From spectator.com
By Chas Newkey-Burden
It's one of the last bastions of national orthodoxy, one that people look forward to for months, but many vegans dread Christmas dinner. It’s not the food that’s the problem – it’s the conversation.
Veganism is now as mainstream as oat milk lattes, so for 364 days of the year it barely raises an eyebrow, but come 25 December it’s often seen as a personal affront to centuries of tradition. Politely declining the turkey is treated as a personal assault upon centuries of gravy-soaked heritage.
As the seasonal sitting wears on, even mild-mannered relatives can metamorphose into belligerent barristers for Big Meat. ‘But would you eat a pig if you were stranded on a desert island?’ wonders an auntie, as though the Yuletide table were the Old Bailey. Grandpa, who hasn’t mustered a full sentence since the Blair years, awakens to mutter that ‘in my day we ate what we were given’. A third relative asks: ‘If you don’t want to eat meat, then why do you eat food that looks like meat?’ The question is delivered with the sort of ‘gotcha’ triumph one associates with a man who has just check-mated a suspect in a murder trial.
All of this unfolds across a table that resembles a battlefield of animal remains: the turkey that might have lived a decade but instead had its throat slit after just 12 weeks; the pigs-in-blankets whose pampered PR name conceals the gas chambers they were killed in; the cream stealthily extracted from dairy cows whose shortened lives of hell wouldn’t feature in any heartwarming festive flick.
There’s a final insult to those animals as a lot of the food is scraped into the bin untouched. For days afterwards, carcasses of poultry are seen sticking out of overstuffed dustbins, alongside the plastic of gimmicky presents which thrilled people for all of seven minutes on Christmas morning. No wonder some people don’t want a vegan round the table: if they started thinking about how cruel, greedy and fatuous our celebration of a festival of God has become, then the whole farce might start to crumble.
Meanwhile, as we toast goodwill to all, the animal kingdom enjoys quite the opposite. Reindeer are dragged, bewildered, onto high streets to entertain small children; cats and dogs endure lonely vigils while their humans decamp to distant in-laws; fireworks turn New Year’s Eve into a night of terror for horses, pets and birds. We send cards adorned with cheerful robins in snowy gardens – then bung their cousins in the oven. We build nativity scenes with docile sheep figurines while the real ones bleat in terror in abattoirs. It is, to put it mildly, not our species’ finest hour.
In case you hadn’t noticed, yes, I am one of those preachy, judgemental vegans. Why would I not be? It would be strange to be so appalled by animal slaughter to take the drastic step of stopping eating meat, fish, eggs and milk, but then to say I’ve no issue with other people consuming those things. You either think a thing is wrong or you don’t.
In fact, most people agree that cruelty to animals is wrong – except, crucially, at mealtime. Vegans are merely attempting to align our actions with our beliefs. So rather than feeling like the lone tofu soldier at the festive front, we might raise our oat eggnogs in quiet congratulation. For all the mockery we attract, no creature met a grisly end for our plate. And while the carnivores clutch their stomachs and groan into the sofa, the carrot chewers are merrily digesting away, light as chestnut stuffing.
I’m lucky to have a family that’s supportive of my veganism but my heart goes out to those who will have to endure the annual interrogation in the days ahead. Merry Christmas, then, to all my fellow beetroot-botherers. May your veg be roasted, your conscience clear, and your festive season as gentle on the animals as it is on your digestion.
https://spectator.com/article/christmas-dinner-is-hell-for-vegans/
