Eating Earth

The average American or junk food addict can eat their way through pounds of fat in a year. The fat comes from the food they eat that is usually high in calories, cholesterol, sodium and simple sugars. The normal, healthy calorie intake for an average male is 2100 and for a female it is 1800 calories in a day. However, more often than not people are eating more calories than they can burn off as energy causing obesity amongst junk food addicts. Not only is this unhealthy dieting style detrimental to a person’s health, it also has negative effects on the environment and the animals living in it.

Eating an excessive amount of foods high in saturated fat and cholesterol (usually any form of animal products) can not only cause a bad body image and low self esteem, it can also cause more lasting damage. Heart attacks, strokes, brain aneurisms, osteoporosis, high blood pressure and breast cancer have all been found to having relations to vile eating habits. In the United States, over 20 people suffer and occasionally die of a heart attack within a single hour. Many think that the most autopsy results would come back as substance abuse or cancer, but that isn’t true; more autopsy results come back with just two items on it as the cause of death… saturated fat and cholesterol.

The negative consequences on the environment and animals from a fat-eating lifestyle are intertwined. The cattle, which provide the marbled-meat that tastes oh-so-good, take up land and resources from the environment as well as poisoning it. Many other animals are included in this fiasco of fatty consumption, but because bovine animals take up most of the fat spectrum I will focus mainly on them. Most of the crops grown in the United States are not grown for humans, but for the animals that humans eat. Aqueducts that should be supplying cities with water are supplying cattle with water instead. By the end of its life, a full grown bull would have slurped up enough freshwater to float two naval destroyers!

The fields used to grow crops for the cows are copiously splattered with herbicides, pesticides and fungicides that kill off other animals that accidentally eat them. Cow manure, just overflowing with harmful nitrates, will often infiltrate water systems to cause algae blooms and kill off fish or make our drinking water too toxic to actually drink!

All in all, I don’t think Americans will change the way they eat unless something drastic happens. People are constantly turning vegan and vegetarian but the trend never lasts for them. Quitting meat is difficult, and eating meats in the form of fish and turkey is actually healthy, so that isn’t exactly the only and best option out there. Animal products are one source of the killers cholesterol and saturated fat, but junk food like chips, cookies and other snacks can also be harmful and have those things in the. If you are like me, and can’t quit meat or junk food entirely whether it is a half-ass attempt to save the animals or just be a physically better person, you should just be more careful with what you eat. Don’t let being vegetarian and vegan seem like a pointless fad to follow and merge in the crowds and be forgotten like your “Go Green!” little purse that you bought in attempt to look like you are environmentally friendly. Instead, start the process of leaving junk food slowly by taking some sugary things off of your at-home menu and so that in time, we can stop eating so unhealthy foods. With all the bad reactions from the environment from an average American’s diet, it is a miracle that this country hasn’t completely eaten the planet Earth.