Why choose to be vegan

I had been vegetarian for quite some time before I finally decided to be vegan.

Being vegetarian, by the way, is different from being vegan. I've got some of my friends confused with the two. Being vegetarian means you are either of the following:

• Lacto-ovo vegetarian - you still eat dairy and eggs but don't eat any form of meat, including fish meat and seafoods.
• Pesco-vegetarian - you still eat fish but don't eat dairy and eggs.
• Pesco-lacto-ovo - (I'm pretty sure you can deduce what this is.)
• Pretend-vegetarian - those who classify themselves vegetarian simply because they eat meat in minimal portion.

If you're vegan, however, it's simple. You refuse to eat any form of meat (red, white, they make no difference, fish meat is well, white meat).  You also choose not to consume any animal-based products or products which have animal contents or products tested on animals.

I chose veganism for one word - compassion. It encompasses compassion to self, others, and nature.

Research shows there's no better diet than vegan diet if we want to prevent illnesses. It's just a fact. Unfortunately, the SAD (Standard American Diet) as popularized by the American meat industry, don't want you to know more about it because of one word - profit. Click to watch Earthling Ed  or What the Health.

It also helps you practice compassion to other beings. Seriously, if you can't butcher your own animal and eat it, why would you do the same to other animals? It's what we call selective compassion. You won't eat your dog, will you? But all animals are the same. They have the same sensory perceptor which means they feel pain just like your dog. If you say you love animals but still eat them, you don't love animals: you love pets. Click to watch Dominion.

Being vegan also enable you to help nature. Animal agriculture is the largest contributor of pollution in the whole world. If you stop consuming animal based products, you are, in fact, doing your part to help protect and save the environment.

I've made many wrong decisions but deciding to be vegan is not one of them. Being vegan is one of the best decisions I've made for myself, others, and nature.

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Vegan to animals

The Nameless Hen

As I welcomed my Nanay with her basketful of vegetables and fruits, she told our driver to  butcher the hen. I didn't know what butcher looked like then. For me, it was simply putting an animal to sleep.

As I was running around the compound, I saw the hen and petted her one more time. Our driver walked in and told me it was time to let go of the hen.

He knelt down and grabbed the hen. I saw he had with him a bolo. I got scared for the hen.

I started crying. I kept telling Ka Ito not to hurt the hen. I was pushing him away.

But I was a child.

I stomped my feet. I cried "No" repeatedly. I told them not to hurt the hen.

Sooner, I saw how the hen had its throat slit. Its blood gushing out of its head as our driver held it from its two feet.

My Nanay asked me to get inside. So I did. But I kept crying. I never even gave my hen a name.

After a few hours, I was seated at the dining table and I saw the fried chicken there on the plate.

I cried again. I didn't want to eat it. But my Nanay was strict. She told me to eat it. I refused at first but she had a spoonful of rice with chicken pointed at my mouth. I opened my mouth while I was crying still. I chewed on it but the insides of me wanted to puke. My little hen. My little hen.

Source: Pinterest

The Howling Cow

I was in second year high school. I was in the province visiting my brother. My Mama and I went to the market.

As we were walking around the stinky meat section, I suddenly heard a howling cow. It was wailing. I looked at the direction of the sound and saw a man with a metal baseball bat. He was batting the cow in between its eyes. Each time he batted, the cow would howl and wail.

Mama, the cow! I started shedding tears. I couldn't believe that was how they butcher cows. I was reminded of the hen I witnessed being butchered.

For weeks I couldn't eat any form of meat. I couldn't tell the people around me that I felt bad for the cow. I didn't people around me to think I was a cry baby.

I found myself eating meat again. But I knew something inside me was not for it.

Pigs in Jail

As I was traveling from the province to my school in Quezon City, a truckload of pig stopped beside the window of the bus where I was in.

I saw the pig shed a tear. And I couldn't forget that picture.

I was reminded of the hen. I was reminded of the cow. I was reminded of the violence.

Several years after, I made a decision. If I couldn't bear seeing them get hurt, why the fuck am I eating them?

Then I learned of the wrong information fed to us by animal agriculture giants: that we are supposed to eat meat as if that is the main reason animals were created. We were fed information that animals are healthy. What a baloney!

Let's be kind to them. They feel as we do. They feel as your pets do. If we can't take care of them, let's not hurt them. They don't deserve to be hurt like popular media tell us so. They are sentient beings. They deserve respect too.

Not killing animals but paying others to kill them for you so you could eat them is simply as brutal. Now tell me if you could look an animal straight in the eye and kill it and eat it after you have heard it beg for its life.

Let's be vegan.