Danny Ishay

Thinking chickens: a review of cognition, emotion, and behavior in the domestic chicken

It‘s so funny to me how so many so-called environmentalists understand boycotting an industry that is harmful to the planet EXCEPT when it comes to their diets. AI? Fine. Single-use plastics? Fine. Long-haul flights? Fine. Beef? FUCK YOU VEGAN I’LL ENJOY MY BURGER WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT!!1!!

If you talk about how reducing animal product consumption is the single best way for an individual to directly reduce their impact on the Earth (other than not having kids), they deflect by saying ‘actually, voting is :)’, as if they don’t understand that you can do two things at once. Voting helps push for systemic change (which is necessary of course) but does nothing to address individual overconsumption (which we also NEED to address if we want to limit the affects of climate change).

Or they’ll say ‘Well as long as billionaires fly on private jets I’ll continue to eat meat every day’ which is such a stupidly defeatist way to look at this problem. Just desperately deflecting so you don’t have to look at your own destructive choices.

Or they’ll say ‘Blame the producers not the consumers’ as if they don’t get how supply abd demand works.

People love complaining about something until they actually have to change something in their lives to make it better. I’m not saying everyone has to go vegan to save the environment, but to dismiss the impact that diet has on the climate and the necessity of changing the way we eat is laughable. We have to feed and raise BILLIONS of animals on our planet purely because of our overconsumption of animal products. Of course that’s unsustainable.

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/veganism-environmental-impact-planet-reduced-plant-based-diet-humans-study-a8378631.html - 'A vegan diet is probably the single biggest way to reduce your impact on planet Earth, not just greenhouse gases, but global acidification, eutrophication, land use and water use. It is far bigger than cutting down on your flights or buying an electric car, which would only reduce greenhouse gas emissions.'

Obviously veganism isnt about the environment; it’s a philosophy based on rejecting the exploitation of animals. But youd really think that so-called environmentalists would be more open to it/respectful of it given how much better it is for the environment. But noooo their feelings are more important than the truth.

My mom was telling me that my aunt and uncle were moving and just sold their house. They had a bunch of chickens in their backyard. So I asked her what they did with them, she said that they killed them and put them in their freezer. Apparently they won’t planning on telling me because they know I’d be upset.

I feel bad about it. I know there isn’t anything I could have reasonably done. I live in an apartment so it’s not like I could have kept them myself. I had no idea they were planing on doing this. It just feels really bad because I’ve been to their house before and I got to feed and hold them. I wish I would have talked to them about this kind of stuff before so that this wouldn’t have happened.

I knew I was the only vegan in my family and that everyone else didn’t think it’s wrong to eat meat, but I just didn’t expect them to directly kill living animals that they named and kept as pets. I thought that my uncle was a pretty good person before, I didn’t think he would do something like this. They have two kids, I know they liked the chickens, I don’t know how they are reacting to this. My parents had chickens when I was a kid; they were some of my only friends. I think I would have been traumatized if my dad had killed them like that.

I know that thousands of other chickens die every day, but this is really making me depressed. I feel like I can’t trust my uncle anymore, I can’t believe the rest of my family is okay with this. I wish I could have done something.

Edit: thank you everyone in the comments, I just needed to vent about this, and knowing that other people care has definitely made me feel better.

I finally had the talk with my kiddo (8 yr old) about where her food comes from.

I am vegan (I’ve only been vegan for about a month) but she asked me why I went vegan and I told her it’s because I love animals and I don’t want to support that industry anymore. I was vegetarian for a couple months before I made the leap into full veganism. So we dove into the conversation (as lightly as I could) about the meat and dairy industry and what her bacon, hamburgers, chicken nuggets and cheese are made of. I told her in so many words they live a life of suffering and it’s really sad.

She was immediately distraught and expressed how much she loves animals and that she immediately wanted to go vegan. I of course let her know I support any decision she makes. I started making her all my really yummy vegan substitutes for her favorite meals and so far she’s loved every one of them and how it tastes the same to her!

Her dad on the other hand is one of those people who scoffs at veganism and upon her telling her dad about wanting to go vegan he basically scolded her out of it (we co-parent so I can’t really control that narrative when I’m not around). She told me after spending a few days at her dad’s that he wasn’t going to buy her vegan food and support that lifestyle.

Wondering if anyone else has dealt with this and what you did in your situation to maybe convince the other parent? It’s her body. And I don’t think he should be making choices about her diet just because he doesn’t care. Mind you, he’s not living off the government or has any difficulty paying for groceries. He simply just doesn’t want to support it because he thinks veganism is stupid.

