Everyday Hassles for Vegans

Sweet Freedom Honey Alternative: the bees say Thanks!

 Oh, it happens all the time to vegans, doesn't it? Shared lunches where the food isn't labelled so you don't know what's in anything, and loads of people who contributed smoked salmon, parma ham and sausage rolls, are enjoying your lovely bowl of couscous salad and fruit from your garden (what's the word for the opposite of a bring'n'share?..Bring UN-share...); hot drink machines with no decent vegan options; outings to restaurants that cater for vegans offering them only salad or a bowl of chips while everyone else is having a proper meal. These are the everyday facts of life for many vegans living in a non-vegan world; and we're all used to it, I guess. But, at least no-one expects you to PAY for the ham or sausage rolls, or buy a non-vegan meal which you aren't going to eat. Or go and buy tickets to an animal circus to which you are ethically opposed and aren't going to attend.
  We are having an issue today in which our family is being expected to pay for an outing to see a talk by a bee keeper, which also involved honey-tasting. There may be people out there who like to call themselves vegans and who eat honey, but we are not those people. To be quite clear, true veganism is not just a diet, it's a whole philosophy, a way of life, which seeks, as far as is possible, to avoid the exploitation of ALL animals, so, for us, attending this workshop was not an option. You can argue until the cows come home (and they DEFINITELY WILL come home one day..) about local beekeepers, how much they love their bees etc, but there is no doubt in my mind that bees are exploited by the beekeeping process and have the fruits of their labours taken from them, which in my book is exploitation. I wrote a piece for this blog in August with some thoughts on honey: Home made 'Hunny' for Grounded Bumblebee
  We were not given the choice several months ago about what the planned series of workshops were about and one of them turned out to be about bee keeping and honey. We made our objections known to this subject several months ago, and made it clear that we would attend the other sessions but not the one about honey, and we made it quite clear why this was.
  Now we are in the position of being expected to pay for all the sessions including the honey tasting one. We are being put under pressure to pay even though the cost of all the sessions is already covered even without our money for that one session. I'm even more disappointed that the person trying to insist that we go against our principles here is an Associate Member of the Vegan Society.

A Bumblebee We Found In Our Garden in the Summer.

   We always happily pay for any sessions that we are unable to attend, whether we knew beforehand, or not, that we wouldn't be going, but this is different. As vegans we will not knowingly support the bee keeping industry and that's what we would be doing if we paid for that session, as obviously some of what is being covered is the cost of honey for people to try.
  It's a very uncomfortable feeling being in this position, but there's not much point in having principles if you aren't prepared to stand by them. If we were going to pay for the honey-tasting session, then we might have just as well turned up on the day and eaten the stuff ourselves.
  We are bringing up our three children as vegans- what sort of message would we be giving them if we tell them it's not ok to harm, steal from or exploit animals, but, even though we won't do it ourselves, it's ok to pay for other people to do exactly that.