“I want a roast beef sandwich, but without the
roast beef. I’m a vegetarian.” I’ve
heard my share of very odd requests at The Horny Toad, the bar where I spend
many of my off the clock hours, but this one seemed odder than usual. There is,
to my knowledge, no substitute for roast beef in a roast beef sandwich, the
roast beef and the salt, pepper, and other sundry condiments being the whole
point of the roast beef sandwich. There is a word for a roast beef sandwich without
the roast beef, yes there is, and that word is bread. I suppose that somewhere there may be an
acceptable substitute for the roast beef in a roast beef sandwich, but I do not
believe that any of these substitutes would be acceptable to a vegetarian. Roast pork, roast goat, roast lamb, roast choose
any four-legged protein source you want, no vegetarian will surrender the smug
attitude of moral superiority that comes with saying, I don’t eat meat, just so
that they can have a roast beef sandwich without the roast beef. Our bovine craving veggie eater could use a
nice bit of fried eggplant on her sandwich, but for your average vegetarian frying
anything other than a Republican is a most evil and wicked practice, comparable
to bashing cute little kitty cats over the head with a baseball bat and then drinking
their blood, and therefore is not a practice that any decent person who
believes in the sanctity of both the human body and cute little kitty cats
would choose to engage in.
And then there is tuna fish, although it is difficult,
if not impossible, to see how anyone could mistake a tuna fish sandwich for a
roast beef sandwich; doing so would truly be a victory of mind over matter. In
addition, it is also difficult for me to see the moral difference between
eating a cow and eating a fish, unless the genetic accident of having fins instead
of feet permits the peckish plant enthusiast to indulge a perverse proclivity
for protein while simultaneously salving a guilty conscience. I can see no
moral reason why vegetarians should consider the footless and fancy free tuna to
be a legitimate source of dinner, whereas they would protect the cow from the
dinner plate with the religious intensity of Hindus. This hardly seems fair to
the fish and privileges a terrestrial creature over a maritime one, which is
the sort of rank specieist discrimination I think we can all agree has no place
in modern American life. So the next time you feel like a roast beef sandwich
without the roast beef, eat the bread instead. But make sure that it’s wheat
bread and filled with gluten. You can hate gluten these days and I’m sure it
has done something to deserve its fate.
PS This is my 999th post here. I kept
trying to think of something outstanding for the post but nothing came, so you
are stuck with this. Sorry.
Labels: ankles, Republicans, roast beef, Roberta Vasquez, tuna, vegetables, vegetarians, yellow cling peaches in heavy syrup
