Top Ten Reasons to Go Vegetarian During World Vegetarian Week (May 19-25)
Gone are the days when vegetarians were served up a plate of iceberg lettuce and a dull-as-dishwater baked potato. With the growing variety of vegetarian faux meats like bacon and sausages — along with an ever-expanding variety of vegetarian cookbooks and restaurants — vegetarianism has taken the world by storm.
With World Vegetarian Week beginning on Monday, here without further ado are PETA’s picks for the top 10 reasons to give vegetarian eating a try.
1. Helping Animals Also Helps the Global Poor
While there is ample and justified moral indignation about the diversion of 100 million tons of grain for biofuels, more than seven times as much (760 million tons) is fed to farmed animals so that people can eat meat. Is the diversion of crops to our cars a moral issue? Yes, but it’s about one-eighth the issue that meat-eating is. Care about global poverty? Try vegetarianism.
2. Eating Meat Supports Cruelty to Animals
The green pastures and idyllic barnyard scenes of years past are now distant memories. On today’s factory farms, animals are crammed by the thousands into filthy windowless sheds, wire cages, gestation crates, and other confinement systems. These animals will never raise families, root in the soil, build nests, or do anything else that is natural and important to them. They won’t even get to feel the warmth of the sun on their backs or breathe fresh air until the day they are loaded onto trucks bound for slaughter.
3. Eating Meat Is Bad for the Environment
A recent United Nations report entitled Livestock’s Long Shadow concludes that eating meat is “one of the … most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global.” In just one example, eating meat causes almost 40 percent more greenhouse-gas emissions than all the cars, trucks, and planes in the world combined. The report concludes that the meat industry “should be a major policy focus when dealing with problems of land degradation, climate change and air pollution, water shortage and water pollution, and loss of biodiversity.”
4. Avoid Bird Flu
The World Health Organization says that if the avian flu virus mutates, it could be caught simply by eating undercooked chicken flesh or eggs, eating food prepared on the same cutting board as infected meat or eggs, or even touching eggshells contaminated with the disease. Other problems with factory farming — from foot-and-mouth to SARS — can be avoided with a general shift to a vegetarian diet.
5. If You Wouldn’t Eat a Dog, You Shouldn’t Eat a Chicken
Several recent studies have shown that chickens are bright animals who are able to solve complex problems, demonstrate self-control, and worry about the future. Chickens are smarter than cats and dogs and even do some things that have not yet been seen in mammals other than primates. Dr. Chris Evans, who studies animal behavior and communication at Macquarie University in Australia, says, “As a trick at conferences, I sometimes list these attributes, without mentioning chickens and people think I’m talking about monkeys.”
6. Heart Disease: Our Number One Killer
Healthy vegetarian diets support a lifetime of good health and provide protection against numerous diseases, including the United States’ three biggest killers: heart disease, cancer, and strokes. Drs. Dean Ornish and Caldwell Esselstyn — two doctors with 100 percent success in preventing and reversing heart disease — have used a vegan diet to accomplish it, as chronicled most recently in Dr. Esselstyn’s Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease, which documents his 100 percent success rate for unclogging people’s arteries and reversing heart disease.
7. Cancer: Our Number Two Killer
Dr. T. Colin Campbell is one of the world’s foremost epidemiological scientists and the director of what The New York Times called “the most comprehensive large study ever undertaken of the relationship between diet and the risk of developing disease.” Dr. Campbell’s best-selling book, The China Study, is a must-read for anyone who is concerned about cancer. To summarize it, Dr. Campbell states, “No chemical carcinogen is nearly so important in causing human cancer as animal protein.”
8. Fitting Into That Itty-Bitty Bikini
Vegetarianism is also the ultimate weight-loss diet, since vegetarians are one-third as likely to be obese as meat-eaters are, and vegans are about one-tenth as likely to be obese. Of course, there are overweight vegans, just as there are skinny meat-eaters. But on average, vegans are 10 to 20 percent lighter than meat-eaters. A vegetarian diet is the only diet that has passed peer review and taken weight off and kept it off.
9. Global Peace
Leo Tolstoy claimed that “vegetarianism is the taproot of humanitarianism.” His point? For people who wish to sow the seeds of peace, we should be eating as peaceful a diet as possible. Eating meat supports killing animals, for no reason other than humans’ acquired taste for animals’ flesh. Great humanitarians from Leo Tolstoy and Mahatma Gandhi to Thich Nhat Hanh have argued that a vegetarian diet is the only diet for people who want to make the world a kinder place.
