by Gordon Hamilton

Created on: December 20, 2008

Vegetarian or carnivore, which is right? I answer that question with another, far more important one: who has the right to judge?

If we are to ask a carnivore whether their practise is right or vegetarianism is right, they will of course answer that theirs is and vice versa. It is all down to perception and to opinion, not forcing our perceptions or opinions on to other people. What if we were considering dress sense as the basis of a similar argument? Is someone who likes to dress overly casual, outlandishly, or extremely formally at all times wrong just because we happen to disagree with them? What about someone who supports a different sports' team from us? Someone who has a different taste in music?...What about someone who has different political or religious beliefs from us? Are they wrong and we are right? Consider the wars and genocide throughout history that have been based on such small-minded, "I am right, so you are automatically wrong," ways of thinking!

What we eat, when we eat it and how we eat it is a very personal choice in each and every one of us. Sure, experts or - even worse! - so-called experts can give us advice, make suggestions and perhaps even genuinely attempt to help us improve our eating habits for the better with the best intentions in the world. At the end of the day, however, this choice is our own to make and one which we each have the inherent right to make without ridicule or unnecessary criticism.

I will give you such an example from my own family. My mother has told me many times how, as a child, she would be ordered to eat the meat that was placed before her. Remember that we are talking about quite some time ago and vegetarianism was by no means so widely practised or accepted as it is today. She tells of how, as a young child, she used to cry, saying that she didn't like meat and didn't want to eat it but the response was that it had been paid for with good money which was by no means plentiful and that she would eat it. She is now and has been for a great many years a strict vegetarian - for the simple reason that she doesn't like meat.

I am an omnivore in that I eat both meat and vegetables. I will be honest and state that I much prefer meat to vegetables but I am aware of the importance of eating a balanced diet, so accordingly obtain the necessary vitamins and minerals from a variety of sources. Does this make me a hypocrite for being neither a vegetarian (one who only eats vegetables) or a carnivore (one who only eats

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