When I started college, I became more environmentally aware and I adopted a Buddhist philosophy. With this new mindset, eating meat became something that sat uneasily with me, but I didn’t have the motivation to give it up. That motivation came last March, when I found a PETA pamphlet someone had discarded in one of my classes. What I saw in it was revolting. I had never comprehended the degrading ways in which chickens, pigs and cows are raised and slaughtered. I knew what I saw was wrong; animals aren’t meant to be treated like this. I decided to become vegetarian from that point on. Then, about a month ago, when the big PETA exhibit came to campus, I decided to step up my commitment and go vegan after reading the literature they were passing out.The decision to go vegetarian was probably the hardest I have ever faced. I come from a family of conservative hunters and big meat eaters; some sort of meat dish is the entrée at every meal. When I told my family that I was no longer eating meat, they ridiculed me. They couldn’t understand why I was doing it and supported me very little. It was very hard for me to stick to it because I felt completely alone, but my conviction was strong enough to last. Nine months later, they still don’t completely agree with my reasoning as to why I’m vegan, and still tell me that I’m only one person and I can’t change the world, but they have at least broadened their horizons a little bit; they now try vegan dishes with me sometimes and they’ve finally accepted that I’m vegan.
I feel that I have an ethical obligation to not eat or use animal products. As a Buddhist, I feel that animals are not ours to use as we please, and they deserve equal respect as living creatures. As an environmentalist, I know raising animals for food is detrimental to the environment. For me, going vegan was just an ethical commitment that I needed to do, and I’m happier and healthier for doing it!
I was one of the few people who actually went vegan without going vegetarian and eventually excluding more and more things. My motivations, however, were more self-centered. I actually decided to make the switch for health reasons. Throughout my childhood I had always been slightly obese. By the end of my junior year in high school, I decided that it was time I really did something about it - and actually do it! I ended up going from a 36" waist to a 28, and lost 60 pounds total... all from going vegan. Who knew?
The thought of killing animals for food always disturbed me. Even when I was eight years old I wanted to go vegetarian, but I did not have enough information about this lifestyle. I just avoided the fact that animals are being killed and filled my stomach with their corpses. It was not until I moved to the United States that I thought of going cruelty-free. One night I was exploring myspace.com and through a network of links I found a page which featured the “
I grew up in a home where I was always taught to respect all living creatures, especially animals. My family ate meat, but it was not a necessity for every meal, and I was taught to be grateful and mindful of the animal that had sacrificed her or his life for me. When I was around ten years old, a cousin introduced me to the idea of being vegetarian. At the time, I didn’t give it much thought, but as I grew and matured I really began to think about the morality of eating meat. She had planted a seed of awareness in me that my conscience would not allow me to ignore. Knowing that the food I ate took the life away from another living creature left me unsettled at the very least, and often nauseated. I discussed the idea of phasing meat out of my diet with my parents, who were encouraging but worried about the nutritional aspects of being vegetarian. My mom suggested I do some research and spend some time really thinking about the idea of giving up meat. The more I learned about the issues and ethics of vegetarianism, the more appealing it became to me.
