Ellen DeGeneres Quotes

I personally chose to go vegan because I educated myself on factory farming and cruelty to animals, and I suddenly realized that what was on my plate were living things, with feelings. And I just couldn't disconnect myself from it any longer. I read books like 'Diet for a New America' and saw documentaries like 'Earthlings' and 'Meet your Meat,' and it became an easy choice for me.

If you think that being vegan is difficult, imagine how difficult it is for animals that you are not vegan.

If you could see or feel the suffering you wouldn't think twice. Give back life. Don't eat meat.

Could you look an animal in the eyes and say to it, 'My appetite is more important than your suffering'?

Just for a few tiny buds on your tongue you are killing live animals, with no sensitivity, with no awareness, with no love. It seems impossible; how can a man who has known love be capable of doing such things? A man who loves his wife, who loves his children goes on eating meat? Impossible.

In 1968, I became a vegetarian after realizing that animals feel afraid, cold, hungry, and unhappy like we do.

There's no doubt in my mind that going vegetarian has made me feel better not only physically, but also because I learned about the suffering of animals who are raised and killed for food. I feel good knowing that I'm not contributing to that.

Human cruelty knows no limits and that one needs immense courage and a will of iron to help others understand that animals are made of flesh and blood like us, that they suffer the same pains as us, that they deserve the same respect as us and that their continuous slaughter should not be part of human entertainment.

Inside me, I think that an animal goes through a lot of pain in the whole cycle of death in the slaughterhouse; just living to be killed. That whole situation is really messed up for animals, growing up in those little cooped-up pens. I just don't think its worth eating that animal. I think animals should be free. There's so much other food out there that doesn't have to involve you in that cycle of pain and death.

For me, it always has to be about health. That's why I'm a vegan. Well, I don't even do that for my health entirely, I do it for animals.

The question is not, 'Can they reason?' nor, 'Can they talk?' but rather, 'Can they suffer?'

The best part of being a vegan is the purity and peace of mind one experiences and the strong connection I feel to the animal kingdom.

I just realized that if it's really compassion that drives you, maybe it's not enough just to stop eating animals but you maybe should boycott the whole animal industry, because... it's not what you as a compassionate being would want. So actually you should go one step further and become vegan.

I don't eat any animals or anything that has to do with animals. No fish or egg or dairy because I personally don't feel it's a good practice to eat anything that might run away from you.

Being vegan truly is the secret to my life's joy and peace. I feel physically and spiritually better than I could have ever imagined knowing that I am doing everything I can to reduce animal suffering with simple lifestyle choices like being vegan, never wearing any products made from animals (like wool and leather), and buying only from companies that NEVER test their products or ingredients on animals.

If you claim to 'love' animals but you eat animal products, you need to think critically about how you understand love.

What people need to understand is, that if they are eating animals, they are promoting cruelty to animals.

This brings me back to the image of Kafka standing before a fish in the Berlin aquarium, a fish on which his gaze fell in a newly found peace after he decided not to eat animals. Kafka recognized that fish as a member of his invisible family- not as his equal, of course, but as another being that was his concern.

I hate the thought of animals being killed just for our pleasure...

I became a vegetarian because I was persuaded that life is as valid for other creatures as it is for humans. I do not need dead animal bodies to keep me alive, strong and healthy. Therefore, I will not kill for food.

It's just that I have this funny objection to torturing small animals no matter how scrumptious their body parts might be. ... Our food industries are equal opportunity abusers: cows, chickens, pigs, and a special mention to those little calves who for their short, miserable lives are locked into crates too small to allow movement just so we can eat veal.

Part of my becoming a vegetarian was that I would look at my burger, then look at my dogs, and I wasn't able to see a difference.

We have to be aggressive when those we stick up for have no voice. I don't consider it radical to say cruelty is wrong and that animals should be respected. I consider it radical to eat corpses, put electrodes in animals' heads, make elephants live in chains in the circus, and poison animals we consider a nuisance.

If you are interested in preventing animal suffering, the first thing you should give up is eggs and milk, because the animals who produce those foods lead the most unhappy lives. You would do better to eat meat and stop eating eggs and dairy products.

We are all God's creatures-that we pray to God for mercy and justice while we continue to eat the flesh of animals that are slaughtered on our account is not consistent.