A great question to ask Kenny, nice one! Most people don't really understand or want to understand much of the reasoning behind a vegetarian or vegan diet.. I'm happy to contribute as i have a thing or two to say! I grew up eating meat, and almost no vegetables. Since 25 years im mostly vegetarian after discovering how to cook using spices and visiting India for the first time.
Morality (Is it moral to kill when it's not necessary to survive/thrive?)
This question is well put. There is a HUGE difference between eating ethically sourced meat once in a while or eating 'tortured' meat with every meal.
I eat meat once in a while, or when im ill i often like chicken soup. When i buy meat i always buy the most ethical brand I can find and also buy local meat when possible. I consider that OK morally.
All of life is about birth and death. Most animals kill to survive, and the deeper question looms as to whether it is any more acceptable to kill a plant than an animal?! Life is life, and some people do seriously ask this question. I think to be 100% morally perfect we should only eat the parts of plants that have been designed to be eaten.. like animals do.. without killing the whole plant. Examples are most vegetables such as pumpkin, cucumber, lettuce etc.. and all fruits.
Health (Which diet is better for the human body?)
I have studied this and learned a few intersting things about our digestive system and how it handles meat. Our stomach has different enzymes and chemicals needed to digest meat or vegetables, and our intestines are very long indeed compared to true carnivores like dogs. This is because our intestines are primarily designed to digest vegetables over longer periods of time. Many people have several kilos of undigested rotting meat in their intestines because they eat too much of it. We are actually not designed to eat a mostly meat diet! Our canines are pretty lame compare to a dog, and most of our teeth are dedicated to grinding food as we do when we eat vegetables.
Also, due to bio-accumulation, toxins and hormone mimicking chemicals are at much higher concentrations than found in vegetables.. especially in fish! One animal eats so many vegetables, and the toxins get stored and build up in the animal fats that people eat.
It's well accepted that eating a balanced Vegetarian based diet is much better for your health and vegetarians generally have a lower risk of developing high blood pressure, several forms of cancer, heart disease, diabetes and obesity because these diets are usually lower in fat and higher in fiber.
Environment (Which diet has a lower negative impact on biodiversity, water quality, and air pollution?)
It is fair to say that there is NO comparison when looking at which diet has less impact on the environment. The list is extremely long and concerning when you compare the two! For instance, a single pound of beef takes, on average, 1,800 gallons of water to produce. Compare that to 22 gallons for the same weight of Tomatoes! Water is a HUGE issue globally and meat production is a big part of the problem!
There are many more points to make on this, almost too many to discuss them all! Global Warming is our great threat, and the methane produced by centralised mass scale animal farming is a big part of the global warming problem. Methane is around 30 times more toxic as a global warming gas than CO2! The entire industry is responsible for at least 20% of global warming effects. If you take into account the amount of deforestation taking place to accommodate livestock, this figure is actually much more. We are clearing land and forests and losing our biodiversity at an astonishing rate...
Economic (Where is our money going, who are we supporting?)
I don't know a lot about this, and so to put something more positive into the mix I would like to say that some of the biggest USA meat producers are now putting significant money into developing lab grown meat. This new type of very ethical meat is soon to hit our shelves, and in my opinion might be the way forward for most of the world who refuse to give up meat. This new type of meat deals with most of the issues around environmental and pollution concerns, but not health!
I believe when you eat animals from your own ecosystem there are benefits. I am from Alaska and there are places that without the fish the Native culture would they die or become very sick. The energies from eating farm raised animals is different than wild and that has an impact on the person eating it. Cage something up, feed it gmo pesticide ridden food, and think of it with no regards....It will be no good for anyone who consumes that.
It is a belief when you hunt/fish just like when you wild craft you must think of nature first. Take only what you need and use everypart of what you take. The animal or plant will sacrifice it's self and in return you must take the most care of your environment.
It is really an argument for both sides. If you have no access to local wild, fresh, SUSTAINABLE meat then being vegan is probably a better choice. If you do have access to wild meat it can be beneficial for you and your environment; such as when you holistic fish as I call it when you fish an invasive species of a lake to let the natural fish and wild life recoop.
Really this whole topic gets be thinking about the terrible ways veggies are grown and the need for holistic farming or permaculture as well. However what are people going to eat now if the vegetables too are bad? Just my thoughts. Good vibes to all!
Of course, there is a lot of reasons why I don't eat meat. But main one is spiritual...
To me best quality someone can have is virtue of looking thru eyes of another. When you have that perception, you can imagine what would that someone else go thru if you hurt him. With that spiritual (heart) knowledge, you can't even imagine hurting them.
When you look thru eyes of another, you can't even different yourself from that another. That imply on any creature, not only humans. In the end we are all one consciousness anyway. You can have experience of human, other consciousness can have experience of some other creature, but only difference is vehicle which you have right now. Spirit in everyone is the same in the end because we are all one.
Also I don't feel some higher intelligence full of love would create world in which we should eat each other causing fear and suffering. Someone full of love just wouldn't create that. I feel this world/reality is creation/manipulation of some energies who want constant creation of fear and suffering. Eating meat is causing exactly that! If you don't want to cause fear and suffering, don't do what causes that. Is simple as that.
There is also spiritual/health reason I don't eat meat...
When I practice deep meditation, my body is sending me signals that it want to eat the most lightest food possible, which are juices. Because everything vibrate, in my opinion food you take in your body can help you to be more in tuned to higher vibrations. I would call meat and dairy low vibration products because they are based on fear and suffering.
It is not coincidence that people who want to spiritually uplift themselves usually give up on meat and dairy almost by reflex action. In my opinion the reason is not only spiritual, it is also their body signaling them that if they want to go to higher vibration state, they must do same base for the body by taking food that would help achieving higher vibrations more easily.
