What do you eat?! This is the most common question after someone finds out I am vegan for the first time. Do you survive on tofu and lawn clippings?
I realize that this question comes from the feeling most people have that a vegan diet is some restrictive and/or temporary thing. They see it as a sacrifice that I am making and constantly suffering for. Well I am here to tell you that it is a lifestyle and a very liberating one at that! And it is here to stay. My whole paradigm on food has changed in the last year or so. I don’t think in meals of solely meat, eggs, and dairy anymore. There are so many other options out there. I don’t think, “well I used to think a real meal was a center of meat and a side of mashed potatoes and veggies so I need to just make substitutions to recreate a want-to-be real meal.” I don’t crave meat or dairy or eggs. And now that I have gotten rid of the butter, milk, and cheese on top of everything, I can appreciate the rich and varied flavors of spices, herbs, whole grains, and vegetables. Everything is so fresh!
There are a lot of vegetables and grains out there that I hadn’t tried before a year ago. There are combinations I had never imagined. Before becoming a vegan, my diet was pretty small in sphere. Wheat, a few staple vegetables, and a lot of dairy. That is where I was. Now I have a whole lot more color in my food. There is more to life than smothering everything in dairy! My options for eating have actually widened greatly since becoming a vegan. And my health is rewarded for the nutritious variety. There are so many other foods to eat and becoming vegan lets you see past the animal products to all the other options out there. Its a great big world of vegan food!
And yes I do like tofu in many of it various forms. If you didn’t like it, it is probably because whoever prepared it for you didn’t know what they were doing and didn’t care much because cooking meat was really their main job.
I have mentioned the book, Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer a few different places on this blog. It really is a great book. Informative, shocking, well researched, and somehow entertaining (or at least really well written.) It has a great voice. I really grew to like the author while reading and it was informative- even to me who thought I already knew all there was to know about animal treatment. Anyhow….. a friend just finished reading the book and sent me an email of some highlights. These are things she found important or interesting from the book. Read on. And then go get the book and read the whole thing.
“Eating Animals
Cruelty-
not only the willful causing of unnecessary suffering, but the indifference to it.
Depends on an understanding of cruelty, and the ability to choose against it. Or choose to ignore it.
The power brokers of factory farming know that their business model depends on consumers not being able to see what they do.
When we walk around thinking we have a greater right to eat an animal than the animal has a right to live without suffering, it’s corrupting.
The animals have paid the price for our desire to have everything available at all times for very little money.
Isn’t it strange how upset people get about a few dozen baseball players taking growth hormones, when we’re doing what we’re doing to animals and feeding them to our children?
Americans eat 150 times as many chickens as we did 80 years ago.
The highest rates of osteoporosis are seen in countries where people consume the most dairy foods.
Farmed animals in the US produce 130 times as much waste as the human population.
In the world of factory farming, expectations are turned upside down. Veterinarians don’t work toward optimal healrh, but optimal profitability. Drugs are not for curing diseases, but substitutes for destroyed immune systems. Farmers do not aim to produce healthy animals.
Roughly 4.5 million sea animals are killed as bycatch in longline fishing every year, including roughly 3.3 million sharks, 60,000 sea turtles, and 20,000 dolphins and whales.
I’ve left a mental state of constant personal decision making about eating animals for a steady commitment not to.
Less than 1% of animals killed for meat come from family farms.
Other animals have the same five senses that we do. And more and more, we’re learning that they have behavioral, psychological, and emotional needs that evolution created in them just like it did in us.
Today’s social conservatives are yesterday’s extremists on issues like women’s rights, civil rights, children’s rights, and so on.
Millions upon millions of advertising dollars are spent simply to make sure that we see people drinking milk or eating beef in movies.
Once upon a time I was snowboarding with a few friends. I am a pretty low key person without oodles of extra energy and with no desire to participate in most sports other than hiking, snowboarding, scuba diving, and gymnastics when I was younger. I guess I just don’t do team sports. Anyhow, I made a comment on the way home about being tired by midway through the snowboarding day and how at that point snowboarding isn’t as fun anymore. I could be totally happy with a half day and then some relaxation. I commented on my sluggish metabolism stating that “I have a hibernating bear like metabolism.” I was joking really- or at least being my normal over dramatic/ over exaggerating self.
