Vegan landlord bans meat-eaters

[andiesenji]

Any group with dietary restrictions will find it easiest to socialize with only their group..........like the Orthodox who keep kosher.

I'd say this is a question of attitude and personality rather than diet and its particular restrictions. While it might be "easier" to socialize with only like-minded people, there are many who chose the "less easy" route. One's diet does not determine one's personality. Unless, as I mentioned before, you deny yourself chocolate!

Actually it depends on a willingness to respect the beliefs and traditions of others and if we accept that it can be beneficial to all.

Back at the beginning of the 60s, I was a very young widow and began working for an internist in North Hollywood. I was not making enough money to afford an apartment close to work so my boss found me a situation with an orthodox Jewish family.

I was what was popularly known as a Shabbos Goy. In exchange for a lovely room, all my meals and many other perks, not specified at the beginning, all I had to do was do the things that Orthodox Jews are not allowed to do on the Sabbath.

This was not a lot of work, in fact, I often felt very guilty about taking so much in exchange for so little.

I gained an enormous amount from the relationship, I learned to cook wonderful things that had been a mystery to me prior to that. (You should try my honey cake.) I learned to appreciate the many reasons for their beliefs and because they treated me like one of their daughters, I was safe and secure.

Keeping kosher did not determine their attitudes, it was a fundamental part of their family life and they were happy and prosperous because they were generous and giving people.

Others in their congregation who also kept kosher were selfish and bad-tempered because that was the way they were, not because of their diet.

Edited August 2, 2004 by andiesenji (log)

[tryska]

i think there's a differenmce between vegetarians who were raised vegetarian in cultures that support vegetarianism and vegetarians who are "sticking it to the man". the vegetarians who are "sticking it to the man" are a wee bit high strung and attitudinal, imo.

[Katherine]

i think there's a differenmce between vegetarians who were raised vegetarian in cultures that support vegetarianism and vegetarians who are "sticking it to the man". the vegetarians who are "sticking it to the man" are a wee bit high strung and attitudinal, imo.

I assure you, there are damn few vegetarians out there who are only doing it to annoy you.

[slkinsey]

I suppose the guy can rent to anyone he wishes to rent to. . .

Where did you get this silly notion?

No, he can't. Not if "renting to anyone he wishes to rent to" means unlawfully discriminating against the people to whom he does not wish to rent. I'm not up on Canadian law, but I would bet that denying a lease to someone based on whether or not they subscibe to a fairly extreme dietary philosophy would be unlawful discrimination. Now... this is not to say that there aren't ways to get around this (for example, forming a vegan co-op and making the "renters" buy-in).

[tryska]

i'm not talking about annoying me. i'm talking about those who go against prevailing culture for whatever reason. i'm sure there's a lot of honorable reasons, but i still think at least in the US there's a certain amount of "pioneer, individual, not liek the rest of the herd" flavor to it. there's ego involved. which i believe is most likely what adds to the bitterness and vehemence. it's like new religious converts or the newly sober.

(i'm basing this on what i see in america, coming from a culture that's predominantly vegetarian, btw - so my opinion is a bit shaded)

the other thing that puzzles me is meat substitutes. if you're gonna be veg, be veg, imo. it's like people low-carbing with sugar substitutes.

[Gifted Gourmet]

So this guy only rents to veterinarians?

Yes, veterinarians who don't eat their patients!

(Admittedly, this is a very miniscule part of the general population)

[StudentChefEclipse]

I personally believe that in some ways vegans can be a lot more, shall we say, feisty than the normal population. I base this on having met a whole bunch *bunch, not herd, right?* who evidently believe their way is the only way, and are willing to scream at you to prove it.

On the other hand, if enough of them also believe that they are more pacific and loveable than the rest of us omnivores, then maybe they've talked themselves into it. Placebo effect in life choices.

[Devilkitty]

I think Bourdain said it best:

"...vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans."

(May not be quite exact, but I don't have a copy of KC here at the office.)

[Andrew Fenton]

I suppose the guy can rent to anyone he wishes to rent to. . .

Where did you get this silly notion?

No, he can't. Not if "renting to anyone he wishes to rent to" means unlawfully discriminating against the people to whom he does not wish to rent. I'm not up on Canadian law, but I would bet that denying a lease to someone based on whether or not they subscibe to a fairly extreme dietary philosophy would be unlawful discrimination.

