Ever think of becoming a vegetarian? Yes, it’s true that you won’t be able to eat that mouth-watering, greasy bacon or get a bucket of chicken from KFC, but who needs those things? They’re the insides of precious animals! I’ve only been a vegetarian for five months, but I plan on never eating meat again. I do not believe in eating animals, especially ones that have been tortured in slaughterhouses. It all boils down to this: Why eat an innocent animal when there are abundant nutrition options that are healthier, guilt-free, and eco-friendly?
For a long time, I was not informed about how unhealthy slaughterhouses are. Linda McCartney says, “If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone in the world would be a vegetarian.” People need to be more informed about the conditions of slaughterhouses. Animals are treated unbelievably inhumanely and the environment is completely unsanitary. In fact, slaughterhouses violate more laws than almost any other business. One law says the animals are not supposed to be exposed to their own kind getting slaughtered. Unfortunately, many slaughterhouses ignore that rule.
For example, in Texas, during a slaughterhouse inspection, nine live cattle were found dangling from chains. They dangled there, watching other cattle’s heads being sliced off. I don’t understand how people could be that cruel. Personally, I don’t want to eat animals that have been through all that trauma and stress. It makes me feel guilty and depressed.
How do the animals get to the slaughterhouses? In many cases, they’re forced to run there. Workers spray red chili powder in their eyes to get them to run as fast as possible. If they don’t run fast enough, they’re beaten. Think transportation in trucks is any better? Not exactly. The animals are crammed into such tiny, crowded spaces, they can hardly move…or breathe. Sometimes, if the animals have horns, they can blind other animals by accidentally jamming their horn into another animal’s eye.
One of my relatives has a hog trucking business. He says they feed the hogs a lot, so they produce a lot of meat, but a hog’s heart isn’t meant to carry three hundred pounds. In each truck load, there are at least five hogs dead because their heart exploded. If the animals are “half-dead,” they’re either shot or slammed down into the concrete and forgotten about. Those poor animals can suffer for days, or even weeks, in chronic pain.
Slaughterhouses aren’t just bad for the animals, they’re also bad for the people who work there. According to PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals), “The rate of repetitive stress injury for slaughterhouse employees is thirty-five times higher than it is for those in other manufacturing jobs.” Workers shouldn’t be getting injured that often and society should have more respect for them.
One meat company imported immigrants to the United States and promised them good jobs, but instead they were forced to live in a homeless shelter in Minnesota and work at the company’s slaughterhouse for a rate below minimum wage. The meat company believed the immigrants would not complain, for fear of being deported back to where they came from.
So yes, slaughterhouses are terrible. By not buying meat and being a vegetarian, you can help stop the severe pain these animals go through. There are a few brands that even sell “fake” meat that tastes just like the real product. That way, you can have “meat”, but not cause pain and suffering to any animals. And have you ever had a veggie burger? Oh my goodness, they’re delicious! Honestly, they’re a million times better than real meat, and healthier. Depending on the size, hamburgers contain four to seven grams of saturated fat, while the average veggie burger has less than one gram. A 2.5 ounce hamburger is about 170 calories, while a 2.5 ounce veggie burger is only 90 calories. You could basically eat two veggie burgers for the same amount of calories as a single hamburger.
On another note, most veggie burgers contain soy protein which is proven to help lower blood cholesterol. There are many different styles of veggie burgers, so if you find one you don’t like, just try another brand. Personally, I recommend Morning Star.
Have you ever heard America is the fattest country? It’s true. We consume so much food, and yet millions of people in the world are starving or have died from starvation. There is more than enough food in this world to feed everyone and we need to start distributing the food better. We waste tons of grain, corn, and soy beans to feed animals that are going to soon be killed for our eating pleasure. We should use these crops to help world hunger instead. PETA says, “If we stopped intensively breeding farmed animals and grew crops to feed humans instead, we could easily feed everyone on the planet with healthy and affordable vegetarian foods.”
For every sixteen pounds of food an animal consumes, only one pound of food from that is edible for humans. Those sixteen pounds of food should have gone towards the 925 million hungry people in the world. In 1995, there were only 780 million people hungry (which is still an incredible amount), but in 2010, 950 million people classified as hungry throughout the world. More and more animals are being slaughtered each year, which results in more grain being used. As long as the meat industry keeps increasing, so is world hunger. More people should consider becoming vegetarians, so that the meat industry will decrease.
In conclusion, this is why I feel the way I do about vegetarianism. Please consider becoming a vegetarian. I promise you it would mean a tremendous amount to the poor animals and the hungry humans out there.