ANSWERS:

Natalie, age 19: I appreciate that you are thinking of this as an ethical issue. I myself am a lacto-ovo vegetarian officially, but while at school at least, I eat very few animal products. Determining whether or not organic dairy and egg products are "ok" is entirely up to you, in my belief. You will not be "vegan" by definition if you consume these products. If being ethical is more important to you than subscribing to an official label, than by all means reconsider your eating habits.

Many times, free-range, cage-free, and cruelty-free products do not give an accurate depiction of how the animal was raised. "Cage-free" might just mean that the chickens were crowded together inside a dark barn instead of crowded in a cage in that barn. To my understanding, there are no official criteria for those labels on products. To find out for sure how the animal was treated, I feel that your best option would be to contact the company from which your products came.

Organic products do have to meet certain criteria, so you can be fairly sure about how those animals were fed. Still, it would be best to contact the company, I feel.

Again, just do what you feel is right for you. If the animals' conditions seem optimal to you and you still desire dairy and eggs, than have them. The point of being vegetarian, and being vegan, for that matter, is about abundance and what you can have, not what you cannot. Feeling uncomfortable with your limits will only lead you to be unhappy and crave "illegal" foods. Others will sense your feelings and might be turned off from vegetarianism altogether. As long as whatever you do is an imformed decision which you can back up with research, morals, and your own feelings, than go for it.

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