101 Reasons Why I’m a Vegetarian By Pamela Rice • SEVENTH EDITION • 2007Full-length book version (Lantern Books), info: www.vivavegie.org/101

Veal Ban Day,Astor Place

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Index and Table of Contents at www.vivavegie.org/itoc • Photographs by Pamela Rice

101 REASONS WHY I’M A VEGETARIAN

1Nearly all of the some 10 billion an-imals slaughtered for food in the

U.S. every year are the end result of abehemothic-sized swift-moving assem-bly line system, incorporating danger-ous, unprecedented, and unsustainablemethods of production. If America’sfarmers were required by law to givetheir animals humane living condi-tions, including spacious quarters,clean surroundings, fresh air, sunlight,and opportunities for social interac-tion—and if it were illegal simply todrug the animals who would otherwisedie from the conditions in which theylive—cheap meat could never exist.Time and again the industry balks ateven low-cost measures designed toimprove the animals’ plight. Priceshave been driven to levels unnatu-rally low, and, alas, a luxury goodhas been transformed into a staple.

2America’s farmed animals pro-duce 1.3 billion tons of waste per

year, or 5 tons for every U.S. citizen.(Just one cow produces 100 poundsper day.) And the pollutionstrength of it all can reach levels160 times greater than that of rawmunicipal sewage. This vast accu-mulation is not neatly contained; ma-nure is the most common pollutanttoday in America’s waters. Landsprayed with pig excrement is particu-larly toxic, since pigs contract andtransmit many human diseases—namely, meningitis, salmonella, chla-mydia, giardia, cryptosporidiosis,worms, and influenza. Manure isladen with phosphorous, nitrates, andheavy metals and emits ammonia,methane, hydrogen sulfide, carbonmonoxide, and cyanide. Manure hasalways been seen as fertilizer. But intoday’s quantities, it is an under-regu-lated industrial pollutant.

3 When people adhere to a diet richin animal fat and protein and get

little exercise, cancer risks are in-creased. Beef consumption raises thelevel of toxic substances called N-ni-troso compounds, which are formedin the large bowel. The substances arebelieved to stick to DNA, making mu-tations more likely. Dietary fiber could

be helpful in repairing the damage.But only plant foods contain it.

4 The U.N. Food and Agriculture Or-ganization estimates that 70 per-

cent of the world’s commercial fishstocks are fully exploited, overfished,or collapsed. To supply surging worlddemand, fishers use rapacious tech-niques, such as sonar, driftnets, long-lines, dredgers, and leviathan fish-packing vessels. In the case of longlin-ing, 4.5 million hooks are launcheddaily. A third of the world’s harvestedfish go to feed livestock or farmed fish.The ocean’s interconnected ecosystemsimply cannot keep pace. Now, 90 per-cent of the coveted top predator fish

are gone. Consequently, fishers havemoved down the food web to speciesonce considered “trash.” These species,of course, are the food source of thefish that were initially overfished. In2006, a report published in the journalScience gave the world until 2048 for allwild commercial stocks to be wipedout. The world could be left to fishnothing but jellyfish and bait.

5The Humane Slaughter Act requiresthat mammals be rendered insensi-

ble to pain before being slaughtered. AWashington Post series in 2002, how-ever, exposed a packing industry hardpressed to follow this law. Animalswere found regularly butchered aliveon speeded-up conveyor lines. A reso-lution that the Humane law be fol-lowed to the letter did become part ofthe U.S. Farm Bill. But long after thepoliticians enjoyed their photo-ops,

the live butchering surely continues.Appropriated Farm Bill funds endedup being diverted to food-safety in-spectors already employed. In the end,it almost doesn’t matter. The Humanelaw does not even apply to 99 percentof animals slaughtered, because poul-try and fish are not covered by it.

6A meat diet dramatically raises yourrisk for heart attack, but in recent

years you’re less likely to die from thetrauma. Technology will probably saveyour life, leaving you to live with theconsequences. In the case of conges-tive heart failure—an increasinglycommon outcome—your heart, nowdamaged, is unable to adequately cir-

culate blood to the rest of yourbody, resulting in fluid build-upand organ damage. In the U.S.,nearly 5 million people live withthe condition, and about 550,000new cases are diagnosed every year.The disease is the leading cause ofhospitalization among the elderly,and hospital bills attributed to ittotal $29 billion annually.

7 Pigs are naturally anything butdirty and brutish and, if given

half a chance, display high intelli-gence. Ask Professor Stanley Curtis ofPennsylvania State University. Hetaught several pigs to understand com-plex relationships between objects andactions in order to play video games.Curtis, along with his colleagues,found these creatures to be focused,creative, and innovative—equal in in-telligence to chimpanzees. Other re-searchers have found chickens to begood at solving problems, cows to re-spond to music, and fish to be as indi-vidualistic as dogs.

8 Approximately 800 million peopletoday live with chronic hunger,

and 16,000 children die from hunger-related causes every day. Yet the worldcycles nearly 43 percent of all thegrain that is harvested through ani-mals to produce meat. To get a feedlotsteer to gain a pound, you need 7pounds of corn. Likewise, additionalpounds of pig, chicken, and farmedfish will cost you, respectively, 3.5, 2,and 3 pounds in feed. Of course, large

Extinct Is Forever: Commercial fish stocks gone, 2048

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101 REASONS WHY I’M A VEGETARIAN

portions of the added weight turn intoinedible tissue, such as bones. Themeat industry does endeavor to in-crease feed-to-flesh efficiency, but the“improvements” sadly come via ge-netic tinkering, growth enhancingdrugs, and questionable feed.

9About 25 million pounds of antibi-otics are fed to U.S. livestock every

year primarily for growth promotion.This is almost eight times the amountadministered to humans. Though per-fectly legal, the practice is leading tothe selection of antibiotic-resistant bac-teria and adding to the general world-wide crisis of drug-resistant disease. Theconsumption of meat contaminatedwith these superbugs raises thethreat of human illnesses thatphysicians are unable to treat.

10Every year, Americans suf-fer from approximately 76

million illnesses, 325,000 hospi-talizations, and 5,000 deathsfrom something they ate. Thatsomething was probably of ani-mal origin. The main culprits areE. coli, salmonella, listeria, andcampylobacter. The annual costto the U.S. for the top-five food-borne pathogens, all predomi-nantly associated with animal-derived foods: $6.9 billion.

11Bypass surgery requires thatyour rib cage be opened, your

heart stopped, and your body hookedup to an external pumping machineso a vein from some other part of yourbody can be removed and grafted as areplacement blood vessel to yourheart. Memory, language ability, andspatial orientation remain impaired in10 to 50 percent of bypass patients sixmonths afterward. Side effects forsome never go away. Gloom and de-pression affect between a third andthree-quarters of patients. Many willrequire a second operation. A vegetar-ian diet, regular exercise, and spiritualnourishment have proven to reverseheart disease—the biggest killer inWestern countries.

12To supply the corn and soybeansto feed the livestock to bring

daily meat to America’s dinner plates

has meant concentrated levels of pesti-cides, fertilizers, and farm chemicalscontaminating many aquifers acrossthe Midwest. Some towns have cometo rely on their neighbors for fresher,though expensive, supplies of water.But a recent boom in cattle and pig op-erations has poisoned these stores aswell, prompting plans for government-subsidized pipelines to link towns withmajor rivers. Some, however, see suchcostly schemes as ill-advised and thesubsidized water as exactly what gotthe towns in trouble in the first place.

13Eating a plant-based diet guardsagainst disease: first in an active

way with complex carbohydrates,

phytochemicals, antioxidants, vita-mins, minerals, and fiber. Then by de-fault: the more plant foods you eat,the less room you have for animalfoods that clog arteries with choles-terol, strain kidneys with excess pro-tein, and burden the heart with satu-rated fat. Clinical studies have shownthat meat-free diets reverse diabeticsymptoms and reduce cholesterol lev-els by about as much as the use of cho-lesterol-lowering drugs.

14Livestock production is responsi-ble for 18 percent of greenhouse

gas emissions measured in CO2 equiva-lent, a share 38 percent higher thanthat emitted by all the world’s vehicles.Domesticated animals worldwide arethe source of 37 percent of all human-induced methane, with most of thatcoming from intestinal fermentation

of ruminants. They also are the sourceof 65 percent of human-induced ni-trous oxide, the great majority frommanure. Methane and nitrous oxideare exceedingly more potent green-house gases than carbon dioxide. Live-stock are also behind almost two-thirdsof all human-induced ammonia emis-sions, which contribute significantlyto acidification of ecosystems.

