Using Dried Fruit - The Vegetarian Resource Group

Vegetarianism in Political MagazinesBy Bobby AllynVEGETARIANISM AND VEGANISM OFTEN APPEAR INthe nation’s leading newspapers. From piecesabout the rise of vegan-friendly retailers to veganfirefighters in Austin, Texas, The New York Times’archives reveal many articles a year on plant-based diets.A LexisNexis search in all majors papers during a sixmonthperiod resulted in 760 hits for vegetarianismand veganism—most of which are recipes, restaurantreviews, and articles on veganism’s growing pop cultureallure. But how are vegetarianism and veganism coveredin political magazines? Very scantly.Over the past six years, the words “vegan” and“vegetarian” have been steadily increasing in numberin all the major political magazines but never in thecontext of diet or lifestyle. For example, an article inThe Weekly Standard quoted Mitt Romney as saying,“Being a conservative Republican in Massachusetts isa bit like being a cattle rancher at a vegetarian convention.”Or seen in a quote in the February 2007 editionof Mother Jones, “There are people who are against birthcontrol for religious reasons. Then there are the hippiesand vegans who say no chemicals.” But out of all thepolitical magazines that I searched—left-, right-, andcentrist-leaning—the only one to heed an article actuallyabout vegetarianism or veganism was a conservativepublication, The National Review.In 2003, National Review editor Rich Lowry gaveJonah Goldberg an assignment: go on a vegan diet andwrite about it. Reluctant and apprehensive, Goldbergtook Lowry up on the offer and wrote an article forthe February 2003 edition called “Soy Vey!” Probablya lot of National Review readers were surprised whenGoldberg found veganism less painful than he hadexpected. “After a couple days of this regimen, I felthealthier.” He also conceded that vegan alternativescan be tasty. “Meatless Chik’n nuggets, truth be told,don’t taste that bad.” Nevertheless, Goldberg didn’thesitate to unleash his irrational, meat-addicted sideby making analogous comparisons to cannibalism.“If meat is murder, why hawk products that look likemutilated corpse... Imagine selling a faux human flesh...Wouldn’t that be in poor taste?” In the end, Goldbergresented Lowry for putting him on a vegan diet, butstill, it was a clever experiment that proved to Goldbergand National Review readers that a vegan diet can bedelicious and actually make adherents “feel healthier.”Conclusions drawn from a more recent article in TheNation were not as positive.In the February 2007 edition, Daniel Lazarereviewed Tristram Stuart’s Bloodless Revolution: ACultural History of Vegetarianism from 1600 to ModernTimes in a piece titled “My Beef with Vegetarianism.”Unlike the National Review article that was an assignmentspecifically on veganism, Lazare decided to usethe book review as a vehicle to vent his oppositionto abstaining from meat. He claimed that nature iscrueler than slaughterhouses and that vegetarianism isan “ideology.” He goes on to allege that vegetarianismhas “antihumanist and authoritarian elements.” Beinga reader of The Nation, I was shocked and annoyed byLazare’s article, but I wasn’t the only one. Many onlinereaders responded similarly, and some were vehementlyoutraged. Kaye Beiswanger of Minnesota said, “As avegetarian, I found this article so offensive that I canceledmy subscription after being a loyal subscriberfor years.” And Patrick McKernan of Goffstown, NewHampshire, said, “As I read the article, I kept hopingto find some indication that the author knew something,or had at least thought, about the matter athand. Apparently not.” It’s unfortunate that the onlyarticle discussing vegetarianism in The Nation in thepast 10 years has been one filled with misconceptionsand gross overstatements.As my LexisNexis searches and other research conclude,vegetarianism isn’t covered in political magazines.And demonstrated by articles in The National Reviewand The Nation, political affiliation doesn’t matter whenit comes to ignorance about vegetarianism and veganism.Maybe it’s good that political magazines don’ttackle vegetarianism, keeping the practice and lifestylea non-partisan issue. But I think it behooves politicalperiodicals across the nation to cover an issue that hassuch widespread cultural, economic, and environmentalimpacts as vegetarianism, not as merely a brief asideto Dennis Kucinich or Ralph Nader.Bobby Allyn wrote this article during his Eleanor WolffInternship with The Vegetarian Resource Group.30 Issue Three 2008 VEGETARIAN JOURNAL