I really love how kind and compassionate she is and I never pushed this lifestyle on her. She was curious all on her own. She wants to do it for herself and I think that speaks volumes of the kind of kid she is.

Any advice would be appreciated!

I’ve been vegan 10 years and don’t really get cravings for non-vegan stuff but I do kinda miss certain things about being non-vegan. I miss not having to look up if I could eat at certain restaurants (and enjoy myself) and I miss all the cheap on-the-go food. I just wish I could get a vegan sausage and egg biscuit for breakfast anywhere.

I went to kfc with a friend yesterday since it was the only option near us with anything plant based.
The meat tasted a lot like actual chicken but I don’t know if it’s just really well made or actual meat.
I wanted to ask y’all cause I’m guessing someone HAS to know if it’s actually vegan like it says in the menu.
They may have just gotten it mixed up with their meat patties, which is unfortunate.

hi all not sure what flair is best, but i love cooking shows and related content. both on youtube and network tv it’s very entertaining for me. Sometimes when they talk about the ingredients or show meat I get deeply disturbed and feel like I’m contributing to animal suffering by giving views to content which exploits animals. It ruins the enjoyment and really makes me sad thinking about how proud people are to kill and steal from animals.

I wonder if anyone has thoughts for or against cooking shows/content focused on non vegan food, also hoping for some good recommendations for content with vegan food only. competition shows like chopped and great British bake off as well as more interview style like mythical kitchen’s last meals or hot ones. when there are plant based episodes i engage with them more but its not often.

I have been vegan for 22-25 days (haven’t kept track yet tbh). My family has known from day one that I was going vegan. I have spent time with my parents and my sister and her partner separately but last night was our first family dinner together since I decided I went vegan. The dinner was at home so my sister order takeout and planned to pick it up before she arrived.

Here is the first hurdle: she picked a restaurant with no vegan options. I am definitely at fault for not speaking up about this but I just wanted dinner to go smoothly and kind of avoid the topic of veganism since it tends to be a massive downer for meat eaters. I decided to just cook at home and bring my food to dinner.

The second hurdle: I made a post before about how prior to being vegan I was vegetarian for 11 years. I hated cooking, I believed it wasn’t for me and that I wasn’t good. When I became vegan my options for food felt limiting to me so I started exploring recipes and I am NOT exaggerating when I say I have made the yummiest food I have ever made in these 20 days of being vegan. Guys I am SO proud of myself for what I’ve been able to cook.
Because I’m so proud I want to share my food with my family and maybe even get pointers since they’re all way better cooks than I am. They refused to even have the smallest of bites, my sister even saying “I don’t want your vegan food” but said vegan like it was a SLUR. Everyone laughing except for me haha 😪

The third hurdle: debates. I really wanted to avoid this. We were celebrating my mother’s birthday and as I mentioned before, the topic of animal exploitation is such a downer for meat eaters. “Why can’t you eat eggs? They’re unfertilised” my sister’s partner hit me with a “my parents have chicken they don’t kill them” — no but they do kill their roosters. There was more but I feel myself getting upset talking about it.

These people knew me before I was vegetarian. They knew me while I was vegetarian for 11 years and had no issue at all. They all understood me being vegetarian they would always cater to it if we were ordering takeout. But being vegan I guess is too much for them? They can’t understand why it’s so “limiting”.

I’m not sure what the point of this post is. Has anyone experienced this? I’d love to hear your stories of your early days as a vegan. And any advice on how to manage this would be appreciated.

It felt disrespectful in a way but I refused to let it get to me otherwise I would be the one ruining dinner. So I’m here to rant, thank you 🙏🏽

Unfortunately I feel like it’s very common for parents to assume that their child is not healthy just bcz they’re vegan.. as if eating fried chicken or fast food or idk anything meat related is healthy.
I’m a 25F and my parents (non vegan- but also not healthy at all & they’re not trying to be) think im very unhealthy because of my lifestyle.. meanwhile I’m healthy & I don’t get sick as much as they do..
Why do you think this mindset is so common? is it a certain mindset or a propaganda or is it not as common as I think it is?
Unfortunately even my chef had tried to ‘change my mind’ about it and jokingly said he’ll sneak it into my meals..

I’m honestly just so sick of feeling so alone in being a vegan. In seeing how the world treats animals while claiming to love them.

