[Essay] PTE & IELTS Topic Sample: Vegetarian Vs. Meat-containing Diet

Human beings do not need to eat meat in order to maintain good health because they can get all their food needs from meatless products and meatless substances. A vegetarian diet is as healthy as a diet containing meat. Argue for or against the opinion above.

[Essay] PTE & IELTS Topic Sample: Vegetarian Vs. Meat-containing Diet

‘Are you veg or non-veg?’ This is the most commonly asked question. There are pure vegetarians, pure non-vegetarians, vegans, eggetarians (who eat eggs but not meat). Should humans eat meat or they are herbivores by nature? This has always been a hot topic of debate. Vegetarians blame non-vegetarians for an increase in global warming. And recently, non-vegetarians took a dig at vegetarians that their actions result in deforestation as land is needed for agriculture.Then what should we eat and what should we not eat?

People turn vegan or vegetarians for a number of reasons. One of the reasons is because they believe that eating meat is unhealthy and rearing beef, dairy cows damage our environment. They are against all forms of animal cruelty.

Vegetarians /vegans say that eating meat makes us aggressive like animals as their fear and anger towards us ,which they experience when they are being slaughtered , are transferred into our bodies when they consume their meat. To keep the nature’s food chain going, one animal has to die in order for other to survive. Big cats kill wild herbivorous animals but if humans kill animals for meat , that is considered inhumane.

It is true, indeed that animals, chickens reared for milk and meat are often malnourished and kept in poor conditions. That’s why it is advisable to eat only grass fed animals as they are left free to roam and eat what they choose, in a comfortable condition.

Eating plants is no doubt, very healthy, but eating ‘plants only’ diet has its drawbacks. The fiber from plants is not always soluble, it is sometimes insoluble, i.e. not actually digested by our bodies. Without sufficient amounts of water, this fiber can not be moved through our system which leads to intestinal blockage, constipation, bloating and toxic accumulation.  The main fiber in plants is cellulose which our bodies can not digest because our digestive structure is shorter than animals.

There are many nutrients which can not be obtained from plants but from meat, we can easily get all the essential nutrients. Moreover, the myth that saturated fats are bad for health has been debunked. Humans are omnivores and our health is at peak when we consume plant based and meat diet, combined. Neither vegetarian nor non-vegetarian, the only food which should be avoided is processed packed food.