Intro
We would like to address some of the points that have been raised by some of our users (and by one of our communities here on Lemmy.World) on /c/vegan regarding a recent post concerning vegan diets for cats. We understand that the vegan community here on Lemmy.World is rightfully upset with what has happened. In the following paragraphs we will do our best to respond to the major points that we’ve gleaned from the threads linked here.
Links
Actions in question
Admin removing comments discussing vegan cat food in a community they did not moderate.
The comments have been restored.
The comments were removed for violating our instance rule against animal abuse (https://legal.lemmy.world/tos/#11-attacks-on-users). Rooki is a cat owner himself and he was convinced that it was scientific consensus that cats cannot survive on a vegan diet. This originally justified the removal.
Even if one of our admins does not agree with what is posted, unless the content violates instance rules it should not be removed. This was the original justification for action.
Removing some moderators of the vegan community
Removed moderators have been reinstated.
This was in the first place a failure of communication. It should have been clearly communicated towards the moderators why a certain action was taken (instance rules) and that the reversal of that action would not be considered (during the original incident).
The correct way forward in this case would have been an appeal to the admin team, which would have been handled by someone other than the admin initially acting on this.
We generally discuss high impact actions among team before acting on them. This should especially be the case when there is no strong urgency on the act performed. Since this was only a moderator removal and not a ban, this should have been discussed among the team prior to action.
Going forward we have agreed, as a team, to discuss such actions first, to help prevent future conflict
Posting their own opposing comment and elevating its visibility
Moderators’ and admins’ comments are flagged with flare, which is okay and by design on Lemmy. But their comments are not forced above the comments of other users for the purpose of arguing a point.
These comments were not elevated to appear before any other users comments.
In addition, Rooki has since revised his comments to be more subjective and less reactive.
Community Responses
The removed comments presented balanced views on vegan cat food, citing scientific research supporting its feasibility if done properly.
Presenting scientifically backed peer reviewed studies is 100% allowed, and encouraged. While we understand anyone can cherry pick studies, if a individual can find a large amount of evidence for their case, then by all accounts they are (in theory) technically correct.
That being said, using facts to bully others is not in good faith either. For example flooding threads with JSTOR links.
The topic is controversial but not clearly prohibited by site rules.
That is correct, at the time there was no violation of site wide rules.
Rooki’s actions appear to prioritize his personal disagreement over following established moderation guidelines.
Please see the above regarding addressing moderator policy.
Conclusions
Regarding moderator actions
We will not be removing Rooki from his position as moderator, as we believe that this is a disproportionate response for a heat-of-the-moment response.
Everybody makes mistakes, and while we do try and hold the site admin staff to a higher standard, calling for folks resignation from volunteer positions over it would not fair to them. Rooki has given up 100’s of hours of his free time to help both Lemmy.World, FHF and the Fediverse as a whole grown in far reaching ways. You don’t immediately fire your staff when they make a bad judgment call.
While we understand that this may not be good enough for some users, we hope that they can be understanding that everyone, no matter the position, can make mistakes.
We’ve also added a new by-laws section detailing the course of action users should ideally take, when conflict arises. In the event that a user needs to go above the admin team, we’ve provided a secure link to the operations team (who the admin’s report to, ultimately). See https://legal.lemmy.world/bylaws/#12-site-admin-issues-for-community-moderators for details.
TL;DR In the event of an admin action that is deemed unfair or overstepping, moderators can raise this with our operations team for an appeal/review.
Regarding censorship claims
Regarding the alleged censorship, comments were removed without a proper reason. This was out of line, and we will do our best to make sure that this does not happen again. We have updated our legal policy to reflect the new rules in place that bind both our user AND our moderation staff regarding removing comments and content. We WANT users to hold us accountable to the rules we’ve ALL agreed to follow, going forward. If members of the community find any of the rules we’ve set forth unreasonable, we promise to listen and adjust these rules where we can. Our terms of service is very much a living document, as any proper binding governing document should be.
Controversial topics can and should be discussed, as long as they are not causing risk of imminent physical harm. We are firm believers in the hippocratic oath of “do no harm”.
We encourage users to also list pros and cons regarding controversial viewpoints to foster better discussion. Listing the cons of your viewpoint does not mean you are wrong or at fault, just that you are able to look at the issue from another perspective and aware of potential points of criticism.
While we want to allow our users to express themselves on our platform, we also do not want users to spread mis-information that risks causing direct physical harm to another individual, origination or property owned by the before mentioned. To echo the previous statement “do no harm”.
To this end, we have updated our legal page to make this more clear. We already have provisions for attacking groups, threatening individuals and animal harm, this is a logical extension of this to both protect our users and to protect our staff from legal recourse and make it more clear to everyone. We feel this is a very reasonable compromise, and take these additional very seriously.
Sincerely,
FHF / LemmyWorld Operations Team
EDIT: Added org operations contact info
IDK it seems like pretty clear animal abuse to me
Cats are obligate carnivores. It is 100% animal abuse.
Can we not restart the argument please.
