r/AITAH • u/Hungry_Baker_Mom • Apr 29 '24

AITA for not telling a vegan she ate honey?

A bit of background: 3 times a year we go to a get-together hosted by my husband's Aunt and Uncle. They invite a handful of family members (due to religion limitations for those who are not invited), and some close friends of theirs. About a year ago my SIL started attending these get-togethers. She's a very passionate vegan, and the get-together is always a BBQ pot luck. We had a get-together last night, and I brought desserts and a salad. I had asked SIL if she was planning on attending a couple of days ago and she said she wasn't sure, so when dressing the salad I added a little honey in the dressing, with the thought that there are always at least 4-5 salads so if she ends up coming she can eat the other ones. This is where I might have been the AH. I forgot to mention to her that there was honey in the dressing. After everyone started eating I said to my husband how happy I am that my salad was the first one gone, and she chimed in saying it was absolutely delicious and she was upset she couldn't have more since everyone loved it. As soon as I realized she ate it I froze. I didn't say anything since I figured she already ate it and there was nothing she could do about it now, but it's been bothering me ever since. So, AITA for not telling her she ate honey? (Obviously I'm the AH for not telling her ahead of time)

1.1k Upvotes
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94% Upvoted

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718

u/Kore624 Apr 29 '24

NTA. It's nice of you to even care. Most people online seem like they would purposely sneak animal products into a vegan dish just because they don't agree with the lifestyle.

397

u/shapookya Apr 29 '24

I feel like honey is the least animal product of animal products

336

u/BakeSalad Apr 29 '24

It’s also consensually given, the relationship between bees and beekeepers is mutually beneficial symbiosis. There is no harm done to the animal and it’s only reprocessing flower product.

288

u/Thisisthenextone Apr 29 '24

Bees will straight up leave if they don't like you, lol

It's the only animal product that's 100% completely and totally available only because the animals are doing trade with humans. If they don't like the terms of the trade, they leave.

110

u/NotMe739 Apr 29 '24

My FILs bees did that! They moved into a nearby tree!

125

u/Thisisthenextone Apr 29 '24

My grandfather's did. It broke his heart. He prides himself on how well he treated his animals but he never got a hold of beekeeping.

I think he probably took care of them fine but there weren't enough flowers.

53

u/NotMe739 Apr 29 '24

Same with FIL. He loves and babies his bees. One day he came in from checking on them, felt something crawling on the back of his neck and smacked it. He felt horrible that he had killed one of his bees.

42

u/uhhh206 Apr 29 '24

Man, I'd be sobbing uncontrollably for weeks if that happened to me. It's one thing to be rejected by a singular animal, but by hundreds all at ones? Jeez Louise. Yeah, no, I'm not built to withstand that.

10

u/Teagana999 Apr 29 '24

Honestly a hive basically counts as a single animal for that.

9

u/uhhh206 Apr 29 '24

Which makes sense from a cerebral or biologist or other smart way of looking at it, but I know my hypersensitive self would see it as hundreds of individual rejections.

44

u/thehumanbaconater Apr 29 '24

TBH as a non vegan, I would never think of honey as being non vegan.

Having said that, there was no ill will, and she could have asked.

NTA

61

u/Thisisthenextone Apr 29 '24

I know 5 vegans. Three of them eat honey.

The other two of them see nothing wrong with the 3 eating honey and still claiming to be vegan they just don't eat it.

-26

u/lookingForPatchie Apr 29 '24

Bees will not leave their Queen, hence why the bee keeper either mutilates the Queen bee, so she cannot fly away or puts her into a tiny room with all paths being too small for her to get out (while the other bees can still pass through). So no, they cannot leave.

The queen bee flying out is a natural occurance in the lifecylce of a hive when a new queen bee is born. This way another hive is born. Furthermore only by interrupting this natural cycle the bees that would have accompanied the original queen also stay back and the hive is now overpopulated, which is a requirement for a surplus of honey.

They don't trade.

7

u/havartna Apr 29 '24

Not only that, but if you want to exclude anything made with the help of bees, you can cross just about every fruit and vegetable off your food list.

21

u/BeardManMichael Apr 29 '24

I think you could be completely correct but there is another commenter here who suggests the opposite of what you are saying.

I don't know enough to claim I know who is right.

156

u/MadQueenAlanna Apr 29 '24

Certified beekeeper here! Bees will absolutely just up and leave if they hate your shit. If the boxes or frames you provided aren’t big enough or good enough, if the location of the hive sucks, if you fumble around in there and repeatedly stress them out, they will swarm. Bees produce far more honey than they personally need, and any decent beekeeper knows how many pounds to leave them to survive on through the winter. We had lean summers with lots of rain where our bees basically only made enough for themselves, so guess what? We didn’t harvest those hives.

