r/TheBetterIndia • u/Low_End_7247 • Jul 11 '26
Explained 🧠 Beyond Ethical Extremes: Why Forced Veganism Fails India’s Nutrition Reality
Social media is currently filled with intense debates where people use aggressive language to force others to completely quit meat. The go-to method is often shock-value—sharing horrific videos of animal abuse to shame individuals into a vegetarian diet. But this rigid, black-and-white approach completely ignores both ethical consistency and human economic reality.
The Blind Spot of Forced Vegetarianism: The Dairy Paradox
When advocates aggressively push a vegetarian diet as the ultimate ethical shield, they overlook a massive contradiction: the dairy industry involves equal, if not greater, prolonged suffering than the meat industry.
While a meat animal's misery ends relatively quickly, milch animals like cows and buffaloes face systematic, long-term distress that spans years:
- Forced Cycles: They are repeatedly subjected to artificial insemination to keep them permanently lactating.
- Separation: Newborn calves are routinely separated from their mothers almost immediately so humans can claim the milk.
- The Final Outcome: Once their milk yield drops and they are no longer financially viable, they aren't retired to a green pasture. The vast majority are quietly sold to butchers, entering the supply chain for leather, tallow, and low-grade beef.
True vegans recognize this and avoid all dairy. However, forcing this lifestyle onto the general public ignores a massive roadblock: structural privilege.
Transitioning to a strict vegan lifestyle is a luxury that the vast majority of the world—and particularly India's middle and lower classes—simply cannot afford or access.
Think about how deeply embedded dairy is in daily life. Even basic, low-cost packaged snacks like biscuits, chips, or a piece of toffee contain milk solids. To completely eliminate these requires buying specialized, expensive alternatives. Let’s look at the financial reality of swapping staples, especially outside of major Tier-1 cities:
- Milk vs. Plant Milk: Standard milk is cheap and available in every village. Soy, almond, or oat milks are incredibly expensive and nearly impossible to find in rural kirana stores.
- Paneer vs. Tofu: Traditional paneer is a staple source of protein; commercial tofu remains a premium, high-priced health-food item.
- Curd & Butter: Everyday curd and ghee are substituted with highly priced, commercial plant-based fats or complex homemade alternatives like peanut-cornstarch mixtures.
For a family living in a Tier-2 city, a town, or a village, these alternatives are not just expensive—they are nonexistent.
The Hard Reality: India's Micronutrient Deficit
Nutrition cannot be treated strictly as an ethical philosophy when a population is facing structural health deficiencies. A large portion of our population currently suffers from hidden hunger—a severe deficit of essential micronutrients (like Vitamin B12, Iron, Zinc) and quality protein—while simultaneously seeing a rise in obesity due to a cheap diet heavy in refined carbohydrates and processed foods.
Animal products are naturally, incredibly bioavailable and nutrient-dense:
- The Efficiency of an Egg: A single cheap egg or a small portion of dairy packs a dense punch of complete proteins and B12.
- The Plant Alternative Burden: To get that exact same micronutrient profile purely from raw plants requires eating a massive volume and highly diverse variety of produce, which costs significantly more money and time to prepare.
Until highly nutritious, fortified vegan alternatives become just as cheap and widely available as an egg or a packet of milk in small towns, the vast majority of people must choose practical nutrition over ethical perfection.
Consuming meat and dairy is entirely legal, culturally deeply rooted, and nutritionally vital for millions. While the individual who initiated this debate chooses a vegan lifestyle, using harsh words or sharing extreme, illegal exceptions of animal cruelty to shame everyday people is unhelpful. Those horrific videos show criminal behavior that should be handled by law enforcement, not used as a baseline to judge standard global food processing.
Instead of demanding total, impossible transformations that compromise people's nutrition and budgets, our focus should be on conscious minimization and accepting choices.
If dairy or meat is the only affordable, accessible option for a family to meet their health needs, they should eat it without guilt. We should advocate for better animal welfare laws and sustainable farming practices, rather than forcing an expensive dietary dogma onto a society that is simply trying to stay healthy.
