Vegan vs Plant-Based

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:00

Welcome to the Deficient Vegans Podcast, episode 53. I'm the muscle deficient vegan here with the protein deficient vegan. Do you want to say hi? Hi. Hi, everybody. So this week, we'll be talking about plant-based versus vegan. Why are these two movements that seem so similar at odds with one another? And another thing we're going to talk about is the intersection of veganism and the LGBTQ plus community. And a couple of LGBTQ plus-owned vegan businesses that we swear by.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:25

Some of our favorites.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:26

But first up, new news.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:27

New news.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:30

The first thing we have here is that Portland, in Oregon in the U.S., has banned foie gras.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:35

Yeah. So if you don't know what that is, which I actually didn't because I've never been anywhere that served it because I'm a mere peasant. Yeah. But apparently, foie gras, I don't know if I said that right. That was right. Okay, cool. It's the fatty liver of a waterfowl, such as a goose or a duck, in which the organ is enlarged by a traditional force-feeding process.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 0:56

Oh, good.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 0:57

Which, you know... Even by vegan standards, which we think most things are unethical, this is like one of the more unethical practices.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:05

This is like active torture almost.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:07

Yeah. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:09

But so in Portland, because of council rules delaying the implementation and also an amendment that pushed the enforcement of the law out by another 180 days, the ban will actually go into effect at the end of the year on December 31st.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:20

Yeah. And so reading through the article, basically, it was talking about some of the tactics that the protesters used. Oh, yeah. And I guess they would reserve primetime tables at the restaurants that were serving it and then wait for the dining room to fill up and then stand up and start screaming at everyone about how inhumane it was, which sounds pretty effective.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:38

It sounds like it worked. You would think with all that ruckus, the restaurants would have voluntarily stopped serving it, but I guess they needed a law to get the point across. Yeah. Some other places in the U.S. that have also passed some bans on the sale of foie gras are California, New York City, Pittsburgh, and Brookline, Massachusetts. Also, dozens of countries in Europe have banned the production, but they still allow imports.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 2:02

Which is, like, weird.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 2:04

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 2:04

We think it's bad enough that you can't do it here, but we will buy it from other places.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 2:08

That is a little weird. India is the only country in the world with a complete ban on foie gras.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 2:15

Go India! Hopefully other countries will follow suit.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 2:18

Yeah, hopefully. The next piece of news we have is talking again about protein made from air, which we mentioned a couple of episodes ago. But we do have some updated news on that front. So, there's a Finnish gas fermentation startup called Solar Foods, and they have a product called Solein Protein. That has officially entered the U.S. with the launch of a new protein powder by the Ambrosia Collective's Planta brand.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 2:42

Yeah, which I think Planta protein powder is pretty well known. I've seen people talk about it. We've bought... two bags of it it was like a birthday cake sprinkle protein powder and i think maybe banana bread or something yeah i didn't particularly care for it's kind of gritty i'm hoping the air protein is less gritty than their normal protein powder

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:04

You would think so right air is not super great i can't i don't taste any grit in the air right now no feels.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:08

Pretty grit free

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:09

Um also the only i remember planta the only thing i actually remember about that is it's one of those protein powders that includes like includes a bunch of vitamins and stuff and i try not to use it yeah okay yeah i look even the air brand or the air flavor has that in there so there are a couple of vitamins where it can be a little weird to get too much of it so i try to avoid keep it putting in the protein powder but most people probably don't need to avoid that i just already take multivitamins yeah yeah um yeah so i'm not a big fan of having it in protein powder but if you don't take a multivitamin this is probably a bonus yeah i'm.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:41

Mostly interested in trying the first air protein to enter the

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:45

U.S. Oh, absolutely, yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:46

Right now they only have one flavor, and it's salted caramel cold brew, which I don't know that I will like because I don't even like the smell of coffee. Yeah. But we'll see.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:56

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 3:57

And we'll let you know because we ordered some.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 3:58

Yeah. It's got 20 grams of complete protein in each scoop.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 4:01

I think we're like officially living in the future if we're getting protein from the air.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 4:06

100%. It seems that way. We need to figure out how to do it in the backyard. Yeah. All right. And the last piece of news we have is a story about Canada turning beer waste into protein. The Canadian government has kicked off a project to turn beer waste into proteins, also turn it into cocoa alternatives and other things.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 4:21

Yeah. So I really like talking about beer and ethanol production and anything involving yeast.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 4:27

Yeah. Or grains.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 4:29

Or grains. Yeah. I worked as a process engineer at an ethanol plant for seven years. So I like this topic. Like, so if you don't know how beer is made, they basically mash up grains, they remove the solids, add water, yeast, and a few other things, and then ferment it until alcohol is produced. There's, like, a few other steps, but, like, that's the gist of it. Right.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 4:49

That's why it's so easy to make at home. It's a fairly simple process. Yeah. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 4:53

So the solids that are removed are high in fiber and just like some stats around what we're looking at macro-wise. It's 50 to 60 percent carbohydrates, 20 to 30 percent protein, and like 6 to 10 percent fat. And most of the carbs are fiber. So lots of good stuff.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 5:11

Yeah, sounds like a pretty good makeup for an ingredient that would be used for food.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 5:15

So the majority of brewers spent grain, which is what we're talking about, is used for animal feed, biofuel, or compost. But some of it still ends up in landfills. And, like, obviously that takes up space in landfills and also can emit greenhouse gases like methane and carbon. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 5:31

I know everybody has forgotten about the ozone layer, but we could mostly fix the problem. But let's not re-cause the problem. Right. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 5:38

And, like, why food waste? If you can use it, why would, you know, you dump it? Yeah. So, you know, turning it into a protein source for humans could lower the greenhouse gas emissions and food waste.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 5:47

And it can also help tackle some food shortages. Yeah. So anytime we get more food opportunities from things that were not used for food before is probably a good thing. Yeah, absolutely.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 5:57

It's also like it's a byproduct or I guess a side product. Yeah. So the startup company Terra Bio Industries has developed a process that breaks open the spent grains, converting the outer layer into sugars. And then this allows them to separate the protein from the spent grains and turn that into a dried plant-based protein ingredient. I assume maybe similar to like textured vegetable protein.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 6:23

Yeah, it sounds like really similar to that kind of thing. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 6:25

I couldn't find like pictures or really a description of what that looks like, but that's my guess. Yeah. And it can also allow them to separate out the sugars. And then those are concentrated into a feedstock that gets used for precision fermentation. Okay. Which is like our second favorite thing to talk about. And so then this technology is going to use the brewer's spent grains to make like basically four different ingredients. Terra protein, which is like a high protein concentrate that would taste like bread and could lower carb content and boost protein and fiber in things like baked goods. Pasta and snacks.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:00

High-protein cake.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:00

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:01

Okay.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:01

I'm done. Not bad. Yeah. Then there's the Terra Fibra, which is high-fiber flour.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:07

Oh, nice.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:08

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:09

That's pretty cool.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:10

And then there's the Terra Choc, which is a cocoa extender that targets the alt-chocolate space, which is actually pretty popular right now.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:18

Topping off with all the issues with cocoa.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:19

Yeah. And then the last ingredient it would make is terra malt, which is like a toffee barley malt syrup that adds flavor, sweetness, and a natural brown color to, they were saying, sausage, drinks, and other things. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:32

I'm going to be honest. I've had a lot of things that are malt flavored. I have no idea what malt is or what that means.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:36

No, but I like it. Maybe we can get like a vegan Ovaltine.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:41

Oh, that'd be cool. Yeah. More Ovaltine, please.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 7:45

So separating it into individual ingredient type products makes it more useful and profitable.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 7:52

Yeah, they do like making money. I would imagine that if a company has an opportunity to either throw something in the garbage or make money from it, they're going to go for making money from it, right?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 8:00

Yeah, and I also think this is interesting because if we ever enter a fully vegan world in which we aren't raising animals for slaughter, then there would be no reason we would send this out as animal feed, which is what it's primarily used for. Yeah. So finding other ways to use it for humans is a good thing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 8:18

Yeah, definitely.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 8:20

And then I did want to note that Unlike, like, fuel ethanol production, the beer production, it's already food grade because people drink beer. Oh, yeah. So, like, no changes would need to be made to the actual manufacturing plants.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 8:31

Oh, that's interesting because the way it gets processed and the machinery and stuff has to be, like, different.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 8:35

Food grade already. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 8:36

That's really a good point. Yeah. Cool.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 8:38

It's already human grade, so, like, but we're feeding it to cows, which is kind of weird.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 8:42

Yeah. There you go. Looking forward to seeing a lot of these new things turn up in our foods as we go forward. The terra fiber one, high fiber flour, that could be really interesting for, like, tortillas and stuff like that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 8:51

Yeah. I don't know if it would be similar to, what's that one that people, I still haven't messed with it yet. Psyllium husk.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 8:57

Oh, yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 8:58

I wonder if it's similar to like psyllium husk, you know? I know people use that in like bready things to reduce the carb count and increase the fiber.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 9:05

It's pretty potent on the increasing the fiber department. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 9:08

I actually haven't baked with it yet, but I think we bought a bag of it.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 9:11

Yeah. I've had it as a supplement a few times. It's pretty.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 9:15

Pretty effective for lubricating the pipes.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 9:20

Yeah. Yeah, definitely. So that's it for the news. Let's move into our main segment. So plant-based versus vegan. We hear these interchanged quite a bit, but they're actually separate movements or separate ideas with separate motivations. They can seem really similar, but they're actually quite different.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 9:36

