Emma JC

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I am not someone who has watched or followed Bonny Rebecca and yet I have seen many videos, the past couple of days, from other YouTubers who are responding to her "no longer vegan" video.

One of the response videos I watched was from Plant Based News and GogiMan was the host. He is qualified to answer the issues that Bonny raised and if anyone is following this situation then this is a good video to watch.

Summary: Bonny and Tim have been having gut issues for a very long time, including before they went vegan. They did not get the proper help and as a result their issues 'inflamed' literally. I think it is vital that we all are aware of restrictive diets, water fasting etc as these "cures" can often do more harm than good, if not done under proper medical supervision.

Let me know what you think if you have been following this situation.

Emma JC
 
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I don't specifically follow Bonny Rebecca but I'm aware that a lot of ex vegans on YouTube are orthorexic or have some other form of disordered eating then blame veganism to avoid dealing with the underlying problem. Moon and Rock are an example of this, neither were eating enough calories, he was doing intermittent fasting and she just had a baby but was eating these ridiculous low calorie and low fat meals, too much fruit and not enough things like tofu. Another woman on there was refusing to take B12 for years then wondered why she felt like crap. It was stupid because she had plastic surgery and would eat candy bars yet avoided supplements for being "unnatural"..mkay. She also probably wasn't eating enough either, really vain and narcissistic woman, I think her following was unfortunately mostly young girls.

Then there's Vegetable Police who had similar issues to what you are talking about. He had health problems all along, he apparently drank turpentine at some point, his gut was unhealthy and he tried weird restrictive fasts, then blamed veganism. Nikado Avocado has a binge eating disorder and mostly ate vegan junk food. Now he binge eats fast food and has gained fifty pounds. But it's veganism right?

Some of these people on YouTube shouldn't be on there. They're people who have a variety of untreated health problems physical and mental, and some just got into veganism because it was trendy, more like a diet than a philosophy or lifestyle.
 
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and for the clicks.... $$$ of course!

We do tend to eat a much higher fibre diet than the meat eaters and so, for some, that can be problematic. I have found that I prefer my vegetables cooked, and my oatmeal cooked. Raw broccoli, cabbage etc can cause some pains in my innards. Beans, legumes etc seem to be no problem and berries and bananas make life joyful. So consider your fibre if you are having issues and maybe add some "more processed" vegan foods if necessary.

Emma JC
 
I am just watching Mic the Vegan's response and it is excellent and explains in even more depth about the issues that can be caused by a high fruit/fructose diet which is how Bonny and Tim started out their vegan lifestyle on the Raw Til Four.

They also had exposure to parasites in Thailand.

Emma JC
 
I too like Mic, not sure why I find GogiMan grating. I suppose people gravitate toward people that they can gel with.

@Emma JC You are right, a lot of these ex vegans turn to veganism to fix an underlying serious gut issue. It is great to start off with, they see some drastic improvement and they make vids to promote veganism.

But they have not addressed the real health issue so it persists.

Then they get off the fibre feel good and become ex vegans with a message to spread. Classic example is Vegetable Police. He started eating Raw Meat. Some vegans turned on him and he became a super ex vegan. Not sure what he is up to now; I unsubbed.
 
Vegetable Police imo has serious mental health issues that he hasn't sought counseling for. I thought he was funny a couple of years ago but then I noticed that he talked a lot about Nazis and just kinda offensive stuff so I started watching him less, and now with the raw meat thing. I cannot fathom how someone who was mentally balanced could resort to raw meat in this day and age with all of the information out there on disease and human digestion.
 
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It's harmful and stigmatizing to treat mental health and behavioral disorders as matters of speculation, especially when discussing the level of trust and respect a person's ideas warrant.

It isn't necessary even when it's relevant.
 
Hmm. Sorry I wasn't trying to say all bad ideas are the result of mental health issues, or that people with mental illness can't be smart or right or interesting. But eating disorders are a mental illness, not a physical one, and there are extreme examples of people in public view - such as on YouTube, or presiding over the United States - where their illness is obvious and the issue is that it's untreated and leaving themselves and naive others vulnerable due to the public nature of their work or media hobby.
 
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When I decided to become vegan, I looked up all the doctors in What The Health and binge-watched all of the videos of theirs I could find on YT. In that process, I discovered Mic the Vegan, Footsoldier, and for a while, High Carb Hannah. It was from her that I first heard the word "Freelee." What struck me was that she talked about this person as if everyone knew about her (and shared some clips that immediately made me wonder how anyone on the planet could watch her, but I digress).