To me, it’s a lot more important in this post to look at the response from mods and admins to a disagreement (and infighting, and mistakes made).
Personally it seems like it was handled well, at least eventually (here). Do you feel one way or the other?
I have a bunch of cats I feed vegan diets to, but to anyone concerned that I’m doing animal abuse, don’t worry - occasionally, I wring one of their necks and chop it up to feed to the others, so clearly I’m not abusing them.
Seriously though, I do not understand how non-vegans are all getting on their high horse about “animal abuse” when their preferred course of action is just abusing different animals. Cats do not hold a higher moral standing than other animals just because they look cute. You know they feed cows literal shit? Do you think that’s part of their “natural diet?”
I don’t have any cats or other pets, but even if the worst claims are true, the people doing it would be no worse than what carnists do every day. It’s simply that abuse against certain categories of sentient beings is so normalized that people don’t even recognize it as abuse, no matter how bad it is.
The comments were removed for violating our instance rule against animal abuse
The comments have been restored
What… So the rules don’t matter if enough people get angry, I see
cats can live on a vegan diet. so it’s hardly animal abuse.
Well in germany you would get up to 3 years prison time for trying that bullshit. because it absolutely is animal abuse. quote the The German Veterinary Association for Animal Welfare
"A strictly vegan cat diet [would] be tantamount to an unauthorized, uncontrolled animal experiment and violates § 3 No. 10 of the Animal Welfare Act "
“Force-feeding for the purpose of an ideologically justified change of diet to vegetarian rations is a violation of § 3 No. of the Animal Welfare Act”
cheery picking laws aside, if the food provides all the necessary nutrition and the cat enjoys it, then I see no issue.
Do you have proof of that being the case or are you just throwing stuff out there?
Ima throw your own words back at you.
You are cherry picking the few favorable studies over the heaps of unfavorable studies.
You asked for peer reviewed studies into the palatability and nutrition of vegan cat food.
I provided.
show me some unfavourable ones then
But are they actually healthy and happy?
if the food is palatable and nutritious one would image that they are.
Is the food palatable and nutritious?
there are ways to measure both.
Let’s see it.
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0253292
here is one study.
let me know what you think
What are the results of those measurements?
that the food is enjoyable.
regular.biscuits given to cats contain a lot of artificial flavours and vegetable matter already.
All I’m getting from this entire saga is that vegans on here are lunatics. From forcing this nonsense on pets, to all of the follow-up, this is a very bad look for the community, from somone looking in from the outside.
This is some cultish behavior…
Someone is being quick to make judgements.
Vegan pet diets have historically been controversial, as dogs and cats are biologically omnivores and carnivores respectively. However, due to the demands of consumers concerned about farmed animal welfare and environmental sustainability, increasing numbers of pet food companies are now producing vegan diets excluding any animal products. These aim to supply all nutritional needs using plant-sourced ingredients, and supplements of minerals, vitamins and amino acids, amongst others.
However, a recent study by Daina et al. (1) asserted nutritional inadequacies in vegan pet diets. The study based its conclusions on the analysis of only three specific diets—a sample insufficient to draw conclusions about the nutritional soundness of all vegan pet diets. Nutritional unsoundness is also not uncommon among nonvegan pet diets (2). Although diets in each group may be nutritionally sound or unsound, depending on the quality of diet formulation and manufacturing, systemic differences between vegan and meat-based pet foods appear minimal in this respect. In fact, a recent survey of 29 pet food manufacturers (many more than examined by Daina et al.), which examined steps taken to ensure nutritional soundness and diet quality, found that 10 plant-based pet foods had slightly higher standards overall, than 19 meat-based pet foods (3). The former were more—not less—likely to be nutritionally sound.
Furthermore, the gold standard test for nutritional adequacy is animal health and longevity. Ten studies in dogs (4–13) and three in cats (14–16) have found that vegan diets produce health outcomes as good or better than nonvegan diets. The palatability of vegan pet diets appears comparable to that of meat-based diets (17), and nutritionally-sound vegan diets for dogs and cats offer major benefits for environmental sustainability (18).
The sweeping claims made by Daina et al. concerning the nutritional unsoundness of vegan pet diets are inconsistent with the evidence in this field, and incorrect. Given the positive health outcomes for dogs and cats maintained on nutritionally-sound vegan diets, and the substantial environmental benefits such diets may offer, the use of such diets should be supported.