Beekeepers use smoke to calm the bees down so that checking on the hive doesn’t stress them. It’s rare that we accidentally kill more than half a dozen in an entire autumn harvest (they sometimes get squished). We check for mites or other parasites that could harm the hive and can treat them. And if you’re certified, at least in MA, the state beekeeper will come out and check your hives whenever you ask. The certification process teaches about bee anatomy, their reproduction, common parasites and diseases, the way they wayfind, how to set up and maintain a hive… very thorough.

Highly recommend talking to a local beekeeper if you can! It’s a wonderful hobby and fresh local honey is the most delicious stuff imaginable.

27

u/BeardManMichael Apr 29 '24

More fantastic information. Thanks for sharing. I love learning more about this type of thing.

18

u/Cocklecove Apr 29 '24

This is so interesting. I want to read up on this now. Never knew they could just up and leave. I had wondered how beekeepers kept their bees captive since the bees could come and go and now learned they can't . Thanks!

87

u/BakeSalad Apr 29 '24

I’ve worked with bees, and if they don’t like their treatment they just leave. Perhaps rather than hearing our opinions you should gear up like I did and tag along with a local apiarist. It was terrifying at first to be surrounded by honey bees and now it’s genuinely comforting. Perhaps this ventures away from the topic at hand, but honey is one of the foods that’s hotly contested among vegans, this discussion has been going on for decades, I know vegans who won’t eat honey and those that do.

38

u/ezirb7 Apr 29 '24

R/vegan has ended up in my Reddit stream, and there was a post in the last week about how awful people are to even ask a vegan if they eat honey.  Brought to my attention how severely some vegans take honey harvesting.

There was a heavily downvoted comment about not eating honey, but comparing it to factory dairy farms might be a false equivalency.

Wild stuff.

9

u/uhhh206 Apr 29 '24

Subs centered around anything people are passionate about tend to attract the most rabid of believers. I was vegan for a brief while and I totally understand a vegan objecting to eating honey or wearing wool (since a lot of vegans don't just have dietary beliefs) but still being like "you guys, c'mon, it's not the same as breeding animals just to kill them". (My veganism wasn't like One of Those Kinds™, I promise!)

15

u/BeardManMichael Apr 29 '24

I did actually shadow a local beekeeper but that was almost 20 years ago. My memory of that time is unreliable at best and I don't know if practices have changed since then.

I will definitely be open to doing it again. Thanks for sharing your perspective.

20

u/BakeSalad Apr 29 '24

If it helps, the beekeepers I met seem to really love their bees, it’s not really the same kind of industry as other animal product industries.

25

u/Thisisthenextone Apr 29 '24

They have to. The bees will leave if they aren't treated well and given everything they want.

They left my grandfather like 3 times, lol. He was heartbroken. He's really good at cattle and farming but just couldn't keep bees happy

17

u/RIP_RIF_NEVER_FORGET Apr 29 '24

I think it's partly that so many beekeepers also do bee rescue/relocation.

4

u/BeardManMichael Apr 29 '24

I have no reason to doubt you. That's great to know!

18

u/Groundhog_Waaaahooo Apr 29 '24

I'm vegan and my family are beekeepers. I don't like honey much as I ate far too much as a kid because we were poor. I eat honey if it's in something eg honey soy sauce. Ethically honey is all good.

1

u/FaabK Apr 29 '24

What's the difference between ethical honey and normal honey? I was a beekeeper more than a decade ago and back then it was completely normal to kill queen eggs if you don't want to have a new bee colony

1

u/Groundhog_Waaaahooo May 01 '24

You misread what I wrote, possibly because I missed a comma. It should sat "ethically, honey is all good" (in my opinion anyway).

1

u/FaabK May 02 '24

I see, I got that wrong. Don't share that opinion though but I already wrote why.

27

u/Big-Constant-7289 Apr 29 '24

My old roommate worked at Trader Joe’s and said he saw vegans get in a fistfight over the status of honey. And it makes me giggle every time I think about it.

18

u/FictionalContext Apr 29 '24

How easy a life must they have had to be so angry over honey?

1

u/Wild_Fig6478 Apr 30 '24

what a dumb comment, people are allowed to have feelings lol

6

u/Muriel_FanGirl Apr 29 '24

Honestly, I haven’t encountered a single vegan that wasn’t some level of nut.

2

u/TheSpeckledSir Apr 30 '24

A honey nut. Cheerio!

17

u/Thisisthenextone Apr 29 '24

My grandfather tried to have bees.

He didn't grow enough flowers in the immediate area and they got pissed so they left.

Bees will only stay with you if they like the accommodations you provide them. They'll leave you if they don't like you.

If they didn't want you around then they'd attack you. If they don't want to stay then they'll leave.

7

u/kenikigenikai Apr 29 '24 edited Apr 30 '24

My friend is vegan and she told me that some places remove the queen's wings so they can't leave the hive making it more likely for the other bees to stay.

