Vegetarian, to be or not to be?
Dreads and Diets
I always recommend researching all sides of a thing being considered. There are many reasons why people choose to be vegetarian and vegan and I respect them all. There is more than one way of dealing with those issues though. For instance, pasteurized, homogenized milk is disgusting. It is putrified, sick, and ultimately dead of all benefits and a great host to disease. Raw milk from hand milked, organic pastured raised cows is a truly healing food. Hard to get, sure, but the sickness is in the processing, the agricultural system, not the milk. With a little research, it can be found across every state.
We eat meat, but we eat limited quantities because we prefer to have a spiritual connection to anything we put in our bodies. Though I believe in the health benefits of eating organically pasture raised animal products these, for us, are missing a key factor... respect and liberty... for the animal. We had to learn to bow hunt, on foot, no technology, no tricks. The fair game of life as it was meant to be... this is a spiritual practice for us.
I have many years of research, vegetarianism and veganism in my history. These were decisions that I made when my information about how to deal with my values and beliefs was limited to a pro-veg knowledge. Though I devoured many, many books all of them were written by vegetarians and vegans. I did not read anything of credibility which questioned the long-term health of eating an all veg diet.
Ultimately, I am an omnivore. I am working to create the healthiest body and spirit I can and I take what I eat very, very seriously. I had to learn to ferment foods, learn about beneficial bacterias, the way the human digestive system works down to the very chemistry of food items, how they combine, what it means soak something, lacto-ferment, etc. In effect I have had to relearn the merits of how our most ancient ancestors ate, how their choices were guided by necessity and natural order and why the worked... how our industrial agricultural system has removed and destroyed most of these practices... etc.
Anyhow, with the utmost respect for each person to make the choices that they feel best suit them, I'd like to recommend three books:
The Vegetarian Myth: Food, Justice & Sustainability
Nutrition and Physical Degeneration
Namaste