the sikh population, sikh gurus have sought to clarify the sikh view on diet, stressing their preference only for simplicity of diet. guru nanak said that over-consumption of food (lobh, greed) involves a drain on the earth's resources and thus on life. passages from the guru granth sahib (the holy book of sikhs, also known as the adi granth) say that it is "foolish" to argue for the superiority of animal life, because though all life is related, only human life carries more importance: "only fools argue whether to eat meat or not. who can define what is meat and what is not meat? who knows where the sin lies, being a vegetarian or a non-vegetarian?" the sikh langar, or free temple meal, is largely lacto-vegetarian, though this is understood to be a result of efforts to present a meal that is respectful of the diets of any person who would wish to dine, rather than out of dogma. environment and diet environmental vegetarianism is based on the concern that the production of meat and animal products for mass consumption, especially through factory farming, is environmentally unsustainable. according to a 2006 united nations initiative, the livestock industry is one of the largest contributors to environmental degradation worldwide, and modern practices of raising animals for food contribute on a "massive scale" to air and water pollution, land degradation, climate change, and loss of biodiversity. the initiative concluded that "the livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global." in addition, animal agriculture is a large source of greenhouse gases. according to a 2006 report it is responsible for 18% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions as estimated in 100-year co2 equivalents. livestock sources (including enteric fermentation and manure) account for about 3.1 percent of us anthropogenic ghg emissions expressed as carbon dioxide equivalents. this epa estimate is based on methodologies agreed to by the conference of parties of the unfccc, with 100-year global warming potentials from the ipcc second assessment report used in estimating ghg emissions as carbon dioxide equivalents. meat produced in a laboratory (called in vitro meat) may be more environmentally sustainable than regularly produced meat. reactions of vegetarians vary. rearing a relatively small number of grazing animals can be beneficial, as the food climate research network at surrey university reports: "a little bit of livestock production is probably a good thing for the environment". in may 2009, ghent, belgium, was reported to be "the first in the world to go vegetarian at least once a week" for environmental reasons, when local authorities decided to implement a "weekly meatless day". civil servants would eat vegetarian meals one day per week, in recognition of the united nations' report. posters were put up by local authorities to encourage the population to take part on vegetarian days, and "veggie street maps" were printed to highlight vegetarian restaurants. in september 2009, schools in ghent are due to have a weekly veggiedag ("vegetarian day") too. public opinion and acceptance of meat-free food is expected to be more successful if its descriptive words focus less on the health aspects and more on the flavor. labor conditions and diet some groups, such as peta, promote vegetarianism as a way to offset poor treatment and working conditions of workers in the contemporary meat industry. these groups cite studies showing the psychological damage caused by working in the meat industry, especially in factory and industrialised settings, and argue that the meat industry violates its labourers' human rights by assigning difficult and distressing tasks without adequate counselling, training and debriefing. however, the working conditions of agricultural workers as a whole, particularly non-permanent workers, remain poor and well below conditions prevailing in other economic sectors. accidents, including pesticide poisoning, among farmers and plantation workers contribute to increased health risks, including increased mortality. according to the international labour organization, agriculture is one of the three most dangerous jobs in the world. economics and diet similar to environmental vegetarianism is the concept of economic vegetarianism. an economic vegetarian is someone who practices vegetarianism from either the philosophical viewpoint concerning issues such as public health and curbing world starvation, the belief that the consumption of meat is economically unsound, part of a conscious simple living strategy or just out of necessity. according to the worldwatch institute, "massive reductions in meat consumption in industrial nations will ease their health care burden while improving public health; declining livestock herds will take pressure off rangelands and grainlands, allowing the agricultural resource base to rejuvenate. as populations grow, lowering meat consumption worldwide will allow more efficient use of declining per capita land and water resources, while at the same time making grain more affordable to the world's chronically hungry." according to estimates in 2016, adoption of vegetarianism would contribute substantially to global healthcare and environmental savings. demographics prejudice researcher gordon hodson argues that vegetarians and vegans frequently face discrimination where eating meat is held as a cultural norm. turnover research suggests that, at least in the united states, vegetarianism has a high turnover rate, with less than 20% of adopters persisting for more than a year. research shows that lacking social support contributes to lapses. a 2019 analysis found that adhering to any kind of restricted diet (gluten-free, vegetarian, kosher, teetotal) was associated with feelings of loneliness and increased social isolation. vegetarians or vegans who adopted their diet abruptly might be more likely to eventually abandon it when compared to individuals adopting their diet gradually with incremental changes. country-specific information the rate of vegetarianism by country varies substantially from relatively low levels in countries such as the netherlands (5%) to more considerable levels in india (20–40%). estimates for the number of vegetarians per country can be subject to methodological difficulties, as respondents may identify as vegetarian even if they include some meat in their diet, and thus some researchers suggest the percentage of vegetarians may be significantly overestimated. media vegetarianism is occasionally depicted in mass media. some scholars have argued that