Thursday, February 20, 1997
Tom’s column disgraces UCLA
I am writing in response to Katherine Tom’s incredibly tasteless
article in the Friday, Feb. 14, 1997 edition of the Daily Bruin.
First of all, shame on the Daily Bruin editors who permitted the
publication of this appalling commentary on Cupid’s Day.
Judging from the ludicrous content of Ms. Tom’s insulting
article, it is no wonder she spends Valentine’s day alone! Her
shameless abuse of the English vernacular in order to justify and
chronicle her uncontrolled alcoholism, speaks volumes about her
troubled character. As a campus tour guide, this is not the UCLA
that I would want prospective students and their parents to
encounter when choosing which college to attend. This article is
not funny at all, rather it is in very poor taste.
John C. Yi
Fourth-year
English/ Asian American studies
Vegan means meat for all!
As a life-long omnivore (I don’t really know any human
carnivores), I would like to take this opportunity to encourage
Jennifer Nelson’s bold new lifestyle choice. I hope others join her
in becoming vegan so that the price of the meat products I purchase
will fall accordingly. This is certainly a win-win situation for
all involved, so I wish her happiness and luck in maintaining
proper nutrition in her new choice of cuisine.
MacLane Key
Grad student
Computer science
Vegetarian issues
I applaud Jennifer Nelson for deciding to become a vegan. Best
of luck to her. However in the interest of accuracy, there is one
little detail regarding her current dietary preference which, I
feel, warrants correction: Nelson is not a vegetarian. She eats
fish. Fish are animals. Vegetarians don’t eat animals. Don’t
believe me? Look it up. Sorry to have to break it to her this way,
but I’ve grown weary of hearing people say "I’m a vegetarian, I
only eat fish and chicken." What do they think chickens are,
legumes? Hey! Let’s go pick some fish off that salmon tree!
Hmmm.
Now onto a bigger issue. I have been a vegetarian for five
years. Over the last 18 months, I’ve been 99 percent vegan (every
once in a while, I’ll cave in and have a blended mocha or
something). As for why I’m a vegan/vegetarian, who cares? It’s not
for everyone. But flesh-eaters do need to understand that they
aren’t "normal," any more than vegetarians are "strange." I
challenge anyone to watch a documentary or read literature on the
rendering of animal carcasses and tell me that non-meat eaters are
"weird." What’s weird is watching my Mom proudly plop a
Thanksgiving turkey on the table. I look at the corpse and think
"Road kill." Excuse me, but there is a dead animal on the table. In
my humble opinion, most meat eaters are living in denial; we all
seem to know that watching the process where chickens are converted
to McNuggets would likely make us puke. But when the topic comes up
in conversation, people usually reply "I know, I know, I don’t want
to hear about it."
As for the person who suggested that the cow population will
explode if we stop eating meat. Yes. And if we all stopped drinking
beer, breweries would explode. Hello? Ever heard of supply and
demand? When was the last time you saw a feral cow? They’re not
like bunnies living in the forest; they are a product, just like
Betamaxes and Edsels. (Lookout! The Betamax factory is going to
explode. Run for your life!) Yeah.
His kind of thinking supports my opinion that vegetarians are
generally better informed about health and nutrition and their
carnivorous counterparts. Face it, if you eat meat, you probably do
so by default. On the other hand, if you don’t, it’s probably
because you came to an informed decision  for any one of
several compelling reasons  to abstain.
I could go on and on and on about the statistical relationship
between animal/animal by-product consumption and a long list of
undesirable conditions we are all going to have to deal with sooner
or later: eutrophication, top-soil depletion, disease, precocious
puberty, global warming, osteoporosis, famine, rain deforesting,
yada, yada, yada, but I’ve got a paper to write.
Michael Daugherty
Senior
English