I have a feeling I may piss people off or alienate them, and I'm sorry

[aprilstarchild]

Vegans Taste Better. Short sweet summary of why a person would be vegan. Like, say, me. *lol*

Bleh. Tricky stuff. I'm not big on evangelizing to my friends, even though I wouldn't mind leafletting total strangers. BUT: I am personally of the opinion that, when given all the facts on the matter, most people would severely cut down their consumption of animal products. Note that I didn't say that most people would become vegetarian or vegan. But more of them would, certainly.

It's hard, because I know a lot of my friends are very caring and wonderful people, but the things they eat are doing so much harm to the world. Several environmental organizations have pointed out that not eating meat is the biggest thing you can do for the environment. Not trading your car for a bike, or recycling, or using low-flow showerheads and toilets. But not eating animals.

I am not against the idea of killing things to eat them. However, if I know I can be perfectly healthy (chances are, I'll be healthier!) and happy without having to kill animals, why not? Also, the way most food animals are treated (whether for meat or eggs or milk) is inexusable. Period. I won't go into details, but it's pretty awful, and the awful stuff is not the exception.

I feel healthier. Everyone around me has been laid up with a cold. I spent one day lying down and then was fine. In fact, during the day I rarely had any symptoms other than an occasional cough and having to blow my nose. I can't help but think it's related to my diet. I've always had a weak immune system, catching everything that blows by and being in bed for a week, so this is a new thing. *knock on wood* Watch, now I'll catch something awful. *lol*

Blargh. Feel free to ignore this post if you want. Please please know that I'm not angry at anybody. I know that vegetarianism and veganism are the exception in this world. I just wish people would think about it more....

Comments

Sing it sister!

[5minutelimit.livejournal.com]

I stopped a long time ago giving lectures because I knew too many ranting vegetarians who were back on the meat after a year, and because I got tired of explaining myself. But, yeah...what you said.
And as we discussed before, since I've been doing this for 30-(cough-cough) years, so I think I've reduced my footprint pretty well. So I am entitled to "cheat" a little here and there, eat a little cheese, fish if I'm craving it (which means I need it). But always with consciousness.
Thank the cow.

Re: Sing it sister!

[aprilstarchild.livejournal.com]

I'm of the opinion that most of the harm done would be vastly reduced if most people just ate a lot less animal products. It's unrealistic to expect everyonet to stop entirely. But it's taken a prominent part of our diet, and it truly shouldn't. Historically, it never did. Hunter gatherer peoples get most of their calories from plant foods.

I used to have a pin that said, "TOFU: The other white meat!" and I got more conversations started that way, and educated far more people, than if I had some animal rights pin, even a mild non-confrontational one.

Another fun way: Bring tasty food to work school etc. At PCC once I had brought this dish that was tempeh and all these veggies on rice. It smelled fantastic and everyone wanted to know what it was.

In general, I don't even tell people I'm a vegetarian/vegan unless it comes up in conversation somehow. "Why aren't you eating anything but what you brought and the salad?" "welll...."

Re: Sing it sister!

[alicia-stardust.livejournal.com]

Tell me about tempeh. I have never had it, but was told to avoid tofu for the time being. I went to buy some tempeh and it looked odd/scary to me. Is it good and if so what is a good way to prepare it?

Re: Sing it sister!

[aprilstarchild.livejournal.com]

Tempeh is cultured soy beans. Most people find it easier to digest than tofu. It's made by soaking or cooking (dunno) soybeans and then adding a culture and keeping it warm until it looks like tempeh. It sometimes gets black spots but that doesn't mean it's gone bad, it just tastes stronger. When there's a lot of them you'll want to toss it. Try to buy fresh if possible--it tastes so much better than frozen. OMG, I had really fresh tempeh in Eugene once. It was fantastic.

Most people fry it a little. You can also cut it into chunks and put it in soup. vegancooking's memories section has lots of recipes, see if you can find tempeh in there.

Re: Sing it sister!

[aprilstarchild.livejournal.com]

http://www.livejournal.com/tools/memories.bml?user=vegancooking&keyword=meat+substitutes+-+tempeh&filter=all

try there.

Re: Sing it sister!

[alicia-stardust.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the link! :)

BTW, if I can borrow that book from you I'd love to.

Re: Sing it sister!

[aprilstarchild.livejournal.com]

I'll try to remember to bring it Friday.