Oprah goes Vegan!!! - UPDATED

Yesterday Oprah announced her plan to do a 21 day cleanse involving going vegan. I'm so happy to see veganism being portrayed as a positive, healthy thing in mainstream media, but especially by Oprah who has so much influence. I hope that even if she decides not to stay vegan, that she inspires others to give it a try and if nothing else, is dispelling the myth that veganism is unhealthy, hard, weird and crazy.

I noticed some of her recipes that she gives involve "beef-flavored broth", which is a little confusing. Hopefully what's meant is a vegan beef-flavored broth, and not broth with actual beef in it. I think it gives the idea that vegans still consume some animal products like beef and chicken broth when we don't.

I don't usually watch Oprah (well, I don't have TV anyway...), but I'm looking forward to keeping up with her experiment and seeing what happens. It seems like she's been leaning in this direction for a while, with her shows about puppy mills and with several authors of vegan books.

UPDATED - Now that I've had some more time to think about it, I've found some bigger flaws in this. For one, Oprah is doing a 21 day cleanse, which contributes to the image of veganism as a fad diet that one does for a little while to lose weight and then quits. She's also giving up all caffeine, alcohol, sugar, and gluten which could make others think that this is part of a vegan diet. As far as I know, Oprah is not looking at the animal products she is consuming outside of her diet, so really she is eating a strict vegetarian diet, and is not going vegan.

Overall though, I think this has the opportunity to get veganism into the mainstream in a positive light. I wonder if the FBI is working on planting someone behind the scenes to keep an eye on Oprah in case she starts participating in terrorist vegan potlucks....