Honey and/or beeswax

SarahJane · #1 22-02-2016, 04:30 PM

Hi all,

Can I ask your opinion on the use of honey and beeswax as a vegan? My initial reaction was that they are animal products, but not all vegans apparently see it this way?

Rah nam · #2 22-02-2016, 10:24 PM

i would not call myself vegan, since there are many things vegans eat, which I would not touch.
I go by sensing food items if they are OK for me to eat or not.
And a some raw honeys are OK. They are never very strong as molasses, just as a comparison, but just OK. Can not say anything about beeswax, not sure what I would us it for.

knightofalbion · #3 22-02-2016, 10:49 PM

Bees have to visit 2,600,000 flowers to produce one pound of honey. Vegans would see taking the honey as exploitation.

Tobi · #4 23-02-2016, 12:42 AM

The way I look at it, bees provide honey, wax, propolis, royal jelly...etc for the benefit of their community, and their young. It never was meant for humans or predators.

Now while those things are very healthy foods for us, and as medicines, have benefit.....it is the equivalent of this:
A human couple work like stink to provide for their childrens' needs. Then one day a huge hand comes in, lifts up their walls, takes their childrens' food away, damages the life they have created for their family, and disappears again.
And the bees can and will sting the invaders who come to rob them....unless they are smoked of course, in which case they will gorge on honey until their bellies won't bend, and so they can't sting. Why do they gorge on honey when threatened? Because they are forced into 'crisis' mode, and know they will need the energy for possible re-location or for any massive reconstructive work ahead of them.

In my own personal opinion, the only way I could think of to take anything from the bees, would be with their permission, after consulting with them on a plane most humans find difficult.....and then only taking what was willingly offered as a gift. And that should be a small amount, taken very gently with little disturbance.
And during such a thing, not one bee would sting.
Something like that might happen through an established loving relationship between the bee-keeper and the bees, and for a human who loved and cared for them very much, and possibly when the human was in great need -such as medicine for illness etc.

SarahJane · #5 23-02-2016, 08:24 AM

Thank you. I have discovered, I believe, the confusion amongst my vegan acquaintances, two of whom eat honey. It seems that they became vegan for their personal health benefits, whereas myself and the rest of the vegans I have spoken to had ethical/moral reasons.
I had already made the decision that honey and beeswax were not going to form part of my diet/lifestyle, but I was intrigued by the discrepancy.