Generation V: The Complete Guide to Going, Being, and Staying Vegan as a Teenager
160
Generation V: The Complete Guide to Going, Being, and Staying Vegan as a Teenager
160-
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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781604863383 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | PM Press |
| Publication date: | 06/01/2011 |
| Series: | Tofu Hound Press |
| Pages: | 160 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.50(d) |
| Age Range: | 13 - 17 Years |
About the Author
Claire Askew has been a vegan since the age of 15; has written for the Kansas City Star, VegNews magazine, and Vegetarian Journal; and is a contributor to the 2009 edition of Fiske Real College Essays That Work. She lives in Portland, Oregon.
Read an Excerpt
Generation V
The Complete Guide to Going, Being, and Staying Vegan as a Teenager
By Claire Askew
PM Press
Copyright © 2011 Claire AskewAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-60486-576-9
CHAPTER 1
Parents and Other Family
* * *
Going vegan as a teen can be more difficult than doing so when you're an adult. Your parents have significantly more control over your life when you're young. You still have to live under their roof, follow their rules (to a certain extent, at least) and depend on them for most, if not all, of your money, clothes, freedom — and food. So, if your parents don't understand/accept/support your decision to cut animal cruelty from your life, it can be very difficult, if not impossible, to be vegan when you're a teenager.
See, when you're an adult — living on your own, paying for everything — veganism's only as hard or easy as you yourself make it. If your parents don't like the idea of you being vegan, it might create a problem at, say, holidays, but won't really impact your day-today vegan livin'. If you want to fill your fridge with seitan and soymilk, sport clothes with vegan messages, and spend your time reading books about animal liberation, your parents can't do anything to stop you. If you're a teenager, however, there's a lot your parents can do to stop you. This is where the difficulty comes in.
On the one hand, if they won't let you go vegan and you still really want to, it's too bad because either you wind up eating bad, boring, not-so-nutritious food or being torn up inside as you eat animal products. On the other hand, if your parents make your veganism so difficult that you eventually lose the desire to be vegan, it's too bad because then you're turning your back on your ethics.
But there's a third hand! If you just figure out why your parents are so against the idea of you being vegan and then show them that their misconceptions are just that — misconceptions, that their fears won't come true, and so on. Then you can happily coexist with your non-vegan parents and vice versa! Trust me, it can happen. Maybe your parents envision you morphing into a jaundiced skeleton from a diet of nothing but lentils and green tea. Maybe they're picturing you throwing red paint on fur-wearers and screaming at them at the top of your lungs about animal cruelty. Maybe they think your friends will stop talking to you when you will no longer go to certain fast-food restaurants with them. Whatever the reason(s), use this chapter to help your parents see that you can be vegan and still be a member of your family as happy as you were prevegan.
The rule of thumb for dealing with non-vegan family is: educate yourself thoroughly, and be peaceful and respectful (or as close to it as you can get) when discussing things. Mumbling "I don't know" when they ask you something about veganism or screaming at them about how wrong they are just won't work. Calmly talking about an issue, knowing what you're going to say, and possibly having a few books or articles to back up what you're saying is a much better way of getting your parents (or any other person, really) to see where you're coming from.
Be patient, too. If something doesn't over go over too well one time, bring it up again in a week or two and hope it goes better. Practice what you're going to say beforehand, if you have to. At the very least, even if it keeps going poorly, your parents will see that you're determined.
Some typical parental worries:
"It's just a phase."
This one can be tougher since you can't just calmly show your parents an article or pamphlet, or fill up your brain and then have a discussion with them. You have to be the answer, not what you know or what you have read. The best (and sometimes only) way to deal with a parent who is convinced that your veganism is merely a stage you're going through is to stick with it and give it time. Eventually, they will see that you're serious about being vegan.
"You've been brainwashed!"
This is common when you have a vegan friend who showed you the light. A parent will think that you, in your easily impressionable youth, will want to go vegan after this particular persistent friend (who your parents might imagine as a PETA T-shirt-wearing, dreadlock-sporting, pamphlet-flinging punk/hippie combo if they don't know them) did something to make you suddenly want to make a drastic change in your life. For example, when one of my friends wanted to go vegan because of me, her mom's first response was to ask her daughter what "this Claire" had been doing that caused her to want to go veg. Show your parents that you're still your same old self. You just found that veganism makes a lot of ethical (or environmental, nutritional, etc.) sense. If there is a vegan friend whom your parents don't know well and may be apprehensive of, let the friend meet your parents so they can see that he/she is normal and nice and not an angry uber-militant vegan asshole. If they think you've been brainwashed because yesterday you were eating chicken without a care in the world and today you want to throw away all your leather shoes and tested-on-animals body products, tone it down a little, if only to please them. I'm not saying go back to eating animal products so they'll think you're not as "brainwashed," but you have plenty of time to replace your shoes and toiletries and plenty of time to convince your parents that you're serious about this.
"You won't be healthy!"
