The successful activist isn't even active?

photo courtesy of shutterstock.com


The vegan cats blog inspired some interesting comments on a completely different topic. I thought I would make this the subject of today's blog:

Basically it comes down to this question: Just how active should an activist be? Or perhaps its better put as: What kind of activity best suits an activist?

I'm curious as to others thoughts on the subject.

I've never considered myself an activist. But we're all activists to an extent just by doing whatever we do and serving as some sort of example to whomever we interact with. I started thinking about this after reading a comment that was left by an anonymous vegan reader in the comments section of last week's blog (I've reprinted this comment below so you'll read it shortly). They left this comment in response to another vegan reader and myself. We were debating an issue and both agreed that we don't like imposing our views on other people. This anonymous vegan reader then criticized this viewpoint as being apathetic and falling short of our "moral imperative". Basically the reader was saying "you must do more you lazy schmucks" in so many words :-). I welcome criticism and want to hear whatever anyone has to say, its just that i'm not sure I fully agree with this particular criticism. I do feel its an important question.

Here's the comment in question:

This is very sad! BILLIONS of animals are living in hell, tortured and suffering and dying every day around the world and people can't spend one hour a week of their lives to be the animals' voice. There is so much apathy in the world. This is why animal cruelty will never end. It's not enough to just go vegan. It is our moral imperative to actively campaign to end the suffering of these precious souls. If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem!

Not too long ago in this country it was perfectly acceptable to keep another human being as a slave. Do you think slavery would have ended if people just sat on their butts and said, "I'd have a hard time imposing my beliefs on a slave owner. I'd like to live in a world where other human beings aren't beaten and tortured, but I'm not one to put pressure on anyone"

YIKES! WAKE UP PEOPLE!!!

http://www.meat.org/

And here is my response:

Hey Anonymous. I respect your ultimate goal very much. However, I wonder if you would consider the merits of our approach as well. Your basic message in your first paragraph comes down to where you say, "if you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem". This is similar to George Bush's thinking when he said "You're either with us or against us" when referring to the iraq war, the terrorists, etc. I disagree with this thinking. This is the language of war. This is drawing up battle lines where they do not need to be drawn. By waging a war to end a war we're just adding one more war in a long line of wars. I don't believe we need to do that. After all, each of us can only do what we can and feel able to. We can celebrate this fact rather than condemn it. We don't have to attack or try to guilt others into doing more. This will only hurt a cause not help it. People are less likely to listen if they feel attacked and more likely to just tell the person to screw off and deem what they're saying as worthless. And if you do guilt them into doing more with this tactic, it won't be coming from a genuine place. I'm not sure if you were attacking me or the person who wrote the comment specifically or not, but after all, that person is a vegan and is doing tremendous amounts to save those animals you mention. That is not apathy. Even if they're not doing all they could do (which is debatable), what they're doing is still important to this cause. And even if the person feels uncomfortable telling others what to do, this person is still influencing others simply by being a living example. What could be better than that? A living example who is happy rather than angry and isn't trying to stuff their views down your throat? That's someone I'd like to listen to! In fact this person has helped me and I know serves as a living example to many others just through everyday people interaction. Why not celebrate what people are doing and inspire others to do more by example rather than point and condemn? This doesn't mean that you yourself can't still do what you do for the cause which may indeed be much more than us.

You question whether slavery would have ended if people hadn't gotten up off their asses and done something about it. True. But what did people really "do". How did slavery end? How did this huge behemoth of an entrenched way of life whose victims were quite powerless ever even begin to change? Most people would say Lincoln. But if you asked Lincoln he'd say the single biggest single reason was Harriet Beecher Stowe and her book "Uncle Tom's Cabin"'s effect on the country. Though I haven't read it yet myself, people say that the success of the book was that it awakened people's compassion. It looked at both the slave and the slave master as human beings. She didn't win hearts by saying "what a bunch of apathetic wimps people are!" or saying "WAKE UP PEOPLE, get off your lazy asses and do your moral imperative!" She simply told a story and let people come to that themselves. (and it became the 2nd best selling book at the time behind the bible). And of course slavery didn't just end all of a sudden. It slowly eroded. It remained long after Lincoln and even long after the 13th amendment. When it did finally stop outright as a practice in the 1930's, racism endured and still does. If we want animal abuse to end, treating everyone with compassion is the place to start (animals, meat eaters, apathetic vegans, and high functioning activist vegans). Because that's what they all deserve. Were you ever a meat or milk eater? Can you relate to what it was like to not know enough to give a shit about where your meat or milk came from? I can. And so how can I judge someone who is thinking that way now? Better that we understand where they are coming from by seeing it in ourselves and love them as such. We can still be activists and make sure the information is out there, and give people the resources and information when they ask and do what we can in our own lives to further the cause and be living examples. That's using compassion to inspire compassion rather than war to stop war. It feels right, and is not driven by guilt and stress or hate and violence. For me currently, it feels good to focus on what feels right for me and not concern myself with what others "should" do. How do I know what's right for you? I know what's right for me. It feels wrong and stressful to be trying to impose beliefs on others (as if we could). Yes billions of animals are dying, but even by not "doing" anything other than being living examples we are certainly furthering the cause. Perhaps even more so than by being "in your face" activists?

If you are able to accomplish more than me, then I salute you! And by all means, show me how! Tell me how you are doing it! Be my living example! Is it by scolding people? If so I can't help you there, but good luck! A system I can scold, but for people I'd like to have only compassion. If we want change then we need to "win hearts and minds" as they say. What's the best way to do that?

Sometimes when i'm waiting at a bus stop for a bus, I get kinda fidgety. I just hate standing still feeling helpless, like i'm wasting time getting nowhere. So I decide to walk and catch the bus at one of the next stops. Inevitably, the bus passes me while i'm walking in between stops and I end up waiting anyway.

Maybe "doing" nothing as an activist is the same. Maybe "doing nothing" by waiting at the proverbial bus stop accomplishes more than "doing something" and missing the proverbial bus... Even though we may feel helpless by just standing there in the face of such unimaginable cruelty to so many beings, we may actually be doing more for them.

Please don't misunderstand, I'm not saying to do nothing as an activist of course. By all means do anything and everything you can. This is more about the general attitudes and motivations behind whatever it is that you do as an "activist". In other words, take care not to become an oppressor yourself in your crusade against the oppressors.

What do others think about this? What is the best way to effect change? Should we even be trying to effect change? Is it best to do as Ghandi said and just change ourselves? Not concern ourselves with what others do if they aren't looking for advice? Or should we be yelling from the rafters to any who'll listen and even those who won't? Somewhere in between? Leave a comment if you'd like...

Eric


photo ©2009 Eric M

VEGAN CATS? Ok, its official...I've now heard everything.

Yes, its true. Today's blog is about trying to feed your cats veggies alone. Before you start throwing things however, i'd like to point out that this Wednesday is Earth Day! The most helpful thing you could do for the Earth on that day is to stop eating meat and meat by products for the day. Here's Ecorazzi's coverage of Farm Sanctuary's "Vegan for a Day Challenge". Give it a try! Another great Earth Day activity would be to watch The Meatrix videos. Very entertaining AND enlightening!

