honey

nomorebadtown

whats this i hear about vegans not eating honey?!

argument seems to be that they dont like the idea of stealing the bee's (excess) honey.

surly these hippie bastards have gone one step too far?

discuss

RobertFoster

Are they stoping you from eating it?

nomorebadtown

RobertFoster wrote:

Are they stoping you from eating it?

pfft, they can try. have they tried to stop you eating your honey brother?
bloody tree huggers, we'll show them!

Hugh Hefner

Now, you're almost certainly gonna be banned from here anyway so I don't know why I'm really wasting my time, but just so you know: probably the biggest issue vegans have with eating honey is that many (if not most/all) the bees are killed in the harvesting of the honey. Granted the honey may be harvested without doing this.

nomorebadtown

in case it escaped you all i am taking the mick, lightening the mood, easing the tention.

i was genuinly interested in the honey issue as i was at a vegan person's 21st birthday party last night and that was the first i heard about it.

as a general rule do vegans not eat honey or is it only Hardcore ones? this is the first aspect of veganism that made me sit up and go -"your taking the piss right?"

Shabadu

nomorebadtown- I realise you are new to boards.ie, so consider this your first and only warning on the vegan/vegetarian forum. Even if you are 'taking the mick', it is not acceptable to insult people because of their chosen lifestyle.

nomorebadtown

fair enough. but if anyone was seriously insulted by my comments and took them to heart then i suspect they probably have some serious emotional problems. that or their 'choice of lifestyle' is very easily shaken. either way i just wanted to discuss vegan views on honey.

Nature Boy

http://www.peta.org/mc/factsheet_display.asp?ID=122
There's an article on honey bees on the PETA website. Look in particular at the "Manipulating Nature" section.

Personally I've no problem with honey as long as it is only excess honey and the bees have been treated properly, but I suppose there's no way of knowing that for sure.

Vegans, by definition, do not eat, wear, or use any animal produce so I guess it's just part of the package.

dahamsta

Hugh Hefner wrote:

probably the biggest issue vegans have with eating honey is that many (if not most/all) the bees are killed in the harvesting of the honey.

I'll bet those hypocrites sleep in beds every night, killing millions upon millions of bed bugs in the process.

Shabadu

nomorebadtown wrote:

fair enough. but if anyone was seriously insulted by my comments and took them to heart then i suspect they probably have some serious emotional problems. that or their 'choice of lifestyle' is very easily shaken. either way i just wanted to discuss vegan views on honey.

If you have an argument to put across about your personal disagreement with the vegetarian/vegan ethos you are more than welcome. What people don't like is being called 'hippy bastards'.

nomorebadtown

Nature Boy wrote:

Vegans, by definition, do not eat, wear, or use any animal produce so I guess it's just part of the package.

makes sense i guess...

Catsmokinpot

Hugh Hefner wrote:

Now, you're almost certainly gonna be banned from here anyway so I don't know why I'm really wasting my time, but just so you know: probably the biggest issue vegans have with eating honey is that many (if not most/all) the bees are killed in the harvesting of the honey. Granted the honey may be harvested without doing this.

thats quite untrue, the bees are smoked out of there, makes them dosile so they can take the honey from them they dont take all the honey either.... i know this because my uncle used to keep bees...

i think its a bit stupid tbh, i can understand no meat or dairy produce, no eggs as they actually come from an animal, but honey is a product that bees make, its like taking produce from a farmer, although you didnt make it, you gave the farmer the land with which to grow its produce, looked after the land so that noone else damaged it, harvest some of the produce, and leave the bees with more than enough to survive on.

tbh i think the people who believe taking honey from insects that outnumber us by millions, and arent just going to die out, have slightly more conscience than i would have.

Tar.Aldarion

Catsmokinpot wrote:

tbh i think the people who believe taking honey from insects that outnumber us by millions, and arent just going to die out, have slightly more conscience than i would have.

It doesn't matter if one bee exists or a trillion, life does not become more or less precious. Although clearly most people think it does.
It's like that guy on sky news that was representing britain as regards the torturing of Iraqi's, his argument was that since less that .05% of british soldiers are abusing iraqi's and the rest aren't, it's ok! and what is the fuss.
I mean wtf, we couldn't believe what we were hearing especially when somebody else from the government quoted his words later as a point.:eek:

Hugh Hefner

Catsmokinpot wrote:

thats quite untrue, the bees are smoked out of there, makes them dosile so they can take the honey from them they dont take all the honey either.... i know this because my uncle used to keep bees...

I'm just repeating what I've read from other sources. Maybe your uncle was one of the beekeepers who didn't kill the bees. If I remember correctly they don't kill them when they want to keep the swarm for the next season, which is usually only in the case of the smaller farmers, and the bigger bee farms (I guess the ones who are contracted to big companies) just kill the swarms instead. I would assume because it's more efficient.
Again, this is just what I've found out. I mean, I'm no beekeeper.

i think its a bit stupid tbh, i can understand no meat or dairy produce, no eggs as they actually come from an animal, but honey is a product that bees make, its like taking produce from a farmer, although you didnt make it, you gave the farmer the land with which to grow its produce, looked after the land so that noone else damaged it, harvest some of the produce, and leave the bees with more than enough to survive on.

