The battle of vegetarianism rages on and is leaving a lot of eco-conscience people wondering ‘to be or not to be?’ which is a better solution for the environment and for our personal health? With compelling arguments on both sides it is easy to become confused about this hot environmental topic.
The environmental implications that come from eating meat are fairly obvious. Environmentally the raising and slaughtering of livestock is contributing heavily to greenhouse gas emissions. The crops needed to sustain livestock feed demands are contributing directly to deforestation and loss of habitat for several wildlife species. Even after the animals are slaughtered the meat industry is contributing to greenhouse gases and fossil fuel dependency with the shipping of meat.
There are a lot of questions about the health effects of a meatless diet as opposed to a diet containing meat. There are benefits and drawbacks of a vegetarian diet like any diet and like any diet it is important to measure the good against the bad. A diet without meat can cause serious medical problems due to lack of protein and the b vitamins. Lack of iron is also a concern especially for young women. These are all things to keep in mind if you’re planning to cut meat out of your diet. Some of the things we get from meat are vitally important to our health and we need to find other sources of these things to replace what we will lose once we stop eating meat. It is possible to be healthy without eating meat and in some cases it is healthier to avoid meat and the hormones and chemicals that are often injected into livestock.
Morally the boundaries are hard to define. The meat eating side often argues that death is a way of life and therefore killing animals for food is the natural order of things and that may very well be true. After all we are not the only animals who eat meat and our natural digestion systems are set up for processing meat. However, because of the age of mass marketing humans have taken a natural process and turned it into an unnatural and often cruel practice. Without question, the standard of life for livestock animals is brutal and disgusting and something needs to be done to change that.
The choice to become a vegetarian is a personal choice for every individual to make and it is a major life style choice. It’s not something that anyone else can decide for you. Being a vegetarian is difficult, but it can also be very rewarding and beneficial to the environment. Whether it is natural or not is still up for debate, but it is clear that the meat industry is out of control and needs to be monitored more carefully by society. Animal cruelty will never be natural so if you do eat meat, buy it locally and make sure you know where it’s coming from. You can also try cutting down on the meat in your diet to reduce the demand and the argument from some farmers that inhumane practices are necessary to keep up with growing demand.
http://holistic-nutrition.suite101.com/article.cfm/disadvantages_of_going_veg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_vegetarianism
