On December 2, 2015, I weighed 232 pounds… about 53 pounds overweight.
My “bad cholesterol” levels were too high.
Lab tests indicated I was heading towards diabetes and heart disease.
When I looked in the mirror, and saw the bloated, fat person staring back at me, I felt despair and self-loathing.
I wanted to die, and in fact, due to eating animal-derived food, I was dying.
The weird thing is, I’ve been an athlete most of my life.
I exercised daily, and yet I’d gained weight.
I tried all kinds of diets and eating fads: Paleo. Vegetarian. Pescatarian. Low fat.
You name it, I’d tried it.
But I still consumed dairy products.
I loved pizza, ice cream, gelato, brownies.
If there was a special occasion or social occasion, I sometimes ate meat.
I ate like almost all Americans eat, and it hurt me.
My exercise wasn’t exciting and fun like it used to be.
I was lethargic. I never felt that coveted “runner’s high” I used to feel.
I was trying hard not to be fat, but I was fat.
I was desperate to lose weight and have more energy.
But going vegan wasn’t just about improving my health.
I also did it because my conscience is troubled by the way humans treat animals and the biosphere.
In the months prior to going vegan, I’d been riding my bike on scenic farm roads in rural Michigan.
I’d stop at corrals, farms, and horse ranches and look into the eyes of the horses, cows, pigs, goats, chickens, and other imprisoned animals.
I watched them interact with each other, tried to “be” with the animals as if we were all equals, not the usual human superiority attitude.
It was easy to see that non-human animals have their own lives, thoughts, feelings, and social networks, their own “personhood.”
I realized that if I consume animal-derived food products, I’m complicit in a brutal system that harms me, the environment, and tens of millions of innocent animals.
I realized that all my life I’d been taught that other animals have no rights.
That we can do whatever we want to them.
And that we shouldn’t much care about the cruel ways we make them suffer and die.
So on December 3, 2015, I went 100% vegan.
As I write this today, only a few months later, I weigh 181 pounds. I’m elated to have dropped 51 pounds in less than four months!
I’ve cut the amount of money I spend on food by 35%.
I’m lighter, more agile, more energetic.
I have almost zero body fat.
The XL and XXL size clothes that I purchased as a fattie are literally falling off of me.
People don’t recognize me.
Athletic activities that had been painful or impossible, such as running long distances outdoors, became pleasurable again.
It feels so nice to rediscover my musculoskeletal system.
I realized that the fat was like an anchor, a suit of excess, that had been weighing me down.
My skin cleared up.
My mental clarity, mood, and self-esteem also improved.
My relationship to food has completely changed for the better.
No longer did I crave certain types of food, or feel controlled by food.
But is it hard to be a vegan?
In some ways it is, and that’s the main reason created The Vegan Samurai website and the Vegan Samurai code of honor.
Because as I’ve researched veganism, animal rights, health, culture and other related topics, I’ve discovered that being vegan is like being a samurai… a warrior.
As a Vegan Samurai, you battle internal cravings that come from being raised in a society that programs you to view animals as mere fodder for your dietary pleasure.
You also deal with moral qualms and PTSD that you as a person of conscience feel from living in a society based on harming animals and the earth.
You may feel socially ostracized, or even morally indignant, when you notice everyone around you blindly participates in harming animals and the earth.
The good news is that being a vegan samurai gives you the strength, knowledge, and encouragement so you can become vegan and stay vegan.
Read all the articles here on my website. You’ll find information and inspiration so you experience the health, joy, and other benefits of being vegan.
I used to listen to a bi-monthly health and nutrition public radio program on radio station WMNF.
On the program, a licensed nutritional counselor named Eve Prang Plews accurately warns about bad health effects of pollution, pesticides, herbicides, junk foods, fast foods, GMOs, and unhealthy lifestyles.
I didn’t become vegan until 2015 because I believed Plews when she said vegans were the most unhealthy people she sees in her health counseling practice.
Plews never misses an opportunity to slag veganism by claiming a vegan diet doesn’t provide enough protein, minerals, and B vitamins.
In 2015, after researched proved that her anti-vegan ideas were incorrect, I realized that for the sake of morality and health I had to give up all animal food products.
And now that I’ve gone vegan, I’ve discovered that the fears Plews planted in me about B vitamins, other nutrients, and protein were all unfounded, as long as I understood the simple and easy to follow concepts of whole-food organic vegan eating.
Listening to Plews, who also has a thriving in-person practice in Sarasota, Florida, you’d say she seems well-meaning, caring, and knowledgeable about many health topics.
But her unfounded prejudice against vegans and veganism is a serious problem for her and her listeners.
On that topic, she’s just another lemming in the vast herd of deluded animal-harming humans culturally programmed to believe in two very damaging paradigms: speciesism, and carnism.
Speciesism tells us we have the right to do whatever we want to the earth and innocent animals, including exploit animals for food.
It’s the selfish belief that our species is ultimately the only one that has rights.
We use speciesism to justify killing and otherwise enslaving other animal species– not for “survival,” but for fun, gluttony, pride and ego, and for blood lust.
The second paradigm almost all humans are brainwashed into believing is called “carnism.”
