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A pro-meat sign outside a Bristol pub has angered vegans – and sparked debate online.
The chalkboard sign, outside the city’s Royal Oak Pub, said ‘Turning vegan would be a big missed steak’.
This anti-vegan stance has led some to accuse the pub of not caring about animal welfare.
Not vegan-friendly
“They don’t seem to care much for animal welfare. Not that I don’t have a good sense of humor but the vegan joke is one way to turn away a lot of customers. Just checked on Facebook… it’s spread far and wide around the area, Shame that I’ll just have to go elsewhere from now on,” one reviewer wrote on Facebook.
But the pub denied these accusations.
“Thanks for the comments, the play on words that was used tells nothing about what I think or do for animal welfare!” a representative replied to the post. “We love the growing vegan movement. Spoiler- we will be using lettuce in a pun next week.”
The best approach?
The sign has caused disagreements between some vegans themselves – with some advocate saying complaining about these kinds of jokes is ineffective when it comes to promoting the movement.
“When people make these kinds of jokes, and either don’t know about or don’t care about the suffering animals go through before ending up on a plate, it can be really angering,” one vegan said.
“It can seem like they are laughing at the animal suffering. But I don’t think people are necessarily thinking about it like that. When vegans get really angry about this kind of thing, it’s too easy for the focus to shift away from animal exploitation and to shift onto how easily annoyed vegans are.”
