South London Beers: Reboot - Last Thursday of the Month at The Prince Regent, Herne Hill, SE24

Surely there are no 'rules' for avoidance of animal products... you must draw the line wherever you feel it ought to lie?

The idea of having moral principles, rules or maxims is that you give those to yourself--we have that ability, and also that restriction, i.e. I would argue that it isn't possible to act genuinely morally unless you had decided to do so yourself. You can of course use information and advice to inform your decisions, but you still need to determine your own will.

(what I am saying is, if you want to eat honey, you can, right? And still bee (sorry) a Vegan who avoids all flesh and other farmed animal products such as dairy?)

Nutritional veganism is defined in relation to all animal products, including honey or silk. The justification for worrying about those isn't as immediately apparent to most people, but I always say that it's best to take it one step at a time--if you can see the cruelty in meat production and want to act on that, do that first, but don't tell yourself to stop right there. In time, you may find that you see the problem with eggs or dairy, as for instance, animal exploitation industries are all connected, or eventually even with wool or silk.

Or you may be particularly concerned with experimentation on animals--most people are most immediately concerned with experimentation onapes and monkeys, as they're more similar to us than rats, and when you get to other creatures even less similar to us, most people wouldn't bat an eyelid at first. Even if the creature concerned is very dissimilar, I find it incredibly interesting to think about what the life of an animal really is and to focus on those similarities, however small, that do exist.