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Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer: Some of My Favorite Reviews

I posted my review of Eating Animals on the examiner site yesterday. I’m so grateful for what I consider to be a brilliant and important book. (And let me just say, as a complete aside, that it also has what is one of my all-time favorite covers!)

Jonathan Safran Foer has a unique talent for educating people about the horrors of factory farming through an engaging storytelling approach. No one can deny the impact that this book is having on readers. It’s likely to reach many more mainstream consumers than any other book so far on this subject, with […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-11-16T11:13:00-05:00November 16th, 2009|Tags: Books for activists, Vegan activism|4 Comments

Buying Cookbooks is Good Vegan Activism

I tweeted and facebook-status-updated this yesterday but I think it deserves a quick blog post, too.

I noticed that the best selling cookbook in America this week is The Pioneer Woman Cooks. In case you haven’t heard of her, The Pioneer Woman has a wildly popular blog sub-titled “Plowing Through Life in the Country…One Calf Nut at a Time.” She’s a city girl who met a rancher in a bar, married him and moved to Montana. It’s hard to figure out which blog posts are more annoying—those waxing poetic about the […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-11-12T13:52:00-05:00November 12th, 2009|Tags: Cookbooks, Vegan activism|7 Comments

Is Vegetarianism a Useful Gateway to Veganism?

I have quite a few friends and acquaintances who are vegetarian. I’ve talked with them, of course, about why it doesn’t make sense to give up some animal products and not others. And about the horrible suffering involved in egg and dairy production. Some are making the effort to move toward veganism, and some are almost there. But, sometimes, when I talk to vegetarians about this issue, they are sort of stunned. They thought they had already done something very significant in giving up meat, chicken and fish. They thought they had done enough, and finding out otherwise takes some […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-11-08T13:49:00-05:00November 8th, 2009|Tags: Vegan activism|18 Comments

No Need for Vegans to Give Up Fat, Gluten, Soy or Cooked Foods

When I order a vegan meal on a plane, it invariably comes with fat-free salad dressing. This annoys me more than I can say. It’s not just because I think fat-free salad dressing is basically inedible (which it is IMHO), but because somehow, vegan diets have become synonymous with low-fat eating. That’s not good for vegans or for the animals we want to help.

Given the fact that vegan eating is well outside the mainstream and very different from the way most Americans eat, it’s not surprising that many people view it as difficult and restrictive. (Most people view any dietary […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-11-05T10:25:00-05:00November 5th, 2009|Tags: Fat, Nutrition, Raw foods|24 Comments

Five Must-Read Blogs for Vegans

In preparation for World Vegan Day (today!) I’ve been looking at some of the best resources for new and aspiring vegans. I posted a list of really good free vegan starter guides on the examiner site this past week and a list of five of my favorite new cookbooks over there as well.

Continuing with that theme, here are five blogs that I love. It’s not that easy to choose. I subscribe to around 50 blogs (including a fair number from the meat and dairy industry). I don’t read them all every day, of course, but there […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-11-01T09:37:00-05:00November 1st, 2009|Tags: Resources|2 Comments

Vegan Issues in the News: Meeting Nutrient Needs and Growth of Vegan Kids

It’s just not possible for dietitians to be knowledgeable about every single aspect of nutrition. If you put me in charge of a dialysis unit, I’m sure all the patients would be dead in no time at all. Although I took a few clinical nutrition courses in school, I learned—and promptly forgot—just enough to pass my RD exam.

So, I wouldn’t take a job as a hospital dietitian and I wouldn’t agree to do an interview on any aspect of clinical nutrition. Unfortunately, when it comes to vegan (and vegetarian) diets, journalists often end up interviewing health professionals who don’t have […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-10-26T11:03:00-04:00October 26th, 2009|Tags: children|5 Comments

Ten Tips for Animal Activists Based on the Life of Henry Spira

In 1973, when Henry Spira was 45, two things happened that sparked his interest in animal rights. A friend gave him a cat (he had no personal relationships with animals until that time) and he met Peter Singer. It was a turning point that gave way to full-time activism on behalf of animals.

Ethics Into Action, written by Singer, is the story of Henry’s work. It reads like an inspirational tale of one activist’s life as well as a manual on how to get things done. The lessons in this book for activists are not to be missed.

By Ginny Messina|2009-10-09T11:53:00-04:00October 9th, 2009|Tags: Books for activists, Resources, Vegan activism|5 Comments

Meatless Mondays Take a (Little) Step in the Right Direction

I wrote yesterday on the examiner site about Meatless Mondays in the Baltimore school system. Some email and twitter responses to that article suggested that serving up vegetarian meals in school cafeterias one day a week is not exactly progress for animal rights. For one thing, the non-meat choices are pretty cheese-laden. Some are more plant-based than others, but there is a grilled cheese option every day and lots of mozzarella sticks on the menu.

It’s true; from the standpoint of animal rights, there is no obvious gain. Baltimore kids simply trade in one animal product for another. […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-10-05T13:45:00-04:00October 5th, 2009|Tags: Meatless Mondays, Vegan activism|13 Comments

Why I Love the USDA’s New Tip Sheet for Vegetarians

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has just released 10 Tips for Following a Vegetarian Diet, and you could knock me over with a feather. It’s not just that it takes a positive approach; it actually takes a vegan approach.

While the fact sheet lists some nutrients that vegetarians need to focus on, it doesn’t have any of that annoying verbiage about the need to carefully plan meals. (Vegetarians and vegans should, of course, carefully plan their meals; so should everyone else.) More importantly, there isn’t a word about animal products in the whole fact sheet, other than […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-09-25T15:03:00-04:00September 25th, 2009|Tags: Resources|6 Comments

In Praise of Activists

I was in elementary school when I first heard Mary Travers sing. By that time, Peter, Paul and Mary had already achieved great commercial success, but they were new to me—and I fell head over in heels in love with Mary’s voice and the passion behind it—not to mention that incredible slinky blond hair.

It wasn’t until quite a few years later that I understood what their music was about and that there was more to the group than great harmonizing and sing-along tunes. Peter, Paul and Mary were authentic folk artists. Their music spoke to […]

By Ginny Messina|2009-09-18T12:27:00-04:00September 18th, 2009|Tags: Vegan activism|1 Comment