Carnism is the idea that humans eating other animals is a good thing to do and has no moral violation attached to it.
Carnism fosters the worldwide animal enslavement and slaughter industry, creating immense suffering for billions of innocent, sentient animals.
On the radio show, I heard Plews constantly extolling the virtues of eating animals, while downplaying the blatant harms that accrue to humans and “food animals” because of our non-vegan dietary choices.
Plews has recipes for meat and other animal products on her website.
Before I went vegan, when I was eating the kind of diet Plews recommends, I noticed that whenever I ate even small amounts of meat, poultry, dairy, fish, and eggs, I felt sick, sluggish, fat, and had digestive problems.
I wondered why even though I did hardcore exercise nearly every day of the week, I was at least 50 pounds overweight.
I wondered what I could do about my guilty conscience, which bothered me every time I consumed animal food products.
I have to tell you.. if you don’t have a guilty conscience about eating other animals, I wonder if you have a conscience at all.
I’m a deep ecologist animal lover who’s seen undercover videos showing animals enslaved, tortured, butchered alive, and otherwise abused to provide the animal food products that Plews and other carnism advocates claim are healthy to eat.
Eggs, dairy, fish, beef, pork, lamb, etc.– whatever euphemism you use, and no matter if you tell yourself it’s from a “free-range, humane farm,” it’s all produced by exploiting and harming sentient animals.
So I went vegan in December, 2015.
The first effect was my conscience is now clear. I can look animals in the eyes and assure them my dietary choices aren’t causing harm to their kin.
The ongoing effects are I’ve lost 50 pounds, my skin has cleared up, my mental clarity has improved, my athletic performance has reset to what it was when I was 25 years younger, and my food bill has dropped.
I now can run 7-8 miles per day. I swim 2 miles per day in the open ocean.
On some days, I also bicycle 20 miles.
I’m in my late 50s, feeling like I’m in my 20s.
Going vegan turned the clock back!
Do I have B vitamins deficiencies, calcium, iron, or protein deficiencies as the Plews predicted?
Hell no!
I recently had a doctor test me six months after I stopped eating all meat, fish, and dairy, and I don’t have any deficiencies.
My lean muscle mass and exercise performance have increased now that I’m on a plant-based diet!
The doctor says I’m in the top .5 percentile when he examined health indicators such as LDL cholesterol, and that I’m healthier than most people 30 years younger than me.
I eat organic, plant-based foods rich in protein and/or B vitamins, such as beans, rice, chlorella, hempseeds, fermented foods, leafy-green veggies, legumes, and raw cacao beans.
I avoid all processed foods, including plant oils and tofu.
I’m leaner, stronger, and happier than I’ve been in years.
If you have any worries that being vegan will deprive you of protein, B vitamins, Omega-3s, or other crucial nutrition, consult an intelligent naturopathic or holistic physician, and you’ll find out veganism is by far healthier than carnism or even vegetarianism.
In rare cases, your particular metabolism, genetics, lifestyle, health issues or body type may predispose you to deficiencies in protein, B vitamins, Omega 3s problems.
These problems happen in some people regardless of their dietary choices.
Your physician can tell you about vegan supplements that erase any deficiencies.
Loving Guilty Pleasures Leads to Lies About Veganism
There’s a hidden psychological reason that Eve Prang Plews preaches against veganism.
The problem is, people such as Eve Prang Plews dearly love eating animal foods.
It’s one of their most cherished pleasures and they don’t care enough about the harms their food pleasures create for the animals they eat.
They don’t want to feel bad about their dietary choices. So they look for “evidence” to justify their dietary choices that harm innocent animals.
And then they spread bogus information that discourages people from becoming or staying vegan.
Plews has been brainwashed by the multi-billion dollar animal exploitation industries that dominate nutritional training paradigms in academia and at the USDA.
She mouths anti-vegan propaganda put out by craven, profit-driven corporations that sell flesh foods, eggs, fish, and dairy.
She doesn’t understand nutrition as well as she claims she does.
Many people on all kinds of diets make mistakes in the ratios and sources of protein, carbs, and fats they intake, and in the amount of calories they take in.
Instead of telling people to quit veganism like Plews does, if she was a truly intelligent and creative health counselor, she’d advise them how to adjust their vegan diet to make it work better.
The simple fact is whole food vegans have far lower rates of heart disease, obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, and other disorders than do meat-eaters and vegetarians.
Take a look at the videos in this article from the fitness expert who calls himself “Vegan Gains.”
He doesn’t look weakened by veganism, does he?
Plews should educate herself, by watching videos like this one:
What’s really sad is that when esteemed vegan scientists contacted WMNF and proposed an on-air debate between Plews and a scientist who knows that veganism is the healthiest dietary choice, the station’s programming director Rob Lorei REFUSED to air the debate!
On his own radio show, Lorei is always going on and on about justice, fairness, free speech, open exchange of ideas.
But when it comes to Plews and her lies about vegans, he won’t allow anyone to say anything to challenge her on his radio station.
That’s why I stopped listening to WMNF, and stopped donating to it.
The really ironic thing is, WMNF portrays itself as a “progressive” radio station.
