New from Atlanta Area

[Jaxxie1181]

Hello, folks! I'm Jenn and I'm a 34-year-old wife, mother, vegan and atheist. I've been a vegan, off and on, since the age of 19. I've had moments of lapsing back into meat eating (yuck!), but I've mostly wavered back and forth between ovo-vegetarianism and veganism. I have only recently come to terms with being an atheist. I came up in the Baptist church. My dad is an ordained deacon and minister. I dabbled a bit in Neo-Paganism after departing from the Christian faith about a year ago, but once I allowed myself to even explore the possibility of atheism everything truly "clicked" into place. I'm an open vegan, closeted atheist living in the Bible Belt. My husband knows I'm an atheist. My mother and my sister know I'm not a Christian, but they think I'm a "spiritual, not religious" type. I have vegan forums I belong to, but there's a lot of New Age spirituality. I have atheist forums I belong to, but there tends to be an overall negativity toward plant-based diets. I cannot believe I actually found this forum that takes the best of both worlds and combines them into one safe haven.

[Insert name here]

Hello and welcome to the forum, what motivated you to leave religion? What caused you to become a vegan? What type of negative comments regarding veganism were there on the atheist forums that you mentioned?

[brimstoneSalad]

Welcome Jaxxie, I hope you like it here!
I'm glad you found the forum.

There's a lot of debate here, but you'll definitely be in the majority.

[Jaxxie1181]

Hello and welcome to the forum, what motivated you to leave religion?

There were several factors that lead me away from Christianity. One was the seemingly never ending contradictions in the Bible, as well as logical fallacies that seem to be part and parcel of core Christian beliefs (things like God made sinners, but didn't create sin. God loves us all, but condemns some to eternal torment. God is in control, but we have free will and things like natural disasters aren't his doing, etc.) Historical and scientific information completely points to Christianity adopting bits and pieces of its history and tenets from ancient religious beliefs and practices rather than being divinely inspired. The final straw was how religious people behave. I didn't see many good examples of religion actually benefiting people, and for those that testified to it doing so, it concerned me that the only barrier between being a decent human being and being a total dick was belief in an imaginary being or a holy text. I researched other religions and nothing resonated with me, so I finally realized the reason for that is simply because I don't believe in a higher power or supernatural presence in the universe.

What caused you to become a vegan?

My sister joined PETA in high school and I was 19. She received the GoVeg starter pack and I read some of the literature. I decided then I wanted to abstain from eating meat, but didn't go vegan until a few months in. I was a vegan until the age of 23 and started eating eggs and dairy again. I started eating meat at the age of 25 during a very unhealthy period in my life. I was extremely depressed and did not care much at the time for things I had once been so passionate about. I went vegan again at the age of 28, stayed vegan until I was 30 and I got really sick. I'm not sure if I was simply not eating a balanced enough diet (I was doing 80/10/10 at the time), but I got the flu and was really, really sick. After about a month of being incredibly ill, and stupidly refusing to go to the doctor, my husband suggested I try to eat some beef for the iron. I hated it, but I was so sick at that point I probably would have laid on a bed of coals if someone had promised I'd feel better. After that I was just sort of desensitized and lazy. It took me months to recover, and laziness caused me to fall back on preparing processed meals that were definitely not vegan. About a year ago I read Diet for a New America by John Robbins and I decided to go back to my vegetarian diet and have been gradually easing all animal products out and looking for cruelty-free health and beauty options.

What type of negative comments regarding veganism were there on the atheist forums that you mentioned?

There was recently a post about the WHO study on processed and red meats causing cancer. There were many, "ah, we're gonna die anyway. Eat bacon!" comments. One person mentioned eating a plant-based diet and people became very irritated and said that was "woo-woo" and that humans had evolved to eat animal flesh. That it's not biologically normal, or healthy, to abstain from animal products.

[garrethdsouza]

Hi. welcome jaxxie! What is it like living in the bible belt?
Also is your vegan diet now scientifically informed ,nutritionally balanced and not pseudoscience based (as before)?

[Jaxxie1181]

Hi. welcome jaxxie! What is it like living in the bible belt?

LOL Interesting. It's somewhat surreal living in an area where there are literally three churches in my residential neighborhood, and about a dozen more within a two-mile radius, Bibles can be purchased at every gas station/grocery store/pharmacy, most local boutiques sell tacky garb with crosses emblazoned on them, and yet somehow Bible Belt Christians seem to feel the most persecuted. The one issue is that not only being atheist, but also being a progressive Socialist AND a vegan in the Bible Belt is incredibly isolating. There are other vegans in the area, but they are largely conservative and/or Christian. It's difficult to connect with vegans who are progressive and non-religious (or at least open-minded to the non-religious).

Also is your vegan diet now scientifically informed ,nutritionally balanced and not pseudoscience based (as before)?

Definitely! I learned the hard way that the HCLF raw vegan diet was simply not sustainable long term. Now I eat a variety of cooked and raw foods and eat things like vegan sweets and baked goods and some processed foods sparingly. Even as an omni I tried to maintain some balance when it came to whole foods and processed.