Introduction Imagine living your life squeezed into an excrement-filled cage, with no sun or fresh air, listening to your neighbors regularly being hauled away to die. Yes, you are in an industrial farm. Your Thanksgiving turkey was just one of the millions of creatures, capable of both pain and affection, that suffer and die to feed us. Today I will demonstrate why adopting a flexetarian diet is good for the animals, the environment, and your health, and suggest how you can become a flexetarian. Main Points  1. What do we mean by flexetarianism?      1. Flexetarians consciously choose to substitute plant-based foods for animal-based proteins from time to         time.      2. This means that they mainly use grains, beans, and high protein vegetables for protein, but include meat         in small amounts.      3. This differs from strict vegetarianism and veganism, which exclude meat entirely.  2. People avoid meat for many reasons, but I will address those I find most relevant.      1. Some worry about animal cruelty.           o Consider these images of industrial farming,           o As you see, millions of animals suffer lives and deaths that are unnecessarily painful.      2. Aside from avoidance of animal cruelty, people also adopt flexetarian diets for environmental         preservation.           o The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says that chemical and animal waste runoff from             factory farms pollutes more than 173,000 miles of rivers and streams.           o The livestock industry also uses up vast amounts of water. Although estimates vary, a pound of             beef requires many times the amount of water needed to produce a pound of grain.           o David Pimentel, a Cornell ecologist, asserts that the grain we feed to our meat animals could             sustain 800 million people, offsetting famine.           o Giant factory farms also release greenhouse gasses, particularly Carbon Dioxide (CO2) and             Methane. These contribute to global climate change.           o University of Chicago researchers estimate that a vegan diet can prevent 1.5             tons of CO2 emissions annually.      3. Another reason to become flexetarian is for better health.           o Plant foods usually contain lots of fiber, lots of important vitamins, and minerals, with little             fat.           o Missing nutrients, chiefly B12, essential to the nervous system, are replaceable via vitamin             supplements.           o Individual plant based foods also contain incomplete proteins, but these can be enhanced by             combining legumes and grains.           o Our flexetarian food pyramid has low-fat, low-calorie, foods like grains, beans and vegetables             at the broad base. These should make up 90% of our diet.      4. Calorie-dense foods like meat and dairy occupy the tiny top of the pyramid in small quantities.           o This is because, according to researchers, an estimated 70 percent of all illnesses, including             one-third of all cancers, are diet-related.           o A flexetarian diet, lower in fats, can help reduce risks for many diseases.  3. Now, if you are convinced, how can you become flexetarian?      1. Most importantly, your expectation of what makes a meal mu