Analysis of 16 studies on the impact of vegan diets on cat and dog health
Domínguez-Oliva et al. (2023)concluded, “there was no overwhelming evidence of adverse effects arising from use of these diets and there was some evidence of benefits. … Much of these data were acquired from guardians via survey-type studies, but these can be subject to selection biases, as well as subjectivity around the outcomes. However, these beneficial findings were relatively consistent across several studies and should, therefore, not be disregarded.” They advised, “… if guardians wish to feed their companion animals vegan diets, a cautious approach should be taken using commercially produced diets which have been formulated considering the nutritional needs of the target species.” [i.e., that are nutritionally-sound].In 2023 veterinary Professor Andrew Knight and colleagues published a large-scale study of 1,369 cats fed vegan (127 – 9%) or meat-based (1,242 – 91%) pet food, for at least one year. Cats fed vegan diets had better health outcomes for each of seven general health indicators studied. First, differences between diet groups in age, sex, neutering (desexing) status and primary location (outdoor vs. indoor) were all controlled for statistically. Next, risk reductions were calculated for cats of average age, and other characteristics. For average cats fed vegan diets, risk reductions were:
• increased veterinary visits (possibly indicating illness) – 7% reduction
• medication use – 15% reduction
• progression onto a medical diet (after being fed a vegan or meat-based diet) – 55% reduction
• reported veterinary assessment of being unwell – 4% reduction
• reported veterinary assessment of more severe illness – 8% reduction
• pet guardian opinion of more severe illness – 23% reduction.
• Additionally, the number of health disorders per unwell cat decreased by 16%.No reductions were statistically significant, but collectively they revealed a strong trend. Additionally, the prevalence of 22 of the most common feline health disorders was studied. Forty two percent of cats fed meat, and 37% of those fed vegan diets suffered from at least one health disorder. 15 disorders were most common in cats fed meat, and seven most common in cats fed vegan diets.
In 2021 veterinarians Dr Sarah Dodd and colleagues published a large-scale study, including dietary information for 1,026 cats, of whom 187 were fed vegan diets. The latter were more frequently reported by guardians to be in very good health. They had more ideal body condition scores, and were less likely to suffer from gastrointestinal and hepatic (liver) disorders, than cats fed meat. No health disorders were more likely, for cats fed vegan diets.
And in 2006 veterinarians Dr Lorelei Wakefield and colleagues published a study in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association comparing the health status of 34 cats maintained on vegetarian diets, and 52 maintained on conventional diets, for at least one year. No significant differences existed in age, sex, body condition, housing, or perceived health status between the two groups. Most of the caregivers in both groups described their cats as healthy or generally healthy.
Animal abuse isn’t an opinion. It’s evil. And malice by ignorance that could be corrected is malice.
Stop apologizing for doing your jobs. We all have opinions and raise them loudly in the Fediverse so I understand your natural reaction and want to communicate well. But IMHO this is troll feeding. If they posted in favor of human genocide, you’d close a ticket, and move on, not write an apology for taking it down.
https://www.benevo.com/vegan-cat-food-from-benevo/
Benevo Cat foods contain all the nutrients an adult cat needs, including a wide range of vitamins (including A, B, D, E, K), essential fatty acids and taurine, without the need for slaughterhouse meat. Although obligate carnivores in the wild, domestic cats still need nutrients they would normally source from prey. Thankfully Benevo Cat contains all those nutrients in a bioavailable kibble.
Benevo Cat is a professional cat food, created by Benevo in 2005, formulated and checked by independent animal nutritionists to meet the AAFCO(USA) and FEDIAF(Europe) guidelines for animal nutrition.
We’ve had safe and healthy variants of vegan cat food for 20 years. Trying to elevate the question to animal abuse speaks entirely to personal ignorance.
Just because the company making money off of purchasers says it’s good for cats. Doesn’t mean it’s good for cats. Other than one study that relied on surveyed answers from vegan pet owners, I haven’t seen any evidence that a vegan diet is safe for cats.
It’s always “the plant-based capitalism profiteers” concern trolling.
They didnt say that, they said its been independently verified to be healthy, exactly thr same way meat based cat food is verified.
If you would give your cat regular canned food then vegan cat food from benevo meets the same requirements.
Also meat based cat food is not the quality you likely think it is.
Yes the same goes for human, you can create manufacture food checking all the marks that you believe is needed. But ignoring the fact that human evolve over thousands of years to eat food that biologically manufacture. The nuance of diet is still studied to this day and suggestion something out of norm for an animal that cannot comprehend what is happening should be consider abuse. You dont own a pet, you take care of one…
Update: this also not limited to forcing cat to eat vegan food. Animal abuse include inhumane slaughter houses, and feeding your pet unhealthy diet, fat cats for example is also abuse.
Do cats normally eat what’s in regular canned cat food?
Show me the herd or cats that hunt cows and pigs. Or how about the ones that swim in the ocean and eat salmon or trout.
How about all of the synthetic additions to the food? Is that what they would normally eat? Vegan taurine is in meat based cat food too.
Sound like we already force our cats to eat whatever we deem appropriate, regardless of what the cat would choose to eat if left alone.
Unless you are arguing noone should have a pet then I dont see the consistency in your argument.
Vegans causing controversy. This is my complete lack of surprise.
Vegans have their rights to opinions just as you and me. This is not about t vegans vs us, but about how to handle disagreements We never learn if we just sensor everyone we disagree with
Who said they don’t? I just find it hilarious that one of said idiotic opinions (cats should be vegan!) is the cause of so much controversy.
Yeah, kinda… no one said that. But hey, haters gotta hate
I mean, it says the post was about cats and vegan diets. But whatever.
Still, when they use words like “meatsplained”, I think vegans can also be haters just as much.
Lunatic vegans on lemmy? No way dude