P.S.
In day or two had plan to make post about this. Will definitely because I want to expand more about this...
I've touched on this before, and I will do a full post about it it, but in brief, I think there are positives and negatives on both sides.
I have tended to eat a primarily vegetarian diet for most of my adult life, and I'm the soup queen, as soups are one of those things I make particularly well. I could pretty much live on soup, frequently all but do, and a lot of the soups I make are indeed vegan.
But I am not vegan, or truly vegetarian, and likely never will be, because after a period of not eating meat. my health starts to deteriorate. If I ignore it, which I have often done, I will start literally craving meat, and I very rarely get true cravings of any kind.
I've learned the hard way not to ignore those cravings, or I'll wind up ill for real, sometimes seriously. I evidently require a certain amount of meat, and it can be a small amount, in order to properly process the rest of the nutrients I am taking in. Without it, my immune system takes a lunch, which is clearly not a good thing.
One thing I've learned over time is that those of us with O blood types don't typically make good vegetarians. I have a LOT of vegetarian friends, which is why I developed a number of go to vegan recipes. Damned few of them, at least those who are able to remain vegan long term, have O blood types.
I met an evolutionary biologist several years back, and he explained that this is because O negative is the oldest human blood type, which is also why we are the universal blood donors. Evidently there is something in our physical chemistry that makes us incapable of successfully making the switch to a strict vegan diet; much like cats, which will sicken and die if kept on a strictly vegan diet.
Thankfully we are not obligate carnivores, but speaking strictly for myself, if I want to become seriously ill, becoming strictly vegan would get me there pretty quickly. So, far preferring good health, I do eat some animal products, including organic milk that I typically make into kefir, eggs from our chickens and ducks, and occasional fish, poultry and meat, grassfed when possible.
So this is the tip of the iceberg version, which I will expand into a full post, hopefully tomorrow. Lots more to say on both sides of the issue. ;-)
I began my vegan journey as a simple challenge to myself. It was New Year's Eve, 2015, and I wanted to explore which things I was truly addicted to. I decided that for each month of the year, I would give up one element of my diet or lifestyle that was a normal part of my routine. I decided to start with animal products. (February was the month for giving up dessert and I failed within 2 weeks.)
I had many friends who were already vegan or vegetarian, so I had solid models of how to eat without animal. The question was could I do it?
Side Effects of Veganism
As it turned out, I was easily able to ditch animal products. I immediately lost 5 pounds, which was nice, but I also had fewer headaches. I felt better in my skin in a way which is tough to define. My hair felt softer, and by now I call it Mermaid Hair.
As I continued throughout the month, and learned more about the way critters are treated, particularly here in the States, I decided that I no longer wanted to support that system with my dollars. I gave up animal on a whim, but I've left it out after conscious consideration of how it made me feel personally and the impact I believe my choice has on the way society treats animals.
Implications
Hopefully, by choosing not to use animal products, my small statement will ripple throughout my spheres of influence, spreading to the world at large and joining with the rest of us who choose to do the same.
There are many who see vegetarians as people obsessed with health. However, being vegetarians (or vegans) is another form of respect for Nature, and also a way of respect for others, especially in a world where so many people suffer from HUNGER, so hungry that many die every day for this cause. In short, being vegetarian or vegan is a way to contribute to a cleaner and fairer world. Nor is it necessary to be a strict vegetarian. It's about knowing the reasons for vegetarianism and then choosing freely.
The problem of the production and consumption of meat is of such dimension that it is included among the five very simple things that are greatly improving the world.
A strict vegetarian or vegan diet may not be a complete diet, especially in growing age, if it is done without knowledge. The good vegetarian eats a great variety of foods, and admits foods of animal origin whenever it has not been necessary to kill the animal, especially eggs and dairy products (milk, cheese, yogurt ...). Veganism does not admit any food of animal origin (and almost always animal products for other uses: dressing, decoration ...). On the other hand, it is not uncommon to be vegetarian with an occasional consumption of meat or fish, because vegetarianism is not a religion nor has rigid precepts to fulfill (this is recently known as flexitarianism).
1. For HEALTH
Eating meat in excess is bad for your health. All doctors and food experts advise a diet based more on fruit, vegetables and cereals than on meat and, among the meat, the best is poultry meat, due to its low fat.
2. Produce meat excess pollution
Our appetite for animal products is erasing our forests, dirtying our waters, polluting the air, devouring our natural resources and decimating our lands.
3. Meat is a luxury, in a HUNGRY world
The exact data little matter, when approximately 20% of humanity access daily to 40% more of the NECESSARY food, while 40% of humanity is not very healthy because it ingests 10% less than necessary daily.
4. The abusive consumption of meat entails MALTREAT the animals
For meat, fish or milk to be cheap products, animals are mistreated (overcrowded at least), over medicated, unnaturally fed and artificially fattened, but there is more: castration, separation the mother and her offspring, the rupture of herds, the brand, beatings, the trauma of transport ... This is a common practice in industrialized countries, because what is important is to produce a lot, regardless of quality.
The final question is not whether we want to be strict vegetarians, but whether we are capable of feeling responsible for the global influence of our actions and acting accordingly with such simple acts as REDUCING OUR MEAT AND FISH CONSUMPTION.
I changed my mind about eating meat after watching a documentary about the food industry. To know that they torture animals just to make money was enough for me to take a decision in the same hour. I cant imagine having a tortured dead chicken on my table and wont enjoy eating it.
I got to know that eating vegetables and fruits is more healthier than eating meat. I could replace meat with other healthy choices and get enough vitamins for my body. I felt more energetic, healthy and active. I could wake up early in the morning and sleep late at night without any alarm. My face was glowing and all my friends noticed that.