mass media serves as a "source of information for individuals" interested in vegetarianism or veganism, while there are "increasing social sanctions against eating meat" over time, societal attitudes of vegetarianism have changed, as have perceptions of vegetarianism in popular culture, leading to more "vegetarian sentiment." even so, there are still existing "meat-based" food metaphors which infuse daily speech and those who are vegetarian and vegan are met with "acceptance, tolerance, or hostility" after they divulge they are vegetarian or vegan. some writers, such as john l. cunningham, editor of the vegetarian resource group's newsletter, have argued for "more sympathetic vegetarian characters in the mass media". literature in western literature, vegetarianism, and topics that relate to it, have informed a "gamut of literary genres," whether literary fiction or those fictions focusing on utopias, dystopias, or apocalypses, with authors shaped by questions about human identity and "our relation to the environment," implicating vegetarianism and veganism. others have pointed to the lack of "memorable characters" who are vegetarian. there are also vegetarian themes in horror fiction, science fiction and poetry. in 1818, mary shelley published the novel frankenstein. writer and animal rights advocate carol j. adams argued in her seminal book, the sexual politics of meat that the unnamed creature in the novel was a vegetarian. she argued that the book was "indebted to the vegetarian climate" of its day and that vegetarianism is a major theme in the novel as a whole. she notes that the creature gives an "emotional speech" talking about its dietary principles, which makes it a "more sympathetic being" than others. she also said that it connected with vegetarianism in the romantic era who believed that the garden of eden was meatless, rewrote the myth of prometheus, the ideas of jean-jacques rousseau, and feminist symbolism. adams concludes that it is more likely that the "vegetarian revelations" in the novel are "silenced" due to the lack of a "framework into which we can assimilate them." apart from adams, scholar suzanne samples pointed to "gendered spaces of eating and consumption" within victorian england which influenced literary characters of the time. this included works such as alfred, lord tennyson's poem titled the charge of the light brigade, christina rossetti's volume of poetry titled goblin market and other poems, lewis carroll's alice's adventures in wonderland, mary seacole's autographical account titled wonderful adventures of mrs. seacole in many lands, and anthony trollope's novel titled orley farm. samples also argued that vegetarianism in the victorian era "presented a unique lifestyle choice that avoided meat but promoted an awareness of health," which initially was seen as rebellious but later became more normalized. in irene clyde's 1909 feminist utopian novel, beatrice the sixteenth, mary hatherley accidentally travels through time, discovering a lost world, which is a postgender society named armeria, with the inhabitants following a strict vegetarian diet, having ceased to slaughter animals for over a thousand years. some reviewers of the book praised the vegetarianism of the armerians. james joyce's 1922 novel, ulysees is said to have vegetarian themes. scholar peter adkins argued that while joyce was critical of the vegetarianism of george a.e. russell, the novel engages with "questions of animal ethics through its portrayal of ireland's cattle industry, animal slaughter and the cultural currency of meat," unlike some of his other novels. he also stated that the novel "historicizes and theorizes animal life and death," and that it demonstrates the ways that symbolism and materiality of meat are "co-opted within patriarchal political structures," putting it in the same space as theorists like carol j. adams, donna j. haraway, laura wright, and cary wolfe, and writers such as j. m. coetzee. in 1997, s. reneé wheeler wrote in the vegetarian journal, saying that "finding books with vegetarian themes" is important for helping children "feel legitimate in being vegetarian." in 2004, writer j. m. coetzee argued that since the "mode of consciousness of nonhuman species is quite different from human consciousness," it is hard for writers to realize this for animals, with a "temptation to project upon them feelings and thoughts that may belong only to our own human mind and heart," and stated that reviewers have ignored the presence of animals in his books. he also stated that animals are present in his "fiction either not at all or in a merely subsidiary role" because they occupy "a subsidiary place in our lives" and argued that it is not "possible to write about the inner lives of animals in any complex way." in 2012, marla rose published her book, adventures of vivian sharpe, vegan superhero, which was praised for being an "authentic coming-of-age story" which exposes vegan youth to "teenage challenges". in 2014, the new yorker published a short story by jonathan lethem titled "pending vegan" which follows "one family, a husband and wife and their four-year-old twin daughters" on a trip to seaworld in san diego, california. the protagonist of the story, paul espeseth, renames himself "pending vegan" in order to acknowledge his "increasing uneasiness with the relationship between man and beast." in 2016, a three-part korean novel by han kang titled the vegetarian was published in the u.s., which focuses a woman named young-hye, who "sees vegetarianism as a way of not inflicting harm on anything," with eating meat symbolizing human violence itself, and later identifies as a plant rather than as a human "and stops eating entirely." some argued the book was more about mental illness than vegetarianism. others compared it to fictional works by margaret atwood. television vegetarians, and vegetarian themes, have appeared in various tv shows, such as buffy the vampire slayer, true blood, the simpsons, king of the hill, and south park. spock stands out. said to be "television's first vegetarian," he and other vulcans avoided eating meat due to a "philosophy of non-violence."" he is identified as vegetarian following an episode where he was "transported back to pre-civilised times" and ate meat. richard marranca, in an issue of the vegetarian journal, said that for spock, like kwai chang caine in kung fu, "vegetarianism was something authentic and taken for granted; it was the right thing to do based on compassion and logic." in 1995, the simpsons episode "lisa the vegetarian" aired. before recording