Veg*n mmm veggies!

In Australia, the most commonly raised sheep are Merinos, specifically bred to have wrinkly skin, which means more wool per animal. This unnatural overload of wool causes animals to die of heat exhaustion during hot months, and the wrinkles also collect urine and moisture. Attracted to the moisture, flies lay eggs in the folds of skin, and the hatched maggots can eat the sheep alive. To prevent “flystrike,” Australian ranchers perform a barbaric operation—mulesing—or carving huge strips of flesh off the backs of unanesthetized lambs’ legs and around their tails. This is done to cause smooth, scarred skin that won’t harbor fly eggs, yet the bloody wounds often get flystrike before they heal.

Within weeks of birth, lambs’ ears are hole-punched, their tails are chopped off, and the males are castrated without anesthetics. Male lambs are castrated when between 2 and 8 weeks old, with a rubber ring used to cut off blood supply—one of the most painful methods of castration possible.Every year, hundreds of lambs die before the age of 8 weeks from exposure or starvation, and mature sheep die every year from disease, lack of shelter, and neglect. Faced with so much death and disease, the rational solution would be to reduce the number of sheep so as to maintain them decently. Instead, sheep are bred to bear more lambs to offset the deaths.

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By contrast, eating too much animal protein has been directly linked to the formation of kidney stones and has been associated with cancer of the colon and liver. By replacing animal protein with vegetable protein, you can improve your health while enjoying a wide variety of delicious foods.

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Because a vegan diet reverses heart disease.
On the American Heart Association (AHA) diet, which includes meat, patients’ arteries continue to clog, while Dr. Dean Ornish’s vegan diet unclogs arteries. In one study, AHA dieters experienced a 28 percent average worsening of clogged arteries, while dieters on Ornish’s program experienced an 8 percent improvement in their arteries.

Because eating meat and dairy products makes you fat.
As a nation, we’re getting fatter, and the Atkins diet has only made matters worse because it only works in the short term. Only 2 percent of pure vegetarians are obese, which is about one-ninth the figure for meat-eating Americans.

Because in every package of chicken, there’s a little poop.
A USDA study found that 98 percent of broiler chicken carcasses had detectable levels of E. coli, indicating fecal contamination.

Because you wouldn’t eat your dog.
Most people are horrified that some cultures eat dogs or whales, but these animals suffer no more than animals commonly consumed in the U.S. The difference is only cultural, not moral.

Because mad cow disease is in the U.S.
Any animal with a brain could contract a version of mad cow disease, yet millions of pigs and chickens are still being fed the remains of diseased animals—in violation of World Health Organization recommendations and the laws of Europe and Japan.

Because it takes a small person to beat a defenseless animal ... and an even smaller person to eat one.
If you’re eating meat, you are paying others to commit acts so cruel that if committed against dogs or cats, they would warrant felony cruelty charges in most U.S. states.

Because the grain used to feed animals could be used to feed hungry people.
A full 80 percent of U.S. agricultural land is used to raise chickens, pigs, and other farmed animals; 70 percent of grains produced are used to feed them. If the massive quantities of grain, soy, and corn now fed to factory-farmed animals were freed up, there would be plenty of food for the world’s starving people.

Because more than half of all water used in the U.S. is used to raise animals for food.
A totally vegetarian diet requires 300 gallons of water per day, while a meat-eating diet requires more than 4,000 gallons of water per day. Time magazine reports, “Around the world, as more water is diverted to raising [cattle], pigs, and chickens, instead of producing crops for direct consumption, millions of wells are going dry.”

Because when animals feel pain, they scream, too.
If you burn them, they feel it. If you give them electric shocks, they feel it. Other animals feel pain in the same way and to the same degree that we humans do.

Because it isn’t fair.
Killing other animals is an act of exploitation and violence, and we do it only because we have the power to.

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