Marjorie Lee GarretsonStudent Essay

More Pros Than Cons in a Meat-Free Life

Marjorie Lee Garretson’s opinion piece originally appeared in the Daily Mississippian, the student newspaper of the University of Mississippi, in April 2010.

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What would you say if I told you there was a way to improve your overall health, decrease environmental waste, and save animals from inhumane treatment at the same time? You would probably ask how this is possible. The answer is quite simple: go vegetarian. Vegetarians are often labeled as different or odd, but if you take a closer look at their actions, vegetarians reap multiple benefits meat eaters often overlook or choose to ignore for convenience.

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The health benefits vegetarians acquire lead us to wonder why more people are not jumping on the meat-free bandwagon. On average, vegetarians have a lower body mass index°, significantly decreased cancer rates, and longer life expectancies. In addition, Alzheimer’s disease° and osteoporosis° were linked to diets containing dairy, eggs, and meat.

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The environment also encounters benefits from vegetarians. It takes less energy and waste to produce vegetables and grains than the energy required to produce meat. Producing one pound of meat is estimated to require 16 pounds of grain and up to 5,000 gallons of water, which comes from adding the water used to grow the grain crop as well as the animal’s personal water consumption. Also, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, the runoff of fecal matter from meat factories is the single most detrimental° pollutant to our water supply. In fact, it is said to be the most significant pollutant in comparison to sources of all other industries combined.

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The inhumane treatment of animals is common at most animal factories. The living conditions chickens, cows, pigs, and other livestock are forced into are far removed from their natural habitats. The goal of animal agriculture nowadays seems to be minimizing costs without attention to the sacrifices being made to do so. Animals are crammed into small cages where they often cannot even turn around. Exercise is denied to the animals to increase energy toward the production of meat. Female cows are pumped with hormones to allow their bodies to produce triple the amount of milk they are naturally capable of. Chickens are stuffed tightly into wire cages, and conditions are manipulated to increase egg production cycles. When chickens no longer lay eggs and cows cannot produce milk, they are transported to slaughterhouses where their lives are taken from them—often piece by piece.

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Animal factory farms do a great job convincing Americans that their industry is vital to our health because of the protein, calcium, and other nutrients available in chicken, beef, and milk. We are bombarded with “Got Milk?” ads featuring various celebrities with white milk mustaches. We are told the egg is a healthy breakfast choice and lean protein is the basis of many good weight loss diets. What all of the ads and campaigns for animal products leave out are all the hormones injected into the animals to maximize production. Also, the tight living conditions allow for feces to contaminate the animals, their environment, and the potential meat they are growing. It is ironic how irate° Americans react to puppy mills and the inhumane treatment of household pets, but for our meat and dairy products we look the other way. We pretend it is fine to confine cows, pigs, and chickens to tiny spaces and give them hormones and treat them inhumanely in their life and often in the way they are killed. We then cook and consume them at our dinner tables with our families and friends.

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Therefore, I encourage you to consider a meat-free lifestyle not only for the sake of the animals and the environment, but most importantly your personal health. All of your daily nutrients can be found in plant-based sources, and oftentimes when you make the switch to being a vegetarian, your food choices expand because you are willing to use vegetables and grains in innovative ways at the dinner table. Going vegetarian is a life-changing decision and one you can be proud of because you know it is for your own health as well as the greater good.

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