Going vegetarian
has never been easier
by PETA
When it comes to vegetarianism, the number one question on most meat-eaters' minds is, "What do you eat?"
The answer: "Anything we want!"
There are vegetarian alternatives to almost any animal food, from soy sausages and "Fib Ribs" to Tofurky jerky and mock lobster. Vegetarian-friendly menus are sprouting up everywhere - even Burger King offers veggie burgers - and more and more eateries are focusing exclusively on vegetarian and vegan foods. There are fantastic alternatives to every dairy product you can imagine, including Soy Delicious ice cream, Silk chocolate soy milk, Tofutti cream cheese, and more.
When it comes to vegetarianism, the number one question on most meat-eaters' minds is, "What do you eat?"
The answer: "Anything we want!"
There are vegetarian alternatives to almost any animal food, from soy sausages and "Fib Ribs" to Tofurky jerky and mock lobster. Vegetarian-friendly menus are sprouting up everywhere - even Burger King offers veggie burgers - and more and more eateries are focusing exclusively on vegetarian and vegan foods. There are fantastic alternatives to every dairy product you can imagine, including Soy Delicious ice cream, Silk chocolate soy milk, Tofutti cream cheese, and more.
Going vegetarian has never been easier, and we're here to help! From our fantastic recipes and list of favorite products and favorite vegetarian cookbooks to our free vegetarian starter kit and online shopping guide, PETA has all the information you need to adopt a healthy and humane vegetarian diet!
Every year in the U.S., more than 27 billion animals are slaughtered for food. Raising animals on factory farms is cruel and ecologically devastating. Eating animals is bad for our health, increasing the risk of developing various diseases and illnesses, including heart attacks, strokes, cancer, diabetes, and obesity.
In response to animal welfare, health, and ecological concerns, compassionate people everywhere are adopting a vegetarian diet.
Every year in the U.S., more than 27 billion animals are slaughtered for food. Raising animals on factory farms is cruel and ecologically devastating. Eating animals is bad for our health, increasing the risk of developing various diseases and illnesses, including heart attacks, strokes, cancer, diabetes, and obesity.
In response to animal welfare, health, and ecological concerns, compassionate people everywhere are adopting a vegetarian diet.
For Animals
Animals on factory farms are treated like meat, milk, and egg machines. Chickens have their sensitive beaks seared off with a hot blade, and male cattle and pigs are castrated without any painkillers. Farmed chickens, turkeys, and pigs spend their brief lives in dark and crowded warehouses, many of them so cramped that they can't even turn around or spread a single wing. They are mired in their own waste, and the stench of ammonia fills the air.
Animals raised for food are bred and drugged to grow as large as possible as quickly as possible—many are so heavy that they become crippled under their own weight and die within inches of their water supply.
Animals on factory farms do not see the sun or get a breath of fresh air until they are prodded and crammed onto trucks for a nightmarish ride to the slaughterhouse, often through weather extremes and always without food or water.
Many die during transport, and others are too sick or weak to walk off the truck after they reach the slaughterhouse. The animals who survive this hellish ordeal are hung upside-down and their throats are slit, often while they're completely conscious.
Many are still alive while they are skinned, hacked into pieces, or scalded in the defeathering tanks. By switching to a vegetarian diet, you can save more than 100 animals a year from this misery.
One suggestion: If you plan to make the transition to a vegetarian diet gradually, the most important foods to cut out of your diet first are bird flesh and eggs. While many people think that “red meat” and dairy products should be the first to go, this isn’t the case.
By cutting bird flesh from your diet, you’ll save many more animals. Because chickens are so small, the average meat-eater is responsible for the deaths of many more chickens than cows. Plus, chickens and turkeys exploited by the meat and egg industries are the most abused animals commonly used for food.
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For Your Health
Some of the leading killers in America today, including heart disease, cancer, obesity, and strokes, are directly linked to meat-based diets. Heart disease is the number one cause of death in Americatoday, and it can often be caused by the build-up of cholesterol and saturated fat from animal products in our arteries.
The only two doctors in human history who have successfully reversed heart disease have included an exclusively vegetarian diet as a part of their programs. The average vegan cholesterol level is 133 (compared to 210 for meat-eaters); there are no documented cases of heart attacks in individuals with cholesterol under 150. Other health problems tied to clogged arteries, like poor circulation and atherosclerotic strokes, can be virtually eliminated with a vegan diet.
Vegans are approximately one-ninth as likely to be obese as meat-eaters and have a cancer rate that is only 40 percent that of meat-eaters. People who consume animal products are also at increased risk for many other illnesses, including strokes, obesity, osteoporosis, arthritis, Alzheimer's, multiple allergies, diabetes, and food poisoning. Learn more about the health benefits of a vegetarian diet.
For the Environment
America's meat addiction is poisoning and depleting our potable water, arable land, and clean air. More than half of the water used in the United States today goes to animal agriculture, and since farmed animals produce 130 times more excrement than the human population, the run-off from their waste is fouling our waterways. Animal excrement emits gases, such as hydrogen sulfide and ammonia, that poison the air around farms, as well as methane and nitrous oxide, which are major contributors to global warming.
