Going Vegan: Why I Am & So Should You.

Why We Eat Meats

Being raised in the average American household, I always ate the SAD diet: the Standard American Diet. This diet includes anything you can afford: meat, cheese, candy, processed foods, white grains, fast food, whatever your heart desires. It wasn’t until recently I began thinking about going vegan.

A little over a year ago, I came across a book called ‘The Abs Diet’ by David Zinczenko. Reading this book was the first time I ever made a connection with the things we eat and our quality of life. Then, I bought a book called ‘The Daniel Plan’ by Pastor Warren and got hooked.

Since then, I’ve been studying nutrition like never before and realizing that we don’t have to eat whatever is in front of us. We have the ability to choose our meals and our health.

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American culture has been conditioned to eat meat and view eating meat as a tradition. That’s why every barbecue and celebration has meat on the menu. From hotdogs to baked ribs and roasted chicken, meat seems to be a part of a normal diet.

American culture is surrounded by eating meat

But once upon a time, only the rich and wealthy ate meat. Meat wasn’t something everyone could afford and was used as a form of celebration. As you know, Americans today can now afford to eat meat at alarming rates – every single day if they wanted to. It’s served in fast food joints, restaurants, and even schools.

For such a long time, the meat industry has paid a lot of money to market meat and dairy to us in a way that makes us believe it’s good for us. School systems teach about protein as if meat is the only source of it.

Companies like McDonald’s target children and condition them to be life-long customers. And honestly, if you’re a McDonald’s customer and you don’t purchase meat, then what are you ordering? Most of their famous foods include burgers, fish, nuggets, and bacon.

I’m not picking on McDonald’s because every other restaurant has jumped on the beef, chicken, and pork train. There’s Red Robin’s, Burger King, Arby’s, Chick-fil-a, Wendy’s, Taco Bell, Little Caeser’s, Subway. I mean think about it: McDonald’s owns over 36,000 stores worldwide & Subway has over 40,000 stores. How many animals are being slaughtered each day just to keep up with the demand for meat in the food industry?

Meats Make Us Sick

Here’s something these companies didn’t tell us while they were marketing to our children: meat causes illnesses and diseases to human beings. Heart disease is the number one killer in the United States and it’s completely avoidable. Meats clogged arteries and put people at risks for high blood pressure, heart disease, and stroke. [1]

As if heart disease wasn’t enough, 80% of all antibiotics in the world is given directly to livestock. [2] The reason antibiotics are so heavily used by the meat industry is because the animals are is such horrible, filthy living conditions that they would become infected and die without them. One of the strange side effects of these antibiotics and steroids are bigger cattle. This means more profit for the company.

But since you are what you eat, we digest these very same medicines when we eat these animals. By consuming these antibiotics, people are becoming immune to them. This means illnesses that used to be treatable, arent. A woman in Nevada contracted a bug that was resistant to 26 different antibiotics. [14]

Another threat caused by factory farming and eating a large quantity of meat are diseases. One of these diseases is E. Coli which comes from the intestines of an infected cattle. E. Coli is responsible for many deaths and illnesses dating back over 20 years ago. [3]

A study linked meat consumptions with the increase of the following diseases:

cancer;
heart disease;
stroke;
diabetes;
infections;
kidney disease;
liver disease;
and lung disease. [4]

There’s No Benefits Of Dairy Products

Contrary to popular belief, there are no benefits to dairy products. To me, it doesn’t even make sense that people would be drinking cow’s milk. A mother cat produces milk for her kittens and a mommy dog for her puppy’s. This is the same for rats, humans, and pigs. So why would we consume something that was meant to be drunk by calves?

In fact, dairy products are linked to multiple health issues such as heart disease, Diabetes, osteoporosis, prostate, ovarian, and breast cancer. [5] That’s because pregnant cows release hormones such as estrogen that can cause the breast of men to get bigger and women to go infertile.

If you’re interested, here’s a 5-minute video that explains the harsh reality of the dairy industry. This video caused many people to stop using dairy products and inspired restaurants to do the same. Take a look:

Rainforest

The Amazon Rainforest is being cleared out in record timing. Every hour 4,500 acre’s of rainforest is depleted killing multiple species of animals. [7] The number one cause of this is animal agriculture, accounting for 80% of it. [6]. With cattle production at an all-time high, more land is needed to grow grain for all these cows.

Global Warming & Climate Change

Most people love to talk about how automobiles are so bad for the atmosphere. However, animal agriculture releases more greenhouse gases than all transportation exhaust combined. [8]

Our Water Supply

Manure lagoons are poisoning water supply by accidental leakages. Because of the antibiotics in the animals’ digestive tract, fish has been found with deformities. 17 states have had their groundwater contaminated. Plus, 35,000 miles of rivers in 22 different states have been contaminated from animal waste runoff. [9]

There are many dead zones in the ocean due to contamination by animal waste. These dead zones killed millions of fish and left the water uninhabitable

contaminated water

Did you know? Animal agriculture consumes 1/3 of all fresh water in the world. [10, 11] Yep, you read that correctly. While some humans out there don’t have fresh water to drink, all the cattle bred into this world do. Also, the average cow drinks 40 gallons of water each day.

One hamburger requires 660 gallons of water to make. If we really want to make a difference in our environment, the quickest way would be to stop consuming meat and dairy products.

Animal Abuse

As if all the above wasn’t bad enough, the poor animals used in this industry get abused beyond measure. If you watched the video I put in the dairy section of this post, you already know how the mom cows get sexually exploited and have their babies stolen from them.

