valhalla - how can you control everything your kids eat, or anything else, at their age?
I have teenagers and know several kids who do one thing at home, to please their parents, but sneakily do other stuff behind their backs. I always feel that, especially with teens, this is a big issue. It's a bit like drinking or having girlfriend. If they want to try it out, they will, whether you are happy about it or not. How would you feel if you found out your child had been eating meat behind your back? Or if they leave home to go to uni or whatever and start to eat it then? There comes a time, when they have to be responsible for themselves.
Re the religion thing. Yes, I do take the children (the younger ones) to church with me, but I don't expect them to believe, just to listen and process the information. In fact both my elder boys are atheists and DS3 is heading that way. OH, as well as being a meat eater, is an atheist, so they get his point of view given them all the time as well. They have also been given info about most other major belief systems. Then, they decide for themselves. I still don't think that it is a parents job to give their kids their own morality. Children need to be able to make their own decisions.
Just to be clear, I am not a part time vegetarian nor am I one for health reasons. I became one 30 years ago in protest over the way animals were farmed. Nothing to do, really, with the actual killing of them, although this I also find upsetting, more the fact that while they were alive, their lives were pretty dire. That's why I will feed my kids ethically farmed meat, at least those animals have a decent life. I don't see vegetarianism as a bit of an alternative lifestyle, either, although, where we live, it is certainly a very rare choice.My kids do enjoy meat and fish, my DS3 even enjoys going fishing sometimes, but they also enjoy vegetarian food so they have the experience and knowledge to make their own choices. The key thing is that I don't think that my morality has any more value than other people's.
It is also my belief, having grown up with a close friend from a farming family and having a brother and SIL who run a farm, that if everyone became veggie, that would be a very bad thing for farm animals. I really have no wish to see cows, sheep etc., disappear from our countryside, nor to see millions of creatures being destroyed to no end, which is what would happen. These animals cannot live in the wild, are not suited to life without human intervention, and even if they were, would upset the whole ecosystem because of the effect that roving, wild cows would have on the indigenous food chains.
As far as drinking milk goes; surely most vegetarians would use organic dairy products, anyway? Modern dairy farming is horrendous. it is absolutely more unethical than meat farming, especially where the meat animals are reared outdoors. And the fate of male dairy calves is awful ( this is why I will buy rose veal, at least the calves have some kind of life and a reasonably humane death.) Again, I don't think that we should all run out an become vegan, though, because what would happen to all the dairy animals? I certainly only buy organic dairy products, mainly from a local farm, where the cows have a decent life.
I don't expect people to agree with me, everyone is entitled to their own position, but I do think that, very often, opinions on this are based on emotional responses rather than hard practicalities.Throughout history man has milked and eaten animals. The earliest humans used animals to provide almost everything that they needed. My problem, now, is that things have gone too far, particularly in the western world and that a new balance needs to be found where we treat this planet and all the life on it with a bit more respect.
I think that if anyone wishes to bring their children up as vegetarians, than that is all good as long as that parent realises that their child may choose to eat meat for themselves, and respects that decision, should it come. The OP should decide for herself, along with her husband, what is right for their family without feeling like she is somehow letting the side down if her child eats some meat.