10. The Joy of Veggies
As the growing range of vegetarian cookbooks and restaurants shows, vegetarian foods rock. People report that when they adopt a vegetarian diet, their range of foods explodes from a center-of-the-plate meat item to a range of grains, legumes, fruits, and vegetables that they didn’t even know existed.
Sir Paul McCartney sums it all up, “If anyone wants to save the planet, all they have to do is just stop eating meat. That’s the single most important thing you could do. It’s staggering when you think about it. Vegetarianism takes care of so many things in one shot: ecology, famine, cruelty.”
So are you ready to give it a try? Check out VegCooking.com for recipes and meal plans and to take the World Vegetarian Week 7-Day Pledge.
Bruce Friedrich is vice president for campaigns at PETA. Before joining PETA in 1996, Bruce spent six years running a shelter for homeless families and the largest soup kitchen in Washington, D.C. He has been a progressive and animal activist for more than 20 years.
Wow! This are great reasons!
I should–
oh wait
been doing it for 20 years.
I like the “Bruce spent six years running a shelter for homeless families and the largest soup kitchen in Washington, D.C.”
Good way to shut up the “yoo shuld carre bout huemens furst,” people. But then again its hard to shut them up.
That Thich Nhat Hanh link is really great. I’m posting it here for people who didn’t notice it:
http://www.healthyat100.org/display.asp?catid=3&pageid=4
Eating for Peace by Thich Nhat Hanh
A talk by the Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hanh on Mindful Consumption
All things need food to be alive and to grow, including our love or our hate. Love is a living thing, hate is a living thing. If you do not nourish your love, it will die. If you cut the source of nutriment for your violence, your violence will also die. That is why the path shown by the Buddha is the path of mindful consumption.
The Buddha told the following story. There was a couple who wanted to cross the desert to go to another country in order to seek freedom. They brought with them their little boy and a quantity of food and water. But they did not calculate well, and that is why halfway through the desert they ran out of food, and they knew that they were going to die. So after a lot of anguish, they decided to eat the little boy so that they could survive and go to the other country, and that’s what they did. And every time they ate a piece of flesh from their son, they cried.
The Buddha asked his monks, “My dear friends: Do you think that the couple enjoyed eating the flesh of their son?” The Buddha said, “It is impossible to enjoy eating the flesh of our son. If you do not eat mindfully, you are eating the flesh of your son and daughter, you are eating the flesh of your parent.”
If we look deeply, we will see that eating can be extremely violent. UNESCO tells us that every day, forty thousand children in the world die because of a lack of nutrition, of food. Every day, forty thousand children. And the amount of grain that we grow in the West is mostly used to feed our cattle. Eighty percent of the corn grown in this country is to feed the cattle to make meat. Ninety-five percent of the oats produced in this country is not for us to eat, but for the animals raised for food. According to this recent report that we received of all the agricultural land in the US, eighty-seven percent is used to raise animals for food. That is forty-five percent of the total land mass in the US.
[please click the link for the rest]
Hey Bruce, long time no see!! (:
I’ve been vegan since 1995 and vegetarian since 1986. I can offer first hand another reason: I was supposed to die way back when and I really do believe that my change in my diet has kept me ALIVE to bug all of you here on Common Dreams!! (:
Everybody go vegan! We’ll help you in your transition! (:
Thank you, Bruce! It’s great to let folks know how easy it is to choose delicious vegetarian food. Every time we eat, we can have a positive impact on our health, on the environment, and, of course, on animals by choosing veg foods.
As a former meat-eater who has never felt better physically or emotionally since adopting a vegan diet, I encourage folks to go veg. It’s a powerful decision that’s a win-win for all!
I love deep fried San Francisco hot dogs on a toated bun though. With mustrd, relish and finely chopped onion, or peanut butter and Miracle Whip with a dash of horse radish. Yummy yum.
I love Cucumber and hard boiled egg sandwiches on a hard roll too, with butter and salt and pepper. The best is home grown sliced tomato on home made bread with lots of ground pepper corns and Miracle Whip, so guess Veggie is alright too. Gonna miss those deep fried dogs though.