Ok you may now start throwing things.

But seriously brave blog reader...

Today I challenge you to join me on a little journey...

A journey to a land where Sports Illustrated calls a dude who eats only veggies the "Olympian of the Century" (not enough protein my ass :). A world where the highest paid tight-end in the NFL and the lead singer of the raddest band in the land, both turn their noses up at brie and take no cream in their coffee. And a place where the oldest dog is a vegan???

Yes its true folks. And actually, you don't have to travel very far to get to this land since you live there already.

But ok, vegan cats? At least dogs are said to be omnivores (can survive on meat or veggies). Cats are believed to be obligate carnivores which means though they likely need some vegetable matter, they must eat meat in order to survive and would eat primarily meat in their natural habitat. So, there you go, case closed, right? (if you've been reading the blog, you must know by now that the case is not closed :).

I am going to basically focus on cats in the blog today (being a cat owner) but the same basic arguments apply to dogs (just switch the words in your mind as you read). Let me also offer full disclosure and say that upon first thought, I was completely against the idea of this diet myself. I am now interested in trying this diet out on my cuties, but have not done so as of yet.

In fact the thought of putting the critters on such a diet had not even crossed the ole noggin until one day, a month or so ago whilst searching the internets, I came across an article on the topic. There have been a bunch of media reports of late about a growing trend to feed dogs and cats vegan diets. The backlash to the trend has been extraordinary. Just look at the comments section of any of these articles and you'll see an impassioned outcry against said activity. This one on the Huffington Post's website elicited 11 PAGES of highly heated back and forth (mostly back. very little forth actually). The perpetrators of the diet are denounced as incredibly cruel for imposing their beliefs on these poor animals. How could these owners deprive their cats of their natural nutritional needs not to mention tastes? Are they crazy? Who are these freakish animal "activists" who would impose their weirdo morals on a CAT. 'What's next???' they cry. 'Are these freaks going to go to the Serengeti and start picketing the lions with "SAVE THE GAZELLES" posters???'. In fact, I even noticed there were several vegans and vegetarians who chimed in on the merits of maintaining the natural, meat based diet of a cat and that to do anything else was simply cruel.

Diane Sawyer and Good Morning America did a segment on the diet last week. I found the link through vegan fashionista, blogger and all around hot chick Chloé Jo Berman who makes a cameo appearence in the clip with her vegan doggies. (visit Chloé's amazing blog The Girlie Girl Army). They interview several owners who swear by the vegan pet diet and then counter with many "people on the street" and experts who are not so sure the diet is the cat's meow. There is a pet store owner who says something to the effect of "human philosophy should play no part in the animal kingdom. In the wild, dogs wouldn't think twice about eating a chicken". A veterinarian says something like, "Yes its possible for a cat to be vegan, but that's like saying its possible for a human to live on the south pole. Its true but very few of us would choose to do it". They finish off the segment with Diane Sawyer conducting a little uncontrolled experiment where they bring a dog on set and offer him both a vegan and a meat based treat to see which one he goes for (he doesn't like either, and then ends up eating both).

Ok, I'll get straight to my bottom line folks (after which i'll attempt to pick the above arguments to pieces). If you do your research, and if you let down your guard for a second and listen to what the vegan pet owners are saying, you'll hear them saying one thing clearly. "My cat is doing great". "They love the food". Yes, i've heard now of many people who say that they have tried this diet for their cats, and that the cats not only live long healthy lives, but also thrive. To be sure, there are also stories of where it did not seem to work to the complete exclusion of meat. There seem to be a small percentage of cats that require some extra attention. Having done the research, however and having contacted owners, I am convinced that there definitely are many cats living long happy, healthy lives on it with no special magic. The magic is that the missing nutrients are added to the vegan cat food that would normally be found in the meat.

• "Cats should eat their natural diet".
• "These people are depriving cats of how they would be eating in the natural environment".
• "Human philosophy has no place in the animal kingdom"

If we take a moment to look closer, these end up being pretty hilarious. Simply through the act of keeping a pet in our home, our pets are far from being "natural". They are in our living rooms. If we care so much about our pets being natural, then why don't we set them free into nature? That pet store owner may be right that human philosophy should play no role in the animal kingdom, but its quite laughable at this point in human history to think that it hasn't. If the pet store owner is so concerned about dogs living according to their natural ways then why does she own a PET STORE??? (pet stores being perhaps the thing that MOST prevents animals from living according to their most natural selves. no actually that would be the factory farm. in any case...) So are we just going to pick and choose which unnatural things are ok for us to impose on our pets based on what's convenient??? Are we??? We are? Ok. Well then that brings me to my next point.

The food. This natural food that we're feeding our pets that so closely mimics their natural diet. Have you looked at the list of ingredients in your pet food? It is one of the most processed foods on the planet. Most brands of pet food contain "downed" or diseased meats. And even if you feed your cat the most organic, pure ingredients, how often in nature do you think a cat eats a cow? The thought of my kitty Huck trying to take down a Holstein is a pretty funny image actually :). Are cats going into the water to hunt fish? (Have you tried giving your cat a bath?) And even if they could catch a few sardines in the shallows, do you know how big a tuna is? (hint: chicken of the sea is something of a misnomer here... cow of the sea would be closer). Are we going to just say "meat is meat" here for convenience's sake and its basically all the same to a cat anyway??? Are we??? We are? Ok. Well then that brings me to my next point.

Vets say that the reason cats must eat meat is mainly because of their requirement for the amino acid Taurine found only in meat (or synthesized in a lab). This is why vegan cat food is supplemented with Taurine and minerals like it. What I found interesting was that each of the many meat based cat brands that I buy, ALL have "Taurine" on their labels as an added ingredient! I found this quite interesting... So we're to believe that cats need Taurine to survive, that only meat can provide it, yet we also have to supplement their meat with it? I was pretty sure that cats didn't get Taurine added to their "natural" diets when they lived in the wild centuries ago. I was also sure that a pet food company wouldn't be adding expense to their product without a reason... so I investigated further. I found that Taurine is added to canned cat food because Taurine is destroyed during the cooking process! Cats can't survive on a vegetable diet any more than they can survive on a diet of cooked meat!!! So either way, we're feeding cats a bunch of stuff that's unnatural and inadequate nutritionally and we're throwing in a bunch of vitamins and supplements to make it ok. Hmmm.

Ok, fine, so we've established that inherently as a pet owner we're not even close to helping our animals live "naturally". They live in our homes not the forest. We are feeding them foods which they would not normally eat or need to be supplemented for their survival. We dress them up for Halloween. We have no leg to stand on.



Which brings me to my last point. I will say that one thing we can glean from all these impassioned pro-meat commenters and interviewees is that they certainly do seem to care about animals. Their impassioned attacks, however venomous, are directed toward preserving the welfare of their pets. They decry these vegan fundamentalists only because they feel that the welfare of a beloved, sentient pet is at stake. Interesting how both parties actually seem to be on the same side. The side of preventing cruelty to animals. So where's the problem? What these obviously well meaning people are missing is that it is the vegan owners who are allowing themselves to pull back the proverbial wool from their eyes and take into account ALL the animals in our scenario rather than only their own beloved pet. They are taking into account the thousands of animals tortured and killed each day to make that pet food. They are choosing to not support our backward factory farming system. And they are looking past their biases to allow themselves to at least consider the possibility that the cats actually might like the stuff!

