I too was a vegetarian for approximately 17 years. I have no problem with people becoming vegetarian, however, the issue rests with vegetarians who are not devoted to ensuring that they obtain proper nutrition from their food. To be a proper vegetarian requires a lot of knowledge about nutrition. For the most part, teenagers just are not that interested. One girl in the article talks about eating chicken now because it was too hard to cook her own meals. I have 5 neices who all became vegetarian. Every one of them has started to eat meat because they lacked energy from the lack of protein in their diets. Neither were they dedicated to remaining vegetarian when push came to shove.



What about amino acids?



Who is this writer? A teenager? Now, seriously, I can't even believe this was put to print. Heated, rancid, free radical-forming, DNA-mutating vegetable oils are healthier than meat?

It took me years to come to grips that mankind requires adequate protein. I was a failure to thrive vegetarian who had to change my eating habits. Like many other ex-vegetarians, I choose to only purchase free range, organic, humanely treated meat. There's no compromise. I will always be an animal lover, I just have to look at things in more shades of gray than black/white.

Everybody has a right to choose the way they want to eat. I was never a militant vegetarian and I'm not militant about the way I eat now (nor do I appreciate militants who post on this site about the error of our ways). I just don't want teenagers becoming vegetarians because it's cool. Do it because it means something and you are committed to ensure that you don't become malnourished in the process.