Why I Choose to be Vegetarian

First, we should get one thing straight, I have never told someone that I am vegetarian the first time that I met them. There is this huge stigma that if you are vegetarian or vegan, that is all you talk about and you're stuck up about it. The truth is that once you adopt a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle, that is all people see when they look at you. That becomes your defining characteristic wether you like it or not. People greet me by saying, "hey vegan" instead of "hey Krisi." When someone introduces me to their friends, they say "this is Krisi, she's vegetarian." It is not me that can't stop talking about it, it is the people around me.

That being said, I am not ashamed of being vegetarian. The reason it bothers me that my eating habits are my defining characteristic, is because while I am passionate about it, I am way more passionate about other things. I care about what goes into my body, how my lifestyle affects the world, and how animals are treated; but my passion for that does not even compare to my passion for my belief in Christ and my desire to be a vessel through which He shines, or my belief that once the sperm meets the egg you've created a real life human that will be hand stitched by the hand of our Creator, or the pain I feel and the light I feel should be brought to the fact that sex trafficking is still alive and a massive issue. I would so much rather be The Crazy Christian Girl than The Girl Who Doesn't Eat Meat.

Okay, I am done with my ranting, let's get into why I am actually vegetarian.

I would love to tell you that I am vegetarian because I am a health freak and I care so much about what goes in my body, but that is not the case. It is an amazing bonus that my lifestyle provides me with a far less greater chance of having high cholesterol or being diagnosed with certain types of cancer, but I drink just as much diet coke and eat just as much cake as the next twenty two year old girl. The reason I chose to give up meat has more to do with personal preference, the condition of factory farms, and global warming.

What I mean by "personal preference" is that I never really liked meat that much anyways. I was raised in a house where meat was more of a staple than fruits and vegetables, and in a society where I was told that eating meat is the only way that I can get all the nutrients I need. I would always push the meat around on my plate and avoid it at all costs. Because of this, I thought about becoming vegetarian for years, until one day I realized I had a job and therefore my own money, and therefore could eat however I wanted to. The day I had that realization, I threw out the turkey sandwich I had brought for lunch that day and coincidentally quit "cold turkey." From there I began the long journey of planning meals and grocery shopping for myself and never once looked back. Chicken was the only meat I ever really enjoyed, so I do have to admit that becoming vegetarian was way easier for me than it is for others, because I technically only had to give up one meat. I have now been vegetarian for two and a half years and the idea of sinking my teeth into hot flesh absolutely makes me want to gag. Steak houses make my stomach churn. I'm not sure if I'll ever go back to the meat eating lifestyle or if I will cook my future husband and children meat, but for now, this is how I choose to live per personal preference.

Another reason I choose to be vegetarian is the condition of factory farms. You can hit me left and right with Bible verses and what you believe God's purpose for animals was; but when it comes down to it, my personal Christian walk calls me to live a life of compassion. For me, that does not line up with eating animals that have come from a place where the babies were ripped away from the moms, they are crammed into cages so full they can't move, and they are fed a diet tainted with pesticides and antibiotics (which you are then putting into your body.) The farms portrayed in children's story books are not the farms that your dinner is coming from. You are not eating animals that came from a free roaming field, eat grass, and are only restrained by a simple fence. You are eating animals that are confined to windowless sheds, tiny barren crates, and filthy wire cages. The vast majority of these animals are mutilated without pain killers, stepped on, beaten, denied veterinary care, and ultimately slaughtered. If you are completely okay with that, then you do you, but at this stage in my life, my compassion for God's creation does not allow me to support that. I support my choice and I am proud of my choice and no one can make me feel bad for having a caring heart. I would also like to point out that a good way to look at it is that I wouldn't eat my dog, so why would I eat a cow? I wouldn't stick a skewer through a horse and roast it in my backyard, so why would I do that to pigs? There is no difference between cows, dogs, horses, pigs, and cats. That's why other countries eat dogs and cats! Who are you to judge that as a meat eater?

The third and final reason that I will touch on, is the effect that mass animal production has on our earth. I am so sorry to break it to you, but global warming is very real. The article “Environment” from Choose Veg.com states that raising animals for food, including land used for grazing and growing feed crops, now uses a staggering 30% of the Earth’s land mass, and nearly 80% of land deforested in the Amazon is now used for cattle pasture. The article “Why Go Veg” in the Vegetarian Times says that in the United States, about 70 percent of all grain produced is fed to animals raised for slaughter. David Pimentel, professor of ecology at Cornell University, said that the 7 billion livestock animals in the United States consume five times as much grain as is consumed directly by the American population. If all the grain currently fed to livestock were consumed directly by people, the number of people who could be fed would be nearly 800 million. And if you’re not interested in feeding other people, if the grain were exported, it would boost the US trade balance by $80 billion a year. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), chemical and animal waste runoff from factory farms is responsible for more than 173,000 miles of polluted rivers and streams. Runoff from farmlands is one of the greatest threats to water quality today. Agricultural activities that cause pollution include confined animal facilities, plowing, pesticide spraying, irrigation, fertilizing and harvesting. To produce one pound of animal protein vs. one pound of soy protein, it takes about 12 times as much land, 13 times as much fossil fuel, and 15 times as much water. Sorry to hit you with a whole lesson, but this is a main reason why I choose to not eat meat, and most people just aren't aware of the effects of our mass animal production system here in the U.S.

I hope I didn't come across too aggressive, and I hope if anything, you take away from this blog a respect for the passion and the real reasons behind being a vegetarian. It isn't just a random diet that makes you seem better than others, it is a choice made out of love and selflessness.

Thank you for reading. I love animals but I love you way more, and Jesus loves you even more than that.