Many of us vegans have gotten ourselves into heated debates about our lifestyle choices. Whether we want to or not, we’re dragged into defending our choices. The nonvegans ask us, “But what about protein?” “Isn’t it hard” “But they don’t kill the cows to get milk, why no cheese?”

We answer honestly.

Protein is widely available in plant foods from beans, nuts and grains to even just fruits and veggies. So long as we eat enough calories we generally have no problem getting plenty of protein.

At first it can be hard to be vegan, but like all good things in life: it takes some work, but that work is worth it. And it just keeps getting easier as time goes on.

No, they don’t kill the cows in order to get milk, but they do kill the calves. Veal is a byproduct of the dairy industry, not the other way around. Moreover, when the cows are no longer useful to the dairy farmers, they too are killed and turned into cheap beef.  Remember that horrible footage of tortured downed cows in the HSUS investigation in Chino? Those were DAIRY cows. Every dairy cow is destined to a slaughterhouse.

But no matter how skilled we become at answering those questions, we’re rarely engaged in large scale debates where our voices would be heard by hundreds.

Bruce Friedrich, however, is currently involved in college debates about the ethics of veganism. His debates attract hundreds and hundreds of students to listen. And as a skilled debater, he has found some of the best reasons for veganism and he has concluded that it’s not veganism that requires defense. Nonveganism is the lifestyle that everyone should  question. Because modern-day nonveganism is indefensible.

Friedrich writes:

You can watch many of the debates online, if you’re so inclined, but here is the crux of my argument:

First, eating meat wastes and pollutes our land, water and air–as I discuss more thoroughly here.

Second, eating meat drives up the price of cereals, which leads to starvation and food riots — as I discuss here.

Finally, eating meat supports cruelty to animals so severe that it would warrant felony cruelty charges were dogs or cats so horribly abused — and that’s true even of so-called “humane” farms (video).

He continues with even more reasons for veganism:

• “there is no ethical difference between eating a dog, cat, chicken, pig or fish. If anything, eating your dogs or cats would be morally preferable, since they would have led a good life until you killed them.”
• “if we’re eating meat, we are paying people to abuse animals in myriad ways that would violate anti-cruelty laws if these were dogs or cats rather than chickens and pigs. Animals are deprived of everything that is natural and important to them; they never breathe fresh air, raise their young, develop normal relationships with other animals, explore their surroundings, or do anything else they would do in nature.”
• “meat is absolutely not good for us. The American Dietetic Association — the largest body of nutrition professionals on the planet — conducted a meta-analysis of all the studies that have ever been done on diet and disease, and found that vegetarians have lower rates of heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer and obesity than meat-eaters (they believe that the studies indicate causality, not just correlation). Their position paper on vegetarian and vegan diets concludes that vegetarian and vegan diets are appropriate for all people and during all stages of life, including infancy and pregnancy.”

Although I’ve quoted a significant portion of the article, you should still take a look at it yourself. It’s online at this address: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-friedrich/resolved-eating-animals-i_b_671322.html

If you’re not yet vegan, please go vegan today! Do it for yourself, do it for the animals, do it for other people, and do it for the planet. Just do it!

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Sections: Vegan Resources, Vegan Theory
Topics: bruce friedrich, change, compassion, debates, go vegan, peace, reasons, resources, respect, Theory, veg, Vegan, why vegan