I ate meat all my life, but could give it up in no time. After some weeks I started seeing as the most disgusting food, mostly when I see it raw in the supermarkets. There is no guarantee of getting fresh healthy meat of an animal that was not tortured in the process, so why eat it!
I choose my food very careful when I go to restaurants, even it can be sometimes very difficult, mostly when you live in places where the idea of being vegetarian is still a bit weird. I buy only fresh fruits and vegetables. I still have problems with replacing milk and cheese , but still trying hard :)
Your effort is great. But I must say animals used for meat or any dairy go thru same torture, so there is no difference in that. You don't need milk from another species. Only milk you need was from your mom. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to convince you in anything and I'm not trying to you feel bad, but really there is no difference in abuse. Maybe even more abusing is milking the cow because cow must be pregnant to produce milk, and for that it must be raped again and again after giving birth her baby. Killing is "only" one time thing, milking the cow continue all the time...
A cow does not need to be raped in order to produce Milk.
Moreover, cows are able to continue being milked for several years after giving birth to their calves. I know people within the Krishna Consciousness society both here and abroad that do not engage in any of the standard industry practices in milking cows and it's factually wrong and ill informed to proclaim they are partaking in animal cruelty by milking cows.
See Ahimsa farms
The only question morally speaking is whether the interaction is consensual. If a cow does not want to be milked or worked on a farm, it would object to this through it's behavior. Anyone that is not emotionally retarded is able to observe this and thus forcing the cow to engage in the said activity would then be immoral.
There is nothing inherently wrong however with having a symbiotic relationship with an animal where you both benefit and the interaction is consensual. In using their manure, in benefiting from working sheep dogs, snow dogs, using eggs from backyard chickens when their eggs would otherwise go to waste, or milking a cow once you remove the violence and ensure they are being looked after. To imply so has more to do with being in line with the dogmatic views of an ideology than to eliminate suffering.
Let's not forget that we are all complicit to varying degrees in our support of animal agriculture but the question is where one draws the line.
Being Vegan you are NOT removing yourself from all exploitation and violence, however are striving to do so.
This is evident in the taxation system which in most countries subsidizes the cost of meat and dairy and there are a plethora of other examples.
It may be humbling as a Vegan to bear in mind that there are branches within Vegetarianism e.g. Jainism and Fruitarianism that take the virtue of NonViolence/Ahimsa further than Veganism.
It would be just as valid for these groups to maintain that being a Vegan is hypocritical and is not going far enough. Moro-ever whereas obtaining animal bi-products often
requires violence to be perpetrated on these animals within the dairy and egg industry, it does NOT require one to do so.
This is evident in backyard-eggs, and farmers that treat their cows as family members, abstaining from industry standards like the rape of cows, separation of calves from their mothers
and the shipping of these cows to slaughter.
The 'current' definition of Veganism is rooted in Marxist ideas e.g. commodification and exploitation which are philosophically flawed. The original meaning of Vegan, coined originally from one of the readers of Donald Watson's newsletter, simply meant Non-Dairy, Non-Egg eating Vegetarians. The philosophy around Veganism was later codified by the Vegan Society and over several years morphed into the obfuscated definition we now have around abstaining from exploitation and commodification.
I still don't understand why people think you need milk from another species?
I'm gonna be 32 years old soon, not consuming meat, dairy or any animal products for over 10 years. Didn't go to my doctor for over 15 years and I feel perfectly fine. I even never get sick from season flu.
Saying all this because my opinion is that we don't need milk from another species. I don't know why people use milk at all? What are benefits we can live without? I think most of people just have belief they must drink milk or their bones will get weak or something bad will happen to them.
About Krishna Consciousness society...
They maybe have good intentions, but still they are holding animals in cage when they want to. They do with them what ever they want to. Only freedom for those animals would be to letting them free and building shelter for them in which they can return when they want to. Someone could say this cows don't seem to mind the life they live. That is because they don't know there can be more freedom. If we give them more freedom, they would wonder around on fields and wouldn't choose to be in cage.
Being Vegan you are NOT removing yourself from all exploitation and violence, however are striving to do so.
This is evident in the taxation system which in most countries subsidizes the cost of meat and dairy and there are a plethora of other examples.
Taxation system is fraud anyway. Don't know what that got to do with being vegan?
I would add up that being vegan is not enough. If everyone went vegan without producing any food, that would create same situation what we have now. That is massive production of food for people who don't produce food at all living mostly in cities. (In my opinion big cities are completely wrong organized). For those who produce food on massive scale it is usually more easy to use some kind of poisons to be able to produce food on massive scale. Yes, these are more ecological ways, but it is mostly easier way with poisons like pesticides etc.
So being vegan without producing food is not enough. We must build society where there wouldn't be need to big farming. In my opinion, one of first things we must do is dismantle big cities they are today. Too much concrete, too less nature and food we can eat.
Anyone who grow some food know that it is not so hard to grow tomato's, potato's and other vegetables. If most of people do that, it will more easy...
In the end I think it is easy to be "perfect" vegan where you will ecologically produce food and exchange it with others who also don't harm anyone in production of food. Then you couldn't call those people hypocritical or whatever. But again, there gonna be always people who will try to justify killing of animals by pointing at vegang with absurd claims. Just few days ago, one guy on Facebook were trying to convince me that killing of lamb is same like picking apple from the tree. He also said that potato's have feeling also. Wtf are those people talking about? Do they even hear themselves? Yes, I know they are only trying to justify their meat eating habits, but still can't believe someone can compare killing of living being with picking apple for tree, apple that is meant to be picked up from tree.