I guess what I'm saying is that first, "Bonny who?" and, apparently, once again, I'm haven't missed anything. ...I cannot stand that kind of content, whatever motivates it. I have enough drama in my own life, I don't need to spend my free time watching it. (I'm also not a "reality TV" fan, as one might have already guessed.)
 
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Found out more about the situation and I find the fact that Bonny and her partner quit veganism at the same time offensive. It suggests to me that the cause wasn't all physical or even a rational decision made by an individual. Seems they were just on some orthorexic plant based diet and when Bonny's partner had more severe health issues, she quit too just because he did. A lot of these people on YouTube are insincere, they aren't ethical vegans, and leaving veganism because of your partner intimates a desperate lack of personal identity.

Good and real YouTube vegans:

Mic the Vegan

Vegan Gains (right wing, abrasive but a real vegan)

The Vegan Zombie

Footsoldier

Ghost Vegan

Brown Vegan

Bite Size Vegan

Freelee

Cheap Lazy Vegan

That Vegan Couple

Happy Healthy Vegan

Unnatural Vegan (not my personal favorite but she's vegan)
 
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speaking of Freelee, if you want to see an extremely passionate response to the Bonny situation then watch her video

Emma JC
 
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Re: Bonnie - All I watched was Mic’s response video and even after watching that I have no opinion, except that it seems futile to speculate unless one is in possession of all the facts, test results. Did they provide them in their video? Also if fiber is a real issue there is still resistant starch to feed your gut bacteria and if trying to gain weight is a problem there are higher fat foods like Tahini, peanut butter, flax, avocados etc that will work just fine.



Vegetable Police has recently said that his gut issues have to do with a mesh surgically implanted to address a hernia from many years back. Although I enjoyed some of his content from back before he went carni – I think that overall he is too quick to draw erroneous and sweeping conclusions to the data that is presented to him. He also makes $$ from youtube and it appears that might be his sole income. Many of his videos are click bait and sensational in their content and I believe $$ motive cannot be ruled out for some of the things he says and does.



Moon and Rock – I watched their “no longer vegan” testimony and the stated initial reason was a complete anecdote: Something about being a pianist and having brain fog, and then hearing from a fellow musician that eating meat suddenly brought on mental clarity. So he tried it and “bam” - he could sight read better! Psh.

Complete Bull. I am also a pianist and play Bach fugues, Mozart, Liszt etc and have experienced 0 “mental fog” nor sight reading issues since going vegan. I also compose music, do video editing, work with Bash (Bourne again Shell – Unix/Linux), do some basic programming and assist with hardware/computer troubleshooting and repair. These activities can be somewhat mentally taxing but I’ve never had an issue when consuming the foods I do and getting enough calories.

I also don't think Moon and Rock are 'orthorexic' I find it difficult to believe that an orthorexic who happens to be vegan, and for multiple years would not be aware of all the negatives that comes with eating animal products. It’s like saying 1==5. Does not compute. Error. As an aside, this term wasn't introduced until 1997. It's a proposed condition that basically reflects the opinion of one man - Steven Bratman. Formal criteria weren't even formulated until 2016! So someone throwing the term around should just be aware that they are using the appeal to authority fallacy and Bratman as that authority.



From my perspective as a new vegan with just a year and few months under my belt, my meat eating experiences are still pretty fresh in my mind, and all the negatives that go with that. A 10 year vegan going back to eating animal products – I can’t believe it happened over night. The idea must have been romanced in their head, and at some point they got lazy and started eating them here and there, eventually that became more and now they crave them due to habit and altered gut microbiota. Combine that with a few too many processed junk food items and there’s a recipe for disaster. Then comes a video where all this is misrepresented or left out and eating a corpse is the one thing that “worked”. Meat eating doctor approved. Too skinny? Gut problems? Eat a corpse or animal secretion. High fat more calorie dense vegan foods like flax, avocado, Tahini, peanut butter and other higher fat plant foods? Nah.
 
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Moon and Rock did not eat any processed foods. They live off grid. It's common knowledge they were orthorexic. Rock fasted and only ate once per day, and Moon ate too much fruit and not enough substantial vegan foods. She claimed her baby "took all her protein." As a Millennial it's very easy to spot orthorexic behavior and I'm puzzled when others can't spot it. To me it's so obvious and appears obvious to other Millennial vegans.

@Emma JC

I love Freelee now. She used to bug me with her thirty bananas but now that she's older she's so interesting and wise.
 
