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This is going to depend a lot on the state of the environment and the global economy, and the size of the world population. From an economic and environmental standpoint, this doesn't seem impossible, or at least that eating large portions of meat at meal, or eating meat several times a day may become a thing of the past. There would be plenty of resistance to this, but I think cost and availability will eventually take some sort of toll on eating meat whenever we please.

I agree with mongoose that there will probably be a trend towards eating less meat. Many people are now becoming aware of where their food comes from, and we all know that "sustainable" is the buzz-word of the moment. I definitely hear more of my friends and people I meet saying that they try to make conscious and considered decisions about eating meat, and doing so more sparingly.

I said and did alot of things at fifteen that are not in my belief system today. At that age you need to be idealistic to give hope to the notion you can change the world. I don't think we will all become vegetarians, but I am glad your daughter does, because we need a new, passionate generation to change the earth for the better!!

srhcb .. I think maybe it came with the discovery of fire. Barbeque time!!!! I go along with we will probable eat less meat, more fruits & veggies (local produce) I love vegetarian food, as long as it's served with a nice piece of meat : )

a life without bacon? one cannot think... (i used to be vegan and scrapped it for bacon.)

RE: NanaJoie: "I think maybe (eating meat) came with the discovery of fire. Barbeque time!!!!"

You are in the august company of Mr Charles Lamb, who in 1823 wrote:

http://www.angelfire.com/nv/mf/elia1/pig.htm

"His sauce should be considered. Decidedly, a few bread crums, done up with his liver and brains, and a dash of mild sage. But, banish, dear Mrs. Cook, I beseech you, the whole onion tribe. Barbecue your whole hogs to your palate, steep them in shalots, stuff them out with plantations of the rank and guilty garlic; you cannot poison them, or make them stronger than they are -- but consider, he is a weakling -- a flower.

RE: Karen: Lamb's "Treatise on Roast Pig"

Yes, however, the Greek philosopher Porphyry, in an argument opposed to the eating of flesh which should be required reading for anyone researching for moral aspects of vegetarianism,

http://thriceholy.net/Texts/Porphyry2.html

gives us a strikingly similar account of "the origin of barbecue" albeit from a negative viewpoint:

"Asclepiades, in his treatise concerning Cyprus and Phoenicia, relates as follows:—In the first place, they did not sacrifice anything animated to the Gods; but neither was there any law pertaining to a thing of this kind, because it was prohibited by natural law. They are said, however, on a certain occasion, in which one soul was required for another, to have, for the first time, sacrificed a victim; and this taking place, the whole of the victim was then consumed by fire. But afterwards, when the victim was burnt, a portion of the flesh fell on the earth, which was taken by the priest, who, in so doing, having burnt his fingers, involuntarily moved them to his mouth, as a remedy for the pain which the burning produced. Having, therefore, thus tasted of the roasted flesh, he also desired to eat abundantly of it, and could not refrain from giving some of it to his wife. Pygmalion, however, becoming acquainted with this circumstance, ordered both the priest and his wife to be hurled headlong from a steep rock, and gave the priesthood to another person, who not long after performing the same sacrifice and eating the flesh of the victim, fell into the same calamities as his predecessor. The thing, however, proceeding still farther, and men using the same kind of sacrifice, and through yielding to desire, not abstaining from, but feeding on flesh, the deed was no longer punished."

"I don't know. Why did people start eating meat in the first place?" -srhcb

In the old days, your friendly local Hawai'ian god was an anthropology student. Old-time teacher said it happened because cooked meat was more palatable to hominids than raw; and ancestors (yours, not mine, as mine came from the heavens and from molten rock and from the water) were scavengers and the protein from meat was more responsible for human evolution than from veggies. One idea for explaining the dramatic increase in cranial capacity is that cooked meat entered the diet.

Old school professor also argued that human bodies (yours, not mine, as I am a friendly local god vice human being) have still not quite adopted to cooked meat. That was a harder argument to swallow, than, say, a Quarter Pounder with Cheese.

Can't wait for well-fed, superior-minded Westerners to shove vegetarianism down the throats of, say, poverty-stricken sub-Saharan Africans, who unfortunately are likely to be as hungry 100 years from now as they are now. And yes, friendly god is aware of the dessication of rare lands in places like Africa, Australia and Molokai from ranching.

I think that for the most part (with many exceptions), vegetarianism runs in phases. High school and college students being the most classic example. I know lots of young people who are. And when I was a young person, many of my friends were. I am no longer a young person, and almost every one of my contemporaries within my work/social group eats, at the very least, fish. Vegetarianism is the diet of idealism.

Now, I grew up in a fairly strict ovo-lacto vegetarian household, and didn't even taste meat until I was 14 (and promptly fell in love). I have been eating it ever since. I guess that for me, rebellion took the form of nice, fat, juicy bacon cheeseburgers. My father, SUPER strict about such things, started eating meat when he was in his late 60's. But the fact is that Mr. I Don't Eat Anything With A Feast, is now chowing down on kaluah pig and fried chicken.

Again, I know that there are lots of exceptions, but within my own experience, that does seem to be how it works.

Kudos to you for keeping up with what your kid is doing on myspace. Myspace profiles should be viewed with a grain of salt anyway, since many users feel it's ok to lie on their profiles, whether it's regarding weight, income, or age.

Tell her Soylent Green is humans!!!!

To MadelynRodriguez

I don't feel threatened by vegetarians. I don't have to justify my eating habits. If we were having lunch together and it would offend you that I ate meat then I would eat a vegetarian meal as to not upset another. But, I love steak and crab and will devour them at any time of any day. I don't feel that I need to change or do something different. Nor is there any guilty conscience about it. The more the better.

For us college students, going pretty much vegetarian isn't necessarily a choice, rather a necessity. You can either choose to make your own salad, being able to inspect each veggie for its "apparent freshness" or eat the unidentified meat in sauce or the soup that was probably made with yesterday's leftover sauced meat.

Ironically in all of these discussions regarding giving up meat because of environmental concerns, no one discusses what the large 'factory farming' vegetable producers, like Con Agra, ADM and the like, are doing to the environment with their farming policies. Chemicals anyone?

A few thoughts:
1. Teens tend to use superlatives a lot and exaggerate a lot. "Everyone will be vegetarian" appears to be a case of this.

2. Teens follow fads.

3. Teens have their own buzz words and phrases.

Do I think everyone will be vegetarian? No. I think there's a growing number of vegetarians because of animal right issues and environmental issues but also as the world population rises trend numbers for just about everything rise (if you look at stats that are straight numbers).

Nice that the fad is something healthy. "Stop eating meat or start using hard drugs?" Easy decision to make. I'd prefer vegetarianism to certain fashion fads too. :D (Are teenage boys still wearing baggy pants with their underwear showing?)

I'm certainly no vegetarian but as I've gotten older I find myself only eating red meat several times a month. In general I think society is eating meat less and less for a number of reasons, environmental, societal, whatever.
As far as teens go, hey it's like the thing to do, I guess.

There is no way this will happen.

1) As a Chef i know of too many people who love the meats.

2) This is where everyone gets confused too. We say meats and we automatically think BEEF, but meat means PROTEIN, that is fish and all seafoods, chicken, weal, lamb, goat, multiple forms of wild game.

3) If this were to ever happen we would see it coming a lot more advanced because of certain vitamins and enzymes we can only get from meats, red meat in particular, and though there are some supplements out there to help there is nothing that is a full complex yet.

So if this were to happen, it would not be widespread vegetarianism, it would become what a lot of other countries already are, and that is you eat what is near you. Me being in Florida gets a lot of beef and seafoods. I think that means i would have it made.