I can only speak for myself, but I have no desire to stop nature. I don't want to go to the Serengeti and filibuster a pride of lions. But the ability to ponder whether a fleeting pleasure such as meat eating is worth another's suffering is a natural ability of a human. And apparently the ability to survive and thrive on a diet of supplemented vegetables is a natural ability of his pet cat.

Will the cats enjoy the food less? I have no clue. I have heard stories from some people saying that their cats seem to enjoy the food very much and live long healthy lives. I am going to look past my biases and try actually believing them for a minute. Who knows? I can say that I have 4 cats of my own who jump all over me while i'm eating food (vegan food) and beg for a morsel.

I also have no idea whether the diet will ultimately work for my cats. I've read that thousands of cats have done it successfully, but that a small percentage require more careful monitoring and adjustments of nutrients to thrive. This is true of any diet though (many dogs, cats and humans have food allergies and require special considerations). I would call it a success even if I could feed them just a little less of the factory farm stuff. In any case, the reasons that people give to not even TRY the diet just fall short. And even if cats do enjoy it less than a meat based diet... Is a pampered, warm, safe, beloved cat's full enjoyment of his meals a justification for me to kill and torture so many of his peers? I think not.

Is a human's?


This concludes the philosophical portion of the blog. However, a helpful reader's comment made me realize that it would be great if I delved further into some of the cautionary and practical aspects of the topic:

With dogs it seems a healthy animal on a vegan diet is a no brainer. Cats are a different story. I'm convinced it can happen without too much effort, but i'm also convinced that this is not necessarily the case. Very serious health problems and death can occur if we are not paying close attention and if we're not willing to adapt whenever necessary. Therefore, one should consider very carefully before trying a diet such as this one. Because it is such an unpopular concept, there are very few companies to support it, and fewer scientific studies about it. This makes it difficult for us as pioneers and we must therefore be extra vigilant. It would be a shame if the diet is actually perfectly healthy when implemented correctly yet gets a bad name simply because the proper methods are not being used. And of course, its possible that some cats simply can't tolerate it. I've heard mixed things about one of the company's products (not all bad things, mixed things) and its made me to decide to go with one over the other. Being such small operations with not a lot of customers, it must be hard for them to insure consistency in the nutritional content of their products. I've heard that the nutritional analysis that is done by most cat suppliers to insure consistency is prohibitively expensive for these vegan cat companies. All this in mind, I would say you should make sure you are committed to the following before trying this diet out on your cat:

1. Do research and talk to other owners to gain from their experience. Join a group like http://vegancats.ning.com so you are part of a supportive community.
2. Recognize that you are not certain it will work.
3. Recognize that even taking away some factory farmed stuff is a good thing and you don't have to go all vegan.
4. Commit to carefully monitoring your cat for symptoms, and be prepared to test the pH of its urine at least every few months.
5. I've read that plenty of water, and NO dry food are helpful in keeping a vegan cat healthy. One of those electric water things is a good option to encourage water drinking since cats often like their water moving (maybe just turn it on when you leave the house and overnight to save electricity).
6. See if you can find a vet that is supportive of the diet (They do exist! ask people for recs). But take what any vet says with a grain of salt. (take what I say with a grain of salt as well).
7. If you have an outdoor cat, consider letting them hunt for their own food as much as possible.
8. Support more humane meat options in our food system. Sadly, there's incredibly few options out there (organic and "free range" most often say nothing about the horrid conditions an animal must live under unfortunately due to lack of regulation). Go see FRESH to see the exciting things that are possible in this area with our support. Maybe someday soon there will be a properly regulated "humane" seal so you'll know your catfood came from a better place.
9. Most of all, don't take my word for it. After all, I haven't even tried it yet! I may talk a good game, but I don't know the answer here. It sounds very possible for a cat to both enjoy and thrive on the diet and i'm going to give it a try, but do your own research and draw your own conclusions. Consult with an open minded, knowledgeable vet throughout.

Much Love,
Eric

• An article about a cat who prefers the veggie diet!

• Big name brand "Pedigree" dog food just released a line of vegetarian dog food (only currently available in India). Thanks to VEGdaily for that link.

• Here is the "Facebook" for vegan cat owners! http://vegancats.ning.com
Great tips and advice and like minded people to trade stories and advice with.

• The pet food that i'm going to try is called "vegekit" found here: http://www.vegepet.com/
Also has great information on the site.

• http://www.vegancats.com is a reseller with slightly discounted products and also offers starter packs for cheap so you can give it a low risk trial.

• other vegan cat foods include evolution brand (don't confuse with "evolve" brand) and ami treats.

p.s. - All pictures on the blog to date have been taken with my own camera. The two in today's blog were snagged off the web.

p.p.s Also, here are some excellent interviews with two great authors about our favorite topic here at the blog:

Peter Singer interview on Salon.com
Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson interview on salon.com

"Dude, I hear ya..."

"Dude, I hear ya, it must be awful what goes on in those factory farms. But I just love the taste of meat too much. I could never make it."

This is one i've heard MANY times now, and I always find myself saying one thing.

"I love the taste of meat too!"

No, really! Jesus, give me a philly cheese steak (especially from Espresso's, the pizza joint near my alma mater) and i'm in freaking heaven. I swear if I could eat meat with a side of meat all day long i'd be positively gleeful. In heaven I tell you! Well, sheesh, while i'm at it i'm going to think about what else might put a person into "heaven". A guy also might feel in "heaven" if he could take home every attractive woman he met on the street in this city. He also might feel in "heaven" if instead of work he stayed in bed and watched "Intervention" and "The Price is Right" reruns all day. He also might feel in "heaven" if he smoked pot, ate meat, took women home and watched tv in bed all day long! (ah memories...) No, but seriously folks, sorry to have gotten so crude so quick in today's blog but I swear there is a point i'm trying to make here (especially sorry to you mom! Argument's sake only I swear!)

What happens after an extended bout of consistently doing any one of these things? After staying in bed for a week, heaven becomes hell real quickly doesn't it? No sunlight, no exercise, no paycheck, too much "Price is Right" and things soon get pretty dreary. (although to me, A&E's "Intervention" could never get old). And after a while of taking a different attractive person home everyday, one would start feeling pretty skeezy pretty quick as well. With all the messy physical and emotional interactions going on, it wouldn't be long before you started catching things and headed down into that abyss of feeling low about yourself. And y'know, pot all day long is great and all, but the next day isn't so great, and after a few days, one starts forgetting things and feeling and acting stupid among other things. And who knows what long term damage you are doing to your body. Feel free to substitute your drug or activity of choice here... say heroin or ice cream or ice cream whilst on heroin or what have you. (um, eric, you're not going to seriously compare meat to heroin are you?). Well, yes actually! I'd say a double bacon cheese burger has more in common with heroin than it doesn't. Pleasure is pleasure. Its all the same circuits.

