I was vegetarian for maybe two, or two and a half years, with a nine month vegan stint in there. It was for moral reasons - I believe that animal suffering is, well, bad. I had to go vegan because it was the logical extension of vegetarianism (since animals also suffer in egg and milk production). But one day I sort of just... stopped. In a sense I'm morally bankrupt - I never really changed my mind, philosophically speaking. My return from veganism to vegetarianism was based on the fact that I was no longer convinced that a vegan diet is particularly healthy. I know mine wasn't. Actually, I lost a lot of weight, and don't have much to lose in the first place. These days I am skeptical of any assertion about nutrition one way or the other... I always remember people asking me what I ate, with an incredulous tone, as though being vegan or vegetarian meant that you basically starved. In reality, my diet became much more varied as a result of the change.
That's the word - variety. As I said in my comment, I end up eating vegetarian meals at least a few times a week because I enjoy a variety of foods and cuisines. I think in general, it can be difficult to get the kind of variety I'm after from the supermarket. A lot of the vegetables, even the organic ones go through all kinds of nutrient sapping processes by the time they arrive at the supermarket. Yes, the quality of vegetables grown in greenhouses has become much better, but it's hard to make sure they get everything they'd get growing outside. Of course, I realize that vegetables grown in a garden might get things that aren't beneficial from soil and groundwater, but even so, I much prefer my vegetables to get sunlight and to interact with pollinators and whatever else. Do you really feel that you're morally bankrupt because of the way that your eating habits changed? With the economy the way it is, I had hoped that more people in my part of the country would have started raising animals for sale, but unfortunately that's not the case. It takes a lot of time and care to raise animals for slaughter in a healthy and humane way, not to mention quite a lot of resources, but still, I had hoped. I am doing my best to eat healthfully but in this country it's tougher than I think it should be, not to mention more expensive than I think is right.
I think there might be something to be said about the difference between the logical aspect and the affective aspect of a particular moral belief. I can feel that something is bad despite believing on a rational level that it isn't, and vice versa - when I was vegetarian, I believed animal suffering was wrong, but I didn't later feel bad about eating meat.Do you really feel that you're morally bankrupt because of the way that your eating habits changed?
A little bit. Like I said, the reasons I went vegetarian (and subsequently vegan) never disappeared - I still believe that the suffering of animals for the purposes of human consumption is bad. Somewhere along the line I just stopped caring, or lost my conviction or something, and I'm not particularly happy about that. Particularly so because I'd generally assert that all people should be mindful of what they do, and here I am ignoring my own moral dilemmas.