You are absolutely right in everything you said. I reduced consuming milk in the last years and was buying baby powder milk from pharmacy from time to time. Lately I started making coconut and almond milk at home and need to stay that way. I used to drink milk 2 - 3 times per day all my life. Now maybe twice a week, but I think almond milk is good and healthier.
I wished people could be aware of what we are doing to animals and to the planet itself :(
Hey man, great contest. An excellent way to create awareness and learn what people trully believes. I'm pro vegan and the reasons keep growing every day.
I don't want to support murder, torture, rape, slavery and such. All comitted to our brother animals.
I dont wanna support the hunger of people. Do you know that if we just fed the people the grains used to fed the animals there'll be no hunger in the world? This feeding the cows so that the rich can eat richer and the poor die of hunger is, to me, terrorism.
I don't wanna support the deforestation of the world due to animal farming. Weare killing the land that support us. Also we have extinguish almost all wildlife.
Health. This is just a benefit of doing well. Since I'm vegan I have more energy and feel happier. Becoming vegan means you will avoid most of the sickness beating the population today. Wanna beat cancer? Go Vegan.
Reasons to go V are many, I used to eat lost of meat and dairy products, so I completely understand the addiction of carnivorse. But a big change is needed to save life in this Beatiful planet. Once you realize that you are addicted and should stop for the better, you do it happily.
To vegan or not to vegan, that is the question
whether it is nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous animal cruelty or to end it all with kindness and love. :)
By what right, do we kill and eat animals?
Thanks for this question, @kennyskitchen , the timing is interesting since I only stopped eating dead animals about a month ago. To address the topic, the first question I have to ask myself is do I have a right to kill any living creature.
I can think of nothing that gives me the right. But knowing right from wrong is no guarantee that a person will do the right thing.
There were two things that tipped the scale for me:
My health. It's illogical to me to eat things that are unhealthy. Meat is acidic, gives your body an acidic ph which is the preferred environment for disease. That's what you get for doing something unnatural I guess.
Knowing that didn't stop me though.
But I've been feeling bloated and sluggish lately, not a good feeling. I feel so much better now after just a few weeks not eating meat. I can tell you that I move much better, much lighter on my feet. Yesterday, my wife thought my footsteps belonged to our son so it's not just my imagination. I expect this to only get better.
When I look into an animals eyes, I see someone in there, whatever you want to call it, it has feelings, expresses the same basic emotions that I do. I feel love for them. I talk to them every chance I get, whether it's a bird or a rabbit, or a baby deer, I'm touched by them.
I believe our consumption of meat is part of the perversion that "The Masters of The Universe", have inflicted upon mankind.
The greatest threat to their continued exploitation of humanity, is our solidarity, our harmony with one another and the planet as a whole.
It stands to reason that unnatural actions will have unnatural consequences. Farming animals to supply everyone with meat is not natural and since everything is connected, the negative impact of perverting nature is far reaching.
Specifically, I don't know where the money's going but I know without researching where it's not going and that's to anyone who gives a damn about their fellow human.
So you know where I am coming from, I was either lacto-ovo vegetarian or vegan for over a decade. I am not now.
I was told by a dietician that I knew more about vegan nutrition than she did, so to be clear it's not because I didn't know what I was doing. But I would get into arguments with my doctor about it all the time - I'm sure you too have had approximately 9,873 people tell you you "need more protein." Even when I kept a food log my doctor would wave me off and insist.
Well, after years of arguing about it, I agreed to try being pescatarian; if it helped my health issues, or not, I could at least say I had tried, right?
I started feeling better immediately regarding certain symptoms. Logically, I didn't understand it because I paid attention to my macros and vitamins and supplemented B12 and all that. My IBS symptoms drastically diminished, and I lost six sizes - from eating animal products (not just pescatarian anymore). I did more research and came across various new nutrition studies, which essentially say there is no one size fits all diet and your ancestral diet has a lot to do with what your body does well on.
Fast forward several months, and I finally saw an allergist and had lots of allergy testing done. AHA. I'm allergic to most of what's in the supermarket, and all of my veg staples. I could not be veg and avoid my allergens. The list is a mile long; I would literally die of malnutrition or an allergic reaction (those get worse with greater exposure). It's easier to ask me what I'm not allergic to (animal products, black (only black) beans, onions, sweet potatoes, white (not brown) rice, tomatoes, coffee, cocoa, cane sugar, ginger, apples, various spices, uh... peppers, cherries, tapioca ...I'm scraping the barrel here. Not a lot). Technically all wheat should be off the menu, but I rash if I eat whole wheat and don't if I eat white flour, so I cheat and eat white flour some.
It's possible that I am having a reaction there that I don't realize, though: I laid off most soy before I even found out I was allergic, because I read about the cancer connection, right. After doing that, for the first time in my adult life, my thyroid levels were normal, and my endometriosis pain went way down. Another thing I didn't realize: potatoes and green leafies trigger horrible digestive upset. I had been told I had IBS; yeah, if I avoid potato and green leafies, most of that goes away. Other foods now swell my throat and mouth (knock on wood, never had full anaphylaxis yet), that seven years ago I ate just fine. I had no food allergies as a kid; this started in adulthood.
So compassion has to include ourselves. It is necessary for some of us to eat animal products.
That being said, I'm not a carnivore. A big serving of meat to me is about two ounces. I don't eat more than that at once. I probably eat about a pound of meat per month, give or take. The major staple of my diet now is dairy products. My ancestry is Celtic and northern Native American; ironically, a lot of my safe foods align with what they might have eaten, too. Dairy is a very Celtic thing. 😁
I do my best to get the most ethical products I can, like I do in all areas of my life. But even vegans aren't deathless: every pest killed on the farm, the oil in the pleather shoes, the manufacture and distribution of everything we own; it's impossible to live without harm. I think if we all do what we can, where we can, and realize that systemic, societal change makes a bigger difference (whether we're talking weaning ourselves off oil or abolishing factory farms or what), then we'll all be better off - the world, and our psyche.
