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I am not a vegetarian. I eat meat minimally because it is healthier not to consume and I disagree with the slaughter of animals. But why do we eat meat at all? A long time ago it was mandatory for human survival. In the meantime, humans have learned to produce vegetarian foods which are capable of replacing meat. But people seldom do it because we have inherited a culture of meat consumption. Our culture made us believe that we are worth more than animals and that we have the right to slaughter them. Capitalism additionally encourages us to eat meat in huge quantities, demeaning animals as subjects of mass killing and profit. The fast-food industry convinces society that heavily processed meat products are the way to go even though they are very unhealthy. Killing animals today is incredibly inhumane. It is a real genocide. Animals are sentient beings like humans. We are making a big mistake to animals and ourselves. As a result, we deteriorate our spiritual and physical well-being even though we might not know it, we are spiritually and physically less healthy by consuming meat.
We need to stop killing animals. To do so, we need to develop a culture of eating vegetarian food. Beginners have to understand that vegetarian food needs to have more nutrition than just green salad. Otherwise, we would remain hungry. We also need to understand that vegetarian food could be very tasty if well prepared. We may find surprisingly delicious vegetarian pizza that is also filling. And it could be improved. I have learned to cook a fantastic meal using beans, carrots, onions, hot peppers, oil, and salt. I enjoy it so much that I can hardly breathe after consummation. A good meal can be made just by cooking onion, tomato, oil, and salt. Bread would help satiation and hot peppers will give a better taste, though taste varies by individual.
I still have issues with cooking a variety of vegetarian meals. This means that I am still not able to eliminate meat consumption. But I am willing to learn. We should all do it. Vegetarian production should also be encouraged by lower taxes and subsidies. We also need to stimulate inventions and competitions in producing healthy, tasty, and highly nutritious vegetarian food. When we start enjoying the vegetarian diet and fulfilling our hunger, we would eat vegetarian food more and will be healthier and live longer. When we understand that a large number of illnesses come from unhealthy consumption of meat, we will refuse to eat it. Lower meat demand will lower the slaughtering of animals. I hope one day it will be eliminated.
We also need to improve the protection of animals from senseless killing. We need to regulate animal rights by law. Killing animals for entertainment should be banned and severely punished. Young animals should not be killed. We need to enforce high taxes for meat consumption. We should beautify the lives of animals. That would make us better human beings.
All of that is not easy to achieve because changing our culture of meat consumption is not easy to accomplish. Nor would it be easy to restrict the profits of the food industry. However, we need to establish such a goal to reach a better future. We do not have any other choice if we want to be human and live better lives.
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This post was previously published on www.sarovic.org and is republished here with permission from the author.
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Photo credit: Shutterstock
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