But as you can imagine, mother cows aren’t the only ones in this industry getting screwed over. When pigs are born, their tail is cut off and testicles ripped out without any anesthesia. They also have their teeth removed. 50% of piglets die from an infection.

Then, they’re put into a huge room without any windows. These animals are completely crammed together. Although pigs can live up to 20-25 years, they’re slaughtered at only 6 months.

The mom pigs are impregnated over and over again to keep this business going. They’re locked up in tiny crates. They cannot move or stand up. At times, they crush their young.

Pigs and cows are stunned by a bolt gun to the head that destroys half of the brain upon impact. Then, they hang them upside down and slit their throats. There are many other ways to killed pigs, too. Sometimes they’re thrown in scalding hot water alive or put into a gas chamber where they scream and beg for their lives for up to 20 seconds.

Chickens have it horrible, too. When baby chicks are born, they’re sorted. All male chicks (useless to this industry) are ground up alive or thrown in the garbage to die of starvation. The female chicks are saved to produce eggs.

Normally, a chicken can only produce an egg 12 times a year. Their eggs are their menstrual cycle. However, the workers have made it possible to have a chicken lay 500 eggs per year. Creating an egg takes a lot of nutrients, so many of the chickens develop osteoporosis.

Once the chicken is at the end of her egg laying cycle, she is starved for up to 15 days. This causes the chicken to go into shock and lay many eggs at one time. Workers may repeat this to the same chicken for two more times until she is slaughtered.

Other chickens that are not used to produce eggs are kept in extremely cramped conditions. Many develop diseases, infections, and cannot walk. If you’re interested, here’s a video covering the egg industry:

Poverty & Malnutrition

“Hunger is caused by poverty and inequality, not scarcity. For the past two decades, the rate of global food production has increased faster than the rate of global population growth.”

–

Every ten second, a child dies from starvation. [12] But you know what’s even crazier? 60% of all agricultural land is used to raise crops for cattle. [13] Yes, that’s correct. 60% of all food that is grown is fed directly to cattle in order to eventually sell their flesh and meat for a profit. Can you imagine the difference that could be made in the world if these foods were fed directly to suffering humans?

Why Is No One Talking About This?

The harsh reality is these huge meat companies are rich and backed by the US government. They have a lot of influence and power. People who have spoken out about this industry have found themselves in deep trouble.

However, more and more people are learning about the harmful effects and the truth about this heart-breaking industry. There is no good reason to eat meat and dairy products. It’s proven to cause all sorts of illnesses and disease. Continuing to eat it because ‘it tastes good’ is like continuing to smoke because ‘it feels good.’

You will continue to see a large about of advertisements pushing cheesy pizzas, eggs, and milk because the industry doesn’t want to lose its customers. But what’s more important? Their wallet sizes or our nation’s and children’s health.

Did you know? The USDA warns the egg industry that labeling eggs as nutritious or safe is against the law. You know why? Because they aren’t. [15] They’re extremely high in cholesterol and can cause heart disease.

Check out the documentary Cowspiracy. This movie fully covered all of what I said, but in extreme detail. You’ll hear from many M.D.s & former cattle ranchers. These people spill all the beans on this industry. Plus, you’ll see how this man was attacked for pursuing this documentary. You can watch it for free by clicking here.

What To Eat Instead

Sales in the dairy industry plummeted about $1.1 billion dollars in 2018 compared to the previous year. [15] This is a good thing y’all! It shows that every dollar we spend is a vote on what stays on the shelf.

Lucky for us, there are many alternatives out there. Many people assume a plant-based diet is restrictive. There are people who only drink cow’s milk, but there’s oat, soy, almond, hazelnut, cashew milk, and so much more. All of these come in varieties of flavors and tastes! (The ones listed below are 6 packs.)

When I became vegan, I was shocked at how many wonderful vegan recipes there are. For example, have you ever heard of a Beyond Burger? Yeah, neither did I. These burgers are receiving a lot of hype from communities because the tastes and textures are just like a normal burger, yet it’s all plant-based.

Plus, plant-based diets can reverse the onset of many diseases. Just watch this video by Dr. Neal Bernard explaining how it all breaks down and affects the body.

You can find many vegan recipes on Pinterest that will blow your mind! Also, type into Google ‘vegan restaurants near me’ to pull up a bunch of results.

If you can find a Wholefoods or something similar, there are hundreds of alternatives to dairy products. There’s vegan cheese, butter, and the like. Why cause animal suffering when you can eat the same products without it?

More plant-based alternatives are popping up in the market because it’s what consumers want. There’s another company called Morning Star that makes really great vegan ‘meat’ products.

Making The Switch & Going Vegan

Switching from meat to plant-based has been made simple. There are so many alternatives. However, there’s yet another issue. Families and friends who are not vegan and do not want to be vegan may try to persuade you to eat meat. And although I know you’re strong enough to say no, it sucks feeling like an outcast.

That’s why it’s important for you to find some sort of community of vegans that share your same point of views on meat. There are many vegan Facebook groups you can join as well as Reddit forums. You’re not alone. As a matter of fact, the number of vegans in the United States jumped up by 600% from 2014-2017 (from 1% to 6%). [16]

I never thought to give up meat. As a matter of fact, I never thought much about eating it. It was considered normal and necessary. But when you really stop and think about the damage being done to communities and the world, the evidence is overwhelming. I’m convinced, are you? It’s time to go green.

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Why I'm going vegan - & so should you. Find out why you should stay away from animal and dairy products.

Ariel Shanelle

Wealth | Fitness