15Governments try to regulate fish-ing gear, catch size, species, and

fishing season, but usually withoutsuccess. Perhaps the biggest singlethreat to global fish stocks is illegal,unreported, or unregulated (IUU) fish-ing, which, it is estimated, amounts to

about a quarter of the world’scatch. In some locations, IUUfishing has been documented toamount to four times the legalcatch. Efforts to combat piracyare fraught with obstacles, notthe least being feverish worlddemand for fish. For pirates, thereturn on investment is wellworth the risks of side-steppingfishing conventions, skirtingsurveillance, off-loading fish toother boats that “launder” thecatch, and docking at complicitports. Because when pirates areactually caught, the penaltiestend to be inordinately light.

16Egg-laying hens in the U.S. arecrammed into battery cages, each

with 4 to 8 other birds, stacked in rowsby the tens of thousands. Manure androtting-carcass fumes billow up frombelow. Beetles form a layer over thewaste. Some birds get loose and drownin the pit. Others get tangled in thewire and die of dehydration, then de-compose, covered in bugs, while cagemates have no escape. Intense stresssets birds to attack one another. After17 months of confinement, necks arecovered with blisters, wings bare,combs bloody, and feet torn. By now,the birds are considered an expenseand will be disposed of, expediently.

17Early in 2007, Consumer Reportstested 525 supermarket chickens

from all across the U.S. and foundonly 17 percent free of both salmo-

Global Warming: Livestock, worse than world’s cars

Everything about caged life for a battery hen spells unmitigatedcruelty. There is no way out for these and hundreds of millionsof hens like them as every urge is thwarted and every instinctoverridden. This image taken as part of an activist investigation.

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nella and campylobacter. Premiumbrands labeled “organic” or “raised freeof antibiotics” actually harbored moresalmonella than conventional ones.Most of the bacteria were resistant to atleast one type of antibiotic, makingfood poisoning from eating poultrythat much harder to treat. Some sam-ples showed resistance to multipleclasses of antibiotics.

18Two major studies have emergedrecently that show the vegan

lifestyle to be conducive to lower bodyweight. A Swedish study of 55,000women and a British study of 65,000men and women both found vegans tohave lower BMIs (body mass index)and to suffer less often from obesity.Vegan food tends to be lower in calo-ries by volume. And since plant-basedfare is likely to contain abundant fiber,it satiates quicker.

19Half of every butchered cow and athird of every butchered pig be-

comes either byproduct material orwaste. And “mortalities” are integral toevery feedlot and stockyard. What’s anindustry to do with all this death andgore? Call the renderer straightaway!Recycling, they call it. Lips are exportedto Mexico for taco filling; horns aremade into gelatin; other parts are fash-ioned into drugs, aphrodisiacs, and in-dustrial ingredients. Much is dried to atacky brown powder to be mixed intochicken and pig feed. The rest isminced, pulverized, and boiled downfor cosmetics and household products.Essentially, assume slaughterhousebyproduct is all around you.

20Of all the animals in America whosuffer cruelty, 95 percent of them

are farmed animals. Designated as eco-nomic units, they have convenientlybeen stripped of all protections againstabuse. At the federal level, the AnimalWelfare Act simply does not apply tofarmed animals. At the state level,where laws might pick up the slack,anti-cruelty statutes are either not en-forced or have, in recent years, been re-written to exclude farmed animals. Inthe case of the latter, if a farming prac-tice is established as “accepted,” “com-mon,” “customary,” or “normal”—no

matter how inhumane—anti-crueltyprotections are overridden. In essence,it’s the criminals dictating the laws tosuit their designs.

21In the mid-1970s, chicken proces-sors argued that in order to keep

up with skyrocketing demand theyshould be allowed to merely rinse offfecal matter from bird carcasses ratherthan cut away affected parts. The gov-ernment gave in to the processors’ re-quest, and the rule stands to this day. Anumber of studies have since provedthat rinsing carcasses, even up to 40times, is ineffective at dislodging thefilth. It’s something to know since theviolent motion of factory defeatheringrubber fingers not only works to squirtfeces out from the carcasses, it can pushfilth deep the crevices of the birds’ skin.

22Several of the world’s mightiestrivers no longer reach the sea, and

aquifer levels around the world aredropping by dozens, and even hun-dreds, of feet. Largely responsible is thefivefold increase in worldwide (water-guzzling) meat production that’s takenplace over the last half-century, and thetrend is not over. Producing a pound ofanimal protein requires about 100times the water to produce a pound ofvegetable protein. It takes about 1,300gallons of water to produce a singlehamburger. Seventy percent of thewater that is pulled from the world’srivers, lakes, and underground wellsgoes to agriculture, and 43 percent ofthe world’s grain goes to feed animalsfor meat.

23Feedlot meat is a product of theoil age. When cheap oil is gone,

cheap meat will be history. A pound ofbeef takes three-quarters of a gallon ofoil to produce, according to NationalGeographic. A 1,250-pound steer essen-tially embodies 283 gallons of oil.Thirty-five calories of fossil fuel areneeded to produce a single calorie ofbeef protein. By comparison, only twocalories of fossil fuel are required to pro-duce one calorie of tofu.

24Today’s confined cattle live intheir own excrement, which is the

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101 REASONS WHY I’M A VEGETARIAN

grate to edible portions during dehid-ing, thanks to line speeds of 390 ani-mals per hour and laborers who are notalways properly skilled. Ground beeftoday is made up of mixtures ofhundreds or even thousands ofanimals. The grinding processbrings surface pathogens topatty interiors thatmay, down the line,not be cooked ade-quately. A univer-sity study found thatO157:H7 may also beharbored in the interiorof a solid piece of meat.

25Wild salmon stocks in 20Norwegian rivers have in re-

cent years been wiped out by aparasite that first took hold inlocal aquaculture feedlots. Scot-land’s river managers warnedearly in 2007 that one carelessangler spreading the parasite coulddecimate Scotland’s wild salmonstocks as well. Pharmaceuticals andpesticides are typically added to allaquaculture pens to forestall diseaseand infection, sometimes doing nei-ther and inadvertently causing envi-ronmental havoc.

26Birds are cheap and cages are ex-pensive, so battery hens live out

their dreary days in space just aboutthe size of their own bodies. No hengets to run, build a nest, enjoy acleansing dust bath, protect a chick,forage in the sun, perch, fly, or evenlift a wing. Instead, this creature willcrouch and suffer and fend off thefeather pulling of cage mates. Andevery egg that is laid will roll awaydown the slope of a wire floor, whichwill also cripple her legs and feet.

27The senseless waste of theworld’s growing meat-centered

diet is illustrated by a hypotheticalstatement put forth by the PopulationReference Bureau: “If everyoneadopted a vegetarian diet and no foodwere wasted, current [food] produc-tion would theoretically feed 10 bil-lion people [49 percent more peoplethan alive today], more than the pro-jected population for the year 2050.”

28By some assessments, the H5N1strain of bird flu, which origi-

nated in Asia and is now spreadingacross Europe and Africa, has the po-tential to disrupt life on planet Earthsecond only to global nuclear war.Others predict that if the strain mu-

tates, perhaps just slightly, abird-flu pandemic could killmore than 140 million peo-ple and put a halt to[U.S.]$4.4 trillion in worldeconomic activity. Influenzapandemics generally come

three times per century, andwe’re overdue for our next. Any

strain of influenza that humans con-tract, including H5N1, wouldscarcely exist if people had never do-mesticated poultry.

29Every spring, neighbors ofchicken feedlots in North

Carolina desperately complainabout the stench. It is then thatammonia-laden fumes from

adjacent manure la-goons begin to perme-ate everything porousthat they own: clothes,rugs, drapes, andhair—haunting themfor weeks. But unlikethe state’s infamouspork industry of 10 millionhogs, poultry growing is virtuallyexempt from environmental reg-ulation. For North Carolina’s 165million tightly confined birds,there are no rules, because theirwaste is considered less nox-ious. But over a year’s time, the drop-pings and mortalities accumulate inpits below to about a foot deep and, tosome, smell even worse than lagoonsof pig excrement. Nearby wells becometainted from runoff, but it’s nearly im-possible to trace this kind of pollutionback to the polluter.

30A male calf born to a dairy cow:what’s a farmer to do with this

by-product of the milk industry? If heis not kept for breeding stock or im-mediately slaughtered or factory-pro-duced for meat, the calf will be raisedfor fancy veal. To this end, he will be

locked up in a stall and chained by hisneck to prevent him from turningaround for 16-weeks until slaughter.He’ll be fed a special diet without ironor roughage. He’ll be injected with an-tibiotics and hormones to keep himalive and to make him grow. And he’llbe kept in darkness except for feedingtime. The result: a nearly full-grownanimal with flesh as tender and whiteas a newborn’s.

