First of all, the statement that I made is certainly true, though you go far beyond the context of what I was discussing. The kind of “indoctrination” you’re talking about is different than the type of event raised by OP. I won’t deny that such influence exists, but you do not have the beef lobby making presentations in schools about how you can’t get vitamin B12 from plants and showing videos of people with symptoms of B12 deficiency. We are swimming in an “indoctrination” environment created by every industry that is trying to sell something (e.g., every kid needs to have a smartphone). At least some schools are starting to divorce themselves from the soft drink industry.
It sure is when you put it in “scare” quotes.
First of all, the statement that I made is certainly true, though you go far beyond the context of what I was discussing. The kind of “indoctrination” you’re talking about is different than the type of event raised by OP. I won’t deny that such influence exists, but you do not have the beef lobby making presentations in schools about how you can’t get vitamin B12 from plants and showing videos of people with symptoms of B12 deficiency. We are swimming in an “indoctrination” environment created by every industry that is trying to sell something (e.g., every kid needs to have a smartphone). At least some schools are starting to divorce themselves from the soft drink industry.
I’ve been vegan for 18 months and vegetarian for my kids whole lives (I have a 7 and a 10 year old) so they are very familiar with the concept of veganism. They have school friends who are vegan, and it’s a particularly growing trend here in Australia, both for animal rights and environmental reasons.
I only cook vegan, but my partner who is an omnivore cooks meat for them when they feel like it; it’s perhaps an unusual blended household in that respect. What it is doing is giving my kids a real sensitivity for ensuring that others needs are being met; they check whether I can eat things wherever we go, get excited when I can try things, and they ensure that the vegan kid attending a party gets a take home treat that she can eat. I can’t think of anything that makes me more proud.
I didn’t see the presentation so can’t comment as to whether the person ‘ranted’ or not (I feel that language is inflammatory though, just in terms of a fair discussion). The only thing we know for sure is that a video showing some aspects of abattoirs was shown. Now there can be a huge range of variance that that might have included, from a non-implicit Jamie Oliver cooking show clip where most of the action happens offscreen, to raw animal activist iphone shots within local farms, to the documentary Dominion, to clips shown on the national news recently showing animals dying on while being shipped alive to the Middle East and race horses being tortured at the knackers yard.
Assuming the killing was overt, I would say that it would give me pause to have my kids see similar videos - they are immensely distressing even for someone like myself who has the agency to do something in response to what I’m watching. For a child who may have no ability to respond it feels like it leaves things very much up in the air.
As to whether I think this will make kids think less of vegan activism? No, I think there is no risk of that. I think that reaction comes from when your beliefs are challenged in an uncomfortable way, and the natural reaction is to discount the person and their views entirely. I think that’s an established adult’s reaction, not that of a child. I think kids are more likely to be horrified and my concern is that they don’t have anywhere to turn to in response. I think exposure to new ideas and experiences is awesome, but it needs to be managed carefully.
Thank you for your thoughtful and illuminating reply. I find it very helpful. I stuck with the OP’s description of the presentation because that’s all we have. To say, “Oh, it probably wasn’t really that way” would, for me, require some indication that the OP is exaggerating. While we fundamentally agree, I disagree with your theory that only adults whose beliefs are challenged in an uncomfortable way would generalize such a reaction. Children, who are still learning how the world works are very likely to generalize as I described. A child whose first exposure to doctors and nurses is a painful medical procedure may well associate doctors and nurses with pain. My guess is that the presenter had had some success in making the presentation to adult audiences and didn’t realize he’d need to make adjustments to show it to children.
I definitely agree with your last sentence.
Interesting, I hadn’t thought about the doctor/pain link, and it’s true, kids to tend to create that connection, so you may be right. As straw poll of one, I asked my daughter what she would have thought about the scenario. She said she would be angry at the person for showing the video, but not at veganism as a whole, and it wouldn’t make her feel less likely to be vegan. She just thought it was a cruel thing to do, by that one person. She would also feel very guilty for eating meat, and worried about the effect on her vegan friend who she was sure would be really distressed that she was already doing everything she could, and yet animals were still suffering. So there’s that.
As you say, it is not too difficult to provide all the nutrients if you allow dairy and eggs, but vegan is way more diiifcult, and especially for growing kids.
It’s fine by me if teenagers make an informed choice.
As for the advantages of vegetarianism, I feel that the civilized world is over-emphasizing meat. The curious part is that developing countries feel they are more developed according to the amount of meat they eat, even - oddly - in places such as India that had been largely vegetarian. Of course, there is just a possibility that the meat industry has a hand in this. And even the politicians; in my time in Japan over a quarter of a century ago there were regular temper tantrums by US pols to force the Japanese to import more beef and oranges from the USA.
I’ll ignore the ecological side of growing feed for animals and then selling the resulting cheap meat at knockdown prices. Meat in many countries is cheaper than it had even been historically, and can be one of the cheapest options for a meal. This has the bizarre result that the poor in some Western countries consume more meat than the more affluent.
If you want to be virtuous, eating less meat or none at all is good for the environment, given the various financial and ecological costs of raising animals for meat. Over the years I have reduced the amount of meat that I eat, but I cannot do without it altogether. It is really very difficult to change your tastes and eat a different kind of food. So all the Ms Dopers on this board can make a change for the better by feeding their kids on less meat. And more real food, if you can still get it.
