Once again, many people started their year by embarking on Veganuary, adopting a completely vegan diet for the whole month. It’s become quite a cultural phenomenon, with supermarkets introducing new vegan ranges and fast food companies adding vegan options to their menus. It’s meant to shake up people’s routines, kick-start a healthier diet, and incite them into a new, plant based, way of life.
Unfortunately, I was not one of those people. By the time I’d remembered that time was even real, and processed that a new year had actually started, I was already one and a half sausage sandwiches in. I therefore chose to immediately abandon all my vegan aspirations and continued making the most of my parents’ cooking.
”In reality, any time is a good time to set yourself a goal.”
However, I don’t think missing Veganuary is the end of the world. We put a lot of pressure on ourselves to start things at certain times, as though the dawn of a new year is some golden window of opportunity for making lifestyle changes. But particularly now, when all the days have smudged into one another, and entering 2021 has changed absolutely nothing about the pandemic, the significance of ‘New Year’ resolutions is pretty low. In reality, any time is a good time to set yourself a goal, especially something as big a commitment as cutting out meat.
I’ve therefore decided to do Veguary instead, going vegetarian for February. It feels a lot more realistic than Veganuary was; particularly as someone with a nut allergy, being able to swap out various nutty proteins for a couple of scrambled eggs comes in very handy. Being vegetarian is also more familiar to me: during my admittedly brief pre-Christmas stint in university halls, all the meals I cooked were meat-free (driven in equal parts by environmental concerns and a deep seated fear of salmonella-based food poisoning). I’m excited to start cooking more for myself again and trying out new recipe ideas.
My main motivation for cutting meat out of my diet is the environment. I switched to oat milk several months ago after researching the impacts of the dairy industry on both the cows and the planet and also because oat milk just tastes nicer. It was a small, simple change for me to make, but I’m keen to keep going.
”Battery farmed meat is kind of like buying fast fashion: riddled with ethical issues.”
The meat industry is a huge contributor to the climate crisis: it involves deforestation to clear the farmland, growing the food to support the livestock, and the gasses that livestock produce. It’s also an inefficient way of feeding people. According to Greenpeace, more than a quarter of all land is being used to grow food for livestock – food that could have fed people directly. Moreover, the mass production of cheap meat invariably means the exploitation of workers.
Battery farmed meat is kind of like buying fast fashion: riddled with ethical issues and something to be avoided if you can afford to. Like fashion though, sustainable meat sources aren’t accessible or affordable for everyone. Simply consuming less meat or trying plant-based alternatives is a more realistic approach and I’m aiming to keep my post-February diet as vegetarian as possible.
Climate change can feel like one disaster too many at the moment, as keeping up with the news becomes more and more emotionally draining. It also feels overwhelmingly outside of our control – all the vegetarian nuggets in the world aren’t going to stop big corporations from pumping carbon dioxide into the sky. But even making a tiny difference feels reassuring to me, especially one that may even bring health benefits with it.
Caitlin Chatterton
Featured image courtesy of Farhad Ibrahimzade on Unsplash. Image license found here. No changes were made to this image.