Ask your parentals why, specifically, they think you won't be healthy on a vegan diet. Do they think you won't get enough calories? Not enough protein, calcium, or iron? That your diet won't be varied enough? Once you find out just why they don't think your body can thrive without animal products, turn to page 59 and show them that, yes, you can be vegan and be just as healthy as you are now, if not more so. Once you do go vegan, if you feel healthier, have more energy, clearer skin, etc. (which happens to a lot of people!) make sure to mention this to your parents, especially if they didn't think you would be healthy. My mom didn't think I would get enough protein at first, but I showed her the facts and changed her mind. I mention all the time how I have more energy during the day and fall asleep easier at night, how I can barely remember the last time I had a stomach ache or cramps, and a bunch of other stuff — now she's the one who'll point out how clear my skin looks since going vegan.
"You'll be teased!"
Parents who think their child will be teased for being vegan are similar to parents who thinks that their child will be teased for sporting knee-high rainbow toe socks or reading on the bus and at every other possible moment (neither of which are bad, and both of which I may or may not have done in my own early youth). When it comes down to it, they're sending their offspring the message to change herself in order to fit in, and that just ain't cool. Tell your parents something to the tune of, "I'm comfortable with who I am, and wanting to be vegan is a part of who I am. I would rather get teased for being confident in being myself than pretend I'm someone else and never get made fun of." It's very hard for a parent to argue with that. It's also good to mention that if your friends were really your friends, they wouldn't tease you, and if they aren't your friends, who really cares what they think?
Parents who are concerned about you being teased also often think not that you'll get teased simply forgoing vegan, but that in going vegan you automatically become the self-righteous, undernourished, red-paint-flinging pinko commie stereotypical vegan, and that's why you'll get teased — or, regardless of whether or not you get teased, they might not want you to become that stereotype at all. This one can be solved best by giving it time. After a while, your parent will see that you're still you, just vegan, and not drastically different.
"You're too old to be sentimental."
In this situation, your parents are trying to enforce the idea that "that's just how it is" — people just eat animal products, that's just the norm, tough luck, kid. They may assume that your desire to be vegan stems from a childlike view of animals as adorable, innocent peers rather than thinking, feeling beings with their own interests and that you're so young that you just don't know how the world works yet. Make sure your parents know that you feel eating animal products is wrong because it forces suffering on a being who experiences sentience, not because it's mean to hurt poor widdle cowsie-wowsies (and chicky-wickies, and I'm done talking like that ...). You are between a child and an adult, yes, but try to play up the fact that you're not holding on to your childlike view of animals, but rather that you're getting older and developing the ability to look beyond what's immediately in front of you and live by your ethics.
"Why won't you eat my food? Don't you love me?"
Let me tell you a story. A few weeks before I went vegan (when I was trying to be a strict vegetarian as much as possible), my mom and I were in the car together and she mentioned the dinner she had made: some kind of chowder that was predominantly milk and cheese. She was so happy about making this lovely vegetarian meal that (she thought) everyone could enjoy together. My mom didn't really know that I was trying to edge my way down the path to veganism, and I wasn't about to tell her since I thought that she would make me eat more animal products than I would eat if she didn't know. So I asked her if I could have something else for dinner, and she wanted to know why. I tried to avoid it, mumbling "because," but she kept at it, and eventually I told her that I wanted to be vegan and why. She sighed and said something like "But I made it and I thought you would like it ... it's vegetarian ... I thought we could all eat it together." I did end up eating something more plant-based that night, but what I'm trying to get at is that some parents can take it as a blow to them personally when you reject their food. I'm not saying you should eat a ham-and-cheese omelette if it would make your dad happy, but that a lot of parents forget that you're only turning down what they make you because it contains animal products. My mom made that chowder with the best of intentions, thinking I would be happy because it's vegetarian, only to see me turn up my nose at it.
In this situation, explain to your parents that it's not the fact that they made it that's causing you to refuse the food, just that it's not vegan. Stress that you're not trying to be difficult and you're not rejecting their food for rejection's sake, but that this is something important to you now. You probably have a food or foods that you've never liked, and maybe your parents have avoided cooking that food in the past for you. Bring this up and mention how veganism isn't really that different. When they do take the time and effort to cook you something vegan, be sure to thank and praise them for it. They'll remember that you liked it and might do it again!
Personally, I have never appreciated my mother's cooking more than now that I'm vegan. When I would eat whatever, I thought she made me food simply because I had to eat. Now that I'm vegan, every time she makes me something special, I really know it's because she cares about me and my well-being. When we go visit my extended family and I live in vegan hell (oh, okay, vegan limbo) for a few days, my mom always helps me to make sure I have plenty of delicious and nutritious things to eat, and every time this happens, I appreciate my mother so much more than I did when I was an omnivore.
"I'm not cooking anything special."
Translation #1: I don't know how to cook anything special. Most parents (and people in general, really) who aren't familiar with vegan food will assume it's salad, plain tofu, lentils, the neighbor's shrubs, etc. If your parents believe that vegan cooking will be difficult and require a thousand trips to a thousand different health food stores, they most likely won't want to learn about it, especially if you're unwilling to help. If you show that you're willing to learn how to cook and to organize some kind of schedule — maybe your parents will cook something for you every other day, and the rest of the time you'll cook for yourself — they might soften up and grab a cookbook or two (see Chapter 5 for a list of some great vegan cookbooks).
