The Evils of "Health"

Food plays a vital role in every single person on Earth's life. It is the one constant among all people, and thus is often being examined. In a world with so many options of what to eat, people are afraid they could be eating the wrong thing. Worried that their food could be bad for them, the environment, farmers, or animals people turn to dietary recommendations. One of the biggest healthy eating “ideologies” is the one of vegetarianism, and the smaller, but growing, sect of veganism. Vegetarianism dictates one should eat no meat, veganism though dictates that one should eat no animal products at all. These two dietary plans differ in their severity towards restricting the intake of animal products, but not in the reasons to follow these restrictions; which often involve appeals that focus on the environment, health and animal rights. While often coming from a good place, the diets of vegans and vegetarians actually turn them into hypocritical people who live under a dictatorial and destructive ideology.

Saving the environment is one of the greatest appeals that persons opposed to the consumption of animal products have in their arsenals. This appeal consists a string of “facts” meant to shame meat eaters into ceasing to consume meat, such as “a staggering 51 percent or more of global greenhouse-gas emissions are caused by animal agriculture” (PETA) The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) instead says that this number is 14.5%, and could be reduced by 30% while sustaining the current meat supply. (The Guardian) The difference in these studies is simple, the one that claims 51% adds numerous things to CO2 emissions that are erroneous, like the claim that ⅓ of animal  emissions can be from animals breathing. This is an outrageous difference, yet even organizations such as the PETA, a major proponent at the forefront of the argument for the vegan or vegetarian diets, use faulty statistics. Data so incorrect that to proclaim it as fact is to not understand it or to willfully spread disinformation. In reality, vegan and vegetarian diets don’t actually really reduce a carbon footprint at all. Since to sustain such a diet a variety of foods is necessary to avoid malnutrition, foods that must be flown in from across the world. In the end, the footprint balances out to those who eat meat anyway. (CNN) Plus there is not only the effect on the globe, but on the long term good for humanity. If the United States became vegan it could support 735 million people, while if the restrictions were to be made less extreme and the U.S. was to be vegetarian it could support 807 million people. In fact, it was found in the same study that diets consisting of 20-40% meat were actually significantly more sustainable than any diet that was meat free. (NOVA)

Eat healthy. The ideology of dietary restrictions consistently insists that their diets can be tied to numerous health benefits. The PETA says “all our dietary needs, even as infants and children, are best supplied by a meatless diet.” This statement is not altogether false, but this system of eating is not altogether as safe as it would suggest. Such as a case in Georgia where two parents received life sentences after starving their baby to death on a “vegan diet”, (Daily Mail) or another case in Italy where a 14 month old baby was found to be malnourished and weighing the same as a baby that was 3 months old after being fed a vegan diet. (Washington Post) These two cases are examples of issues with veganism, that the diet itself is naturally lacking several nutrients extremely important to human development normally found in meat. Italy is in the process of passing a law that would institute a four year penalty on parents who enforce a vegan diet on their kids, after three other such cases involving malnourished children under vegan diets. (BBC) It is often easy to tie a host of health benefits to a vegetarian diet, as a study in Austria found that they have lower BMI’s. (Medical University of Graz) The PETA spouts numerous facts claiming those who eat vegan or vegetarian diets are less likely to have heart attacks or cancer. This forgets to factor in that people who follow these diets are also less likely to smoke, consume tobacco, and are wealthier something the study from Austria did do. Vegetarians were found to suffer more from anxiety or depression, chronic diseases and a 50% increase in heart attacks and cancer. This is then portrayed as the “healthy” diet.

Animal rights rest on the crux of vegan or vegetarian arguments. People don’t want to hurt animals, and they see the industry that creates animal products as being abusive. If someone has a guilty conscience about eating meat then they can become vegetarian, or even go vegan. What can’t be done though is guilt those who would like to eat meat into following a diet that is less sustainable, needs supplements to make up for lost vitamins, has the same carbon footprint as eating meat, and can hurt one’s children. The sort of behavior by organizations like the PETA and the vegans and vegetarians who support it is akin to a cult, they ignore facts and dogmatically push their arguments. They ignore that their diets meant to be champions of healthy and the ecosystem go against everything they claim to believe in, and instead insist on lying about the subject. It pushes veganism and vegetarianism on people, dietary restrictions than can actually force people to sacrifice something that can be a large part of their lives and happiness, meat eating. For now though, the structure that pushes veganism and vegetarianism is harsh and hypocritical, often having to use downright lies or bad science to support their ideas. Vegans and vegetarians use propaganda, and they share company in history with fellow infamous vegetarian Adolf Hitler who too used system wide deceit and denial of reality to push his ideology.

Why this is my best possible 2fer: 

For me 2fers were at first just assignments, but the longer I did them they became easier and I decided that I did my best work when I was having fun. My first 2fer was about human attention span, it was an interesting enough topic but I just couldn't really get interested. What I was writing about was too factual and too easily agreeable. As time has gone on, I have tried to make my 2fers more outrageous and to prove ideas that can be difficult to approach or prove. I decided to make this 2fer the climax of that, to prove a point that had little to no evidence in actuality to back it up and to prove it with a relation of events and data. This is my best possible 2fer because I made it fun and made a claim that seemed ludicrous relevant and believable by the end of the paper. 

Works Cited:

1. "Going Vegan Isn’t the Most Sustainable Option for Humanity." PBS. Public Broadcasting Service, 16 Aug. 2016. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/next/earth/going-vegan-isnt-actually-th/

2. "Italy proposal to jail vegans who impose diet on children." BBC News. BBC, 10 Aug. 2016. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-37034619

3. Thompson, Paul. "Vegan couple will serve life sentences for starving baby to death on a diet of soy milk and apple juice." Daily Mail Online. Associated Newspapers, 13 Sept. 2011. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2036671/Vegan-couple-serve-life-sentences-starving-baby-death-extreme-diet.html

4. "Factory Farming: Misery for Animals." PETA. PETA, n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/factory-farming/

5. "Disadvantages of Being a Vegetarian." HealthGuidance.org. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://www.healthguidance.org/entry/11183/1/Disadvantages-of-Being-a-Vegetarian.html

6. Martindale, Wayne. "Is a vegetarian diet better for the planet?" CNN. Cable News Network, 06 Feb. 2017. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/06/health/vegetarian-diet-conversation/

7. Dye, Lee. "Researcher: Vegetarian Diet Kills Animals Too." ABC News. ABC News Network, 01 May 1970. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=97836&page=1

8. "Meat and the Environment." PETA. PETA, n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/meat-environment/

9. Bryce, Emma. "Do the UN's new numbers for livestock emissions kill the argument for vegetarianism?" The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, 27 Sept. 2013. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/world-on-a-plate/2013/sep/27/environment-food-ipcc-emissions-greenhouse-gas-livestock-vegetarian-meat

10. "Vegan Diets: Healthy and Humane." PETA. PETA, n.d. Web. 30 Apr. 2017.

http://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/animals-used-food-factsheets/vegan-diets-healthy-humane/

11. Buckert, Nathalie T., Johanna Muckenhuber, Franziska Großscha¨dl, E´va Ra´ Sky, and Wolfgang Freidl. "Nutrition and Health – The Association between Eating Behavior and Various Health Parameters: A Matched Sample Study." Journals. Medical University of Graz, 7 Feb. 2014. Web.