my feelings on veganism are roughly the same as my feelings on going completely"zero waste" in that like. they ARE lifestyles that decrease the harm we do to the earth and the other life on it. i respect people for whom those lifestyles work and who commit to them.
but also, neither of them completely do away with all harm (there's basically no way for any animal to live and eat without doing SOME harm to other living things, and there's no ethical consumption under capitalism) and often may not be the best way to minimize harm in all cases. however, they're often touted by people following those lifestyles as like "this solid rule is THE way to not do ANY harm and are what everyone should do." rather than "this solid rule is one that works for me and helps me personally reduce my harm". it's forcing binary rules as a universal solution for something as complex and full of grey-areas as harm reduction.
and sometimes this attitude can lead to people being less likely to take small steps that work for them like "i'll eat a couple more plant based meals a week to give less support to factory farms" or "i'll try to opt for stuff in glass or aluminum packaging instead of plastic, when i can" because either they can't follow the strong binary rules and think there's no use in trying at all, or they see the hypocrisy in acting like the rule will prevent all harm and so reactively assume the rule has no benefits at all.
this also!!! there are many different reasons why some people can't follow these rules and disability is a HUGE one!
when you value the rule itself over the harm reduction that the rule was created to serve in the first place, vulnerable people get forgotten and harmed. this doesn't mean that the rule is useless in reducing harm, or even that it's not the best method for some people, but it needs to be treated as *a* tool rather than *the* one destination