A great question to ask Kenny, nice one! Most people don't really understand or want to understand much of the reasoning behind a vegetarian or vegan diet.. I'm happy to contribute as i have a thing or two to say! I grew up eating meat, and almost no vegetables. Since 25 years im mostly vegetarian after discovering how to cook using spices and visiting India for the first time.
Morality (Is it moral to kill when it's not necessary to survive/thrive?)
This question is well put. There is a HUGE difference between eating ethically sourced meat once in a while or eating 'tortured' meat with every meal.
I eat meat once in a while, or when im ill i often like chicken soup. When i buy meat i always buy the most ethical brand I can find and also buy local meat when possible. I consider that OK morally.
All of life is about birth and death. Most animals kill to survive, and the deeper question looms as to whether it is any more acceptable to kill a plant than an animal?! Life is life, and some people do seriously ask this question. I think to be 100% morally perfect we should only eat the parts of plants that have been designed to be eaten.. like animals do.. without killing the whole plant. Examples are most vegetables such as pumpkin, cucumber, lettuce etc.. and all fruits.
Health (Which diet is better for the human body?)
I have studied this and learned a few intersting things about our digestive system and how it handles meat. Our stomach has different enzymes and chemicals needed to digest meat or vegetables, and our intestines are very long indeed compared to true carnivores like dogs. This is because our intestines are primarily designed to digest vegetables over longer periods of time. Many people have several kilos of undigested rotting meat in their intestines because they eat too much of it. We are actually not designed to eat a mostly meat diet! Our canines are pretty lame compare to a dog, and most of our teeth are dedicated to grinding food as we do when we eat vegetables.
Also, due to bio-accumulation, toxins and hormone mimicking chemicals are at much higher concentrations than found in vegetables.. especially in fish! One animal eats so many vegetables, and the toxins get stored and build up in the animal fats that people eat.
It's well accepted that eating a balanced Vegetarian based diet is much better for your health and vegetarians generally have a lower risk of developing high blood pressure, several forms of cancer, heart disease, diabetes and obesity because these diets are usually lower in fat and higher in fiber.
Environment (Which diet has a lower negative impact on biodiversity, water quality, and air pollution?)
It is fair to say that there is NO comparison when looking at which diet has less impact on the environment. The list is extremely long and concerning when you compare the two! For instance, a single pound of beef takes, on average, 1,800 gallons of water to produce. Compare that to 22 gallons for the same weight of Tomatoes! Water is a HUGE issue globally and meat production is a big part of the problem!
There are many more points to make on this, almost too many to discuss them all! Global Warming is our great threat, and the methane produced by centralised mass scale animal farming is a big part of the global warming problem. Methane is around 30 times more toxic as a global warming gas than CO2! The entire industry is responsible for at least 20% of global warming effects. If you take into account the amount of deforestation taking place to accommodate livestock, this figure is actually much more. We are clearing land and forests and losing our biodiversity at an astonishing rate...
Economic (Where is our money going, who are we supporting?)
I don't know a lot about this, and so to put something more positive into the mix I would like to say that some of the biggest USA meat producers are now putting significant money into developing lab grown meat. This new type of very ethical meat is soon to hit our shelves, and in my opinion might be the way forward for most of the world who refuse to give up meat. This new type of meat deals with most of the issues around environmental and pollution concerns, but not health!
I believe when you eat animals from your own ecosystem there are benefits. I am from Alaska and there are places that without the fish the Native culture would they die or become very sick. The energies from eating farm raised animals is different than wild and that has an impact on the person eating it. Cage something up, feed it gmo pesticide ridden food, and think of it with no regards....It will be no good for anyone who consumes that.
It is a belief when you hunt/fish just like when you wild craft you must think of nature first. Take only what you need and use everypart of what you take. The animal or plant will sacrifice it's self and in return you must take the most care of your environment.
It is really an argument for both sides. If you have no access to local wild, fresh, SUSTAINABLE meat then being vegan is probably a better choice. If you do have access to wild meat it can be beneficial for you and your environment; such as when you holistic fish as I call it when you fish an invasive species of a lake to let the natural fish and wild life recoop.
Really this whole topic gets be thinking about the terrible ways veggies are grown and the need for holistic farming or permaculture as well. However what are people going to eat now if the vegetables too are bad? Just my thoughts. Good vibes to all!
Of course, there is a lot of reasons why I don't eat meat. But main one is spiritual...
To me best quality someone can have is virtue of looking thru eyes of another. When you have that perception, you can imagine what would that someone else go thru if you hurt him. With that spiritual (heart) knowledge, you can't even imagine hurting them.
When you look thru eyes of another, you can't even different yourself from that another. That imply on any creature, not only humans. In the end we are all one consciousness anyway. You can have experience of human, other consciousness can have experience of some other creature, but only difference is vehicle which you have right now. Spirit in everyone is the same in the end because we are all one.
Also I don't feel some higher intelligence full of love would create world in which we should eat each other causing fear and suffering. Someone full of love just wouldn't create that. I feel this world/reality is creation/manipulation of some energies who want constant creation of fear and suffering. Eating meat is causing exactly that! If you don't want to cause fear and suffering, don't do what causes that. Is simple as that.
There is also spiritual/health reason I don't eat meat...
When I practice deep meditation, my body is sending me signals that it want to eat the most lightest food possible, which are juices. Because everything vibrate, in my opinion food you take in your body can help you to be more in tuned to higher vibrations. I would call meat and dairy low vibration products because they are based on fear and suffering.