Yeah, and it can cause a lot of confusion. So we're going to spend this episode clearing up what some of that confusion is and why it's important to understand the differences. I think kind of for everyone.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 9:46

Yeah, definitely. Um, this seemed like a particularly relevant topic because another fairly popular plant-based influencer slash recipe creator is eating animal products again. And it seems like that happens kind of a lot.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 10:00

Yeah. I'm going to be real honest. I don't follow a lot of, like, influencer recipe creator types because I don't want to, like, accidentally lodge their ideas in my brain. So I just kind of don't pay attention to that space. but i mostly see it on reddit of people being like oh my god another vegan content creator or like influencer is now eating eggs yeah so i saw that this week i don't remember what the guy's name is but seems like it happens a lot yeah so hopefully this episode kind of like clears up some of the confusion around why that could be and yeah and

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 10:32

You know something else just related to that is kind of crazy it's like when one of those creators makes that video that's like oh i'm eating eggs again or i'm eating meat again or whatever that's probably like their most popular video so far, maybe because of the controversy, but they're going to, you know, lose all their vegan followers probably. And then I don't think a lot of omnivores are going to catch on the bus with this person who has been vegan for a while. I mean, or has been plant-based for a while.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 10:53

Maybe they will. Yeah. What I think will happen is they'll just put that in their arsenal of reasons why they can't be vegan, you know, but yeah, we'll get into that. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 11:03

So let's get to the root of the matter. If somebody eats plants, are they vegan?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 11:07

And I think so. I think many non-vegans would say yes to this yeah and i think some plant-based people would also say yes but i think a lot of vegans would say i don't know tell me more yeah

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 11:19

I need more information.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 11:20

I'm not gonna give you an answer yet

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 11:24

So, let's get into the differences a little bit. So, for veganism, first and foremost, this is an ethical philosophy. It's not really necessarily about the diet on its own. Yeah. It's seeking to end animal exploitation. It's like an animal rights, animal welfare philosophy.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 11:40

Yeah. And it extends beyond just food choices. So, if you're a vegan, you're looking at your clothing, entertainment, household products, and things you might avoid like aquariums and general issues with any form of animal exploitation. So it's like diet is obviously a very big part of it because that's where most of us would normally use animal products, but it is definitely not like the whole thing. And like I would say the diet is more of a byproduct of the philosophy than it is like the point, you know?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 12:10

Yeah, definitely. It's just you have to be you have to have a vegan diet if you're a vegan because you're not using animal products.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 12:17

Exactly. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 12:18

So for plant-based, this is mainly a dietary pattern, and it's honestly a pretty big spectrum.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 12:24

Yes.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 12:25

People may call themselves plant-based whether they eat entirely plant-based or mostly plant-based. It's like pretty broad.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 12:33

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 12:33

And I think even like in medical terminology, like a plant-based diet means mostly plant-based.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 12:39

Right. And I've seen that used in products too. Yeah. It's like, it'll say plant-based, but then it still has eggs in it. Right. And I'm like, okay. But then, I mean... I think I see it mostly on threads, I guess. It's like, oh, yeah, like I'm mostly plant-based. I'm like 80% plant-based or, you know, they just kind of, I'm plant-based except I eat fish. I'm plant-based except I eat cheese. It's like a very broad term that definitely doesn't, it's not like as black and white as the term vegan.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 13:07

Right. Yeah. Some of the reasons that you might be motivated to move towards a plant-based diet are like health, weight loss, longevity, athletic performance, or maybe even environmental concerns. Yeah. There are a lot of people who eat a plant-based diet because of environmental concerns, but really aren't in it for like the animal welfare. Right. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 13:26

And so I think, you know, you can be plant-based and not be vegan, even if you eat plant-based 100% of the time. Right. Because ultimately it comes down to the person's reasons and motivations. So if you eat entirely plant-based, but you don't care about animal exploitation, and you also don't follow the rest of the vegan philosophy, Maybe I would say you're not vegan.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 13:47

Right. And that's not necessarily a judgment call. It's just I think we're going to talk about a lot of the reasons why using the wrong terminology, like, confuses people in general. So, like, when we are telling somebody, hey, we're vegan, they don't know what the hell it means. Yeah, yeah. It just makes conversations a lot more difficult when we get things mixed up.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 14:06

Yeah. And I will say, but like you could also be vegan and health focused. Like you could be a vegan for the animals, but follow a whole food plant based diet because you're focused on your health.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 14:16

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 14:17

So it's totally possible to be vegan and also care about your health, just like you could be an omnivore and care about your health.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 14:22

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 14:23

So I think it really ultimately comes down to like, what is your primary, what is your primary motivation? And do you care about animal exploitation? Right? Right.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 14:32

And that also changes the lens of, like, what you are going to change in your life. Because if you're doing it for animal exploitation, like, you know, you're changing everything. Like, you're getting rid of anything that you can that is reasonable to eliminate, you know, animal harm as much as possible. Like, that is the primary goal and everything else is just kind of like you were saying a byproduct of that. Yeah. Whereas if you're doing it for your health, you're really only going to change the things that are going to improve your personal health.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 14:55

Right. And I think it also might change the way you, like, what kind of things you eat, too. Yeah. Because, like, vegans are fine with eating, like, meat alternatives, meat substitutions, cheese substitutions, like, processed things. But if you're plant-based and your primary thing is your health, you're more likely to be, like, a whole food plant-based person where you're only eating whole food ingredients. So you're probably not messing with, you know, Beyond Meat and Violife cheese.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 15:23

So let's talk a little bit about where both of the movements came from. So veganism, not new really at all.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 15:30

Which is interesting because I think a lot of people think it's like a really new thing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 15:34

Yeah, they think it's like a trendy fad type situation. Yeah, yeah. But they've been thinking it was a trendy fad for a thousand years. But yeah, so basically ethical objections to animal use go back thousands of years and are even intertwined with some religions.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 15:48

Yeah. Modern veganism, however, emerged around the 1940s.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 15:52

Yeah. Donald Watson helped establish the vegan society. And the core idea of that was that animals are not resources. It has also been an ethical movement first. And like we said, the food is just kind of part of that stance. Yeah. The plant-based movement, on the other hand, is a little newer. This became mainstream because of nutrition, science, public health, and chronic disease prevention. So some of the key characters in that movement are T. Colin Campbell, Caldwell Esselstyn, and Dean Ornish.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 16:20

These are some of your favorite people.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 16:22

Yeah, we've talked about a couple of these people. And, you know, this is definitely not a judgment against, like, plant-based diets because, like, I really think that they are great for health. And, you know, I follow a lot of these people. I've read their books and stuff like that. So there's definitely something to that. But the plant-based diet, as a function of improving your health, kind of came from some of these, you know, founding fathers, so to speak, of the movement.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 16:41

Right. And it's like fairly separate from the animal rights.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 16:44

Yeah. Oh, very separate.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 16:46

Stuff, you know, like unrelated. Yeah. It's pretty much just human health focused. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 16:50

Um, yeah, the messaging for, like, plant-based diet was focused on heart health, cancer risk, diabetes, longevity, reversing chronic disease in some cases. Yeah. Things like that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 17:00

Think of books like How Not to Die or even documentaries like Forks Over Knives.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 17:05

Yeah, or The China Study was a book by T. Colin Campbell.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 17:09

Yeah, um, they even have some, like, classes for college universities that are popping up that are around the plant-based diet that focus on nutrition and stuff like that. Yeah. Just because I think... That's not really in the normal college curriculum in the nutrition and like dietitian coursework, I guess.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 17:28

Yeah. And the plant-based ideology doesn't necessarily care about animals at all. It's all about optimizing human health. And again, that's not to say that there aren't whole food plant-based people who are also vegan. It's just they are separate things. So the reason why these two movements might kind of clash, even though the diets are very similar, is that vegans in general want to change society's relationship with animals.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 17:49

Right. So, like, success for the vegan movement would look like fewer animals being bred into exploitation. There's just a large cultural change or shift. Like, we're just not using animals like resources.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 18:05

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 18:06

And then we'd probably look for legal protection for animals. Similar to how legally you protect, like, pets, like dogs and cats, like you can't abuse them or they can be taken away from you. I think we would look for those legal protections for all animals.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 18:20

Yeah, they're already animal cruelty laws. Yeah. I mean, it's just an extension of that to all animals.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 18:24

Right. Like it doesn't go to factory farming right now.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 18:27

I don't remember the details. We covered a story probably a couple of months back where I think it was dolphins and some region were going to be granted like personhood for legal purposes. So it's that kind of idea.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 18:38

It's really interesting that it's like species based where these laws apply. Yeah. You know, but from a vegan perspective, we'd want that for all animals. Yeah. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 18:49

And on the other hand, success in the plant-based movement that's mostly focused on improving human health looks like, you know, lower cholesterol, lower rates of heart disease, weight loss, like more longevity or, you know, not just a longer life, but a longer, healthier life, health span over lifespan, things like that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 19:07

So like the success for the vegan movement is a societal change where the success for a plant-based movement is like an individual betterment for your health.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 19:17

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 19:18

So like totally different goals. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 19:20

And I think one place where this could potentially become obvious is that if new science were to come out that was basically like clear cut favoring some new animal based diet or it was just like extremely irrefutable evidence that an animal based diet was the healthier diet over a plant based diet, then the plant based movement could completely fall off because they've lost basically their entire argument at that point.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 19:45

Yeah, exactly. Since the plant-based movement, the building blocks of that are solely around scientific backed up data that suggests that a plant-based diet is the healthiest. If that were to tumble, it doesn't exist anymore. It has no legs. Yeah. But, like, so the vegan movement, it's based on ending animal exploitation. Like, you can't really, like, poke holes in that.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 20:07