31The world’s exploding humanpopulation, combined with its

sagging ability to feed itself, appear tobe on a collision course. The GreenRevolution, which facilitated much ofthe recent growth, has clearly stalledout. Indeed, cereal availability percapita has been declining since 1984,and the “promise” of biotech is far

from certain or free of risk. Today,70 percent of grain in the U.S. and43 percent of grain worldwide lav-

ishly go to feed livestock. And justas the world clamors for more

grain to feed to animals, sopeople can eat them, per-capita world cropland de-clined by 20 percent in the1990s alone. The WorldHealth Organization says800 million people in theworld live with chronic

hunger. More meat production isdefinitely not the answer.

32A USDA inspector, part ofan ABC Primetime investi-

gation, clandestinely filmed aplant that processes a millionpounds of chicken for schoolseach year. The investigator foundcarcasses laden with yellow sores

and fecal matter and machinescaked with harmful residues. The planthad repeatedly failed salmonella tests.Some of the cheapest, most unsanitarymeat tends to be sold to schools.

33Bestiality is integral to pork,turkey, and dairy operations. Nu-

merous Web sites instruct in the craftof artificial insemination. Sample ex-cerpts follow: As he sniffs around, puton disposable gloves. If he hasmounted the stool, he will beginthrusting movements. With a gloved

Bestiality: Integral to turkey, pig, and dairy operations

Photographs by Pamela Rice

hand, rub his sheath. Now reach for thecup. The penis will erect and start toenter your clenched hand. Continue tohold the penis until the boar with-draws. The end of ejaculation is deter-mined by a bouncing of the penis. Withthe sow, a stockperson must mimicsome of the stimulation normally pro-vided by a boar, that is, back pressureand flank and udder rubbing. When thelips of the vulva are gently parted, in-sert the catheter.

34The late parent advisor Dr. Ben-jamin Spock maintained that

cows’ milk “causes internal blood loss,allergies, and indigestion and con-tributes to some cases of childhood dia-betes.” In the last edition of his famousbaby book he recommended, essen-tially, that children adhere to a vegandiet after the age of two. But he did notrecommend dairy milk for babies ei-ther. According to renowned nutritionresearcher T. Colin Campbell, “Cows’-milk protein may be the single mostsignificant chemical carcinogen towhich humans are exposed.”

35University research asserts thatthe feeding of approximately 10

million tons of poultry litter to U.S. cat-tle and other livestock every year is safe.But the mere presence of wasted feed inthe mix, which otherwise includes ex-creta, carcass parts, bedding, and feath-ers, could include the stray remains ofcattle. This would seem to violate the1997 USDA rule that no cow is to eatthe flesh of other cows, instituted tothwart the spread of mad cow disease.Also, poultry litter needs to be properlycomposted to neutralize microbial tox-ins—in practice not always done. Fur-thermore, livestock, so fed, need suffi-cient time to flush out veterinary med-ications that might have tainted the lit-ter. Finally, feeding poultry litter to live-stock provides one more vector for thespread of bird flu.

36Beef cattle are best suited to moistclimates, such as those in Europe

where their ancestors evolved. Butranchers in America’s West continuethe destructive tradition of herdingtheir animals on the nation’s most aridland. Grazing destroys ecologically re-

generative riparian zones. According toa recent U.N. report, “the livestock sec-tor may well be the leading player inthe reduction of biodiversity…as well asone of the leading drivers of land degra-dation, pollution, climate change, over-fishing, sedimentation of coastal areas,and facilitation of invasions by alienspecies.”

37Adopting a high-protein fad dietmay help you lose weight in the

short run, but so might chemotherapy,food poisoning, or serious illness. Ifhealth is what you desire, you’re even-tually going to have to learn how to eat.Resoundingly, the American Heart Asso-ciation and other major health organi-zations warn people against the Atkinsand other low-carb diets, because theycan cause fatigue or dizziness and strainthe kidneys. Often unbeknownst to thedieter, these diets induce dehydration.Also, upping fat and lowering carbohy-drate intake has been found to impairbrain function over time.

38Genetics through single-trait se-lection has become as important a

component of today’s intensive farm-ing as drugs and confinement hard-ware. The animals themselves, rightdown to their DNA, must stand up tothe rigors of the industrial process, bothin life and in carcass form. They mustproduce at breakneck speeds and do soon as little feed as possible. And ulti-mately, the particular output they un-willingly give forth must please ourfinal end user, the consumer, in texture,taste, uniformity, convenience, andprice. Mutant genes that would neversurvive in the wild are cultivated tomonstrous ends.

39Officially, Wildlife Services, a pro-gram of the USDA, prevents

“damage to agriculture.” Never mindthat agriculture is hugely damaging towildlife, this multi-million-dollar perqfor cattle ranchers exists primarily toexterminate species thought to spreaddisease and to eradicate predators. Non-target wildlife is often caught in thecross-hairs. Wildlife Services agentsshoot, poison, gas, electrocute, andlethally trap millions of mammals andbirds on public land where only 3.8 per-

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cent of the nation’s beef is even de-rived. The methods are often cruel andexcessive and even ineffective. Theprogram has decimated populations ofgrizzly bears, mountain lions, moose,elk, buffalos, and coyotes. Recently, anintriguing global study actually foundthat predators inflict negligible dam-age to ranching operations.

40Many Americans are not gettingenough magnesium. Deficiencies

can cause irritability, seizures, delir-ium, depression, abnormal heartrhythms, spasms of the coro-nary arteries, anemia, bloodclots, abnormal blood pres-sure, and even death. Wheredo you get this vital nutri-ent?—whole grains, fruits,dark-green leafy vegetables,nuts, and, best, raw cacao.

41Results from two majorstudies involving tens

of thousands of subjects—one in the UK (University ofLeads, 2007), the other inthe U.S. (Nurses’ HealthStudy, 2006)—suggest thatthe more red meat a womaneats the more she is at riskfor breast cancer, regardlessof her age. Suspected cul-prits include saturated fat,growth hormones fed to cattle, hemeiron (only in red meat), and hetero-cyclic amines (carcinogens producedduring the cooking process).

42 When faced with a flock of spenthens, an egg farmer may choose

to induce production again by way ofa forced molt—accomplished withstarvation and water deprivation forperiods of up to two weeks. No U.S.law prevents this heinous practice.Some major U.S. producers havephased it out but then need to bringtwice the number of hens into pro-duction for the same number of eggs.

43Fish make vibratory sounds withvarious “calls” that researchers

have identified as communicatingalarm and aggravation. They possessfully formed nervous systems as wellas complex social behaviors. They arealso capable of learning complicated

tasks. British researchers discovered in2003 that fish have the cerebral mech-anisms to feel pain. As one animal ac-tivist once put it, “Fish are not merelyvegetables that can swim.”

44 In America today, only four com-panies slaughter 59 percent of all

the hogs, only four companies slaugh-ter over 83 percent of all the cattle,and only two companies slaughternearly 60 percent of all the chickens.At the farm level, the trend over recentdecades has been for many fewer oper-

ations to produce many more animals.In 1967, for example, there were overa million hog farms. By 1998, thenumber fell to 114,000. The trend hasfunneled many of America’s farmersinto contract, or franchise-like, ar-rangements that strictly take choicesabout herd densities, feed, and veteri-nary care away from them. Thechanges have ushered in a pollutedlandscape, a host of new pathogens,and a hell on Earth for the animals.

45The 18th century philosopher Je-remy Bentham challenged the

world about animals with his famousquandary: “The question is not, Canthey reason? nor, Can they talk? but,Can they suffer?”. Curiously, science isevery day discovering that in fact ani-mals do all three: reason, communi-cate, and suffer. The differences be-tween animals and humans are being

blurred with every revelation. Man’sclosest relatives share over 98 percentof our DNA, and all animals, includingman, are related by a common ances-tor. Today’s question must now be, canwe humans use our known capacityfor logic, communication, and empa-thy to take animals off our plates?

46Arsenic has been a common ad-ditive in factory chicken feed for

nearly 50 years. It is used to kill para-sites, reduce stress, and promotegrowth in the birds. The practice has

long been deemed safe. Re-cently, however, scientistshave found that the sub-stance turns carcinogenicrather quickly after applica-tion. Arsenic-imbued manurebecomes toxic to the envi-ronment when spread as fer-tilizer. The risk for those whoingest the meat of treatedbirds is, in fact, worse thanonce thought, particularlysince exposure to arsenic iscumulative and people areeating three times thechicken they once did in the1960s.

