We all know that our planet is in serious trouble. The fact that you really care is great, so take this one-question test to find out if you are a true environmentalist: So what did you have for dinner last night? Not to worry, I'm not trying to get chummy, it's just that one simple question is actually the whole test. Yep, that's right. What you had for dinner last night is the determining factor on whether or not you are a true environmentalist.

By far, the number one cause of our environmental problems is meat (and dairy). Meat is the cause of the destruction of the rain forests. Some people think that rain forests are being cut down so that we can reap the lumber, and also to make paper products such as toilet paper from the trees. While lumber and paper can be byproducts from the trees, you must remember that they are just that ? byproducts. The main product, and the real reason for cutting down the forests, is to create more land that we can use to raise animals headed for human consumption and to grow more feed for those animals.

Without these trees to filter carbon from the air, global warming becomes a grave issue. Further, the methane gases released from the animal agriculture makes matters far worse. But it doesn't stop there. Without trees, topsoil has nothing stabilizing it and so it erodes into our water supplies. To add insult to injury, animal agriculture actually depletes the viability of the soil that's left and, therefore, meat production requires an

ever-widening swath of land.

Topsoil erosion is poisoning our oceans and killing off vast amounts of marine life, such as coral reefs and fish. We now have vast areas in our oceans that are termed "dead spots." These are huge areas in our oceans, miles and miles wide, where literally nothing lives or grows. You should remember that water is truly the elixir of life and what we do to the oceans we do to ourselves - eventually.

Until we each learn the truth, we may find ourselves sitting down in a McDonalds with some friends to discuss how to save the planet over a meal of hamburgers or chicken nuggets. Sorry to say, but that's like trying to save a suffocating man by sitting on his chest while reading a book on how to best get oxygen into his lungs.

Most of us can get caught up in technologies like recycling, which are great, but let's put things in their proper perspective. Recycling cans, bottles, aluminum foil and plastic wraps does nothing to save a planet that is being destroyed from the inside out by meat production and consumption. Recycling while eating meat won't amount to a pile of beans. Whereas give up meat and dairy, and recycling becomes a useful tool in maintaining a healthy planet.

And this is where you probably know the rest of the story, such as polar ice caps melting, heating of the Earth's oceans and atmosphere, animals dying off, world hunger (ironically also caused by meat), etc. And by the way, another sad fact is the trees of the rain forests are rarely used for lumber or paper. They are usually just burned, which dispenses even more carbon into the atmosphere.

Now that you know the real truth behind the demise of our planet, and if you care to become a true environmentalist, you must stop eating meat and dairy. You will find that you don't have to "save the planet" per se, you'll simply not be killing it. The fact is the Earth will be here for millions of years, but we might not be unless we immediately change our ways.

While you probably already knew that a vegan diet is the healthiest for the human body, you should now also know that it is the only healthy and sustainable diet for the planet.