Yeah. So, I mean, even if it, and again, this is a hypothetical because there are decades of research showing the plant-based diet benefits. But even if the vegan diet or the plant-based diet was, you know, notably unhealthier, not, like, you know, lethal or something. Right, right. But notably unhealthier, vegans would still stick to it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 20:25

Right. Because vegans aren't doing it for human health. Right. and I think you know I think any research that would come out about human health wouldn't really shift the philosophy of veganism as a whole.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 20:36

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Protein Deficient Vegan: 20:40

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Muscle Deficient Vegan: 20:42

So how do you think the two terms got intermingled?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 20:45

I think most of it is because the general population doesn't know, like, the difference between the two and the two terminologies haven't been widely discussed. Yeah. So, like, the general public was calling people who don't consume animal products vegan because... because they didn't even care to ask them what their motivations were. They just know that vegan means, like, you don't eat animal products. And I will say that the general public doesn't even really understand the difference between, like, vegetarian and vegan. No. They don't even understand what vegetarian means. Like, when I was vegetarian for 20 years, people were like, so you still eat fish?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 21:16

I mean, we've met some that work in restaurants that don't understand the difference between vegan and gluten-free.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 21:21

I know. So, like, this is just, like, poor education of the general public. It's a very, I mean, even if you look at the vegan movement and the plant-based people as a whole it's still a very small percentage of the population and I think what's just true in society is like the majority of people don't really give a shit what a small group of people are doing enough to learn about it unless it directly impacts them or they have someone come into their life that is you know, following a vegan or plant-based diet, and then they might care to learn more about it. So I think just generally speaking, they heard the term vegan and they just applied that to everyone.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 21:55

Right. And I don't necessarily think the onus is on everybody on the planet to learn about these things, but we should not on our sides, on the plant-based side and the vegan side, be like using the wrong terminology and things that get pushed out to the world. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 22:07

And I think, interesting, you brought that up because I would say that the confusion actually really escalated between like 2010 and 2020 because of social media. Oh, yeah. You have like influencers and food bloggers that are branding themselves as vegan, even though they're just plant-based health focused. Yeah. And now you have like millions of people watching their videos, reading their stuff that have never heard the word vegan or plant-based before. And so whatever that person is saying is now the definition they know.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 22:36

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 22:36

So, like, if a health-focused, plant-based influencer calls themselves a vegan, the general population doesn't know there's a difference. It's just they're all vegans. Right.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 22:48

Yeah. And, you know, I think a lot of the time the content creator in those cases is using the word vegan because it's a little more trendy and, you know, it latches on a little better than plant-based.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 23:00

And you have like a built-in fan base already of people that are vegan.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 23:05

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 23:06

You know?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 23:06

Yeah, definitely. Companies also began rebranding their products to be plant-based instead of vegan because maybe they sold better. But that also created more confusion that the terms can be used interchangeably.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 23:18

Yeah. I think we really saw this over the last 10 years or so, but I guess there was a study that basically found that people, basically non-vegan, non-plant-based people, were more willing to buy food that had a plant-based label than a vegan label because, for some reason, vegan has negative connotations with it when people read it.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 23:36

Yeah, the vegan label has a lot of stigma. And you also see some products that were like, they were vegan, they switched to using the plant-based label, and then maybe they add milk, and they still had the plant-based label. Morning star! So now you have this product that used to be a vegan product, but is now not vegan and still has plant-based on it, but is using animal products, and it's extremely confusing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 23:57

It's very confusing. I would actually be really interested to see their numbers because, I mean... I can't imagine it helped things on with the people that were already purchasing the products. I guess I'd be interested to see if more omnivores started buying their products. But I mean, I can't imagine it was substantial.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:16

Do you think more omnivores bought more? I think it was like plant-based short ribs or whatever because milk's hiding in the ingredients. That seems unlikely.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:23

Well, yeah. I just wonder if it's like, did they buy it because it said plant-based instead of vegan?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:28

Oh, definitely. You know what I mean? I think that's probably.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:30

Do you think it's like substantial though?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:32

I don't know.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:33

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:33

It's interesting.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:34

I wish people would release that kind of information. Yeah. Because, you know, if a brand showed, okay, yeah, well, we got like 10% more sales, then fine. Use whatever fucking label you want. I want less animals murdered.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:46

I know I have talked to a few people at restaurants and stuff that are basically like, I put vegan on this. People won't buy it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 24:52

I have seen that.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 24:54

So, yeah. Yeah, it's interesting. Also, documentaries like Forks Over Knives, What the Health, Game Changers came out, And the ethical part of the movement received less and less attention because those were all health focused.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 25:04

Right. So I think that's where the general public's perception became veganism is like a health thing. Right. It's another diet.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 25:14

So why do vegans object to plant based people calling themselves vegan? Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 25:19

Okay, from my perspective, if you have plant-based people who are in there for their health, calling themselves vegan, then the ethical stance can get lost if the two movements aren't clearly separated.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 25:31

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 25:31

Right? So, like, it becomes less about the animals, it loses the actual goal, which is ending animal exploitation, and it can start to cause other things to get lost, too, like, you know, the fur industry, or, like, use of feathers in pillows and coats, or, you know, zoos, aquariums, like, all forms of animals. animal exploitation kind of get lost because it just becomes focused on a diet.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 25:52

Yeah. And it also creates confusion for the general public that doesn't really understand either movement. So influencer says they're vegan just to kind of simplify their messaging or to make it easier for viewers to understand what they eat specifically. They're not doing any of the other vegan things. So even if they like, even if they convince somebody to like start a vegan diet, like you're going to have somebody who's like, oh, I'm a vegan now, but they're not really vegan because they don't even understand like why, like the philosophy behind veganism itself.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 26:20

Yeah. I see this on threads all the time. Threads is like the one I see this with the most. Yeah. Where people are calling themselves vegan or they're like, ooh, I'm going to try a vegan diet for two months or something like that.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 26:31

They say like, I'm going to be vegan for the next two months. Yeah. Like try a vegan diet almost makes sense. Right. But they're like, I'm going to go vegan for the next three months. Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 26:39

And it's like, clearly you don't really understand the philosophy. Like, I wish you would just use the term plant. I'm excited that you're going to be doing this, but can you use the right words?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 26:47

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 26:48

You know, and then I think with the influencers thing, whether where they're not like a real vegan, they're a plant based influencer calling themselves a vegan. Yeah. They even maybe they eventually decide they're going to reintroduce animal products or maybe they always use honey. Oh, yeah. Because they don't know that's not a vegan thing, but they're calling themselves vegan. Yeah. And then sometimes they'll just start reintroducing animal products because they want a larger following or they personally want to eat animals again.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 27:14

Yeah. Or they're wearing leather or something. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 27:16

Right. and it's like That's confusing to most people. Yeah. People don't really understand the ins and outs of like, what is vegan? What is plant-based? Was this person vegan or was this person plant-based? And so then the general public just thinks, oh, well, like vegans quit all the time. Yeah. And they're secretly eating meat all the time and there aren't any real vegans. And then also vegans are just hypocrites because no one actually sticks to a vegan diet.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 27:40

Right. Which were all these things applied to people who were just like trying a plant-based diet for a while. Right. And it wasn't really, they weren't, they were never really vegan. Yeah. They're different things.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 27:49

And I've seen all of these things said where it's like, people don't believe that you're not eating meat. Like, oh my God, at work? I had people being like, do you go and sneak burgers when I'm at work? Yeah. And I'm like, no, he's vegan. And they're like, yeah, people say that, but then they go eat meat. And it's like, vegans don't go eat meat. What are you talking about?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 28:11

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 28:11

Plant-based people might. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 28:13

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 28:14

A vegan wouldn't.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 28:15

Yeah. It's a... Yeah. Using interchangeable just makes it confusing. And now, you know, I'm vegan and I go to work functions and it's like, I've had conversations with people about like, I'm vegan, but they don't get it. So they're like, well, so you can't have this because it has cheese or like, or it's like, well, I've got this food. Can you eat this this time? Or it's like, it doesn't like change. Yeah, yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 28:34

Or like, yeah, you first go vegan and it's like, oh, well, you've only been doing that for three months. Can't you still eat this? Like, like a family gathering or something. Yeah. I just think this whole setup of like famous person, influencer, calls themselves vegan, stops going vegan. It creates all this confusion with everyone else because that's all most people see in that space.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 28:57

Well, and I think the real world implicate, like a lot of this, you know, we're talking about something and maybe it sounds to some people like, oh, it's just like a label thing. Like, who cares what you call yourself? But really it has real implications because like the thing is like if I'm at work and I'm like, oh, I'm a vegan and we're doing some kind of group outing or something. It's like finding the right food may not be taken as seriously or like, you know, they might not consider that like I actually can't eat the thing. They're like, oh, it's a best effort. Like, we'll try to get something maybe you can eat. But if not, you'll just eat the thing, right?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 29:24

Yeah, it's seen more of like, oh, you're trying to eat healthy versus like, oh, you're morally against eating animal products.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 29:31

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 29:32

Where veganism should be seen similar to like religious ways of eating. Yeah. It's often seen as like a health diet. Yeah. Right. And then I think a lot of this confusion makes it harder for actual vegans and the movement in general to move forward because like you're losing trust of the public. You know? Yeah. They don't think anyone actually sticks to the vegan diet or veganism. Right. And then it makes people nervous because they don't think it can be done safely because you have these like, quote unquote, ex-vegan influencers being like, oh, my health was in jeopardy. I had to add back in eggs. Yeah. And it's like, I don't want to. really comment on like anyone's medical situations but it it's just more of like you have huge influence millions of people are seeing your stuff if you're coming out and saying like i was vegan for 10 years and i couldn't keep doing it because i got really sick yeah it makes people feel like nervous about trying a vegan

