Janamashtmi is the festival marking the birth of Lord Krishna. It is celebrated joyously in many different ways, not just in India, but all over the world. For myself, Janamashtmi has always been one of my favorite celebrations. The buildup and the final unveiling of the murtis at our local temple, right at the hour of midnight, was always a joyous occasion.

However, there is more to this festival than simply the celebrations and various forms of worship. The story behind the birth of Lord Krishna is a fascinating one, full of rich symbolism and metaphorical meaning. This article explores a few of those.
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I’m a bit behind on articles, but I saw this nice cogent summary on arguments against eating meat in Hinduism Today, and thought I’d put up an excerpt since I have not yet finished my own article. It’s a good read.

Quoted from Hinduism Today, Spring 2007 issue, pages 40-41.

“1. The Hunger Argument

Much of the world’s massive hunger problems could be solved by the reduction or elimination of meat-eating because the needs of livestock pasture drastically cuts into the acres of land which could otherwise be used to grow food. Additionally, vast quantities of food which could feed humans is fed to livestock raised to produce meat.

This year alone, twenty million people worldwide will die of malnutrition. One child dies of malnutrition every 2.3 seconds. One hundred million people could be adequately fed using the land freed if Americans reduced their intake of meat by a mere 10%. Eighty percent of the corn and 95% of the oats grown in the US is eaten by livestock. The percentage of protein wasted by cycling grain through livestock is calculated by experts as 90%. One acre of good farmland can produce 40,000 pounds of potatoes, or 250 pounds of beef. Fifty six percent of all US farmland is devoted to beef production, and to produce each pound of beef requires 16 pounds of edible grain and soybeans, which could be used to feed the hungry.

2. The Environmental Argument

Many of the world’s massive environmental problems could be solved by the reduction or elimination of meat-eating, including global warming, loss of topsoil, loss of rain forests and species extinction. Trees, and especially old growth forests, are essential to the survival of the planet. Their destruction is a major cause of global warming and top soil loss. Meat-eating is the number one driving force for the destruction of the forests. Two hundred and sixty million acres of US forestland have been cleared for crop land to produce the meat-centered diet. Fifty-five square feet of tropical rain forest is consumed to produce every quarter pound of rain forest beef. An alarming 75% of all US topsoil has been lost to date. Eighty five percent of this loss is directly related to livestock raising. Another devastating result of deforestation is the loss of plant and animal species. Each year 1,000 species disappear due to destruction of tropical rain forests for cattle grazing and other uses. The rate is growing yearly.

3. The Cancer Argument

Those who eat flesh are farm more likely to contract cancer than those following a vegetarian diet. The risk of contracting breast cancer is 3.8 times greater for women who eat meat daily compared to less than once a week; 2.8 times greater for women who eat eggs daily compared to once a week. The risk of fatal ovarian cancer is three times greater for women who eat eggs three or more times a week as compared with less than once a week. The risk of fatal prostate cancer is 3.6 times greater for men who consume meat, eggs, processed cheese and milk daily as compared with sparingly or not at all.

4. The Cholesterol Argument

The average cholesterol consumption of a meat-centered diet is 210 milligrams per day. The chance of dying from heart disease if you are male and your blood cholesterol intake is 210 milligrams a day is greater than 50%.

It is strange but true that US physicians are as a rule ill-educated in the single most important factor of health, namely diet and nutrition. As of 1987, of the 125 medical schools in the US, only 30 required their students to take a course in nutrition. The average nutrition training received by they average US physician during four years in school is only 2.5 hours. Thus doctors in the US are ill-equipped to advise their patients in minimizing foods, such as meat, that contain excessive amounts of cholesterol and are known causes of heart disease. Heart attack is the most common cause of death in the US, killing one person every 45 seconds. The male meat-eater’s risk of death from heart attack is 50%. The risk to mean who eat no meat is 15%. Reducing one’s consumption of meat, processed dairy products, and eggs by 10% reduces the risk of heart attack by 10%. Completely eliminating these products from one’s diet reduces the risk of heart attack by 90%.

5. The Natural Resources Argument

The world’s natural resources are being rapidly depleted as a result of meat eating. Raising livestock for their meat is a very inefficient way of generating food. Pound for pound, far more resources must be expended to produce meat than to produce grains, fruits and vegetables. For example, more than half of all water used for all purposes in the US is consumed in livestock production. The amount of water used in production of the average cow is sufficient to float a naval destroyer. While 25 gallons of water are needed to produce a pound of wheat, 5,000 gallons are needed to produce a pound of California beef. That same 5,000 gallons of water could be used to produce 200 pounds of wheat.

