A better example
Apr. 5th, 2013 05:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
underthewillowsSuppose you go to a restaurant for your lunch every day. It's not the greatest in town, but it's within your budget, it's convenient to your place of work or where you live, and all you really want is something hot and filling in the middle of the day. This place does that at least.
The menu isn't that varied, they have a bad habit of suddenly and with no warning switching the items on offer and when you can get them, and the service is (to be honest) not that helpful or responsive, but although you grouse about it, it hasn't yet got to the stage where it's more trouble than it's worth.
So, one day, you go in and decide to order an omelette. But when you look at the menu, it's all vegan food. Big posters on the walls about veganism. Flyers on the tables for vegan causes and events. Gift cards on sale that you can give to your friends and family for vegan meals. A collection tin prominently positioned at the cash desk soliciting donations for a particular vegan organisation.
Huh, you think to yourself. I didn't see anything outside or in the local papers saying this place had suddenly gone vegan or changed ownership. Maybe it's just a promotion for this week?
Anyway, when the waiter comes to take your order, you tell him you want an omelette. He tells you sorry, no can do. You ask why, and he tells you "Oh, we don't do those kinds of dishes".
You say you didn't realise they had switched to being a vegan restaurant - or is it because they're under new management? Your waiter says, with a distinct look of who let this one wander around outside on her own?, that they haven't changed, they've always been this kind of restaurant. Indeed, the attitude he exudes very strongly implies that this is normal, that this is what all restaurants are like, that anything else, well, just isn't food service provision.
Okay, you say. If you haven't changed, if this isn't a specifically vegan restaurant, if anyone can come in here and order a meal, can I get my omelette?
"Oh, no," your waiter tells you. He adds, with a sneer, "We don't do that kind of cooking because our staff don't share those beliefs, and we consider that the majority of our customers don't, either."
Those beliefs? What kinds of beliefs are those?, you ask.
"Pro-animal suffering", your waiter explains. "Neither our staff nor our customers believe that the provision and consumption of food should involve or rely on cruelty to animals. That's why we don't serve your kind of meals."
Now, I ask you: would you continue to eat in that restaurant? Would you accept that if you wanted an omelette, this meant you wanted hens to be kept in cruel conditions? Or that if you liked shepherd's pie, this meant you were a sadist?
Would there have been a better way for the waiter to explain why they had an offer on quinoa salad but you couldn't get a hard-boiled egg with that, without insulting customers, insinuating that those who didn't immediately embrace veganism were barbarians, or telling you why there wasn't a contradiction in the statement that this restaurant hadn't changed its policy or emphasis, it was the same as ever it was, but that being a restaurant meant it served greens but not steaks?
And, had you been treated as some kind of animal-torturer, would you have remained to munch on a lettuce-leaf or departed full of determination to eat the biggest, rarest, most juice-dripping steak you could get your mouth around - even though, when you went in, all you wanted was a lousy omelette and you didn't mind if the other patrons ate cous-cous at the same time you were eating your lunch?
The menu isn't that varied, they have a bad habit of suddenly and with no warning switching the items on offer and when you can get them, and the service is (to be honest) not that helpful or responsive, but although you grouse about it, it hasn't yet got to the stage where it's more trouble than it's worth.
So, one day, you go in and decide to order an omelette. But when you look at the menu, it's all vegan food. Big posters on the walls about veganism. Flyers on the tables for vegan causes and events. Gift cards on sale that you can give to your friends and family for vegan meals. A collection tin prominently positioned at the cash desk soliciting donations for a particular vegan organisation.
Huh, you think to yourself. I didn't see anything outside or in the local papers saying this place had suddenly gone vegan or changed ownership. Maybe it's just a promotion for this week?
Anyway, when the waiter comes to take your order, you tell him you want an omelette. He tells you sorry, no can do. You ask why, and he tells you "Oh, we don't do those kinds of dishes".
You say you didn't realise they had switched to being a vegan restaurant - or is it because they're under new management? Your waiter says, with a distinct look of who let this one wander around outside on her own?, that they haven't changed, they've always been this kind of restaurant. Indeed, the attitude he exudes very strongly implies that this is normal, that this is what all restaurants are like, that anything else, well, just isn't food service provision.
Okay, you say. If you haven't changed, if this isn't a specifically vegan restaurant, if anyone can come in here and order a meal, can I get my omelette?
"Oh, no," your waiter tells you. He adds, with a sneer, "We don't do that kind of cooking because our staff don't share those beliefs, and we consider that the majority of our customers don't, either."
Those beliefs? What kinds of beliefs are those?, you ask.
"Pro-animal suffering", your waiter explains. "Neither our staff nor our customers believe that the provision and consumption of food should involve or rely on cruelty to animals. That's why we don't serve your kind of meals."
Now, I ask you: would you continue to eat in that restaurant? Would you accept that if you wanted an omelette, this meant you wanted hens to be kept in cruel conditions? Or that if you liked shepherd's pie, this meant you were a sadist?
Would there have been a better way for the waiter to explain why they had an offer on quinoa salad but you couldn't get a hard-boiled egg with that, without insulting customers, insinuating that those who didn't immediately embrace veganism were barbarians, or telling you why there wasn't a contradiction in the statement that this restaurant hadn't changed its policy or emphasis, it was the same as ever it was, but that being a restaurant meant it served greens but not steaks?
And, had you been treated as some kind of animal-torturer, would you have remained to munch on a lettuce-leaf or departed full of determination to eat the biggest, rarest, most juice-dripping steak you could get your mouth around - even though, when you went in, all you wanted was a lousy omelette and you didn't mind if the other patrons ate cous-cous at the same time you were eating your lunch?
