To Eat Meat Or Not To Eat Meat

Lauren Nicole Mills

Fall 2001

To eat meat or not to eat meat that is the question you will most likely
be asking yourself in the years to come. As a global village we are
consciously remembering how to heal ourselves naturally not only for the
sake of our bodies, minds and spirits but for the sake of the planet, and if
you care to live a healthy life on a healthy planet it is important to
understand the benefits of being a vegetarian and the consequences created
by the consumption of meat. We are at a crucial point in our existence when
we really need to question why we eat the way we do and how these traditions
affect our bodies, the quality of our lives, and how all these factors
effect the world as we know it today. After all the planet is a reflection
of how well we take care of ourselves, the human being is composed of 71%
water and the planet we live on is composed of 71% water, it is not some
strange coincidence that these percentages are the same, in fact evolution
proves we were born from the Earth and share common elements. Unfortunately
as human existence has evolved so has the evolution of the destruction of
our natural resources for both the environment and the human body, however
in light of the situation there is a common understanding that people are
aware of the need to respect the Earth and that we must learn to live within
her boundaries. A time has come when it is important to know how you
individually contribute to the planet and what you can do to slow the
process of mass destruction and help create an economically compatible way
of living. As they say you are what you eat therefore it is important to
begin with understanding what you eat effects the quality of life you live.
Have you ever thought about why you eat meat? Most certainly you were
raised on this product, because your parents thought that it was a natural
diet to feed you in order for you to grow up to be healthy and strong. How
ever history tells us differently, studies have shown that our ancestors
were vegetarian by nature. The human body is simply not designed for meat
consumption, our intestines are long and complicated they twist and turn and
the walls are convoluted and are not smooth. Therefore meat is slowly
processed through the intestines which are not designed for the putrefying
bacteria, high levels of fat and lack of fiber. “Meat normally takes about
72 hours to eliminate from our bodies. We should eliminate all food within
24 hours before it has time to decay inside. Our intestines are twelve times
our body length while carnivores measure three times their body length.”
(Khalsa 1995) The intestines of carnivorous animals are short and smooth
and can pass meat quickly through the body. Not only do meat eating animals
have strong stomach acid to digest meat, it is about twenty times more
powerful than humans. Biologically carnivores are physically built with
claws and sharp teeth for tearing flesh, the teeth of humans are ment for
chewing.
It is obvious why your parents thought it was only natural to feed you
such an unhealthy diet, bombarded by propaganda which pursues us to think
that meat is a necessary part of the human diet, begins in school at such a
young age when we learn about the basic food groups and the food pyramid.
But who supplies those brightly colored food charts- the meat and dairy
industry. Most Americans receive their information about foods through
advertising, and advertisers spend billions of dollars to do so. It is
interesting to know that “the dairy industry spends $190 million annually on
the “milk mustache” ads, McDonalds spends $800 million annually advertising
its products, while the National Cancer Institute spends only $1million
annually promoting fruits and vegetables.” (Robbins, 2001). Sadly enough
Americans are poorly informed because these advertisements provide us with
misleading information, lets take the dairy industry for example “president
of the Physicians Committee for the Responsible Medicine, Neal Barnard says
“The dairy industry continues to whitewash the dangers of cow’s milk. The
ubiquitous ‘milk mustache’ campaign makes misleading claims about milk
preventing osteoporosis, lowering blood pressure and enhancing sports
performance. Recent studies including the Harvard Nurses Health Study, have
shown that milk offers no protection against broken bones…., ”(qtd. in
Robbins 99). Medical research proves that vegans (vegetarians who consume
no animal by-products) and vegetarians have far less risk of heart disease
(the number one killer of Americans), breast cancer, colon cancer and
strokes. “Other diseases which are often prevented and sometimes cured by a
low fat vegetarian diet include kidney stones, prostate cancer, diabetes,
peptic ulcers, gallstones, irritable bowl syndrome, arthritis, gum disease,
acne, pancreatic cancer, stomach cancer, hypoglycemia, constipation,
diverticulosis, hypertension, osteoporosis, ovarian cancer, hemorrhoids,
obesity and asthma.”(Hai, 1996)
There was a time on this planet when meat consumption was necessary to
survive, in the ice age there was a time when vegetation was scarce and it
was necessary to eat meat for sufficient nourishment. That is not the case
today, people eat meat because they are addicted. A human being is well
nourished from a diet that consists of grains and vegetables. In fact
according to the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition it is possible to
receive more absorption of calcium from consuming brussel sprouts (63.8%
rate of absorption) or broccoli(52.6% rate of absorption) compared to cows
milk (32% rate of absorption). But it is not only the flesh of the cow or
the milk from the heifer or the egg from the hen or the leg of the turkey
you digest when you consume the animal product, in this day of age you are
also taking a bite of hormones, antibiotics, toxins and the abuse that the
animal endured in order for a dollar to be exchanged in order for you to
call it a meal.
Hormones- “More than 90 percent of U.S. beef cattle today receive
hormone implants, and in the larger feed lots the figure is 100 percent”
(Robbins, 2001). These sex hormones says Robbins (2001) include Zeranol,
trenbolone acetate, progesterone, testosterone and or estradiol. Cattlemen
inject their cattle with hormones for the same reason weight lifters take
steroids, they think bigger is better, regardless of what it does to health..
It is interesting to know that Europe banned the trade of US hormonal
treated beef, outraged cattleman took this issue to the World Trade