It is not coincidence that people who want to spiritually uplift themselves usually give up on meat and dairy almost by reflex action. In my opinion the reason is not only spiritual, it is also their body signaling them that if they want to go to higher vibration state, they must do same base for the body by taking food that would help achieving higher vibrations more easily.
P.S.
In day or two had plan to make post about this. Will definitely because I want to expand more about this...
Love this initiative!
Peace & Love.
beautiful answer <3 ommm
Thanks, Alex! 🙂 ❤️
One of my favourite cartoons 🕉
Great question, @kennyskitchen!
I've touched on this before, and I will do a full post about it it, but in brief, I think there are positives and negatives on both sides.
I have tended to eat a primarily vegetarian diet for most of my adult life, and I'm the soup queen, as soups are one of those things I make particularly well. I could pretty much live on soup, frequently all but do, and a lot of the soups I make are indeed vegan.
But I am not vegan, or truly vegetarian, and likely never will be, because after a period of not eating meat. my health starts to deteriorate. If I ignore it, which I have often done, I will start literally craving meat, and I very rarely get true cravings of any kind.
I've learned the hard way not to ignore those cravings, or I'll wind up ill for real, sometimes seriously. I evidently require a certain amount of meat, and it can be a small amount, in order to properly process the rest of the nutrients I am taking in. Without it, my immune system takes a lunch, which is clearly not a good thing.
One thing I've learned over time is that those of us with O blood types don't typically make good vegetarians. I have a LOT of vegetarian friends, which is why I developed a number of go to vegan recipes. Damned few of them, at least those who are able to remain vegan long term, have O blood types.
I met an evolutionary biologist several years back, and he explained that this is because O negative is the oldest human blood type, which is also why we are the universal blood donors. Evidently there is something in our physical chemistry that makes us incapable of successfully making the switch to a strict vegan diet; much like cats, which will sicken and die if kept on a strictly vegan diet.
Thankfully we are not obligate carnivores, but speaking strictly for myself, if I want to become seriously ill, becoming strictly vegan would get me there pretty quickly. So, far preferring good health, I do eat some animal products, including organic milk that I typically make into kefir, eggs from our chickens and ducks, and occasional fish, poultry and meat, grassfed when possible.
So this is the tip of the iceberg version, which I will expand into a full post, hopefully tomorrow. Lots more to say on both sides of the issue. ;-)
Addiction
I began my vegan journey as a simple challenge to myself. It was New Year's Eve, 2015, and I wanted to explore which things I was truly addicted to. I decided that for each month of the year, I would give up one element of my diet or lifestyle that was a normal part of my routine. I decided to start with animal products. (February was the month for giving up dessert and I failed within 2 weeks.)
I had many friends who were already vegan or vegetarian, so I had solid models of how to eat without animal. The question was could I do it?
Side Effects of Veganism
As it turned out, I was easily able to ditch animal products. I immediately lost 5 pounds, which was nice, but I also had fewer headaches. I felt better in my skin in a way which is tough to define. My hair felt softer, and by now I call it Mermaid Hair.
As I continued throughout the month, and learned more about the way critters are treated, particularly here in the States, I decided that I no longer wanted to support that system with my dollars. I gave up animal on a whim, but I've left it out after conscious consideration of how it made me feel personally and the impact I believe my choice has on the way society treats animals.
Implications
Hopefully, by choosing not to use animal products, my small statement will ripple throughout my spheres of influence, spreading to the world at large and joining with the rest of us who choose to do the same.
There are many who see vegetarians as people obsessed with health. However, being vegetarians (or vegans) is another form of respect for Nature, and also a way of respect for others, especially in a world where so many people suffer from HUNGER, so hungry that many die every day for this cause. In short, being vegetarian or vegan is a way to contribute to a cleaner and fairer world. Nor is it necessary to be a strict vegetarian. It's about knowing the reasons for vegetarianism and then choosing freely.
The problem of the production and consumption of meat is of such dimension that it is included among the five very simple things that are greatly improving the world.
A strict vegetarian or vegan diet may not be a complete diet, especially in growing age, if it is done without knowledge. The good vegetarian eats a great variety of foods, and admits foods of animal origin whenever it has not been necessary to kill the animal, especially eggs and dairy products (milk, cheese, yogurt ...). Veganism does not admit any food of animal origin (and almost always animal products for other uses: dressing, decoration ...). On the other hand, it is not uncommon to be vegetarian with an occasional consumption of meat or fish, because vegetarianism is not a religion nor has rigid precepts to fulfill (this is recently known as flexitarianism).
1. For HEALTH
Eating meat in excess is bad for your health. All doctors and food experts advise a diet based more on fruit, vegetables and cereals than on meat and, among the meat, the best is poultry meat, due to its low fat.
2. Produce meat excess pollution
Our appetite for animal products is erasing our forests, dirtying our waters, polluting the air, devouring our natural resources and decimating our lands.
3. Meat is a luxury, in a HUNGRY world
The exact data little matter, when approximately 20% of humanity access daily to 40% more of the NECESSARY food, while 40% of humanity is not very healthy because it ingests 10% less than necessary daily.
4. The abusive consumption of meat entails MALTREAT the animals
For meat, fish or milk to be cheap products, animals are mistreated (overcrowded at least), over medicated, unnaturally fed and artificially fattened, but there is more: castration, separation the mother and her offspring, the rupture of herds, the brand, beatings, the trauma of transport ... This is a common practice in industrialized countries, because what is important is to produce a lot, regardless of quality.
The final question is not whether we want to be strict vegetarians, but whether we are capable of feeling responsible for the global influence of our actions and acting accordingly with such simple acts as REDUCING OUR MEAT AND FISH CONSUMPTION.
