New PETA Germany Video: Grocery Shopping Is a Matter of Life and Death
The choices we make at the supermarket are a matter of life and death. That’s the message behind this sobering new video from PETA Germany, which focuses on the deadly consequences of buying meat, eggs, and cow’s milk:
Our Purchases Have Consequences for Living Beings
To dupe consumers, animal abusers rely on misleading labels such as “cage-free,” “free-range,” and “pasture-raised” that do almost nothing to improve animals’ living conditions. It’s not possible to enslave, exploit, or kill a nonconsenting individual humanely.
The meat industry uses manipulative marketing strategies to make consumers forget that the animal parts on their plate once belonged to thinking, feeling individuals who lived a miserable life and died violently. If shoppers knew how animals languished on filthy farms—where they’re subjected to extreme crowding and routine mutilations and denied everything that’s natural and important to them—they’d think twice about buying their flesh for dinner.
Our Purchases Have Consequences for Our Planet
The United Nations has stated that meat consumption has to decrease by as much as 90 percent in order for us to avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate change. Producing 1 pound of beef uses as much water as about six months’ worth of showers. And it takes up to 13 pounds of grain to produce just a pound of meat. That water and grain could sustain far more people than 1 pound of meat could.
Waste runoff from farms and livestock grazing is one of the leading causes of pollution in our rivers and lakes. Farms frequently get around water-pollution limits by spraying liquid manure into the air, creating mists that are carried away by the wind. People who live nearby are forced to inhale the toxins and pathogens in the airborne waste.
Our Purchases Have Consequences for Our Health
The leading sources of saturated fat and cholesterol for Americans are meat, eggs, and dairy “products.” Studies have found that drinking cow’s milk may lead to higher rates of bone fractures and an increased likelihood of dying prematurely. Red and processed meats are known to be human carcinogens.
Meanwhile, according to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, vegans have lower rates of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer.
Make the Right Choice at the Grocery Store: Shop Vegan
Thankfully, choosing compassion is easy and eating animals is completely unnecessary—and humans can enjoy healthy, compassionate lives by going vegan. When you do, you’ll save nearly 200 animals each year. Get started with PETA’s vegan starter kit:
