This posting has been brewing for years. (Alternate name: Smart Patty My Ass.)
You probably know of LightLife‘s packaged veggie meats, maybe picked some up at some point given their widespread availability. They’re everywhere!
Of course they’re everywhere. They get delivered with the Chef Boyardee, the Eggos, Orville Redenbacher’s, the Slim-Jims and the Redi-Whips. Lightlife, like the other brands listed, are own by ConAgra, the super agribusiness/largest packaged food company in North America.
As with many profit machines, ConAgra is running quite a disgusting operation. Putting aside the fact that their packaged “food” brands are antithetic of my vegan foodie sensibilities, they are criticized for their environmental practices, or lack thereof, their labor practices, plant health violations, unethical business practices and their staunch support of keeping labels off genetically modified food (along with buddy super-powers PepsiCo, General Mills, Kelloggs, Sara Lee, and Heinz. All who fought Oregon’s measure 27 hard)<source>.
And yes, they are one of the largest producers of beef in the U.S. Their slaughter capacity exceeded 1.5 million in 1999
<source>. Who knows how many animals ConAgra is slaughtering these days… They’ve been buying up smaller meat packing plants up the wazoo and the figures are hard to locate. This wonderful company is also the numero uno provider of meat to fast food establishments. (Note: ConAgra may be familiar to you from the book sensation must-read,
Fast Food Nation.)
Ok, ConAgra buys Lightlife in 2000. The biggest meat producer buys the little veggie-protein company that could. But you’d hardly know what your purchase of Lightlife is profiting. Lightlife seems like it is a separate entity. It seems responsible, built on sustainable business practices. It even has a tab on its
website that preaches the good word about reducing your meat intake while a streaming video on their “About Us” talks of the environmental damage of a meat-based diet.
All of this is a bit confusing. Kind of. I mean, I understand: It is nice to have vegan products so widely available. It’s nice to have quick options now and again. Awesome that Lightlife’s website is educating people of the health and environmental problems associated with eating meat. All of that is good… But the fact remains: When you buy Lightlife your money goes to ConAgra. I don’t consider a product like this vegan. Especially with all the other choices out there, there is just no reason for a vegan to make that kind of compromise.
I recall a few years back Lightlife making available special online coupons. Many vegan blogs posted about them, including the dishes they made using Lightlife’s products. Blogs were receiving free care packages from Lightlife. I am not sure what the terms were but there was an assumption, I suppose, that these bloggers would post about how yummy and delicious the products were… genius marketing given how far and wide vegan food blogs reach. But the whole ordeal left a bad taste in my mouth. After seeing a posting from the
Urban Vegan, who often had Lightlife postings, I cracked. I stated my opinion that Lightlife is not
really a vegan product by way of commenting on her blog.
Now, I forget
exactly what I said when I posted my comment to the
Urban Vegan but I’m sure it was both passionate and tactless, as these characteristics, once and awhile, mark my talking about veganism… plus, I remember her quipping back defensively. Ever since then, I have pushed the issue out of my mind. I don’t like upsetting people, especially vegan folks- no offense, non-vegans.
But yeah, Lightlife isn’t vegan.
That’s all. I just needed to purge my thoughts on this.
Related
You probably know of LightLife‘s packaged veggie meats, maybe picked some up at some point given their widespread availability. They’re everywhere!