpetuate this cruel system. Vegans are always “rude” in the eyes of carnists.
It’s time to stop buying dairy milk so that the baby cows can be spared from being ripped away from their mothers to be on death row.
Hear, hear. I think I’m also going to stop saying “milk” (when I mean cows’ milk) and “dairy” and replace these with “cows’ milk” and “cows’ milk products”. Euphemisms normalize and hide exploitation. I made the shift from “animal” to “non-human animal” and I’ve never faced backlash. I think these language shifts are pretty non-threatening ways while around omnis to gently challenge the status quo. It also serves an IYKYK feature. I would privately approach someone who uses “non-human animal” and ask if they’re vegan; I think other vegans might be able to identify me by my use of the term
