My family is vegetarian. Consumption of meat based food by others was treated with disgust. I initially believed their reasoning - that it was cruel to animals, that it was not right to cause harm to another living thing, etc. But then they were also uncomfortable with eating food at a restaurant that also had meat dishes on the menu. They disliked vegetarian food being cooked in utensils that had been used to prepare meat dishes. Egg doesn't even have any meat but was still considered a bad thing to eat.

我家是素食者。我的其他家人对吃肉类食物感到厌恶。起初我相信他们的理由——这对动物是残忍的，对其他生物造成伤害是不对的，等等。但他们也会对在菜单上也有荤菜的餐厅吃饭感到不舒服。他们不喜欢用做过肉类菜肴的器皿烹调素菜。鸡蛋里没有任何肉，但他们仍然认为那是一种不好的食物。
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As I grew up, I realized that vegetarianism for them, and society at large, was about maintaining an imagined purity that had been bestowed upon them by virtue of being born in an upper caste lineage. Since butchering, skinning and tanning of animals is considered the occupation of untouchablesoutcastes, for an upper caste person to partake in it means risking the ritual purity or caste based superiority. Disgust towards a meat based diet is actually disgust towards the section of our society (Dalits, Muslims) who consume it. Among Gujarat's upper castes, someone who eats non-vegetarian food is considered a baser person, someone who has not quite adopted human values and norms.

随着我的成长，我意识到，对他们，乃至整个社会来说，素食主义意味着保持一种想象中的纯洁，这种纯洁是由于出生在高种姓血统而赋予他们的。由于屠宰、剥皮和鞣制动物被认为是贱民的职业，对一个高种姓的人来说，参与其中意味着会承担失去宗教仪式的纯洁或基于种姓的优越感的风险。他们对肉食的厌恶实际上是对我们社会中食用肉食的部分人(达利特人、穆斯林)的厌恶。在古吉拉特邦的高种姓中，吃非素食的人被认为是卑贱的人，没有完全接受人类的价值观和规范。

The vegetarian sort is fine with the exploitation of livestock for milk. They are okay with cows being pumped with steroids, with male calves being culled for being unproductive, old cows being let loose on the streets, with cattle starving to death in cow shelters. Even this pretense of humaneness is restricted to animals. Jainsupper caste Hindus who harp about the moral superiority of their food are the vote banks of a political party which has caused widespread massacres. Denying Muslims and Dalits permission to reside in their localities, forcibly stopping the sale of meat on JainHindu holy days, removing eggs from the mid day meals of school kids, banning the slaughter of cattle does not strike these people as violence being committed on their fellow humans. It is such people who constitute and support a party that overtly states its goal to be the subjugation of the 'other'. Protesting the loss of life in pogroms, mob lynching, caste based violence or fake encounters as a community never occurs to devout Jainsupper caste Hindus. Spilling the blood of people they consider inferior does not shake their faith.

素食主义者一定程度上可以利用牲畜来获取奶。他们可以接受给奶牛注射类固醇，可以接受公牛犊因为没有产出而被宰杀，可以接受老牛被放到大街上乱走，可以接受小牛在牛棚里饿死。甚至这种人道的伪装也仅限于动物。耆那教种姓的印度教徒喋喋不休地宣扬他们在食物方面具有道德优越感，但他们却是某个政党的票仓，而那个政党已经造成了大规模屠杀。他们拒绝允许穆斯林和达利特人在他们的地方居住，强行阻止在耆那印度教圣日出售肉类，把学童午餐中的鸡蛋取消，禁止宰牛，却不去打击那些对同胞犯下暴力的人。正是这些人组成并支持一个公开宣称其目标是征服“他者”的政党。作为一个群体，虔诚的耆那教种姓印度教徒从来没有为大屠杀、暴民私刑、基于种姓的暴力或虚假遭遇造成的死难者提出抗议。让那些他们认为低人一等的人流血，并不会动摇他们的信仰。

This explains why upper caste HindusJains are so obsessed with vegetarianism, so much so as to label the normal food of the masses, that is contrary with their own practices, as non-vegetarian. It's merely a performance. Those who call the cow their mother, consume its dung and urine, or claim vegetarianism as superior have no great love for animals or ethical living. Vegetarianism is merely a vehicle to project and maintain superiority over the lower caste masses. It makes it easier to think of yourself as a good person while ill treating those who have no power to fight back.

这就解释了为什么高种姓的印度耆那教徒如此痴迷于素食主义，以至于给普通大众的食物——与他们自己的做法相反的食物——贴上非素食的标签。这只是一场表演。那些称奶牛为他们的母亲，吃它的粪便和尿液，或声称素食主义优越的人，对动物或道德生活并没有极大的热爱。素食主义仅仅是投射和维持对低种姓大众的优势的一种工具。这让他们更容易认为自己是一个好人，同时虐待那些无力反击的人。