2000-05-13
vegetarian manifesto, posted at 21:53:56
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com I really wish I would have discovered ethnic foods earlier in my life.As I spoonfeed myself a bowl of Chinese Bean Curd and Rice from Gourmet Village, I'm kicking myself for not discovering my love of "worldly" foods earlier in my life.
I've been a vegetarian now for 4.5 years, since it was my New Year's Resolution in 1996. Before that I'd signed off red meat since I was about 15. Becoming a vegetarian was much, much easier than expected. I don't miss meat at all, and whatever twinges of longing I have for it (i.e. at a barbecue, or with cold sandwiches at lunchtime) are easily extinguished by fake meat products that more than make up for it. Morningstar Foods makes food for the Gods. Or at least me.
I remember the moment I decided to become a vegetarian - I was at taco bell, and instead of my usual soft chicken taco, I decided to go for a bean burrito. At that moment, I decided I never needed to go back to meat. It's the only New Year's Resolution I have ever stuck to.
The impetus for my doing so was going back to my high school job. Yes, I worked at a meat processing place. It was a decent high school after-school job. The people I worked for were really nice, it was a family owned business, and my duties of sweeping, mopping, helping with catering, working the cash register, etc., were never too hard. But I eventually got really sick of what we were churning out. Beef looks the grossest throughout the process of, well, making it, so that was the first to be eliminated from my diet. Other meats dropped out of my diet until there were none left that I could eat. Chicken stayed with me the longest because the store never actually processed chickens. Most other animals were brought in whole (or, gasp, sometimes even alive... though I rarely if ever saw their demises, thank god), so I would see (though not do) most of the processing of them. Anyhow, I held this job from my sophomore year of high school on, then went back to work during breaks from school. I don't look back at my time working there badly -- the pay was decent, the people nice, and my exposure to the more base elements of the meat industry was very small. But I kept thinking, "If this is how we do it, I wonder how other, less friendly places do it?". It was enough to make me switch over from carnivore to vegetarian.
Other factors helped -- my sister was a vegetarian at the time, although she's fallen off the wagon now. There was this inspiring article in "People" magazine (sad but true). My friend Karen was one through most of high school (although she's also fallen off the wagon).
I look back at the decision to become a vegetarian as one of the most important of my life. Although I didn't necessarily do it at the time for "ethical" reasons -- I was mainly just grossed out by meat at the time -- it's become a passion for me.
There are some inconsistencies with my vegetarianism. I eat milk, cheese, eggs (in cake and bread), ice cream, etc. I think I probably wear some leather, although I'm not really sure how to tell real leather from faux leather. These are things that may someday be eliminated from my lifestyle, but not now.
I believe that to be truly compassionate in this world, to be truly about equality and liberal politics, you can't eat meat. While I can understand the eating of meat -- I did it, after all, for 18 years -- I can't understand anyone who doesn't have any problem with it, who doesn't feel some sort of guilt about it. I figure to be truly accepting, I need to be accepting of meat-eaters. But I do sometimes wonder how someone can consider themselves empathetic while eating a steak. While I'm not naive -- I know that meat eating will be prevalent throughout my lifetime and we vegetarians will never truly take over the world -- I think that whatever you can do to change the meat-eating culture is a good thing. If you think there's nothing wrong with eating meat, visit a slaughterhouse.
Anyhow, back to the original subject... ethnic foods are wonderful for vegetarianism! Much better than any "american" foods. Indian, Asian, Italian, Mexican, and Middleeastern cuisine are very vegetarian-friendly. And I kick myself every time I go to one of these restaurants for not noticing it sooner.
Sorry for the rant...
I'm lonely.
-mark