Tuesday 17 August 2010

happy meat served up by the greens; or, on not leading by example

On Sunday I ventured down with Danni to the Australian Greens' fundraiser at the Noise Bar in Brunswick. There were some nifty bands, and I had been a bit excited in advance to know there was vegan and gluten free food available. Some of it was provided by Anikee at Radical Grocery! Awesome!

Anyway, given they're the Greens, I was a bit disappointed to find out there was also meat being served. The MC spent a while talking about how great this organic, free-range meat was, and where you could purchase it, and then was all 'also, Radical Grocery' without mentioning its awesomeveganness, and I know it's all about outreach and not alienating people but seriously. The organisation I work for is filled with people who get really sulky when the catering is all vegetarian, but nobody complains because it's always prefaced with, 'this event is vegetarian so that we're a bit better for the environment,' so if they can do it, why can't the Greens?

I am sure everyone is sick of us dirty filthy vegan hippies going on about how great it is for the environment to cut out animal products (or at least meat), so here is just one link! It is all about science! At Science Daily, Conscious Choice of Food Can Substantially Mitigate Climate Change, Research Finds. OH YEAH.

OH GREENS. It would not have been difficult for you to set an example! Debunk the happy meat myth!

7 comments:

Sarah said...

Sigh. It is frustrating, but not at all surprising. Every conference I have ever been to (most of them environmental conferences) has served meat, and I have been the only vegan - or one of only a few. I recently went to one where I ended up eating salted almonds and an apple for lunch. And this was in the UK, where there's a huge vego population.

Anonymous said...

mate I agree with you so wholeheartedly about this I actually had the exact same conversation this morning with someone who also went!

Theresa said...

Urg, the greens candidate in Townsville is constantly banging on about how we have to start eating more kangaroo :\

steph said...

@Sarah - yeah, I get that all the time. I'm always pleasantly surprised when I go to an environmental conference and it's all vegetarian food, and it's nice when I can occasionally meet another vegan, or at least a vegetarian!

@Carla it was super disappointing! I didn't even realise they were serving meat until that point, and just - ugh.

@Theresa nooooo. :o(

Miss T said...

Oh grrr!! I know they're not the Vegreen Party or anything but for pete's sake, it's taking the piss to serve meat at a fundraiser, and it's just bloody bad manners not to properly recognise Anikee's contribution, especially because she's a small and ethical business. Bloody rude and bloody disappointing.

Nadia said...

You are pretty damn amazing. Please keep blogging.

jh said...

I should preface this by declaring that I work for the Greens so am obviously biased, but...

Just thought I'd mention that the majority of catered Vic Greens functions (internal and external) are vegetarian (or vegan when I get to organise them!) purely because it's much more likely that food will be environmentally friendly. And whilst I was happy that they had vegan options at Noise Bar (I went, too - should have said hi!) it would have been better for it to not have had any meat catered there at all.

Thanks for such a great blog.