“Why did you become vegetarian?” is the probably most annoying and most frequently asked question I have been asked in my 20 years.
Most college students struggle with what they want to eat in the cafeteria, but you do not need to have one more tough decision because you are vegetarian or vegan. I will help you navigate the cafeteria with a vegetarian or vegan diet, as well as live healthfully off a low budget, so you never have to think twice about whether or not you made the right choice to become vegetarian or vegan.
People become vegetarian for many reasons, including religious concerns, animal rights and health.
Some religions, like Jainism, require a vegetarian diet.
In 2014, almost 13,000 cattle, a little over 3.5 million chickens and almost 45,000 pigs were slaughtered in the U.S. in 2014, according to The Humane Society, a non-profit organization whose mission is to protect animals. I have not contributed to those numbers whatsoever within the time frame that I have been a vegetarian.
One health concern all over the world are cardiovascular diseases, and a vegetarian or vegan diet lowers the risk of having coronary heart disease, according to the American Heart Association, a volunteer organization dedicated to fighting heart diseases.
My role model in July 2011 was YouTuber Damon Fizzy, known to his fans as DeeFizzy. When he started his online career in July 2008, he was a vegetarian but eventually made the switch to veganism around the time I started to watch his videos. He made a video explaining why he chose a life without meat. His reasoning was to stop the inhumane treatment of animals, revealed to him in a video that he had linked to in his own video.
Out of curiosity, I watched it.
The video (warning: the video is graphic and not intended for young viewers) is narrated by Alec Baldwin and is about animal cruelty. Of course, videos like these have been made for years. I did cry after watching it. After all, I have chickens running around my own backyard. After a week of seeing if I could go without eating meat, I officially made the switch to the vegetarian lifestyle.
It is not as hard as people think that it will be. Even if you eat chicken or some other meat in every meal, there is a way to satiate that hunger without even knowing that what you are eating isn't even meat. The new meat alternatives that are coming out are getting better and better as more competition has been brought in from everyone making the switch.
I made the switch, and I have never missed meat once, not even bacon.