So, as per the old cliché, everything in moderation right? Is that what we're getting at? Nothing wrong with a day in bed and some Bob Barker every once in a while is there? Nothing wrong with taking the occasional pretty person home is there? (when you're single of course). And why not celebrate that one time back in college when you did heroin all week? Ok, i'm exaggerating again, of course, so let me get to my point. Why not a bit of meat once in a while? Well, let's discuss the one thing that each of the previous examples have in common. They all have some negative consequences when done repeatedly. These negative consequences are all far removed from the present moment. That is to say that in the moment, doing these things feels wonderful. Stupendous. Breathtaking. But if we partake in them to excess on a regular basis, we sooner or later find ourselves being made unhappy by the very thing which had brought us such bliss. This is the sinister thing about addiction. This is the constant bait and switch that catches us with our pants down over and over throughout our lives if we let it. When we allow ourselves to slide down the path of excess, the addictive path, we find ourselves as deer in headlights or as the butt of the Universe's cruel joke.

"Ha Ha! What you once thought was so awesome isn't so awesome anymore!!! LOL!!!" says the Universe.

(Yes, the Universe is hip to "LOL" and uses it regularly).

I think eating meat, milk or eggs on a regular basis is the same (especially to the extent we consume in this country). However, in the case of meat eating, the negative consequences are particularly and sinisterly divorced from the present moment. We could speak of the negative health consequences meat eating has that I mentioned in my march blog. These, much like smoking's consequences, may not arrive for years if not decades. We could talk about the environmental destruction meat consumption wreaks (also in march blog) which appear to be particularly slow in arising and may only affect our children or grandchildren. And we could talk about animal cruelty. Are there negative consequences to that? (negative to us directly I mean). In the March blog I wrote about how eating meat without careful consideration of where it comes from keeps us out of touch with our innate compassion. When we are not fully in touch with our compassion, we act without it and I would argue this can negatively affect many aspects of our lives.

It is difficult for us to empathize with the animals we eat because the killing itself is so far removed from the eating. Much like the killing of people is so far removed from the spoils we gain after waging a war. Few of us play any role in the act of killing any longer. We simply find our meat, eggs, cheese (or spoils of war) sitting on our plate. Steaming and succulent and bearing little resemblance to the sentient beings it once was. How many of us would perform the killing and torture that brings meat to our plates ourselves? Let's take the egg industry as an example. Male chicks are considered waste since they cannot produce eggs and are of a breed which is useless for human consumption. How many of us would toss thousands of screeching male chicks into a dumpster each day to slowly suffocate to death as is common in the industry? Or do the alternative common procedure which is to toss them live into a meat grinder for animal feed? Well, unfortunately, when we buy an egg we support the chicks being tossed in there whether we are the ones doing the tossing or whether we are paying someone else to do it for us. That is fact. This happens whether the eggs are "free range", organic or conventionally produced. It is the rare farmer big or small that is in the business of being a shelter for "useless" chickens. The same goes for the fact that whenever we drink a glass of milk, we are supporting the horrid conditions found in both the dairy and the veal industry. In order to make milk, a dairy cow must be kept pregnant and always birthing children (some of these children are male, non-milk producers of course). These male calves inevitably become veal, subject to some of the worst treatment.

So in truth, when we say,

"why not eggs, milk or meat once in a while? They're tasty!"

under the current system we are actually saying,

"why not support a system that snatches baby chicks from their mommies and tosses them living by the bucket load into a wood chipper among countless other atrocities while simultaneously being one of the largest contributors to environmental destruction on the planet, one of the causes of the obesity epidemic and a cause of shorter, less healthy lives for the human race...once in a while?"

Well, I dunno, when you put it like that, doesn't once in a while seem like once too many? That is, when you actually allow yourself to take in the full picture? Visual aids help bring it to life so check my links above or just google the internets.

I would think it might be better to say,

"why don't we support alternatives to this system once in a while?"

Alternatives include demanding that livestock be treated humanely once in a while, or eating a vegetarian meal once in a while. What's really sad is that there are so few humane alternatives out there that we can say they basically do not exist. "Free Range" is such an unregulated term as to basically be meaningless. Maybe that will be next week's blog. In the mean time, use your google to learn more.

I've heard it said,

"why be so focused on animal rights when there are so many human rights issues to be addressed in the world?"

I believe that being focused on animal rights IS being focused on human rights! Again, Pythagoras said

“For as long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed, he who sows the seed of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love."

In fact, an animal is often easier for us to feel compassion for when we let ourselves go there. Think of your cat or dog who gives you unconditional love and displays such innocence and trust. At times it can be harder for us to show respect to a human than to a pet because it is a human that can REALLY push our buttons. A human can insult us, steal from us, belittle us, share radically different beliefs from us, and generally HURT us. And even though he is a human being, who like us, had his own hardships and abuses done to him in his life which may have caused him to be hurtful in that moment, it becomes real easy to ignore our compassion, get defensive and to want to HURT HIM BACK!

And so, allowing ourselves to feel respect for an animal is actually a great place to start a quest for human rights. A quest to get the world back in touch with its compassion. Feeling compassion for all animals is a starting point in the removal of our own hypocrisies. How can we expect people to be kind to each other when we can't even be kind to a helpless, defenseless, feeling, intelligent, sentient being such as a pig? An animal that is often compared to a dog in terms of intelligence and playfulness and which many people keep as pets.

When we become people who won't think about a thousand innocent chicks being taken from their mothers and thrown into a grinder alive, then make no mistake, we've become a people who won't think about a lot of things. We are creatures of habit and we can't easily pick and choose what we are and aren't going to consider carefully. We get good at whatever it is that we are practicing, and if we're practicing not thinking about consequences and focusing on pleasures, then we're gonna get reeeeeeeal good at it. What ends up happening is we become a people focused on maintaining our pleasures. Especially when the consequences are far removed from our moment of indulgence. But make no mistake, the consequences still come. We become a nation of addicts. People addicted to foods, drugs, and pleasures. We are willing to run over (or simply ignore) who or whatever stands in front of our objects of desire. Regardless of whatever rationalizations we may appease ourselves with.

So people say, "How can you do that, how can you give all that up?" Well, i've given lots of pleasurable things up. Haven't you? (smoking cigarettes, schtooping exes, sniffing glue, etc...) The irony is that, in my experience, i've only found myself happier and with more pleasure for having done it. And so long as the addictive side of it is truly given up, maybe the once in a while part isn't so awful? That is for each person to decide. If you're interested in giving it a try, read my first blog entry or go here to have a daily tip emailed to you from the wonderful folks at Vegan At Heart which is a great way to ease in. Start off slow to see what you're comfy with and above all be compassionate to yourself! (which, in our interconnected universe, is often ultimately the same as being compassionate to others. And vice versa).

much love,e


p.s. "According to a 2006 United Nations report, animal agriculture is “one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global.”

p.p.s. Speaking of baby chicks, a recent study showed that they are intelligent enough to do do basic math. They prove it using the inborn trait that scientists call "imprinting" whereby a baby chick tries to stay close to objects they are reared with (usually a mommy bird). Call it "imprinting" if you like, but i'd call it love. Makes me sad to think about what baby chicks in the slaughterhouse become imprinted with (cage bars, rotting dead neighbors, etc). Thanks to the awesome blog The Girlie Girl Army for that one!


