I have recently transgressed (again) from being vegetarian to vegan. Since I was 12 I have been going through stages of being vegetarian and vegan and for about four years I was weak and went back to animal based food and products. However I am now 100% COMMITTED to being vegan and will never ever go back to animal based food or products.
Important! I am not writing this post nor will I be writing the subsequent Veganism posts with the aim of converting you all to being Vegan. Instead I am writing about veganism to share with you an element of my life and also to hopefully start a discussion / debate on GGG how our lifestyle choices can affect the planet and even our health (whether in negative or positive ways)
So you may be asking ‘Why vegan? Well I personally believe in the vegan principles and ethics. Also I am now 100% committed to being vegan because it is better for the environment and also my health.
Principles and Ethics
Some may argue that we are born omnivores (meat and veg) and that eating and using animal based products is only natural. But is killing any animal (including human) ‘natural’? Is exploiting any animal (including human) keeping them locked up in pain and suffering ‘natural’?
I don’t think that it is ‘natural’ at all. Yes in the animal kingdom and in the circle of life some other animals kill other animals for food and some even ‘fun’. But these animals do not have choice – as humans we have a choice to choose that no animal including humans suffer in order for us to survive as a species. We do not need to eat animals to survive. We do not need to exploit anyone or anything including animals, humans or the planet to survive.
For more information about vegan principles and ethics then please watch the The philosophy of Vegan Values: The practice of non-violence Youtube video, go to the Veganism article on Wikipedia, or go to The Vegan Society website.
Environmental Benefits
Being a vegan is better for the environment compared to an animal based diet because fewer resources are used.
Here is a simple demonstration:
Land + Water + Energy = Crops
Land + Water + Energy + Crops = Livestock and dairy products
I could go into this in much further detail but the post would be far too long. However hopefully from the simple diagram you can see by eating meat or having dairy products additional resources are being used. So to me it makes sense to just eat the crops. Yes energy and land is needed to grow crops and I will write more about vegan farming / agriculture in another post.
If you want more information about the environmental benefits of being vegan then please check out an interesting online essay called ‘Logical Environmental Reasoning for a Vegetarian Lifestyle’.
Also some food for thought is, in “A 2006 study by Gidon Eshel and Pamela Martin, assistant professors of geophysics at the
University of Chicago, found that a person switching from the average American diet to a vegan diet would reduce CO2 emissions by 1,485 kg per year.” Source: Diet, Energy and Global Warming study.
Health Benefits
As the vegan society says “How many times have you been told to eat more fruit and veg? Contrast this with how many times you’ve been told to eat more burgers…” The 
typical vegan will eat more fruit and veg than the average meat eater! And who can deny that an increase of fruit and veg is bad? Also people who “avoid meat also tend to have lower levels of saturated fat, cholesterol, and animal protein, and higher levels of carbohydrates, fiber, magnesium, potassium, folate, and antioxidants, such as vitamins C and E, and phytochemicals” Source: “Position of the American Dietetic Association and Dietitians of Canada: Vegetarian diets (June 2003)
A well balanced vegan diet provides a range of health benefits compared to meat eaters and even vegetarians. For further details about the health benefits and for some recipe ideas etc, check out Super Vegans – Living proof vegan diets and nutrition.
Next Post
My next veganism post will explore about how easy it is to be Vegan using organic and locally sourced food. But in the mean time feel free to leave comments about your experiences of being a vegan or your arguments for or even against the various benefits of veganism including environmental.
November 18th, 2007 at 10:12 pm
“Land + Water + Energy + Crops = Livestock and dairy products”
This is true, however:
Healthy forestland = animals that can be hunted (like moose, deer, rabbits, and birds)
These animals eat bark, seeds and grasses that humans can’t eat, and they require no resources to raise them other than keeping forest areas natural. Therefore if you’re going to eat meat, the ecologically sound choice is game meat. Not only does it promote hunters investing in forest preservation, but it uses up even less resources than cultivated crops.
November 19th, 2007 at 9:18 am
Hi Tina,
Thank you for your contribution. I agree that healthy forestry land can support a wide range of wild species including animals that eat some food that we can not eat (there are lots of wild plants etc that grow in forests that humans can eat too – the art of foraging ha sbeen lost due to supermarkets etc).
I agree that historically people have hunted these animals for food. However over hunting caused a significant decline in many species and hunting to feed our overpopulated world is not a sustainable option at all, neither is fishing (I know that you did not mention this but I always like to point out that our seas are dying due to too much commercial fishing).
The problem with hunting and fishing (besides ETHICAL issues!!!) is that people are generally greedy and will kill the young animals too – which then does not allow a healthy and robust population to continue breeding. There is also ecological implications of hunting wild animals as if too much of one species is killed it can unbalance the eco system.
I agree that some hunters would help and invest in forest preservation however I am skepitcal that the majority would. Remember hunting to a lot of people in the Western World is ‘sport’ it’s not a survival method to feed their starving family (though I admit that in some other countries people do need to hunt to survive – however they tend to only take what they need)
I really do beleive that we cant all eat meat as it is not the most sustainable or ethical way to feed ourselves.
I would be interested to hear your response to this Tina and also the response from other GGG readers.
Thanks