I have many friends which are vegan and we live in an area + work in an industry with a comparatively high amount of people with such a diet. We have talked about the topic at lengths, and my understanding is that in order to have a healthy diet you have to do quite a bit of research and spend time planning your meals. And then going out on a dinner is often a pain, although this has improved in the recent years.
We eat much less meat than the general public. But going the next step and eliminating meat and then diary products is not trivial. Unless you have less responsibilities and or more prior knowledge to get you up to speed. I simply do not have the time for that, I have a small kid to take care of. And we often struggle to plan enough meals ahead of time in the short period of time between finishing work and doing groceries.
It might sound like an excuse to you. It feels the same on my end, when my concerns are dismissed with some hand waving by people which usually are in a completely different place in their life than me.
The thing is, you could argue you need to do all that research to verify you’re eating enough of the right things, but in some sense you should be doing that regardless of whether your diet is vegan. But most people don’t bother, they just eat whatever and go to the doctor every once in a while and if there is a big gap somewhere the doctor will point it out. The lazy vegan diet is no more unbalanced than a lazy Omni diet. You can just not think about it, it’s not like you will immediately die if you are lacking in some nutrient. If you are supplementing with a multi vitamin or even just taking only B12 and iron, chances are you’re eating enough different kinds of things just by happenstance that you don’t even have to think about “complete proteins”.
If you only eat potatoes and Oreos then yeah you’ll have a bad time, but who is doing that? Do you count your carb, protein, fat intake? Daily caloric intake? Your lysine? Your riboflavin? Why don’t you? How are you so sure you’re getting enough already? Do you think vegans sit around counting that stuff too? I buy the usuals at the grocery store, I just make/eat whatever I feel like and have a couple weeks worth of recipes I rotate through same as everyone else, eat out once or twice a week at normal restaurants with vegan options. It’s not hard no matter how much you insist it should be.
When I hear its too hard my lived experience tells me it’s entirely possible to think about food the absolute minimum required, so it seems either like an excuse or ignorance.
The thing is, you could argue you need to do all that research to verify you’re eating enough of the right things, but in some sense you should be doing that regardless of whether your diet is vegan. But most people don’t bother, they just eat whatever and go to the doctor every once in a while and if there is a big gap somewhere the doctor will point it out. The lazy vegan diet is no more unbalanced than a lazy Omni diet. You can just not think about it, it’s not like you will immediately die if you are lacking in some nutrient. If you are supplementing with a multi vitamin or even just taking only B12 and iron, chances are you’re eating enough different kinds of things just by happenstance that you don’t even have to think about “complete proteins”.
If you only eat potatoes and Oreos then yeah you’ll have a bad time, but who is doing that? Do you count your carb, protein, fat intake? Daily caloric intake? Your lysine? Your riboflavin? Why don’t you? How are you so sure you’re getting enough already? Do you think vegans sit around counting that stuff too? I buy the usuals at the grocery store, I just make/eat whatever I feel like and have a couple weeks worth of recipes I rotate through same as everyone else, eat out once or twice a week at normal restaurants with vegan options. It’s not hard no matter how much you insist it should be.
When I hear its too hard my lived experience tells me it’s entirely possible to think about food the absolute minimum required, so it seems either like an excuse or ignorance.
I have many friends which are vegan and we live in an area + work in an industry with a comparatively high amount of people with such a diet. We have talked about the topic at lengths, and my understanding is that in order to have a healthy diet you have to do quite a bit of research and spend time planning your meals. And then going out on a dinner is often a pain, although this has improved in the recent years.
We eat much less meat than the general public. But going the next step and eliminating meat and then diary products is not trivial. Unless you have less responsibilities and or more prior knowledge to get you up to speed. I simply do not have the time for that, I have a small kid to take care of. And we often struggle to plan enough meals ahead of time in the short period of time between finishing work and doing groceries.
It might sound like an excuse to you. It feels the same on my end, when my concerns are dismissed with some hand waving by people which usually are in a completely different place in their life than me.
The thing is, you could argue you need to do all that research to verify you’re eating enough of the right things, but in some sense you should be doing that regardless of whether your diet is vegan. But most people don’t bother, they just eat whatever and go to the doctor every once in a while and if there is a big gap somewhere the doctor will point it out. The lazy vegan diet is no more unbalanced than a lazy Omni diet. You can just not think about it, it’s not like you will immediately die if you are lacking in some nutrient. If you are supplementing with a multi vitamin or even just taking only B12 and iron, chances are you’re eating enough different kinds of things just by happenstance that you don’t even have to think about “complete proteins”.
If you only eat potatoes and Oreos then yeah you’ll have a bad time, but who is doing that? Do you count your carb, protein, fat intake? Daily caloric intake? Your lysine? Your riboflavin? Why don’t you? How are you so sure you’re getting enough already? Do you think vegans sit around counting that stuff too? I buy the usuals at the grocery store, I just make/eat whatever I feel like and have a couple weeks worth of recipes I rotate through same as everyone else, eat out once or twice a week at normal restaurants with vegan options. It’s not hard no matter how much you insist it should be.
When I hear its too hard my lived experience tells me it’s entirely possible to think about food the absolute minimum required, so it seems either like an excuse or ignorance.
The thing is, you could argue you need to do all that research to verify you’re eating enough of the right things, but in some sense you should be doing that regardless of whether your diet is vegan. But most people don’t bother, they just eat whatever and go to the doctor every once in a while and if there is a big gap somewhere the doctor will point it out. The lazy vegan diet is no more unbalanced than a lazy Omni diet. You can just not think about it, it’s not like you will immediately die if you are lacking in some nutrient. If you are supplementing with a multi vitamin or even just taking only B12 and iron, chances are you’re eating enough different kinds of things just by happenstance that you don’t even have to think about “complete proteins”.
If you only eat potatoes and Oreos then yeah you’ll have a bad time, but who is doing that? Do you count your carb, protein, fat intake? Daily caloric intake? Your lysine? Your riboflavin? Why don’t you? How are you so sure you’re getting enough already? Do you think vegans sit around counting that stuff too? I buy the usuals at the grocery store, I just make/eat whatever I feel like and have a couple weeks worth of recipes I rotate through same as everyone else, eat out once or twice a week at normal restaurants with vegan options. It’s not hard no matter how much you insist it should be.
When I hear its too hard my lived experience tells me it’s entirely possible to think about food the absolute minimum required, so it seems either like an excuse or ignorance.