I’ve been a (pretty inactive) member of CAMRA for a year and a half. Apart from moaning about finings in beer to a few other members, my goal of infiltrating the organisation and covertly influencing change from within remains unfulfilled.

One factor behind my failure was my inability to motivate myself to begin my mission. However, the main reason was that things were already starting to change. Don’t get me wrong, most CAMRA members I’ve encountered to date have seemed to consider vegans an oddity. I’ve never declared myself to be a vegan, it’s something assumed when I’ve said that I don’t do fish in beer. They generally don’t understand that beer fined with isinglas isn’t actually suitable for vegetarians, although many vegetarians either don’t realise this or don’t care. 

Perhaps I shouldn’t generalise, but I can only relate my experience. Anyway, back to the point. Things were already beginning to change. Not for ethical reasons, of course, but because adding finings isn’t natural (which it isn’t). And because finings remove a lot of what makes beer taste like beer (which they do). 

While I’d be very happy if ethics were a driver, I’m certainly not complaining that CAMRA could be on the brink of a pretty huge change, one that could influence an industry. Guinness’ plans to revert to unfined beer by the end of the year may also contribute. 

There’s more about this here.