Both photos in todays blog are ©2009 Eric M

I Love Honey Enough To Not Eat It!

A good friend said to me, "I saw that "Maxine the cow" video you posted on your last blog about that cow who escaped from a slaughterhouse onto the streets of NYC. Wow, it really moved me! She was like a dog! I could really see the soul in that cow's eyes. I honestly now think twice when eating a hamburger. But what do you think about chickens?" the person said. "I mean... aren't they just stupid?"

Stupid. Well. Yes. I think the answer is "yes, chickens are stupid". That is to say dumb as doorknobs, not going to be terribly enlightening in conversation and terrible math tutors. The question is, is that really the point? Isn't a mentally handicapped person (and there are some who are quite severely so) also "stupid"? What of people in comas or otherwise vegetative? Are they not also "stupid" to put it far too bluntly? Is it ok to treat them without respect? Do we discard people once they have reached a certain level of "stupidity"? Isn't "stupid" just a way of saying that they're not going to do so hot on the LSATs but says nothing about their ability to feel or do? So then what does it matter that a chicken is stupid? Does our superior intellect give us a right to dominate another or a responsibilty to protect them? Of course animals do not have our intelligence nor our ability to reason but as Princeton bioethics prof Peter Singer said,

"All the arguments to prove human superiority cannot shatter this hard fact: in suffering, animals are our equals."

And I believe it. A recent study suggested that even crabs "feel and remember pain". I believe it. That's what nervous systems do, they feel pain! I'll even go you a step further down to an insect. Will a bumblebee feel stress if it is made to continuously replenish its honey stores (used to feed its young) its entire life because its human beekeepers are constantly depleting it for their own use? Yes. I think it will. Stress is nature's way of showing us that something's wrong here and you need to do something about it (i.e. dammit, the honey's gone AGAIN (day 364), gotta go back out...). And I believe that bees experience stress in a surprisingly similar way to how we do because we've all evolved along the same path. There's a reason why you can implant a jellyfish's genes into a human and have it work as perfectly as it did in the jellyfish. Its because we've all evolved along the same path. The things that we do have in common with other species, we really have quite literally IN COMMON. As humans, we've got a whole load of extra features no doubt, but these things are built on top of the basics, not instead of. The basics remain intact throughout the chain. The basics do not include our human thoughts and rational reasoning. So what's left? Feelings. Basic feelings are quite universal I believe and are what drive animals and humans to be and do what they do. Love and lust drive them to mate and care for young. The instinct to love is strong enough that animals will even occasionally care for young across species! Fear and pain drive them to seek safety from the dangers of the wild. Jealousy, greed, altruism can all be found in nature. What makes us so arrogant to say that our love is somehow different or "better" than that of the animals in the cross species mothering video? What's different is that our love also has thoughts mixed in, but the underlying feeling is the same.

Does this mean we shouldn't eat honey? I think that is up to each person of course. "God" put compassion and reasoning into human nature. "He" did not give this in any abundance to the shark or the tiger (nor even my cute little kitty carnivores). So let's at least give our compassion and reasoning a chance to do their thing rather than ignoring them and pushing them away (they don't go away anyway, ignoring them makes it come back as stress). Not eating honey is where my compassion and reason lead me but its no more a "right" answer than anyone else's. I believe a honey bee is a conscious being (they can be knocked unconscious can't they? remember knocking out drosophila flies in science lab?). Therefore, as a human with compassion I can relate in someway to being a honey bee through knowing what it feels like to be conscious. There are vast differences between myself and a honeybee to be sure, but like Mr. Singer says, I believe, "in suffering they are our equals." And so it comes down to love. If I were a honey bee, how might I feel if day after day I found my honey gone after working all day, flying flower to flower to collect pollen? I might not have thoughts about this as a bee, but it would certainly be a more difficult existence. And so why would I inflict this suffering on another being just because honey tastes good and because a bee might not "know" what's happening in the same way I do? If you have an answer, please tell me because i do love the taste of honey. But until I hear a better argument, I love honey enough to not eat it.

much love,
e

ps for more info on bees and why they like to keep their honey, and other interesting vegan tidbits, go to this recent NY Times blog. A 3 part series of q & a from the public regarding the facts, myths and history of a vegan diet.
(and agave nectar is a sweet alternative to honey).

The photo in today's blog is ©2009 Eric M

Its over. I know it didn't last long but i'm DONE fighting all the urges that come with this vegan diet damnit!

After 2 months or so since first starting to ease my way into this vegan diet, I have to tell you that I am done. I'm done fighting. I'm done fighting everything that goes along with this diet goddamn it. I'm done with all the resisting of urges, the wondering if I can do it, and the guilty thoughts like "hmmm, I could just sneak a taste of that cheese, I mean christ the moo-er is dead already." The thoughts of "oh who's going to know if I snap up that piece of sesame chicken that she left on her plate, no one's looking!!". Done I tell you. Done.

Done with those thoughts because they don't come up anymore... Done fighting the diet because it no longer feels like a fight! Not done with the diet silly, done with the fight!. Because there is no fight anymore, Its easy!!!

THAT'S RIGHT BABY, ERIC's GONE VEGAN AND HE AIN'T TURNING BACK!!!!!

heheh. sorry if i scared ya, that was all for dramatic effect people :).

Here's what's been happening.

• Those 10lbs I lost over the course of a two week period have remained off and no further significant weight loss or gain has occurred. Many people have said to me "but eric you didn't NEED to lose 10lbs". Well that's kind of you folks. I do feel much better without them.

• My appetite has remained markedly reduced. I love being able to actually stop eating when I feel like it. I did some searching online and found that this is a side effect that many vegans feel. One example can be found in this blog/video, where famous vegan Ellen Degeneres says to gorgeous vegan "House" star Olivia Wilde,

“But you fill up more with vegan stuff, don’t you find? So you can’t eat as much.”

Amazing, because I had thought I was just a dude with an insatiable appetite, but no longer. The truth is probably something more to do with dairy (or the hormones, pesticides or whatever other crap is in dairy)... I say that because I have been vegetarian before, but it had no effect on my appetite. The most drastic change in my new diet is the removal of dairy and so I believe that is probably what is causing my appetite to return to "normal".

The other thing that has been going on, as I implied in my opening paragraph, is that the diet is no longer hard for me. I'm finding it easy. I don't miss dairy or eggs or meat. I can't say that will be true for others. I would not have believed it would be true for me. It is true for me.

Karma
In today's blog i'm going to talk about the concept of "Karma". Some might be thinking, "ok eric, yeah yeah yeah, I know, you're gonna give me some new age crap about how eating animals is somehow giving me 'bad karma energy'. Dude, how far over the edge have you gone?". Ok, well yes, granted i'm a nutter. But i'm still a scientist at heart. (for those who don't know me so well, I was a bio major in college, worked at Cornell performing gene therapy in a research lab as my first job out of school, and through the years if you had asked me if there is a god, I would probably have said "yeah. science is god. or nature"). Ok, mr. "scientist", so how is "Karma" coming into play here? Well first let's define the word.

kar⋅ma

 /ˈkɑrmə/ [kahr-muh]
1. Action, seen as bringing upon oneself inevitable results, good or bad, either in this life or in a reincarnation.


