Fatty-Acid Deprived Bitchcraft Network

Alex Jamieson vs. Fatty Acid-Deprived Bitchcraft Network

I can almost picture the teeth grinding behind pointed goatees as monocles popped out of their deep eye sockets! The thin, emaciated fingers unable to keep up to the turbidity of rage sparked by one woman who suddenly realized that it’s not a crime to put a bit of feta cheese on her pasta salad… might even brighten her day and improve her overall health!     

After eating a couple of pieces of toast covered in a three-meat homemade chilli with mozzarella cheese melted on top, I caught a moment of Charles Adler discussing the backlash over Alex Jamieson’s recent switch to camp omnivore - where the food is more satisfying, and the constituents more easy-going. Myself being a proponent of the ‘your own body knows best’ approach to diet and nutrition, I relished in learning of the explosive outrage from members within the anti-meat sect over one former vegan’s decision to begin reintroducing animal products into her diet. Before this afternoon, I hadn't heard of the lady.

Just because I have always been someone who eats basically whatever looks or smells good at any given time – as often and as gluttonously as I like (listening to my own cravings as it were) - does not incline me to feel even the slightest shred of hostility toward someone who sees fit to avoid animal products at all costs. It’s up to your own personal tastes, and your particular physiology will usually tell you if something’s amiss: gee, that artichoke dip never seems to sit well in my stomach; or, gosh, too much hamburger always makes me feel tired and bloated. There exists a complex symbiosis between the plant and animal kingdoms, and all foods don’t harmoniously jive with all people. Paul McCartney claims to have a strict vegan diet, and he seems to be charging into his 70’s in good health, and with vigour to spare.  

Experience has shown that for some people, relying on the bounty of the sea for the bulk of their nutritional needs will see them to a ripe old age. For others, dietary staples might be primarily comprised of bugs and wild berries. For me, everything from shrimp to almonds to wild game and everything in between is on the menu. There’s likely some sound biologically explicable reasoning behind choosing foods according to the traditions of one’s ancestral geography.

Prairie people have for generations thrived on cattle, wheat, and corn as the modern Inuit people still stay warm and happy eating whale and seal meat as their ancestors always did. Is such an obvious logical approach to dietary requirements so hard for the vegan agenda to fathom? Would they feel better about themselves if they persuaded the great hunters of the arctic to put down their harpoons and spend a several hundreds of millions dollars to drill hundreds of feet into the defiant permafrost to build geothermal greenhouses so they might more correctly subsist on sprouts and mushrooms?  

This article wasn’t cooked-up to impart any dietary advice, but to point out the broad base of intolerance toward individuality in the online community - as evidenced by the trove of hate mail our hero Alex purportedly received after her 180º dietary approach was made public. I haven’t seen any of the sentiments directed at her, but I can imagine they stem not from a genuine subjective disagreement over dietary choices, but rather from a mindset that embraces ideology out of condemnation for the mainstream: most people include meat in their diets, so I’m going to distinguish myself from most people by publicly attacking them for their ordinary choices and making life difficult for myself.

It tickles me to think of all those hard-line vegans who idolized Ms. Jamieson when her stance most conveniently helped facilitate the advancement of their secret communist plot under the guise of anti-meatism - how they now must feel a sense of ultimate betrayal! It’s hilarious to think of the ensuing panic leading to outrage over one spokeswoman’s change of heart, isn’t it?

The backlash only suggests to me that the vegan community must be short on adherents articulate and charismatic enough to make the movement seem fashionable. It makes you wonder if veganism is even a worthwhile pursuit when so many of its practitioners seem so broke, miserable, and incapable of lifting anything weightier than a bag of pre-washed carrots if their life depended on it.

Though I like to think that a strong majority of non-meat eaters are well-adjusted, happy people who would never chastise someone for sitting down to a plate of asparagus and mashed yams because it also includes a medium-rare steak au poivre, a little hyperbole to illustrate archetypes; while completely imaginary, are fun to concoct, and indeed plausible enough:

  

I can vividly picture some smarmy twerp with non-existent biceps, angry about his student loan for feminist studies not quite covering the cost to fill his pantry with enough couscous, walnuts, and granola to last until his first pay check from Planet Organic. The dried apple chips and granola bar he had for breakfast didn’t even provide him the stamina to make flax seed porridge at noon. Too tired and hungry to care, he glances over his shoulder and skulks into a Wendy’s franchise. Directing his mounting frustrations at the Wendy’s counter attendant he delivers a chirpy discourse in the evils of agribusiness before oh-so reluctantly ordering… a fish burger. He slinks low in the plastic seat, praying to Guyana that one of his vegan peers from neo-nutrition class doesn’t catch him in his cantankerous moment of weakness. He strolls through the park on his way back to the campus. Our fictional Marxist now has enough food-energy to muster a good long sneer at a happy family innocently eating cold-cuts and cheese at a picnic. It’s going to be a long four nights with only three sachets of alfalfa tea left!