Why You Should Become Vegetarian | Food

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Why You Should Become Vegetarian

Written by Laurence

Saturday, 25 October 2008 20:46

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Why do people chose to be vegetarian?

Several different factors can be at the origin of a choice to become vegetarian. In the past the principal reason was the respect for the rights of animals and out of concern for their welfare.

Today, even if the motives of animal welfare are still valid, the majority of vegetarians have chosen this diet because of their own proper welfare. An other popular reason amongst vegetarians is the respect for the environment. Effectively, a vegetarian diet contributes to the effort to reduce climate change. Another reason to be vegetarian is for cultural or religious reasons, for example: buddists and hindus.

Ethics and Animal Rights

Refusing to eat animal flesh is one way to denounce the way animals are treated in factory farms. These farms, called CAFOs (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations), give animals little mobility, fresh air, good food and they require antibiotics to remain disease free. CAFOs stop treating animals as beings and treats them as commodities to be fattened as efficiently as possible before going to the slaughterhouse.

Wellbeing and Respect for Your Body

Reducing your consumption of animal flesh will make you feel better.

Animal flesh is difficult to digest and blocks other foods from digesting as they move along the intestine, causing the food to putrify in your gut. The human digestive system is different from that of carnivores such as lions or dogs and is not made for digesting meat. Carnivores in nature have very short digestive systems so the meat is digested and removed from the body as quickly as possible. The human digestive system on the otherhand is much longer as it has evolved to digest fruit and vegetables. As meat progresses slowly through the human digestive system, it liberates toxins and impurities that irritate the stomach and intestines.

Man lying in grass, enjoying the sun and life

Adopting a balanced vegetarian diet helps to reduce cholesterol and hence risks from cardiovascular diseases such as heart attacks and angina. Meat is a source of saturated fat which drives cholesterol. Increasing your intake of fibres from vegetable sources increases the efficiency of your intestines and helps prevent certain cancers.

Animal feed contains pesticides that accumulate in their fats and are passed through the food chain. Particularly in the US, animals are given growth hormones that can find their way into a meat eater's diet. These hormones have been banned in Europe for health reasons. Hormones and pesticides that you eat are then stocked in your fat and can potentially cause diseases such as cancer.

Environmental Respect

According to a 2006 initiative from the United Nations, the cattle industry is one of the greatest drivers of climate change in the world today. It contributes to: the pollution of the air and water, degradation of soils, climate change and the loss of bio-diversity.

Almost one fifth of greenhouse gases are produced by industrial agriculture. On one side, animals such as cattle produce a lot of methane because they are incorrectly fed themselves, and on the other hand large amounts of energy are consumed to produce grains and cereals necessary to feed industrial cattle. In the US alone, the grains and cereals given to livestock could feed up to 800 million people - that's more than the population of the US and EU combined! (Cornell Science News, Aug. 7, 1997)

Eating fruits and vegetables contributes to the fight against climate change.

Mark Bittman, the New York Times food critic has a wonderful presentation on our current food system: