This is a choice that only benefits our bodies, our minds, our souls and our planet. It is an offering to the values of peace, non-violence, compassion and environmental preservation.
Albert Einstein "Nothing will benefit human health and increase chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet."
Approximately 750,000,000 animals and 650,000 tons of fish are slaughtered each year for food in Britain. And in the US alone 10 billion animals (not including fish) are killed each year for food consumption. This is much higher than the total number of people on the planet, yet more than a third of the world goes to bed hungry each night.
In brief, several reasons why vegetarianism can be a great life choice:
One of the main principles in yoga is non-violence. Killing animals for food is not only violence to the animal but harms the environment and creates more hunger in the world.
Albert Schweitzer "The thinking man must oppose all cruel customs no matter how deeply rooted in tradition and surrounded by a halo. When we have a choice, we must avoid bringing torment and injury into the life of another, even the lowliest creature; to do so is to renounce our manhood and shoulder a guilt which nothing justifies."
Humane Farming Association “The average farm animal is characterised by acute deprivation, stress and disease. Hundreds of millions of animals are forced to live in cages or crates barely larger than their own bodies. Unable to groom, stretch their legs, or even turn around, the victims of factory farms often exist in a relentless state of distress.”
Even ‘white meat’ is not harmless. More than 300 million baby male chicks (the total population of humans currently in the USA) are systematically, senselessly and painfully killed every year by the egg industry, because, as males, they are useless at laying eggs.
Gandhi “To my mind, the life of a lamb is no less precious than that of a human being. I should be unwilling to take the life of a lamb for the sake of the human body.”
Food is a major source of the body's chemistry, and what we ingest affects our consciousness, emotions and overall well-being.
Imperial Cancer Research Department at the University of Oxford “Western vegetarians have a lower BMI (by about 1kg/m2) and 25% lower mortality from IHD (coronary artery disease). The association between consumption of red and processed meats and cancer, particularly colorectal cancer, is very consistent.”
Before factory farming took off in the 1960s meat was generally free of antibiotics, added hormones, feed additives, flavour enhancers, age-delaying gases and salt-water solutions. Mad cow disease and the deadliest strain of E. coli — 0157:H7 — did not exist.
Today‘s industrialised process reduces the nutritional value of the meat, stresses the animals, increases the risk of bacterial contamination, pollutes the environment and exposes consumers to a long list of unwanted chemicals. If that‘s not enough, when an animal is about to be killed its body is flooded with stress hormones and other toxins which remain in the animals‘ tissues. You ingest and absorb these.
Each day 40,000 children starve to death and the number of people worldwide who will die as a result of malnutrition this year is around 20 million. Dr George Borgstrom, a specialist on the geography of food, estimates that one third of Africa's nut crop (nutritious and high in protein) ends up in the stomachs of cattle and poultry in Western Europe.
Every day the USA alone produces enough grain to provide every person on earth, yet at least 80% is grown to feed livestock. It takes around 16 pounds of grain to produce just 1 pound of animal flesh. If the USA reduced its meat intake by just 10% 100 million people could be fed.
In 'Diet for a Small Planet' Frances Moore Lappe encourages you to imagine bring served an 8 ounce steak. "Then imagine the room filled with 45-50 people with empty bowls in front of them. For the 'feed cost' of your steak, each of their bowls could be filled with a cup of cooked cereal grains."
Eating meat causes almost 40% more greenhouse-gas emissions than all the cars, trucks, and aeroplanes in the world combined. For each hamburger made from rainforest beef, 75 kg of carbon dioxide is released into the air - the equivalent of driving a car all day long for many days. To support cattle grazing, Central and South America are chopping down rain-forests (home to almost half of all the species in earth, including thousands of medicinal plants). In addition to global warming, more than a thousand species a year and becoming extinct. Chemically based farming methods are also contaminating the water.
A United Nations report entitled Livestock's Long Shadow states that eating meat is:
"one of the ... most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global." It concludes that the meat industry should be a major policy focus when dealing with land degradation, climate change, water and air pollution, water shortage and loss of biodiversity.