One of my friend’s response was, “that is because you don’t eat meat.” Now I REALLY respect this friend so I didn’t go into all the ways this is a ludicrous statement, but he was serious and I get reactions like this once in a while. (Of course a similar situation has happened more recently leading to the writing of this post but I wouldn’t want that recent person to know he made my blog…. so I go back in time a bit.) I just want to rebut these types of statements in a safe and anonymous forum that I don’t think he will ever read!
1) Eating meat is not optimal for your digestive system and therefore it requires much more energy to digest and use the protein in meat as compared to plants. This is energy you could be using to play sports or snowboard. Because meat has no fiber, it is harder for your body to move it on through the system. It makes your GI tract sluggish. Isn’t it common for people to eat a big meaty meal and then need a nap? You don’t really hear of that happening after a giant salad (greens and veggies) is consumed.
2) I get a more optimal level of protein as a vegan than the average omnivore does. Most Americans get about 2 times the protein they should have everyday which actually slows them down, causes constipation, and causes (in the long term) kidney problems. It is hard work for kidneys to filter out all the by products of meat digestion/ processing and it is hard work for the body to keep its pH in the appropriate range with meat protein breakdown being so acidic.
3) Many vegans/ vegetarians report needing less sleep than they did before their diet switch…. Although I haven’t become the non-sleeping super human of productivity that I would have hoped.
4) I definitely know I work better on this diet. I don’t have the stupor of tired-unable-to-thinkness that I used to get about once a day. I don’t need naps. And my GI tract is much more happy and works wonders these days 🙂
Since I am writing things I didn’t want to say out loud at the time of hearing ridiculous statements, here is another little anecdote:
Once upon a time I was with some adults and some children in a car. We saw a dead animal on the side of the road. It had been hit by a car. One of the kids expressed sadness for the animal being hit. Not overcome with emotion kind of sadness- just a passing statement. These kids were older kids (13-15) and well able to handle the situation of an already dead animal on the side of the road. The adult leader in the car (the one having a large impact on molding those young minds) said, “I don’t think animals feel pain in quite the same way we do.” AKA animals feel less pain or don’t know they are in pain so their pain is less important or nonexistent. At least that is what I took his statement to mean. Now this person did say, “I think” and they are entitled to their own opinion, but what is this statement based on? I think it is a myth passed on generation to generation to make us all feel better about the horrible things we do to animals to eat them. I think it is denial and justification. This particular person doesn’t know more than your average Joe about animals or biology. Its not his line of work or his interest. When asked, he had no basis for it scientifically. I think people tell themselves this and propagate this myth because it helps them sleep at night.
If you have ever seen an animal in pain, then you know they feel it. The stress hormone levels in grocery store meat indicates that the animals were in pain when they were killed. Animals display being frightened by the potential to be in pain and by the smell of blood and the sound of other animals in pain. All animals (which is a word that technically means mammals) including us, have the same basic anatomy and nervous system. They feel things how we feel things. Ditto with birds and fish. You have to get down to lower life forms like insects and cnidarians with their nerve nets to start saying they may not feel pain the same way we do. Now whether or not you care about animal pain is up to you, but don’t go perpetuating fallacies to make yourself feel better. (Just for the record I don’t think this person put that much thought into their statement or was trying to perpetuate a fallacy. I think its just so ingrained in many people to disregard animals and not think a second thought about eating them or their suffering.)
Okay I am done venting passive aggressively to the google universe for a while.
Let me drop some knowledge on you! Hehe jk. I just wanted to start off with an “attention grabber” as all of my English teachers used to push. I do have a point though. I want to discuss calcium- calcium and milk to be precise.
I often hear, “Where do you get your calcium from if you don’t drink milk?” This question makes me think two things. First, something like “wow those dairy advertisers have done their jobs well.” They have created an international frenzy over milk and calcium. I am sure they are well compensated. Second, I think something along the lines of “let me drop some knowledge on you.” I don’t know why milk commercials are immune to the skepticism that all other products on tv get. They are advertisements! They are trying to sell you something so they make unfounded claims or twist the truth a bit. For some reason dairy commercials are treated as scientific facts. Yes it is true that milk contains a lot of calcium. But it is not true that milk’s calcium helps you to build strong bones and teeth.
