I’ve learned SO much over the past 4 years about the powers of food and the undeniable impact it has on our health, the environment, and all other living creatures. Its important for me to relay what I’ve learned so others might be able to turn their health around and live a more fulfilling and happy life just as I have. In this post I’ll discuss the ethical and health-related issues related to our diet. I urge you all to read this with an open mind. 🙂 And keep in mind that I’ve been on both sides and know exactly where you are right now!

I want to start off by saying that its not our fault that we’ve been misinformed about nutrition and the foods we’re consuming. Its only natural for us to believe and trust the information given to us from sources that we consider to be reliable. Although this is not our fault, its up to us to educate ourselves so that we can control our actions based on our own morals and values.

I say its not our fault because ever since we were born its been programmed in our brains that eating animals is the norm. I don’t believe that anyone intends to contribute to an industry that causes harm to living creatures, themselves, and the environment. Trust me, I ate animals for almost 19 years of my life yet considered myself a lover of all animals. Like I said before, its natural to believe that whats being told to us is accurate information BUT its our responsibility to educate ourselves and dive deeper into the research. With all of this being said, I decided I wanted to discuss a few ways that we are being mislead by the meat and dairy industries themselves.

Lets talk about “Humane Slaughtering”…

There is no way to slaughter an animal in a “humane” way. I was listening to Colleen Patrick Goudreau’s podcast the other day and she said something that really stood out to me.  She claimed, “humane slaughter is an oxymoron”.  Which I believe is 100% true. And to add to the madness, The Humane slaughter act is not strictly enforced or followed and doesn’t extend to birds.

There is nothing humane about taking the lives of animals when we are able to get the nutrients we need from plant-based sources alone.  Yes, thats right, plant-based foods give us all the nutrients we need so theres no point for us to go through animals.

Why would we need the milk of another species?

The fact is that we don’t. The dairy industry has made us think that cow’s milk is needed for us to get calcium, yet studies show otherwise. Why would they mislead us to think this?? Well, if they had to choose between our health and their profit, its pretty obvious which one they’ll choose. Its an industry with so much power that it has a major influence on the government’s role in providing us with accurate information.

Clip from the documentary Cowspiracy. You can find it on Netflix.

Dr. Michael Klaper, M.D., a leading educator in applied plant-based nutrition and integrative medicine, unveils the truth about cow’s milk.

Okay, so if we don’t need to go through cow’s to get calcium, then where do we get it? Lets think, where do cow’s get their calcium?? GRASS. Therefore we can get our daily requirements from leafy green vegetables with no supplementation needed. So the real question is why are we being told that dairy products are the best source of calcium when this has been scientifically proven to be false?  Logically speaking, going straight to the source (leafy green vegetables) would be a much more sustainable way for us to get the nutrients we need. And not only would it increase sustainability, we wouldn’t have the diet related health risks caused by eating dairy. Heres the disturbing truth about why we are given this deceptive information..

The USDA is supposed to provide the public with reliable information about food, nutrition, agriculture, and more. This information includes recommendations on the foods we should eat to stay healthy. The committee that makes these recommendations has taken money from:

As stated in What The Health, this is basically like a lung cancer association taking donations from tobacco companies. While the USDA is supposed to look out for our health and wellbeing, they are actually feeding us information that if we follow will end up killing us. As extreme as this sounds, its the sad truth and really needs to be brought to the forefront.

But what about protein?

Protein always seems to be brought up when talking about the vegan diet. Its been burned into our brains that our main source of protein has to come from animals. Vegetable protein is often considered incomplete, meaning it does not contain all the amino acids we need. While this is true for a single vegetable, a wide variety of whole, plant-based foods has all of the amino acids and gives us the protein we need, if not more. This is the only reason that animals have complete protein. FROM WHAT THEY EAT! So why do we have to eat the animal when we can go straight to the source..?

What The Health: Truth about plant protein

 Were we really made to eat animals?

This seems to be a controversial topic. I’ve heard a lot of people claim that we were made to eat animals and the argument tends to include facts about the anatomy of the human body. I used to believe this as well, but this is actually false. I recently read an article, The Comparative Anatomy of Eating, that validated the facts I was hearing from other vegan activists. When you compare our anatomy and physiology, it is much more in line with herbivores, not carnivores.  The article discusses the way our oral cavity, stomach, small intestine, and colon is made and why we were never meant to eat meat. See summary chart explaining this theory.

My point is, there isn’t a need for us to eat animals and just because you can do something doesn’t mean its right.  Yes, our bodies can digest the flesh of animals, but this doesn’t mean that we’re supposed to. There are a million things we can do but don’t because of our values. So if we know that our bodies don’t need animal sources and our anatomy and physiology actually confirms this, then why on Earth would we continue to kill animals for our pleasure? Its because we’re such habitual creatures. We fear the thought of having to change our lifestyles because we’re so used to doing things a certain way. Make the leap of faith, go vegan and later you’ll find that it was the best decision you ever made! Because going vegan is a win-win scenario overall. Do it for your health, the animals, and the planet. 🙂

Credits: Conspiracy, What the Health film, Colleen Patrick Goudreau,  Humane Facts