Rich is correct about the health benefits of not eating meat. [Except for fish, of course … ]. That is where the argument must focus. People are too selfish to care about cruelty, and I must say, having lived around cows and chickens growing up, neither do I. The psychic argument is probably not relevant either, until you have stopped eating meat. Focus on personal health and on the environmental damage of factory farms and feed lots which pollute our water streams with the hormones and antibiotics fed to those critters. Arguments 1,2,5,9 and 10 are useless. The rest are where we might get thru to people. I am 68 and I row and backpack and bike and walk and get it up easily. [And isn’t it interesting that we can talk about filth and disease, but shouldn’t mention that which occupies our thoughts more than all the others combined?] Those are relevant arguments.
Many thanks to Bruce for posting this! The fate of the animals and the fate of man are interconnected. (Ecclesiastes 3:19) A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami, worshipped by millions of Vaishnavaite Hindus worldwide as a shaktya-avesha-avatar or empowered representative of God, said in 1974:
“We simply request, ‘Don’t kill. Don’t maintain slaughterhouses.’ That is very sinful. It brings a very awkward karmic reaction upon society. Stop these slaughterhouses. We don’t say, ‘Stop eating meat.’ You can eat meat, but don’t take it from the slaughterhouse, by killing. Simply wait (until the animal dies of natural causes) and you’ll get the carcasses.
“You are killing innocent cows and other animals–nature will take revenge. Just wait. As soon as the time is right, nature will gather all these rascals and slaughter them. Finished. They’ll fight among themselves — Protestants and Catholics, Russia and America, this one and that one. It is going on. Why? This is nature’s law. Tit for tat. ‘You have killed. Now you kill yourselves.’
“They are sending animals to the slaughterhouse, and now they’ll create their own slaughterhouse. You see? Just take Belfast. The Roman Catholics are killing the Protestants, and the Protestants are killing the Catholics. This is nature’s law. It is not necessary that you be sent to the ordinary slaughterhouse. You’ll make a slaughterhouse at home. You’ll kill your own child–abortion. This is nature’s law.
“Who are these children being killed? They are these meat-eaters. They enjoyed themselves when so many animals were killed and now they’re being killed by their own mothers. People do not know how nature is working. If you kill you must be killed. If you kill the cow, who is your mother, then in some future lifetime your mother will kill you. Yes. The mother becomes the child, and the child becomes the mother.
“We don’t want to stop trade, or the production of grains and vegetables and fruit. But we want to stop these killing houses. It is very, very sinful. That is why all over the world they have so many wars. Every ten or fifteen years there is a big war — a wholesale slaughterhouse for humankind. But these rascals — they do not see it, that by the law of karma, every action must have its reaction.”
Similarly, in his purport to the Srimad Bhagavatam 6.10.9, Bhaktivedanta Swami writes:
“One cannot continue killing animals and at the same time be a religious man. That is the greatest hypocrisy. Jesus Christ said, ‘Do not kill,’ but hypocrites nevertheless maintain thousands of slaughterhouses while posing as Christians. Such hypocrisy is condemned…”
And:
“If one kills many thousands of animals in a professional way so that other people can purchase the meat to eat, one must be ready to be killed in a similar way in his next life and in life after life. There are many rascals who violate their own religious principles. According to Judeo-Christian scriptures, it is clearly said, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Nonetheless, giving all kinds of excuses, even the heads of religions indulge in killing animals while trying to pass as saintly persons. This mockery and hypocrisy in human society brings about unlimited calamities; therefore occasionally there are great wars. Masses of such people go out onto battlefields and kill themselves. Presently, they have discovered the atomic bomb, which is simply waiting to be used for wholesale destruction.”
(Chaitanya Charitamrita, Madhya 24.251, purport)
Also:
“To be nonviolent to human beings and to be a killer or enemy of the poor animals is Satan’s philosophy. In this age there is enmity towards poor animals, and therefore the poor creatures are always anxious. The reaction of the poor animals is being forced on human society, and therefore there is always the strain of cold or hot war between men, individually, collectively or nationally.”
(Srimad Bhagavatam 1.10.6, purport)
“In human society, if one kills a man he has to be hanged. That is the law of the state. Because of ignorance people do not perceive that there is a complete state controlled by the Supreme Lord. Every living creature is the son of the Supreme Lord, and He does not tolerate even an ant’s being killed. One has to pay for it.”
I believe abortion is the karmic reaction for killing animals. And therefore, pro-lifers should learn that it’s in their best interest to include the animals in their ethics. I’ve tried to make the case in secular, political language, because I’m not trying to “convert” them to another religion. In contemporary American society, animal rights and vegetarianism are a secular trend which could use the inspiration, blessings and support of organized religion. The record of organized religion with regards to animals is mixed: stronger in some religions than in others.
