Beyond the “need” comes the ethical, moral part, where the responsibility of each of us plays a role. Some vegetarians and vegans say they don’t want them to kill animals or eat other evolved beings. Which brings us back to the reference to monks, saints and the energetic-spiritual, scientifically unquantifiable aspect. Vegetables are alive, as it has been explained to me many times by meat-eaters, so I’m holding on for nothing… but still.
Other people have become vegan because they want to not participate, even indirectly, in the way farm animals are treated. The conditions in which these animals are born, live, feed, are treated for various diseases and are killed are abominable in the overwhelming majority of farms, anywhere in the world.
Finally, there are people who have been informed to the point where they found out, for example, that much more water is used to produce meat than for vegetable products with the same nutritional value. And water is the most important element in nature and we are already experiencing a global water crisis. Not to mention the carbon footprint that a kilo of meat produces, much larger than that left by plants with the same nutritional value. This is where the responsibility of all of us comes in, and here I believe that a person who does not consume meat actually has that ethical and moral ascendancy that the good-natured thinker denied him.
This responsibility is equivalent to any other that an individual assumes in the name of the common good. Avoid getting a 3 liter diesel if you can, don’t leave the light on for nothing, etc.
Our multilaterally developed capitalist society is only concerned with producing profit regardless of the consequences. So no one will bother to teach us the parsimony with which meat is consumed, the symbol of our daily satiety, as long as we don’t mind taking a handful of medicine after every meal starting at the age of 35. And …God help me! Speaking of which, I counted the fasting days from the Orthodox calendar.
There are 32 weeks a year.
So even God helps you, if only you want.