Paul Andreas Fischer
10/20/2015
Environmental Studies
This Monday Ori Shavit came to the Hillel House at UVM and gave a lecture on the vegan lifestyle based on her writing on “Vegans on Top” which raises awareness for the vegan “revolution” that has occurred in Israel in the last decade. Her first order of business was to describe the necessity to change to a vegan lifestyle and to describe her own realization that an all-vegan lifestyle was a choice which she could and did want to make. This was once a, as she described, “fringe phenomenon” and now in America and Israel, the decision to eat vegan foods has become a mainstream one. In Israel, 100’s of thousands have now changed their diet. The change is not limited to Israel, but is global and in the United States there are around half as many vegans per capita.
Some vegans worry about fitting in socially, and there is a book for this which includes many alternative dishes and some that are nearly identical to non-vegan options called “So You’re Dating a Vegan.” Those who are uncomfortable with their choice publicly may also look to numerous celebrities and important figures who have adopted this lifestyle. Many are athletes, such as Marc Danzig, Ariel Rosenfeld, and even a former weightlifting champion who has maintained a vegan lifestyle for over 25 years. One suggestion she provides to encourage vegans to make their meals more accessible to guests and others who have not made the change completely is to incorporate corn cream into meals and to make use of pates.
While the presentation was not one which was laden with factual details, the audience was encouraged to seek out the scientific basis for the choices themselves. There were key health, environmental, and social facts are presented. For example, industrial farming techniques involve the electric killing of baby chicks which do not lay enough eggs. This is a way in which the true cost of a dish is hidden. How does this translate into actual savings on a national scale? Among the 5% of Israelis who have become vegan, their food intake has decreased markedly, in fact even commercial chains which have not been historically friendly to vegans now have vegan options including Dominos.
There are some boundaries which are established early on, which include the convenience and taste of vegan-ism which make adopting this lifestyle easier. Normally, vegans refuse all foods with meat, eggs, cheese, and milk but now many people who are not “fully” vegan supplement their diet with vegan food, a practice which confers many of the benefits that a vegan diet provides. Understanding where the food comes from can be quite as important as deciding where and to whom it will go. While a study from 2014 has shown that Alzheimer’s is actually the leading cause of death in the USA, heart disease is a major cause of mortality. Among vegetarians, heart attack mortality decreased by 24% and in vegans by 57% as shown in a study published by the American Dietetic Association.
Other ways the true cost of eating traditional agricultural products can be hidden includes the substitution values of agricultural inputs. In Environmental Studies we have learned that the United States is among the greatest contributors to greenhouse gases, and by far the greatest contributor per capita. Part of this negative trend is related to the dietary choices which American have made, which may be sustainable, but also may be limiting growth. Importantly as well, cattle and other animals suffer unnecessary cruelty for the sake of what one chef describes as “a few colors on his pallet.” Seeing this vegan blogger was inspiring. We were able to see the meals, lifestyles, and positive consequences of this difficult and possibly overwhelming change. Investigation of research on this topic proved quite fruitful, and at the end of the evening, it was even worth it for this student to make a pledge to eat vegan daily. Even if unsuccessful, this pledge captures a fair amount of the social, health, and environmental benefits while still maintaining a fair amount of flexibility in dietary choices.
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