The Different Types of Vegans

Did you know that there are different types of vegans?

And, does it really matter?

I did a vlog about five years ago about what it means to be vegan and the nuances involved (you can watch it here: 50 Shades of Vegan.) And as I was re-watching it, I thought to myself, ‘There’s hardly any change at all in fact there are probably more different ‘labels’ now than before’.

So let’s start with moi! — a good place to start as I went through my journey.

I have no idea when I became vegan. I went vegetarian back in the late 90s, and the only reason I did was because I couldn’t afford to buy meat, and legumes were way cheaper.

Now, my dairy intake was minimal, and it was easy to switch to soy for my coffee, so that wasn’t an issue, but Eggs … I loved them. However, I would only ever buy free-range, but, whew, they were expensive back then — it was such an elite market. Consequently, I wouldn’t buy them very often.

Then, in early 2000, I suddenly realised that I hadn’t eaten eggs for ages, and it was like, “Whoa — looks like I’m vegan”.

But not quite. I was definitely plant-based. You see, my reason was still about the money, but slowly, as Google came into my sphere, I began to learn about animal farming practices…