How to Save the World: Seven Pillars of Vegetarianism: Blog Action Day

So the title of this post is a bit grandiose, but we're talking about climate change here today, because it's Blog Action Day 2009. Think thousands of bloggers sitting in front of their computers can't change the world? Well.... you're probably right — but! That won't stop us from trying. My goal here today is not to convince you climate change is real and caused by human activity (it is), or to lecture you about the evils of modern consumer-based society and why a market system based on consumption will never, truly actively support a reduce-reuse-recycle model (it won't). My goal here today, friends, is to give you an excuse.

Actually, seven. Seven excuses, seven reasons to give up meat, to go vegetarian; seven excuses to save the world. You see, according to current studies on global warming and its major contributors, one of the most effective and easiest ways for ordinary individuals to fight global warming and help the environment is to reduce their consumption of animal products. Steve Pavlina notes in an article earlier this year:

"A 2006 United Nations report found that the meat industry produces more greenhouse gases than all the SUVs, cars, trucks, planes, and ships in the world combined. [...] In terms of greenhouse gas emissions, eating one pound of meat is equivalent to driving an SUV 40 miles."

Reducing our reliance on and support of the environmentally-devastating meat industry by cutting meat and dairy out of our diets has more impact than switching to that hybrid car or buying those energy-efficient light bulbs. Eating a vegetarian or vegan diet, especially one of mostly locally-grown organic foods, might just be the single best thing you can do to help restore the natural ecosystems of this planet, ecosystems human life evolved within and on which we depend for our future survival. And you can make the change immediately, starting today, at your very next meal. That's your first excuse.

But if that's not enough, I have six more. Vegetarianism isn't just about the environment, though that is an essential pillar in support of this lifestyle. At every level of our personal and social existence, we find compelling reasons why a vegetarian diet is not only a good idea, but a deeply meaningful choice to live with respect and gratitude as part of the natural world. The seven pillars that support this view are: biological, historical, environmental, political, ethical, psychological and spiritual. And each pillar has tied to it a strawman argument against the vegetarian diet, set up like a scarecrow to frighten people away from examining their choices too carefully. Well, consider this post a kind of Bad Wolf essay, panting and prowling through the temple, ready to blow those strawmen down.


...Follow the link to Meadowsweet & Myrrh to read more!