If you're thinking of going veggie and are keen to know why other young people made the same choice, read on. If you are already veggie and would like to add your views to this page please click here to contact us. We can't guarantee to use everything that we are sent but will always reply to your messages!

"I turned veggie after thinking about the poor animals. Now I don't eat fish and meat. Even though it might seem strange to some people I don't sit on leather or sheepskin. I don't wear make-up which has animal ingredients in, or other things like toothpaste. If you're like me and live in the UK, The Co-Op does veggie stuff, and Bodyshop too!" - Neve (13)

"I became vegetarian by accident. I had never liked eating meat because I knew it was a dead animal but I was raised eating it. Then, one day after school, my Biology teacher offered extra credit to watch a movie called "Earthlings", which she had never seen, only heard about. After seeing the movie, seven out of the eight people who watched it became vegetarian. The movie showed everything an animal can go through in a slaughterhouse, and I cried and cried both during and after it. After going home, I felt sick to my stomach looking at the chicken my mom had made for dinner and just couldn't eat it. I had never seriously thought to become a vegetarian but told myself that if I could make it through the weekend without eating meat, then I would become veggie. I did it and after a while my friends were all very interested and they too became vegetarian soon after. We all reserached together and realized by becoming vegetarian we were helping not only the animals, but the environment and our bodies too! I'm proud to be a vegetarian and now can look at my cat and not feel guilty!" - Katie (14)

"I first became a vegetarian to see how long it would last, but after reading a couple of things and watching a couple of things I realised they kill animals and killing things is murder, and murder is wrong!" - Lottie

"My mum and dad were vegan long before I was born, I've always been vegan, all my life. It's just normal." - Aidan Jeavons (8)

"I became a vegetarian on the 30th May 2007. I was 13. I had wanted to be vegetarian for years beforehand; didn't like most meat or fish for all my life and the thought of having someone else, who I don't know, killing another living creature and not knowing how much of the animal is used completely kept on playing on my mind. I really hated the thought. Plus, knowing that loads of sweets and random foods contained gelatine was fab for a girl with a sweetie disposition! It made me stop and eat healthier. It was hard becoming a veggie due to the massive diet change and it didn't help that my mum decided to keep buying some of the meat products I liked! I made it though and nearly 4 years later I'm still vegetarian with no intention of changing." Dee (16)

"Being Hindu, I was born a vegetarian for religious reasons. But, I soon discovered the cruelty of the meat industry and factory farming. Today, there are so many options of vegetarian foods that is is easy to go veggie!" - Pallavi (15)

"I became a vegetarian during Superbowl Sunday 2011. Yeah, random. But I had actually been doing a lot of research and half-heartedly thinking about it since June. On that morning, I came across PETA's meat.org video with Paul McCartney in it. The video was based on his quote: 'If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian.' Well, for me, that was the last straw. I'd kind of steered clear of those videos because I knew they could be...well...gross. Duh. But when I watched it, I realised that these animals feel pain, horror, confusion. You can see it on their faces. Hear it in the sounds. Besides, some of the clips of the way the workers beat or even stand on the animals...! I couldn't believe it! And when you stop to think that they take an animal, shock it, slit its throat, strap it by the leg(s) to a conveyor belt and it's carried through the factory and skinned, butchered, eventually packaged... The same way they make, like, mustard! It's...weird. And to me, wrong. These are real, living, breathing, sensory creatures. I don't understand why some people turn their eyes when a lion kills a gazelle on animal planet but then they go and eat a hamburger. We're conscious beings. We can make better choices. We don't need meat to survive. Another major factor for me (and the first reason I started researching) was the health benefits. I find them worth it as well. So when someone offered me that sausage pizza, I said 'No thanks. Pass the salad.'" - Emma (17)

"I have two guinea pigs and a dog and I love them to bits. I also share a horse with my sister which she rescued from a slaughter house. This is the reason I became a veggie! I couldn't imagine any of my animals on someone's plate." - Ruth (13)

"I've only been vegetarian for a few years but I'm very serious about it. A friend of mine did a book report on the content of Bologna processed meat and it made me look at the slaughter of animals in a new light. I had always turned my head when I heard vegetarians speak, but after that it made me think how right they are. People might have needed meat for protein in the past, that's plausible, but now, with all the different foods and meat substitutes available, why should animals have to suffer at our greedy hands? Are they not just as entitled to life on this planet as we are? Eating other living creatures just isn't natural."- Laura

"I went vegetarian because at the age of two my mum and and dad decided that it was the right choice to make. I think maybe if they hadn't made the decision for me to become a vegetarian I would have become one anyway. I hate the thought of animals suffering. It is very, very cruel and how would we like it if an animal came and ate us. If you care about animals why eat them?" - Sophie (15)

"Growing up I never liked fish or seafood. Eventually I stopped eating red meat and then later I stopped eating poultry. I watched an episode of "The Ellen Show" where she had the author Jonathan Safran Foer as a guest. He wrote a book called "Eating Animals". I went out, bought it right away and after learning how the United States slaughters their animals I decide to commit to a vegetarian diet." - Danielle (19)

“At home I have 2 guinea pigs, a cat and a hamster and they are like little kids to me. I just hate the thought of how stressful it is for the mother animals to have their babies taken away to be slaughtered and never seen again. I can't imagine eating my guinea pigs or any other animals.” - Rose Linihan (10)

"Because I realised that you don't have to eat meat and then I saw how the animals were killed, I felt really sad and guilty that I used to eat them." - Caitlin Golding (11)

"At first I was a veggie because my mum only gave me vegetarian foods, but now it is because I don't want to eat any animals. People don't need to eat meat as there are plenty of other foods we can enjoy. Vegetarian food is better for you, and I like being fit and healthy." -Michael Cumming (11)

"Because I don't like the fact that it is animals being killed for food! How would we like it if a chicken killed us for dinner?" -
Eanna Bedser (11)

"Mum has been a veggie since she was my age. My dad has not eaten meat since being with my mum!" - Lucy Fellows (12)

"I was born a vegetarian." - Elliott Humphreys (13)

"My mum is a vegetarian. I want to keep on being a vegetarian because I don't want to eat animals. There are loads of other things we can eat instead." - John Cumming (8)

"I’ve been a veggie for more than 30 years. I went on holiday when I was 17 and in the field next to the campsite was an abattoir. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, lorryloads of lambs went in, and empty lorries went out. I can still hear, baaaa….. bang. Baaaa….. bang. I stayed there for two weeks. By day four I had eaten my last meat ever!

In your life as a veggie, you will have all sorts of ridicule thrust at you. People will play jokes on you, and there will be times when even you question what you do. They may think your beliefs are funny, but most of them will be without any beliefs of their own.

As I said, I haven’t knowingly eaten meat for more than 30 years. And if I do nothing else good in life, then this was worthwhile. And I’m proud of it.

Good luck young veggies. Your path won’t be smooth, but be brave. The animals need you."

And if you want to know what young veggies have got to say about the important issues of today click here to visit our Have Your Say! section.