I have a foodstagram.
It is very embarrassing for me, because I used to make fun of those very people who take pictures of their food and then proceed to talk about the latest food fad. But it keeps me from eating horribly every day of the week, so I stick to it pretty regularly.
As a lactose-intolerant vegetarian, I have tagged a few Instagram pictures as vegan before. However, it seems more and more the pictures that I tag as vegan get so many more likes and comments than my vegetarian ones.
My vegan posts are filled with emoji hearts and comments on how I’m doing the best thing I can ever do for myself and the Earth. Which is why, right now, I am making a heartfelt defense of being vegetarian.
I’ve been a lifelong vegetarian. My parents never kept meat in our house and routinely referred to it as gross. Growing up, I never felt any need to eat meat. I still don’t, and overall, I think that the vegetarian diet is a healthy lifestyle choice that still reduces greenhouse emissions. Being vegetarian lets me eat all the fruits and vegetables I want, along with omelettes, pizza and ice cream.
Recently, I have considered going vegan. I eat a vegan diet almost 60 percent of the time because of my lactose intolerance, so I considered changing my diet because I read that going vegan would be able to drastically help the environment.
Now, I am not a science major for no reason. I have come to respect a good scientific study. In 2005, the University of Chicago published a finding that lacto-ovo vegetarians have a much smaller carbon footprint than omnivores. Going vegan would decrease the amount of carbon dioxide released by even more.
This convinced me that I should try eating more vegan meals, but I still decided to not become fully vegan.
Why? It was mostly for personal health reasons, but also because I don’t have time right now to be vegan. I don’t have time to cook, nor do I have the budget to buy the produce I will eventually have to find time to cook. It’s a weak argument, but it’s true.
This article isn’t to mock vegans. It’s a hard lifestyle, and I couldn’t do it. However, being a vegetarian or even eating vegetarian meals three days a week can have a drastic improvement on the environment.
The aforementioned carbon emission aside, being vegetarian also involves a diet lower in saturated fat and may confer health benefits. Vegetarianism has been correlated with decreases in heart disease, type 2 diabetes and some cancers. For all that, why wouldn’t you want to at least consider vegetarianism?
Being vegetarian may not be glamorous, but it can help the environment and your health. While it might not “fight the good fight,” as vegan Instagram users claim about my spaghetti squash boat, it’s a great way to get into a more plant-based diet.
npatwari@indiana.edu
