[september]

Eggs and honey =/= vegan.

As for drawing the line, for the vegan who becomes vegan for moral purposes, it's still not a religion. it's a part of a lifestyle that respects (in my case) the sentient creature as one who can feel pain, and who doesn't deserve to suffer that pain.

It's NOT the same as a grapefruit because grapefruits don't have nerve endings, nor do they have the necessary parts of the brain that can give rise to sentience. The jury's still out on some animals, but I'd rather be safe than sorry on whether cows, chickens, and pigs (who have the intelligence of human 4-year-olds) are conscious. Even if they aren't (in the case of fish, scientists are not sure whether fish have the appropriate nerve endings, but see it as a possibility), one is still bound by the fact that these animals feel pain and suffer. They do not suffer "humanely". Even kosher slaughter can be inhumane, mainly because they are usually not the quick deaths they are promised to be.

I drink rice milk because it's yummy, it's less fattening than milk ("2%" milk is calculated by weight... it's actually 35% fat), and there's just no guarantee that any milk was milked humanely unless you're watching it happen (or know the farmers). I've never liked eggs, and I don't see much reason to use honey.

Animal proteins are toxic, and consuming too many of them can have dangerous consequences. It's just not as simple as grapefruits and cows. And if one is to consider the moral ramifications, examining other cultures that do eat different meats is not sufficient.