Journey to Veganism: January

Look at this face. This is the face of the two cheeseburgers I ate last week. He/she looks so sad. I wonder if he/she knows that his/her only existence is to put that steak on the plates of humans.

Whelp, today is the day (well, yesterday). The start of a new journey. Today/yesterday, I cut out red meat forever. So far, so good. The issue, really, is fighting that craving for a shredded beef taco, or the Beef with Broccoli from Szechwan that's so delicious. But I'm thinking that won't happen for at least a few days, if not weeks.

Seriously, look at that face! This is the face that will be going on my refrigerator. Then next month, I'll add the face of an adorable piggy, just to give myself a reminder that these animals are giving there lives up (forcefully) to feed me.

Ok, let's be honest. I am doing this as a new diet and for health purposes, and nothing else. I fully support everyone who believes what I believe; that God put animals on this earth for food. Let's face it. We are carnivorous mammals. In The Kind Diet, Alicia Silverstone claims that we are not made to eat meat because of the teeth that we have. I beg to differ. These teeth, my teeth, are pretty damn good at tearing meet off of bone. The ribs that I ate last week are proof. She claims that the molars are for chewing grains. Can't our teeth be for eating all forms of food, which includes meat? Look at cavemen. What did they have to survive offf of, living in desolate areas of the planet? Meat. Look at Adam and Eve. They had trees full of delicious fruits. But God forbid them from eating them. Maybe because he wanted them to eat the meat that was frolicking through the forest? Probably.

Alright, I'm not bashing vegans (afterall, I will be one within the year). I get where you're coming from. I understand the "why can we eat cows and pigs and chickens, but not dogs and cats" mentality. I get it. In a way, it breaks my heart. But in another way, it's what's meant to be.

On another note, I think Alicia's facts from her book are incredible. She discusses how animal waste is dumped into the rivers where people get their drinking water from. She discusses how the animals are treated before they are slaughtered (chickens having their beaks and legs cut off and forced to sit in a tiny cage without any sort of movement). What I don't understand is how we humans can even allow these acts to occur. The least we can do is provide a life for these animals that enables cows to graze fields, pigs to roll in the mud, and chickens to flap their wings, all before they are slaughtered and sent to the grocery stores throughout America and the world. Don't you agree? I for some reason thought that these laws had been set in place many years ago with the Animal Rights groups, but apparently they only go so far.

I encourage everyone to at least research these slaughterhouses and find out what is really going on. I refuse to watch the videos that have been released because I wouldn't be able to handle them. My friend, Amy, and I went to a Sundance movie last year called, The Dry Land. They shoot a cow in the head and slice his stomach open right there on the screen. I was not expecting that one bit and I broke into tears right in the theater, sitting behind America Ferrera. Thank God it was dark.

That's all my venting for now. More on this subject Feb. 1.