I'm not up on Canadian law either. But I'm pretty confident that in the US, it'd be perfectly legal to allow only vegetarians (or vegans, for that matter) to rent. Meat eaters aren't a protected class.

[tanabutler]

I am willing to bet that Santa Cruz, where I live, has more vegans per capita than most cities represented on this board. While some of them are vegans out of sheer compassion, which extends to animals and humans, most of my encounters have been with the unpleasant, condescending, holier-than-thou kind like the staff from Millennium.

The next time someone tries to serve me a dessert with soy "whipped cream," they're gonna get a pie in the face.

[tanabutler]

Where's the stamp-your-foot emoticon when you need it ?

Try this

Or this:

Edited August 2, 2004 by tanabutler (log)

[Pan]

The next time someone tries to serve me a dessert with soy "whipped cream," they're gonna get a pie in the face.

Temper, temper!

[Gifted Gourmet]

I am willing to bet that Santa Cruz, where I live, has more vegans per capita than most cities represented on this board. While some of them are vegans out of sheer compassion, which extends to animals and humans, most of my encounters have been with the unpleasant, condescending, holier-than-thou kind like the staff from Millennium.

Thereby dispelling my longheld view of Santa Cruz as a "live and let eat" environment ..... one full of laid back aging hippies who live for their 60's retro lifestyle .. like whatever, man .. chill out ...

[hshiau]

[i'm not up on Canadian law either. But I'm pretty confident that in the US, it'd be perfectly legal to allow only vegetarians (or vegans, for that matter) to rent. Meat eaters aren't a protected class.

Yes but in the US, the meat eaters will most likely sue.

[slkinsey]

I personally believe that in some ways vegans can be a lot more, shall we say, feisty than the normal population. I base this on having met a whole bunch *bunch, not herd, right?* who evidently believe their way is the only way, and are willing to scream at you to prove it.

This is something Steingarten discusses in his books, I think. If you look at most of the vegetarians in the world who are vegetarians in a predominately omniverious society rather than places like India where vegetarianism is quite common and complex vegetarian cuisines have evolved over centuries due to religious reasons, almost all of them in the Western world are in the US and UK. An interesting fact is that, while French and Italian omniverous diets include lots of vegetables because people from these cultures love vegetables, most American and British vegetarians pursue their dietary philosophy for reasons other than a love of vegetables. When Western vegetarians are asked why they are vegetarians, health considerations is far and away the top answer, followed by ethical/political reasons. "I love vegetables" is fairly low on the list, somewhere after "I don't know."

What this means is that most vegetarians in the US and UK tend on average to be evangelical about vegetarianism, because their dietary choice is founded in strong beliefs of one kind or another. This is another reason why, on average, US and UK vegetarian cuisine lags so far behind others around the world in quality, with the food tending to get worse as the dietary philosophy becomes more dogmatic. This makes sense, when one considers that the gustatory quality of the food that is consumed becomes less and less important as the dietary philosophy diverges more from the mainstream and becomes more rigid. It is only with extreme care, considerable expertise and creative talent (e.g., at NYC's Pure Food & Wine) that something as extreme as raw vegan food is made enjoyable and non-monotonous from a purely gustatory standpoint.

[tryska]

what a fascinating idea. and definitely explains the differences i see between US vegetarians and the vegetarians i know and love who are of asian descent.

[cakewalk]

I personally believe that in some ways vegans can be a lot more, shall we say, feisty than the normal population. I base this on having met a whole bunch *bunch, not herd, right?* who evidently believe their way is the only way, and are willing to scream at you to prove it.

This is something Steingarten discusses in his books, I think. If you look at most of the vegetarians in the world who are vegetarians in a predominately omniverious society rather than places like India where vegetarianism is quite common and complex vegetarian cuisines have evolved over centuries due to religious reasons, almost all of them in the Western world are in the US and UK. An interesting fact is that, while French and Italian omniverous diets include lots of vegetables because people from these cultures love vegetables, most American and British vegetarians pursue their dietary philosophy for reasons other than a love of vegetables. When Western vegetarians are asked why they are vegetarians, health considerations is far and away the top answer, followed by ethical/political reasons. "I love vegetables" is fairly low on the list, somewhere after "I don't know."