Ok mr. "scientist", so how could eating meat possibly bring "inevitable bad results" upon me in this this life? (lets drop the idea of reincarnation for now). Well, as a starting point, lets examine what "bad things" occur when one does eat meat:
• 70% of crops grown in this country go directly toward feeding cows (not even getting into pigs and chickens). Yes, go back and re-read that one. 70% of every plant grown here goes to feeding cows.
• Partly as a result of this, cattle are responsible for 18% of greenhouse gases in the world, more than cars, planes and all other forms of transport put together!!!
• The World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) has warned people that if you eat 50g of processed meat; the equivalent of just one small burger a day then your risk of bowel cancer is increased by 20 per cent.
• There are numerous studies that show that veggie diets can cut the risk of heart disease, stroke and certain cancers. Some of the most impressive data arises from a study of close to 2000 vegetarians over 21 years by the German Cancer Research Center (Deutsche Krebsforschungszentrum). The study's results: vegetarian men reduced their risk of early death by 50%! Women vegetarians benefit from a 30% reduction! 30% and 50% are quite impressive statements for those of you familiar with scientific studies of this sort.
• There are many other "bad" things that occur as a result of eating meat (i.e., it is often said that world hunger could be ended if the world reduced their meat intake by even a small amount because all those crops going to cows could go to people) but i'm going to stop here for now.

Ok so there are some bad things that result from meat eating without even mentioning the ethical issue of whether it is right to cause animals such suffering. Can we come up with some "inevitable good results" that come from eating meat?: I've been racking my brain for a while, and the only thing I can come up with is pleasure. Can you think of something else that doesn't ultimately boil down to pleasure? I can't. Not that pleasure isn't important. Of course it is. Some might say "what about nutrition?" and that is a myth. We don't have to eat meat as humans, and if we do (like if you would argue that we need that miniscule amount of B12 from meat even though it is available from vegan sources) we certainly don't need to eat very much of it. So long as we have a diet of varied fruits and vegetables, we will get the nutrition we need. So it comes down to pleasure. I love pleasure as much as the next guy, but it does seem like, at least to a degree, we're sacrificing our own health and the health of our planet for pleasure. And this is without even going into the ethics of whether it is right to allow animals to suffer so much.

So there's that. That's karma as I see it. You make a "bad" action, and inevitable "bad" things result. Don't even have to get into mystic voodoo shit.

And now, to get a little more "new age-y" and "out there" as a further argument for the "bad karma" of eating meat... In my last blog I spoke a bit about how when you get into certain philosophies or get into meditation you become better able to exist with the mad rush of thoughts that so often dominate our minds and often make us unhappy. And I also spoke of how when that mad rush is not such a focus, that the natural human compassion that is in us all perhaps is more free to come forth. I'm not saying you sit down for 5 minutes and become mother theresa, no. Perhaps its much more subtle than that, but something happens. This has been my experience. I'm just much happier overall for having gotten into the stuff. And so maybe I started taking a little more time to empathize, and put myself in the "shoes" of a factory farm animal. When we are not allowing our compassion to come forth, perhaps our compassion gets a little blocked up. A little atrophied. If we are not allowing ourselves to feel compassion for an animal, then who else are we not feeling compassion for? If we cannot take a moment to try and imagine ourselves as an animal, existing in a hell zone, then who else can we not imagine as ourselves in a hell zone? If our compassion is not being exercised, could it also be that maybe we aren't allowing ourselves the compassion for our neighbor, or god forbid our enemies? How about compassion for ourselves? As we live in this era of such war and ruinous greed, it makes me wonder. It makes me wonder if this "bad karma" that might result from turning a blind eye to our own innate compassion isn't a very real thing. This innate compassion that I believe anyone would experience if they would allow themselves to watch a video of a "behind the scenes" at a factory farm and actually allow themselves to imagine what it might feel like to be that animal. It makes me wonder if there aren't some "inevitable bad things" that result from this shunning of our own compassion. From this "lack of exercise" of our compassion. I'm not saying this is true, i'm just saying I wonder... Sometimes when I tell someone that the movie "Fresh" played a big role in my becoming vegan they say "oh, god no, I don't want to see that film!" as they smile and shudder. As if to say they don't want to see the horror show they assume it must be, but would you please pass the chicken wings?. This says to me that we are shunning our compassion. That we know we won't like what we see, so we turn away from it and choose to ignore our own truth for the sake of grasping to and preserving our pleasures. At what cost?

Again, I'm not saying that we should all be vegetarians necessarily. I think it would be great to simply eat less meat, and to support meat that was raised and slaghtered humanely. Perhaps the "bad karma" comes simply from the excess of it. I don't know.

After writing this paragraph, I discovered some quotes from Albert Einstein that speak to this issue:

"Besides agreeing with the aims of vegetarianism for aesthetic and moral reasons, it is my view that a vegetarian manner of living by its purely physical effect on the human temperament would most beneficially influence the lot of mankind." - Albert Einstein

Could Einstein be referring to "human temperment" in the same way I am referring to our compassion? (yes I just compared my own thoughts to Einstein's :)


and pythagoras, math god and the father of greek philosophy...

“For as long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed, he who sows the seed of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love." -- Pythagoras

and finally Einstein again,

"A human being is a part of the whole, called by us the 'Universe', a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest - a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but the striving for such achievement is in itself a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security." - Albert Einstein


So yes, bacon does taste good. It is up to us to decide how good. I would argue that we might make that decision having first allowed ourselves to fully witness all the facts.

I'll finish up with a video a friend sent. Now this video is NOT a horror show. Its a short, touching, cute story that takes place on the streets of our fair new york city not long ago. I recommend you watch! :)
video

Much love,
eric

“Truly man is the king of beasts, for his brutality exceeds theirs. We live by the death of others: we are burial places! I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look on the murder of animals as they now look on the murder of men.” --- Leonardo da Vinci

“People often say that humans have always eaten animals, as if this is a justification for continuing the practice. According to this logic, we should not try to prevent people from murdering other people, since this has also been done since the earliest of times. “
-- Isaac Bashevis Singer

"All the arguments to prove human superiority cannot shatter this hard fact: in suffering, animals are our equals."-- Peter Singer

The photo in today's blog is ©2009 Eric M

E's Gone Vegan

I've had a number of people say to me something to the effect of, "Eric, you're nuts. Why are you on a vegan diet?". Well, I thought i'd try and explain that here. I'll also try to answer the other question i've been getting which is, "Eric. What exactly do you eat???". Some people ask because they are curious, and others are asking because they want to try the diet themselves, even if only on a partial basis. If you'd like to just see what i'm eating then feel free to just jump to the bottom. Ok, so here goes:

For the first 15 years of my life, vegetables were things that I did not understand. Mostly, I did not understand why people ate them. Pithy, grainy, bitter... Yucky, I believe was the term I would have used back then. Out of the vast cornucopia that is the modern day supermarket there were 4 vegetables that I would so much as touch as a child. Potatoes, iceberg lettuce, ketchup (yes i'm counting ketchup as a vegetable), and an occasional can of del monte canned green beans. But ONLY the canned stuff. You couldn't buy me enough video games to make me touch a fresh green bean. And NOT mashed potatoes. Mostly just french fries. And even many fruits were blackballed. The foods I would eat were basically threefold: salami sandwiches, steak, and burger king. Yes, it was a limited list, but to me it was more than enough. I saw no reason for anything else. What more could one need? Some of the items I refused to eat (and this is no exaggeration) included: any non-iceberg lettuce, strawberries, peaches, nectarines, berries of all types, SPAGHETTI (who's italian?), seafood of any kind, avocados, PEANUT BUTTER, jelly, olives, tomatoes (besides ketchup), SOUP, CORN... CORN!!!??!!? Yes I was a jewish mother's nightmare. (plus, I not only didn't want to be a doctor, I wanted to be a mechanic like my hero the Fonz).

My wonderful parents, however, cannot be faulted here. They tried. I refused. Adamantly. Until I was 15!!!! They would diligently make sure there was one of the big three or little 4 at the dinner table while everyone else ate what was for dinner. When I hit 15, I was at summer camp one day when I found myself piling a small scoop of spaghetti on my plate after watching everyone else in my bunk do the same for zillionth time. I drew a forkful to my lips. "Hm. Not so bad..." I thought. Soon after came corn, soup, tuna, and others. Before long, my aversions began giving way to passion. Through college I found myself becoming adventurous even. As school progressed there soon seemed to be nothing I wouldn't eat (I won't go into details of what I agreed to eat while pledging old AEPi). I had done such a 180 that I became a human garbage can of sorts who basically liked everything! (though I was still very much meat focused).

When my dear older brother Daniel died at age 26 after a long battle with cancer, I decided that perhaps my unrefined eating habits could use a makeover. I felt that having lived all those years on basically meat and meat by-products alone, my health might do well with an equally stringent few years of veggie only living. And also, I hoped it would open up my palate to a new focus. I slipped into it rather easily. I found myself a bit of a "cheese and potatoes" vegetarian, but also I found myself slowly awakening to the wonders of the vegetable. Spinach with garlic... who knew? Eggplant! Mushrooms! Squash! I lasted for about 2 years. I cheated a bunch. There is an "infamous" story I don't tell where at a pool party I ingested a dangerously large combination of Captain Morgan and Nicorette. (Ok, I hated cigarettes, but wanted to know what all the fuss over nicotine was about). Drunk (yet strangely relaxed?) I could not stop myself from eating about 10 hotdogs as my friends taunted me for breaking my veggie vows. I then proceeded to throw up captain morgan, nicorette and hotdogs all over some poor stranger's bathrooom. Not long after, I gave up the vow for good. However, the 2 years of veggie living had served to fully open me up to love for my veggie friends and I had become well acquainted with their various incarnations. I would describe my eating habits as "veggie focused" since then. Basically this means that I would usually eat vegetarian but was not too strict. My reasons for the focus were still health related. I found the reduced animal cruelty I was supporting a nice, but quaint side-effect. Though I had never owned a pet in my life, I had had the usual contact with the neighborhood dog, and the best friend's cat. I believed that animals felt pain and fear and had rights, and so it seemed nice to not be hurting such folk, but I don't think I really thought about it much more than that. I think I just imagined that the animals lived relatively happy lives, maybe on a large farm somewhere and had a moment of pain at their demise and basically didn't know any better, so what's the big deal? Its especially easy to gloss over when there's a side of bacon looking up at you.

Flash forward to 2008/2009 when three things converged to inspire the jump from being "veggie focused" to vegan. The first was my new experience of living with an animal. Actually 4 animals in a 1 bedroom NYC walk-up. The first being my girlfriend Faith's cat Isabel, followed soon after by the three 1-day old kittens she found abandoned and on death's doorstep along the side of a road. The kittens were supposed to stay a month or 2 tops and then be given away (4 cats in a 1 bedroom? come on!). We're going on 7 months now and I am deeply in love with all of them. They have made me remember how much animals are like ourselves. I'm sure other dog or cat owners relate. I don't feel like animals that are socially acceptable to eat, like cows or pigs or chickens, are terribly different. They may exhibit different behaviors, just like a cat exhibits drastically different behaviors from a dog, but they all feel pain and fear, and love for their children.

The second thing that I believe had an impact, was my interest in recent years in meditation and buddhist flavored philosophies. People often assume that buddhism has a "rule" that you must be vegetarian. Not so. The buddha himself would eat meat if he knew that the meat was not prepared specifically for him. Its really more that vegetarianism follows naturally from the buddhist's practice. Buddhism, or meditative practices in general are really about one thing. Paying attention. Retraining your mind to stay aware of what's going on around you and not get lost following the rush hour of thoughts that race through our minds. Sounds simple, but its not. In fact, not paying attention is why I believe I found it so easy to gloss over thinking about where that side of bacon came from. As you pay attention more, a natural side effect is more compassion. Compassion for people, your noisy neighbor, yourself, your boss, your parents, and yes animals. It seems to me that when a mind isn't so busy moving on to the next, and keeping up with whatever its keeping up with, the human compassion that is naturally in us all finally gets a chance to focus on what's in front of it. Just happens, ya don't even have to try. Also, when you're in a state where you're not having many thoughts, I think its easier to catch a glimpse of what its like to be an animal, because presumably this is more like what its like for them. Their brains are wired incredibly similarly to our own, minus some of the higher thought centers. I think it must be so that animals feel pain and fear exactly as we do. And when I say exactly, I really mean exactly. As we all learn in biology, pain and fear arise in our "reptilian" brain. This is the primitive part of our brain that is called "reptilian" because it has not changed or evolved much since then and most vertebrates have the same structures. Thus, it seems that the actual way it feels to be afraid and under stress and pain as an animal should not feel any different than it does for us. Our bonus is that we also get to stress and think thoughts ABOUT the pain. Like, "oh shit that hurts! Is that going to leave a mark? Well great, won't a bruise go just perfect with my big ass and varicose veins." and so on ad infinitum...