47 If you like the idea ofbeing welcome at the

places where your food isproduced, don’t count on your not-so-local poultry grower allowing you, theconsumer, to view his massive shedsof monocultured birds any time soon.Without natural immunities thatcould otherwise be acquired by out-door life, his flocks need to be pro-tected from the slightest infection.When operators are even slightly laxin applying rigorous measures of“biosecurity,” a case of the sniffles inone bird can escalate to a mass out-break, forcing a giant cull involvingmillions of birds.

48Smithfield Foods, the largestpork producer in the world,

slaughtered 27 million pigs in 2005.Pound for pound this number repre-sents, in equivalent human weight,the combined population of the 32largest U.S. cities yet only 26 percentof all the pigs that are slaughtered in

No Debate Now: Animals reason, communicate, suffer

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PHOTO BY PAMELA RICE

the country as a whole. North Car-olina’s pigs alone emit the waste-equiv-alent of 40 million people, and essen-tially none of it is treated.

49A study of 49 island countriesfound 55 percent of their coral

reefs overfished. To sustainably harvestthe million metric tons of fish taken an-nually from the islands, 30,000 squaremiles more of reef—or the equivalent ofnearly four Great Barrier Reefs—wouldbe needed. Demand for reef fish islargely coming from Hong Kong traders,who are now supplying a burgeoningmarket in Mainland China. Reef fishtake 5 to 10 years to reach breeding ageand so are particularly vulnerable. Fish-ers capture the fish, live, using cyanide,destroying coral in the process; 75 per-cent of the fish die even before gettingto their market destinations.

50According to one study, when dia-betics eat copious amounts of

fiber they are able to control theirblood-sugar levels significantly. Fiber,which is found only in plants, helpspeople to lose weight because of its abil-ity to satiate. According to a Europeanstudy of 400,000 people, a high-fiberdiet can slash the risk for deadly cancersby up to 40 percent.

51About a decade ago the govern-ment began imposing manure-

handling controls on the nation’s con-fined animal feeding operations. Therules, which now regulate only 40 per-cent of the nation’s largest feedlots,have not only been laughably overduein their implementation but haveamounted to nothing more than per-mits to pollute as usual. And the vastmajority of the nation’s mostly moder-ate-sized livestock operations are sim-ply urged to follow recommendedguidelines voluntarily. In 2004, the EPAgranted a sweetheart deal to 130 com-panies representing thousands of mega-feedlots when it allowed them amnestyfrom the Clean Air Act in exchange forscientific monitoring. Other facilitiesacross the country are now in line forexemptions from Superfund lawsuits.

52Animal agriculture routinely mu-tilates farmed animals for its own

convenience and often simply out of

habit. Debeaking, branding, castration,ear notching, wing and comb removal,dehorning, teeth clipping, and tail andtoe docking are ever-present tasks ontoday’s farm and ranch. Laborers, notveterinarians, perform the surgeries,employing restraint, not anesthesia.

53Male chicks are a bothersome ex-pense to the egg producer. Sexers

must be hired to pick them out for di-version to expedient deaths. No lawprotects them as they are dumped intrash bins to die by crushing, suffoca-tion, starvation, and exposure.

54Fish and shellfish farming, oraquaculture, is no less disruptive

to the environment than taking fishfrom the wild. Shoreline pens replacemangroves, that is, the habitats wherewild fish would otherwise reproduce.Some farmed species will not breed incaptivity, so fish farmers must steal ju-veniles, who never get a chance to re-produce, from the wild. There are nu-merous cases where farmed fish haveescaped into the wild, corrupting thegenetic purity of native species andspreading disease. Indiscriminate bio-mass fishing for fishmeal threatensecosystems. Feed-to-flesh ratios soar insome farmed species to 25 to 1. Ni-trogenous waste poisons the seabedfloor below cages that hold fish in un-natural densities.

55Between 1980 and 2004, meatproduction in the developing

world tripled, today amounting to wellover half of the world’s output. Denseconcentrations of corralled industriallivestock, which create vast quantitiesof manure, now skirt the edges of majorcities in Asia and Latin America, caus-ing severe environmental damages.

56People who eat a lot of fish are in-creasingly falling victim to the de-

bilitating effects of mercury poisoning.Women, in particular, are putting theirbabies at risk for irreparable brain dam-age when they eat seafood high in mer-cury while pregnant and even before-hand. According to the EPA, about630,000 newborns in the United Statesevery year—roughly 15 percent of all—may be exposed to dangerous levels ofmercury in the womb.

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57Hoof-and-mouth disease is rarelyfatal for livestock, but it remains a

death sentence just the same. Whenblisters form on hooves and lips, andgrowth slows because of fever, econom-ics prescribe execution and incinera-tion. In 2001, Great Britain respondedto an outbreak by destroying nearly 6million mostly healthy cattle, sheep,and pigs at a cost of [U.S.]$9 billion tosave its export trade. There were actu-ally only 2,030 known cases of the dis-ease. The rest were exterminated to pro-vide buffers to contain the outbreak.

58Several years ago, a New YorkTimes story featured an Ohio

schoolteacher who discovered that a“swirling poison” invaded his homefrom a nearby hog farm and “robbedhim of his memory, his balance, andhis ability to work. It left him withmood swings, a stutter, and fistfuls ofpills.” His diagnosis: irreversible braininjuries from hydrogen sulfide gas. Butthe source of the H2S was half a mileaway. Only after visits to 14 doctorswas the cause of his symptoms deter-mined. Surprisingly low levels of thegas will eat the brain over time. Neigh-bors of industrial hog farms will alsoexperience diarrhea, nosebleeds, ear-aches, lung burns, chronic sinusitis,asthma, and corroded lungs.

59Genetic manipulation has cre-ated monsters as well as mon-

strous suffering for farmed animals.Cloning threatens to jack up the mis-ery yet another notch. Its general useis probably a ways off, provided it be-comes commercially viable at all.Meanwhile, as the scientists tinker,their cloned creations will suffer frompremature deaths and deformities,and the resultant meat and milk aresure to enter the human food supply.

60Before 1981, E. coli O157:H7 poi-soning didn’t exist. Today, the

deadly strain infects 80 percent of cat-tle on America’s feedlots. You canblame a change in feed for this. Tomake the animals grow five times therate they would on hay, feedlot opera-tors foisted a corn-based diet ontotheir charges and provided the perfectenvironment for O157:H7 to emerge.

And now this terrible strain is regu-larly poisoning our raw veggies viacross contamination.

61From the animal-feed breadbas-ket and feedlots of the nation’s

Midwest, massive amounts of fertil-izer, pesticides, and manure-runofftravel down the Mississippi River. Thishigh-nutrient mix causes an eco-chainreaction that ends with microscopicorganisms robbing oxygen from thewaters of the Gulf of Mexico. Marinelife must relocate or suffocate. Thephenomenon is known as hypoxia.Scientists have dubbed affected areas“dead zones.” Each summer the Gulf’sdead zone grows to an area the size ofNew Jersey. A recent U.N. reportshowed a 34 percent jump over 2 yearsin the number of dead zones—now200 worldwide. Today, red tides(harmful algae blooms) line somecoastlines of entire nations nearlywithout break. Soon, the hot real-es-tate properties around the world willbe away from the waterfronts.

62 In what is still the most compre-hensive study of diet and life-

style ever made, the China Studyfound that the consumption of rela-tively small amounts of animal pro-tein is linked to chronic disease. Thefindings from this grand epidemiolog-ical study are especially compellingbecause they allowed meaningfulcomparisons between populationswith similar genetic backgrounds, yetwith nonhomogeneous diets. All to-gether, the China Study provides theultimate vegetarian vindication.

63Fifty-two billion pounds of inedi-ble byproduct (bones, fats, unus-

able hides, and cartilage) from Amer-ica’s meat and poultry slaughterhousesis each year transmogrified by “render-ers” into saleable adhesives, lubricants,chemicals, cosmetics, and processedfood ingredients—a grisly but prof-itable side business of the flesh trade.This amount, however, does not in-clude the 6 billion pounds of deadstock that accumulate on U.S. feedlots.It must also be dealt with. Unfortu-nately, only half of it is rendered andtherefore processed safely. If buried,

dead stock attracts vermin, leaches ni-trogen and methane into the environ-ment, and poisons the groundwater. Ifburned—usually the case when mortal-ities are catastrophic due to weatherevents or disease outbreaks—pyres willpoison the air with dioxin. If com-posted, the process is often poorlymanaged, failing to adequately pro-mote full decomposition and allowingvermin to carry disease off site.