Your body can’t use most of the calcium in milk. You are much better off getting calcium from other sources- like leafy greens and soy. (Tofu has 4 times the calcium of milk of an equal volume.)
Have you ever wondered why the more calcium from milk we take in, the more osteoporosis we see in this country? You probably haven’t thought too much about it, but if you had you would have noticed a trend. Throughout the world, the countries with the highest per capita milk intake also have the highest per capita incidence of osteoporosis. America is right up there with the Aussies and New Zealanders for milk intake. On the other end of the spectrum you have the Asian countries that eat very little milk. Most people in China have never had any significant intake of milk, yet osteoporosis is relatively unheard of in that country. This holds true for most of Asia. When Asians start drinking milk like Americans, they start getting osteoporosis at the same rates as Americans too. So osteoporosis isn’t genetic- it is directly related to milk intake.
Here is the working theory as to why the milk actually leaches calcium from the bones. This theory is supported by studies that show that the kidneys of milk drinkers excrete more calcium in the urine than the milk drinker actually takes in by drinking milk. In other words the output of calcium is greater than the input when drinking milk. The kidneys do this directly following the intake of milk. Here is the proposed mechanism of action:
Intake of Animal protein causes an acidic environment in the body (blood pH is lowered.)
Calcium is released from the bones into the blood to stabalize the pH.
This calcium is, in part, excreted by the kidneys (and then you pee it out!)
Studies have shown that this acidic environment and the calcium being excreted by the kidneys happens with any animal protein intake. Because drinking milk always means taking in animal protein with calcium there is no way to get ahead of this cycle! The good news is that studies done on vegans showed that even if they were taking in less calcium than the average milk drinker, they had stronger bones and blood levels of calcium that were comfortably in the range of normal. I had my blood work done recently and my calcium levels were a-okay! So thanks for the concern everyone, but I am good letting cow milk be for cow babies.
Milk is nasty for a number of other reasons. There are a number of websites and books out there on the subject. I have also listed, briefly, some of the biggest complaints with milk intake on the ‘For Health Nuts’ page.
I want to address one more thing! I recently had a broken 5th metatarsal in my foot. A small bone, a small fracture. I can’t tell you how many people said to me, “this happened because you don’t drink milk.” They usually said it jokingly, but were somewhat serious. To these people I say that I have had 5 broken bones in my life! The first 2 happened while growing up on an all American normal intake of milk diet. The second 2 broken bones happened while in my I-am-a-vegetarian-replace-all-missing-meat-protein-with-milk-products-diet. During this time I was eating more milk than the average American. So this last bone breaking is really an improvement. It was a far less serious break than the previous 4, and when I went back to the doctor my wearing-a-cast-sentence was shortened for good behavior! I was healing better than average. So there…
My family members also have a history of feet injuries….we have weird hyper-flexible feet that get out of place and break or sprain a lot…. No one else in my immediate family eats like me but most of them have hurt their feet and ankles multiple times.
Well this is a (at least partially) vegetarian blog so its time I post something for my vegetarian followers (hehehe maybe one or two of you…)
I realize that many non-vegetarian people kind of know that something is wrong with how the animals they eat are treated, but they often say they don’t want to know details. To them I say, ignorance is bliss, but knowledge is power! Power and moral responsibility that is. I think it is just more conscientious and shows a stronger moral character to not turn a blind eye. But that is just me… upsetting my friends one post at a time 🙂
Currently I am more public about my eating habits than I ever have been since becoming a vegetarian about 5 years ago. I used to be pretty self conscious about telling people because they always had questions and I didn’t want to go into details. There was no way to concisely explain all of my logic quickly so I would rather they just didn’t know anything. I am getting better at this. Lots of people now know how I eat and not a meal with friends goes by where I don’t get questions and comments. I am learning to roll with it…
One of the most common first questions I get is, “it’s not for the animals or anything is it?” This question is usually mostly an insult. It really means something more like, “those people who care about animals so much they don’t want to eat them are crazy and you aren’t crazy like them I hope.” The questioner usually says it with an inflection of conspiracy and pity for me. Like they will keep my secret and not tell people if it’s true that I am crazy. So here is my answer: My diet is partly because I don’t want to eat animals. It isn’t so much the eating of animals or animal products that bothers me per se, but it is the means by which those products are produced. I don’t want to cause lives of pain and torture for animals just so I can eat them. That is the truth! And I don’t see why that is so weird? Why is it considered extreme to care about the suffering of other living creatures!? But I have talked about their suffering enough on other pages. I just think this question and where it comes from is so weird. It seems to be the norm is to go against the common innate decency we are mostly all born with. If you stand up for the poor animals and your instinctive feelings about their welfare then you are labeled crazy. Most people would care if they saw the lives of the animals they eat. At least I like to think so.