The third of the three convergent factors was the kicker that put me over the top. I started working on a documentary called "Fresh" which I sometimes like to call "Omnivore's Dilemma: The Movie" (for those of you familiar with Michael Pollan's masterful book and exposé on our nation's agricultural practices of the same title). In fact, Michael Pollan is one of the talking heads in the film. "Fresh" is not a film about veganism by any stretch. But it does show the underbelly of the livestock industry (actually, the industry is really mostly underbelly, there's not much else to it). It juxtaposes the harsh realities of the industry with a few pioneers who skillful demonstrate the way things COULD be done. It demonstrates how these pioneers are able to raise animals for slaughter in a much more humane, really beautiful way. It shows us how it can be both more profitable and relatively simple to adopt such a system and the wonders it could do for our environment, our pocketbooks, our health, and animal welfare. And it shows that the reason we're not adopting these practices is at least partially due to the influence of 3 mega corporations and their lobbyists protecting their interests. The thing that really hit me in the heart, and how it came to be that I decided to go vegan while watching a film that still was about killing animals (albeit humanely), was this gorgeous scene on one of the "good" farms. A pig had just birthed a litter of piglets that morning and they were all running around freely and happy and were just the most innocent, curious, cutest things. They truly reminded me of my kittens, and it made me cry each time I saw it to think of all the piglets born into the hell that is the factory farm. Being confused and unaware and subject to such a life of torture. On a factory farm, pigs and chicken and cows live out their entire brief life in cages often just big enough for a single animal to fit in, unable to even turn around. Tails are chopped off (or beaks if you're a chicken) without anesthesia to prevent animals from damaging each other under the stressed conditions. Pigs are neutered while wide awake, also without anesthesia. Babies are separated from their mothers at birth. This is just the beginning of it. Its horrifying really. Anyway, as an editor, you need to watch a film a few thousand times over the course of a project and by the second week, I just felt I didn't want to support our backward system anymore in any way. I also learned that eggs and milk producers treat the animals no better than they do animals raised for meat (and they are eventually all used for meat anyway). And, I found that the "free range", "grassfed" or even organic labeling when it comes to meat or dairy products is basically a load of chickenshit (pun intended) and is marginally better than a factory farm if at all when talking about animal cruelty. So, I slowly started trying to avoid milk and eggs. I've been doing it for maybe a month or 2 now where i've been slowly phasing them out and trying out alternatives. For a little over 2 weeks now i've been able to be completely vegan. Its feels great and now I see its totally something I can do. I gotta say, its not so hard! I'm not saying i'll never eat meat or dairy or eggs again (especially if more humane meat becomes more widely available). I don't think being able to "say" you're 100% vegan is the point. The point is to do what we can. If that means taking one meal a week where you focus on eating less meat, then wonderful! If that means eating less meat whenever the thought, "well, I could get the ceasar salad without the chicken strips..." pops into our mind then wonderful! Mark Bittman, award winning chef / author of "How to Cook Everything" and NYTimes columnist has recently found supreme benefit in being a "Vegan till 6" (or in other words, being vegan until dinner, and then eating whatever he wants).
http://tinyurl.com/brzrlk
Just seeing before and after pictures of the guy could turn a person vegan.

The things I have found so far from being on the Vegan diet (after just two weeks)
• Lost the love handles real quick.
• Appetite in general has been reduced in half. Thus I am able to eat smaller portions which I have always found incredibly difficult. Ok, which I have always found impossible :).
• Feel great. Mentally and physically.

Also people have many misconceptions about getting proper nutrition as a vegetarian. Mostly about the need for protein. Google it. Its a myth. American's eat so much meat that they get over twice their protein needs (which can have bad health side effects in itself). The truth is that if you eat a diet with a variety of vegetables, then you'll get all the protein you'll ever need. Really. The only thing thing that I've found to be of perhaps legitimate concern while on a vegan diet (though the jury is still out) is vitamin B12. This is found mostly in meat we eat, but only because its made by bacteria that are found in the gut of the animals (so it actually has a vegan source). Its also made in our own gut, but its not clear if we absorb enough of it on our own. Our bodies require a incredibly minuscule amount of it and its actually been found to be the vitamin that we require the least of out of them all. Symptoms of a deficiency take 5-20 years to show up if they show up at all and can then be easily reversed (though if left untreated, serious damage can result). Its often fortified into vegan foods anyway, or you can take a weekly supplement. If you eat any kind of meat or dairy on a regular basis you'll be more than covered as I understand. Please don't take my word for it. Google it. (funny how google became the gospel isn't it?). And always consult your doctor before starting any kind of diet or exercise regimen. (that one I just threw in there because I thought it might be fun to say. It was kinda fun).

Ok, now info on what i've been eating and some tips about things that get me through the day:
I'm no gourmet and no foodie, much as I love to eat, I don't discriminate. I also don't have much time to cook these days (though i'm looking to change that). So this is what I do, but someone who does have time to cook can have a vastly wider range of options than what i will present (which you may still consider pretty wide).

Breakfast:
Keys here are my milk and butter replacements.
• Butter - Earth Balance buttery spread. So yummy. Tastes like butter to me. This lets me have bagels or toast whenever I want. Also there are some good cream cheeses, but i haven't tried them yet.
• Milk - Not a fan of Silk or any soy milk. Yuck, but great if you are. I thought this might be a big problem early on, but Mark Bittman introduced me to other milks. I tried Pacific Oat milk. Bingo. Milk-like, mildly sweet, no weird aftertaste. Now I can have cereal too! Almond milk is also great.

Lunch - I work right next to Whole Foods, so this makes lunch a no brainer. Lunches there are exquisite. Elaborate vegetable dishes of many varieties are always available and always changing. I get a big lunch plate for maybe $8. Usually can't even finish it and so I save it for later, and its delicious. Also they have a hot salad bar with several vegan choices including indian food and veggie sushi. Can't go wrong.

Dinner - Often i'll make a big salad with fresh veggies and nuts and raisins etc. Yum. I'm good. However, if someone had told me that's what i'd be eating, I would have been like, "um. no." Also sometimes I'll have tofu dogs (key is a nice hot dog bun and condiments. I like Smart Dogs or Yves brand dogs). Also found a vegan cheese that I like a lot called Follow Your Heart Vegan Gourmet Cheese. I've only tried the mozzarella so far. Butter up some bread slices with Earth balance, and fry yourself up a grilled cheese. YumYum! Then there also local fare. My local pizza place Freddie and Peppers makes an incredible soy cheese slice, and the local hummus place("The Hummus Place") is bar none the best hummus i've had. And chinese food is always an option with lots of choices. I'll be coming up with more dinner options as I get further into it i'm sure. Any suggestions are welcome!

DESSERT! - Toffuti Cuties. These are little mini ice cream sandwiches. All vegan. I don't like the chocolate kind. I do like the vanilla kind. I LOVE the key lime pie flavor. It will hold its own against any key lime bar vegan or otherwise.
Uncle Eddies Vegan Cookies. Love these guys as well. Especially the chocolate chip ones. Amazing. Will hold its own against any cookie vegan or otherwise. I realize thats a bold statement. Ok, maybe its too bold. I'm just saying they're good damnit! Chocolate - If you like dark chocolate I like Tropical Source brand a lot. Haven't tried their other varieties.

So ya see folks, it ain't so bad. And living in NYC sure helps when you are unable to cook much. I've only barely touched on it in this entry, but you can help the planet, your health, your weight, your pocketbook, and spare some furry cuties from hellish oblivion through the simple act of reducing your meat intake. I could also certainly see people doing this diet for the money savings, weight loss and reduced appetite alone.

Hope that was of help, and lots of Love,
Eric

p.s. for those interested, "Fresh" is a movie directed by Ana Sofia Joanes, and will be released soon. Info to follow as it arrives.



The photo in today's blog is ©2009 Eric M