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 30:27

Diet right and again like you said like i'm not gonna make judgment on somebody's specific medical situation but a lot of the time when that happens it's like they were trying a plant-based diet they're not really vegan so like the speed bump comes up and they're like okay i'm having like this issue so i should try to change my diet a little bit like it's usually you should make your diet healthier and not like you should reintroduce animal products but making your diet healthier and sticking to a vegan diet is harder so they're like okay well i'm not really in this with the animals anyway so it's just easier for me to start eating meat again but if that person was actually a vegan i mean there's almost always a way to just like change the diet yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 31:04

It might be more challenging

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 31:05

Right, Exactly.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 31:08

Yeah. You might lose some conveniences of like where you can eat out and stuff. But I think for the most part, you can probably you can probably get it done. I mean, yeah, we were talking the other day and it's like if for some reason I ended up with a bunch of overlapping allergies that came out of nowhere and I had to just eat lentils and that was like all I could eat forever.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 31:26

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 31:27

I would do that because I'm not eating animal products.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 31:30

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 31:30

And I don't really have the expectation that anyone else is going to eat one ingredient for the rest of their lives if they have a bunch of overlapping allergies or something. But, like, I don't know. I think I'd figure it out. Yeah. Even if it was, like, horrible.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 31:43

Yeah. I mean, typically the people who are, like, I stopped going vegan or whatever, they're actually plant-based. It's just because, like, the alternative was too hard. It wasn't because they medically needed to do that. It was like, okay, it would be too hard to get this stuff because I'm, like, going out with my friends all the time. Yeah. Or I'm going to have to start cooking more. Or, like, I'm going to have to try some ingredients I don't actually like and stuff like that. And they're like, but I already know I like these animal ingredients, so I'm just going to go back to that. It's way easier.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 32:05

Right. And then I think just, I think most vegans kind of get that. You're like, oh, you probably weren't actually vegan. Yeah. You were just using the label. But, I mean, the general population doesn't understand the difference between the two. So all they see is, like, this person went on a vegan diet for 10 years. They got sick. Yeah. Obviously, eating a vegan diet is bad for you.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 32:26

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 32:27

I shouldn't try it because it's unsafe. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And then I think the most interesting part about this whole thing is that the animals become completely lost in the conversation, right?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 32:39

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 32:39

It's like when people go from, quote unquote, vegan to non-vegan, it's like there's almost never a conversation about the animals. It always ends up being about like human health.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 32:48

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 32:49

Yeah. And then, you know, veganism just gets seen as like another diet.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 32:53

Yeah, it always gets lumped in with like...

Protein Deficient Vegan: 32:55

Keto or the carnivore diet.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 32:57

Even, like, vegan versus carnivore, that doesn't make any sense because carnivore is not an ethical thing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 33:02

Yeah, it should be plant-based versus carnivore. Yeah. If you want to compare things.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 33:06

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 33:06

But, yeah, you always see, like, vegan lumped in with, like, keto. It's, like,

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 33:11

What and it's kind of it is hard to navigate a little bit because i feel like even when i'm talking about it i have to say the vegan diet because plant-based diet doesn't mean vegan all the time anymore right yeah plant-based diet could include meat and milk and stuff like that so there's not really a term where we can cleanly separate and be like i'm a vegan and i also eat the, the snufflegus diet or whatever but it's just you know the vegan diet but then you start thinking veganism was all about the diet right you say the plant-based diet which also sometimes includes animal products so yeah it's a little confusing it's gotten.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 33:41

Pretty confusing where i think before it was kind of clean before plant-based came on the the radar it was kind of clean because it's like vegan diet there was one only one meaning for that

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 33:49

Yeah yeah it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 33:50

Never got conflated with plant-based it was just its own thing yeah and like just because you had a v you're eating a vegan diet they call also imply that you're following vegan principles

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 33:59

Yeah and there's also another layer i guess of like plant-based diet is not the same as whole food plant-based diet right yeah oh.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 34:05

I learned that on reddit they get kind of mean

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 34:07

Yeah they have very strong opinions on what whole food means and.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 34:13

Then i think you know another layer of the of an issue that this causes is that real life vegans end up spending more time like correcting the misunderstandings than actually explaining ethics and getting people to care about animals

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 34:26

Oh yeah i rarely like when i'm talking about me being vegan in a conversation the conversation rarely last long enough for me to get to the animal part.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 34:32

I know because you're like having to like correct a bunch of misunderstandings of like what what the hell does that mean? Because there's so much confusion.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 34:40

Yeah. And you know, I get it. The part that impacts your relationships with people is like, OK, what do we eat? What can we eat together? Yeah. So it makes sense. But like, yeah, when we're using different terminology, you just you lose the whole point of like, I'm doing this because like eating animals. Why are we doing that? Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 34:56

Or just like conversations that are happening online and social media are pretty ineffective because they kind of just get stuck in this like loop of like what is a vegan diet what is a plant based like you're kind of like correcting misunderstandings and you never really get to the meat of the meat the vegan meat of the argument yeah um And then I would say, like, this can be really frustrating because the actual vegans have to explain this, like, over and over again.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 35:21

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 35:22

And all the time, all the while, the influencer may have never been vegan in the first place. And their ethics weren't even in line with veganism. And now I have to explain what that means to a bunch of people.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 35:33

And we're going through another round of it, I guess, now with whoever this was. I don't even know the influencer started eating eggs again. Yeah, yeah. So it's like, okay, well, we have to go through, like, they weren't a vegan. They were eating a plant-based diet, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Same thing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 35:42

Oh, it's, like, exhausting. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 35:43

Groundhog Day.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 35:43

And then when this happens, like the public perception of... veganism or the vegan movement becomes rebranded to like wellness culture or weight loss culture or clean eating culture you see that a lot and that's when people think like they can't believe that vegans are eating like junk food yeah

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 36:00

We see all the time it's like how are you how are you unhealthy as a vegan or like how.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 36:04

Can you gain weight as a vegan it's

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 36:06

Like okay well these those aren't the same thing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 36:07

Yeah or all you eat is salads or all you eat is rabbit food it's like uh yeah yeah i like rarely eat a salad maybe i should eat more salads actually right

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 36:15

And like Like, you know, as a personal trainer, it's interesting because, like, I'm obviously putting out information about, like, vegan nutrition and fitness. So, like, you know, I don't know if I make it seem like vegan is necessarily health-related. But I think of it as just, like, first of all, there's nothing different about fitness for vegans. And nutrition is, like, sometimes different. Yeah. So it's like I'm just supporting people who are interested in fitness who also happen to be vegan. Right. But it's not an implication that, like, all vegans are doing it for health and fitness.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 36:43

Yeah. And I mean, I think vegan personal trainers are important because I would say most vegans probably don't want to work with a personal trainer who isn't vegan or is like pressuring them to eat animal products or being like, oh, you need like more protein and you should be adding in chicken or you know what I mean?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 37:00

It's also an easy out for the personal trainer to be like, oh, you're not making progress with my program. I guess it's because you're not eating steak. Right. They don't want to hear that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 37:07

Yeah. And they also can't really help you in the way like a vegan personal trainer could where they could offer you recommendations of foods. You know, they just aren't well versed on that stuff because they don't need it. But yeah, it does get a little confusing. It's like. You see a lot of vegan fitness influencers who are really just showing how healthy you can be on a vegan diet, even though they also believe in in the actual vegan stance.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 37:29

And that's just because one of the big concerns about the vegan diet is basically like you can't get strong or you won't be performant or whatever. So this is just the way of being like, well, yeah, you definitely can still do those things here.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 37:40

Yeah, it's kind of like an endless loop of like, I don't want to make this about the diet specifically, but all the questions that people ask are related to the diet. Like, how do you eat your protein? Where do you get iron from? Like, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 37:51

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 37:52

So, yeah, you have to talk about the diet. Yeah. Inevitably. Like, that's where people's biggest hang-ups are.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 37:56

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 37:57

But, you know, ultimately in all these conversations, the animals are, like, completely lost, right?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 38:02

Right. So, the social media influencer problem is a really big issue because plant-based influencers and celebrities have really large platforms a lot of the time. So, when they say they're vegan and then they become, quote-unquote, ex-vegans, a lot of people see that. And maybe that's all they've ever heard about veganism. They're like, I followed this person. They were vegan. Now they're not vegan. Right. I guess that happens all the time.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 38:23

Yeah. And then, like, honestly, like, magazines and blogs and news outlets pick up that stuff. And then they have articles about, like, why I quit veganism. But they're never writing it from the standpoint of, like, why I stopped eating a plant-based diet.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 38:36

Exactly. And, you know, something I think about a lot is, like, even if you felt like you had to medically change your diet, why would you quit all of veganism like yeah if there was some crazy reason you had to start eating animal products like a medical necessity of some sort then why would you like you'd still probably not do like leather and fur and all that stuff and like so you'd still have a lot of the same vegan philosophies you're just like okay well unfortunately i have to do this animal product thing yeah which you know again is not hardly ever a thing that actually is really happening but which.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 39:08

I think is why a lot of vegans don't actually believe ex-vegans exist because like Like, it's weird because, like, how can you believe that animal exploitation is wrong would then be like... No, I don't think that anymore.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 39:20

