Open letter to my meat-eating friend

Dearest meat-eating friend,

How have you been? I hope this correspondence meets you in a very good place.

The last time we met, we argued about the pros and cons of being a meat eater over being a vegan. Unfortunately, time was not our friend. We had very little time to convince each other. Thus, I am using this medium to reinforce my points on why your meat-eating lifestyle should be dropped for a non-meat-eating one.

Without mincing words, I know you are probably fixated on meats because of the taste and nutrients they contain. If we are being honest, both of these attributes are something you can get from being a vegetarian or a vegan. Do you know that there is a plant-based version of the meats you eat? If you are in doubt, see it for yourself here.

The good thing is that you don't even have to be a vegetarian or a vegan before adopting a non-meat-eating lifestyle. The evils that the meat-eating lifestyle has caused, is causing, and will cause the world is enough to abandon meat-eating totally for non-meat-eating alternatives. Let me educate you on a few, in case you don't already know.

^{A vegan burger. By Marco Verch on flickr}

Do you know that your meat-eating lifestyle is a major contributor to climate change? According to research findings, a single cow will belch about 220 pounds of methane annually. Methane may not be able to compete with carbon dioxide in terms of volume in the atmosphere, but it is 28 times stronger than carbon dioxide when it comes to absorbing reflected solar radiation.

Perhaps you don't know. The more warmth the earth gets, the more erratic the climate becomes. You need to see one of the tons of devastating effects of climate change in the recent flooding in Nigeria. The next time you are going to munch a lump of meat, think of the people whose lives have been lost or displaced as a result of climate change.

Okay. Let's even put the climate change thing aside. Do you know that meat-eating has indirectly contributed to a host of conflicts that have claimed lives, destroy properties, and displaced millions of people from their homes in the developing parts of the world? Let me explain with an example.

There are no dedicated grazing lands for cattle in many developing countries. Thus, the bulk of the people that are into cattle rearing are nomadic herders. They roam with their herds and settle anywhere the land is green. With modernization, these herders started incurring into politics and trying to make legal claims for land wherever they go to. They often resort to violence, destroying farms and killing settlers along the way.

A good example is the menace of Fulani herdsmen in Nigeria. If you have full knowledge of what cattle herding has caused in some of these countries, you will know that for every meat you consume, you have human blood on your hand.

Let's even leave the environmental and socioeconomic effects of meat-eating aside. How about the long-term health implications of meat consumption? As a meat addict, you may not experience any health consequences because you are still young. Once you hit your 40s, it may no longer be business as usual.

According to research findings, those who regularly eat meat are more at risk of developing heart diseases, hypertension, diabetes, pneumonia, cancer, and other health-sapping illnesses. Read this article by the Guardian and you will understand more about what I am trying to say. The fact that you don't have any of those diseases now does not mean that you are immune to them. A halt now may reduce your risks.

You may want to argue with me that consuming white meat defeats all of the effects of meat eating that I have highlighted. Poultry farming has been reported to be the biggest emitter of dust, microorganisms, and organic compounds into the environment. In other words, it may seem that meats from poultry appear to be safer than red meat, but they don't completely remove the risks of eating meat.

Have you now seen that the evils inherent in meat consumption cannot be over-emphasized? For a willing mind, a single piece of evidence is enough, for an adamant mind, tons of evidence won't suffice.

Extend my warmest greetings to your meat-eating households. Ensure that my plant-based favorite is on ground for my next visit.

Your non-meat-eating friend.