It's not as though there aren't enough resources to go around. On the contrary, there is plenty of fuel and building materials, food and land, yet the human population is scattered unevenly across the planet and have managed to distribute what's harvested from the earth severely disproportionately. Today is not a recycling crusade, nor a hippy controversy. I would simply like to explain why I am a vegetarian, and how that means I'm helping out the planet more than a meat eater.
You may have encountered a vegetarian or two. Bet you that at least one of them ate fish, or chicken, or Harribo. Or maybe they were quite strict about food but didn't apply their life style to products outside of food and drink. Perhaps they were really good about everything you could think of, but gave their reasons for being so thorough in line with “animals are too cute to kill”.
Having lived on a farm, where the wethers were carted off to the abattoir every Autumn, I can happily say that I don't have a problem with animals being humanely slaughtered, after leading a happy and healthy life, and being turned into steak and sausages. My meat eating clan will testify that Millsteads lamb is rather tasty. However, I choose not to eat or drink, consume or use anything that contains or has been made using products from a dead animal. Inevitably, I am frequently asked why I go to such lengths to adhere to strict vegetarian criteria.
1. All or nothing
Being 'vegetarian' but supporting products or companies that use animal products, which require the animal to be killed or harmed, is like being an animal cruelty protester who buys battery farmed eggs. You either have to embrace it fully or not at all. I've found, after four and a half years of being veggie, that once you discover something contains dead animal products, it becomes a lot less appealing.
The following all contain dead animal products:
Chocolate can contain products from animal bones, such as whey protein or uses non-veggie gelling agents
Coke Cola and other drinks manufactured by Coke have fish products in them
Ice-cream can be made using animal products, which helps it to set
Many crisps use flavourings and emulsifiers derived from dead animals
Cheese is made with rennet, which is frequently sourced from the inside of calf's stomachs
Spreads, juices, smoothies, margarine and cereals often promote containing Omega 3, from fish when there are alternative sources, such as sunflower seeds
Candles, shampoo, deodorant, toothpaste, washing up liquid, mascara, lipstick, lubricant: all these and almost all household products and cosmetics contain products from dead animals
Maybe it's just me, but it's not natural to be using all that shit to clean yourself and your house. All this wouldn't be such a problem if the animals could be sourced. The way things are, there's no way to find out whether the calf that made your cheese was completely dead before it's stomach was cut out, or if there were dolphins killed and reefs destroyed when the fish were netted to go into olive spread.
I do not endorse animal cruelty and therefore, refuse to support companies that do not ethically source the animal products they use to make food, drink, cosmetics or cleaning products.
2. Economy
Economically, this country and the world in general, is mismanaged when it comes to agriculture. For a start, half of the meat eaten in the UK is shipped in from countries where it's cheaper, although ultimately lower quality, and where farmers to not have to adhere to the same standards of slaughter or production. There are a ridiculous amount of animals in the world; bred to be eaten. They serve no purpose other than to add carbon dioxide and methane to our atmosphere, then be sold as almost worthless and canned, shipped off to wherever has the demand.
Why not farm fewer animals, which would then increase their worth, reduce their contribution to global warming, or whatever is going on with the weather, and ultimately, provide much better quality meat to the consumer. And a lot of the blame is on the consumer, for being willing to buy vast quantities of shit 'meat'. It's unhealthy to eat meat every day, especially meat from malnourished, over farmed livestock that doesn't contain half the protein and iron it's meant to.
More people should eat more plants. As plants give out oxygen and take in carbon dioxide, you would think this would be a fairly simple solution to the jumbled up gases in the atmosphere, yet nothing get's done about it. Well, hi. I'm not going to buy any of your shite meat products, or anything that has animal products that might come from your animals in it, until you sort it out, mate.
3. Environment
Tree hugging is all very well. Marching might be great. However, actively refusing to give money to the poor bastards that think up all the stuff that meat and products from meat, or animal carcasses, goes into will actually make a difference. Environment is essential to survival and the way things are going, it looks like humanity might be checking out early if the majority of mankind refuse to acknowledge the fact that pumping fumes into the air, toxins into the rivers and ploughing through rainforests like there is no tomorrow, is going to continue wrecking the environment.
Regardless of vegetarianism, I despise fast food. It's greasy, smelly, packed with saturated fat and generally the most foul and unhealthy food on the planet. Maybe you fast food eaters are not aware that the chains you frequent, or even just 'treat' yourself to, buy beef from South America, where the cows are farmed by 'slash and burn' farmers. The deal is, that a farmer cuts down a load of rainforest and burns it, leaving a nice big patch of fertile soil, full of nutrients from the rainforest. He gets his cows to munch on the ex-forest floor for a while, but as the rainforest isn't there any more to hold the topsoil in place with tree roots, and no leaves to drop and create mulch and compost, the 'rain' forest rains wash away the soil and it becomes bad land. So the farmer cuts down the next bit of forest and so on and so on. The long and the short of it is, the rainforest disappears in the blink of an eye and the world's delicate balance of gases in the atmosphere goes haywire, resulting in mental weather, melting ice caps and eventually a loss of land from rising sea levels.
What a fucking joke. US President going blah blah blah about the 'terrible' hurricanes, droughts, floods, tsunamis and general fucked up everything. Yet the USA still refuses to comply with international standards of emissions. They are too wrapped up in their own interests, which in the end will result in them burning first. Same to you China. Eat that.
Or rather, don't.
4. Animal Cruelty
I have to admit that recently the telly has been doing it's been trying to persuade consumers to think about where their food has come from. Jamie Oliver's high profile battle against battery farming chickens, C4's 'Kill it, skin it, wear it' about cruelty free fur and that one where the posh guy eats carrion or something, River Cottage maybe? All have encouraged the average consumer to consider whether there has been a particularly unfair amount of suffering behind their food and promote organic and free range meat and eggs.
But really, these programmes target the 'average' middle class consumer who is already aware and kind of doing their bit for animal welfare. The real offenders are the ones who eat at KFC and buy economy battery farmed eggs when they could use less a week and buy free range ones. By British law, an animal must be dead before being 'processed' but that doesn't mean that law is abided by, or applicable considering where most meat consumed in the UK is farmed and processed. KFC put chickens that are still alive in boiling water to burn off their feathers, cows are often not completely dead and the lives of many animals, especially on battery farms, is not comparable to anything a human would call 'life'.
It is unnecessary and inhumane to treat animals, who can feel pain just like you or I, the way that so many companies do. This has to stop. Animals should be respected and anyone who eats meat or products derived from the animals that are abused does not respect themselves.
5. Meat is disgusting
I hate the taste, the smell and how it looks. So that's me sorted.
All the time, my vegetarian lifestyle expands to another aspect of my day to day life. Since I first became vegetarian I have learnt more about the way food is produced and what is and isn't vegetarian. Gradually, I have become more strict and do not consume or buy products that are not marked as vegetarian or vegan. It takes time to start eating new food, drink and buying different products. I love vegetarian and vegan stuff, so to leave today on a slighter happier note, take a look at the uh-mazing gear below which is cruelty free,
Supermarket own brand are clearly labelled veggie or not
Superdrug marks which own brand products are vegan, for example their hair gel
The Co-op supermarket is excellent at making sure it's own brand food, drink, alcohol and household products (basically all things under the Co-op label) is Fairtrade, vegetarian and/or vegan, approved independently to not be tested on animals and everything is clearly labelled as such. Just, shop at Co-op!
At the end of the day, this article has not been aiming to convert any reader to living a vegetarian lifestyle. I simply hope that reading this will have explained the reasons that I choose not to eat products derived from dead animals.
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