I’ve read a lot on this over the years, part of it from texts I had to translate.
Humans are omnivores, just like pigs. We are genetically very similar, and in a few cases, almost indistinguishable. But I digress. We can eat all kinds of things, and do, but the general consensus in the medical world is that a high-fiber diet is immensely beneficial, and this essentially entails a high proportion that is vegetarian. On the other hand, meat provides all the nutrients that we need in concentrated form.
But when I say “general consensus”, bear in mind that there is a huge amount of intense and often acrimonious discussion in the scientific world. Kids don’t grow up, they just argue about different things.
Insofar as there is agreement, I would say that there is a consensus than any one-sided diet has its disadvantages. The main issue that is brought up is that our modern diets are in general too concentrated and too rich. But the so-called paleo diet is not the answer, given that we don’t really know what they are back then, and there are a number of proposed variations of this diet.
It is also generally agreed that if you eat a healthy diet, you may live a bit longer, and with more chance of being healthy to the end. As they say, it just means that we die of different things. The statistics from communities that have various restrictions, such as no meat, no alcohol, no smoking, even no tea or coffee is that they suffer less from the degenerative diseases, but that in general obesity is a big factor. And vegetarians can be obese as well.
I think it would have been better to have the lunch room have a vegan meal maybe for a few days and see if the kids like it. Peanut butter and jelly is vegan.
I don’t think schools allow peanut butter any more–meat isn’t murder, but PB can be.
I think it was completely inappropriate. Feeding a family can be difficult, both financially and logistically. Children that insist on either separate food or controlling the eating habits of the entire family can be disruptive and cause family conflict.
And the activists know this. That is their intent. A 9 or 10 year old cannot unilaterally change their diet. They are there to encourage your child to lecture and scold you about your behavior. Their entire business model, as it were, is based on encouraging disrespect. The children are too young to totally understand the issues, anyway.
And the shock video…they did that to me back in the 1960’s as part of a fire safety program. I was ( and still am) extremely disturbed by images depicting the pain, suffering, serious injury or violent attack of another human being. I must have overactive mirror neurons of something, I just can’t watch it.
And being forced as a child to watch a film of the burnt bodies of other children being dragged out of a building really traumatized me.
If I was a parent I might threaten legal action over that one.
We tell kids to eat more vegetables, unequivocally and constantly, and yet we also know that vegetables are harder to buy and prepare than junk food, especially for low income people in food deserts. Do you have the same concern about the potential for a child who comes home and demands more vegetables, causing family strife for a single mother who’s unable to accommodate such a demand?
I think you’re missing what I’m saying- I’m not hostile to veganism at all. I’d be perfectly fine with presenting it as one of many options that are available to people out in the wider world, along with all the various flavors of vegetarianism, omnivorism, Kosher, Halal, etc…
But my beef with the way it was stated in the OP is that the person who gave the speech was something of a zealot and presenting a lot of opinion cloaked as fact, and using a lot of unacceptable tactics to push their own personal agenda.
That’s the problem here- not the veganism. That’s why I used that earlier hypothetical of a 2nd amendment zealot showing up and presenting his side of the story as if it was fact- everyone here would totally lose their shit if something like that happened, and rightly so. Just as we should also lose our shit if some Brady Campaign person showed up and presented their side as fact. The truth is somewhere in the middle, and schools shouldn’t be letting one side or the other present their side to children as fact, especially not with inappropriate tactics and materials.
Kids tend to trust that what they’re being presented in school or by parents is absolute, irrefutable fact, when sometimes it’s not. And they misinterpret things all the time as well- sometimes it’s a matter of not having the background information, sometimes it’s not having the emotional maturity to evaluate it rationally, and sometimes, it’s just something like not hearing it right or not having the vocabulary to understand what was said.
So I have an issue with ANYTHING being presented in school as fact, that has a moral/ethical component that’s not part of the accepted curriculum. I’d be equally pissed if they started playing favorites about religion, political party, etc…
I’m with bump. My objection would be to any subject presented in a way that encourages the students to make moral judgments about their parents. (There are exceptions, obviously, especially if your parents are axe murderers.) But kids shouldn’t be coming home thinking their parents are evil because they eat meat, drive an ICE vehicle, or keep a firearm (safely secured) in the house.
Smoking? Telling kids not to smoke sure has caused a lot of family conflicts. OK or not OK?
Are kids being told not to smoke because of scientifically-based health problems caused by smoking? Or are they being told smokers are immoral?
Fine telling kids about the deleterious effects of tobacco in Health class.
I’d say that falls under the exception I mentioned upthread for scientifically verifiable fact. I mean, nobody in their right mind is actually going to argue that smoking is somehow healthful in this day and age.
And FWIW, my beef isn’t because it causes conflict with parents or encourages rebelliousness, but rather because it can lead students to incorrect conclusions. Basically it’s propaganda, not education.
The only place where this would really get sticky is when something that’s scientific fact and/or consensus is opposed by ignorant and/or religious opinion. I mean, I could totally see some parents coming unglued because their kids are taught about evolution, and they happen to be bible thumpers of some stripe who believe in literalism. Or if they have ignorant parents who don’t “believe” in global warming/climate change. In both cases, I’d say the school should have balls and call them out on their ignorance, but I don’t know if that’s likely to actually happen.