Go Vegetarian; You Have No More Excuses Essay, Research Paper

Everyday, more and more people are making the choice to lead a vegetarian or vegan lifestyle. Vegans abstain from partaking in all animal products, including honey and dairy products. Vegans do not use goose down, silk, wool or leather. The American Vegan Society (AVS) says that ?vegan? is describing a lifestyle that avoids all forms of animal life, not just a diet (Krizmaniac 8). The definition of a true vegetarian is a person who does not eat any meat products or gelatin, but does eat dairy products (Krizmaniac 6). People who choose to live a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle may have several reasons for making that choice, including animal rights and health reasons.

One of the two most common reasons people choose to be vegan or vegetarian is due to harsh living conditions, mistreatment and slaughter of animals on industrial farms. Factory farmed animals are giving many types of hormones to reproduce more, grow larger and faster. As for cows, many people believe it does not hurt them to be milked; however it is unprofitable to keep a cow once its milk production declines. Therefore, dairy consumption leads directly to slaughter. By using these hormones, cows on industrial farms are forced to produce 8.2 tons of milk per year, whereas a normal cow would produce 3.5 tons of milk per year, naturally (Vegan Outreach 4). As for birds on farms, they are the most overcrowded. They are kept in cages stacked one on top of the other, so that the feces falls from the top to the cage below. Since they are kept in wire cares and cannot move, it is common to find the skin of their toes frowns around the wire bottom (Vegan Outreach 4). Also, to get the hens to reproduce more often, they are starved for eighteen days and kept in the dark to shock them into another egg laying cycle, which causes about ten percent to die (Vegan Outreach 4). The average hen should produce about seventy eggs a year, but on industrial farms, the count has been up to tow-hundred and seventy-five per year (Vegan Outreach 4). And because they have been manipulated to lay such large eggs, the hens? uterus is often expelled along with the egg. Pigs are also extremely crowded, living on hard floors, commonly covered with feces and vomit. Because of this confinement, pigs become aggressive and will fight and bite each other so the farmers have to cut off their tails and castrate them. However, farmers find this as an unnecessary expense and don?t bother to use anesthesia.

The second of the two of the most popular reasons for being vegan or vegetarian is health related reasons. Meat eating is linked to many types of cancers such as colon, breast, prostate, cervical, lung, uterus and ovarian because the heterocylic amines found in meat (Teisler 1). Plus, people who consume animal products are ten times more susceptible to cancer. In addition, men who eat meat are at a 3.6 times greater risk of prostate cancer and women who eat meat and dairy are at a 3.8 times greater risk of breast cancer (How To.. 2). According to A Teen?s Guide To Going Vegetarian, ?America is too fat. And fat contributes to heart disease, hypertension, liver disorder, cancer and other diseases? (62). According to Pamela Teisler, heart disease accounts for nearly fifty percent of all the deaths in the United States making it the number one cause in the world (1). Dairy products contain a lot of cholesterol, which builds up on arteries, restricting blood flow to the heart and results in heart attacks (Teisler 1).

Regardless of whatever a person?s reasons for these eating habits may be, they do not necessarily want to change their entire lifestyle. As a vegetarian, I still want to go out to dinner with my family and friends, but so many times I find myself with little or no choices and I am sure that other come across this problem daily. Some restaurants have become more vegetarian friendly, such as TGIFriday?s and Ruby Tuesday both carry veggie burgers and Tripp?s sales vegetable wraps. However none of these nation wide establishments offer any items that are vegan. Not even the french fries after having been fried in the same grease as the chicken. This makes it hard for vegetarians to go out for dinner and nearly impossible for vegans.

I feel this is a big problem in the triad area considering there is a decent amount of vegetarians, and if you have ever gone out to dinner on a Friday or Saturday evening, you would know that going to eat is an activity frequently enjoyed by those in this area. I also feel that if people had more of a selection at these popular restaurants for vegetarian and vegan food, more people would be apt to cut meat and dairy out of their diets. It?s all about convenience. Plus, I think that having a larger selection would draw a larger crowd. For example, any time I have been to Kate?s Corner, a vegan friendly restaurant in Manhattan, or Panda Garden, a vegan friendly restaurant in Richmond, they are always very busy.

However, in an interview with Bill Blaylock, a manager at Logan?s Roadhouse said he feels like if people are going to a steak house, they did not come to eat fake meat. But on the other hand, I cant tell you how many times I have had to special order fired tofu at the Panda Inn buffet because people eat it all. When I asked why more restaurants do not fry their french fries separate from the chicken, Bill said it is more of an inconvenience to the cooks and it may costs more. But if the restaurants were already set up to cook the items separately, then it would not be an inconvenience. Also, if more restaurants did offer their fires cooked separately, then it would increase their business, which could cover the extra costs of two fryers. No matter how you look at it, it is not going to cost the restaurants any more money because they are only going to buy the amount of vegan and vegetarian food that is in demand, and then it will be sold. It may actually help them by increasing their business, especially with websites up such as ?famousveggie.com?, which lists all the vegetarian friendly restaurants in each state.

In conclusion, vegans and vegetarians have made their choice to not eat animals, but in the triad, they are greatly inconvenienced because the lack of selection when eating out. I really believe that if more restaurants catered to a non-meat eater, more people would be apt to stop eating meat and dairy and it would also help the eating establishments gain more customers. So think about what Dave Thomas from Wendy?s says: ?if you make it, they will come.?

BibliographyBlaylock, Bill. Personal interview. 30 April 2001.

?How To Win an Argument With a Meat Eater.? 6 April 1999. Vegetarian Pages.

April 1999. Krizmaniac, Judy. A Teen?s Guide To Going Vegetarian. Penguin: 1994.

Moby. Everything Is Wrong. Elektra Entertainment Group:1995.

Teisler, Pamela. 101 Reasons I?m A Vegetarian. Pamela Teisler: 1992.

Vegan Outreach. Why Vegan. Vegan Outreach: 1998.