Before we put up this question, can you tell me, why do vegans need to climb up Mount Everest to prove anything?
Actually, it's the non-vegans who will always try to make fun of such an attempt from vegans. So vegans don't want to take any risk for any inevitable failure.
Triumphing Mt. Everest isn't an easy job. Less than 8,000 humans have ever succeeded reaching that summit so far and almost 300 died in that attempt.
Didn't an Indian called Kuntal Joisher scaled Everest in 2016?
Of course, he did! But he wasn't vegan. Yes, you read it right, it wasn't a vegan mountaineering!
Kuntal Joisher is often attributed as the first vegan to triumph the Mt. Everest in 2016.
But that expedition is also remembered with the death of South African born Australian Dr. Maria Strydom. Dr. Strydom and her husband Robert Gropel were passionate vegans.
By triumphing Everest, Maria wanted to prove to the world that vegans can do anything. Unfortunately, she died just 15 minutes to the summit due to severe altitude sickness. Her husband Gropel though reached the summit, he too was suffering from some altitude sickness.
On the other hand, just a couple of days before this couple, Indian mountaineer Kuntal Joisher successfully climbed to the top of Himalayas on a completely plant-based diet.
But here's the catch:
Just eating a plant-based diet doesn't make you a vegan. Kuntal was wearing a single piece suit that was made up of down and leather.
Down and leather are product of cruelty to animals. Several animals and birds have to be killed to make such a suit.
Kuntal Joisher was always at guilt for this. But he couldn't find any vegan alternative for it in this world dominated by non-vegan products.
Later he wrote to several companies to make a customized warm suit for him. Finally, an Italian company Save The Duck responded to his request and made him a synthetic suit.
The First Vegan to climb over 8000 meter mountain
With the help of this vegan suit, last summer on 15th May, 2018; Kuntal Joisher became the first vegan human ever to climnb a mountain over 8000 m high. He was atop the Lhotse summit ...over 26,500 feet.
As I told you, it wasn't an easy decision. He was under immense family pressure to take that down suit with him to Lhotse as a back up. Even the company who made it was also not very confident and wanted him to take it as a back up in case something went wrong.
Not only his life was at risk but if something went wrong, all vegans will be mocked at for his attempt. Such is the situation in today's world!
But Kuntal decided to go with just the synthetic one only.
And finally, here is a vegan mountaineer who climbed up the Lhotse summit.
But does it help to spread the vegan message?
His Wikipedia Page was distorted by non-vegan trolls
As I told you, despite it was made very clear that a vegan diet was not responsible for Dr. Maria Strydom's death in 2016; people keep making meme and mockery out of her expedition.
A few days back, some miscreants even edited Kuntal Joisher's Wikipedia page to include the following lines:
Like Joisher himself, Strydom’s 2016 Everest attempt was motivated by the desire to dispel the myth that vegans were 'malnourished, weak and obnoxious' and that they could 'do anything that the superior meat eating master race can do.' However, as she died in her attempt two days after Joisher’s successful summit, it’s safe to say that she has not dispelled the myth, and indeed, has become a testament to its validity. Joisher criticized associating veganism with Strydom’s death, saying that she didn’t die due to her vegan diet and rather due to the fact that she was a woman.
This sexist message was also attributed to Kuntal Joisher. A couple of days back, he gave his clarification on his Facebook page as below:
He is deeply offended by the treatment Maria receives even after her death.
It's also sickening that he needs to clarify his stance time and again.
But no matter how much vegans are trolled, veganism is spreading by leaps and bounds.
You can never stop an idea whose tome has come.
Truth will prevail!