To Be or Not to Be Vegetarian

Okay, so I've been a vegetarian for about 9 months now (well, started out as vegan but I ran into some health problems with that. Lazy people should never go vegan.) I've enjoyed it for the most part, despite the strong temptations to eat meat at times. You see, I'm not like alot of the hardcore veggies where I have that basic, gut level reaction of revulsion towards meat. I'm more of a vegetarian on an academic level: I know it's wrong so I don't do it, but the sight and thought of it doesn't bother me.

Well, in about a month I'll be leaving to go to Prague for a month. It's a trip I'm really looking forward to since it's the farthest from the U.S. I'll ever have gone. I really want to experience all that Prague has to offer. I was talking to my parents (who have never been supportive of my vegetarianism, but still) and they suggested I should try eating meat while there just to get the full experience of their food. Normally I'd say my parents were just being dumb, but I kind of have to agree with them. I want to experience everything they have to offer over there, but I'm still not crazy about the thought of eating meat. Then again, if it's for one month, is it really that bad?

Help me, I'm open to any opinions.

Honestly, Id say eat the meat while your their. I was a vegetarian for a month last summer because me and my friend were bored, and my little sister had a birthday with all sorts of seafood, and I missed out, and I kinda regret it. So I guess it comes down to your convictions vs. wanting to fully experience a forign culture. But I'd also say that if you decide to eat meat while your there, since I would suppose their food is so rich and everything, you should eat some chicken or something here, cuz you dont want to start off too rough, youll get really sick.

From someone who has no real problems with eating meat, I guess I'd say "Do it!", because that's what I'd be doing.

Your diet is up to you. There aren't any consequences if you decide to eat meat or not. Nothing is going to make you feel guilty about it later, and if you don't have a problem actually eating meat, then why not?

Of course, if you're looking for a reason to stick to your guns, then you can always justify it by saying that it's just food, after all, and that if it's wrong enough for you to change your eating habits, then going to a foreign place won't change that in any way.

why are your parents against vegetarianism in the first place? this might help explain their reasoning better.

i can see their point, but it's not something i could do. i last ate flesh about 14 years ago now, and there's just no way i could do it again. fuck offending someone from another culture; i'm not about to offend myself by breaking my beliefs.

i guess you have to look at why you are a vegetarian in the first place. i'm a mac user, but i'm not about to preach to pc users that they should all use macs, any more than i preach to meat eaters that they should never eat meat again. each to their own, because we all have a different agenda.

if you feel you simply have to try that approach, then try it. just remember that you don't have to stick to it if it feels wrong to you.

Being a veggie in Prague is like drinking cider in Prague. Bizarre, and extremely difficult.
There are veggie restaurants there, but in most of the other restaurants veggie foods are still deep fried in animal fat, so I highly recommend to engulf oneself with meat, unless you really want to live on knedlik for the whole month.

Yes, I would say to condition yourself w/ eating meat here in the US again before going to Prague. Your vegetarian selections will be limited there, and you'll need some hearty food to soak up the absinthe.

I didn't eat beef for 10 years, then I broke down when someone made Guinness stew. It tasted unbelieveably delicious, and I didn't feel one bit sick.

To each their own, but yes it's alot of work to have a proper vegetarian diet (ie, getting all your amino acids, etc) especially when traveling abroad. I got laughed at in Japan for eating vegetarian selections when a dinner companion was dipping raw beef into raw egg.

It depends on how strongly you feel about not eating meat.

Personally, I wouldn't eat it just for the reason that I was afraid of missing out on 'fully experiencing the food.'

There will be so many customs and new things to experience, besides eating meat.

To me, it would depend on how the animals are slaughtered. Hopefully it will be better than the factory farms we have in America.

Hope you have a great trip!

personally i think meat is about the best thing you can eat!

i always wondered how someone who grows up normally decides to become a vegan/vegetarian, i dont really understand the whole moral of it.
i'm pretty sure most of them still swat at mosquito's, perhaps even set traps for pests when they have them.
a lot of wool comes out of australia where every year kangaroo's and dingo's die because sheep take their food and land and i'm sure there's a ton of other examples like that.

you're hardly doing the world a lot of good and you're missing out on some of the best food around.

When in Rome, do as the Romans.

this is not an "i think vegetarian is daft" thread. someone is asking a specific question. if you're not going to answer it, then don't post.

i thought i was pretty clear on weather or not i think he should eat meat.

Why is eating meat wrong? Ok eating human flesh.. I can see why that's wrong. But fish, cow, pig, chicken? what is "wrong" with that?

I mean vegetables are great... and quite frankly more people need to eat more of them but if the idea and sight of meat doesn't 'repulse' you. and in fact you have the occasional craving maybe that's your body telling you that it needs a little meat every once in a while.

People are ominivores. We have enzymes to break up animal flesh. We are designed to eat it. We are also designed to eat vegetables, those big grinding teeth at the back.

Having said that.. .people also have allergies and food intolerences. Differernt people use food fuel differently. A vegan diet might work great for one person but not meet the needs of another.

good luck with your decision.

Lazy white trash vegan right here. I think it has more to do with having some practice and developing a broad knowledge of what's good/easy/cheap to eat. Having a cool vegan buddy helps.

ANd yeah, I fucking love meat and dairy. I always think it's a little counter productive to feel like you have to say because it's bad it doesn't taste good.

RE: travels, I don't know. I am not an absolutist. If I'm in Europe and I can't find a veggie meal, I'd eat meat. I don't think it would change my beliefs or my future behavior that much. But to actually make meat eating part of the adventure? Personally I've given up the romance that surrounds meat and dairy period. I take pride in the fact that although I may be a hedonist in a sea of hedonists. At least I can abstain from SOMETHING!