What this means is that most vegetarians in the US and UK tend on average to be evangelical about vegetarianism, because their dietary choice is founded in strong beliefs of one kind or another. This is another reason why, on average, US and UK vegetarian cuisine lags so far behind others around the world in quality, with the food tending to get worse as the dietary philosophy becomes more dogmatic. This makes sense, when one considers that the gustatory quality of the food that is consumed becomes less and less important as the dietary philosophy diverges more from the mainstream and becomes more rigid. It is only with extreme care, considerable expertise and creative talent (e.g., at NYC's Pure Food & Wine) that something as extreme as raw vegan food is made enjoyable and non-monotonous from a purely gustatory standpoint.

I think you're missing something pretty basic here. "I love vegetables" is not a reason to become a vegetarian because, well, you can be an omnivore and *still* love vegetables and eat as many as you want. Loving vegetables has nothing to do with omitting meat from one's diet. For someone to say, "I'm a vegetarian because I love vegetables" borders on the inane. So it makes perfect sense for "health reasons" or "philosophical reasons" to be the answer given to the "why are you a vegetarian?" question. The "evangelism" is part of the personality. If people who evangelize about their vegetarianism weren't veggies, they'd evangelize about something else. Perhaps they'd evangelize *against* vegetarianism?

[tanabutler]

[i'm not up on Canadian law either.  But I'm pretty confident that in the US, it'd be perfectly legal to allow only vegetarians (or vegans, for that matter) to rent.  Meat eaters aren't a protected class.

Yes but in the US, the meat eaters will most likely sue.

In the U.S., any idiot will sue. It's the American way!

[tanabutler]

The chapter in Tony Bourdain's A Cook's Tour on the vegan potluck in Berkeley is one of the funniest and most damning accounts of veganism I've ever read. His politics are so right on.

[slkinsey]

I think you're missing something pretty basic here. "I love vegetables" is not a reason to become a vegetarian because, well, you can be an omnivore and *still* love vegetables and eat as many as you want. Loving vegetables has nothing to do with omitting meat from one's diet.

These aren't categories that represent sole answers to the question of why one has chosen to be a vegetarian. Rather they are answers that might be among one's motivations to pursue vegetarianism. I think it's noteworthy that actually liking the food they choose to eat is not a particularly high priority for most Western vegetarians, and this is clearly reflected in the overall poor gustatory quality of Western vegetarian cuisine.

For someone to say, "I'm a vegetarian because I love vegetables" borders on the inane.

I don't know... no more than it is to say, "I'm an omnivore because I love meat and vegetables." Where I think you have a point is that Western vegetarianism does not represent so much a choice to eat certain foods, but rather a choice to not eat certain foods -- and there are certain philosophies behind those choices. This, I agree, tends to lead to evangelism. And, for what it's worth, if you're one of those people who really belives that eating animals is murder or eating raw food will make you live 150 years or whatever, how could you not share that with the people around you?

[tryska]

I think it's noteworthy that actually liking the food they choose to eat is not a particularly high priority for most Western vegetarians, and this is clearly reflected in the overall poor gustatory quality of Western vegetarian cuisine.

eg: tofurkey.

[mongo_jones]

evangelism of any kind is usually tiresome--whether practised by vegans, vegetarians, omnivorous epicures, whoever.

[Andrew Fenton]

evangelism of any kind is usually tiresome--whether practised by vegans, vegetarians, omnivorous epicures, whoever.

But when we do it, it's cute!

[cakewalk]

I think it's noteworthy that actually liking the food they choose to eat is not a particularly high priority for most Western vegetarians, and this is clearly reflected in the overall poor gustatory quality of Western vegetarian cuisine.

I think you're coming to this conclusion with absolutely nothing to back it up. It's an assumption on your part (and one I disagree with), not a conclusion of any sort. You're assuming that if a person doesn't actually say "I'm a vegetarian because I love vegetables," then it means he doesn't really like vegetables, or doesn't really care about how they taste one way or the other; that his philosophy, whatever it may be, overrides matters of taste or likes and dislikes. I think it's much more likely that, if asked, a vegetarian won't say it because he'll assume it's a given that he likes vegetables, and then get on to his other reasons, whatever they may be, because those reasons are not "givens."

And yes, I agree with mongo_jones, evangelism is a terrible bore, isn't it.

[tryska]

but again...if one likes vegetables and choses to eat vegetables only, why are there meat substitutes?