I changed my mind about eating meat after watching a documentary about the food industry. To know that they torture animals just to make money was enough for me to take a decision in the same hour. I cant imagine having a tortured dead chicken on my table and wont enjoy eating it.
I got to know that eating vegetables and fruits is more healthier than eating meat. I could replace meat with other healthy choices and get enough vitamins for my body. I felt more energetic, healthy and active. I could wake up early in the morning and sleep late at night without any alarm. My face was glowing and all my friends noticed that.
I ate meat all my life, but could give it up in no time. After some weeks I started seeing as the most disgusting food, mostly when I see it raw in the supermarkets. There is no guarantee of getting fresh healthy meat of an animal that was not tortured in the process, so why eat it!
I choose my food very careful when I go to restaurants, even it can be sometimes very difficult, mostly when you live in places where the idea of being vegetarian is still a bit weird. I buy only fresh fruits and vegetables. I still have problems with replacing milk and cheese , but still trying hard :)
Thank you for this nice opportunity :)
Your effort is great. But I must say animals used for meat or any dairy go thru same torture, so there is no difference in that. You don't need milk from another species. Only milk you need was from your mom. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to convince you in anything and I'm not trying to you feel bad, but really there is no difference in abuse. Maybe even more abusing is milking the cow because cow must be pregnant to produce milk, and for that it must be raped again and again after giving birth her baby. Killing is "only" one time thing, milking the cow continue all the time...
A cow does not need to be raped in order to produce Milk.
Moreover, cows are able to continue being milked for several years after giving birth to their calves. I know people within the Krishna Consciousness society both here and abroad that do not engage in any of the standard industry practices in milking cows and it's factually wrong and ill informed to proclaim they are partaking in animal cruelty by milking cows.
See Ahimsa farms
The only question morally speaking is whether the interaction is consensual. If a cow does not want to be milked or worked on a farm, it would object to this through it's behavior. Anyone that is not emotionally retarded is able to observe this and thus forcing the cow to engage in the said activity would then be immoral.
There is nothing inherently wrong however with having a symbiotic relationship with an animal where you both benefit and the interaction is consensual. In using their manure, in benefiting from working sheep dogs, snow dogs, using eggs from backyard chickens when their eggs would otherwise go to waste, or milking a cow once you remove the violence and ensure they are being looked after. To imply so has more to do with being in line with the dogmatic views of an ideology than to eliminate suffering.
Let's not forget that we are all complicit to varying degrees in our support of animal agriculture but the question is where one draws the line.
Being Vegan you are NOT removing yourself from all exploitation and violence, however are striving to do so.
This is evident in the taxation system which in most countries subsidizes the cost of meat and dairy and there are a plethora of other examples.
It may be humbling as a Vegan to bear in mind that there are branches within Vegetarianism e.g. Jainism and Fruitarianism that take the virtue of NonViolence/Ahimsa further than Veganism.
It would be just as valid for these groups to maintain that being a Vegan is hypocritical and is not going far enough. Moro-ever whereas obtaining animal bi-products often
requires violence to be perpetrated on these animals within the dairy and egg industry, it does NOT require one to do so.
This is evident in backyard-eggs, and farmers that treat their cows as family members, abstaining from industry standards like the rape of cows, separation of calves from their mothers
and the shipping of these cows to slaughter.
The 'current' definition of Veganism is rooted in Marxist ideas e.g. commodification and exploitation which are philosophically flawed. The original meaning of Vegan, coined originally from one of the readers of Donald Watson's newsletter, simply meant Non-Dairy, Non-Egg eating Vegetarians. The philosophy around Veganism was later codified by the Vegan Society and over several years morphed into the obfuscated definition we now have around abstaining from exploitation and commodification.
I still don't understand why people think you need milk from another species?
I'm gonna be 32 years old soon, not consuming meat, dairy or any animal products for over 10 years. Didn't go to my doctor for over 15 years and I feel perfectly fine. I even never get sick from season flu.
Saying all this because my opinion is that we don't need milk from another species. I don't know why people use milk at all? What are benefits we can live without? I think most of people just have belief they must drink milk or their bones will get weak or something bad will happen to them.
About Krishna Consciousness society...
They maybe have good intentions, but still they are holding animals in cage when they want to. They do with them what ever they want to. Only freedom for those animals would be to letting them free and building shelter for them in which they can return when they want to. Someone could say this cows don't seem to mind the life they live. That is because they don't know there can be more freedom. If we give them more freedom, they would wonder around on fields and wouldn't choose to be in cage.
Taxation system is fraud anyway. Don't know what that got to do with being vegan?
I would add up that being vegan is not enough. If everyone went vegan without producing any food, that would create same situation what we have now. That is massive production of food for people who don't produce food at all living mostly in cities. (In my opinion big cities are completely wrong organized). For those who produce food on massive scale it is usually more easy to use some kind of poisons to be able to produce food on massive scale. Yes, these are more ecological ways, but it is mostly easier way with poisons like pesticides etc.
So being vegan without producing food is not enough. We must build society where there wouldn't be need to big farming. In my opinion, one of first things we must do is dismantle big cities they are today. Too much concrete, too less nature and food we can eat.
Anyone who grow some food know that it is not so hard to grow tomato's, potato's and other vegetables. If most of people do that, it will more easy...
In the end I think it is easy to be "perfect" vegan where you will ecologically produce food and exchange it with others who also don't harm anyone in production of food. Then you couldn't call those people hypocritical or whatever. But again, there gonna be always people who will try to justify killing of animals by pointing at vegang with absurd claims. Just few days ago, one guy on Facebook were trying to convince me that killing of lamb is same like picking apple from the tree. He also said that potato's have feeling also. Wtf are those people talking about? Do they even hear themselves? Yes, I know they are only trying to justify their meat eating habits, but still can't believe someone can compare killing of living being with picking apple for tree, apple that is meant to be picked up from tree.
