Ruby Roth...

is the author and illustrator of two children's books that provide information about veganism, animals and how they are abused, environmental degradation and how to eat and live more healthy and less harmful lives. The second book "Vegan is Love" was just published and she posted a video interview on her blog wherein a "child psychologist" decried her book and flatly admonished people to "avoid this book" because it was about "fear and guilt" and that it would be "disturbing" for children. (apologies, you'll have to watch the video on another site, I couldn't get the embedding code to work)

Well, that sort of intrigued me so I went to the library and...there was the book over in the children's section so I decided to take it home and review it. Then I thought, heck, it's a kids book with lots of illustrations, how long could it take to read? Poof, five minutes and I was through. After reading it I was even more disappointed than initially.

Not about the book or its message...it was a nice book with well done illustrations and text. My disappointment was with the "psychologist", his 'performance' was rather pitiful. He started off talking about "restrictive diets" and sweets...which was totally irrelevant to the book's contents and ended up urging people to not let children see the book. After reviewing the book myself I question whether he had even read it.

I visited his website and discovered his touting that he's written over 200 articles and 15 books. I haven't read anything by the psychologist in the interview, nor will I. My impression is that his primary activity is writing and interviewing and maintaining his website. Learning about people and children and families is hard and time consuming and emotionally draining. I'm seriously skeptical that anyone actually knowing very much about these things has time to write 200 articles and 15 books.

Ironically his website has a list of topics and included are "love" and "peace". Hmmm....he's bashing a children's book about love and non-violence (veganism) but thinks those things are important enough to list on his website. On the "peace" link he calls for a one day worldwide armistice...good...and yet he bashes a children's book calling for non-violence toward animals. Since the interview was conducted on Fox "news" I presume he's some sort of hired gun they stuck up there to shoot down the book The woman doing the interview sadly brought new meaning to the term vapid.

The best part of the interview, and what I found to make it very much worth watching were two points made by Ms. Roth. She made the observation that it was curious that upset was being directed toward her book rather than toward the treatment of animals that is pointed out in her book. She also made the point that she hasn't seen any child get upset about the book rather it is the adults who get upset about the book.

Here's an excerpt from a comment about the book I found here. "If I want my kids to be able to see a giraffe or a zebra, I'm not going to shell out $6000 to go to Africa, I'm going to spend $8 for a ticket to the zoo. I'm sorry if those animals are sad, sick and angry. It's cheaper than going to Africa. I need to protein, so I do eat meat, cheese and other dairy products. I can't eat peanuts all the time....".

My thought is that if you write a book and it doesn't upset people with the mentality exhibited by that comment...then your book is probably not worth reading. Indeed, if professionals of the caliber of this 'psychologist' aren't upset by your book, you ought to rethink what you are doing.

Hey, if you're looking for a gift for a child, go buy the book and present it. You'll be doing them a favor and maybe helping our sister/brother Earthlings too. You will at least be exposing the child to some accuracy and truth instead of distortions and omissions. And...doing that is almost a guarantee that someone is going to get upset. Thank you Ms. Roth.