The other day, my boyfriend and I met at the VU, he was after class, I just finished my last meeting. We were both quite hungry, and wanted to grab some warm food. We never eat at the VU, there is just simply nothing there, but we decided to give it a try this one time. As expected, we were rather disappointed. There is a vegan pizza, more than double the price of the one with cow's breast milk. There is one vegan cupcake, the most expensive item on that menu, also double the price compared to the rest. We turned away and went home hungry. If there were any other options, I did not see them, and I swear I really tried.

We live in a fake peace

I am very disappointed. I always knew the food choice was quite poor, but I did not know it was this bad. I have been at the VU for over 3 years now, and I can say quite honestly, there has been no improvement. At this point it is almost as if everything is more important. Nobody seems to talk about the way we treat animals at any level of the organisation. Even the Green Office is afraid of speaking up for veganism. We live in a fake peace, where millions die every day and we celebrate over their dead bodies.

How sad is the fact that it is simply more affordable to harm others than not? Doesn't such pricing directly encourage the slaughter of innocent sentient beings over an act of kindness? Why is enslavement of non-human animals, exploitation of their female reproductive systems and straight up murder of their new born children so normalised in our society we never question it to be wrong?

 I will not be silenced until the VU is vegan

Carnists often tell me that humans and their rights matter more. This always leaves me wondering, what is it that they do to support human related causes in their lives? Verbal boycott of something happening on the other side of the planet is easy, posting an angry Instagram story about injustice happening somewhere else. But how about starting from yourself? Being kind to animals does not cost any more time than eating their flesh. It also does not cost more money, unless you're at the VU. It is time for a change.

I swore to myself to fight for the right to freedom for everyone, human or else until there is nothing left to fight for. Not many listen to me, plenty disagree. This is to be expected, it is only human to feel attacked when confronted with a truth that is inconvenient. This does not discourage me. I will not be silenced until the VU is vegan. I will take every opportunity to talk about the issue to people in the organisation. I want to use my outreach to show our university the way towards compassion. I believe we can only truly be kind towards each other once we start being kind towards the most vulnerable.

Go vegan!

Gabriela Adamczyk
Vice Chair
g.adamczyk.usr@vu.nl