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New vegetarian
- Thread starter haleyvan
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there is nothing wrong with eating meat, so stop ganging up on the omnivores. i believe a certain slice of the population will restrict (i.e. diet, weight) because that's how they're made up;however, try to keep the proselytizing to a minimum. 
Hello to all, I have been a vegetarian for about 6 months. As for the Eggs n' Milk I usually buy the eggs that say 'they can run around freely' (I forgot the As for the Eggs n' Milk I usually buy the eggs that say 'they can run around freely' (I forgot the actual name). For the milk I either buy the soy milk Or buy the ones when they can have water and grain freely. Cheese, I would just go organic cheese.
I agree, also you can't plant a cow in the ground and hope it will 're-grow'.it is not cruel to eat plants because they do not have a central nervous system.
but you can get two cows and they might re-grow
I live in a place where there are a lot of farms. One of them is combined with an ice cream store. When I see the (milk) cows at these various farms, they don't have tumors on them, they're not lame, and they look fine. The farms I see have open areas for the cows to roam. Probably 1/1000 farms abuse their animals and peta just propagates crap for people to believe.
Why would it make sense to starve a milking cow so it looses all its body mass and then sell the scrawny thing to the slaughterhouse? Wouldn't they want them to actually have meat on them...
there is nothing wrong with eating meat, so stop ganging up on the omnivores. i believe a certain slice of the population will restrict (i.e. diet, weight) because that's how they're made up;however, try to keep the proselytizing to a minimum.
no one is trying to convert anyone. don't be so defensive.
no one is trying to convert anyone. don't be so defensive.
Don't worry it's his omnivorian guilty leaking out.
You're getting towards the it's natural to eat meat point of view, which is understandable. But the difference is that we have evolved empathy and a sense of self. Sure, we wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for eating meat, but I imagine early homo sapiens was quite different from today's human due to upbringing and social changes. There weren't such things as vegetarians 50or 60 years ago, but the rise of the media, revolution of communication and social change means people have the means to question and be opposed to the killing of animals, and survive happily without meat - at least in the developed world.
Yes, other animals kill, but if you want to live how we're 'supposed to', you'd be on the plains of Africa catching your own food.
Animals attack animals in the wild - but you have the knowledge and empathic ability to know that whatever you're killing doesn't want to be killed and feels fear and pain. Lions work through instinct - yet we have more than that. Yet, at the same time are animals like anything else and have the responsibility with the knowledge we have to treat other organisms well.
PETA : People for Eating Tasty Animals
As sad as that movie is, it is what supports out way of life. There's many reasons why technology and society has rapidly expanded since the days of the caveman and controlling food output is one of those reasons.
However, I agree in a perfect society I would only eat free range animals as humans are omnivores and I believe the enzymes in meat are beneficial for health. This though, is not worth the cost of progress of society in my view.
I think instead of focusing on the well being of chickens, we should focus on child labor in certain parts of the world, human trafficking for sex, and even slavery first.
Heck, one could get so bent out of shape defending any issue. I find it funny that probably most of the so called environmentalists that come to my campus believe in the cause but change their lifestyle. They most likely reap the benefits of electricity via coal, oil what have you as well as the convenience of driving their cars around since let's face it, living in a city can be VERY difficult if you dont have a car and you need to commute 30 miles a day.
I applaud those who do stop eating animals for the basis of fair treatment but I do not think most of people that do so realize it has had a positive impact on society overall.
Edit: although some vegetarians know how to properly balance their diet to get the essential nutrients and the like, I doubt most do in its entirety and thus aren't having a healthy diet overall
As sad as that movie is, it is what supports out way of life. There's many reasons why technology and society has rapidly expanded since the days of the caveman and controlling food output is one of those reasons.
However, I agree in a perfect society I would only eat free range animals as humans are omnivores and I believe the enzymes in meat are beneficial for health. This though, is not worth the cost of progress of society in my view.
I think instead of focusing on the well being of chickens, we should focus on child labor in certain parts of the world, human trafficking for sex, and even slavery first.
Heck, one could get so bent out of shape defending any issue. I find it funny that probably most of the so called environmentalists that come to my campus believe in the cause but change their lifestyle. They most likely reap the benefits of electricity via coal, oil what have you as well as the convenience of driving their cars around since let's face it, living in a city can be VERY difficult if you dont have a car and you need to commute 30 miles a day.
I applaud those who do stop eating animals for the basis of fair treatment but I do not think most of people that do so realize it has had a positive impact on society overall.
Edit: although some vegetarians know how to properly balance their diet to get the essential nutrients and the like, I doubt most do in its entirety and thus aren't having a healthy diet overall
Aren't having a healthy diet overall, compared to what?
They'd be hard-pressed to do worse than the average American diet.