64Want the omega-3s in fish butwould rather skip the mercury,

PCBs, and dioxins? Well, push asidethat fish altogether, and rediscoverflax. Two tablespoons of ground flaxdaily give you all of the essential fattyacid you need with several bonuses:Flax seeds contain iron, zinc, andhigh-quality protein, plus almost all ofthe vitamins. They’re loaded with sol-uble fiber and are the best source any-where of phytonutrient lignans. Theyease symptoms of diabetes and evenpromote healthy brain growth inutero and in infancy.

65The state of Oregon has takenwarnings about bird flu to heart,

devising elaborate plans to deal with a“most likely scenario” pandemic. Thestate, which represents less than 1.3percent of the U.S. population, has an-ticipated how tanker trucks hauling38,000 pounds of liquid carbon diox-ide can be obtained to kill as many asa million infected chickens and wherean estimated 2,000 tons of chickencarcasses can be buried. The state isalso ready for as many as 800,000human illnesses, 9,700 hospitaliza-tions, and 2,300 deaths.

66The meat industry doesn’t treatthe causes of its problems, only

the symptoms. When it imprisonsmassive numbers of animals incramped stress-inducing cages, it pro-vides the perfect breeding ground fordeadly bacteria, which later infect themeat. Technologies to kill meat patho-gens are now very big business. Wehave acidic-solution carcass misting,alkaline-solution sprays, steam/vac-uum technology, high-temperaturecarcass washes, steam pasteurization,and chlorine applications, etc., ad

Slumgullion Stew: 52 billion lbs. of inedible byproduct

nauseam. Some bug-fighting methods,such as food irradiation and sprays ofantidotal viruses and probiotic bacteria,pose risks in themselves. And in theend, the meat still isn’t safe.

67Most of America’s cows are not“Happy Cows,” in spite of what

the California Milk Advisory Boardmight say in its nationally televisedcommercials. Many cows in the West-ern state spend their lives negotiatingbogs of their own feces and urine. Else-where, they may be tethered at stan-chions. All are inseminated annually tokeep them lactating, and many regu-larly suffer painful udder infections.Thanks to calcium depletion and footinfections, slaughter occurs after onlythree or four lactation periods. TheCMAB is a government agency and so isnot subject to false-advertising laws.

68To choose industrial meat is tosupport a system that has long

ago put family farmers out of business.Essentially, it is only the big players—those who bought into factory sys-tems—who are feeding America. We dohave lower prices at the retail level. Butultimately, what is the real cost ofcheap meat? You need to factor in the$20 billion per year in government sub-sidies to commodity farmers, highermedical costs attributable to excessivediets, antibiotic resistance in commonbacterial strains, a dead zone in theGulf of Mexico, the inordinate need foroil for petrochemical fertilizers, anddwindling aquifers—the list goes on.

69In 2005, a $7.1 billion plan toprepare the U.S. for a bird-flu pan-

demic was instituted by the Bush ad-ministration. It included very little tohelp poor countries slow the spread ofthe H5N1 strain already on the march.Pharmaceutical companies would getmost of the largesse in order to stock-pile and develop speedier methods todevelop appropriate vaccines for Amer-ican citizens. In addition, PresidentBush proposed that he be given thepower to impose essentially martial lawon the land in the event that a pan-demic actually came about. The num-ber of countries with bird flu increasedfrom 14 to 55 in 2006.

70The number of foodborne out-breaks involving produce more

than doubled between 1999 and 2004.But before you blame the veggies, it’simportant to know that the contami-nating pathogens are invariably thosethat hitch a ride on fecal matter. And weknow plants don’t defecate. So what’sthe story? It all gets down to one simplefact: Feedlot operators cannot afford toproperly treat all the waste that theirmammoth-size facilities generate, sothey often divert the muck to the near-est waterway. Down stream, produceprocessors use the water as a rinse.

71Today’s turkeys are unable to cop-ulate on their own, thanks to se-

lectively bred, freakishly huge breasts inthe “toms.” The industry must use arti-ficial insemination. The job is nearly asdehumanizing for the workers—whomust work rapidly for long hours andlow wages—as it is deplorable for thetortured breeder birds, who are essen-tially raped every week for 12 to 16months until they are sent to slaughter.

72 In most large commercial chickenslaughter plants the inverted

heads of doomed birds are first plungedinto an electrified brine bath. The cur-rent is set at a voltage just high enoughto immobilize the birds and to promotebleedout without hemorrhage. It servesto minimize inconvenient flailing thatwould otherwise interfere with theslaughter process. The birds are notonly sentient during slaughter but mustalso suffer the excruciating shock,sometimes twice.

73Grass-fed beef is more eco-friendlythan corn-fed, but supplies of it

could never sustainably meet currentconsumer demand. Several guides areavailable to help seafood consumers“eat with a conscience.” But the speciesthat are recommended would quicklyrun out if everyone ate them. Legally,“free-range” and “cage-free” designa-tions are dubious to outright meaning-less. At least one humane certificationprogram was officially debunked. “Or-ganic” has gone strangely industrialand is rightly tagged “ethically chal-lenged.” Ultimately, to “eat green” andto “be kind,” one needs to go vegan.

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74New York State’s Department ofEnvironmental Conservation

and its Department of Health haveposted an Internet factsheet called“Eating Sport Fish.” The advice speaksfor itself: No one should eat more thanone meal of fish per week fromany of the state’s fresh waters;chemical contaminants may bea problem; trim all fat; don’tconsume cooking liquids. Onthe other hand, if you stillwant to enjoy the“fun” of sport fish-ing but don’t wantto poison yourself,the factsheet rec-ommends catch andrelease. But don’ttear out the hook—cut its leader, goesthe advice. Also, avoid playingfish to exhaustion. Other statescould post similar Web pages:nearly every state in the unionhas a mercury-in-rivers advisory.

75Okinawa has the healthiestand longest-lived people in

the world, boasting the highestpercentage of people who live tobe a hundred years old. The super-se-niors who inhabit the island tend toretain their mental keenness, and fewneed to live in nursing homes. Notsurprisingly, they eat very little food ofanimal origin, according to a 25-yearstudy on the island. Genes could takesome of the credit, although today’sold folks are projected to outlive theirchildren who have adopted Westerneating habits.

76As markets for animal-basedfoods become more global, “car-

nivore conflicts” increasingly threateninternational peace. Live cattle fromCanada are still banned from the U.S.,ever since a “mad cow” of Canadianorigin was discovered in Washingtonstate. In 2001, hoof-and-mouth dis-ease instantly resulted in countries allover the world severing trade with theentire EU, although the disease wasmostly confined to England. Mean-while, trade wars simmer between theU.S. and the EU over hormones in

beef. Worldwide, varying sanitarystandards in meat production alsoleave nations at odds. No two “truedemocracies” have ever gone to war,some academics argue, that is, if youdon’t count violence over fisheries.

77The population explosionshould not be thought of exclu-

sively in terms of people—not whenone considers the ecological foot-

print represented by the world’s3.2 billion cattle, sheep, goats,

and domesticated bisonacross the globe. About20 percent of theworld’s pastures andrangelands, with 73percent of rangelandsin dry areas, have beendegraded to some ex-tent, mostly through

overgrazing, compaction, anderosion caused by livestock.

78 It is estimated that 40 to 50percent of U.S. dairy cows

are infected with mastitis at anyone time. The painful udder infec-tion is considered a man-made af-fliction. Cows get it by improper

care, poor milking procedures,overmilking, and malfunctioningmilking machines. The genetically en-gineered growth hormone Bovine So-matotropin (bST), which is widelyused to boost milk yields, is plainlylinked to mastitis.

79Veggies can lower the risk forteenagers developing high blood

pressure later in life, regardless of bodyweight and salt intake, according to arecent university study. Researcherscite potassium, calcium, magnesium,folate, and other nutrients containedin fruits and vegetables as the reason.Hypertension increases the risk forheart attack and stroke and afflicts 25percent of U.S. adults.

80 In the early twentieth centuryman learned how to extract ni-

trogen (fertilizer) from the air, cheaplyand in large quantities. The discoveryultimately allowed 2 billion more peo-ple to inhabit the Earth and has givenhumans the luxury of feeding crops tolivestock. Yet what gives the world

abundance has, by way of nutrientrunoff and acid rain, poisoned water-ways from the Chinese countryside tothe Ohio Valley. (Excess nitrogen pro-motes algae growth, robbing the waterof oxygen.) In North America and Eu-rope, lakes and rivers contain 20 timesthe nitrogen they did before the In-dustrial Revolution.