Yes, I would agree with you. I don't think it's too bad if the bees are cared for well and aren't killed.

Am I right in thinking that vegan's don't drink milk because the cows need it for their young? I heard this from a vegan friend of mine once but sadly we didn't discuss it. I don't think it's morally wrong to use milk either, as long as the cows are treated well. Too bad this is not always the case.

Peanut

Tar.Aldarion wrote:

It doesn't matter if one bee exists or a trillion, life does not become more or less precious. Although clearly most people think it does.

You have to put it in context though, considering it's impossible to survive on this planet without affecting other forms of life.

Catsmokinpot

Tar.Aldarion wrote:

It doesn't matter if one bee exists or a trillion, life does not become more or less precious. Although clearly most people think it does.
It's like that guy on sky news that was representing britain as regards the torturing of Iraqi's, his argument was that since less that .05% of british soldiers are abusing iraqi's and the rest aren't, it's ok! and what is the fuss.
I mean wtf, we couldn't believe what we were hearing especially when somebody else from the government quoted his words later as a point.:eek:

maybe i worded it wrong, im sorry, i didnt say anything about torturing bees, and i dont think we should just go around killing animals for the sake of harvesting stuff from them, thats why i stopped eating meat, but from my experiences bees dont get killed, ive discovered thats not entirely true because some bee keepers do kill the bees and thats wrong, but whats one or two bees going to make a difference in the cross fire, and they live a happy un restricted life. in the end thats all that matters to me.... as long as an animal has a chance at life, and a good life then its ok, thats what grinds my gears about the meat industry, bring an animal up in a cage, afraid and alone for its whole life, and then bring it to a place where it gets slaughtered brutally without a chance to get away. thats horrific. a bee is relatively well off. and i bet you dont pray for every little bug you step on by accident or hit with your car etc.

Hugh Hefner

Hugh Hefner wrote:

Am I right in thinking that vegan's don't drink milk because the cows need it for their young? I heard this from a vegan friend of mine once but sadly we didn't discuss it. I don't think it's morally wrong to use milk either, as long as the cows are treated well. Too bad this is not always the case.

I'm not a vegan although I don't drink milk because soya is so much tastier but as far as I know vegans are against drinking milk because the calves from milking cows are fattened and slaughtered for profit but also to facilatate the milking, also in other countries I have visited the cows aren't let out to graze they are kept in factory conditions year round.
The way I look at it is that it is a greater good to have milking cows living long cushy lifes than leave farmers with only beef to make profit, and having animals be slaughtered sooner.

direbadger

nomorebadtown wrote:

in case it escaped you all i am taking the mick, lightening the mood, easing the tention.

i was genuinly interested in the honey issue as i was at a vegan person's 21st birthday party last night and that was the first i heard about it.

as a general rule do vegans not eat honey or is it only Hardcore ones? this is the first aspect of veganism that made me sit up and go -"your taking the piss right?"

Honey is for feeding the bee's larva and themselves during the winter. Simple dimple. I don't eat it or products that contain it. So no Burts Bees cosmetics for me! Then again, my boyfriend calls himself a vegan and though he doesn't buy jars of honey, if a product had honey in it, it wouldn't stop him from buying it. I suppose things as small as bees don't make it onto his "radar of stuff to not exploit". I'm trying to educate him as to the wonder of invertebrates with David Attenborough's Life in the Undergrowth but so far all I'm getting from him is "Ewwwww! Sick! Buuuuugs!" :rolleyes:

Al Katraz

This is from Peta's site:

"Some farmers kill all the bees in the fall because it’s easier than winterizing the hives. One beekeeper admits that one of his friends “uses canisters of cyanide gas to exterminate 6,000 colonies of bees at the conclusion of the production season. It is the most economical way to run his operation.”(25) Each hive that is left to hibernate through the winter needs at least 50 pounds of honey to survive, and according to one entomologist, many bees succumb to improper care, starvation, weakness, and other problems during the winter."


In reply to the person who wanted to know why vegans don't drink milk or eat cheese:

When a cow gives birth it starts producing milk for the calf. The calf is then separated after a few weeks and is either fattened up for slaughter at about a year (I think) or itself becomes a dairy cow. Nearly all males (bullocks) are slaughtered at a year or less. Meanwhile, the cow continues to produce milk in the absence of the calf.

So more than half or calves are slaughtered early, and when milk cows get too old they too are slaughtered.

They don't just get pensioned off to a retirement home where they can complain about varicose udders and knit.

I presume that's why vegans who have considered the economics of farming don't eat dairy products.