I am a vegan. I have been vegan since February 1st, 2014. My mother is not pleased.
I think I'd like to share my thoughts on this lifestyle, and perhaps debunk some myths. I am by no means an expert, but my body tells me it is happy, and my mind is clear. When I go to bed I find that I can sleep the whole night through, most days. When I wake up I feel refreshed, with no headache, or joint pain. Imagine that, joint pain at age 16.
My friends think I am a hippie, but they thought so long before I cut animal products out of my diet. I see nothing wrong with killing animals, or eating their flesh and using their skins. If the lion can kill to live, why cannot the human? If the ant can herd aphids to harvest their sweet, sticky, secretions, how could humans be faulted for raising livestock for similar purposes? Nature is ruthless and death is something natural-perhaps misunderstood.
Yet if I feel this way about killing animals, why am I vegan? Health reasons aside, that is. Because killing is a necessity; because killing is survival; because killing is not murder. There is no indignity in being killed to ensure another's survival, but cold, lucrative murder is the greatest atrocity committable.
With our great innovations come our great and human failings. Genius invites greed, and the whispers of wealth hang heavy in the air, even as the blood of our fellow earthlings dry on our hands. At some point in time the world entered the Modern Age and agricultural surpluses meant that families were no longer going hungry. We looked not to our own daily survival, but to line our pockets. We wanted to get ahead, we wanted pretty dresses for our pink-cheeked daughters and a fine strand of pearls for our mothers. We wanted that special happiness that only wealth can buy. Happiness not from love, but from stability and status. It wasn't as important as the other happiness, but oh how we craved it.
So we industrialized and factories sprung like wildflowers all over the nations that could afford it. This way of doing business is efficient, but very cold. So faceless. Employees were only numbers and cattle, well, they weren't much either.
Mass production means that countless animals-today more than ever-are slaughtered to feed a swelling population that struggles to consume it all. And we eat so much of it as it is. We swell in more ways than one. This surplus, this senseless waste, is mercenary; what do they care how many arteries clog and livers fail? This is the first generation that is in danger of not outliving their parents. Because childhood obesity doubles and doubles and doubles again. If a child cannot run and shriek and bang their knees on the jungle gym and bloody their hands on tree bark...where is childhood? How will they know to love sunshine if they are but acquaintances?
But there is more. So much more.
Earth and her children do not exist so that one race may dominate and exploit the others. Why are we so favored, so deserving? We claim advanced intelligence, a higher development, yet we have been poor stewards thus far of the beauty around us.
Did you know, for example, that milking cows are kept in tiny, putrid stalls until they fall from exhaustion. For all four years of their life. Did you know that a healthy cow can live to be nearly twenty? And did you know that these cows are then dragged off to the slaughterhouses, where their diseased carcasses are ground into your childrens' hamburger meant? But you needn't worry because sometimes their flesh joins that of euthanized cats and dogs from enterprising animal shelters to feed more cows. And they wonder why mad cow disease is so rampant still.
Did you know that many farmers will brand cattle with a fiery iron just below the eye? I cannot imagine that their aim is perfect all the time. A momentary distraction, and the brand misses its mark, the eye sizzles and turns milky white. The cow bellows in pain but what do we care? It has no words. It cannot speak to us. It is beneath us. Let the eye smoke. Let it scream. We do not care.
Did you know that they wrench off the horns of so many bulls? To break their spirit and to diminish the danger to ourselves. No anesthetic, either.
Cattle blood is very precious, because it makes less than choice beef seem more appetizing, when mixed with it. Do we care how it is harvested? Does anyone care? Does anyone care that that long-suffering animal is strung by the back hooves and hit with a blow intended to stun it into unconsciousness and slit from belly to chin? A jug catches the blood as it rains from the unconscious creature. But what is that? A movement of the head, froth speckling a mouth that can no longer scream? That cow is awake in its final seconds of life. Awake enough to watch itself bleed dry.
This is not killing. This is murder. This is the greatest hypocrisy of our time. This is why I am vegan. You do not have to be, but I implore that you be conscious. I beg that you be aware of abuse.
My best friend came up with the quote emblazoned on our club sweatshirts at school: "Animals can't speak. They need a voice."
http://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/factory-farming/cows/beef-industry/
http://www.jsonline.com/business/undercover-video-prompts-nestle-to-drop-milk-supplied-by-greenleaf-dairy-b99160610z1-235244161.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kD0RTBtl0Pchttp://www.think-differently-about-sheep.com/index.htm
PS! I am less deficient in calcium and vitamin B12 than I was before! And there is NO SUCH THING as a protein deficiency! So back off, MOM. Just kidding, but lets not hate.
No comments:
Post a Comment