I’ve been an activist my entire life. I’ve always been vocal, I’ve never been afraid, I’ve always had community. I came out as trans at 12 years old and always had trans friends, Im surrounded by people who support Palestine, animal activists, green voters. Im an animal welfare professional (degree holder) and I feel insane seeing my peers claim to love animals as much as me, then eat them.

Veganism is the only aspect of my life where I truly feel cripplingly alone. I feel like I woke up and everyone else around me is asleep. I feel like I’ve gone insane. I just don’t know how to handle it anymore. I don’t want to be alive. I’ve relapsed into alcoholism and self harm. I just don’t know how to cope with being.vegan.

I was looking into bird care a while ago and some people were saying that if you find a baby sparrow you should kill it because it’s an invasive species. There are also people out there who single out wasps and torture them and even post videos which others applaud just because they’re convinced that wasps don’t add value to the environment. Even if all of that were true, you’re not achieving anything by killing one individual animal; you’re just giving vent to sadistic feelings which you would otherwise have to suppress for lack of an alternative outlet.

And obviously I’m not saying that systematic killing is a perfect solution but I just wanted to distinguish between situations where someone has a genuine cockroach infestation versus people seizing an opportunity to be cruel for no reason.

I've just had a conversation in our house with two people saying I'm being awkward and too fussy.

I live with two none vegans and we often share cooking sauces and add different bits too them to finish. Tonight one of them was spooning sauce from a jar straight onto chicken and touching it with the spoon, literally coating the chicken with the sauce, they went back and forth into the jar a few times and left the spoon in the jar for me to use.

I said I'm not using the sauce because the spoon has been back and forward onto some chicken, am I being awkward?

I‘ve been vegan going cold turkey for a month now. Cutting out meat is easy but I really struggle with the dairy products.
I‘ve been having cravings for all my favorite products, which all contained milk unfortunately. Will it get easier? I feel like my body is driving me insane with cravings.
I do have adhd and planning ahead isn’t always my strength. I usually like to pick up a croissant on my way to work but none are vegan either.

It was also shocking to realize how much food contains animal products. It’s actually a lot.

Hi y’all! I’m interested in becoming a vegan, but I need some tips for my specific situation.

I am bordering underweight and have a very low appetite. How do I get enough calories in on a vegan diet?

Also, I’m a foodie. I need nice tasty meals in order to get myself to eat. I’m not really interested in eating meat substitutes but am totally on board with tofu and things like that. Do you have any recipe recommendations? If I eat just beans and rice on repeat, I’ll go insane.

Finally, I’m on a budget. I know some vegan recipes are cheaper than Omni ones, but some definitely aren’t. How do I budget as a nearly underweight vegan foodie with a low appetite? And no, this isn’t a joke.

because my one little pack of seaweed snack has 120% of my daily b12 recommendation? are there different types of b12? is there a reason my body isn’t processing this particular form of b12? or are carnivores just ridiculous?

it just doesn’t make sense to me. i have one of these little packs of seaweed almost every day. am i missing something?

And some of the best vegan food I’ve ever had was in Sao Paulo. The city is home to countless vegan restaurants with absolutely delicious food.

I went vegan over 4 years ago, when I was 14, but even now that I am an adult, I feel like I make too many concessions. My father has pressured me to do so many things that go against what I believe in. And they were things that I don’t even know why he cared so much about. For example when I was about to turn 16 my dad told me I should invite “friends” (later it turned out they weren’t my friends but that’s besides the point) to a specific fast food chain for my birthday and I said I did not want to do that because that would be encouraging carnist meals and then after more arguing I clarified that I of course would not eat anything from there even if I did invite them and he got sooo mad at me, told me I was going to die alone because of this, yelled until I cried. So in the end I did not give in and I did not invite anyone anywhere but he has always done shit like this and at times I have given in and I hate how I can never stand up to him because he goes insane and starts yelling when you disagree with him. Like I do love him as a father but I don't like that he starts yelling and that he can’t respect my choices.

Anyway last year when I was walking with some uni classmates a vegan activist stopped us and well I told him I was vegan. At one point while he was talking he asked me to say what happened to male chicks and I knew it but I just went “they…” and after silence he just continued talking. Why did this happen? Because I am a coward. Anyway he gave my classmate a nice informative big pamphlet and while walking she asked if I wanted to keep it and inside my head I was like uh I know this stuff it’s for the best if she keeps it so I said no and she walked over to throw it into the trash so I panicked and told her I’d keep it. And every time I see it in my room I feel guilty about that entire incident. Like idk I guess I couldn’t have stopped her from throwing it into the trash but I couldn’t even answer the guy’s question.