A quick look around any public place shows that the majority of all people aren't having a healthy diet.
The rest of what you said is silly, so I'll just jump in and say I commute 28 miles roundtrip by bike each day, and am vegan too. Tee hee!
Now quit being silly and eat your greens.
you know what i mean.
a healthy diet does include dairy products, meat, cheeses, etc. This all from the food pyramid and any other recommended diet lol. Plus protein is found in milk and meats predominantly too.
my point is most vegetarians probably don't get the required amt of proteins, calcium and other things that come from animal products.
yes the average american diet is bad because what, people eat way too much fat and sugars and dont exercise. however that wasn't my point.
well you got to admit the average person does not ride their bike 28 miles a day
I have been a veggie head for about 13 years now. about 2 years ago I started eating fish again (I have to have Sushi, and ma's tuna casserole is awesome) The thing to really look out for is the nutrition side of it. All but 1 vegen I know is very unhealthy. It can be hard to figure out what your body needs (everyone is different). When cutting out meat it's all to easy to eat to much potatos, rice and pastas, they fill you up, but they are just carb bombs. There are a lot of great cook books dealing with soy and the wonderful things you can do with it.
Here is a fun plan to get into it.
Go and eat out at restaurants that have a good selection on vegen/veggie meals, and well kind of reverse engineer them.
It they way I was able to figure out what I needed and what I could create.
good luck to you.
Here is a fun plan to get into it.
Go and eat out at restaurants that have a good selection on vegen/veggie meals, and well kind of reverse engineer them.
It they way I was able to figure out what I needed and what I could create.
good luck to you.
I understand your point, but having actually lived on a vegan diet, the only possible way you can make this point is if you have no knowledge of how most vegetarians and vegans eat.
Next time you're in the grocery store, please check out these things that vegans/vegetarians can add to "just the vegetables" that they eat:
Don't forget that many vegetarians consume dairy. Just because they don't eat the cow doesn't mean milk, cheese, etc is out of their diet.
In the dairy case, look for Silk or Planet8 brand soy milk. Look at the amount of calcium, protien, and fat per serving. Check out what other vitamins and minerals that it's fortified with. The lack of dairy in a vegan diet hardly stops them from getting everything that they need.
Then track down tofu and do the same label check. Vegans can make pretty much anything out of tofu. Great source of protein and other nutrients. Same goes for tempeh, another product vegans can turn into just about anything they want.
Take a trip over to the frozen foods area. Look for the breakfast area (that's usually where grocers keep their meatless products). Check out the selection of meatless hamburger patties, chicken patties, chicken nuggets, ribs, corndogs, hotdogs, polish sausages. Again, check the labels for the protien and other nutrients that they're getting.
If vegans/vegetarians just grazed in their yards at meal times, then yes -- they probably wouldn't get enough protein/calcium/etc. But that's some silly, uninformed view of them.
THanks for writing that, I'm having a much harder time believing the people advancing those silly arguments are real, so I'm therefore having a hard time responding. I'd just like to add that you can get a huge variety of nutrient and essential vitamins and proteins from fruits, veggies, nuts, seeds, and beans. It's just a mental hurdle some people have to overcome in order to realize that the side-order with their meal can be made into a meal of its own.
Why is this such an endemic argument in the US? I don't understand the appeal - surely even the most simple minds can see the two aren't mutually exclusive.
At the beginning of your post you said two cows, I think you ment a bull and a cow. well two cows are 2 females.but you can get two cows and they might re-grow
I live in a place where there are a lot of farms. One of them is combined with an ice cream store. When I see the (milk) cows at these various farms, they don't have tumors on them, they're not lame, and they look fine. The farms I see have open areas for the cows to roam. Probably 1/1000 farms abuse their animals and peta just propagates crap for people to believe.
Why would it make sense to starve a milking cow so it looses all its body mass and then sell the scrawny thing to the slaughterhouse? Wouldn't they want them to actually have meat on them...
At the beginning of your post you said two cows, I think you ment a bull and a cow. well two cows are 2 females.
I call bullcow on the whole operation!
ok ok i guess if its not in the us it doesnt really matter. but those chickens that has to stop cuz they are in the us and apparently are more valued than the mistreatment and abuse of people from other countries..........
ALSO i would imagine that animal abuse is probably even the same or more extreme in countries outside the us. just a hunch
to those that corrected me on vegetarianism. thanks for the info. i just know if i were to stop eating meat and dairy products, i would have a hard time to find adequate substitutes without doing alot of research before hand
Hmm... yeah it seems like more people jump on the vegan bandwagon just to be fashionable rather than to be more health-oriented and what not. I always am cautious and suspicious of stuff that resembles something from the handbook of the New Age movements.
