to talk about veg*nism and show people how much veg*n food they already eat, that it's not strange and maybe blow up some of those big brother myths that are ingrained so very deeply.
Veganism is really only a problem when going out to eat and the truth is, you can almost always make do with side orders or just request something without the meat eggs and dairy with little fuss. I'm a vegan for a variety of reasons.
It disturbs me that Americans have no reverence at all for the animals which give their lives to spend a couple of minutes on a plate. We distort their flesh into amusing shapes, gobble it down in contests of gluttony and throw it away by the thousands of pounds per day like it was so much nothing. Americans think of a slice of beef like a cup of peanuts or a bite of bread but it's not. I knew it was hypocritical to eat animals when I was not willing to kill them myself and yet for many years I did it anyway. I was wrong - it, is wrong. These animals are living beings that know fear and suffering and could know joy or at least contentment but for the way we treat them. They live in pure hell and die in cold terror and brutality. This is a good and factual brochure, no matter how you may feel about PETA.
http://petaliterature.com/ProductImages/p2vsk.pdf I live with these damnable slaughter houses and animal concentration camps all around me.
Mad cow is here, it is very, very here. Do some research on CJD in this country, and realize that you are not safe eating birds either, or pigs.
The taste for animal foods has cost the planet much more than it can bear on a continued basis. One of the best people at explaining this is Howard Lyman, a fourth generation Montana cattle rancher who is now a vegan, or John Robbins. He was the heir to the Baskin-Robbins empire and turned his back on it all to advocate better health for humanity and better management of our planet through diet.
I don't consider it any kind of deprivation to eliminate meat from my life. I'm sure deep-fried candy bars are glorious but they are really bad for me. I'm sure meth is lots of fun. I seldom drink alcohol because while it is very amusing cirrhosis is a stupid way to die. If I really wanted to I could go and buy 500 pounds of wheat and potatoes, take it down to the local food bank, soak it with gasoline and set it on fire. I could do that; but that would make me a real asshole.
When I see a plate of meat I see a child in Brazil who goes to bed hungry because the grains which once sustained her are now too expensive for her family to afford. Those grains are now being fed to livestock so Americans can kill themselves with fine steaks, cheap burgers and chicken "nuggets". I see that child going hungry and I cannot be a part of it.
When I see a plate of meat I see an Earth that cannot continue to indefinitely support the abuse of pollution and denudement inflicted upon it by the animal industries. I see small farmers being pushed out of their livelihoods and off of their lands by big global agribusiness just as they have been in the U.S. in order to feed the wealthy of the world their fillet and froi gras. When I see a plate of meat I see water basins fouled with waste and rain forest clear cut for a few short years of grazing and I cannot be a part of it.
When I see a plate of meat I see my mothers congestive heart failure, diabetes, obesity, heart attack and kidney disease. I see my sisters weight issues and high blood pressure at 38. I see my mother in laws obesity, her hypoglycemia, hyperuricemia, heart disease and breast cancer. I see her husbands gallstones, diverticulitis, partial colon removals and astronomical cholesterol counts. I see my seemingly thin and fit neighbor who had stents put in her arteries last summer because even though she followed the guidelines eating white meat and fish her arteries clogged and threatened her life. Bad genetics you wonder? No. Skinless white chicken flesh has just as much artery clogging cholesterol as sirloin steak. I love climbing and hiking and camping and biking and just enjoying my life. I don't want to spend the next 50 years or so getting fatter, slowed down by an abused heart and circulatory system, full of failing organs that have given up trying to rid my body of the hormone injected, pesticide, toxin and cholesterol laden products of the animal industry. I refuse to kill myself with my fork.
When I see a plate of meat I see pigs, which are more intelligent than dogs BTW, that spend their entire brutal lives in agonizingly small crates never feeling the sun or smelling air not befouled by the excrement of thousands only to be hung up by their back legs and skinned or cut apart alive. I see dairy cows who's male offspring have their heads bashed in, many times right in front of their mothers if no buyer is available for the "useless" calves. I see the feedlot cattle I drive by every day, standing in excrement past their knees. They are so goddammed sad and miserable looking, with open sores that will never heal, void of any kind of care. I see chickens and turkeys that are boiled alive till their eyes explode. All of these things I have seen with my own eyes, and I will not be a part of it.
Quick facts:
Average American cholesterol intake - 350 milligrams
Cholesterol intake of a vegan - 0 milligrams ~ Cholesterol is found in animal products only.
Gallons of water required to produce 1 lb. beef 5,214 gallons
Gallons of water required to produce 1 lb. potatoes 24 gallons
Obesity rate since 1980 - up 16 percent
Meat consumption since 1980 - up 14 percent *up 32 percent from 1960!
Cattle tested for mad cow in the U.S. - 57,000 out of 850,460,000 slaughtered in the last 13 years
Cattle tested for mad cow in France - 66,000 per WEEK
Poultry at your local grocer infected with Campylobacter - 80 percent
Persons who die every day in the US from infected food - 14
US cases of foodborne illness reported each year - 76 MILLION
Primary cause of foodborne illness - feces contamination of meat
Not considered an adulterant by the USDA - feces not immediately visible to the naked eye on meat
I don't harass my mom or give her lectures on the evils of hog production. I do cook her delicious and well balanced vegan meals and give her the recipes. I do print out the occasional short article from very reliable sources showing her how a lower protein consumption will help her kidneys or that weight bearing exercise is much more important for her bones than calcium intake. I show her by example that leaving out animal products can be very easy, nutritionally complete, delicious and very satisfying. As she has moved away from a meat based diet to a more vegetable, grain and fruit based diet her diabetes no longer requires medication, her cholesterol has dropped to 110 and she has begun losing weight at the rate of about 1 to 2 pounds per week. It's hard to argue with results like that.
I find it telling that some meat eaters are so hateful and defensive right away as soon as you just say that you are a vegetarian. Trust me, you don't really have to beat them with celery sticks or tie them down and force them to look at photos of skinned cattle with their guts hanging out for some of them to just go OFF on you. All you have to say is "no thanks, I'm a vegetarian" usually after they have tried four or five times to get you to eat some kind of meat. This happened to my entire family in a Perkins restaurant. Somehow the waitress found it appropriate to evaluate my parenting skills based on the fact that we do not eat dead animals. I blame it on the three factors I already mentioned.
If your sister is being overly demanding I would humbly suggest it is more likely due to a character trait or a lack of maturity, and would probably occur with or without her present dietary habits. In those situations I would recommend that you offer a compromise with her like a good spaghetti or Italian place where she can get a dish with animal free marinara and the rest of you can get what you please as well. Meals together should be enjoyed by all and accommodating to everyone as much as possible, not centered around the inflexible demands of one person.
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