I'm not at all annoyed -- I hope it didn't come off that way. I've spent most of my life explaining I can't 'pick out the meant,' 'eat around the meat,' 'just eat the meat anyway,' defending a basic personal choice, having people argue endlessly with me about why it's unnatural, going to cause my brains to leak out my ears, etc., having people actually waving meat in my face -- and I don't mention I don't eat it unless it comes up, irl. I don't go around telling people what they should eat (except in my house, heh, but that's generally people I know well, or people don't notice -- I don't put out snack with a big 'THESE HAVE NO MEAT' flag or anything. It's just there and most people don't think twice -- I've literally never been asked 'hey, where's the meat?' about anything I've served.), or discuss it even in restaurants with people except the waitstaff. So while I am lucky enough to not face the challenges you do, and I'm not suggesting this is in any way similar to a medical need (though I presume if I ate meat at this point it'd make me short-term ill, heh), I in some way get the frustration of having to explain/defend for no reason with weirdly aggressive people. I would want to accommodate a medical need, but not by serving meat. I also didn't mean the disclosure as onerous, but I know how many people claim they're allergic to something when they mean they don't like or want it, or who say they're vegetarian, but hey, they want the fish or chicken, or whatever. People are insane and stupid, as a whole, so I was trying, in this theoretical, to couch against 'I'm required to eat meat!' from a bunch of people who just 'can't' eat veg* fare (I can't tell you how many times I've been told that too, by people with no restriction besides they don't want to, which is their choice, just saying.)
The majority could just eat something besides meat for lunch. Very few people HAVE to eat meat. If they want to, well, yeah, go outside and buy it yourself. If food options are provided, they are. I've been at meetings with crap I don't want to eat. I don't demand people procure something I'd prefer.
I didn't know if you were annoyed, so I asked. Because when you ask for accommodations, especially if you don't go into detail about why, whether it's required or not, you feel the annoyance. Try going into any discussion about a straw ban or handicapped placard or a company banning meat and post as someone who needs, not wants, but needs, that accommodation and you will endure a deluge of judgment, disbelief, and outright hostility. This is why I asked. Glad you're not annoyed. It's good to hash this stuff out, I think (I deleted a stupid joke about the meat content of the hash. You're welcome).
I'm great about accommodating other diets, so I would make sure if you came to my house, you had something you could eat and that you liked. Even if you said don't bother. I've done it a lot. But how do you know if people just don't like veggies or if they can eat them, but have trouble digesting them so they avoid them, or if like me, they cannot eat them (no lie, last week, I took a bite of my husband's sandwich. We tried to make sure there was no lettuce on that bite. We missed a tiny piece, like smaller than the diameter of a pencil eraser. A speck. Four days later, I was out of the woods. We were deciding between a trip to the ER or just letting nature take its course, because I am in sort of pre-hospice. Technically, I don't have an allergy, and it's not always that bad, but I know it was that lettuce, and I could tell you how, but it's gross). How do you really know? People assume it a lot. The other day I was trying to buy a cookie. I asked if it had nut pieces. Guy said if I am allergic I shouldn't get it. I said I wasn't. I can eat nut butters, but not pieces. He challenged me on that, more than was sane, so I lifted my shirt and introduced him to Babs, my ileostomy stoma (so named because she looks like a baboon's ass. I am not big on naming stuff but it helps to have a code name when you're in public). It was a really good cookie.
It's a lot to explain, is what I am saying, but if we don't explain, people assume we're one of THOSE people who are just pretending we need something when we don't. And you don't always know who has that legitimate need, and treating everyone like a faker hurts those who aren't. Sometimes people don't want to have to flash their stomas, or explain their dietary woes. See, I don't care why you don't eat meat. I just care that you're accommodated when it's something like having to eat or not eat or being able to bring your own food at the least, and not stigmatized. I don't want you to have to pay for your own meal when others in the same position don't just became someone made a policy without considering your needs, or worse, hearing them and dismissing them.
You're policing people and trust me, that's something I experience every time I leave the house. I just got policed in a discussion of straws, because I said I need the ones you can position at certain angles and not have to hold them and some woman asked me if I typed my post or used speech-to-text, as though that has anything to do with anything (I use a combination and I rest a lot while I write and sometimes I just run out of voice and "arms." People with dietary issues get policed all the time. Why add to that? But, yeah, no meat sold in the cafeteria is fine, but making people go off-site to eat something they can? Because it's not just about eating meat. I just sometimes can't eat the non-meat offerings. If I can bring my lunch, which may or may not have meat (would anyone really check?), I'd be cool, personally. So I guess I am asking you to allow people to bring in outside food to your hypothetical business.
It always come down to "but some people abuse it." That's why the GOP has a bill to gut the ADA. That's why they might just be able to kill what they call "entitlement programs." That's why where I live they're talking about making handicapped permits harder to get and more expensive and doing away with free parking at metered spaces in certain areas of the city for placard holders (so they don't have to go back to their cars to feed the meter). It's always because some people break the rules, so those of us who don't pay. Here, it's dietary, not disability, but still, it's paying more or going further or asking for an exception that you know may hurt your career or simply set you apart from your co-workers. It's paying for a meal when traveling on business that others get reimbursed for, because you can't (not won't) eat where or how or what your employer wants you to. That some people would chose that (hell, I want a burger and I'll pay myself) doesn't make it fairer for the person who has no choice (and there are plenty, even if it's a smaller amount that can eat anything. It's good to have a conscience, but when that conscience stop shorts of allowing you to accommodate people who need an exception to your policy, it's pretty selective. And I admit policing or not policing who gets that exception may not be something you can bring yourself to do, but being on the other side of that, it's hard to ask, hard if you disclose the reasons, hard if you don't. It doesn't make it easier that it's harder because some people abuse it. The reason it's hard doesn't matter. It's just hard.
