Saturday 17 September 2011

Reasons for becoming vegetarian and vegan

Reasons for becoming vegetarian and vegan.



There are four main reasons that  I can find; moral grounds, health and fitness, economics and religion. Let’s begin with moral grounds. Should we be killing all these animals just so we can eat the flesh of other beings? I mean there is so much evidence now to show there really is no need for meat in our diets to reach a healthy state, but we will go more into this later. There is already enough suffering on this planet without the rearing and slaughtering of countless animals right? Many people think so as the ever climbing percentages of vegetarians and vegans show. Just because we may be smarter and stronger than these animals does this give us the right to torture, abuse and slaughter? When it is done to other humans it is not tolerated so why can we put other earthlings through this day by day as if it is meant to be this way? I personally feel so passionate and strongly about this subject I could go on forever so let us move onto reason  number two – health and fitness. The amount of evidence available now showing how much healthier you can be without consuming meat or animal products is overwhelming. You only need look at The Gerson Therapy or The Tree of Life to see this. The Gerson Therapy is curing cancers using only nutrition and The Tree of Life is curing diabetes using only nutrition with amazing results in every area, so if we can undo these ‘incurable diseases’ using only animal free plant based nutrition could we not just avoid these diseases completely by living on this diet in the first place? Of course we can! It is that simple. “Without any doubt at all the vegetarian and vegan diet is an all-round more superior diet than one based on animal foods “ – Stonebridge associated colleges. This brings me to my third reason – economics. For a start to obtain 1kg of meat protein from a bull it is estimated you will need to feed the bull 10-14kg of vegetable protein, now however you choose to look at this it does not make any sense, especially as not only is one piece of land needed to produce the animals food but also another for its pasture and if this doesn’t seem enough of a waste already when we could be using the land to feed ourselves we have to put in the price of vet bills and drugs too including the constant use of steroids, hormones and antibiotics. On top of this we also face many problems such as BSE (mad cows disease), foot and mouth and many more resulting in the government/tax payer bailing out the farmer, all leading to a method of food production that is unproductive and not to mention very expensive. The forth reason for being vegetarian or vegan is religion. Many eastern and western people have a meat free diet as part of their religious beliefs.

Whatever the reason for giving up meat and/or animal products the others will nearly always be adopted at a later point and for this I would like to use myself as the perfect example: I gave up meat for health reasons as it was obvious to myself that I would be much healthier without it in my life, I instantly became a ‘loose’ vegan in which I would not eat or drink milk or dairy products but still ate some products containing dairy. A little while into this new lifestyle I was shown the suffering of animals used for the production of meat and dairy and the economic damage because it, I instantly became a strict vegan and have never looked back. I am now as proud to not be a part of this suffering as I am to be a healthy and fit young man.
Kyle Kendall

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