It requires 3.5 acres of land to support a meat-centred diet, 1.5 acres to support a vegetarian diet and just a sixth of an acre to support a vegan diet. It takes approx 2500 gallons of water to produce a single pound of meat. It takes approx 4000 gallons to provide a day's amount of food per person on a meat based diet, 1200 on a vegetarian diet, 300 on a vegan diet.
Albert Einstein "Nothing will benefit human health and increase chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet."
Approximately 750,000,000 animals and 650,000 tons of fish are slaughtered each year for food in Britain. And in the US alone 10 billion animals (not including fish) are killed each year for food consumption. This is much higher than the total number of people on the planet, yet more than a third of the world goes to bed hungry each night.
In brief, several reasons why vegetarianism can be a great life choice:
AHIMSA
One of the main principles in yoga is non-violence. Killing animals for food is not only violence to the animal but harms the environment and creates more hunger in the world.
Albert Schweitzer "The thinking man must oppose all cruel customs no matter how deeply rooted in tradition and surrounded by a halo. When we have a choice, we must avoid bringing torment and injury into the life of another, even the lowliest creature; to do so is to renounce our manhood and shoulder a guilt which nothing justifies."
Humane Farming Association “The average farm animal is characterised by acute deprivation, stress and disease. Hundreds of millions of animals are forced to live in cages or crates barely larger than their own bodies. Unable to groom, stretch their legs, or even turn around, the victims of factory farms often exist in a relentless state of distress.”
Even ‘white meat’ is not harmless. More than 300 million baby male chicks (the total population of humans currently in the USA) are systematically, senselessly and painfully killed every year by the egg industry, because, as males, they are useless at laying eggs.
Gandhi “To my mind, the life of a lamb is no less precious than that of a human being. I should be unwilling to take the life of a lamb for the sake of the human body.”
YOUR HEALTH
Imperial Cancer Research Department at the University of Oxford “Western vegetarians have a lower BMI (by about 1kg/m2) and 25% lower mortality from IHD (coronary artery disease). The association between consumption of red and processed meats and cancer, particularly colorectal cancer, is very consistent.”
Before factory farming took off in the 1960s meat was generally free of antibiotics, added hormones, feed additives, flavour enhancers, age-delaying gases and salt-water solutions. Mad cow disease and the deadliest strain of E. coli — 0157:H7 — did not exist.
Today‘s industrialised process reduces the nutritional value of the meat, stresses the animals, increases the risk of bacterial contamination, pollutes the environment and exposes consumers to a long list of unwanted chemicals. If that‘s not enough, when an animal is about to be killed its body is flooded with stress hormones and other toxins which remain in the animals‘ tissues. You ingest and absorb these.
Each day 40,000 children starve to death and the number of people worldwide who will die as a result of malnutrition this year is around 20 million. Dr George Borgstrom, a specialist on the geography of food, estimates that one third of Africa's nut crop (nutritious and high in protein) ends up in the stomachs of cattle and poultry in Western Europe.
LIFE
In 'Diet for a Small Planet' Frances Moore Lappe encourages you to imagine bring served an 8 ounce steak. "Then imagine the room filled with 45-50 people with empty bowls in front of them. For the 'feed cost' of your steak, each of their bowls could be filled with a cup of cooked cereal grains."
EATING UP RESOURCES
A United Nations report entitled Livestock's Long Shadow states that eating meat is:
"one of the ... most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global." It concludes that the meat industry should be a major policy focus when dealing with land degradation, climate change, water and air pollution, water shortage and loss of biodiversity.
It requires 3.5 acres of land to support a meat-centred diet, 1.5 acres to support a vegetarian diet and just a sixth of an acre to support a vegan diet. It takes approx 2500 gallons of water to produce a single pound of meat. It takes approx 4000 gallons to provide a day's amount of food per person on a meat based diet, 1200 on a vegetarian diet, 300 on a vegan diet.
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