Good for him! It's hard being a vegan. Can't survive without my meat! Of course, I do have a fair share of veggies/salad/fruits too... 
You could dude... its really more of a mental thing than anything.. but I understand everyone is different and do not want to make that commitment... but the food is progressively much better and more attainable.. The new veggie burgers from Impossible and Beyond Meat really mimic the texture and taste of the real thing...
Its really refreshing to see the positivity from this thread on this topic..
It gets old when you talk about a plant based or vegan and some child rebuttals "bacon"..
to our health.. cheers
It is also an enviromental and for some a moral issue.
At it's core, veganism is an ethical code. Most people simply equate it to a dietary choice, when in fact it's ethics that drive those choices.
As PaulAllen wrote, veganism addresses many of the biggest issues facing our world today:
- Environmental degradation (even if you don't believe in global warming, to which animal agriculture is a major contributor, the manure lagoons are tangible enough)
- Human suffering - exploited human workers, often immigrants who can be paid below minimum - severe physical injuries, on the job deaths, mental health conditions including PTSD in slaughterhouse workers
- Incalculable amounts of animal suffering in concentrated animal feeding operations
But let me take it a step further and assert that the way we produce food in this country is a direct contributing factor in global food insecurity. I wrote a paper filled to the brim with references about this, but I'll give you the short version. In sum, 75% of the world's agricultural land is dedicated to animal agriculture and the absurd amount of inputs it requires, most notably food inputs primarily comprised of GMO corn and soy. According to USDA and other data, approximately 1/2 of the world's coarse grains and soy are dedicated for animal feed, while only 1/3 is used for actual human food. For corn in the US, only 12% or so was used for actual human food, with the rest of it going to either animal feed or for biofuel production.
Think about that for a second. We're feeding millions of dollars worth of food (and far more total food) to animals instead of people - an incredibly inefficient process of food production due to the sheer amount of food needed to produce an equivalent amount of food by weight of animal flesh. Some estimates assert that we could feed 4 billion additional people if we stopped feeding these crops to animals stuck in concentrated animal feeding operations and fed people instead.
Further, these food inputs are heavily subsidized by our government, along with other inputs - energy, petroleum based fertilizers, antibiotics, etc. Direct subsidies of commodity crops such as corn, wheat, barley, soy artificially suppresses world prices of these foods, meaning that farmers in peripheral economies (3rd world countries) cannot grow their own food competitively to earn a living. It's estimated that 2.7
billion people rely on small-scale agriculture for their own food and subsistence. There's no way for these people to compete. They don't have the resources/capital to do so.
Good for him! It's hard being a vegan. Can't survive without my meat! Of course, I do have a fair share of veggies/salad/fruits too...
It can be difficult at first, but if you internalize the reasons to commit to (or trend towards) veganism - such as the things written above - it actually is really easy. Easier than ever before because there's so many good recipes out there and the market for vegetarian/vegan products has exploded. There's cashew (or other nut) based cheeses (which are incredibly delicious) and meat replacement products have come a very, very long way. But certainly it's all up to what you feel comfortable with, and even cutting back on some animal products goes a long way.
