Jill at Feministe had a fascinating post about food, cruelty, and justice yesterday, responding to this welcome Mark Bittman op-ed in the New York Times. Read both, and if you’ve got time, read the very interesting comments section at Feministe.

It’s been a while since I’ve blogged about veganism and animal rights; I took a break before Heloise Cerys was born, recognizing that my tone on those subjects had become puritanical, even alienating. Since last I scribbled, I’ve moderated some of my views while remaining committed to pursuing veganism, however imperfectly. Traveling as often as we are fortunate to do, and living the hectic lifestyle we have chosen for ourselves made strict veganism (eating nothing with any trace of dairy, egg, refined sugar processed with bone char, honey, etc) next to impossible. I’ve eaten cheese in France and had marshmallows made with fish gelatin in Israel — and I’ve even had an egg salad sandwich at a diner in Nevada City.

I’ve come to see that the “cruelty-free” ideal is an impossible one for those of us living even eco-conscious American lifestyles. The vegan artisan bread I eat comes from wheat harvested with combines that chew up small rodents, to name one example. We’re all complicit to one degree or another; the goal should be to do what we can to alleviate that suffering without flattering ourselves that a personal lifestyle choice can eliminate our complicity altogether.

As I wrote in a comment at Jill’s place, I’ve come to a new attitude about food, particularl as I’ve gotten more intensely involved in eating disorder/body image work through various initiatives in the fashion/modeling industries. For me, there are now five considerations I have when thinking about food:

1. Pleasure. Taste matters, texture matters, time matters.

2. Cost, both in terms of time and money. Who has access to healthy food? How can we expand food options for the poor?

3. Culture. Food traditions matter. Some scholars suggest that early Christians dropped the kashrut laws for non-Jewish converts because people were so connected to their food customs that it became a defining issue. Almost all of us have certain foods we connect to our families and our past — and those connections matter. (I say this on a day when millions will, for example, connect to a real or imagined Irish past by eating corned beef.)

4. Compassion. Without forgetting the above considerations, we absolutely must think about where our food comes from. How much human or animal suffering is involved? What can we do to ameliorate that suffering in terms of what we eat and what we buy?

5. Sustainability. What if everyone in the world ate the way we eat? Could that be sustained? What are the costs to the planet (in terms of carbon, natural resource depletion, etc.) of our diet?

I am convinced that whether we’re vegans or omnivores or somewhere in between, we need to remember that all five of these considerations must be on the table. And at that table, we need to listen to each other — and consider too the voices of those who can’t take part in the discussion. (Perhaps, of course, because they are the ones being eaten.)