Sweetmeat and coconut meat are both not animal muscle, while fish, which is animal muscle, is not meat. Distinctions like 'meat' and 'milk' (and pretty much any culinary term) take on meaning according to our conventions and dietary norms, and if plant-based meat grows to fit the same dietary niche as animal meat, people will call them the same thing.
I'm not sure what parallels you're trying to suggest but they're probably not valid ones. 'Meat' being used strictly in reference to animal flesh is a relatively recent development. It's shorthand, in fact, so those truly concerned for linguistic integrity might opt to use the original term, "flesh meat."
Basically, they are using the connotations of common venacular usage of 'meat' to market something that is the opposite of the venacular 'meat'. Newspeak is all about naming one thing by its opposite, and using the connotations of the latter to hide the real meaning, like 1984's ministry of truth.
So, it leaves me with the impression that this is not merely normal advertising by association, but a more agenda driven marketing move to modify people's consumption of meat by modifying language. For some reason, that leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
If eating meat is really so objectively bad, why do you have to try and trick people into not eating it? The more someone has to rely on tricks and deception to achieve their goal, the less likely their goal is actually in everyone's best interest.
A Beyond Burger is not the opposite of a hamburger. They are the same category of product, much like turkey sausages and pork sausages. I think you need to reevaluate your worldview if you think it's a more sound business model to try to trick unwitting people into buying a plant-based product than to just appeal to the base of people already interested in buying it.
If they were only doing the latter, then their packaging would be much more straightforward. You can find other commentators in this set of comments that see the social agenda I'm identifying, although they are in favor of it.
Ah, exactly what I want as a consumer. Believing I'm purchasing one thing when reading the product name, and finding out it is something else entirely when reading the ingredients list (which I rarely do).
A quick Google search for "beyond meat" reveals lots of photos of their packaging. Every single one of them has large, all-caps, bright green "PLANT BASED" on the front of the package. They're not hiding anything, and anyone confused by it probably has themselves to blame.
I only can interpret that label because I'm now cynically familiar with the deceptive advertising practices currently used. But, to someone not used to how advertisers try to make one thing seem to be another, saying 'beyond meat' is 'plant based' does not communicate this thing is just a bunch of vegetables.
"Beyond Meat" is the brand name, and I suspect that's perfectly clear to people. No one buying "Land O'Lakes" butter expects to open the box and find a diorama of Minnesota inside.
I also suspect people who deem beef burgers "plant-based" on a colloquial level are few and far between.
You're concerned enough about what you're feeding yourself to complain about what's on the label, but not concerned enough to find out what's on the label?
