No, I am not a vegan and here is why. In my farming practices, I try to follow the guidelines developed by the Savory Institute (https://www.savory.global). Basically, Savory encourages farmers to use livestock to rebuild soil – thus increasing the soils ability to sequester carbon - through a practice of active herd and pasture management.
Say you have 100 acres, you divide that 100 acres into smaller paddocks. You let the herd eat from one just long enough to eat down the grasses – but not completely – and then move them to a new paddock, chickens usually follow behind. This process stimulates growth in the eaten pasture, introduces fertilizer in the form of both cow and chicken manure, and both animals turn the soil as the walk across or scavenge it. It mimics the natural systems of the buffalo whom used to move across the great plain being forced to move by predators. Its no coincidence that as the buffalo herds have been pushed off the grasslands, the grasslands have suffered horribly.
This also means you are going to have animals that must be managed – any given paddock can only sustain so many animals so animals will have to be removed to accommodate births. To me it is a rule of life – something must die in order for something else to live. We’ve lost touch with that very basic symbiosis as we’ve gotten further and further away from our food systems.
Veganism is not healthier. Its been proven time and time again that a vegan diet does not return any significant long term health benefits as a whole. While some extremely diligent individuals might benefit – debatable – as a societal eating standard it would make for far more sick and weak people.
Veganism is monoculture. In order to get the amount of protein our bodies need, we have to supplement. For most vegans that comes in the form of soy. Soy beans are already a commodity crop (one of four) and contribute significantly to monocropping and have been found to produce significant amounts of estrogen in developing boys. I’m going to assume you get the idea behind what a mono crop is. Monocropping in turn severely degrades the soil used to grow it to the point that without heavy chemical fertilizers the land can not sustain it for long. As more and more chemical fertilizers are dumped into the soil they leech further and further into our water systems. This same practice also encourages heavy use of insecticides/fungicides. As a farmer you know not to plant the same crop in the same location year after year as it encourages the natural pests and unhealthy soil microbes of the plants to build up. In monoculture the farmer doesn’t have much of a choice so they dump on the chemicals.
In my opinion veganism is an understandable overreaction to our current, horrific system of agriculture and I fully support the idea of eating less meat and being very deliberate about the meat you eat when you do. Things like CAFOs (consolidated animal feeding operations), monoculture, reliance on chemical inputs and so on needs to end. The answer is not veganism. IMHO the answer is in getting back to our food. In knowing the farmer, in making the choice to spend a little bit more and buy food that was grown/raised with regenerative and sustainable practices and uses as humane as possible slaughtering techniques.
Savory is probably the wisest broadland/range manager ever!
if you're interested:
https://steemit.com/dtube/@bot-or-not/xyph8mnc
Well, I agree with you on some points and disagree with you on some points.
I’m not vegan. I’m whole food, plant based. I eat no soy. I’m neither sick or weak. Vegans can make bad nutritional choice and eat industrial but still vegan pseudo-food. That is what makes them sick and weak.
If anyone wants to include sustainably raised meat in their diet, it’s their choice. There’s science that seems to demonstrate health suffers as consumption levels rise.
Ultimately, it comes down to individual choice. I believe everyone can make whatever choices they want, IF they are aware of the consequences and are willing to accept them.
Couldn't agree with you more. I too am deliberate in my choices about meat consumption, preferring to raise/process and/or hunt my own - that's not for everyone. And I also agree that a dedicated individual can make most diets work for them individual, it just takes diligence, more diligence then most of us are willing to put forward.
Im pretty well in full agreement with you
There have been studies done that show that plants can have some sort of "pain reaction" when leaves are clipped, etc. A carrot is a living being that, when harvested, essentially dies a long slow death in the refrigerator, until finally being finished off. So to me I wonder, if vegans consider all life too "sacred" to kill, then do they consider that they are killing vegetables too? Another thing that many do not realize is that crops such as quinoa, for instance, are being grown and marketed so heavily to people who follow fad diets, that it sometimes requires deforestation in South America, as well as displacement of native peoples, and unfair low working wages for those peoples who cannot afford to buy and eat their own native diet of quinoa anymore... It is all quite fascinating. I agree that the reaction is understandable, but it is important to stay objective in our viewpoints... Have you heard of or read the book " The Vegetarian Myth"? It is great, albeit not so great a title...
I did read it, I think she makes some great points. I'm not against veganism at all, its not for me but to each their own, that said, I don't think - for a myriad of reasons, its sustainable on a global scale. Less meat consumption, most certainly and completely getting away from factory farmed meats.
Indeed. I agree...