This, for example, is how things worked out in my family. At first, my mom didn't want to cook anything special for me, and I didn't know how to cook, so I basically lived on mixes and frozen meals for the first month or two of my veganism. Then she found a recipe that she veganized for me, and then I found cookbooks. Gradually, we both learned how to cook yummy vegan meals and loved it. Right now, we don't have any sort of "Claire makes dinner on these nights" kind of thing, but it ends up being about half-and-half. I cook dinner three or four nights of the week and my parents do the rest, and, usually, we all eat the same vegan dinner together — I was lucky that I went vegan after my brothers left for college. Your parents might be in a tough spot if you're vegan but have non-vegan siblings — a lot of parents (including mine) assume that since the vegan kid isn't happy with an omnivorous meal, the non-vegan kid(s) won't be happy with a vegan meal. However, this isn't true — delicious food is delicious food and the fact that the food is cruelty-free doesn't make it any less so! Maybe your younger siblings are young enough that they like to do whatever you're doing and would love the idea of eating something special that you want the family to eat. Maybe your older siblings are old enough that they've come across different kinds of ethnic foods and know that they're delicious. It may be a good idea to point out to your parents that your family has eaten a lot of vegan (or easily veganized) food at dinner before — think stirfries, spaghetti with meatless marinara, vegetable soup, bean burritos, pasta salad, meatless chili (use beans), vegetable sushi ... it's a big list! Also, does your mom/dad ever whine about how your family always eats the same fifteen or so dinners, just in rotation? Mine did. If they do, the next time they say that, mention that cooking vegan dinners for the family would definitely be adding variety!
Translation #2: I'm seeing if you're really committed to this. If you heave a sigh and make do with eating what little of your family's meals are cruelty-free, you show your family that vegan eating is hard and not nutritious, that you aren't willing to learn to cook, that veganism means deprival, and a host of other bad things. If you volunteer to cook for yourself and, if need be, buy vegan groceries for yourself (and really do both of those things), you're showing your family that veganism means enough to you for you to take time, effort, and money of your own in order to be happy as a vegan, and you really are dedicated to being vegan. And once they see that you're serious about veganism, your parents will most likely be willing to at least cook for you now and then and chip in for, if not pay for entirely, your vegan groceries.
"I don't get it."
This is often a simple concern some parents have — they might be willing to let you go vegan, they might have accepted that you won't become a frail, sickly, yellowed weakling, they might have bought you this book, but they might not understand just why you want to go vegan and may be merely curious. Explain to them your reasons — no need to go into grisly detail about the ins and outs of factory farms, but it would be worth mentioning that dairy cows and laying hens are still treated cruelly, exploited for their product, still get slaughtered in the end, and so forth. Most parents can understand the reasons for being vegetarian, but many people still live under the impression that dairy and eggs let animals live relatively happy and free lives, which couldn't be further from the truth. You could also mention the environmental or health reasons for a vegan lifestyle.
"Couldn't you just eat free-range?"
This is an attempt by a well-meaning parent to strike a compromise with you — they don't have to cook vegan or worry about where you get such-and-such nutrient, and you get to stamp out animal cruelty in your life, right? Er, wrong.
Explain the following (remembering that being respectful, informed, and calm works much better than being angry or judgmental) to your parents: "Free-range" is generally complete mislabeling. The only USDA guideline for an animal food to be called "free-range" is that the animal have mere access to an outside area — it doesn't matter if the animal is given access for an hour of her life and doesn't take it, or if she is crammed outside with hundreds of thousands of her kind and made to stand in her own excrement, etc. — that food will be called freerange even if it was made under virtually the same conditions as a factory farm. It is possible, if sometimes tricky, to find eggs and dairy that were made under humane conditions, yes, but this goes against some of the reasons many people have for being vegan.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Generation V by Claire Askew. Copyright © 2011 Claire Askew. Excerpted by permission of PM Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Preface to the Second Edition 1
Introduction
My Vegan Story 5
All the Cool Kids Are Ethical Vegans 12
Part 1 Dealing With…
Chapter 1 Parents and Other Family 31
Chapter 2 Friends and Peers 43
Chapter 3 Yourself 49
Part 2 Stuff You Should Know
Chapter 4 Health and Nutrition 59
Chapter 5 Who's Who and What's What 73
Chapter 6 Vegan Goodies 81
Chapter 7 Outreach, School, Etc. 88
Chapter 8 All the Rest 101
Part 3 Food
Chapter 9 What Vegans Really Eat 111
Chapter 10 New Foods 117
Chapter 11 The Recipes 121
Part 4 Now Stay Vegan!
Chapter 12 Inspire Me, Please 133
Chapter 13 Where Do I Find… 142
What People are Saying About This
A book that is genuine and heartfelt while also being funny, personal, and theoretically rigorous. (Bob Torres, Vegetarian Journal)