We took the plunge and went vegan, swallowed our fear and brought bikes to cut down on car use, decided to keep our horses barefoot rather than encumber them with heavy metal shoes, threw out dog food and make Jenny homemade vegan food, our choosing to home school after primary school finishes.... And much more.
One of the things I have noticed though is the reactions of people (directly and indirectly) to our choices.
For a long time I was confused about peoples attitude.
After all I thought, this is OUR life, why do you care so much? We never pushed our views on people, never expected special treatment, never judged..and yet......
I've had someone tell me (in a very loud voice) That I couldn't possibly be a vegan because I had chickens. (For the record, the definition of a vegan is one who lives without the exploitation of animals. Seeing as my hens are rescued ex-layers and eggs come no matter what we do, I am comfortable eating their eggs, we don't however eat brought eggs or other products with egg in them.)
I was told that at a village meeting about a community even someone kindly asked if one of the soups would be vegan and was basically told that we couldn;t be expected to be catered for as a minority in the village (although there are 5 of us and my kids make up an a significant amount of the pupils at school).
People practically throw lifts at us because we can't POSSIBLY expect our children to cycle into town (a WHOLE 3 miles!).
The more we break away from what is considered the western "norm" the more I see frightened people.
By being vegan (and being friendly and un-judgmental makes no difference) they feel we are saying "Your diet is wrong. Its un-healthy and un-ethical."
Good friends still wink and nudged Kim and try to get him to eat meat. It makes them feel better to think veganism is a passing fad, a mini madness that causes people of over-sentimentality to deviate from the "correct" path.
By choosing to cycle rather than run around in a car they fell we are saying "By using a car you are leading a sedentary and environmentally unsustainable life." They constantly ask when we will be buying a normal car and press lifts into our palms like alms.By choosing to home school during the secondary years they feel we are questioning the regular pattern of school. We are saying "We care about our children's education and have no faith in the regular path of schools and exams." This is something that makes them question how we could consider taking children out of school. After all we all went there didn't we? We're alright aren't we?
The fear that other people...Other NORMAL seeming people are questioning the regular order of life, the very foundations on which modern civilization is built.... Food, Transport, Education... How can these things be deviated from?
The human animal is just that. An animal with all the instinct and safety in numbers that causes the majority to at best treat you as odd and at worst behave openly hostile to you.
Nothing is more scary than someone who seems to live happily, even thrive by dancing to the beat of a different drum.
The point is some are strong enough to follow their heart others will live their lives scared of being driven from the "herd".
So if your life choices include deciding not to vaccinate, to forgo meat, to live in a roundhouse in the woods, to medicate with herbs, to drop out and walk the earth without a care...do it.
Like the man Say's you only have one life, live it, live it well, live it happy and so long as it harm none then do it with your head held high.
I think it scares people. People are herd animals, like you say, and if you step out of the herd then there is a chance you will get eaten. If you can get eaten, then ultimately so can they. People are afraid of what is different.
ReplyDeleteAlso, people think that by stepping out of the herd, you are silently criticising their way of life. You say you want to home educate, then they feel you are subtly saying that they don't care as much about their kids as you do. Same with all your choices. If you do it differently then you are saying they are wrong.
And by god people hate to be told they are wrong! People live their lives by the choices they make, they make those choices based on thinking they are right, and they don't like it when their foundations are rocked.
Anyway - you live your life however you like ,hen. You can please some people all of the time, etc ...
Trouble is with all this talk of fear I'm now in danger of sounding like patrick swayze as the creepy motivational speaker in Donnie Darko! lol.... Move AWAY from the path of fear!! hahaha...
ReplyDeleteIt all comes down to others trying to stamp down on people who maybe live their life yo LIVE rather than live to conform.
Viva La Diffrence.
Unfortunately people tend to think THEIR way is the ONLY way, whether it be eating choices, schooling choices or religious choices. I am raising both of my girls to be self-sufficient and "free range" and you would not believe the amount of crap I get from other parents about putting my children "in danger" because I'm not hovering over them and protecting them every minute of the day.
ReplyDeleteWe also follow an "alternative" religious path and the grief my family gets about that is unbelievable.
People worry so much about what others are doing it makes me wonder how they possibly have any time to worry about their own lives!
COuldn't agree more Jenn. It riles me that in REAL LIFE ( I can rant here as much as I like ;) I go to great pains to be the *quiet* vegan. I never wanted to be one of those who leans over while your eating a burger and tells you EXACTLY how it was reared and killed. People like that tar us all with the same brush. I can go out to dinner with meat eaters and have a good time.