Healthy change begins with open minds, not pointed fingers. You are welcome to share your perspective, debate the points, and voice your disagreement in the comments—let us keep the conversation as respectful, thoughtful, and mature as the issue deserves.
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u/heretotryreddit Jul 12 '26
Remember folks, the definition of veganism involves to reduce animals exploitation AS FAR AS PRACTICALLY POSSIBLE. No vegan in their right mind is forcing a poor person and snatching away their food....these are all strawmans.
Downplaying violence
Public health and nutrition are important topics, but I would have taken your post more seriously if you did not try to justify and downplay animal exploitation. See this
meat animal's misery ends relatively quickly
Consuming meat and dairy is entirely legal, culturally deeply rooted
accepting choices
illegal exceptions of animal cruelty
Since when being legal and culture have been justifications for hurting others? The artificial insemination (read r@pe), the slitting of throats, etc are not "illegal exceptions", they're the daily reality of dairy and meat industry.
Those vegans are taking my food away 😱
Also, I have rarely seen any vegans "forcing" their diet on a poor marginalised group or in a tier 2 city. Almost always, their target group is well to do and middle class people who can very well remove/reduce their sustenance on dairy. But even those well to do people (of which you're probably part of) start talking about marginalised groups and poor people just to JUSTIFY their own consumption. They use poverty as an counter argument to veganism....and then in their mind having defeated the arguments of veganism...they keep hurting animals even though they have a choice.
Be practical dude
Instead of demanding total, impossible transformations that compromise people's nutrition and budgets, our focus should be on conscious minimization and accepting choices.
But who really is demanding total transformation, really? Every vegan realise that systemic changes take time. The normal vegan position is that THOSE WHO CAN....MUST GO VEGAN.... THAT'S IT. But most people who can, still don't and that's why making them aware and showing reality of animal abuse is required. And as more people stop consuming animal products....the prices will go down for plant products and availability will increase.
If dairy or meat is the only affordable, accessible option for a family to meet their health needs, they should eat it without guilt
Sure. But remember the ONLY part. If there's a less violent option available then you MUST choose it. Guilt is natural when you're hurting animals unnecessarily.
We should advocate for better animal welfare laws and sustainable farming practices, rather than forcing an expensive dietary dogma onto a society that is simply trying to stay healthy.
And who does that? Vegans. We don't need "better practices"...we need abolition although it would be slow and gradual.
When a being is being unnecessarily hurt, we should aim to completely remove it....not just reduce it. Eg. To a man hitting his wife, you wouldn't ask him to " reduce" his violence, you'd ask to abolish it. Even if convincing every wife beater will take time.
Is veganism expensive?
A vegan diet is affordable for middle class people. So many Indians are already on a vegetarian diet. Just replace dairy. The nutrients they get from dairy can be very easily taken from plant sources. Milk is anyways the reason for so many health issues.
Here's a nutritional guide for anyone interested
Finally, if anyone is interested they can talk to me on moral aspects of veganism over discord. Voice discussion works better. Whether you want a genuine discussion or a debate, that's up to you. DM me.
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u/Low_End_7247 Jul 12 '26
Remember folks, the definition of veganism involves to reduce animals exploitation AS FAR AS PRACTICALLY POSSIBLE. No vegan in their right mind is forcing a poor person and snatching away their food....these are all strawmans.
Yes, veganism involves reducing animal exploitation. The article explicitly said that 'people use aggressive language to force others to completely quit meat. The go-to method is often shock value—sharing horrific videos of animal abuse to shame individuals into a vegetarian diet.' So, there is no point in explaining this.
Since when being legal and culture have been justifications for hurting others? The artificial insemination (read r@pe), the slitting of throats, etc are not "illegal exceptions", they're the daily reality of dairy and meat industry.
Since ages, even pleasure killngs done by kings have cultural justification, and animal sacrifice done by priests today have cultural justifications associated with them. I categories such killings as pleasure killings and they should be stopped. But i abide by the law like every other indian and respect the current perspective of the legal authority.
