Even when I take the time to explain it people usually just reply with a lame reply, or something they think is clever, even though I counter quite quickly. To be honest, it gets annoying to answer it so many times. So for all those who wonder why a person would become a vegetarian other than the plain answer of "because killing animals is wrong", here's my reasons.
Of course one reason is animal cruelty. I'm fine with animals being killed, that's not my problem with it. Its the way those animals live there wholes lives and the way they are treated from birth until death, which is why I'm fine with eating fish occasionally. No, it is not isolated incidents in those videos you can easily find posted on the Internet. Most of them are accepted by the government(s), United States being one of the worst, if not the very worst. Its horrible, and I really wont go into that factor of it, so I'll add a link at the end of post.
My main reason is the earth and the environment. When I first say that to people, they usually reply, how does me eating a cow change the environment? It's just a cow. They would live naturally in the wild anyways. Wrong, the amount of farm animals humans breed for food far out numbers the amount there would be if we let them naturally reproduce and naturally life in the wild. People then reply, "Still, come on now, it cant be that much", which is yet again incorrect. United Nations reported in 2006 that, "raising animals for food produces more green house gases than all the cars and trucks in the world combined."
Farming animals produces this much green houses gases for a few reasons.
Manure, "The tens of billions of farmed animals of the world produce massive amounts of manure, which emit green house gases such as methane, nitrous oxide, and carbon dioxide."
Cow Burps, "Ruminant animals such as cows and sheep, also emit huge quantities of methane via burping and flatulence. Methane has 23 times the global warming potential of CO2, and the livestock industry alone is responsible for 37 percent of human-induced methane emissions."
Deforestation, "Forests are being destroyed to make room for cattle to graze or to grow crops to feed livestock. When the trees are cut down or burned, the CO2 they store escapes back into the air."
Synthetic Fertilizer, "Growing feed for farmed animals requires intense use of synthetic fertilizers manufactured with fossil fuels. This process emits a tremendous amount of CO2, and the fertilizer releases nitrous oxide — a greenhouse gas that is 296 times more potent than carbon dioxide."
Burning Fossil Fuels, "The burning of fossil fuels releases CO2, one of the primary gases responsible for global warming. In addition to fertilizer manufacturing, the meat industry uses fossil fuels to heat the buildings that house the animals, to produce of all the crops to feed to the animals, and to transport, process, and refrigerate all of the meat. Cornell ecologist David Pimentel estimates that animal protein demands about eight times as much fossil fuel than for a comparable amount of plant protein."
Being a vegan prevents the estimated equivalent of 1.5 tons of CO2 emissions every year. Thats more than switching to a hybrid sedan. Also, eating meat wastes resources. People always are very surprised about that fact. It's just something you could easily come to know if you every thought about it. It's also something you learn about in grade ten science. Every level of the food pyramid you go up the more is wasted. It takes a fourteen gallons of water to make a pound of grain. Where as it takes four hundred and forty-one gallons of water to produce one pound of meat. Those numbers have a huge ration difference, "Around the world, as more water is diverted to raising pigs and chickens instead of producing crops for direct consumption, millions of wells are going dry. India, China, North Africa and the U.S. are all running freshwater deficits, pumping more from their aquifers than rain can replenish." Passing one hamburger is the same as forty showers with a low-flow nozzle.
These are just a few facts that can easily be found if you google about it. There are many more things I could say, but if what i said hasn't made you have second thoughts. Watch this video, "http://www.chooseveg.com/animal-cruelty.asp" Then if that still doesn't convenience you being a vegetarian, chances are i can't at all so I wont waste my time. As for those who want to know more, simply do some research, you can find information everywhere as long as you at least attempt to find it.
So to answer that question, "Why are you a vegetarian?", is simple. Because I care.
GoodAsGould
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