Yeah. All right. So opinion time. Do you think influencers or people with a large platform have a responsibility to understand a movement before they publicly represent that movement?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 39:30

Yeah, I really do. I mean, it's a social movement, just like any other social movement. I would expect if you're calling yourself a vegan, you know what the hell that means. Yeah. Just like if you're calling yourself a feminist and then you're also talking about how women shouldn't vote. I think you're a fucking idiot. Right. And you should learn what the word feminist means.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 39:50

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 39:51

If you're calling yourself a vegan and you buy a bunch of leather products, I think you need to learn what the word vegan means. Yeah. What are your thoughts?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 40:00

Yeah. I mean, I don't know why you would want to go out there and say, like, I am this thing. Like, if you're going to label yourself, like, a lot of the time you probably don't even need to label yourself. But if you're going to label yourself, why would you do it with a label you don't actually understand?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 40:14

Yeah. I mean, it feels a little unethical to me. Yeah. Like, if you're going to be part of a social movement, you need to understand what that is. Right. And you need to actually care about it and follow it if you're going to call yourself part of it.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 40:25

Yeah. And it might be different if, like, there was an influencer who was eating a mostly plant-based diet and people were just, like, assuming they were vegan. Yeah. But if you're, like, saying yourself, like, I am a vegan, that's a different situation. Like, you've labeled yourself now, so you definitely need to understand what all comes with that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 40:40

I do think there, there are definitely like some, some influencers who are plant-based recipe creators that I don't think ever use the word vegan. And I actually, I appreciate that. Like, clearly you're like a health focused food blog and you're doing plant-based recipes, which is great. And I think vegans should use plant-based recipes and stuff. Yeah. It's just. plant-based recipe creators shouldn't call themselves vegan unless they believe in the ethics. Yeah. Ultimately.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 41:04

I think even some of the, um, the athletes we've mentioned in the past that follow a mostly vegan diet, some of those are like, they don't identify as vegan because they understand the difference. I'm like, okay, I'm not vegan. I just, I eat this diet. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 41:16

And I deeply appreciate that.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 41:18

So now that we know the vegans get mad about it, uh, how could the plant based movement actually hurt the vegan movement?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 41:23

Like tangibly.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 41:24

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 41:24

Um, I think that the main And one is like the animals become invisible in the conversation because the conversation becomes focused on health and fitness, becomes less about animal rights, ethics and morals. Right. Right.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 41:35

Which is frustrating from the vegan perspective because our entire goal is to reduce the animal harm.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 41:40

We want the focus on animals, not on us.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 41:43

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 41:43

And then I also think it creates this kind of like a conditional commitment for those who, quote unquote, eat vegan or plant based that they'll mostly eat plant based except for, you know, seafood, cheese, holiday food, their birthday, traveling. Yeah. And like from a vegan perspective, I find that a little confusing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:00

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 42:01

And from an outsider perspective, it's just perceived that vegans are always like sneaking meat like we talked about. And like, if you're an omnivore thinking about going vegan and that's your perception of the movement, you kind of start to think it's impossible. So I think just that perception makes it harder to convert people.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:17

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 42:18

I would say in general, like the main issue with this is like it becomes more difficult to convert people. Yeah. Because people think basically we're like lying about sneaking meat or like or that it's unhealthy, that kind of stuff, you know? And then I also think the actual harm can come into, like, the marketing's confusing, you know, because companies can market themselves as having plant-based options or being a plant-based company while still using animal products.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 42:46

Yeah, and this actually seems like it's getting worse for some reason. Like, there are a lot of more products now that say plant-based, and they still have some animal products on them. Yeah. It's, like, a little difficult. You can't even really trust that label anymore. You just have to do the same thing, flip it over, look at the allergens or whatever. Yeah. It's kind of my go-to. But, yeah, I mean, it's frustrating.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 43:05

Yeah. And I feel like all of this stuff just kind of snowballs on itself and basically just like words lose all meanings, you know. So I think the main takeaways of how is this tangibly going to hurt the vegan movement, it's like people become less trusting. It's harder to convert people. Animals are taken out of the conversation and just confusion on all layers. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 43:27

And so since we're trying to be fair and cover both sides, and because, you know, I think the health-based benefits of the plant-based movement are really solid anyway, how can the plant-based movement help the vegan movement?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 43:38

Yeah. So, I mean, for me, it's like eating less animals is eating less animals, right? Like, I want people to eat less animals. So if you're plant-based for different reasons than me, I'm still going to be excited that you're plant-based.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 43:49

And also, plant-based eating can turn into veganism. Yeah. You know, you start with the diet, maybe for your own health. You learn the ethics. I mean, really, in most people's personal lives, the diet is the hard part.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:00

Yeah, yeah, true.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:00

So once you get to that point, if you're eating a fully plant-based diet or a vegan diet, again, terminology, whatever. But then you're like, okay, well, do I really need to buy leather belts? And then, you know, slowly kind of snowballs into like, oh, well, the other stuff's kind of easy compared to the diet. And I, like, actually do care about this thing more than I thought I did.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:18

Right.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:18

So, yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:19

Yeah, and I think the communities intersect a lot. Like, if you're vegan, you're interacting with plant-based people. And if you're plant-based, you're certainly interacting with vegans. Right. So, like, I think you end up learning the whys. Yeah. You know, maybe you watch a few documentaries and then... eventually you become a lifelong vegan. It's obviously easier to convert someone from a plant-based diet to veganism than just a random omnivore to vegan.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:42

Yeah. And also the plant-based diet normalizes a lot of those animal-free foods. So they can create demand for more of the vegan or plant-based options. You know, if we had to solely rely on, you know, full actual vegans to create the demand for vegan foods.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 44:56

Right. It's a lot harder.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 44:57

But there are a lot of people who are doing some variant of a plant-based diet that also help increase the demand for those foods. So it helps, you know, a rising tide raises all ships. Yeah, exactly. Helps us all along the way.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:08

Yeah, it's like you get more restaurant options. Maybe like there are better options in places with like food deserts or like smaller grocery stores start carrying more vegan products. Like it makes it easier for anyone to go vegan.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 45:21

Yeah, and I think the big one is that it can reach people who will just never really be reached by the animal ethics argument. Some people are just never going to care about the animals in that way, But they might stop eating animals anyway if it can just help them be healthier.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:32

That's true. I mean, people are motivated by different things.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 45:35

And I think that is actually the angle that like forks over knives and game changers really kind of takes. Yeah. And I think it's highly effective. And I think it's great because it does significantly reduce animal harm. So, I mean, if we can at least get them there. Right. Eating a fully plant-based diet, that's better than nothing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:50

Which I think is, you know, why in this podcast and a lot of the stuff we talk about, it's like, Yeah, obviously, our focus is animal.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 45:57

Sure.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 45:58

It's the animal focus. That is my why. That's your why. Right. But ultimately, like, if I can convince you to reduce your animal products because you care about the environment or because you want to lower your cholesterol, like, okay.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:13

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 46:14

Reduce your animal products. Like, let's all reduce.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 46:16

Just from my perspective, you know, the Game Changers and the Forks Over Knives stuff is kind of what led me into it because, you know, I've got the interest in, like, health and fitness and stuff. So, you know, my avenue into veganism was through, like, the health lens. It was like, okay, this is like a healthier diet. And I start to learn more about it. And I start to realize, like, okay, we never really needed animal products. And I get more into the ethics and read about, you know, the other aspects of veganism and talking to you about the other aspects of veganism. And now it's like, obviously, I'm vegan for the animal rights, animal welfare, things like that. But this was my on-ramp into, like, even starting to think about the animal ethics side of things. And I think a lot of people will probably enter it that way.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 46:57

Yeah. I know when we first started dating, I was like, oh, I went, I went vegan. Cause like, obviously you knew I was a vegetarian for so long. And, um. you were like, oh, I've actually read a few books on like whole food plant-based stuff. And you were like real into that idea of like, ooh, I'm going to be whole food plant-based. And I'm like, hold up, I'm not eating whole food plant-based.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 47:17

Right. Well, I think that's an interesting example of kind of what we've been talking about here. And it's like, okay, whole food plant-based for health. And you're like, well, no, I don't want that. I'm just vegan.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 47:29

And then, yeah, I just remember, you know, I think like one of some of our initial conversations around the food was like well how are you getting your protein or like is getting your protein hard and it's like yeah well then i just started cooking stuff for you and you're like oh right okay well this isn't bad yeah and then it's like yeah every time because we were like long distance dating yeah so every time we hung out it was like you were only eating vegan food and we hung out and then you were kind of doing whatever when we weren't hanging out yeah but then it was like oh yeah no if we're moving in together you're fully vegan baby right exactly like there's no animal products in this house and you like immediately turned i mean i guess you were kind of just like plant-based at the time like immediately fully plant-based no animal products and then yeah it's like oh i'm gonna make you watch this documentary we're gonna watch this documentary and then yeah i broke your brain yeah you

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 48:18

Just start to get more and more frustrated about all the things that go into using animals for things so.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 48:23

Yeah the turning point was actually pretty quick like the turning point from you being like okay whatever i'll do the plant-based diet to like oh i'm like i care about animal rights pretty hard right now yeah it was a quick on-ramp so i

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 48:38

Think i think a lot of people probably had that.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 48:40

Experience yeah absolutely so

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 48:41

The stuff we're talking about is this just a debate about like veganism purity or strategy or what's the actual impact on the animals.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 48:49