Forests are being bulldozed to make more room for factory farms and feed crops to feed farmed animals, and this destruction causes soil erosion and contributes to species extinction and habitat loss. Raising animals for food also requires massive amounts of food and raw materials: Farmed animals consume 70 percent of the corn, wheat, and other grains that we grow, and one-third of all the raw materials and fossil fuels used in the U.S. go to raising animals for food. In short, our country's meat addiction is wrecking the earth. Read more about factory farming and the environment.
Request a vegetarian starter kit to get started today!
Source: PETA
Top 5 reasons
to go meat-free on Mondays!
by HSUS
A resolution for the times
Meat-free eating went mainstream in 2011. Whether it was former President Bill Clinton announcing his plant-based diet or Ellen DeGeneres launching an online clearinghouse of vegetarian resources, veggie eating has never been more popular.
Part of this status is owed to the Meatless Mondays movement, which encourages people to eat meat-free one day a week.
Here are the top five reasons to include Meatless Mondays in your 2012 resolutions.
Five: It's a diet that sticks
So many New Year's resolution diets fall by the wayside come February. Lots of people eat healthy for a few weeks following the holiday overload, but then quickly resume their normal eating habits. Because eating meat-free one day a week is such an easy thing to do, it's one New Year's diet that you can continue all year long.
Four: Green is good
Raising, transporting, slaughtering, and processing farm animals (and growing all the feed they need) requires a lot more natural resources than creating plant-based foods. According to the Sierra Club, if Americans reduced our meat consumption by just 20 percent, it'd have the same environmental benefit as everyone switching from a standard sedan to a hybrid vehicle.
Three: Your taste buds will thank you
Resolving to eat meat-free one day each week will introduce your taste buds to new foods. From tasty plant-based products like veggie dogs and black bean burgers to ethnic foods like Thai tofu curry and the wide variety of meat-free dishes offered at Indian, Ethiopian, and Japanese restaurants, you'll discover a whole new world of delicious food out there just waiting to be enjoyed.
Two: Your body will thank you
Meat is often heavy in cholesterol and saturated fats, whereas vegetarian foods tend not to be. Compare the protein content on a package of veggie dogs and a package of hot dogs, and you’ll see that plant-based products usually have the same—or even more—protein than their animal-based counterparts. You can get all the good stuff, without as much of the bad stuff. That makes it easier to drop some inches from your waistline and reduce your risk of heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, and other serious health problems.
One: Animals will thank you
More than one million animals are slaughtered each hour in the United States, and concern over how the vast majority of them are mistreated on factory farms has reached new heights. From chickens and pigs being crammed into tiny cages to animals being pumped full of antibiotics and hormones to make them grow unnaturally quickly, there's widespread animal cruelty in industrial agribusiness.
If each American abstained from meat just on Mondays, roughly 1.4 billion animals could be spared factory farming each year. That's a lot less suffering.
Watch the "Meatless Monday video" above, for a light-hearted overview.
Source
Sometimes, solutions to the world's biggest problems are right in front of us.
The following statistics are eye-opening, to say the least.
If everyone went vegetarian just for one day, the U.S. would save:
● 100 billion gallons of water, enough to supply all the homes in New England for almost 4 months;
● 1.5 billion pounds of crops otherwise fed to livestock, enough to feed the state of New Mexico for more than a year;
● 70 million gallons of gas--enough to fuel all the cars of Canada and Mexico combined with plenty to spare;
● 3 million acres of land, an area more than twice the size of Delaware;
● 33 tons of antibiotics.
If everyone went vegetarian just for one day, the U.S. would prevent:
● Greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 1.2 million tons of CO2, as much as produced by all of France;
● 3 million tons of soil erosion and $70 million in resulting economic damages;
● 4.5 million tons of animal excrement;
● Almost 7 tons of ammonia emissions, a major air pollutant.
My favorite statistic is this:
According to Environmental Defense, if every American skipped one meal of chicken per week and substituted vegetarian foods instead, the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more than half a million cars off of U.S. roads. See how easy it is to make an impact?
Source: huffingtonpost.com
The following statistics are eye-opening, to say the least.
If everyone went vegetarian just for one day, the U.S. would save:
● 100 billion gallons of water, enough to supply all the homes in New England for almost 4 months;
● 1.5 billion pounds of crops otherwise fed to livestock, enough to feed the state of New Mexico for more than a year;
● 70 million gallons of gas--enough to fuel all the cars of Canada and Mexico combined with plenty to spare;
● 3 million acres of land, an area more than twice the size of Delaware;
● 33 tons of antibiotics.
If everyone went vegetarian just for one day, the U.S. would prevent:
● Greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to 1.2 million tons of CO2, as much as produced by all of France;
● 3 million tons of soil erosion and $70 million in resulting economic damages;
● 4.5 million tons of animal excrement;
● Almost 7 tons of ammonia emissions, a major air pollutant.
My favorite statistic is this:
According to Environmental Defense, if every American skipped one meal of chicken per week and substituted vegetarian foods instead, the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more than half a million cars off of U.S. roads. See how easy it is to make an impact?
Source: huffingtonpost.com