It even has a fantastic, unique, world-class weekly show for animal lovers, calledTalking Animals, that features interviews with the world’s leading animal scientists and advocates.
WMNF portrays itself as an advocate for humans oppressed and exploited by powerful individuals and organizations.
Its political rants are about underpaid fast food workers, illegal immigrants, police misconduct, racism, prejudice against LGBTQ and similar humanist concerns.
And all that is good.
But you’d think they’d extend their proclaimed compassion to the BILLIONS of innocent animals slaughtered every year in the USA to feed people like Eve Prang Plews!
If they truly wanted to serve the public interest, they’d have had the vegan scientist on the air with Plews, and let the public hear both sides of the vegan debate.
Why does Rob Lorei not allow a vegan scientist to debate Plews on the air? I can guarantee you Rob Lorei consumes animal food products.
He’s part of the carnism and specieism team, and has his guilty food pleasures to protect.
The bottom line is, when I stopped following the advice of Eve Prang Plews and adopted a vegan diet, I became healthier than ever.
I guarantee you I’m healthier than Plews or Lorei, healthier than almost anyone who eats animal food products, even people half my age!
So don’t let anyone scare you away from going vegan.
It’s the best thing you can do for yourself, for innocent animals, and for the biosphere.
I went to a non-vegan restaurant with friends and was reminded how challenging it is to live vegan in a society founded on animal abuse and the psychological mechanisms that facilitate it.
The three people I had dinner with are all “good” people… a married couple who both had eminently statured careers in academia, and an engineer.
They’re interesting, personable, friendly people whom I respect and care about.
The restaurant was classy, full of diners. The interior had attractive aesthetics.
But I felt uncomfortable because my companions are non-vegans who ordered meals containing cut-up animal parts.
I haven’t seen non-vegan food for a while. It made me sick to see other animals’ breasts and other body parts on a plate.
I studied the menu trying to find vegan options. Out of approximately 25 main entrees or side orders, only two appeared to be vegan.
I asked the waitress if there were any animal products in the items and she said there were not.
My companions questioned me about being vegan. Why had I done it? What about protein deficiency? Did I miss non-vegan food?
I recommended they read VeganSamurai.org for a full explanation of why I went vegan, but that the short answer is, veganism is the only dietary system that’s good for personal health, environmental health, and animal health.
And that’s when my companions’ cognitive dissonance, deliberate unknowing, and moral evasion became very apparent.
They agreed that veganism is the morally defensible dietary paradigm.
But they cavalierly talked continuing to eat meat, fish, eggs, and dairy even though the animal food industry, and animal foods themselves, are harmful to animals, Nature, and people.
Not only that, one of my companions is severely overweight because of his dietary choices, and suffers greatly because of it.
In an ironic moment, he talked about his addiction to foods that were killing him… as he ate foods that were killing him.
It was if I’d been sitting in a restaurant with companions who casually admitted they were shareholders in or employees of a company that committed genocide or other horrors.
It reminded me of a conversation I had with a self-described “pacifist and anti-war activist” who worked for a military contractor making weapons of war.
I recalled the book and videos by Dr. Melanie Joy who explains that carnism–the belief system that supports the eating of animals– creates moral deadening, denial, and self-delusion.
When my beet salad and veggie burger main course arrived, I looked at them carefully to see if there were any animal components.
I couldn’t see or taste any, but to my dismay, at the end of the meal when I was asking if there were vegan desserts, the waitress told me my salad had had cheese in it.
This explained the queasy, heavy feeling I’d started to experience as soon as I ate the salad.
And I mused to myself that if there was a Church of the Vegan Samurai, I’d have to go to confession and tell the priest, “I need forgiveness, for I’ve eaten foods produced by harming cows,” and seek absolution.
But as of yet, there is no Church of the Vegan Samurai.
I was left to feel guilt about my inadvertent “cheese sin,” and the incongruous experience of communing with nice people I care about… except they’re willing participants in the violent, dominant culture of speciesism and carnism.
To put it bluntly, my friends support the animal-killing system that to me represents the greatest moral failing of our species.
All of us who truly care about animals realize that living vegan in a death culture means we’re often forced to compromise, camouflage, and “be quiet” when we’re with people who participate in carnism.
We love our family, lovers, friends. We want to “get along” with people.
We don’t want to dislike people for the deliberate, needless sins they commit against innocent animals and the environment.
We grieve for the obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and other maladies they create for themselves because they eat animal foods and processed foods.
Vegans are the dismayed witnesses to the core immorality that animal-eating represents.
Other than the animal victims themselves, vegans are the only people who viscerally recognize we live in a world dominated by carnistic people and systems that create massive harms and suffering.
This is yet another reason I created the Vegan Samurai concept.
A samurai is a warrior who works hard to stay strong and resolute no matter what battles are looming.
A Vegan Samurai is often alone in a cruel world, surrounded by carnistic people who participate in the genocide against animals.
All you have are your vegan ethics, honor, principles, and strength as antidote to the heartbreak of being part of the only species that enslaves billions of innocent animals, destroys its own health, and trashes the earth.
The Vegan Samurai 