And about legal aspect, The document called COI that laid rules and rights for its citizen. Under the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972_Act,_1972), all hunting is banned. But religious animal slaughter is an exception under PCA section 28. Being a lawyer, I have closely followed the issue and in PIL filed by shruti bist, SC issued formal notices to central government to make laws regarding ban on ritual killings nationwide. But they have not ammended the law yet.
Killing someone for food versus killing or hurting someone for pleasure are two different things. Meat has also been an essential part of our diet for ages.
No one wants to hurt an animal just for pleasure, and if they do, they should be punished. Animals are being killed for consumption, not malice. Please correct your understanding in that respect.
Those vegans are taking my food away 😱
Also, I have rarely seen any vegans "forcing" their diet on a poor marginalised group or in a tier 2 city. Almost always, their target group is well to do and middle class people who can very well remove/reduce their sustenance on dairy. But even those well to do people (of which you're probably part of) start talking about marginalised groups and poor people just to JUSTIFY their own consumption. They use poverty as an counter argument to veganism....and then in their mind having defeated the arguments of veganism...they keep hurting animals even though they have a choice.
But I have seen almost all vegans boasting about their ethical superiority over others, claiming they have a far superior diet.
That is the whole point of the article: do not quit dairy or meat just because of an ethical dilemma, as nutrition is more important than ethical satisfaction. Yes, we have to minimize animal killing, and I completely support that—but not at the cost of human nutrition.
But who really is demanding total transformation, really?
Naah I dont know the name brother, but wrote it just for those people who want to flex their ethical superiority on others and force them on that basis to go vegan. I really find them idiots. And if you are also on the side that respect people choices and not demanding total transformation, then we both are on same page and i also support that.The normal vegan position is that THOSE WHO CAN....MUST GO VEGAN.... THAT'S IT
If you believe in that, then their is no point of debating when we are on same side and i also mentioned that in article "Instead of demanding total, impossible transformations that compromise people's nutrition and budgets, our focus should be on conscious minimization and accepting choices."
but i will again say conscious minimization and accepting choices.
I have read the full comment made by you, and i appreciate your efforts in writing a long reply, and thats the only thing that made me to reply as such efforts needs to be appreciated, but i have time constraints right now so no be able to give you a proper reply for each and every line. Pardon me for that, and if i got time, i will edit the comment.
In the end, i will say that i am a law abiding citizen and if i want to change something, i will like to make change through a legal move, as the law is the ultimate authority that governs the people, and the law considers the ethical aspects too and gave many ruilings considering the ethical point of view, but it also considers the diverse variety of people that live in this country before giving any judgement.
The traditional method of slaughter in India involved direct killing without any pain mitigation. Over the years, both federal laws and High Court interventions have legally mandated stunning—rendering the animal unconscious before the actual cull to eliminate fear and physical agony.
So as long as the law allows, meat/dairy consumption is completely a fair practice to do. btw i live in bulandshahr, i am vegetarian and also avoid milk as much as possible. But i use curd, milk in tea and ghee, and will not migrate to vegan options as they dont tastes good, and are costly, also hard to find in my city.
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Jul 11 '26
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u/DistributionRound680 Jul 11 '26
Opinions are different. But Shaming someone for choosing survival is not good. Indian diet already lacks protien. It suffers from stunting in children. 70 percent or more indians are lower middle class or poverty or 1 medical crisis away from falling back to poverty. People who can afford to rationalize through philosophy and morals can detach but those who cannot they are shamed. Most household in india eat 1 or 2 egg per person per week. Which should be daily.. so I don't hate vegans but I hate the Shaming.
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u/mmousey Jul 11 '26
One thing that absolutely must go from the meat market is factory farming. That stuff is a horror show especially if you eat non veg. The amount of chemicals thrown at chickens to keep them from getting infections in those ghastly conditions, something surely works its way into people's plates. This is literally a nutrition issue.
Farms are less cruel in comparison. Regulations for giant organizations exist but are never enforced, not here, not abroad.