• 🏴 hamid abbasi [he/him] 🏴@vegantheoryclub.orgM
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    4 months ago

    Probably not great, its endemically impoverished and one of the poorest part of India. It is hard to understand Indian vegetarianism in a western context because of the stain of hindutva and the ritualistic purity. Because BJP is so powerful right now and many people are being pious for show, Many people claim to be “veg” in India but only on specific days or specific times and has more to do with being ritualistically clean than animal rights.

        • bomibantai@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          Since you want to be rude, Rajasthan isn’t thought of as poor anymore, not as much since BIMARU days.

          And grains/vegetables/cereal being significantly cheaper compared to meat in India/Rajasthan means those who are poorer are generally consuming more vegetarian items. Im finding it very difficult to think of a meat based Rajasthani dish, but they’re commonly associated with dal Bhati churma (all vegetarian).

          Attacking poorer folks for eating whatever they can afford, which sometimes amounts to donated/leftover animal carcasses is a pretty terrible thing to do (also hint hint is basically the same folks BJP likes to attack, generally the dalits and Scheduled castes)

          The way India’s PDS works (the largest in the world btw) is that some amount of grains, pulses, vegetable oil is provided essentially free of charge to those living in poverty (I don’t have the exact numbers on hand but it’s something like eg. 20 lbs of wheat flour per person per month at a cost of like 2 cents/lb)

          As for the ritualistic purity being the reason for being vegetarian, that is definitely more of UP/Sindhi/Marathi cultural relic than Rajasthani, and even then someone who abstains from meat 3 days a week is still doing better than most others.

          As for the BJP, they can all cannibalize each other for all I care, but what Hamid fails to mention is that this election was remarkable setback for the party, they are retaining power only due to having two allies with strenuous ties, and some mischief, and Rajasthan went 8 seats to opposition and 14 to BJP so about 2/3rd BJP to not. Definitely not a stronghold anymore, so idk why Hindutva is figuring so high on the commenters list of gripes

          • 🏴 hamid abbasi [he/him] 🏴@vegantheoryclub.orgM
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            4 months ago

            I’m sorry I understated the economic gains of Rajasthan, I haven’t been there in 11 years.

            I say it this way because despite the recent elections and my experience running English speaking online vegan spaces has been over the past 10 years so for many years now BJP goons have been coming into my vegan communities for years trying to explain how their fascist bullshit is compatible with veganism.

            Additionally no one is attacking them for being poor, it is just in reality the “vegan scene” which was the question is not common in places around the world because veganism is still a niche philosophy. I understand the diet there is vegetarian heavy but if it is without intention of being vegan then is not vegan. I don’t actually believe in terms of veganism that someone who is a part time vegetarian is “doing better” than a vegan. They are totally different things for different reasons. I don’t really believe there is a spectrum of how much you can respect animals and their natural rights to live, you either abstain 100% or you are not vegan.

            Animal rights oriented veganism is not the main driver for most vegetarians in India thus they are not vegans. It also just happens that the ones educated enough to go on the English internet and try and join vegan communities are high caste people who are the same people are conservative BJP losers.