81Every minute of every day, acrossthe globe, 100,000 animals are

slaughtered to feed the human lust formeat. This adds up to 50 billion sen-tient beings a year, not counting fish.Anywhere you go, creatures destinedfor the dinner plate endure cruel liv-ing conditions. “We’re eating themanyway,” goes the strange logic.

82When meat, fish, or poultry isbarbecued, dripped fat over the

open flame sends up plumes of car-cinogenic smoke, coating the food.Other unhealthful chemicals are cre-ated just by extended cooking times.Chemists are telling meat eaters todayto keep those grill times down. Evenenvironmentalists are saying thatrestaurant grilling is an importantsource of soot and smog. But you stillneed to cook your meat thoroughly:How else are you going to kill all ofthose nasty bacteria?

83Forests cleanse the environment,regulate climate, and provide

habitat for wildlife and pollinators ofcrops. Modern medicines derive fromforests. Our very survival on planetEarth depends upon them. Accordingto a 390-page U.N. report in 2006, theexpansion of livestock production is akey factor in deforestation. Today,nearly all is taking place in the Ama-zon, thanks to grazing and the pro-duction of feedcrops. Worldwide, live-stock production uses 70 percent of allagricultural land and 30 percent of theland surface of the planet.

84 In America, essentially all farmedanimals will be trucked around

at least once in their lives. Filthy,crowded, cramped, noisy, and terrify-ing conditions over extended periodsare the norm. Truckers may legallydeny the animals food and water forup to 36 hours. And such “protec-

Desertification: 20% of pasture degraded by livestock

Photograph by Pamela Rice

tions” do not apply to poultry. Manyanimals are traded internationally.About 4 million live sheep are trans-ported from Australia to the MiddleEast every year where Islamic law dic-tates throats be slit without stunning.In one recent year, a ship full of 58,000sheep was rejected because of wide-spread infection. Before finding an im-port destination, nearly a tenth died.

85Clog up your arteries on a dietloaded with saturated animal fat

and cholesterol year after year and yourisk having a heart attack or stroke. Youcan opt to avert these afflictions withan expensive, though now-routine, op-eration known as angioplasty. Per-formed with a balloon-tipped catheter,it works to flatten plaque against arterywalls, thus opening up passageways forblood to flow. A whole-foods vegandiet, along with regular exercise, canhave the same effect.

86More than half of the nation’sseafood companies do not follow

federal food-safety guidelines. Govern-ment inspectors visit processors onlyonce a year to oversee essentially vol-untary measures and to view companypaperwork. Three-quarters of all fishconsumed in the U.S. is imported, rep-resenting 4 billion pounds, but lessthan two percent of it is governmentinspected.

87U.N. Environment Programme ex-ecutive director Klaus Toepfer said

in 2003: “The clock is standing at oneminute to midnight for the great apes,animals that share more than 96 per-cent of their DNA with humans. If welose any great ape species we will be de-stroying a bridge to our own origins,and with it part of our own humanity.”Humans stand behind all reasons forthe die-off, including one of the mostimportant: poaching for meat.

88 Just as smokestack emissions re-sult in acid rain, toxic fumes from

decomposing livestock waste in open-air lagoons on factory farms becomepoisonous to fish when returned to wa-terways via rainfall. The errant ammo-nia also ravages terrestrial ecosystems.Since Earth’s plant species evolved toefficiently use scarce amounts of nutri-

ents, today’s gluts will generally killthem. Fallout can degrade environ-ments as far away as 300 miles.

89Handling livestock these days isrisky business, not the least be-

cause humans are increasingly con-tracting diseases from the animals:Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, Nipah virus,bird flu, and SARS are a few examples.“Exotic,” and often endangered, animalcuisine provides the conduit for aglobal pandemic. In China, wet mar-kets display caged and invariably sicklycreatures, such as cobras, civet cats, andanteaters, for consumers who want that“taste of the wild.” In Africa, the bush-meat trade is blamed for the spread ofEbola and AIDS.

90Even if meat eaters are spared thebig killers that their lifestyle is as-

sociated with (heart disease, stroke, dia-betes, and cancer), their diet may still berobbing them of everyday good health.A meat diet is sure to lead to naggingconditions and ailments. A whole-foods, high-fiber vegan diet, full ofgrains, fruits, vegetables, and legumes, isjust the ticket to reduce arthritis pain,ease irritable-bowel disorders, mitigatecommon back pain, relieve cold and al-lergy symptoms, and lower risk for gall-stones, kidney stones, and heartburn.But perhaps best of all, the vegan life isone free of constipation!

91When food-safety inspectors inNew York City make the rounds,

they often come upon merchants sellingjust about anything: the meat of ar-madillos, iquanas, primates, turtles,frogs, and even rats. Some of the meatcomes from endangered animals. Othercuts, if not intrinsically illegal, fail to de-rive from licensed inspected facilitiesand so put consumers at risk. The sellersof such contraband (most is imported)tend to be ignorant of U.S. laws, some-times conveniently so. They don’t seemto comprehend the dangers to whichthey expose their customers and eventhe city as they raise the risk of outbreak.Over one recent 21-month period, a sin-gle inspector shuttered 138 city stores.

92 It is estimated that 30 percent ofthe world’s fish catch is non-tar-

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typically in the cruelest most expedi-ent ways—separate out the discards,only to dump them overboard, deadand mutilated. Bycatch from driftnet-ting is estimated at 85 percent ofcatch; despite a U.N. moratorium,Italy, France, and Morocco continuethe hugely destructive practice.Shrimp fishing alone is responsible forover 27 percent of the world’s bycatch,despite producing less than 2 percentof global seafood.

93 In nature, pigs avoid filth andwill trek and root over 9 miles

during a 24-hour period. Yet factoryinternment brings a breedingsow cold, strawless floors, nox-ious filth, deafening noise, andimmobilizing space barely largerthan her own body. This highlyintelligent creature will be dri-ven insane as she endures re-peated pregnancies via artificialinsemination. Her body will bepinned in place to expose herteats to her piglets. When herproductive capacity wanes, shewill be sent to slaughter.

94There are hundreds ofchemicals and animal

drugs used on today’s feedlots.These vaccines, parasiticides,hormones, insecticides, feedmedications, and antimicrobialsare making their way into ourcreeks, rivers, and lakes via the fecesand urine excreted by the animals.The substances act as endocrine dis-rupters in wild species down stream.One study showed female fish acquir-ing male traits and male fish acquiringfemale traits. Other studies have simi-larly found disturbing anomalies.

95Less than 1 percent of the Earth’swater is usable for human con-

sumption. Most either comprises thesalty seas or is locked up in glacial ice-caps. You might think that the worldwould be judicious in how it uses thisprecious substance. On the contrary:Just one of many examples of world-wide profligate waste is that of thegreat Ogallala Aquifer, which sits atopAmerica’s High Plains states. Farmersmine this titanic water source of 5 tril-

lion gallons per year to power an in-frastructure of feedlots and industrialslaughterhouses. Scientists say thisnatural wonder will be diminished by80 percent in 2020.

96A 25-percent decline in heart dis-ease in Poland in the early 1990s

coincided with the country’s transfor-mation to a market economy, whichended government subsidies to meat.A switch primarily to vegetable fatsand the increased importation of fruitwere also seen as factors in the decline,according to a report made by a teamof multinational researchers. The au-

thors of the report noted that the de-cline was “apparently without prece-dent in peacetime.”

97To produce foie gras, male ducksare force-fed a stomach-gorging

cup of corn pellets three times a daywith a 15-inch feeder tube. This tor-turous process goes on for 28 daysuntil the ducks’ livers, from which thepâté is made, miasmatically bloat to10 times normal size. Mortalities arehigh due to the disease, intense stress,and burst stomachs. For days prior toslaughter, each bird will pant for air.So cruel are these practices that foiegras production is now outlawed in atleast a dozen countries.

98Every year, 24,000 fishers die onthe job, making fishing the most

dangerous occupation in the world, ac-

cording to the FAO/UN. Meatpackinghas the highest serious injury rate byfar of any occupation. Repetitive stressdisorders and knife cuts are rampant inmeat plants. Poultry processing work-ers earn wages that are, for a family offour, below the poverty level. Full-timecontract poultry growers clear incomesof only $21,000 annually.

99Agriculture science inexhaustiblyworks to eke out every last bit of

commodity wealth from farmed ani-mals via genetic selection. Wild junglefowl lay 2 dozen eggs per year; today’smaligned descendants lay an egg

nearly every day. Sows in naturegive birth to 5 piglets; today’sfactory-raised litters yield 12young. A hundred years ago asteer took 4 to 5 years to grow tomarket weight; today theprocess takes only 14 months.Just 50 years ago cows gave 645gallons of milk per year; ondairies today, cows give overthree times this amount.