Thirty three percent of all raw materials (base products of farming, forestry and mining, including fossil fuels) consumed by the US are devoted to the production of livestock, as compared with two percent to produce a complete vegetarian diet.

6. The Antibiotic Argument

Another danger of eating meat is the fact that large amounts of antibiotics are fed to livestock to control staphylococci (commonly called staph infections). The animals being raised for meat are diseased. The livestock industry attempts to control this disease by feeding the animals huge quantities of antibiotics. Of all antibiotics used in the US, 55% are fed to livestock. But this is only partially effective because the bacteria that cause disease are rapidly becoming immune to the antibiotics. The percentage of staphylococci infections resistant to penicillin, for example, has grown from 13% in 1960 to 91% in 1988. These antibiotics and/or the bacteria they are intended to destroy reside in the meat that goes to market. The response of the European Economic Community to the routine feeding of antibiotics to US livestock was to ban the importation of US meat.

In February 2001, Cornell University reported, “Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), also known as mad cow disease, has now been officially identified in a dozen European countries including the UK, France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Belgium, Ireland, Liechtenstein, Portugal, Switzerland, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. As a result, beef sales have fallen by as much as 50% in parts of Europe.” It was the common practice of feeding cows ground up sheep brains and parts infected with the related disease of scrapie which is believed to have started the mad cow epidemic.

7. The Pesticide Argument

Unknown to most meat eaters, meat contains dangerously high quantities of deadly pesticides. The common belief is that the US Department of Agriculture protects consumers’ health through regular and thorough meat inspection. In reality, fewer than one out of every 250,000 slaughtered animals is tested for toxic chemical residues. That these chemicals are indeed ingested by the meat eater is proven by the following facts:

a. 99% of the milk of US meat-eating mothers, contains significant levels of DDT. In stark contrast, 8% of US vegetarian mother’s milk contains significant levels of DDT. This shows the primary source of DDT is the meat ingested by the mothers.
b. The breast milk of meat eating mothers has 35 times more chlorinated hydrocarbon pesticides than the milk of nonmeat-eating mothers.
c. The average breast-fed American infant contains nine times the permissible level of the pesticide Dieldrin.

8. The Ethical Argument

Many of those who have adopted a vegetarian diet have done so because of the ethical argument, either from reading about or personally experiencing what goes on daily at any one of the thousands of slaughterhouses in the US and other countries, where animals suffer the cruel process of forced confinement, manipulation and violent death. Their pain and terror is beyond calculation. Most slaughterhouse workers are not on the job for long, and have the highest turnover rate of all occupations. It also has the highest rate of on-the-job injury.

In the US alone, 1.14 million animals are killed for meat every hour. The average per capita consumption of meat in the US, Canada, and Austrailia is 200 pounds per year! The average American consumes in a 72 year lifetime approximately eleven cattle, three lambs and sheep, 23 pigs, 45 turkeys, 1100 chickens, and 862 pounds of fish.

9. The Physiological Argument

Humans are physiologically not suited for a carnivorous diet. The book Food for Spirit, Vegetarianism in the World Religions, summarizes this point of view as follows. “Many nutritionists, biologists, and physiologists offer convincing evidence that humans are in fact not meant to eat flesh…” The book gives seven facts in support of this view:

1. Physiologically people are more akin to plant-eaters, foragers, and grazers, such as monkeys, elephants, and cows, than to carnivora such as dogs, tigers, and leopards.
2. For example, carnivora do not sweat through their skin; body heat is controlled by rapid breathing and extrusion of the tongue. Vegetarian animals, on the other hand, have sweat pores for heat control and the elimination of impurities.
3. Carnivora have long teeth and claws for holding and killing prey; vegetarian animals have short teeth and no claws.
4. The saliva of carnivora contains no ptyalin and cannot predigest starches; that of vegetarian animals contains ptyalin for the predigestion of starches.
5. Flesh-eating animals secrete large quantities of hydrochloric acid to help dissolve bones; vegetarian animals secrete little hydrochloric acid.
6. The jaws of carnivora only open in an up and down motion; those of vegetarian animals can also move sideways for additional kinds of chewing.
7. Carnivora must lap liquids (like a cat); vegetarian animals take liquids in by suction through the teeth.”