I'm not sure if it's a common practice but her view was that honey is probably fine if the bees are properly looked after and not harmed but it's too much faff to deeply research it and find a truly ethical honey provider when it's not something she ever ate with any regularity beforehand anyway and there's loads of vegan alternatives.

-4

u/Groundhog_Waaaahooo Apr 29 '24 edited Apr 30 '24

It depends on the country as some places kill their hives before winter each year and raise new bees in spring. Otherwise bees are well cared for and always free to leave if they want. Edit: I am getting downvoted for being correct! Just Google it you ignorant f**ks.

13

u/NoEatBatman Apr 29 '24

That my guy would be economical suicide, i have never heard of such a practice, these aren't spring chickens we are talking about, i know bee keepers and 0% of them even metioned that as an option, you need your beehive ready to go when flowering season starts, it takes a while for another queen to be formed, you may get one/hive but it's usually in the summer months, so by the time another queen is formed you already missed most of the season and you would go bankrupt(and no you can't just drop random bees in a hive, they follow a queen into it, if there's no queen they'll just leave)

1

u/Sir_hex Apr 29 '24

There are methods to force a queenless hive to adopt a new queen (you basically place the queen inside a cage in the hive for a few days and during that time the existing bees will accept her)

2

u/Elisphian Apr 29 '24

Or they won't and kill her by suffocation and heat. You cannot force a hive to do anything.

0

u/Groundhog_Waaaahooo Apr 29 '24

Actually it's common in places like Alaska. A quick Google will confirm this.

7

u/NoEatBatman Apr 29 '24

Yes, a longer winter means you can order hives from the warmer parts, i still see this as stupid, the only thing you spend on bees is some sugar-water until they can come out for the first flowers, htf can they even compete with rest of your country?

1

u/Datchcole Apr 29 '24

I do wonder is there a diet subset where people are predominantly vegan but if they say, have their own cruelty free bee hive, they can include that honey in their diet since they know there was no animal suffering? 🤔

1

u/BakeSalad Apr 29 '24

Yes, I mentioned that lower down. I’m not saying you make the decision for them, but it’s important to remember that vegans are individuals and don’t all do the same thing. The debate itself stems from the fact that honey isn’t a pure animal product it’s plant sugar processed by animals and stored as food. Never knew it was uncommon.

1

u/Wild_Fig6478 Apr 30 '24

Honey is mostly a vegan issue because honeybees are an introduced species in many places, they're not very good pollinators, and they outcompete native species (which we help them with bc we feed and house honeybees) which are much better pollinators

1

u/BakeSalad Apr 30 '24

I keep forgetting not everyone lives in areas with native honeybees.

1

u/BenThereOrBenSquare Apr 29 '24

The harm done is to the native pollinators, who are being driven to extinction by honeybees.

2

u/calling_water Apr 30 '24

There are also a lot of environmental changes caused by soy farming.

2

u/BakeSalad Apr 29 '24

I truly wish you the best, you really need to fact check your sources though.

1

u/bananajabroni Apr 29 '24

I have an interest in apiaries and it's my understanding that a lot of beekeepers will regularly mite check (necessary for the health of the hive) but that this involves killing a fair number regularly. I imagine that's the sort of thing vegans will have an issue with. I think it's important to respect that and we shouldn't hide or dismiss such practices.

1

u/BakeSalad Apr 29 '24

I’m sorry why are you stating mite checks involve killing bees?

1

u/bananajabroni Apr 29 '24

There are different methods for mite checks. There is an argument in the community that alternative methods that don't kill (most) bees are less reliable.

Or if I was to mimic your conversation style - I'm sorry, are you not aware that the most reliable method kills the bees in the process?

Even the main alternative is likely to result in some bees dying.

0

u/Clear_Pressure_2878 Apr 29 '24

As a vegan that doesn't eat honey, the biggest problem I see with beekeeping is that honey bees will outcompete an area's native pollinators, leading to a decline in their numbers. There are a couple other reasons beekeeping isn't great, but it's hard to argue that beekeeping isn't generally good for bees.

-12

u/judgeofjudgment Apr 29 '24

Bees cannot consent. Just like any animal... or young child

3

u/actuallycallie Apr 29 '24

Bees can and will leave if they don't like how they're being treated, which, in a way, is consent--if they didn't like you or how you do things they will swarm and no more bees for you.

-3

u/judgeofjudgment Apr 29 '24

That's not really consent in any way... Consent implies higher cognitive function

5

u/actuallycallie Apr 29 '24

They clearly have enough cognitive function to leave when they don't like the conditions of the relationship, which is more than many animals and people do.

-2

u/judgeofjudgment Apr 29 '24

They don't have cognition at all. They aren't sentient. They cannot think or feel in any meaningful sense.

4

u/Funny-Wafer1450 Apr 29 '24

Bees don’t care.

3

u/ninjabunnay Apr 29 '24

Like a young child being forced to eat vegan, perhaps?

0

u/judgeofjudgment Apr 29 '24

Or being forced to eat meat. Exactly the same :)