The team is bigger than the label

Gaz Oakley is no longer vegan. That doesn't mean he's no longer an ally.

I’m always interested to see the vegan community’s response when a vegan celebrity jumps ship.

That happened, as you may have seen, with Gaz Oakley, a celebrated Welsh chef and cookbook author, who - as Avant-Garde Vegan - built up a following of two million people. He’d recently shifted to a quieter, rural life, growing his own vegetables and keeping rescued chickens. On a podcast, he said he no longer considers himself vegan, and focuses more on localism, foraging, rewilding etc. He even said he’s open to eating invasive species (crayfish, venison, pigeon…).

Many vegans, of course, have expressed disappointment, anger and frustration with Oakley. They talk and write about a betrayal of values or financial gain. I understand this disappointment, and I do think what Oakley did - and still might do - can cause some real PR damage. I don’t agree with the man’s reasoning about nature (nothing is as clichéd as “reconnecting with nature”) or his aggressive stance on invasive species. I could write a long post on all of this, but others have done so (see e.g. here and here). In this piece, allow me to bring some other thoughts that may be a bit less obvious.

Gaz Oakley

Can we be more charitable?

First of all, as some of my readers will know, I’m in favor of what I call slow opinion. We don’t know everything there is to know about this person, we can’t look in his head, we shouldn’t make assumptions too quickly - definitely not negative ones. Let’s leave some room for doubt.

And let’s try to be charitable. The guy did a lot. He inspired millions to eat more plant-based. There are no doubt people who attribute their going vegan or getting active to Oakley (and those people don’t need to follow him where he went now). Also, he apparently plans to remain mostly plant-based, and is potentially still an ally against factory farming.

In terms of harm, our diets are on a spectrum

Oakley is eating eggs from rescued hens. These products are not without issues (the rescued animals are breeds that are inherently problematic), but we should be able to distinguish lesser harms from bigger harms. Considering all animal products as the same evil doesn’t help anyone. I haven’t found anything about how Oakley would source his fish or his “invasive species”, but in case they would come from hunting, this is - as much as I despise hunting and think it’s wrong - less horrible than an animal spending their entire life in a dark, overcrowded shed.

The same goes for the amount of animal products one consumes: none is great, but less is better than a lot. We can’t pretend someone is going full omnivore again when they say they’re going to eat a few animal products now and then (I’ve seen vegan influencers being totally lambasted for saying they’ll eat this or that product-with-some-animal ingredients on occasion).

Let’s also consider that vegan diets are never entirely harmless, with some products negatively impacting the environment, human labor, or even animals. Oakley may be avoiding some issues that many vegans aren’t.

What if vegans are not the best advocates?

This is a point I’ll explore in another post, but for now: what if vegans are putting the bar too high for the average person, and say 90%-vegans are more convincing or inspiring? I can imagine many more people being attracted to a lifestyle or diet that allows for at least exceptions, than to one that is absolute (no matter how many times we may want to say that animal rights are non-negotiable). As much as we dislike it, dropping the vegan identity may also be helpful in this respect.

Health worries should be taken seriously

Oakley spoke about health challenges. Even though some commenters are skeptical this was the case (saying he only offered those after a lot of backlash), we can’t look into his head (see first point). All I know is that health issues are often a cause for people to abandon ship. It’s not necessarily that their diet is the cause of their symptoms, but it’s understandable that after a long quest trying to get better - and surrounded by pro-meat propaganda in a carnistic environment - they might at least think: “what if…” and maybe experiment.

Pushing him away is not going to get him closer (duh)

The so-called black sheep effect is at work here: defectors from a shared norm will be treated more harshly than outsiders who never signed up. Ex-vegans will incur more ire than meat eaters. With their behavior, the defector may imply that the standard is unlivable or false. That’s very threatening to the ingroup, and it’s part of the reason for the backlash. So after the person left, we bolt the door behind them.

Vegans mocking, criticizing, accusing the man of all kinds of nasty things is a reliable way to drive him even further away. Someone pushed out by their fellow progressives may find a warmer reception elsewhere. The right, in particular, is good at welcoming people the left has shamed - offering them community and a sense of vindication. It’s not what we want.

Let’s look at ourselves

Oakley said he didn’t feel at home in the vegan community. We can ignore that, or take that seriously. There are good reasons to do the latter, because many people feel it - including me at times. We define things very strictly - who is in and who is out, what is right and what is wrong. That is not appealing to many people.

So there’s an irony here: the sort of pile-on against Oakley for leaving may be exactly why he no longer felt at home in the first place. The angrier we are at him, the more we prove his point.

Still on our side?

I had ended my first version of this article like this: Let’s be more forgiving toward those who fall off the wagon, and help them back on.

But that’s actually not the message I want to bring. It would imply the only solution is to get Oakley back at 100% vegan.

What if - as long as he remains largely plant-based, against factory farming, and continues to care about animals - we simply consider him to be on our wagon still?

That would be the kind of inclusiveness that makes our movement larger, our rules less absolute, our appeal wider, and our minds less rigid. And that is, I think, what ultimately helps animals most.