A lot of people think
humans can't survive without eating meat because they will be missing out on
proteins or other nutrients. All the nutrients you find in meat can be found in other sources, you just have to do your
research. When you do a search on "
vegetarian" or "
vegan" here, you'll see people calling people who don't eat meat "fuckers" and what not for some reason not
explained. I don't have anything against eating
meat, or people who choose not to eat it. But
studies have shown vegetarians with good eating habits have lower risks for
acquiring diseases later in life, most commonly
heart disease and forms of
cancer.
Some people get a false sense of where humans actually stand in the food chain. Of course we are at the top with our technology. But just think, if you were out in the wild without technology, you'd be screwed. Most likely you'd be eaten by a bigger and stronger animal, or die from exposure to the elements. If you were to survive without aid of technology, I doubt you'd be eating meat, except maybe insects which you can catch easily. You'd look for berries, or some kind of fruit, and if none of those were around, maybe certain kinds of grasses or leaves, and you could probably live on that. But now back to reality...
Most of the destruction and extinction of plant and animal life on this planet is caused by humans producing meat products. Such as in South America, where the rain forests are destroyed at a devastating rate for ranchers to raise livestock on the land. After a couple of years, the livestock have made the soil depleted of any nutrients so no more plants can grow, so they move on to another section, ruining that area too. In other parts of the world, livestock cause soil erosion on hills and mountain sides. In the sea, fisherman's nets catch unwanted animals such as dolphins, who die of suffocation. And still whales are hunted, even though we learned the devastating effects of that early in the 20th century.
Those are just some of the reasons why some people choose to eat diets which contain no meat. This node is especially for those who wonder why people become vegetarians or vegans. Its the person's choice to eat meat or not, either way is good, but being a vegetarian seems to have more benefits for the good of everyone.