Food For Thought: The Joys And Benefits Of Living Vegan

I have yet to meet a non-vegetarian who didn't care about the treatment of animals raised and killed for human consumption, and I have yet to meet a non-vegetarian who didn't declare that they're eating "humanely raised" meat, dairy, and eggs. When you factor in the breeding, transporting, and slaughter, is it possible to have "humane" animal products?

Some people are afraid that their social lives will suffer when they eliminate meat and dairy from their diet, since social occasions and food tend to go hand in hand. For anyone who has ever thought it's difficult as a vegetarian to dine out or to eat at the home of non-vegetarian friends, I hope this can be a guide and a resource. It also includes suggestions for having productive dialogue in social situations.

The words we use to refer to the animals we eat reveals a lot about how we feel about eating once-living creatures. If we can't comfortably call it what it is, then maybe we have a problem eating it in the first place.

Despite the crazy notion that non-dairy milks are alternatives to cow's milk, it's really the other way around when you consider the fact that the milk from nuts and soybeans has been used for thousands of years. Join me as I explore the many commercial (and homemade) milks available to those of us who've weaned ourselves from the milk of cows.

The practice of eating animals is a culturally ingrained habit. If you're in the U.S., you might dine on pigs, cattle, and chickens; if you're in Mexico, you might feast on goats; if you're in parts of Asia, you might devour dogs and cats. We humans have a funny way of judging other cultures for what we think is cruel, despite our own commitment to cruelty. To the animals, it's all the same.

Some people mistakenly think being vegan is about trying to attain perfection, so they resist any considerations of this lifestyle lest they have to "give something up." Being vegan is about living compassionately, consciously, and expansively; it's not about deprivation or being certified 100% pure.

This is a common comment that seems fair enough on the surface, but what if we dug a little deeper?

Despite the stereotype that characterizes vegans as "angry," I call myself a "joyful vegan" and find that most everyone I know who lives this way also radiates with a joy and peace that comes with being fully awake and open.

Join me as I address some of the tenuous arguments against vegetarianism. The arguments that try to catch vegans in some kind of state of hypocrisy are particular favorites of mine, such as accusing them of torturing plants or not caring about insects. "Don't do nothing because you can't do everything. Do something. Anything."

It seems that most of our excuses for eating animals have more to do with how we want to perceive ourselves and less to do with what is actually true. Explore this idea with me as we look at a couple popular justifications for eating animals.

Cow's milk is indeed a natural food - for calves! - just as human milk is made for humans, rat's milk is made for rats, and dog's milk is made for dogs. Our consumption of cow's milk is even more absurd when you consider that calves stop drinking cow's milk when they're weaned, and humans stop drinking human milk when they're weaned, but somehow we've all been convinced that humans should continue drinking cow's milk - and never wean.

Let's examine the physiological differences between carnivores and herbivores and see who humans resemble most. Check out Part I if you haven't already.

If you've ever heard this or said it yourself - even once - you might want to listen to this episode. And then follow up with Part II.

We're told we need to eat animals and their secretions to obtain certain nutrients, such as calcium, iron, B12, Omega 3 fatty acids, but what we're not told is why the animals' flesh and secretions contain these nutrients in the first place. Here are a few clues. Calcium = mineral found in the ground. (Cows [are supposed to] eat grass, which contains calcium.) Iron = mineral found in the ground. B12 = grows on bacteria. (Bacteria is attracted to, well, corpses.) Omega 3 fatty acid = a type of polyunsaturated fat found in plant foods. (Fish eat algae, which contains Omega 3s.) See where I'm going with this?

Join me as we journey to two different egg-laying facilities who label their eggs "organic, free-range, and cage-free" and discover that, though the hens may not be in "battery cages," everything else remains the same.

Marketing language is a powerful thing, and we're all being duped. Let's take a look at the mystique and myths around free-range eggs.

However much we want to believe it, hens don’t produce eggs because they figured out they were good binding ingredients for baked goods. Products of a chicken's reproductive cycle, eggs are simply the waste produced when they go unfertilized. Not as appetizing as what the egg industry tells us. What else are we not being told?

Because this prevailing myth continues to cause even the most independently minded person to ask where vegetarians get their protein, our first episode is dedicated to debunking this myth.