Yeah and i think like it's just kind of multi-layered right and i From the vegan angle, it's like clarity in words do matter. And I think it's important for all of us to use the correct terms because it's important for the general population to understand that veganism is an animal liberation movement. Yeah. First and foremost. And, like, conflating those terms takes away from, like, the actual point of veganism. Right. You know? And I also think it's important that the general population knows we're not, like, randomly sneaking meat.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 49:23

Yeah. Right? Weird opinion to have that is very prevalent. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 49:27

Because like it it um i think that part's important because it maintains the importance of the movement and that we're serious about it and we're serious about what happens to the animals right because like if if there's a movement in which you're only following it like half-assedly yeah which is what i think the general population thinks when they hear veganism like well we're sneaking meat if they if they actually think that if

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 49:49

Even the vegans are eating meat why do i.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 49:51

Care yeah then it's like obviously we don't really care that much about the animals so like Why should you care about the animals? Because, you know, all vegans eat meat sometimes. Yeah. Like, that's the general idea. Like, that's a bad thing if that's what people think. Right. Right? Because it would be like, I don't know, just like a random example, but like feminists saying that we support women's rights except on Sundays. Because women shouldn't be allowed driving on Sundays. Yeah. Or reading books. You know? Like, women get rights on Monday through Saturday only, not on Sundays. Like, that's, to me, what like a half-assed vegan sounds like.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 50:22

Right. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 50:22

You know, we're like, oh, women can only vote in years that don't end with eight. Like, that sounds stupid. It looks weak. It looks like you don't really care about women's rights. Yeah. Which I think is how the public perceives it if they think vegans are sneaking meat. It's like, oh, you kind of only kind of care about animal rights. So, like, it can't be that bad.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 50:40

I think it's important that, you know, vegans, you know, take their stance seriously and they walk the walk. And you're vegan. If you're saying you're vegan, you're fully vegan 100% of the time.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 50:51

Yeah, yeah. Or call yourself plant-based. Right.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 50:54

Which is, again, we love plant-based people. I think there's a lot of benefit to the plant-based diet. So this is not like, it doesn't make sense for you to go the extra step and tell people you're a vegan. Yeah. If you don't believe in a vegan. If you're not going to do it. Why are you doing that?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 51:08

If they're going to catch you eating chicken nuggets, please do not call yourself a vegan.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 51:12

It just makes it hard for all of us.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 51:13

It does. It really does.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 51:15

I know this sounds like.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 51:16

Pedantic.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 51:17

Pedantic and purity and labeling stuff. And I really am not super into labeling stuff, but it's just, this makes it more confusing for everybody. And it's hard to like educate people about veganism when they're like, oh, I don't understand. Like this guy's vegan and he eats eggs and milk. And it's like, well, he's not vegan.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 51:32

I know. I've had those arguments. Like this, this is a real problem because I've personally experienced this a lot in my life.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 51:39

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 51:40

This is a real thing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 51:41

Veganism has been around for, like we've said, thousands of years. And people still don't even understand what it is on the diet side specifically. that one element they still don't understand it because there's so much confusion and like people saying they're vegan when they're not yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 51:53

And it's like that's the problem with like it's a niche movement and now you've caused confusion in an already very small niche movement right and now it's just like you spend all your time correcting misinformation right you know

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 52:07

And it's not really just the general public like you know we talk about people uh had in restaurants and stuff but i was just like at a cafeteria the other day and had a there was something that was marked as vegetarian and i was talking to the chef and i was like oh do you know if this is vegan and they're like yeah it's vegetarian and i was like okay do you know if it's vegan like and this is a.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 52:24

Chef you're a cook i need you to know what this shit means it's

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 52:28

Just yeah there's just so much miseducation misinformation.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 52:31

Well even i've seen plant-based people that like aren't vegans that are calling themselves vegans then they're clearly following a plant-based diet yeah they don't even understand the difference so it's like yeah there are definitely people

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 52:43

Calling themselves vegan out there that don't really know what vegan.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 52:45

Means yeah which is like how can you expect the general population to understand if like the people participating in one or the other don't really understand yeah and then like i mean all of that said i do think the movement should work together yeah and like i think as vegans we should support and embrace people that want to go plant-based or even vegetarian for their health because they're doing more than most people and i think that I think that if we all did that, there'd be a lot less infighting. And I know this is like a hot take, especially if you're on Reddit. This is a very hot take because like the vegan subreddit seems to hate vegetarians. I personally don't hate vegetarians because I was a vegetarian for 20 years and I went vegan and I was just missing information. And I just think like being the most supportive that you can and like pulling in the most people that you can and giving them whatever resources they need, answering their questions, giving them advice, giving them recipes, like sharing helpful information is like the best thing that we can do to support those people and who very well could go vegan at some point and are probably more likely than the general population to go vegan if they're already like interested in eating that way.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 53:53

Yeah. Or at the very least, like make sure they stay vegetarian or plant-based because a lot of, I'm sure a lot of people are like, they're vegetarian. They try to talk to vegans and they get, you know, talked down to and they're like, why am I even a vegetarian? Screw it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 54:06

Yeah. I think like... I'm not going to tell anyone how to interact with other people. Yeah. Me personally, if you're a vegetarian and you want to talk to me and like you need help getting your protein and stuff, I'm going to talk to you. Yeah. If you need support, I'm going to talk to you. If you're plant-based and you need support, I'm going to talk to you.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 54:22

Yeah. I mean, I'm not going to recommend you drink milk, but I will talk to you.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 54:25

Yeah, exactly. I will help answer your questions. Like I will support you however you need to. And I think we should kind of all be doing that because ultimately that helps the animals.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 54:34

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 54:35

You know?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 54:36

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 54:36

And it's like, the more plant-based people there are, the more demand there is for plant-based foods, which drives it into the mainstream, which means that more people know what it is, or at least kind of know what it is. Because I would say, you know, I think there were a lot of vegan and plant-based documentaries popping off at the same time. Yeah. But I would say that, I wouldn't necessarily say Cowspiracy is like a specifically vegan documentary. It's more of environmental. Yeah. But I would say that, you know, you got like Forks Over Knives, What the Health, those, those are plant-based documentaries. But I hear people talk way more about those. Like the general public talks way more about those documentaries than specifically vegan documentaries.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 55:16

Yeah, they just talk more about the health aspect in general.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 55:18

Yeah. I mean, I would say like the vegan documentary is like, I guess, Dominion. Yeah. I've never, ever, ever, ever heard a normal person not in the vegan space talk about the documentary.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 55:29

I guess Seaspiracy is kind of a vegan documentary. Yeah. It's not really about the environment.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 55:34

Yeah, I think it does touch on environmental stuff. But what I will say is, like, way more people are talking about the health-based documentaries. Yeah. And... let's keep calling it plant-based but like that's a good thing because like ultimately i think all vegans just want less animals eaten eventually no animals eaten but like yeah gotta start somewhere

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 55:53

Because like people care about their health the most like you can't really do like a vegan health documentary necessarily because like switching from leather belts to not leather belts is not good for your health like that's not yeah yeah so you have to kind of go the food aspect yeah and the environmental aspect is also kind of a health concern by the way like a better environment also helps your health so like those things um are kind of where the interest is. Right. So it makes sense to make like documentaries about the food specifically, but it's just, you know, it's plant-based.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 56:20

Right. And then, you know, what kind of like you were saying is that not everyone's going to go, not everyone cares about the animals, unfortunately. And there's like, they could watch all of the hidden camera footage that you give them and they're still not going to hear about the animals because that's just, some people are like that. Yeah. But maybe you can get them in with the environment. Probably not if they don't care about animals, But like maybe you can get them in with like a health documentary, you know.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 56:43

And no matter like what way you get them in, just like chipping away at all the little things will help, you know, reduce animal harm a little bit at a time. So any reduction of animal harm is a good thing, even if the ultimate goal is no animal harm at all.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 56:56

Yeah. And I personally feel like we should celebrate the steps along the way, because I think for most of us, I think the end goal is very far into the future.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 57:08

If ever. Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 57:08

Yeah. And I think like none of us and none of the people listening to this podcast are probably ever going to see a fully vegan world. Yeah. And that can feel, in my opinion, it can feel really depressing and daunting. Right. But like what lightens that for me is like seeing people make reductions, seeing new products on the market, like seeing more Google searches for like what is vegan, like. seeing it get more mainstream and popular you have to celebrate wins somewhere you know i for some reason i've been getting a lot of negativity on some of the new news stuff that i've been posting in carousels yeah on social media people are just like oh it's jeff bezos i don't care what he's doing for like the silkworms and it's like okay i mean i also don't really like jeff bezos but i mean i do care about the silkworms so yeah i just think it can be really depressing if you never, ever celebrate fucking anything, you know, until it's perfect, we might never see that.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:05

And I will say, I think Jeff Bezos probably had very little to do with the Bezos fund giving money to the Silkworm research.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 58:11

He probably doesn't even know.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:13

He does not get any personal credit. It just happens to have his name on it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 58:16

Yeah. We weren't being like, yay, Jeff Bezos, right? I mean, I don't know. But yeah, and I also just feel like rejecting and being rude to plant-based people can push them away, which also, like, by the way, doesn't help the animals. Like, if your ultimate goal is to help the animals, like, embracing people, being kind to people, helping them when they ask for help, being inclusive, I think is just a better way to be in general.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:41

Yeah. So, I think some interesting questions to think about on both sides is, like, for the vegans, if somebody reduces their animal consumption by 95%, isn't that still meaningful progress?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 58:51

I think it is. What do you think?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 58:52

Yeah, I think every little reduction should be celebrated and seen as like a milestone and another step towards our ultimate goal. Yeah. Progress comes, you know, one step at a time. It's not an all or nothing kind of thing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 59:03

I mean, like for me, I don't think I've converted anyone but you that I know of, right? But like. They're like little tiny things that have happened, right? Like my parents are using plant-based butter. My parents are buying plant-based ice cream. One of my friends is doing more meatless meals. She'll send me recipes and stuff of things she's trying. Yeah. That's progress. I'm super happy about that. Like I love to see that, you know?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 59:31

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 59:31

That's how I feel about it.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 59:33

Yeah. And I think, you know, that could be viewed as strategic compromise in a lot of ways because you're like not getting everything you want. But you are like making some progress. So I think that's still something that advances animal rights because it creates a little less demand and, you know, less animals get harmed in the process. So, I mean, if you, if there are a lot of people out there like you who can influence, you know, a couple people in their personal life, maybe even just like three to five people per person out there, that's a huge reduction overall.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:00:01

And what is that, like, you'll catch more flies with honey than vinegar or something? Like, I just think being nice to people and, like...