Organization, in a compromise in order to compensate for lost profits Europe
decided they would rather pay $150 million a year than resume this trade.
Antibiotics- What we know according to Robbins “Antibiotics administered
to people in the United States annually to treat diseases: 3 million pounds..
Antibiotics administered to livestock in the United States annually for
purposes other than treating disease: 24.6 million pounds” (qtd. in Robbins
141). Livestock consume the majority of use of antibiotics, and because of
this has reduced the efficiency of antibiotics to cure human illness.
Toxins- The way livestock are raised and slaughtered create risk of
disease in all meat dairy products, and eggs. An organization called Public
Citizen, a nonprofit organization( which has no vegetarian or animal rights
agenda) reports “Many cows are raised in dirty conditions in huge city-sized
feed lots, where they become smeared with fecal matter and other filth. In
this condition they are transported to slaughterhouses, where rapid process
takes place. Workers are under pressure to work as quickly as possible,
killing and gutting as many as 330 animals per hour. In such an intensive
operation, a cow’s body cavity is slit open, and if any errors occur in
cutting, the intestines can be punctured and feces released. The carcasses
are immediately dipped in a cold water bath, which becomes a fecal stew.
Later, as the meat is cut up and made into hamburgers, the consumer may eat
parts of multiple cows in one burger- so if there is contamination in meat
of one carcass, it could be spread to thousands of pounds of meat.” (qtd. in
Robbins 120). This procedure is no different for chickens and is the
leading cause of spreading of pathogens, the sad part is that the consumer
is made to feel responsible for not properly cooking the meat. Common
contaminations include E. Coli 0157:H7, Campylobacter, Salmonella, Listeria,
and Mad Cow disease.
Abuse-An overwhelming majority of animals are “raised” on a factory
farms. This means that animals are treated like machines, the intention is
to raise as much as possible with expending as little as possible. Animals
are packed in as tightly as possible, and disfigured in order to prevent
damage ( such as beak trimming in order to prevent the birds from pecking
each other to death under cramped conditions.) Both cows and pigs are
confined to cages which barely allow for movement and in some cases the
animals can not even lay down. Cages are stacked, therefore the animal on
the bottom is continually bombarded by feces and urine. 90,00 cows are
slaughtered every 24 hours, slaughtering consists of stunning the animal and
then butchering the animal an employee of a slaughterhouse reported an
estimation of 30 percent of the cows are not properly knocked out (Robbins
2001).
The consumption of meat is creating ecological disaster. The excrement
of all the animals killed must go somewhere and it is seriously destroying
our natural resources. “Twenty tons of (pork and other) livestock are
produced for every household in the country. We have strict laws
governering the disposal of human waste, but the regulations are lax or
often nonexistent for animal waste” (qtd. in Robbins 243) Another statistic
too close to home “The excrement produced each year by the dairy cows in the
50 square-mile area of California’s Chino Basin would make a pile with the
dimensions of a football field and as tall as the Empire State Building.
When it rains heavily, however, dairy manure in the Chino Basin is washed
straight down into the Santa Ana River and into the aquifiler that supplies
half of Orange County’s drinking water”(Robbins 2001).
Not only is the excretion of the animals in our water a problem but so
is the consumption of water to raise these animals. Half of the water that
is consumed in the US is consumed by livestock. Water tables are dropping
and natural resovoirs are being depleted. A shift would take place if
cultural recognition validated the need to switch to a plant based diet.
This would literally save our water supply and if resources were used more
effectively to produce grain instead of cattle we could efficiently feed the
world. At the present time 70% of the grain surplus is used to feed
livestock.
Despite the circumstances, an evolution is taking place. Beginning with
Europe whose laws provide farm animals with favorable environments and
natural behavior is protected. Laws protect exploration and there is a ban
on veal crates, chicken (prison) coops, a ban on tail-docking and castration
of pigs. In the year 2000, in order to stop Mad Cow disease Europe put an
end to all factory farming. The west is unfortunately far behind. In
Europe there are animal laws to protect from cruelty, in the US there are
actually laws that amend anti-cruelty laws that excluded the agriculture
business. It will only be a matter of time before the people of the west
have a greater understanding of how and why animal consumption is
environmentally hazardous to our health.
It is amazing to note the famous vegetarians whose influence and
contributions have been so profound to world as we know it the following
people have all embraced vegetarianism: Shakyamuni Buddha, Jesus Christ,
Plato,Socrates, William Shakesphere,Voltaire, Sir Isaac Newton, Leonardo Da
Vinci, Charles Darwin, Benjamin Franklin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David
Thoreau, Albert Einstein, Leo Tolstoy, Mahatma Gandhi, Paul Newman, Madonna,
Paul and Linda McCartney, John Robbins (the son of as in Baskin-Robbins,
whose work profoundly influenced this paper), River Phoenix, Woody
Harrelson,Jennie Garth, Alicia Silverstone, Prince, and many many more.
There issomething you can do to participate in this consciousness, by simply
beingaware. It is time to understand that every individual makes a
differenceand is capable whether they choose to or not to consume meat they
are inevitably impacting the future. There is no better time to wake up and
discover the power in wisdom and truth. I think that Albert Einstein summed
it up best when he said, “I think the changes and purifying effects that a
vegetarian diet have on a human being’s disposition are quite beneficial to
mankind. Therefore, it is both auspicious and peaceful for people to choose
vegetarianism.(qtd. in Hui 75). May peace be with you…

Namaste…

References
Hai, Suma Ching. The Key of Immediate Enlightenment. 26 ed. Formosa: Suma
Ching Hai International Publishing Co. 1996
Khalsa, Ram Das Bir Singh. Diet and Meat. #4 I Need to Eat Meat, or Don’t I?
1995
Robbins, John. The Food Revolution. Berkeley: Conari Press, 2001