I was something akin to an ovo-lacto-pesca-vegetarian for a few decades. It ended on a ~15 hour bus ride in Central America. They assured me that they had my vegetarian meal on board, but “vegetarian” apparently meant a ham sandwich
I was starving. I ate it. Streak ended.
But I never preached to anybody – in part because my choice was based on taste, not morality or ethics. In part because once you start down that ‘morality of ethics’ path, you’re generally hugely vulnerable to charges of hypocrisy.
If the plurality of the T’Day dinner attendees agreed about the trouble of this turbulent vegan, I might consider seeing if the hostess would reach directly out to the nephew’s wife* (the aforementioned turbulent vegan) and basically making her invitation contingent upon her keeping her opinions to herself.
At some point, a) Everybody’s heard her schtick, and b) it sounds like it IS a choice of who needs to suffer – the (responsible) individual or the (collaterally damaged) many.
Happy Holidays!
*But nobody else. I think this is a pas de deux that shouldn’t really involve anybody else.
I had a scenario in my extended in-laws family in which we went with a similar but possibly still less shitty option. The short version is that there was considerable family drama between a sister and sister in law which was causing major tension at family events because no one wanted to step in. Support was strong for all sides, but also for keeping the peace, but once booze started flowing, neither was willing to do so.
Eventually it was ‘suggested’ strongly that the two take some time off, and that the sister-in-law and spouse spend a set of holidays with her family to drop the tension. It did pretty much let everyone save some face, and there was a drop in tension the next year. Other circumstances came up later that made the whole thing moot, but that isn’t pertinent to the thread.
So combine the suggestions, tell nephew and sister in law the real deal behind an uninvite for a single season, suggest they talk about it, and save face by saying said couple won’t be there that year because they’ll be with her family.
But with this and any other backchanneling, someone always talks in most families. So it’s always going to be at least a little shitty still.
My SIL is vegan. This reminds me that when she and her then-husband attended my child’s bat mitzvah, she asked for two vegan meals for them, but i noticed him surreptitiously buttering his bread.
Like @susan , I’m happy to accommodate other people’s dietary needs, and take some pride in doing it well. We had delicious vegan food at that event, although i choose to also eat some of the meat dishes. Of course, a bat mitzvah is not about the food. And let’s face it, Thanksgiving kind of IS about the food. And i know my SIL doesn’t really like watching other people dig into parts of dead animals.
When we first moved near her, we invited her to Thanksgiving, and she declined, saying she would celebrate with vegan friends. And we wished each other a happy holiday, no offense taken by either side. We’ve stopped inviting her, which she’s fine with.
I did make a gluten-free turkey for my brother’s partner (no stuffing during cooking, no gravy near her portion) last year. But a vegan thanksgiving is further than I’m willing to go.
This thread makes me think of a friend/acquaintance Steve. Steve is a vegetarian. I have never heard him, not once, mention this- let alone preach about it. Every summer, Steve has a big get together where he makes pizza from scratch and grills it on pizza stones. If you were attending, you might maybe realize there are no meat toppings. Steve loves Indian food (all the cool people do. It’s my favorite cuisine). You might maybe realize as he purposely orders more than he can eat so he can share with the group, that he doesn’t order meat dishes. He’s a real mensch.
I dunno. Maybe it’s because I’m getting older. My thought regarding how great the vegan food tastes would be to ask how well it goes with the outfit she’s wearing.
Vegetarians who can be civilized about others’ dietary choices are fine with me. I can do meatless meals if the situation calls for it, and get my animal protein (which my body tends to demand if I’m stressed or ill) at a different time of the day.
What I would find objectionable about OP’s relative-in-law is the belligerent militancy and trying to bully others. That’s just rude.
'Zactly. Her particular cause is immaterial. It’s the fact she’s crusading that’s the problem.
Though there’s certainly a common class of crusader who thinks “But you’re disrespecting me by doing that in my presence. That’s unacceptable.” The fact they’re equally disrespecting those same folks by demanding their compliance to the demands seems to not enter their selfish rigid minds.
I don’t believe that’s fair. People who are vegan or vegetarian for moral reasons aren’t concerned that you are disrespecting them, but that you are torturing, enslaving, and murdering animals. I mean, that’s not my perspective, i eat meat. (although i have started sourcing it from more humane providers.) But it’s how a lot of vegans feel about it.
I despise the odor of cooked bell pepper. And you are absolutely disrespecting me by serving a stuffed pepper when you’ve invited me over, even if there’s something else i could eat. Because it smells so nasty that it will ruin my meal. But i don’t try to discourage others from eating stuffed peppers, because there’s no moral component. I would try to discourage others from eating food marinated in the blood of newborn babies, even though it probably tastes good.
I know plenty of vegans and none of them are sanctimonious pricks. If anything, I tend to like vegans as they tend to be more empathetic on average than most people. The problem here isn’t the veganism—it’s the person, and I hate stories like this that make people think vegans in general are unbearable folk.
Hell, two of my wax-girlfriends were vegan. (Given how much meat I eat, that may be surprising.) Both quite lovely people. Several of my photography colleagues are vegan. I even lived in a communal environment as a reconstruction volunteer in post-war Croatia in 1996 that was run as a vegan household because we had a few vegans and it was just easier that way. (A couple times a week is meat eaters would get some chevapi or meat-filled bureks to satisfy our cravings.)
I think it’s pretty immoral to be an RW person. But I can eat dinner with such a person just fine. Provided we both refrain from starting in on politics. I can eat dinner w a vegan too. Or they with me. Provided we both refrain from starting in on the ethics of killing innocent animals. Or plants.
Yes, my analogy is imperfect. In some sense a meat-centric meal, much less a feast, is a veritable celebration of carnivorousness & all the factory farming horrors appurtenant thereunto. Sorta like me and my erstwhile RW pal attending a local Trump boosters’ BBQ and rah rah rally but neither of us say a word to each other about politics. Easy & pleasant for him, maybe not so much for me. So maybe I ought to demur on the invitation instead of being made uncomfortable and making others uncomfortable in turn.
