human rights for vegans

[Guest guest]

Great to hear that the Veggies of Nottingham project to provide healthy

meals for school kids is still flourishing. Reading about this gave me

the idea of forwarding the text of an article published in the latest

issue of The Vegan on rights for vegans under the new Equality Act.

 

Any information or experiences anyone can provide will be gratefully

received. If you reply to me in the first instance

<vclarke I will forward the information to the

appropriate Vegan Society staff member as the campaign gets under way.

 

Apologies to those of you (hopefully a majority?) who are already

members of the Vegan Society and have therefore already seen the

article. For those who are not, do consider joining. You can do so

online at <www.vegansociety.com/shop>. The more members we have, the

greater our ability to speak out on behalf of all vegans, especially

those unable to do so for themselves.

 

If anyone would like a copy of the Society's new Environment booklet

and/or the ever popular Why Vegan and/or a trial copy of the quarterly

magazine, just let me have a mailing address and I'll see what I can do.

 

Sorry this is a bit long, but I don't post very often!

 

Good wishes to all,

 

Vanessa

 

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DIETARY DISRESPECT - THE END IS IN SIGHT

[The Vegan, Autumn 2006]

 

[Vanessa Clarke considers how EU and UK legislation on equality and

diversity and the new Commission for Equality and Human Rights can help

to ensure proper treatment of vegans in all areas of life.]

 

Most vegans spend a great deal of time working for animal rights - and

rightly so, since non-human beings are the least favoured and most

abused group of all. But indifference and disrespect do not stop there.

The very old and the very young, people with disabilities, gays, women,

people from minority ethnic and cultural groups, all risk being treated

with less respect than those more able to speak up for themselves. And

vegans are no exception.

 

THE SITUATION NOW

 

From the cradle to the grave, we are beset with examples of disrespect

and ignorance. Vitamin K is routinely administered to new-borns, but

the vegan option was recently discontinued without consultation or

notification, leaving vegans, Hindus and other groups to remonstrate as

best they could about the bovine bile that now comes as a compulsory

part of the package. At the other end of the spectrum, I was appalled

to find hospital staff trying to get my 93-year-old mother to eat ground

beef despite the large sign over her bed stating that she was a lifelong

vegetarian. Would they have fed ground pork to a Muslim or a Jew?

Quite possibly, so far as I could see. Yet there was no intention to

upset or harm anyone - just overwork and failure to appreciate the

fundamental importance of dietary practice to so many groups in our

society.

 

Most of us have had the unpleasant and unsatisfactory experience of

asking for a vegan meal and being given a standard meal minus the meat,

fish or dairy component, and going away hungry having been charged the

same price as everyone else. Whilst this kind of treatment is

offensive and unacceptable whether it is from a restaurant, an airline

or any other public outlet, it is downright dangerous in situations

where people have no choice but to eat what is provided on a regular or

long-term basis. Again, the most numerous victims are the young, who

are still developing and need proper nutrition, the sick who stand

little chance of speedy recovery on an unbalanced, unappetising and

unvarying diet - and, as ever, the old.

 

PROSPECTS FOR THE FUTURE

 

At last, however, there is light at the end of the tunnel: the European

Union has proclaimed that those with deeply held beliefs such as

veganism are as much entitled to respect and equality of treatment as

any other group - and quite right too, since for many of us our vegan

diet and lifestyle is more important than the culture or religion we

happen to have been born into because it is a moral choice we have made

for ourselves.

 

But there's many a slip between acquiring a right and actually getting

it respected at the point of use. Thanks to the Vegan Prisoners Support

Group, much progress has already been made on behalf of those detained

in Her Majesty's prisons, though it can still be a long step from

getting rights accepted in principle to ensuring that the soya milk and

cruelty-free soap actually reach the intended recipient. And we shall

need all the allies we can get if we are to ensure proper respect for

our diet and lifestyle in schools, hospitals, care homes, canteens and

all the other institutions where food is provided as part of the

service.

 

HOW MANY VOTES IN VEGAN?

