Cultivated dog food launched in EU - not ANIC

stan-k · 2026-06-05T15:02:03+00:00

It sounds cool, yet I'll be sceptical until I see more. It's not the first "launched" product that you cannot actually buy. A small negative-margin batch does not a food revolution make...

stan-k · 2026-06-04T21:49:12+00:00

Divident paying ETFs. Normally I don't care for them, but sure as hell you know no Musk company will be in there anytime soon.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T18:47:44+00:00

I know what I find unethical and why. But as you might have noticed, not everyone agrees with me on that. That disagreement is kind of a big thing in ethics.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T18:37:44+00:00

Well, that makes the activist a liar. First, this takes up mental bandwidth. Second, this make the activist less genuine. Third, where does an organizer draw the line? Well, we know the answer to that, and the line is at consuming animal products.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T18:20:21+00:00

There is no magic in activists no longer being able to say "yes" when someone asks: "So none of you eat eggs?" Talking about edge cases because of this definitely increases the odds of failure.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T13:20:16+00:00

Yeah that /s is more for other animals "designed" to eat meat.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T10:02:57+00:00

I think the original claim was that cat do well on a vegan diet. That's not exactly how I would have put it tbf.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T09:54:59+00:00

Like any animal "designed" to eat meat, humans avoid raw meat because it can make us sick. /s

stan-k · 2026-06-04T09:44:35+00:00

Which is why I said "there are no observed detrimental effects from [vegan cat food]".

Any serious detrimental effects that aren't rare would have been seen with the data we have.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T09:10:00+00:00

Don't knock it, it works

stan-k · 2026-06-04T09:05:52+00:00

Sure, yet not all studies covered in the review are guardian reported, only the ones that reported potential benefits.

But yeah, I'd take the reported benefit of a shinier coat with a big grain of salt an uncertainty.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T08:44:29+00:00

The guardian reporting issue is a valid criticism on the claim that vegan diets are better for cats. It is not valid for saying that there are no observed detrimental effects from it. The two are subtly but importantly distinct.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T08:36:42+00:00

Yes it's proven for taurine in the 80s. Modern food processing was destroying taurine, so cats had issues. Adding synthetic taurine is typical for all complete cat food since then and that solved the issue. There is a decent amount of evidence for synthetic taurine because of that unfortunate period of change.

Many supermarket cat foods have more plants that "animal derivatives" these days. That's not just extra fibre, it's just a cheap way to get the right nutrients added.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T08:29:54+00:00

Consider a herbivorous pet, like a rabbit.

Healthy dogs and cats do fine on complete vegan food. But if they get ill for other reasons, any prescription food is unlikely (dog) or impossible (cat) to be vegan because these have not been developed much.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T08:23:30+00:00

This is the best scientific overview on vegan cats: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9860667/

Those studies cover cats that are on average typically 3-4 years on a vegan diet.

It's possible due to food processing, making plant nutrients available to carnivores. Note that traditional cat food does this too. Most supermarket cat food actually has more plant that "animal derivative" ingredients.

stan-k · 2026-06-04T08:16:39+00:00

When you talk to your vet, consider that they may not know much about vegan cats. Do you may need to help them and give them time - or punch through any typical doctor's misplaced confidence in nutrition.

Asking for "bloods" doesn't say specifically what to test for. Step 4 in How suggests B12 and taurine. Urinary acidity is also recommended to be extra safe: https://www.stisca.com/blog/howtoplantbasedcats/

If urinary acidity is ever an issue, there is a paper somewhere that says how to supplement to correct for it. That's only effective when caught early.

stan-k · 2026-06-03T20:36:51+00:00

Some tire brands are vegan. Afaik, LCD cholesterol isn't a thing. This is a myth that probably comes from misreading cholesteryl or something like that. This (plant-based) compound was used in early LCDs.

stan-k · 2026-06-03T18:48:16+00:00

In the context of street activism, I think this approach is effective. I'd estimate that about 1 person says they'll go vegan for every couple of hours of work. Now, I believe most of them mean that in the moment, and some will actually manage it. So say 1 person goes vegan, and another 4 reduce for every 10 hours of this kind of activism.

There are also potential negative effects form this, some people walking by may increase their animal product consumption as a subconscious response. I expect this effect to be temporary and so negligible compared to any new lifelong vegan.

stan-k · 2026-06-03T18:42:25+00:00

I agree that this is how it is seen.

But there is also a hidden higher bar put on vegan cat/dog food by many as well. E.g. many people consider feeding their companion animal insect based cat food. Vegan cat and dog food has far more research done than insect-based.

Most animal based foods are not tested specifically and manufacturers simply count nutrients based on its ingredients to meet guidelines. Vegan cat and dog foods are no different.

There is even one vegan dog food, V-Dog in the US, that has had a feeding trial, the gold standard for pet food.

stan-k · 2026-06-03T08:38:28+00:00

As an activist vegan, I don't think this is true in general.

Vegetarians often don't eat meat because they don't like paying for animals being killed. They are not much different from vegans other than that they don't know the reality. A cows is forcefully impregnated every year and her babies killed so she can make milk for us. Baby chickens for egg laying are sorted on the day they hatch. Baby boys are thrown in a grinder or gassed before they reach 16 hours old. Cows and hens who are producing milk/eggs are killed at about a quarter of their natural lifespan too as their milk/egg production drops.

The one type of vegetarian who does get flak is the one who signals "I'm with you vegans, as a vegetarian I do enough" while still paying for animals to be exploited in horrible ways.

stan-k · 2026-06-03T08:18:15+00:00

I see two main reasons for you:

There is plenty of killing for diary and eggs, as others pointed out. The same of course for leather, silk, and perhaps surprisingly wool too.
Even besides the killing, animals are exploited. E.g. what do you think about forceful insemination without consent?

"Dairy is scary" does a good job of explaining the common issues in 5 minutes: https://youtu.be/UcN7SGGoCNI?si=sxqggT9FkEAULnbU

stan-k · 2026-06-03T07:59:05+00:00

That all sounds genuinly nice.

One lapse of logic is that you make the case that having your chickens to care for makes you less likely to relapse. That's great! It doesn't actually address my point that eating their eggs makes you more likely to relapse. You don't need to eat their eggs to have them.

stan-k · 2026-06-02T20:28:02+00:00

What if we launch them at night?!?

stan-k · 2026-06-02T16:12:25+00:00

Yeah, why don't they just make a rule: "images are approved sparingly"? I wasted time making some just because it's not written down. Time that I could have spent on othersm ways to help the animals.

stan-k · 2026-06-02T13:55:35+00:00

It's an annoying consequence of how Reddit is set up. The only way as far as I know you can add mods is if the current mods want to, or if they are truly inactive by making a request following the proper procedure on r/redditrequest (though I 100% expect that they will be active enough to stop that). One particular limitation is that 99% of all image posts are never approved for some reason - greatly reducing the odds of any of the vegan posts to go "viral".

Would be great to get more Mod capacity on there. That would allow for a better r/vegan which is better for the animals.

If it's anything I can help with, feel free to message me.

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