I’ve seen a few (not many) people online fawn over how Khaled bin AlWaleed converted to veganism, and even got his dad to do the same. There’s also talk that he plans to open a chain of plant-based restaurants throughout the Arab world.
I’m curious to hear what people think about such figures. This guy is directly descended from the founder of Saudi Arabia – on both his parents’ sides. He’s part of a family that’s brought an entire country – Yemen – on the brink of death, with 2+ million people at risk of dying from hunger. Not to mention he’s part of one of the most brutal, draconian regimes anywhere in the world.
The same goes for places like, say, Tel Aviv, hailed as the “vegan capital of the world”. Is that what we really want to talk about, and not the hideous apartheid regime erected by Israel in the West Bank and Gaza? Gaza, for example, is an open-air prison, where people are left to die, with no access to even drinking water.
And yet we find popular YouTubers celebrating both AlWaleed (who flew in Dr Michael Greger to Saudi Arabia just for a consult) and Tel Aviv as bastions of veganism.
I’ve heard the argument that neither the restaurants in Tel Aviv nor Prince AlWaleed are personally liable for their government’s crimes. I don’t really buy this. I mean I somewhat understand it re-Tel Aviv, but someone like AlWaleed is literally part of the government. He has plenty of power and privilege to relinquish ties with his family and use his newfound platform to bring attention to the hideous regime in Saudi Arabia. But as far as I can tell, he hasn’t said a single thing about Yemen (not to mention Khashoggi, Saudi-Israel ties etc).
In my opinion, in these contexts, veganism effectively serves as a way to whitewash serious crimes that are far worse than the animal lives these individuals/groups are potentially saving. But I’m curious to hear what people think.
I don’t think veganism really works to whitewash the crimes of either the Israeli or Saudi Arabian government. Even for vegans, those crimes are probably some of the first things they think of when we hear of those countries. It is good that Tel Aviv has a decent vegan scene, and it is good that Al Waleed is having some vegan influence. However, I don’t think veganism is considered so good to most people that it really does anything to mask those issues (and it certainly doesn’t make up for them.) For what it’s worth (not much) I do agree that the praise of Al Waleed is worse since Tel Aviv is made up of many more parts than the Saudi Arabian royalty and I don’t think the average Israeli resident has as much power as Al Waleed.
Agreed! I should have phrased my post better – when I said “veganism effectively serves to…” I should have said “these figures’ veganism effectively serves to…”. I.e. I didn’t mean to make a statement about veganism as a whole at all.
And yep, agreed on Tel Aviv too. The shop owners there have little, if any, agency compared to AlWaleed.