re: Anyone on here Vegan or Vegetarian?

I'm a vegetarian, not vegan. I have been one since I was a teenager, and now I'm in my 40s. Growing up in the deep south, you would think it would be tough or you would get picked on, but besides the recurring jokes from isolated close minded idiots, everybody from friends to work colleagues to random people I meet have all been supportive, cool, and always willing to discuss the differences in philosophies.

It's actually not hard at all, especially if you include all the ethnicities in your diet. "American" veggie food isn't very creative or healthy, but every other culture offers delicious, healthy, and an amazing spectrum of options. Whether it's Indian, Mexican, Thai, Chinese, Greek/Lebanese, Peruvian, Japanese, African, Haitian, Central American, Italian, German, etc etc etc, they all have so much variety, spice, and amazing taste.

My wife isn't vegetarian, but she's become moreso, maybe about 90% veggie since we got married. Our 3 young kids are not vegetarian, and we want them to decide what's best for them when they come of age.

To each their own...

What about pig

quote:

---

I went vegan for a week and felt amazing

But cows are delicious

---

There is a theory about the jump in evolution from apes to humanoids. Has to do with going from a basic vegan diet to eating a lot of protein. Apparently, they think that's what jump started brain development............or it was aliens.


Another note of interest. A good friend of mine went vegan for a while. Mainly due to his hippy, new wife. I gave him a hard time about it, and he informed me that Roman gladiators were mostly vegan. I looked it up and found out that was true. But, I delved a little deeper to find out why. By giving up meat, they put on a bunch of fat that made it harder to be killed. Showed this to my friend. He's back to eating meat now.

Soccer board.

affirmative
i love vegetables
ribeyes too…

I’m not a twink so no.

Yes. It was a confluence of events and a gradual process.

Almost 10 years ago, I had an accident that left me in a wheelchair (though I eventually worked up to a walker). I gained over 100 lbs and figured the good part of my life was over. Eventually, I got diagnosed right on the line between "prediabetic" and full-blown type 2 diabetes, and I was prescribed metformin.

I don't remember what it was, but whatever I ate for dinner the night before that was the last time I set out to consume meat and dairy. I've had a little on a few social occasions where it would have felt unacceptable in my mind to decline due to the situation.

I decided to go the plant-based route because I'd read several books over the years about diet and diabetes, because of my grandpa, and Neal Barnard's books resonated with me for whatever reason.

Anyway, it worked like a charm. I was off the metformin and a 10-year prescription for hypertension in two months. I went from 270 to 150 lbs in a little over a year (I'm 5'8"). I was off the walker in 3 months, off the cane soon after, and doing 120 miles a week with a 30-pound pack in two years.

My path from nutrition-based plant-based eating to ethical veganism is fairly common and went like this: I tried plant-based eating > I had successful results and felt amazing > I realized that I'm in better shape physically and mentally at 40 years old, after a debilitating accident, than I was as a 20 year old infantryman> I now knew I didn't need animal products to thrive mentally and physically = only reason left to consume that I could think of was valuing my own taste buds over a life raised in unknown conditions.

I'm sure lots of cows are out there living amazing lives, and I have no ethical objection to responsible hunting and consumption of game meat. I'd just rather not frick with it, to the extent possible, myself. Yeah, I know animals and insects die in plant agriculture but it's not about a purity test or trying to achieve 'pure veganism' for me.

I'm just trying to live life in alignment within an ethical framework based on my own experiences in a world full of everyone else trying to do the same. I have no expectations of anyone conforming to my own independent conclusions nor do I judge them for living the same way I did for most of my life.