Many people mix up between vegetarian and veganism. The two things are not the same. Vegetarian is an eating habit that doesn't allow people to eat meat on their menu while veganism is an eating habit that doesn't allow people to eat or use any products that contain substances made from an animal. Some people think that veganism is good for adults and kids.
When the vegans become parents, they raise their kids with veganism eating habit. These vegan parents introduce vegan food to their kids. The kids are fed with all kinds of fruits and vegetables or rice cereal. Then they will get used to other non-meat food such as tofu, tempeh and other wide variety of foods. The vegan parents also use natural products for their kids' personal care while for clothing, they avoid "cruelty products" such as leather or wool. Vegan parents will check the clothing label to make sure they are on the right track. Kids who are raised with veganism lifestyle have to face several problems such as being withdrawn from society, suffering from nutritional deficiency, and suffering from food poisoning.
The first reason is the fact that most vegan kids are withdrawn from society due to this habit. Kids become disenfranchised because vegan parents want their kids to become vegans too. When they grow up, some kids give negative respond to their parents’ lifestyle. It is because if they become vegans, they can’t choose and eat the food like other kids do. During their childhood, they normally enjoy whatever they like, especially food. An example of this is actress Holly Paige who takes her kids to become vegans. She doesn't realize what happen with her vegan kids due to this belief so that the skin condition of her kids become bad. Then, her kids become unconfident with their appearance because they look so skinny. They don’t look like their friends who have good skin. They are Berte, who is 4 years old, and Lizzie, who is 3 years old. One day, Paige felt worried when Lizzie smiled at her, and she felt horrified to see that the top row of the teeth of her kids was brown and full of cavities. Not only having physical problems, but the kids also have difficulty to make friends because they are not confident with their appearance and afraid to start making friendship. They fear that friends who try to approach them will be afraid of their appearance, and will stay away from them when their friends found out what they eat.
The second reason that kids shouldn't be raised with veganism lifestyle is that the kids will suffer from nutritional deficiency. Nutritional deficiency will affect them greatly such as making them get tired quickly because they lack the energy that is supposed to get from eating meat. The kids’ muscles who have fewer nutrients will not grow well. They will be exhausted fast and can't play like other kids do. This happened to Jessica Hatfield who discovered her nine-year-old son Max, who was previously active, sporty child, became run down. On the same day, he had no energy at all and couldn't get out of bed. She was even more surprised when the nutritionist said his supposedly healthy diet -with no carbohydrates and only meat, fish, and salad –wasn’t giving him enough energy to fuel his activity. The next effect is that the kid's development is hampered because they need nutrients in meat, fish, milk and foods of animal products. Furthermore, forcing a kid to go dairy-free at a very young age, without replacing with calcium, also risks giving them bad teeth and poor growth of bones and will suffer from osteoporosis. Since bone-building of someone stops in the early 20s, weak bones in the kids mean weak bones for life. Kids need vitamin B12 that we can find in meat, protein that we can find in eggs and other kinds of nutrition. The last effect of this lifestyle is that certain organ functions will decline because of kids nutritional deficiencies. The organs in kids’ body need some nutrition of vegetables and meat. If they lack these kinds of nutrition they need, their growth won’t be at best.
The last reason that kids shouldn't be raised with veganism lifestyle is kids are prone to food poisoning. This is quite dangerous because kids who are prone to food poisoning are still in their growth stage. As a consequence of this lifestyle, kids can't receive proper vitamins found in veggies. If you learn about the digestive system, you will know that there are certain age brackets of children who receive vitamin that they don’t receive previously. So, if they consume excessive nutrients, it won’t be good for their body especially for the kids who can't receive certain substances. If the kids are prone to food poisoning, then they will lose their spirits. At this childhood period, they should be active, agile, curious and they should play a lot and try new things. Their high sense of curiosity motivates them to know anything. The kids will easily get bored of something they don’t want. This will happen to vegan kids because they only eat vegetables, while most kids want to try different kinds of food to know new flavor and tastes of the foods.
In conclusion, kids will be much healthier when they are given nutrition in accordance with the proper eating habits. If their parents are vegans it doesn’t mean that their kids should be vegans too. Because all parents want the best for their kids, then the kids should be allowed to choose their own eating habit when they grow up.
By Nabilla A
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