Honestly the only argument for vegetarianism and veganism that holds water in my head is that veggies have a much smaller energy footprint. Much smaller. Earth can support a lot more vegans than it can omnivores.
All these people going on about animal treatment being hte reason for being vegetarian or vegan --- let me give you some information: if you are against the way animals are treated by corporate meat packers, then fine, you are boycotting these corporate meat packers, but there is still no rationale for you not eating the deer stew that your hermit friend makes off the deer he hunts, or the free range eggs, or if you went to a third world country, the meat there.
As far as what the OP last asked, vegan cheese bears very little resemblance to real cheese. You know when some of the packages are advertising the fact that their brand "really melts!!", that it's not going to be like cheese.
I used to work in a pretty hardcore vegan grocery store, and I can tell you that as far as a healthy vegan diet goes, you are generally better off just forgetting all the old animal-product-laden foods that you used to eat. Don't try to imitate them because it will only end up not being what you expected. Instead, learn to make new food that is more suited to the ingredients you are using. Also before you make the leap, make sure you've tried some of the big stuff that vegans use - Tofu and Seitan are big in the vegan world (one of my main reasons for not trying to be vegan is that seitan and other heavy duty wheat based products makes me sick).
Personally, I eat meat and fish occasionally, and by occassionally, I mean maybe 2 or 3 servings a week. I don't believe that it is necessary to make hard rules (I'll never eat meat !!) to have an effect on the world. Just because I eat meat once in a while, doesn't mean that, by reducing my meat intake, I'm not greatly reducing the pressure I put on our planet, and also not supporting hte corporate meat packer folks. But if I'm stuck in situation where I would be miserable if I didn't go to mcDonalds (once a year), or if I'm at abaseball game and I really want to have the experience and eat a hot dog, or if my candy at the movies has gluten in it, I'm not gonna waste a great deal of energy to avoid that stuff. I think I make as much effort as a person can without letting my diet take over my life.
All these people going on about animal treatment being hte reason for being vegetarian or vegan --- let me give you some information: if you are against the way animals are treated by corporate meat packers, then fine, you are boycotting these corporate meat packers, but there is still no rationale for you not eating the deer stew that your hermit friend makes off the deer he hunts, or the free range eggs, or if you went to a third world country, the meat there.
As far as what the OP last asked, vegan cheese bears very little resemblance to real cheese. You know when some of the packages are advertising the fact that their brand "really melts!!", that it's not going to be like cheese.
I used to work in a pretty hardcore vegan grocery store, and I can tell you that as far as a healthy vegan diet goes, you are generally better off just forgetting all the old animal-product-laden foods that you used to eat. Don't try to imitate them because it will only end up not being what you expected. Instead, learn to make new food that is more suited to the ingredients you are using. Also before you make the leap, make sure you've tried some of the big stuff that vegans use - Tofu and Seitan are big in the vegan world (one of my main reasons for not trying to be vegan is that seitan and other heavy duty wheat based products makes me sick).
Personally, I eat meat and fish occasionally, and by occassionally, I mean maybe 2 or 3 servings a week. I don't believe that it is necessary to make hard rules (I'll never eat meat !!) to have an effect on the world. Just because I eat meat once in a while, doesn't mean that, by reducing my meat intake, I'm not greatly reducing the pressure I put on our planet, and also not supporting hte corporate meat packer folks. But if I'm stuck in situation where I would be miserable if I didn't go to mcDonalds (once a year), or if I'm at abaseball game and I really want to have the experience and eat a hot dog, or if my candy at the movies has gluten in it, I'm not gonna waste a great deal of energy to avoid that stuff. I think I make as much effort as a person can without letting my diet take over my life.
It's a far smaller learning curve than you'd think. I thought I'd struggle when I took up vegetarianism (I was a big meat lover) but it turned out really simple - the work has already been done for you. There's a million and one vegetarian recipe websites and books out there. The time it has taken for you to post in this thread would be sufficient for you to find a wide range of vegetarian recipes (more than you'll ever get through). Shopping is also exactly the same - everything's available from the supermarket.
Thanks for your response, maxterpiece. You seem to be one of the more level-headed omnivores around here and I appreciate how you didn't end your post with something along the lines of:
macenforcer said:
With respect to your second paragraph, I disagree, but I see how you'd come to that conclusion. I'm vegetarian for several reasons, one of them being a protest against the industry.
I have no problem with someone going out and hunting a moose for the winter. Nor do I have a problem with any non-industry-based meats and meat products. The reason I choose to stay away from those meats is that I feel it would be easier and more effective for me to cut meat out of my diet altogether than it would be to do a background check on every piece of meat I ever eat and make sure that it lived a good life. It's just being practical, as far as I'm concerned.