You are absolutely right in everything you said. I reduced consuming milk in the last years and was buying baby powder milk from pharmacy from time to time. Lately I started making coconut and almond milk at home and need to stay that way. I used to drink milk 2 - 3 times per day all my life. Now maybe twice a week, but I think almond milk is good and healthier.
I wished people could be aware of what we are doing to animals and to the planet itself :(
Hey man, great contest. An excellent way to create awareness and learn what people trully believes. I'm pro vegan and the reasons keep growing every day.
Reasons to go V are many, I used to eat lost of meat and dairy products, so I completely understand the addiction of carnivorse. But a big change is needed to save life in this Beatiful planet. Once you realize that you are addicted and should stop for the better, you do it happily.
Cheers!
To vegan or not to vegan, that is the question
whether it is nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous animal cruelty or to end it all with kindness and love. :)
By what right, do we kill and eat animals?
Thanks for this question, @kennyskitchen , the timing is interesting since I only stopped eating dead animals about a month ago. To address the topic, the first question I have to ask myself is do I have a right to kill any living creature.
I can think of nothing that gives me the right. But knowing right from wrong is no guarantee that a person will do the right thing.
There were two things that tipped the scale for me:
My health. It's illogical to me to eat things that are unhealthy. Meat is acidic, gives your body an acidic ph which is the preferred environment for disease. That's what you get for doing something unnatural I guess.
Knowing that didn't stop me though.
But I've been feeling bloated and sluggish lately, not a good feeling. I feel so much better now after just a few weeks not eating meat. I can tell you that I move much better, much lighter on my feet. Yesterday, my wife thought my footsteps belonged to our son so it's not just my imagination. I expect this to only get better.
When I look into an animals eyes, I see someone in there, whatever you want to call it, it has feelings, expresses the same basic emotions that I do. I feel love for them. I talk to them every chance I get, whether it's a bird or a rabbit, or a baby deer, I'm touched by them.
I believe our consumption of meat is part of the perversion that "The Masters of The Universe", have inflicted upon mankind.
The greatest threat to their continued exploitation of humanity, is our solidarity, our harmony with one another and the planet as a whole.
It stands to reason that unnatural actions will have unnatural consequences. Farming animals to supply everyone with meat is not natural and since everything is connected, the negative impact of perverting nature is far reaching.
Specifically, I don't know where the money's going but I know without researching where it's not going and that's to anyone who gives a damn about their fellow human.
So you know where I am coming from, I was either lacto-ovo vegetarian or vegan for over a decade. I am not now.
I was told by a dietician that I knew more about vegan nutrition than she did, so to be clear it's not because I didn't know what I was doing. But I would get into arguments with my doctor about it all the time - I'm sure you too have had approximately 9,873 people tell you you "need more protein." Even when I kept a food log my doctor would wave me off and insist.
Well, after years of arguing about it, I agreed to try being pescatarian; if it helped my health issues, or not, I could at least say I had tried, right?
I started feeling better immediately regarding certain symptoms. Logically, I didn't understand it because I paid attention to my macros and vitamins and supplemented B12 and all that. My IBS symptoms drastically diminished, and I lost six sizes - from eating animal products (not just pescatarian anymore). I did more research and came across various new nutrition studies, which essentially say there is no one size fits all diet and your ancestral diet has a lot to do with what your body does well on.
Fast forward several months, and I finally saw an allergist and had lots of allergy testing done. AHA. I'm allergic to most of what's in the supermarket, and all of my veg staples. I could not be veg and avoid my allergens. The list is a mile long; I would literally die of malnutrition or an allergic reaction (those get worse with greater exposure). It's easier to ask me what I'm not allergic to (animal products, black (only black) beans, onions, sweet potatoes, white (not brown) rice, tomatoes, coffee, cocoa, cane sugar, ginger, apples, various spices, uh... peppers, cherries, tapioca ...I'm scraping the barrel here. Not a lot). Technically all wheat should be off the menu, but I rash if I eat whole wheat and don't if I eat white flour, so I cheat and eat white flour some.
It's possible that I am having a reaction there that I don't realize, though: I laid off most soy before I even found out I was allergic, because I read about the cancer connection, right. After doing that, for the first time in my adult life, my thyroid levels were normal, and my endometriosis pain went way down. Another thing I didn't realize: potatoes and green leafies trigger horrible digestive upset. I had been told I had IBS; yeah, if I avoid potato and green leafies, most of that goes away. Other foods now swell my throat and mouth (knock on wood, never had full anaphylaxis yet), that seven years ago I ate just fine. I had no food allergies as a kid; this started in adulthood.
So compassion has to include ourselves. It is necessary for some of us to eat animal products.
That being said, I'm not a carnivore. A big serving of meat to me is about two ounces. I don't eat more than that at once. I probably eat about a pound of meat per month, give or take. The major staple of my diet now is dairy products. My ancestry is Celtic and northern Native American; ironically, a lot of my safe foods align with what they might have eaten, too. Dairy is a very Celtic thing. 😁
I do my best to get the most ethical products I can, like I do in all areas of my life. But even vegans aren't deathless: every pest killed on the farm, the oil in the pleather shoes, the manufacture and distribution of everything we own; it's impossible to live without harm. I think if we all do what we can, where we can, and realize that systemic, societal change makes a bigger difference (whether we're talking weaning ourselves off oil or abolishing factory farms or what), then we'll all be better off - the world, and our psyche.