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:00:07

Not a very vegan phrase.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:00:09

Not a vegan phrase at all. Like, I'm actually not catching flies with honey or not honey. We need a better one, and I don't know what it would be. But it's easier to sweeten tofu with maple syrup than apple cider vinegar. Yeah. There you go. We'll work with it. Okay. But I mean, I think just like the gist of that is like bringing more people in, being kinder to people, like trying to like celebrate their like when they're changing. I think that's a good thing. I think that helps everyone.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:00:37

Yeah. And then the question is to think about on like the plant-based advocates side. It's like if your health wasn't being improved, would you add back animal products to your diet?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:00:47

Right. It's like, if you went plant-based because you thought it was going to be like some drastic health improvement and everything just stayed the same. Yeah. Would you keep eating plant-based? Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:00:58

And then, like, is animal welfare a why or a reason at all for you, or is it just, like, a side benefit of you eating the plant-based diet?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:01:05

And then I think, like, the main question I would have for plant-based people that call themselves vegan is, like, why would you identify as vegan if your motivation isn't ethics-based? Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:01:17

I think, you know, maybe vegan is a more understood term. Plant-based sounds a little pompous.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:01:22

Yeah, it kind of does.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:01:23

It's a little weird. And most people also don't know what it means. So it's easier just to explain socially and be like, I'm a vegan. Leave me alone. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:01:29

But then I will say for like an influencer or someone that's like trying to reach a lot of people, sometimes I think it's a little sus when they do it because I kind of feel like they might know the difference and they're like putting it out there like formally. But I think some of them do it because it's like built in vegan access.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:01:45

I mean, I can tell you right now, if you look at like the traffic volume stuff for using the word plant-based versus using the word vegan, it's like night and day. Like nobody uses the word plant-based out there. Yeah. So using the word vegan is like where you want to be to try to get an audience. Right. If you're not vegan, that's disingenuous. Like I'm not going to jump into like, uh, I'm a professional football player because like, obviously that would get a lot of attention, but I'm, I'm not a professional football player.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:02:09

Yeah. It's a little gross to me because it's like, I think using the word vegan is like you almost automatically gain the trust of a vegan audience. Like they think you share the same values and ethics as them. Yeah. So if you're saying it, but you're not actually a vegan for the animals, it's gross. Yeah. You know, it's like you're kind of like tricking people intentionally for clout.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:02:33

Right.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:02:33

And then like also it gives you access to like vegan media coverage, which is like obviously I think a little more prominent than plant-based media coverage. And it can also open you up to like getting partnerships with different brands and just like vegan credibility in general within the vegan space. But then, you know, I think there's this other thing of, like, potentially you have these influencers or famous people that might not understand that veganism is more than a diet because not everyone is well-educated. So I'm not saying everyone is doing it maliciously. There's also like the possibility that people just don't understand it.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:03:06

Well, they just, you know, they know vegan is a trendy thing and they stop eating animal products. So like, I'm a vegan and they just don't care enough to look into it more.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:03:14

Yeah. I've also seen just because sometimes I'll, you know, get a wild hair and be like, I think you mean you're plant-based because you're saying that you eat fish on Sundays. And then they'll be like, I'm whatever I want to be. And I'm like, but like the term vegan like actually means something. And they're like, it means whatever I say it means.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:03:30

I've seen that several times. Good Lord. Vegan can mean different things to different people. For some people, it's a lifestyle. For some people, it's about the diet. And it's like, no, that's not what the word. I don't want to argue, but like, that's just not what the word means.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:03:43

Words mean things.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:03:44

And I know like language changes over time, blah, blah, blah. That one hasn't changed yet, though. Yeah, maybe one day vegan will mean fully plant-based diet. And there'll be another word for actual vegans. Yeah. But that's not today. Animal liberators.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:03:56

And then like there's like another thing. They could be doing it for the health and ethics both. Kind of like you were saying, like maybe they're starting with health and they develop the ethics along the way.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:04:06

Yeah. So I guess the question we have for our audience is if two people eat the exact same meal, but one's doing it for the animals and the other is just doing it to lower the cholesterol. Are they part of the same team or are they just like eating at the same restaurant?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:04:16

And I would love to hear what you guys think. Yeah. You can discuss it in our Discord.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:04:20

All right. Now, moving on to our next segment.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:04:23

And another thing. If you didn't know, we changed our myth of the week to and another thing. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:04:28

It's not a myth every time. It might still be a myth.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:04:30

It might be myths.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:04:31

So, another thing we're going to talk about is the interesting relationship between veganism and the LGBTQ plus community. Happy Pride! Yeah. We thought this would be an interesting subject because it's Pride Month and also because we saw a couple of polls on Reddit, which are anecdotal, but still pretty interesting.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:04:49

Dude, they were really interesting. Yeah. So basically, over the last week, a couple of polls were created on Reddit because basically the original post was like, hey, can we change the vegan subreddit icon to be rainbow colored? And then someone was like, there aren't any gay people in veganism. And then someone was like, I've got to prove you really wrong. And they created two.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:05:12

I can see some of those people have never been in a vegan community.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:05:16

I know. So then they created the first poll. And then people were like, ooh, I don't like the wording. So then they created a second poll. But we're going to share both results to you because they're really interesting, actually. And it was a pretty big sample size.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:05:27

Yeah. And we know the results are a little biased just based on Reddit slanting pretty significantly liberal more than the general population. But the results are still interesting.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:05:36

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:05:37

So let's share what the polls were.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:05:39

So the first poll, the total responses were 1,383 people. Yeah. That's like a pretty good amount of people. Yeah. So out of those 1,383 people, people that identified as vegan and LGBTQ plus were 530. People who identified as vegetarian and LGBTQ plus were 85. And then people that identified as plant-based and LGBTQ plus were 45. LGBTQ plus and veg curious people were 40 and the non-LGBTQ was 683. So about 50-50 between LGBTQ and non-LGBTQ in the vegan space or veg curious, plant-based, vegetarian, whatever you want to call it, the whole bag. Then the second poll actually had a lot more people because it was up for longer. It ended up with 5,882 responses. Oh, wow.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:06:30

Much bigger. Like three times as big as the last.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:06:32

Yeah. Like a much bigger sample. Like actually like a pretty good survey amount, honestly.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:06:37

It was pretty solid.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:06:38

Yeah. So a little bit different categories here. Yeah. But vegan and LGBTQ plus was 2,100.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:06:46

Out of 5,800.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:06:48

Yeah. Out of 5,800. Yeah. And then people that identified as vegan and not on the spectrum was 2,500. Okay. People who identified as vegetarian and LGBTQ+, 416. People that identified as vegetarian and not, 426. So like almost 50-50. Yeah. And then people that identified as plant-based and LGBTQ+, was 211. And people that identified as plant-based and not on the spectrum was 299. More data this time, but it was still around 45% LGBTQ plus in the vegan space.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:07:23

Yeah, that doesn't surprise me much.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:07:24

It doesn't surprise me either. Representing. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:07:29

So researchers have studied this a little bit. So here's some more broad statistics. Roughly 7 to 10 percent of the adults in the U.S. population identify as LGBTQ+. A Gallup poll in 2022 reported 7.1 percent. So still in that same range. And more recent estimates are higher, especially in younger adults.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:07:49

Yeah. And that's just the general population, right? Right. So like the vegan and vegetarian communities appear to have much higher LGBTQ plus representation. So one academic survey, and this is just in America. Yeah. This is a survey of American vegans, and it found that 65% identify as heterosexual. Yeah. 13% identify as bisexual. Yeah. 7% identify as homosexual, and 15% identify as queer. So that's 35% of the U.S. vegan community is identifying as somewhere on the spectrum of LGBTQ+.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:08:24

Versus 7% to 10% of the normal population.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:08:26

Isn't that so cool?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:08:28

It's a lot.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:08:29

I just think that's amazing. LGBTQ plus community is doing some fucking heavy lifting here. Yeah. So we should celebrate hard this Pride Month. There you go. They are pulling their weight in the vegan community.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:08:40

I'd love to see it. So you might be wondering why there's such an overlap, and so do we. But the best we can do is speculate, right?

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:08:47

Yeah. So here are some of our random speculations. And if you have others, let us know what those are.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:08:53

People love random speculation.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:08:55

I mean, it's a podcast. Like, that's all it is, really, right? Like, we tried to throw in some facts, but...