 

So - how best to use our new-found legal rights? As always, numbers

count. Until that happy day when vegans constitute a majority of the

population, we have to accept that the average politician won't have a

lot of time to devote to securing our rights. But if we get together

with all the other groups at risk of dietary disrespect - Adventists,

Buddhists, Hindus, Jains, Jews, Muslims, Rastafarians, Sikhs, the

lactose intolerant and the ethical vegetarians - we become a force to be

reckoned with and in many constituencies a factor in electoral

calculations.

 

A new Commission for Equality and Human Rights is to replace the current

bodies dealing with race, sex and disability. Among its duties will be

to consult with the various interest groups and eventually to require

all kinds of institutions and authorities throughout society to draw up

plans showing how they intend to meet the requirements of the new law,

which covers the provision of accommodation and catering as well as

employment. The Commission will also be able to offer information,

advice and training on how to put this into practice - always a crucial

factor, since ignorance all too often begets defensiveness and even

hostility when people simply don't understand the needs of the diversity

of groups whom they serve and therefore have no idea how to meet them.

 

THE WAY FORWARD - AND HOW EVERYONE CAN HELP

 

In addition to ensuring that the new Commission consults the Vegan

Society from the outset, we need to have guidelines and even recipes

ready for those doing their best to implement the new rights. The

Society is therefore embarking on a major advocacy campaign approved by

Council earlier this year. We shall be seeking to get the subject

raised in Parliament as well as liaising with a variety of other

interest groups. We shall also be gathering information on the current

state of play in various areas and preparing advice and guidance to make

it easier for those responsible to treat us with the respect to which we

are entitled in every aspect of our lives.

 

But we shall need a very great deal of help, so do have a think and see

what you can contribute. Cash is always very welcome, but information

is equally crucial - and virtually every member is in a position to

offer that. For instance,

 

- Are your school dinners dead awful (dead as well as awful)?

Tell us whether you get vegan food at school and if so, what it's like,

and if not, what excuses they give. What would you like them to serve?

 

- Do your work colleagues or college friends enjoy the benefits of

a canteen at lunchtime? What is the attitude to vegans? What would you

like to see on the menu?

 

- Have you ever been in hospital? How did you fare as a vegan?

 

- Many people spend the latter years of their life in a retirement

home and some eventually move to a nursing home or a hospice. Have you

any experience of this, whether first hand or through a vegan friend or

relative?

 

Most institutions work to a very tight budget, so we can't expect

celebrity treatment. But many of the ingredients routinely used could

easily form part of tasty and nutritious vegan meals. We already have

guidance available for the prison service and are working on similar

information for other areas.

 

MAKING SURE THAT OUR VIEWS ARE KNOWN AND RESPECTED

 

It should not be a struggle to ensure that people who have spent their

lives campaigning for veganism and animal rights should have their

beliefs respected to the end. Nor should a vegan involved in an

accident be tube fed unacceptable substances because no one understands

(or cares?) about their views. A medallion or wristband engraved with

" O positive - and VEGAN " might do the trick, or at least get people

thinking. But what if you're no longer able to take decisions for

yourself? Unless you have made your beliefs and wishes very clear,

whether in a living will or by other means, a non-vegan with power of

attorney may fail to regard your veganism as important - or simply fail

to think of it at all.

 

Thanks to the detective work of Kirsten Jungsberg from Denmark, a number

of us were privileged to meet Vegan Society Patron and activist Serena

Coles in the last couple of years of her life and to witness her joy at

being surrounded by vegans and enjoying vegan food with admirers of all

ages at her 94.5th and 95th birthday celebrations. But it took a lot

of effort by a lot of people to achieve this. And it will take a lot

more effort by even more people to ensure that all vegans are accorded

the respect and the equality of treatment to which we are entitled at

every stage and in every area of our lives.

 

[Further (rather heavy) reading:

 

The text of the Equality Act

www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2006/ukpga_20060003_en.pdf

 

The Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003

www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2003/20031660.htm

 

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