Many American voters #FeelTheBern, but some of those Sanders supporters also #FeelTheSand … in a sensitive orifice … because they’re aggravated and they want the world to feel their pain.
Most vegans are chill. They want to eat that way for their own reasons. Sometimes it’s for health, other times based on ethics, or a bit of both. The reality is that a vegan diet, while not de facto healthy, certainly can be good for you when done well.
But the majority are not fundamentalist screeching asswipes about their veganism who say meat eaters don’t deserve to live. They’re not trying to ram nothing but plants down everyone’s throats. Conversely, there is that minority who are militant in their veganism. They are the all-or-none types. They’re pissed and they are going to tell you why, but what they don’t realize is that their aggressive posturing isn’t winning them any converts, and their demands for all or none make most say, “Screw you. I choose none.” They’re having none of veganism, and will eat all the animals, sometimes just out of spite.
There are some interesting parallels between Bernie supporters and vegans.
If we imagine that Bernie is the kinder and gentler candidate, the one who wants stop the killing and save the planet and we can all live in peace and harmony and all that, then that sounds pretty veganish.
And those who appreciate his approach can follow and support without losing grip on reality. The majority of his supporters are analogous to the vegans who quietly choose and follow their diet without turning militant or publicly decrying all who dare to consume an animal product.
Then there are the militant types. In the political sphere, these ones use the hashtag #BernieOrBust. That means they’d rather stay home and pout protest than vote for Hillary if she wins the Democratic nomination.
Militant vegans are often factually challenged. While meat consumption does have a significant environmental impact, their hyperbolic statements that meat is a toxic substance that we’re addicted to isn’t supported by the science. The reality is that eating meat is encoded into our genes and helped us evolve into the species we are today. It is very possible to be a healthy omnivore.
Like militant vegans, the Bernie or Bust (BOB) types are twisting reality in order to fit their agenda.
Continuing on with the dietary analogy, Trump is like a double carnivore; he only eats animals that eat other animals. He’ll prove his dick size by shooting an endangered predator in the face and taking a gigantic bite out of its still-beating heart with an order of dolphin for dessert. He’ll occasional go off double carnivore by consuming a nice baby panda as an appetizer.
Where the BOBs are like militant vegans in terms of twisting reality is in reference to Hillary Clinton. They proclaim her a right-of-center Republican. They see little difference between her and Trump, although the reality is that both her past and present voting record, in terms of left vs. right, shows her to be more like a vegetarian who eats the occasional bit of fish.
But because she eats those eggs with cheese, and has that occasional fish, the BOBs see it as no different than going on safari and ripping the hearts out of a pride of lions. Mistakes were made, and then blown out of proportion. Even though she may have found it distasteful, she did what she was legally required to do as a defense attorney; then it became a Fox News clip that BOBs use to discredit her.
Another example of glossing over reality is that many Bernie supporters don’t realize that their candidate’s pro-organic stance and his anti-nuclear power plan are at direct odds with his pro-environment position.
I don’t have a dog in this fight because I can’t vote in the U.S. election. The intent of this piece isn’t to convince anyone to vote a certain way. Rather, my desire is to reveal some interesting parallels regarding militant thinking and how it is often at odds with compromise that can lead to achieving at least some of your goals.
There is not perfect, and then there is Trump.
Religion often affects political affiliation. Similarly, people can embrace their chosen diet with religious fervor, blinding them to reality. And while militant vegans are posting a never-ending stream of photos and videos of slaughterhouses, militant BOBs are running the anti-Hillary meme factory at full speed. They fear that Clinton is going to “steal” the nomination from their savior, and that only Bernie can beat Trump (there is no way to predict such a thing – six months ago everyone was saying Trump would never win the Republican nomination), and so they’re helping an adversarial party by piling the hate upon the former first lady, because the thought of a world where Bernie isn’t president is akin to a vegan being force-fed factory-farmed bacon cheeseburgers for every meal.
And so, the BOBs are relentlessly misplacing their excrement on social media, and the non-militant Bernie supporters wish they would stop embarrassing the rest.
When I wrote my open letter to militant vegans it was praised and shared by many vegans who are not militant. They want the world to know that “We’re not with these guys.” They realize that the militant types give all vegans a bad name, and they wish to distance themselves from such irrational, fundamentalist rhetoric that only serves to malign the public image of the group as a whole.
Everything I wrote in the above paragraph applies to Bernie supporters.
All or none thinking is rarely a good idea. Fundamentalism and militancy rarely leads to one’s desired outcome. Like the militant vegans are blind to the reality that they are harming their own cause because of their militancy, so too are the militant BOBs.
BOBs and militant vegans both strive for their view of the best possible world, and they desire it with such fervor that no compromise can be permitted. To them, there is no difference between the pescatarian and the double carnivore.
They fail to comprehend the horror of the impending Trumpocalypse, where the world transforms into a Cormac McCarthy novel and we begin to eat each other.
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James S. Fell is an internationally syndicated fitness columnist for the Chicago Tribune and author of Lose it Right: A Brutally Honest 3-Stage Program to Help You Get Fit and Lose Weight Without Losing Your Mind, published by Random House Canada. He also interviews celebrities about their fitness stories for the Los Angeles Times, and is head fitness columnist for AskMen.com and a regular contributor to Men’s Health.