100Eating vegetables keepsthe brain young, a cho-

rus of research shows. One re-cent 6-year study in Chicagotested 2,000 seniors, their men-tal acumen paired off with veg-etable intake. Subjects who atemore than two servings of veg-etables per day appeared about

five years younger by certain indicatorsthan those who ate few or no vegeta-bles. Green leafies (spinach, kale, andcollards) appeared most beneficial.

101When you fork over that $1.89for those 7 ounces of Brown ’N

Serve Sausage Links, it’s really quite abargain, or so you might think. Butsuch purchases—collectively trillionsof them across the globe—accumulatea steep ecological deficit. In time, thedebt will come due. Future genera-tions will be the ones remitting itspayments, in installments, with globalwarming, aquifer depletion, topsoilerosion, desertification, collapsed fish-eries, wildlife extinction, deforestationand lost ecosystem services. Isn’t ittime to start eating lower on the foodchain? Get Hip. Go Veg!

For as far as the eye can see: pigs, industrially housed, indoors,in cramped quarters, confined to communal pens. Tidy by na-ture, pigs who are commercially raised are invariably forced tolive in and above their own waste.

Ogallala Aquifer: Natural wonder, 80% gone by 2020

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1. David Wolfson, Beyond theLaw: Agribusiness and theSystemic Abuse of AnimalsRaised for Food or Food Pro-duction, Farm Sanctuary,1999, pp. 12–16.

2. “Animal Waste Pollutionin America: An EmergingNational Problem,” Minor-ity Staff of the U.S. SenateCommission on Agricul-ture, Dec. 1997.

John Lang, “ManureProves to Be Massive Environmental Problem,”Nando Times News,Apr. 24, 1998.

Marla Cone, “Foul State ofAffairs Found in Feedlots,”Los Angeles Times, Nov. 17,2006.

“A New Sort of WindPower,” The Economist,Jan. 24, 2004.

3. “Study Shows Why MeatMay Increase Cancer Risk,”Reuters, Feb. 2, 2006.

“Red Meat Cancer Risk ClueFound,” BBC, Jan. 31, 2006.

4. William J. Broad and An-drew C. Revkin, “Has theSea Given Up Its Bounty?”The New York Times,Jul. 29, 2003, p. F1.

Cornelia Dean, “ReportWarns ‘Global Collapse’ ofFishing,” The New YorkTimes, Nov. 2, 2006.

Kenneth R. Weiss, “SeaTurtle Is Losing the Raceto Poachers, Fishing Indus-try,” Los Angeles Times,May 4, 2003.

5. Gail Eisnitz, Slaughterhouse:The Shocking Story of Greed,Neglect, and InhumaneTreatment Inside the U.S.Meat Industry, PrometheusBooks, 1997, p. 24.

“Report Finds Spotty Enforcement of HumaneSlaughter Law,” AP,Feb. 28, 2004.

6. Heart and Stroke Statistics—2006 Update, AmericanHeart Assoc.

Denise Grady, “As HeartAttacks Wane, Heart Fail-ure Is on the Rise,” TheNew York Times, May 4,1999, pp. F1, F4.

7. “He’s Smarter Than YouThink,” The Electronic Tele-graph, May 31, 1997.

8. Web site: www.bread.org.

Lester R. Brown, Outgrowingthe Earth (chap. 3), W.W.Norton & Co., 2005.

9. “Food and Environment:Antibiotic Resistance,”Union of Concerned Scientists, Jun. 16, 2003.

10. “Economics of FoodborneDisease: Overview,”ERS/USDA, Jul. 22, 2004.

11. Sandeep Jauhar, “Savingthe Heart Can SometimesMean Losing the Mem-ory,” The New York Times,Sep. 19, 2000.

Rani Hutter Epstein, “Facing Up to Depression

After a Bypass,” The NewYork Times, Nov. 27, 2001,p. F8.

12. “The Great Plains: Turn-ing Off the Taps,” TheEconomist, Feb. 11, 2006.

13. “Position of the AmericanDietetic Assoc. and Dieti-tians of Canada: Vegetar-ian Diets,” 2003.

“Vegetarian Diet May CutCholesterol as Well asDrugs,” AP, Jul. 22, 2003.

Maggie Fox, “Vegan DietReverses Diabetes Symp-toms, Study Finds,”Reuters, Jul. 27, 2006.

14. Livestock’s Long Shadow,FAO/UN, 2006.

15. Paul Brown, “U.N. toCrack Down as PirateBoats Threaten to DriveFish to Extinction,” TheGuardian, Aug. 15, 2000.

“IUU Fishing—Back-ground,” ejfoundation.org,viewed Mar. 31, 2007.

Paul Greenberg, “TheCatch,” The New YorkTimes, Oct. 23, 2005.

16. “Wegmans Cruelty,”Google video,tinyurl.com/yoe9oc,CompassionateCon-sumers.org, 2004. (Notecomment, Miyun Park.)

17. “Dirty Birds,” ConsumerReports, Jan. 2007.

18. “Vegetarian WomenWeigh Less Than MeatEaters,” Reuters, Jun. 27,2005.

Karen Collins, “Will YouLose Weight as a Vegetar-ian?” MSNBC, Sep. 23,2005.

19. Sandra Blakeslee, “Fear ofDisease Prompts NewLook at Rendering,” TheNew York Times, Mar. 11,1997.

J. Peder Zane, “It Ain’tJust for Meat; It’s for Lotion,” The New YorkTimes, May 5, 1996, p. 5.

Steve Woodward, “CattleByproducts Are Found inHundreds of Products,”Knight Ridder, Jan. 4,2004.

20. Correspondence, DavidWolfson, author of Be-yond the Law (see #1).

21. Elliot Jaspin and MikeWard, “Chicken OnceTainted by Feces Sal-vaged, Sold,” Austin American-Statesman,Jun. 18, 1998.

Richard Behar andMichael Kramer, “TheEpsy Scandal Is MinorCompared with the Waythe USDA Has Favoredthe Poultry Industry,”TIME, Oct. 17, 1994.

Beatrice Trum Hunter,“Overlooked Threats ofFoodborne Illness,” Consumers’ Research,Oct. 1, 1995.

“From Cradle to Gravy,”

Consumer Reports,Mar. 1998.

22. Danielle Nierenberg, “Fac-tory Farming in the Devel-oping World,” World-watch, May/Jun. 2003.

“Global Water SupplyCentral Issue at Stock-holm Conference,”Reuters, Aug. 14, 2000.

Roger Segelken, “End Irri-gation Subsidies and Re-ward Conservation, Cornell U. Study Advises,”Cornell Chronicle, Jan. 30,1997.

“Shortage of Fresh WaterPredicted,” AP, Aug. 27,1998.

“Michael Specter, “TheLast Drop,” The NewYorker, Oct. 23, 2006.

23. “End of Cheap Oil,” National Geographic,Jun. 2004.

How Green Is YourPlate?” Vegetarian Times,Aug. 1996.

Jim Mason, “How OurFood Choices AffectWildlife,” Animals’ Voice,Vol. 3, No. 3., no date.

24. PBS interviews, RobertTauxe and Eric Schlosser,“Modern Meat,”WGBH/Frontline, 2002.

Robert Bazell, “Steak MayBe Bearer of Bacteria,”NBC News, Jul. 3, 2003.

Michael Pollan, “PowerSteer,” The New YorkTimes, Mar. 31, 2002.

25. “Warning Over DeadlyFish Parasite,” BBC News,Feb. 1, 2007.

“Gyrodactylus salaris,”factsheet, River TweedCommission, Scotland,viewed Jan. 2007.

Kenneth R. Weiss, “FishFarms Become Feedlots ofthe Sea,” series, Los Ange-les Times, Dec. 9, 2002.

26. Karen Davis, PrisonedChickens, Book PublishingCo., 1996, pp. 54–55.

27. “Diverse Diets with Meatand Milk Endanger WorldFood Supply,” HearstNews, Mar. 8, 1997.

28. Michael Perry, “Bird FluPandemic Would SparkGlobal Downturn, SaysReport,” Reuters, Feb. 16,2006.

29. Kristin Collins, “FowlSmells Ruffling Feathers,”The News & Observer,Apr. 24, 2006.

30. John Robbins, Diet for aNew America, StillpointPublishing, 1987,pp. 112–17.

31. David and Marcia Pi-mentel, “Feeding theWorld’s Population,”American Inst. of Biologi-cal Sciences, May 2000.

32. “What Did Your ChildEat for Lunch?” ABCNews, Nov. 7, 2002.

