Teresa Palmer became vegan due to climate change
Actress Teresa Palmer was inspired to become a vegan after researching the link between eating meat and climate change.
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THE reported link between animal agriculture and climate change is what turned vegan actor Teresa Palmer off meat for good.
She said she was instantly put off meat and dairy products after researching the effects that consuming animals has on the environment.
“I just started learning about the welfare of animals and gosh, what that means for them to have the kind of lifestyle where they’re raised to end up on someone’s plate,” she told website The Grace Tales.
“I just decided I don’t want to add to any more suffering in the world, including suffering of any sentient beings. It didn’t align with who I was and I realised that I had this sort of cognitive dissonance and I was very disconnected from the food that I was eating.
“It didn’t resemble an animal so I would eat it and not really think about the life that was that animal and then as an animal lover and the more I read, I realised “I actually can’t do this anymore” and then of course all the studies came out about its impact on the environment and how animal agriculture is one of the leading reasons we have climate change.”
A 2018 study published in Science Magazine found that “avoiding meat and dairy products is the single biggest way to reduce your environmental impact on the planet”.
Palmer, who recently launched her new book Zan Mamas, said she has been vegan for one year.
“I’ve been vegan and vegetarian, then pescatarian and then back to vegan many times since 2008,” she said.
“I was vegetarian for a long time and then I thought ‘alright, I’m going to drop it’. It was baby steps, I did it for a few weeks and that turned into a few months and now I’ve been vegan for a full year.”