I’m not singling out pro-lifers for special criticism here, either. War, like abortion, is also the karmic reaction for killing animals. Many in the peace movement are unaware of this. In the April 1995 issue of Harmony: Voices for a Just Future, a “consistent-ethic” periodical on the religious Left, Catholic civil rights activist Bernard Broussard concludes:
“…our definition of war is much too limited and narrow. Wars and conflicts in the human kingdom will never be abolished or diminished until, as a pure matter of logic, it includes the cessation of war between the human and animal kingdoms. For, if we be eaters of flesh, or wearers of fur, or participants in hunting animals, or in any way use our might against weakness, we are promoting, in no matter how seemingly insignificant a fashion, the spirit of war. All are manifestations of a ’survival of the fittest philosophy.’”
I read somewhere that one of the leaders of Operation Rescue came to oppose abortion in the 1970s, upon seeing a bumper sticker which read: “Abortion? Pick on someone your own size!” Yes. That�s precisely my point. The “might makes right” mentality that makes abortion possible begins with what we humans do to other animals. Pythagoras warned: “Those who kill animals for food will be more prone than vegetarians to torture and kill their fellow men.”
Domestication of other animals is artificial. Our relationship with other animals on this planet, wild and domesticated, is, therefore, partly an environmental ethics issue:
According to the editors of World Watch, July/August 2004: “The human appetite for animal flesh is a driving force behind virtually every major category of environmental damage now threatening the human future: deforestization, topsoil erosion, fresh water scarcity, air and water pollution, climate change, biodiversity loss, social injustice, the destabilization of communities and the spread of disease.”
Brother David Steindl-Rast, a Benedictine monk, similarly says: “the survival of our planet depends on our sense of belonging: to all other humans, to dolphins caught in dragnets to pigs and chickens and calves raised in animal concentration camps, to redwoods and rainforests, to kelp beds in our oceans, and to the ozone layer.”
The threat of “overpopulation” is frequently used to justify abortion as birth control. On a vegetarian diet, however, the world could easily support a population several times its present size. The world’s cattle alone consume enough to feed 8.7 billion humans.
America’s largest animal rights organization, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), over 1.6 million strong, is challenging those who think they can still be “meat-eating environmentalists” to go veg, if they really care about the planet. If it could be shown that meat-eating leads to abortion and war, would this be enough to cause our friends in the pro-life and peace movements to go veg as well?
Becoming a vegetarian or a vegan is not merely helping the pro-life movement, it is literally pro-life!
People need to take responsibility for the food they eat and the consequences of its production.
As for going veggie to save the world from the perils of Global Warming, you can take my bacon cheeseburger when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
Seriously though, if you really want to save the planet you might consider the following energy saving, pollution reducing steps:
-Put off having children… forever. They are cute, but those little buggers create a lot of waste. Just think about all the energy and petroleum products that went into the disposable diapers; the tons of plastic toys; strollers; car seats; baby bjorns, etc. And all that is nothing compared to when they become teenagers.
-In most countries in the world, a house the size of the one you live in could reasonably be expected to house 10-25 people. Which means you are using a lot of energy to heat and cool a lot more space than you need. You might consider moving into your garden shed. You could use your house to take in a small herd of homeless chickens or sheep.
-Recycle your car, or both of them, or all three of them. There is an amazing amount of embodied energy that just goes into the construction of each one of those polluting, gas guzzling metal behemoths. Just think of how good a shape you’ll be in from biking to and from work every day.
- Stop buying stuff. How many thousands of dollars a year do you spend on electronics, clothes, skin care products, sporting goods, wine, home décor, etc? All of it was manufactured using vast quantities of electricity, petroleum, chemicals, water, and minerals. Most of it will end up in the ground or the water eventually. Is any of that crap necessary to your survival?
I know we all want to feel like we are doing something nice to make the world a better and healthier place, some of us even want to feel better than other people about all the nice planet-saving things they are doing. But the sad truth of the matter is that even if we do everything Al Gore recommends at the end of An Inconvenient Truth, the human population is still way beyond the Earth’s sustainable carrying capacity. And all those people in China and India are going to keep chasing the American Dream long after this country is a bankrupt shell of its former glory.