33. tinyurl.com/3dqo5t,tinyurl.com/2vrhda, andtinyurl.com/3awnww.

34. T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D.,“New York Times: RealityCheck Needed,” essay,Oct. 26, 2000.

Joe Crea, “Don’t Have aCow, Man: Making Senseof Warnings about theHazards of Milk,” DailyNews (NY), Oct. 21, 1992.

35. Michael Greger, Bird Flu:A Virus of Our Own Hatch-ing, Lantern Books, 2006,pp. 194–95.

Joseph P. Fontenot, “Uti-lization of Poultry Litteras Feed for Beef Cattle,”FDA Hearing on AnimalFeeding Regulation,Oct. 30, 2001.

John Ford, “Several Upsetwith MoArk’s Plants,”Neosho Daily News (MO),Jan. 13, 2005.

36. Todd Oppenheimer, “The Rancher Subsidy,”The Atlantic Monthly,Jan. 1996.

Livestock’s Long Shadow,FAO/UN, 2006.

37. E. J. Mundell, “High-Pro-tein Diets DehydrateEven the Very Fit,”Reuters, Apr. 22, 2002.

“High-Fat Diets Linked toPoorer Brain Function,”Reuters, Feb. 21, 2001.

38. Temple Grandin, “TheWay I See It: The Dangersof Trait Over-Selection,”Western Horseman, Aug.1998, pp. 120–24.

39. Paul Rogers, “DefendersSay Cattle Jobs Are RuralLifeblood,” San Jose Mer-cury News, Mar. 12, 2002

“Grazing Factsheets,” For-est Guardians, 1996.

“Lethal Predator Control,Courtesy of Wildlife Ser-vices,” HSUS, 2006.

Anna Gosline, “CryingWolf Over Predator Attacks,” New Scientist,Sep. 4, 2004.

40. Jane E. Brody, “A DietaryMineral You Need (andProbably Didn’t KnowIt),” The New York Times,May 18, 2004.

41. “Red Meat ‘Ups BreastCancer Risk’,” BBC,Mar. 4, 2007.

“Red Meat Link toBreast Cancer,” BBC,Nov. 14, 2006.

42. Marc Kaufman, “McDon-ald’s Taking Steps to Im-prove Care of Hens,”Washington Post, Aug. 23,2000.

43. Peter Singer, Animal Liber-ation, 1990, pp. 171–74.

Patrick Bateson, “ThePain League for Animals,”New Scientist, Apr. 25,1992.

Michael Holden, “Fish DoFeel Pain, Say British Sci-

entists,” Reuters, May 2,2003.

44. Tom Philpott, “FromConcentrate,” Grist,Apr. 26, 2007.

Keith Collins, “Statementon Livestock Prices,” beforethe Committee on Agricul-ture, U.S. House of Repre-sentatives, Feb. 10, 1999.

45. “Genetic Tool Kit,”WGBH Educational Foun-dation and Clear Blue Sky Productions, 2001, tinyurl.com/2pyj7m.

46. Don Hopey, “ChickenFeed May Present ArsenicDanger,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Mar. 8, 2007.

Marian Burros, “Chickenwith Arsenic? Is ThatO.K.?” The New YorkTimes, Apr. 5, 2006.

47. Kenton Kreager, et al.,“Biosecurity Tips,” Cali-fornia Poultry Letter, U. ofC. at Davis, Jan. 1997.

Peter Jackson, “PoultryEpidemic Threatens In-dustry,” AP, Jun. 23, 1997.

48. “Pork Power,” 60 Minutes,CBS–TV, Dec. 22, 1996.

Jeff Teitz, “Boss Hog,” Rol-ling Stone, Dec. 14, 2006.

Smithfield annual report,2006,tinyurl.com/2xthuu.

“North Carolina Hog In-dustry, Recent History,”Democracy South,tinyurl.com/39dhfb.

49. Katie Newton, et al.,“Current and Future Sus-tainability of Island CoralReef Fisheries,” Current Biology, Mar. 22, 2007.

Nao Nakanishi, “ChineseHunger for Reef Fish,Emptying Asian Seas,”Reuters, Mar. 27, 2007.

50. “Fiber Helps DiabeticsControl Blood Sugar,Study Says,” Reuters,May 10, 2000.

“High-Fiber Diet Can CutCancer Risk by 40 Per-cent,” Reuters, Jun. 23,2001.

51. Jeff Teitz, “Boss Hog,” Rol-ling Stone, Dec. 14, 2006.

Philip Brasher, “EPA to Exempt Farms from Pollution Reporting,” Des Moines Register,Mar. 20, 2007.

Marla Cone, “Foul State...”(see #2).

Andrew Martin, “LivestockIndustry Finds Friends inEPA,” Chicago Tribune,May 16, 2004.

“Not High on the HogStench,” AP, Jun. 20, 2005.

52. Richard A. Battaglia,Handbook of LivestockManagement Techniques,2nd Ed., Prentice Hall,1998.

53. C. David Coats, Old Mac-Donald’s Factory Farm,Continuum, 1989, p. 84.

54. Kieran Mulvaney, “A Sea

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67. “Happy Cows? You De-cide,” unhappycows.com.

Bob Egelko, “Dairy FarmsCan Keep Milking Their‘Happy Cows’ Cam-paign,” San FranciscoChronicle, Jan. 12, 2005.

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71. Jim Mason, “Inside aTurkey Breeding Factory:Of Rape and Pillage,”Farm Sanctuary News,Fall 1997.

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74. “Eating Sport Fish,”tinyurl.com/ysjsx8, 1999.

Steve Grant, “AirborneMercury Poisons the Waters,” Hartford Courant,Nov. 9, 2005.

75. Richard Saltus, “Oki-nawans, the World’sLongest-Lived People,Have a Lot to Teach Amer-icans,” The Boston Globe,May 21, 2001, p. A14.

76. Melinda Fulmer, “Banson Meat: Imports FuelClaims of U.S. Protection-ism,” Los Angeles Times,Mar. 21, 2001.

Jonathan Friedland, “Eco-Threats: Redefining Na-tional Security,” Wall

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T his document isall about ethicalchoices. Once

you are aware ofthese “reasons,” yourconscience willnever be able

to ignore them, even if younever become a vegetarian.

My “101 Reasons Why I’ma Vegetarian,” if you don’talready know, does not sparethe reader. And as is oftenthe case with the truth,what you’ll find here is notalways pretty. If you justtake the time to read thisdocument, you will foreverknow that eating meat isnot without many ugly,though often completelyunseen, consequences.

The marketersbehind animal-derivedfoods are calculated intheir quest to hide thethings I reveal here. It istheir mission to keep youdisconnected from therealities behind your food. They are par-ticularly intent on having you see ani-mals as little more than abstractions.

If I’ve done my job, however, “101Reasons...” will reconnect you by mak-ing it clear that in exchange for amoment of personal pleasure, you notonly bring misery to some corner of theworld, your survival has nothing to do

with it. There is, in fact, no nutritionalrequirement to consume meat, and, onthe contrary, animal foods are likely toimpede good health.

But enough about deprivation. If youtake my words to heart and adoptthe vegetarian diet, you will discov-er that this way of life is in fact a

wonderful creed to live by, onethat will actually open doors onfoods, rather than shut them.

May I suggest that as you readmy “101 Reasons...” you notneglect to glance over at the

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on the fourth page. Feel the energyand exuberance behind them. Justdon’t let them scare you away.

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History of the VivaVegie Society

The VivaVegie Society is a non-profit, 501(c)3, organization,dedicated to public education

about vegetarianism. When the groupwas formed in 1991, its objective wasvegetarian street advocacy—reachingout to New York City pedestrians withthe group’s hallmark publication, “101Reasons Why I’m a Vegetarian.” Then,as now, founder Pamela Rice wouldwear a signboard—created by her sister,Julia Fauci—that reads “Ask Me WhyI’m a Vegetarian.” (See Mayra Ortiz, asmodel, at right.)

Thanks to a gift from costumedesigner Janet Bloor, the group has

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VivaVegie regularly enjoys coverageof its activities—in the past, mostnotably, from CNN, The New York Times,WNYC-Radio, The New Yorker, TimeOut,and New York 1.

In 1992, VivaVegie began publishingits own magazine, The VivaVine. And in1999, the group opened a vegetariancenter, which it continues to maintain.

Founder Pamela Rice is an experton vegetarian issues. She gives talks ongovernment subsidies to themeat industry, the environ-mental impact of society’smeat-centered diet, over-fishing and the reali-ties of ocean col-lapse, and the veg-etarian argumentin general. She hasorganized and emceednumerous events inNew York City.

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