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:08:59

No, no. I'm very expert and authoritative.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:09:02

I'm mostly yapping. So, like, our first speculation is, like, experiencing life outside of social norms may make people more willing to question other social norms, like eating animals.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:09:12

I believe this. I think anything kind of counterculture makes you more willing to be counterculture in other ways.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:09:18

Yeah, I think we read through some statistics a couple weeks ago, and one of those was like, there's a very large population of atheists in the vegan space. And I think that that is kind of lines up with this, right? Like... At least in America, just, you know, social norms would be like a Christian family with children. Yeah. Straight couple, that kind of thing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:09:41

Yeah. And I think the general, you know, the layman's way to say this is like, people are already giving me a bunch of bullshit. I guess I might as well try this other thing people are going to give me bullshit for.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:09:50

Yeah. I'm already getting bullshit. Why do I care? I'm going to go do whatever the hell I want.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:09:54

Exactly.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:09:55

And then I also think people might have greater empathy to animals because of how people who live outside of societal norms can be treated. Yeah. You know, when you're in like a minority group in society or you're just kind of like on the outskirts of society, like you can get treated pretty shitty. Yeah. And I think it makes you develop empathy for like other people and animals.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:10:17

Yeah, that makes sense to me. You also have more of an openness, I think, to new identities, new lifestyles and new ways of thinking that are, again, not really in line with some of the norms. Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:10:27

And then I also think there's like a connection between LGBTQ plus activism and other social justice movements. So, you know, if you're already part of LGBTQ plus activism, you might learn about other social justice movements while you're already in in one. You know what I mean? Like you're more likely to hear about other things.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:10:48

Yeah, a lot of overlap.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:10:50

Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:10:51

It also ties into some of the points we made in our veganism and masculinity episode, where veganism challenges gender norms, and so can LGBTQ+.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:10:59

Yep.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:11:00

Which is a good thing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:11:01

Absolutely. It's a great thing.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:11:03

So we'd love to hear your thoughts on this data and any other random speculations you might have.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:11:07

That are probably better than what we came up with. And as a final side note, we actually have two queer-owned vegan businesses that we can't say enough good things about that we wanted to highlight here on an episode we're talking about. You know, pride and stuff. Okay, so first off is my most favorite ever vegan bakery, Pie Pie, My Darling. Oh, yeah. It's a queer one-woman-owned vegan bakery in Chicago. It's been around since 2014. It's been in Veg News a lot, and she's won quite a few awards.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:11:37

And she deserves them all because this is the best baked good place I've ever had in my entire life.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:11:41

She deserves all the good things in her life. they actually have several rainbow cake cake options year round including one that they offer during the month of june pride month and you can buy it by the slice and they even have a trans is beautiful cake their cakes are not only pretty but they're awesome and delicious they also have a bunch of other desserts like cookies rice crispy treats they have uh like basically cakes in a cup like a like a really big cupcake in a cup cake almost like a cupcake yeah so i would say if you're ever in chicago check it out also she's super nice we've interacted with her many times now and she's

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:12:18

We actually got our wedding cake.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:12:19

From there we actually got two because we couldn't pick between the flavors because she has like a really really really good strawberry cake and then uh what was the other one like a cookie monster cookie dough cake really good we couldn't decide between the two still can't still can't we do it again It lasted for weeks We put it in the freezer It does not freeze well for a year It freezed okay. It was like, I think any cake would not freeze well for a year. I don't know why people do that.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:12:47

It's more about the ceremony.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:12:49

The sentiment. Yeah, it was pretty weird.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:12:51

I liked it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:12:51

Okay.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:12:52

I will say, it was still good frozen one year later.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:12:55

I will say.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:12:55

She should put that on the front of her store.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:12:57

She should put that on the front of her store. So, you know, if you're ever in Chicago, you should definitely hit up Pie Pie, My Darling. Yeah, definitely.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:13:03

But you're going to want to order ahead of time.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:13:05

Yeah, yeah. I think she does have some, like, open hours where you can kind of, like, peruse. I've got some of those cupcake things,

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:13:10

And she makes really good cookies. Maybe some brown. I don't remember. But there is some stuff up there you can grab and go. Yeah, yeah. But if you want any of the cakes, you kind of have to do a thing.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:13:18

Yeah, if you do a cake order, you have to place it ahead of time. And then she also does this thing on Saturday mornings, like Saturday treat day or something. Yeah. Where she basically, like, opens up part of her store for whatever's available. And then you can preorder it and then go pick it up, which is usually what we do because we live far away. We don't want to drive all the way to Chicago and not have any cake.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:13:37

I think it's a little bit of a process because the demand is insane. And I imagine she'd have people just line up on the block if she just opened the door. Anyway, yeah. Yeah. That's one.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:13:47

So, Pie Pie, my darling. Go check it out.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:13:49

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:13:49

Number two, Peaceful Rebel Cheese. Not to be confused with Rebel Cheese.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:13:53

Which I confuse all the time.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:13:55

It's kind of confusing. This is Peaceful Rebel Cheese. It's actually one of our favorite vegan cheese brands. The cheeses are pretty well-priced, honestly.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:14:03

Yeah, I really like their olive feta cheese. I love any kind of cheese with olives in it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:14:06

Oh, yeah. Their feta cheese is really good. And then they have this caramelized garlic cheese that I could put away in a day. It's like super good. But the cool thing about Peaceful Rebel Cheese is a lot of their cheeses are tofu based. Yeah. So they have more protein than other vegan cheeses on the market. And she just has like a lot of interesting and tasty flavors. Yeah. So the company was originally founded in 2017. And actually, just a month or two ago, it changed ownership. And the new owner and head cheesemaker is a queer woman who is super, super nice. I've interacted with her on social media a few times and she just seems delightful.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:14:40

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:14:40

And I think, me personally, I think the best part is you can actually order all the cheeses online. Yeah. Like, they have them at a few brick and mortar stores if you're, like, local. Because I think they're out of Colorado. Yeah, yeah. But, like, we've ordered them online, like, several times. Yeah. And we buy a lot.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:14:56

And they actually sell Peaceful Rebel Cheese at Rebel Cheese locations.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:15:00

See? That's how popular they are. Even Rebel Cheese is like, hell yeah, Peaceful Rebel, keep doing you. so yeah we just wanted to highlight two lgbtq plus owned vegan brands that we love this pride month um if you have any that you really like we would like to hear about them because we searched and like we couldn't actually find a lot yeah as far as like internet searching so if you have brands that you just love and want to tell us about them we will buy their stuff yeah for sure Oh, we're also going to have a little segment where I read the meanest thing that got commented to me this week.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:15:34

Okay, let's do it.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:15:34

Is that okay?

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:15:35

Absolutely.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:15:36

Okay, I just thought it'd be kind of fun. I don't know that I'll have one every week.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:15:39

Mean tweets from protein deficient media.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:15:42

Apparently, some of my stuff is doing pretty well on Facebook, and there are a lot of mean people on Facebook. So I actually have a lot. But this is the one I got this morning.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:15:49

I just want to say, like, I don't know what's up with the Facebook audience, but it's like a whole different category of energy. than the other social media networks.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:15:59

Yeah. I wasn't prepared.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:16:02

So go ahead.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:16:03

It's a good thing I have really thick skin. So this is the one I got on my cheesy bean bowl video.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:16:09

Yeah.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:16:10

Possibly the most disgusting thing I've ever seen. Beans and yeast. Jesus. Have a burger and talk to a woman, you wussy.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:16:21

That is one tough manly man right there.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:16:27

I'm still like, every time I read it, I crack up.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:16:30

Talk to a woman.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:16:31

Talk to a woman, you will see. I should talk to more women.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:16:35

All right. And get into a couple of little announcements we have. The book club raffle just wrapped up. If you didn't know, we did a raffle for a couple of copies of the book for our first book club meeting, which was Eating Animals. So if you haven't joined the Discord yet, you should now. You can get in on the book club. or if your book club's not your thing, you can just get in and see us talk about the book club and chat about all the other things we chat about in there.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:16:58

The book club is officially starting on June 22nd and that's going to be basically where we tell you like how many pages we're reading and then we will, you know, start posting discussion questions and stuff in the Discord channel. It won't be like live call meetings that you need to call into. Right. But yeah, be there by June 22nd if you want to join the book club. And I think we've been talking about having a movie club too, but that's probably a next month or the month after kind of thing

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:17:24

No you gotta figure out the logistics yeah how that works cause you kinda have to like everybody has to watch their own movie yeah yeah a little weird.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:17:31

But there's some interest. You should join the Discord.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:17:34

Cool. Also, thank you for listening. If you're listening on Apple Podcast or Spotify, please leave us a rating and review. That helps us out a lot. If you're listening on YouTube or Spotify, you can leave us comments. We can get back to you there. Also, our new website has the little voicemail thing. You can leave us a voicemail and we can either, if you want, we can potentially play the audio on the podcast and answer your questions. Or we can just read it and answer your questions.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:17:59

And it now has reviews, right? Because somebody left a review.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:18:02

Somebody left us a very nice review directly on the podcast.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:18:03

Thanks for leaving us a nice review. Yeah.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:18:06

Cool. Go join the Deficient Vegans Discord if you haven't already. That link is also in the show notes.

Protein Deficient Vegan: 1:18:10

And if you want a shareable version of the things we talked about in the podcast, go check out the Deficient Vegans social media. We post them on Instagram and TikTok. Yep. And also Facebook, but no one is there. Yet.

Muscle Deficient Vegan: 1:18:25

All right. Yeah, so you can find all of our social medias and websites down in the show notes. Thanks for listening, everybody. Do you want to say bye? Bye, guys. Bye, everybody.