The answer to this first question often leads to another question. “So are you saying that if animals didn’t have to suffer to bring you meat or milk or eggs that you would eat them?” The answer to this is a qualified “yes.” Qualified in that I say I would once in a while probably eat some animal products. I don’t believe animal products to be healthful, but I do eat things once in a while that aren’t healthful. If it didn’t cause the animals any suffering to eat their products I might once in a great while eat something with milk in it. I really never crave meat, but maybe I would try someone’s dish at a restaurant. These answers are all hypothetical of course because all animal products are produced with suffering. Some suffer less than others, but all at a higher level of suffering than I am comfortable with.
This question also comes up in my own mind when I read things like in the second chapter of Exodus where the Promised Land is referred to as the land of milk and honey. I always doubt my ideals when I read stuff like that. But I can always talk myself back into my way of eating 🙂 Good on me right? For one, this ‘”milk and honey” may just be metaphorical. It could mean sweet things and that the land is nurturing to the people- like they will live the good life and be well taken care of. For another, the lives of people in biblical days were vastly different than ours now. They had less access to various nutrients and protein foods. They didn’t have a grocery store with foods shipped in from around the world. And, the big one, they cared for their animals more humanely. The animals lived good lives and then were slaughtered humanely. The goats weren’t forced impregnated and their babies taken from then in continuous cycles until their death. The animals acted out the behaviors important to them- looking for food, building their nests, caring for their young. Goats were milked only when they were naturally producing milk for their young anyways. People then ate a lot less dairy and meat than people do now. They ate meat on special occasions and most of their milk in cheese form. So maybe if we went back to this way of treating animals I might eat milk once in a while. Maybe. But that would make milk and meat much much more expensive and rare than it is now. Most people would be forced by cost to eat it only on special occasions.
Maybe if meat could be grown central nervous system free in a test tube or beaker I might eat it once in a while. (Incidentally, according to the intensive studies referenced in the book The China Study meat protein is safer and more healthful to the body than milk protein…And I spent all those years as a vegetarian increasing my dairy intake to get all the health benefits once I was off meat….) But this hypothetical system is still a few decades away. I don’t worry about it much. But I could see it happening. They are already working on it.
What I can’t see happening is a return to more humane ways of collecting milk. Dairy cows are some of the most abused animals out there. They spend about 3-5 years continuously living in a stall they can’t turn around in, kept inside, being subjected to back to back rounds of artificial inseminations. When their babies are born they are quickly taken away so that the cows milk will go to humans. The females are made into dairy cows (on a diet of artificial formula milk) or the females are slaughtered for casein. Males are kept in crates for a few weeks before slaughter to become perfect veal! The mother cow will cry for days for her baby while being given steroids and antibiotics (to increase her milk supply and keep it clean enough to not kill us.) The mother will produce milk in huge unnatural quantities for about 9 months and then her production drops off and she is inseminated again. The whole cycle is really gross if you ask me. After the cows big producing days are over, her life is cut short and she is sent to slaughter. The trip from her stall to the slaughterhouse may be the only time she sees the outdoors.
