Welcome to Small Bytes, Sound Bytes, a midweek segment of food for thought podcast where I share short, succinct, thoughtful responses to typical questions, myths, and misconceptions related to plant-based eating, veganism, and animal protection.

You can get written transcripts of this podcast by going to joyfulvegan.com slash donate.

Because I'm vegan, I'm often asked my opinion on a lot of different things.

One question I'm asked a lot and have been asked over the last several decades is what do I think about Native Americans who honored the animals they killed before praying over them?

My question is which Native Americans who are you talking about?

There were once hundreds of tribes and nations of Native Americans and they didn't share a common brain. They had different habits, different diets, different customs, and they were individuals within these communities.

Some were kind, some were not so kind, they're human with fallibilities, and like all humans, they use rituals and rights to mask unpleasant behaviors.

But when someone asks my thoughts about this, I suspect what they're really asking is how do I feel about people who kill and eat animals when they have no other choice, you know, that very small fraction of the world population.

Today, the majority of people eat animals out of pleasure and have it, not necessity.

And the way we deflect our discomfort over bringing animals into this world only to kill them is to romanticize our behavior or the behavior of others like when we say what about the Native Americans, all of them respected animals and they prayed over them after they killed them.

You know what's even more compassionate than praying for an animal who was killed for your convenience, not killing her in the first place.

For the animals, this is Colleen Patrickadrow, you can find me at JoyfulVegan.com. Thanks for listening.

Thanks for watching.