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Moon and Rock did not eat any processed foods. They live off grid. It's common knowledge they were orthorexic. Rock fasted and only ate once per day, and Moon ate too much fruit and not enough substantial vegan foods. She claimed her baby "took all her protein." As a Millennial it's very easy to spot orthorexic behavior and I'm puzzled when others can't spot it. To me it's so obvious and appears obvious to other Millennial vegans.

@Emma JC

I love Freelee now. She used to bug me with her thirty bananas but now that she's older she's so interesting and wise.
I have no idea who Moon and Rock are... going to look them up.

Is Freelee still doing that whispering thing?
Check this vis when Freelee DESTROYS, I think she is a "nutritionist" on free to air TV in Australia - freelee was spot on
 
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I have no idea who Moon and Rock are... going to look them up.

Is Freelee still doing that whispering thing?
Check this vis when Freelee DESTROYS, I think she is a "nutritionist" on free to air TV in Australia - freelee was spot on

Freelee used to be in a toxic relationship with another vegan named Durian Ryder. I disliked them so much a few years ago I saw them at LA Vegfest where I was volunteering and hung back and muttered to another volunteer there how much I wished they weren't in front of our table. This is because they peddled a very orthorexic form of veganism where often young girls were manipulated into following a very restrictive fruit based diet for reasons of weight loss, and the two of them as a couple seemed very narcissistic and were always causing drama in the greater global vegan community.

After Freelee broke up with her ex, she admitted he abused her and used her youth and sexuality to sell their brand, and that she had gone along with it. She was single for a while and is now involved with a man named Robin. They live off grid in South America in the Ecuadorian rain forest, grow a great deal of their own food, and Freelee is just...amazing...now. Don't get me wrong, I have to admit she was always kinda cool, speaking up loudly for animals and the environment to the point of offending people but now she does it with such substance and intelligence, I'm very impressed with how she's matured.
 
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Freelee used to be in a toxic relationship with another vegan named Durian Ryder. I disliked them so much a few years ago I saw them at LA Vegfest where I was volunteering and hung back and muttered to another volunteer there how much I wished they weren't in front of our table. This is because they peddled a very orthorexic form of veganism where often young girls were manipulated into following a very restrictive fruit based diet for reasons of weight loss, and the two of them as a couple seemed very narcissistic and were always causing drama in the greater global vegan community.

After Freelee broke up with her ex, she admitted he abused her and used her youth and sexuality to sell their brand, and that she had gone along with it. She was single for a while and is now involved with a man named Robin. They live off grid in South America in the Ecuadorian rain forest, grow a great deal of their own food, and Freelee is just...amazing...now. Don't get me wrong, I have to admit she was always kinda cool, speaking up loudly for animals and the environment to the point of offending people but now she does it with such substance and intelligence, I'm very impressed with how she's matured.

Yeah, last Durian Rider vid I watched all I could see was this very young girl wearing next to nothing and DR voice over. She did not say a word. It was simply... bizarre.
 
Freelee used to be in a toxic relationship with another vegan named Durian Ryder. I disliked them so much a few years ago I saw them at LA Vegfest where I was volunteering and hung back and muttered to another volunteer there how much I wished they weren't in front of our table. This is because they peddled a very orthorexic form of veganism where often young girls were manipulated into following a very restrictive fruit based diet for reasons of weight loss, and the two of them as a couple seemed very narcissistic and were always causing drama in the greater global vegan community.

After Freelee broke up with her ex, she admitted he abused her and used her youth and sexuality to sell their brand, and that she had gone along with it. She was single for a while and is now involved with a man named Robin. They live off grid in South America in the Ecuadorian rain forest, grow a great deal of their own food, and Freelee is just...amazing...now. Don't get me wrong, I have to admit she was always kinda cool, speaking up loudly for animals and the environment to the point of offending people but now she does it with such substance and intelligence, I'm very impressed with how she's matured.
I had always grouped freely with durian and among the high-carb fanatical trendy diet folks. But based on what you just wrote I will check her out again.
 
I think that almost all of these formerly vegan YouTubers and formerly vegan people in general were dietary vegans, not ethical vegans. If you go vegan for ethical reasons it seems like it would be extremely hard to change course. What, do you decide later that it's okay to cause all this suffering? But if you do it as simply part of a diet or a fad diet then of course it's easy to change your mind and start something else. Anybody know of any research comparing recidivism rates for ethical vegans vs. Dietary vegans?