Changing this dairy system to a more humane system is not sustainable. It would be hugely expensive to just milk cows when they are naturally producing milk for their calves. And to not slaughter the cow afterward is not an option either. No company retires milk cows to live out the rest of their 20 year life span in pastures of green. And no one is looking for an extra baby cow to take home as a pet. These details were spelled out for me by a friendly worker at a major ‘humane’ and organic milk producer. I emailed this and many other companies when I was researching milk and trying to justify still consuming it. The emails are posted on my “animal lovers” page.
So maybe if things got better for the animals I could see myself taking in limited amounts of animal products on occasion. But those changes aren’t happening anytime soon! Until then, I will just stick to my ideals as hard as it can be at times. (And I don’t say it is hard because of the diet, but because of the peer pressure.)
And speaking of ideals, why don’t more people stick to their ideals?! I hear this all the time, “I wish I could eat like that. I really believe in it.” To you people I say, just do it! It is a lot easier than you think. And there is something very rewarding about trying whole heartedly to follow your ideals. It is freeing. It leaves you little to be ashamed of or to hide.
In my psychology it is easier to be an all-or-nothing person. This is just true of me in all areas of my life. As a Mormon I have never had a beer or some coffee. When these things are around I don’t even think twice. They just aren’t options. Ice cream and most desserts at social events have become the same way for me. They just aren’t options. It is easy to not think twice about them. But I am no dieter. Ask me to limit my consumption and use wise judgment in how much I eat and I will invariably fail. “Eat a few French fries” more often than not turns into “eat all the French fries I can find and then hope to start again tomorrow on a better diet- all with a side of self loathing.” So all or nothing really works for me. It is more peaceful on my psyche. I don’t like to have to think about my decisions- just know they have been made and stick to them.
For some of you who may find you have more control than myself and want to try and do something different in how you eat, there are many options. There is somewhat of a movement toward VB6. This means vegan before 6. It is for people who eat health conscious vegan meals before 6 and then have a non-vegan dinner. This could work if you find being vegan at a restaurant to be difficult. Of course you would never get all the health benefits to your GI track of being vegan. You’d continuously be messing up the cleanse. I’ve also heard of those who have one vegan day a week or those who eat vegan at home and the “standard American fare” when out to eat. Any of these is a step in the right direction. Did you know that one vegan day a week does more for the environment than driving a hybrid? But no one publicizes that too much…. We wouldn’t want people to actually have to make some sacrifices and changes for the health of the environment. (Not that I necessarily believe in all they tell us about global warming, its causes and impacts, but I do definitely believe in taking the best care we can of this Earth. I think that is our duty.)
Okay, I think that is enough for today. Some shameless vegetarian indoctrination to follow:
I hear the quote a lot. People often throw it out to me after they find out I am vegan. “Moderation in all things” they say. End of discussion. They just toss it out like, “everyone knows that this phrase true. Here you go. And we’re done talking.” It is a conversation ender. People quote it to me like it is scripture and many people believe it is. It is what people use when they want to argue with me but don’t really have any points to make. But what does this phrase really mean and where did it come from?
Moderation in all things is not in the scriptures. It is extrapolated from Aristotle’s Doctrine of the Mean essay. It was a common theme of Greek life in the late centuries BC. It shows up for the first time in writing in a play by Terence (Publius Terentius Afer) who was a Roman comedic dramatist in about 150 BC. It is not scriptural! So the fact that people quote it to me like it is scripture and something we should all live by is total craziness to me! I think moderation in all things is a very UNChristian doctrine. Christian doctrine doesn’t say a little bad in with a little good and everything will be fine! Our doctrine doesn’t say, “eat, drink, and be merry” for its all good! We don’t believe in moderation in the alcohol we drink, or the murders we commit, or the sex before marriage we practice. In fact I would say most of our doctrine is all or nothing. Not moderation. The saying for us should be “all or nothing in all things!” Think about it before you go parroting that little nugget around from here on out.
Temperance is also a word quoted to me from time to time. Temperance is talked about by Paul and in the Doctrine and Covenants. These scriptures too are used by some people to mean that a little of something bad is okay and that being extreme in any way is not okay. But what temperance really means is to be wholly self disciplined or entirely self controlled! To me that supports an all-or-nothing lifestyle a lot more than an a-little-bit-of-everything-is-okay lifestyle. Think about it.
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