I became vegetarian in fits and spurts; first cutting back on red meat, then omitting it from my diet.  Later, eating chicken became too emotional for me to swallow, and I stopped eating that as well.  Eventually, I entered a relationship and began eating meat again, but as soon as the relationship ended, so too did my carnivorous ways.  To this day, I occasionally indulge in some seafood,  but those instances seem to be fewer and farther between.

I think my vegetarianism began the first time I looked into my dog's eyes and it’s reinforced each time I'm with her.  I can clearly see Phoebe's personality (she's very loving, likes chasing anything that moves fast) and can emote with the best of us with a deep sigh or licking the tears off of my face when I cry.  She's intelligent enough to know that when I put on sweatpants and tennis shoes, she gets to "go" somewhere and if she hears me pick up the "red dot" (laser pointer) she immediately looks down, hoping to finally catch that tiny, evasive light.  Her other favorite toys include her hammer and ball.  She can convey so much attitude with a single look or sigh that it doesn't even matter that she can't speak!

With all of that personality and emotion wrapped into that 58-lb fuzzy body, I find it horrifying that in some countries, she would be considered a delicacy.  My baby?  Dinner?  No.

I next considered that if she has a soul and unique personality, why wouldn't other animals?  In fact we hear of cute and/or interesting stories every day of cows and chickens who seemingly show affection and/or personality...we watch these "funniest video" clips, for example, or laugh at the you tube videos and say "awww" to our friends, but yet we go home and eat a taco, cheeseburger or grilled chicken salad. 

I just read an article today on page 73 of Vegetarian Times that summed it up eloquently in the following quote:

..."'We are talking about sentient beings [animals] who can experience complex emotions, including depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.  When we look at a child suffering, we see the ethical significance.  But animals are just as capable of mental anguish as we are.'  And no bacon cheeseburger in the world is worth that kind of karmic baggage."

There are some who will cite nature itself as justification, saying that we are simply animals ourselves participating in the food chain.  I might surprise you by saying that I think that's a valid point.  I also recognize the counter-argument as valid; that because we are reasoning beings, we can choose alternatives to slaughtered meat.

My thoughts are this:  I recognize that in nature, animals kill other animals and their very survival depends upon killing as a source of food.  Wild dogs have a cunning hunting style, from which our military must have borrowed some inspiration, where they split up and head off the gazelle, and/or routing their potential dinner into another pack of dogs for killing.  Once the gazelle is dead, they all share in the feast. 

If other dogs in the pack make a kill first, they will signal the rest of the pack to stop hunting and come share dinner with them.  Because of this, the dogs conserve precious energy that will be needed to hunt food the next day. 

What I find compelling about this is that the dogs are only killing what they need.  They don't kill 5 or 10 gazelles in a day just because they can and then overfeed or end up wasting the meat. 

But what are we doing?  We have slaughterhouses set up where billions of animals are routed through annually...where the animals wait in line to get clunked on the head before having their throats slit in view of the others awaiting their fate.  If one steps out of line, he/she is routed back-it's impossible to escape this death. 

The dead bodies are then routed through factory-style where they are butchered-with each part being removed for its designated purpose.  Undesirable pieces, along with the blood, litter the floor to be removed later (and probably made into dog food).

The packaged meat eventually makes its way into our grocery stores, en masse, where any expired or left over meat will be discarded right into the trash.

Personally, I'm more motivated by my love of animals, but there are environmental implications for us secondary to the mass production of meat; according to the article I cited above, "'Animal factory farms contribute 18% of all greenhouse gas emissions-more than the transportation sector,' says Anna Lappe..."  I wonder how many greenhouse gas emissions are produced when the wild dogs kill and eat their daily gazelle?

I think it's easier to ignore these facts and maintain status quo.  We've been so desensitized to what we are eating...a cheeseburger just tastes good, darn it, never mind what that brown stuff is between the yellow-orange stuff that passes for cheese.  Everyone else eats meat, it's not a big deal!  Nicer restaurants will describe the meat and the care with which it was prepared by the chef so it's easy to disassociate from the nightmare of the animal’s last few minutes.  Even my mouth salivates a bit at a cookout or at the smell of a well-prepared steak-the difference is that I can't forget what that delicious smell was before and how it died...and I just can't swallow it.  Literally or figuratively.