A vegan lifestyle, from the outside, is viewed in many different ways. For some people, vegans are seen in a bad light, as annoying and foolish. Others see vegans as the health freaks, always the ones walking around with their protein shakes and avocado toast. Then some stereotype vegans as the pierced and tattooed hippies. There are even many differing opinions on what constitutes a vegan. According to Miriam-Webster, a vegan can be defined as 'a strict vegetarian who consumes no food that comes from animals and abstains from using animal products.' With that definition, a vegan diet not only excludes eggs, milk, and meat but also honey, gelatin, leather, wool, and many other hidden animal products. This type of lifestyle can seem impossible or even ridiculous to many, but when examining the various benefits, the costs of switching over seem minuscule. A vegan lifestyle is beneficial for one’s health, the animals, and the environment all at the same time.
A major reason why people will go vegan and should go vegan is for ethical reasons. Every year, billions of animals are cruelly slaughtered for consumption, and although many believe free-range farms are a good alternative, they in reality are not much better. Meat production is the easiest to identify as being cruel. Almost everyone knows that an animal has to be slaughtered to produce meat. However, it is the other products such as eggs, milk, gelatin, and leather that are perhaps even more cruel. It can be thought that milking a cow is completely harmless and even beneficial to the cow, however, that assumption has many faults to it. Female cows are artificially inseminated and then kept in cramped cages where they can’t even turn around to save space, then once the calf is born, it is immediately forced away from the mother so that all of the milk can be obtained for human use. This is very emotionally scarring for both mother and calf since it is the natural motherly instinct to want to be with their offspring from birth. Instead, the calves are split up by gender to face some other fate. If the calf is male, it will face immediate slaughter to produce veal and other meat products. If it is female, it will go through the same process as its mother, forced to become impregnated over and over until it’s exhausted and then, too, slaughtered for human consumption. In this way, the dairy industry contributes to the meat industry cycle, and so simply going vegetarian is not enough.
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The dairy industry is just one of the many industries that exploit animals in such a way. Eggs and poultry are just as disgusting. Hens are raised in spaces so tight that they are often irritated and can resort to cannibalism, trampling other hens to death and killing each other. They live filthy lives, all while growing at unnaturally rapid rates to increase production. For these animals, who are used to being able to spread their wings and roam freely, these conditions drive them to insanity. Free range is thought to be a solution to this problem, but the qualifications for raising animals in a free-range environment are very loose, meaning that oftentimes, they are still raised in cramped conditions anyway. And in the end, the animals are still being killed well before their natural life span.
If the ethical reasons aren’t good enough to adopt a vegan lifestyle, then perhaps the environment should be considered. Farm factories are one of the leading causes of greenhouse gases. The methane released from these factories is at least 70 times more damaging per ton to the earth’s atmosphere than CO2 is. Simply putting farm factories out of operation would cut greenhouse gas emissions by roughly 25%. The factories also dump all animal waste into large pits called lagoons that are full of extremely toxic chemicals. If these lagoons were ever to flood, all of those chemicals would flow into crops and water sources, contaminating them. This is a risk that households and lands near farm factories have to face. Sometimes the waste is liquified and then sprayed onto crops as well, contaminating crops with animal feces. Although regulations have been created to stop these actions from happening, farm factories are known to work their way around them whenever possible. It doesn’t help that the government condones the meat and dairy industry.
There is a plethora of resources that go into farm factoring as well. A quarter-pound hamburger requires 6.7 pounds of grain and feed, 52.8 gallons of water, and 1,036 BTUs of fossil fuel energy (enough to power a microwave for 18 minutes). If animal products were cut from the equation, humans would be left with a lot more resources that could be used to help with world hunger and other issues. Clearcutting is also a major issue as well since animal agriculture requires large amounts of land. Every year, acres upon acres of the Amazon rainforest are cleared for meat production. Not only is that acres of land that could be used for other things, but the Amazon rainforest is an essential source of oxygen for the entire planet. A vegan diet and lifestyle would make a huge impact on reducing carbon footprints and benefiting the environment.
Finally, if the animals and environment aren’t good enough reasons, then one can look to their own lives to find that a vegan lifestyle is extremely healthy as well. There is a common belief that vegans don’t get enough protein and vitamins to live properly, but with modern advances, nothing can be further from the truth. Many Americans these days suffer from an overabundance of protein that comes from eating meat products at almost every meal, which leads to obesity, cholesterol, and heart problems, among other health issues. Proteins can easily be obtained from plant sources such as soy, beans, and leafy greens to list a few. B12 is an essential vitamin that used to be found on plants, but after pesticides and intense cleaning processes, fruits and vegetables no longer contain the vitamin. Supplements, however, are easily obtained and can ensure that vegans can live full, healthy lives.
Vegans are much more likely to get the required amount of micronutrients needed to properly function. Fruits and vegetables contain fewer calories as well, which means that a vegan can eat much more food and gain less weight. In addition, our stomachs are better handled to digest plant products, and when compared, the human body is much more similar to that of an herbivore than to a carnivore. And with the convenience of modern technology, we no longer need to hunt for our food, with grocery stores everywhere. These days, you can eat plant products raw, but meat must be prepared and cooked first, otherwise it poses a risk of food poisoning, salmonella, or other problems. This proves that it is much more natural to eat and live a vegan lifestyle than it is to consume animal products.
The benefits of a vegan lifestyle are very clear. Not only can it positively affect one’s health, but it also helps fight animal cruelty and climate change. With these many benefits, a vegan lifestyle should be seen in a more positive light and integrated more into our cultures. However, the government makes money from the meat industries, and so doesn’t want to promote vegan lifestyles. My challenge is for readers to go against the social norms and instead think more about themselves, the animals, and the environment. One doesn’t even need to go completely vegan to have a positive impact. There are other options such as starting vegetarian, meatless Mondays, or just cutting back on how much meat you eat. Even the smallest drops of water can create the biggest ripples.
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