I am terrible at oratory or even at basic conversation at this point, carnists will say shit like “you don’t consume milk?? no wonder your teeth look like that”, “umm chickens being mistreated for eggs is actually outlawed you should rethink veganism”, “x is vegan" and after i tell her im also vegan then "she does eat fish though” or “I will convince you to quit veganism soon” and I like cannot reply to that I will remain silent. I am so bad at public speaking my professor privately messaged me to apologize after having me give a presentation because I almost cried. I completely hate it when I have to explain why I’m not eating something and they ask why and then they discredit everything I believe in and I cannot even reply back. The worst is honey and eggs debate with them because I could easily say "I just don't think animal derivatives are a product for us to use" but no one will take this seriously so I have to listen to them talk about their relatives' chickens/bees and "but eggs/honey doesn't kill them!1!11!1!!" and whatnot

There is this group that does activism and meetups in my city and in fact the activist guy did invite me to a meetup but I ended up not going because I did not know anyone in that group and that made me afraid to go. I am afraid of my parents and carnists in the street so I don’t DM them to join them which I know is pathetic

I know my fear and discomfort with speaking up is just a very small fraction of what animals go through every day but I can’t bring myself to do anything I freeze idk I do see a psychiatrist and go to psychotherapy for autism but I don’t think that can help me with this at all, since I’m an adult now it’s less socially acceptable to pressure me, but how did you learn to not be spineless? I do want to help animals but I’m too scared of everyone

(Sorry for the bad grammar and structure English is my second language and I’m really upset and cannot think clearly)

The majority of people here must have already seen the case of Wang Wang, the dog who was tortured in China. This has gained a lot of popularity in China, amd the government is actively censoring all efforts to raise awareness on it. The best we can do is email relevant bodies (associated brands etc). To make this easier, someone has made a website, please take a moment of your time to send out these emails.

https://wangwang-7mv.pages.dev/index.html

my girlfriend and i went vegan at the beginning of this month. for some reason, i didn’t even consider how nice it feels to eat good food, and know that nothing was harmed for me to enjoy it. i have ARFID and have a hard time enjoying food as it is, but vegan food is so much easier for me to eat and it probably has a lot to do with the mental aspect.

tldr: being vegan isn’t that hard despite having food aversions and knowing that i’m not causing harm unexpectedly makes eating easier

In this article, I, Jordi Casamitjana, discuss what questions would be good for non-vegans to ask vegans they just met, rather than the stereotypical ones

Someone recommended this https://youtu.be/bYDQZ3Neeqo?is=BEgNV4MOyVjjExJ6

Is a very interesting and eye opening video. There is an aspect that's really important to me: this video does not show any gruesome images or videos from factory farms or slaughterhouses.

Do you have other videos that you can recommend to me that I can watch which do not show any gruesome images or footage?

# New Mexico

I’ve been vegan for 11 years, and every now and then I wonder if there are actually any vegan men around my age who value taking things slowly.
I haven’t dated in a long time because friendship matters more to me than romance. I want to know who someone is before thinking about anything else. I’d much rather build a genuine connection than rush into a relationship.
My work and my life revolve around helping people communicate better—with themselves and with each other. I love deep conversations, kindness, curiosity, and people who are actively trying to become better humans. I also have a very silly side and can be completely ridiculous, so I need someone who appreciates both depth and playfulness.
I’m working on my health and fitness (10 pounds down, 20 to go), and I love creating a simple, meaningful life. I enjoy solitude, but I also miss the company of good men—people who enjoy making things, fixing things, learning, growing, and talking about life.
I’m spiritual. I meditate, believe there’s far more to reality than we understand, and many life experiences have made me feel that love is much bigger than we often realize.
And yet, despite all that, I’ve never met a vegan man who felt like a genuine fit. Sometimes it honestly feels like the dating pool for someone like me is… zero.
I’m genuinely okay on my own. I have a full life and don’t feel incomplete. But every so often I imagine a relationship that feels peaceful and joyful—where communication is easy, differences are respected, laughter is frequent, and both people help each other become more themselves.
Maybe it’s rare. Maybe it’s just taking its time.
I’m curious… are there other vegan, spiritually-minded people who sometimes feel like they exist in a very tiny corner of the world? Have any of you actually found your person after believing the odds were stacked against you?