We stopped eating beef 6 years ago, after 14 months spent gazing at one bald, over-grazed hill, which stuck out like a sore thumb from the lush rainforest outside our home in Belize. A year later, we stopped eating all other forms of animal flesh. It seemed unethical to support the destruction of natural habitats to feed our appetite for flesh.
We had read that each pound of feedlot beef can “cost” up to 25 pounds of grain and 2,500 gallons of water. We could no longer justify eating at the top of the food chain, when billions of people suffer from malnutrition and have no access to safe water. According to Vegan Wolf “An estimated 85 percent of all U.S agricultural land is used in the production of animal foods.”
Meanwhile, the beef industry struggles to defend it’s right to feed animal protein to cattle:
To Prevent Mad Cow Disease, F.D.A. Proposes New Restrictions on Food for Animals
The new proposal still allows chickens, pigs and other noncattle animals to be fed material that some scientists consider potentially infectious, including the brains and spinal cords of young animals, and the eyes, tonsils, intestines and nerves of older ones.
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The major meat processors that also own rendering plants, Mr. Stauber said, want to keep exporting cheap protein or feeding it to their own animals and have lobbied hard to keep the right to do so.
The idea of cattle eating pieces of other animals is disgusting and strengthens our decision to further eliminate animal products from our diet. Last year, we cut our consumption of dairy and eggs in half, and as of today will only buy organic dairy products and free-range eggs.