I appreciate your honesty about these matters.

(just remember, you asked)

Intro to Veganism
Every year in the U.S., more than 25 billion animals are slaughtered for food. Raising animals on factory farms is cruel and ecologically devastating. Eating animals is bad for our health, leading directly to many diseases and illnesses, including heart attack, stroke, cancer, diabetes, and obesity.

For animals
Animals on factory farms are treated like machines. Within days of birth, for example, chickens have their beaks seared off with a hot blade. Male cows and pigs are castrated without painkillers. All of these animals spend their brief lives in crowded and ammonia-filled conditions, many of them so cramped that they can't even turn around or spread a wing. Many do not get a breath of fresh air until they are prodded and crammed onto trucks for a nightmarish ride to the slaughterhouse, often through weather extremes and always without food or water. The animals are hung upside down and their throats are sliced open, often while they're fully conscious.

For the environment
Today's factory farms use everything but the "moo," "cluck," and "oink" — but in the process, they leave behind an environmental devastation that generations to come will be forced to clean up. Raising animals for food requires more than half the water used in the United States and is the biggest polluter of our water and topsoil. Coyotes and other animals are poisoned and shot by western cattle ranchers who consider federal land to be their land for grazing. Our country's meat addiction is slowly poisoning and depleting our land, water, and air.

… And for YOU!
The only two researchers in human history who have successfully reversed heart disease, by far America's biggest killer, have included an exclusively vegetarian diet as a part of their programs. On the Dr. Dean Ornish and Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn programs, patients become "heart attack proof" (to quote Dr. Esselstyn, in the August 1999 issue of the American Journal of Cardiology) by getting their cholesterol levels to below 150 (the average vegan cholesterol level is 128), the level below which no one has ever been documented as having died from a heart attack. And people who consume animal products are also 40 percent more susceptible to cancer, and at increased risk for many other illnesses, including stroke, obesity, appendicitis, osteoporosis, arthritis, diabetes, and food poisoning. Additionally, meat contains accumulations of pesticides and other chemicals up to 14 times more concentrated than those in plant foods.

Click here to read PETA's fact sheets on the health, environmental, and animal welfare benefits of a vegetarian diet.

Click here for a longer essay, “Veganism in a Nutshell,” which delves more deeply into each of these topics.

What you can do
Meat stinks for the animals, the Earth, and your health. Make the compassionate, environmentally sound, and healthful choice — go vegetarian! Download our leaflets, videos, photos, and factsheets, and give them to your friends, relatives, and the public (including any reporters you feel might be interested). Check out our "Resource for Activists" for more tips. If you can't download the information you want, you can order copies through the PETA literature catalog.


[Edited to make links work]

[Edited on May 11, 2004 by wigglefree]

You make me happy.

I have a friend who was vegetarian for a substancial amount of time, at some meat, and got extremely sick. Obviously, this doesn't happen to everyone, and it could have just been some bad meat, but don't rule it out.
Maybe give your gut a warm-up meal or two before you go, just to make sure. Wouldn't want to get their and get sick from the first meal you have.

Was that directed at me?


If so, that is the best complement I've gotten since I've been around here.

so eating meat isn't wrong so much as the meat industry is wrong. and eating meat isn't so wrong for ME ( or any person who has no meat intolerances) unless I have an otherwise crappy diet that eating meat, fat, sugar in stupid high quantities.

Let me just say that the meat industry in the US does have it's not so good side, I'll give you that.

I disagree that eating meat is fundamentally wrong. I will, howerever, agree that poor treatment of animals is wrong, the devestation on the environment is wrong and having a crappy diet with no exercise isn't good. (an excess of many foods can be crap for your health, including refined flour, and sugar)

Having said that - I will continue to eat my free range eggs that I buy from the farm up the hill, nice Mrs. Wrathcliffe makes a few extra bucks tax free. I will continue to eat any fish I catch (that goes for crab too) and will continue to eat Caribou steaks whenever I'm home and hanging with a friend who hunted the thing him or herself, and will enjoy my free range organic meat as part of a healthy well balanced diet - without guilt.

I would research the farming conditions in the Czech Republic and have a look around while you're there, then decide what you're comfortable with. Prague will probably be a bit different than smaller towns.

Personally, I think you can have a grand time without animal products, but it's your body, your conscience, and your decision.

As to Conry's point, if you are with someone who speaks Czech, finding smaller restaurants is probably the way to go. I've never had a problem in a place where I could speak to those who are preparing the food, even if they're not familiar with veggies/vegans. They're generally more than happy to provide you with something that fits your foodstyle, and oftentimes are curious to hear your reasoning. This would be tougher considering the language barrier, though.

That would make you the only mac user in the world with this philosophy (and I say that as a newly and happily converted mac user).

Thank you all for your input, too!

This reminds me of that one Star Trek episode where Kirk was stuck in an alternate wrestling universe.

Never again do I want to see Shatner's package.

I tried to make it as package free as possible hence the old grain look to it all.

The advice about conditioning yourself before you go is good. I ate lots of red meat for the first time in years at a recent cookout and I got very sick.

I'm not a vegetarian, but I avoid red meat for health reasons.

I do want to ask one question though....if you;re willing to eat small quantities of meat before you go, in order to ensure that you won't get sick later...why be a vegetarian at all? Why not just eat meat in moderation?

i honestly think you'd be missing out on a lot if you went without meat on your trip. i never made it to prague, but when i went to europe, i found that the meat there was sooooo much better than i have found almost anywhere in the states. then again, i am and always have been a big meat eater.
it will also be time-consuming and very difficult (though of course not impossible) to stay strictly vegetarian over there. enjoy your trip! im jealous