ReplyDeleteI want to make the world a better place but you can't FORCE a person into something....but they all seem to think its ok to dig at me, to question MY life...because THEY are the normal ones right?? ;)
But I want to hear more about your alternative religion!!
We are not religious but if you had to force me into a box I would call us solitary wiccans? Theres a lot of the hedge witch in me ;)
I find it goes hand in hand with the growing and animal rights AND I have my Sundays free lol.
But DO elaborate :)
We are definitely considered "not normal!" We raise our own meat and eggs and are working on trying to grow ALL of our own veggies and eventually, our milk and cheese. Since we've been raising our own meat we tend to eat a LOT less meat than before...maybe twice a week. I think you appreciate the meat more when you have to put so much time and work and emotion into it.
ReplyDeleteWe are Wiccans, the entire family, and we try to be very earth-based (even bleeding over into Native American Shamanism a bit). It is one of the reasons we've started trying to be far more self-sufficient as far as what we eat goes. Even butchering our home-raised animals is done with reverence and ritual.
We don't make a big deal out of it, and for the girls' sake, we tend to keep it very hush-hush. We live in an extremely Christian community and we've found that of ALL the religious beliefs, the Christians tend to be the very least accepting of alternative religions. We've never had problems with any of the other faiths. Surprisingly, we've met and become friends with several other Wiccan families in our area, which is so nice and refreshing.
Jenn thats so cool!
ReplyDeleteI really miss where we used to live as it was near Glastonbury which is basically the witch capital of the UK!! lol.
As a family we try to let a little wicca into our lives, just small things like making a small alter to our passed family, friends and pets on halloween, and we always decorate the "xmas" tree onthe 21st December so its more of a solstice thing.
Its wonderful that you have found some families to connect to, believe me if I opened up a little here I would probably be set upon with pitchforks and burning tourches! We are already the weird ones in the village ;)
This year in the veggie garden I am planting our lots and lots of herbs to use medicianaly and (v.excited) I am getting a new tarot deck for xmas this year.
Wanna know why I stoped using and then lost my old one? Well @ 12 years ago they told me my BF at the time was no good..and did I believe them?? Haha! SHoudl have listend :P
Anyway, if you wanna chat about stuff like that you can MSN me if you like on Gupsygurl@msn.com
Peace x
Oh as well Jenn, I have the utmost respect for people who raise AND slaughter their own animals. Our vegan path here is very much to do with UK farming and dispatching processes. Once they turned slaughter houses into factories and closed all the small family run butchers who traeted the animals with kindness and dignity I said no more.
ReplyDeleteKelly, I've finally made it over to your blog from Touchwood Project and this was the first post I read. I completely hear you.
ReplyDeleteSo far, we don't get grief too much for doing things like getting rid of the car, but I do think our not having children spares us a lot of flack. People seem to think they have the right to tell other people how to parent.
What we do get is people feeling uncomfortable, like we're going to judge them at any moment. This happens when 1) they find out we don't drink and -- this is a HUGE one -- 2) when they find out Malcolm doesn't eat sugar.
My God, not eating sugar is shocking to people. No chocolate? No cake? No cookies?
It really seems to freak people out at first. But, much like our telling them we sold the car to get bicycles, after the initial astonishment and fear, they start to mull it over. Start to consider that maybe it would be a good thing to do...someday.
I feel like THE challenge of this past year and now is learning to truly not care what other people think about my choices. It's easy to say, but it's taken a long time to not feel hurt when someone criticizes, to not feel excluded.
But then you meet like-minded people like you and you think "I'd much rather spend time with this person." And you feel good about your decisions, more relaxed and with no need to prove anything cause you know there are others out there who hear where you're coming from...
Hey Rachel :)
ReplyDeleteI once went on a forum that were discussing a parent who didn't allow her child to have sugar. It was shocking just how nasty these poeple got, almost accusing this woman of child abuse because ..com'on..all kids love cake right!?
I tried to stick up for her..being vegan we have a similar battle with bday parties and school functions which often means we forgo food there ans eat at home after..but they would have none of it..they had decided the mother was a weird control freak and her poor child was going to suffer.
Now I know from our family experience that kids are generally fine about stuff like this, mine are, they always ask if food they are offerd has dairy in it and are happy to wait so long as I can make something as nice at home ;)
Hell..I've even branched into sugarless muffins (do you guys use agarve syrup?)and no one noticed ;)
SO yeah, there is a lot of hostility when confronted with people who are strong enough to make these choices, after all most people react to fear by being angry.
Glad you found us here :)x