The largest epidemiological study ever undertaken between diet and disease shows a near linear relationship between animal protein consumption and cancer growth.  Toxins cause cancer, but animal protein allows it to grow.  Plant protein, on the other hand, does not promote cancer.  Check out the book, The China Study.

I have been a vegetarian for nearly 20 years.  My initial decision was based on my realization that I felt repulsion in every way at the idea of eating another living, feeling being that was capable of love, sorrow and pain.  There were several key experiences in my life that led me to make this choice and when I did, I never looked back.

I began a true journey of enlightenment.  I read books and watched films which explained and demonstrated the way animals are being killed for food and the lives they lead until their lives ended.  I was horrified.  I had been raised in a family that never discussed animal rights or how meat came to be on our plates. 

Nutrition was also not a topic of discussion in my family and I found that I needed to learn about proper nutrition and healthy cooking techniques.  I began to really enjoy vegetables and fruits and to prepare them with care, respecting their journey to my table.  Environmentalism was the third part of my understanding.  This topic is vast and just as important to me as the others.

I have encountered what I believe is every possible question and comment about being a vegetarian; from mild interest to outward hostility.  I’ve grown from each interaction.

I do feel truly enlightened to have gained so much knowledge and respect for so many aspects of life.  I believe my decision to become a vegetarian has contributed to the foundation of the person I am and effects every aspect of my life.  For me, being a vegetarian is not simply a dietary decision; it is a choice to live a way of life which demands thoughtful, ethical, intuitive, peaceable, gentle, loving, learning and teaching behaviors every day. 

I have never regretted what was once a choice I made.  Today, however, I feel there is no choice but to live my life in this way.

If being a vegetarian/vegan is a cultural/spiritual/environmental/animal rights decision I think that it is wonderful.

However, as someone with a nutrition/evolutionary biology background I would just like to point out that it is easier to get a nutritionally complete diet not eating meat in a western/upper class society.  Meat is a nutrient dense food source that many vegetarian animals will not even pass up if they have access to it.  For humans living in conditions of poverty and not having access to a varied food source - as happens to be the case for many in the world - full human cognitive and physical development is aided by having access to animal protein/fat.

The associations with meat consumption and disease usually is a result of overconsumption of meat/under consumption of whole grains and vegetables and a sedentary lifestyle.  Prehistoric peoples upon investigation of the archaeological evidence and modern day gatherers/scavengers/hunters do not have health issues from consumption of meat. 

The meat we eat -with the horrible conditions we raise animals in - and the exposure to chemicals - etc. is substandard to what would naturally be available.

The reduction of poverty world wide, the reduction of human population (and hence the implementation of humane animal
husbandry practices) could aid human health and animal rights at the same time. 

Until than - I view vegetarianism/veganism as a much needed political statement more than a necessary prescription for human health.  And I think compassionate omnivores have something to contribute also.

I heard a snatch of conversation related to Victory Gardens on These Days, Monday, Sept. 8 at about 10:45.

Please provide name and contact information for the group that is promoting Victory Gardens.  I am working with with a group interesting in restoring historic gardens at the former Naval Training Center in Point Loma.

I would like to also recommend the book THE CHINA STUDY (ISBN 1-932100-38-5).  Many local libraries have a copy.

I have been vegetarian for ten years now. I do still eat a little cheese, but no meat of any kind. And it is not popular where I come from. Me being a white male in the south, who grew up fishing and hunting, and I also work a physically demanding job. Some people are suprised and some may even feel offended of threatened that I do not eat meat. Yet this is what feels right to me.

Also, I don’t seem to fit in with most other vegetarians because of my personal beliefs about such things as politics, economics, religion, gun ownership, and other issues. So maybe that goes to show that the common people should not assume that all us vegetarians are tree hugging extreme liberal pacifists. I am me. This is what I have chosen. You can do your thing and I can do mine. Whenever one of us does something good, it can, and sometimes does, inspire others to do something good.