A Little Rant About So-Called "Vegan Products"

OK! So I'm not one to complain...but I've been seeing somethings online lately and it's just bugging the crap out of me! I HATE HATE HATE when sellers (I've seen a tone on Etsy) label their products as "vegan" or "vegan friendly" to attract people like me (vegan) to come to find them...a lot of the time the products are not even vegan!!! Most of the time the people selling the products, aren't even vegan themselves, so they think if it doesn't contain meat or leather or fur..it must be vegan! There is sooo much more to it than that. I've been a vegan for about year now, and I can tell you, it takes A LOT of time and research and ingredient list reading and google searches and emails etc, to know what products are actually vegan. To know, that these people (un-intentionally I'm sure..) are mis-labeling items just makes me so upset :( It's hard enough finding products I can use.
  Example..I was on Lista.com the other day when I came across a women who was listing a "vegan" lip balm. She then proceeded to give a list of the ingredients she used to make the lip balm. I was reading and it all sounded just fine until I came across one word... "beeswax"... Wait. What did you just say??! Bees wax is NOT vegan! Oh boy did she create an uproar with several people! For those of you who do not know, a vegan who is someone who does not use, eat, or wear anything form ANY living creature. Yes, even little insects like bees. No being is excluded. Most people think a vegan is a vegetarian who doesn't wear fur or eat dairy. It's so much more than that! We also do not use animals for entertainment (zoos, seaworld, circus',rodeos, caged pets, etc), we do not buy products tested on animals, and we do not use non food products that contain animal ingredients. (razors with moisture strips, gel capsule vitamins and pills, various bar soaps..just to name a few) So as you can see, it takes a lot of work!
  Then today, I did a search on Etsy to try to find some artificial feathers to make some jewelry with. So I typed in "vegan feathers". A whole slew of cruelty free "vegan freindly" feathers popped up. But as I clicked on each listing, I found out that the feathers were real!!! They were from real actual birds! What?! Again, a vegan doesn't wear any animal products. I am so so happy to hear that they were cruelty free (the birds lived on a special farm and they only use feathers that naturally fall off of them. So the bird is not harmed.) I'm trilled to hear that these wonderful creatures are not being harmed, but that being said, cruelty free or not, it still does not make it vegan. Like my sister put it..labeling real feathers as cruelty free would be the same as labeling free range chicken eggs as vegan. Or like labeling grass fed organic cow meat as vegan. HA! You just can't do it... I sent the seller a message, so we"ll see how that goes :P ..Hopefully well!
  And I would just like to say as well, I'm in no way downing non vegans or meat eaters..or feather wearers in any way! What you choose to use, eat, and wear is your choice. I just want people to respect my choice as well. I just get upset at the mis-labelng thing. The choice to become vegan was mine and mine alone.. I have my own personal reasons.. But I do encourage everyone to buy organic, cruelty free, fair trade, eco friendly, and non animal tested products when ever you can! I've been wanting to do a product review to let everyone know about some great vegan health and beauty products but I just haven't gotten around to it. I think I'll be doing that next. I need more vegan posts in my blog..Its part of my blog name for goodness sakes!
  Alrighty I'm done ranting, that definitely helped to calm me down.
Until next time! Cya! ^__^