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From: Keith ( -207.216.61.173)
In Reply to: Why go vegan? posted by WhitneyXveg on April 3, 2008 at 7:47 am:
I am not about to tell you what you "should" do. I'll tell you instead why I went vegan and why I stay vegan... I was lacto-ovo-veg for many years for ethical reasons. As a Buddhist, I thought it was wrong to eat the flesh of sentient beings. I didn't eat many eggs, though I didn't avoid foods containing them. I never even thought of not eating dairy products. I worked first on cutting out products of slaughter. So, I avoided leather and silk, for example. The breakthrough occurred when I found out about rennet in cheese. Who knew that cheese contained slaughterhouse products too? I tried to find rennet-free cheese, but it was too difficult to do. So I cut out cheese altogether. By this time, I had heard of veganism. I thought, "I'm about 95% there, why not go all the way?" Besides, I was aware of a growing lactose intolerance, so it was easy to give up milk. Since then, I have become more aware of the issue of animal exploitation: that killing is not the only way that we are unfair to animals. Even keeping an animal in "humane" conditions for our own use is a form of slavery, because it is the "use" that makes them slaves, not the conditions they are kept in. A further reinforcement is the health benefits I experience. My athletic performance increased dramatically when I went vegan: my time for a cross-country ski marathon jumped from 4:30 to 4:00 from one year to the next. I like it that being vegan makes me a more conscious consumer. Instead of just buying whatever I see, I make myself stop and ask what it is made of and where it came from. I think this is important. So, as you can see, many reasons. Keith
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