The Vegan and Vegetarian Secrets Blog …

People look at me as a vegan and conclude that since I stepped on a snail or because the vegetables I eat resulted in a tractor death for a squirrel somewhere in Paraguay that somehow vegans are hypocrites, which of course they’re not since perfection is an unattainable goal and is something to be driven towards, never actually achieved.

The difference between you and the vegan standing next to you is that while you’re both going to step on a bug tomorrow, they’ve decided to dedicate their lives to do as little harm as possible, completely independent from what you do. So in no way does the protozoan life form they step on negate your responsibility for the lamb you’re paying a stranger to cut tomorrow. And falling 1% short of an unattainable goal is really good when you’re standing next to someone who won’t even try.

~ Shelley Williams

First they came for the Communists and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist. Then they came for the Jews and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist. Then they came for me — and by that time no one was left to speak up.”

~ Martin Niemoller

Steve Wynn, Russell Simmons, Bill Clinton and a comparable cast of heavies are now using tempeh to assert their superiority. A look at what gives …

By Joel Stein

It used to be easy for moguls to flaunt their power. All they had to do was renovate the chalet in St. Moritz, buy the latest Gulfstream (GD) jet, lay off 5,000 employees, or marry a much younger Asian woman. By now, though, they’ve used up all the easy ways to distinguish themselves from the rest of us—which may be why a growing number of America’s most powerful bosses have become vegan. Steve Wynn, Mort Zuckerman, Russell Simmons, and Bill Clinton are now using tempeh to assert their superiority. As are Ford Executive Chairman of the Board Bill Ford (F), Twitter co-founder Biz Stone, venture capitalist Joi Ito, Whole Foods Market (WFMI) Chief Executive Officer John Mackey, and Mike Tyson. Yes, Mike Tyson, a man who once chewed on human ear, is now vegan. His dietary habit isn’t nearly as impressive as that of Alec Baldwin, though, who has found a way to be both vegan and fat at the same time.

It shouldn’t be surprising that so many CEOs are shunning meat, dairy, and eggs: It’s an exclusive club. Only 1 percent of the U.S. population is vegan, partly because veganism isn’t cheap: The cost comes from the value of specialty products made by speciality companies with cloying names (tofurkey, anyone?). Vegans also have to be powerful enough to even know what veganism is.

>> Read The Full Story HERE

Paul Watson’s thoughts on ‘Bearing Witness’…

You know, you don’t walk down the street and see a woman being raped and do nothing. You don’t walk down the street and see a kitten or a puppy being stomped to death and do nothing. You don’t walk down the street and see a child being molested and do nothing. And you don’t go down there and watch whales die and hold signs and do nothing. I just find this bearing witness another word for cowardice.

Here’s a great answer from a question put to ‘Paul Watson’ of Sea Shepherd in an interview from the ‘Earth Island Journal’

Do you see any situation where it’s okay to hunt a whale, say Indigenous people who have for centuries been living off whale meat and blubber?

“You know, everything has changed because we have a population of seven billion people on the planet right now, and the oceans are dying. The oceans have been so severely diminished that there’s a good chance we could kill them. And if the oceans die, we die. In light of that prospect I find it very difficult to be sympathetic to any cultural needs in order to destroy endangered species. Yeah, sure, it isn’t the Inuit’s fault that the whales have been diminished, but they can finish the job. When you get right down to it, it’s all about human beings. I don’t divide them into groups – the human species has been an extremely destructive species and has the potential to destroy the life support system for humanity. So this traditional stuff really gets to me – anything that involves killing an endangered species or destroying a habitat, if that involves tradition, I say ecology comes before tradition. I’d rather be ecologically correct than politically correct.”

Read the Full Interview with Paul >> HERE

For those people out there whom may be sick of Vegans and Vegetarians pushing their opinions onto them? Check this out and understand the difference between Fact and Fiction!

Did you know that the world’s current population of human beings is about  6.7 Billion?

That’s a lot of people!

If only 1% of them are vegan, that means that there are 67 Million vegans walking the earth right now. That’s a lot of people too!

So here’s the deal. Every vegan has one year to help one other person become vegan. Just one. Forget about reaching the masses, forget about starting a movement, forget about all that stuff. Just spend the next year finding one person who will commit, and I mean really commit, to ending all forms of exploitation of all other animals. If every person who is now a vegan would do that one simple thing, then 365 days from now there would be 134 Million vegans. Now we’re getting somewhere!

Guess what, in another year there would 268 million vegans. Just by having every vegan work all year long with only one goal in mind, and that goal is to find one new vegan.

In another year there’d be 536 Million, keep on working and the year after that over 1 Billion, and then there would be 2 Billion, and then 4 Billion and then, just 8 short years from now, there would be a Vegan World, if you want it.

One vegan, every vegan, each helping one new person become vegan every year for the next 8 years.

The World is Vegan, if you want it. It’s not a slogan, it’s a plan.

Go vegan.

UPDATE: Some people have asked whether I’ve taken the increasing world population into account in writing this post. I have. I looked at the UN’s projections as reported on Wikipedia which predict 9.15 Billion people by 2050, or 40 years from now.

My use of the estimate of the proportion if vegans in the world at 1% has also been questioned. I’ve seen that number mentioned in connection with a Gallup poll taken in the US in 2007, but I do not know how accurate it is. But suppose that the actual proportion of vegans is only 0.01%, meaning that I guessed wrong by a factor of 100. Suppose that instead of 67 Million vegans alive in the world today there are really only 670,000. What happens to my vegan world plan them?

Well, if every current vegan can convince just one other person every year to become vegan as well, and if each of those new vegans can do the same, then in 14 years there would be over 10 Billion vegans, more than the entire population of the world.

Anyone who knows me knows that I am a realistic optimist; I am not a starry eyed dreamer. But the point remains. Advocacy for a cause is something that can be effectively done by a small group of committed activists who are intent on helping others make new decisions. We don’t need huge budgets, or high profile campaigns, or celebrity endorsements. If our message is a good one, and if our strategy is sound, and if our tactics are effective, people won’t resist. Convert a non-vegan, change the world.

- Tim Gier

ref: http://timgier.com/2010/07/28/a-vegan-world-in-8-years/