Although the health reasons supporting the diet are abundant  most Vegan's choose this diet because of spiritual of philosophical reasons. I have heard countless stories of people who could not stand to eat meat after they learnt of the cruel way that the animals are treated through their lives as cattle and poultry. Many spiritual groups (including many Buddhists, and the Dalai Lama) also advocate a Vegetarian or Vegan diet to encourage compassion and thoughtfulness. Most religions advocate "what goes around, comes around", "do unto others as you should have them do unto you", "karma", "thou shall not kill". The theory goes, that is you buy meat, then an animal has to be killed, and that makes the buyer partly responsible.

There is also a lot of research at the moment, not only stating that the vegan diet is good for you, but also saying it can be more effective at managing and even curing sickness. For example the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine recently conducted a study into treating type 2 diabetes with a low fat vegan diet. Their results were amazing. They found that the diet was more effective than the one currently recommended by the diabetes association in America. There is also a lot of evidence that foods found commonly in the vegan diet, such as fruit and vegetables are effective at preventing cancer (see www.cancerproject.org). Another point to note is that heart disease is one of the major killers in the modern world, and most of the heart disease cases are caused by high cholesterol, which is absent from a Vegan diet and high in a meat based diet. The first thing a doctor tells someone who just had bypass surgery is "cutback on meat". Why not just stop eating it in the first place and then avoid heart problems altogether.

I wrote a poem to explain why I am changing from vegetarian to vegan: Does the cow approach the human, to satisfy our need? Or do we steal its milk, to satisfy our greed? The tuna fish in your lunch sandwich did not flip, for your belly's pleasure from the ocean into a ship. Thieves we are, to take so much and not even care. Replacing ungifted products with frustration and despair. A chicken does not solely lay its egg, To say 'eat my baby, of you I beg'. The bees did not create honey to be yummy, Just to give you sweetness and fill your tummy. Humanity is wrong to take what is not freely gifted We should begin to think and care, that our minds are truly shifted.

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