Deep down we all know that the American Way of Life is destroying the world our children will inherit. Feel-good solutions like going veggie or driving a hybrid do little more than give us the sense that we are entitled to be self-righteous. If this is you, get over yourself. We are all responsible to varying degrees for creating this mess and it’s going to take a lot more than switching to veggie burgers to save us from ourselves.
sorry if I have posed this before, but lodt my glasses:
vegetarian diets are healthy, being typically high in fibre and low in fat, and devoid of meat borne toxins as well as meat linked food poisoning, while vegetarian cuisine is tasty and diverse, visit any top class Greek, Indian or Thai restaurant.
The poor can benefit from a vegetarian diet being cheaper than a meaty one, while vegetarianism is better for the environment, as meat production requires far more land and animal manure pollutes waterways, and methane from meat production exacerbates climate change. Vegetarian diets will help end world hunger as meat production is an inefficient method of producing food.
Carnivores naturally eat meat and it would be wrong to stop them, but the human digestive system more closely resembles that of herbivores so vegetarianism is an excellent choice. Hopefully this short synopsis will not be construed fascist by touchy meat eaters.
Indian - vegetarian??? Lamb, chicken… have you never heard of butter chicken or Tandorri chicken Do you know any East Indian people?
Greek - squid, lamb, beef, chicken
Thai - ?? veggies??
ITs true that these cultures have a way better balanced diet than North Americians, but veggies….that is a stretch. Though I do have an East Indian friend who is a vegetarian as part of his religion.
While I don’t eat a lot of meat, if I go for too long without some, I don’t feel right. Perhaps I eat to many carbohydrates when I have “meatless” dinners. Here is your opportunity to change someone’s mind - give me a practical suggestion and I will try it.
REASON #2 The beef I eat comes from my neighbour. I can see his cows from my house. They seem to be happy animals, and he treats them well.
I recently shifted to a plant based diet. I have been talking out loud to friends and comtemplating the shift to becoming a vegan for the past several months. I finally made the shift after reading a book called the RAVE Diet and its accompanying DVD called Eating. The book and DVD also features Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn as he talks about the reversal of heart disease by switching to a 100% plant based diet.
We know that the world is not as it seems. What is purported to be good for the benefit of all is not at all how it is. Food is just another such thing. The government guidelines to what is considered proper and a healthy diet are promoted and tweaked to favor the food industries namely the meat and dairy industries. The reality is that these guidelines have more to do with increasing bottom line profits for these industries than it does in the actual betterment of health for the populace. Sounds like the health care and drug industries, and just about everything else doesn’t it.
The food industries are to health what the tobacco industries were to health a couple generations ago. It was not that long ago that doctors actually approved of pregnant women smoking and would recommend their favorite brand of cigarette by espousing the so-called health benefits of smoking. According to the author of the RAVE Diet, Mike Anderson, 2 out of 3 people die from an animal based diet. Basically, the push to market what the typical standard American diet (SAD) is suicidal. It is the biggest form of unassisted suicide. Pretty harsh statement. But, if you do some research and look at statistics, you will find the truth beneath the matrix that we live within.
Since I made the shift it hasn’t been difficult. First of all, I’m not trying a diet. I have made a fundamental shift–I AM a vegetarian. I will always have fond memories of enjoying my favorite BBQ joint and my favorite dish my mom makes Sati Babi, skewered pork with peanut butter sauce. But, then again, I have very fond memories of my childhood days riding the children’s rides in an amusement park, but I certainly don’t have an inclination to want to ride those wonderful rides again as an adult. I am finding the joy of shifting my taste buds to a plant based diet. There is a diversity of such foods that I never gave much notice to. I feel great knowing that what I’m putting inside my body is correct and meant to be for what its designed for. As I realize the Godself within, our bodies are truly temples. Our bodies are the church. As I recognize the Godself within, I salute my divinity as a being of spirit housed in this human form. We are gods all of us humans. I salute the divinity within all people and myself. The self realization of that is another reason in addition to the ten to become a plant based eater.
borisshootnikoff is right, just eating veggie won’t help matters all that much.
“sustainable living,” such as it is, will only buy us some more time to develop the technologies to escape the planet entirely - that’s really the only long-term solution. it’s either a space diaspora of humans, or outright extinction (or maybe just a massive dieoff). and there’s a long way to go before humans can head out to the stars en masse (dealing with cosmic radiation is one significant issue for instance).
and don’t immediately discard the 10000+ year partnership between humans and animals. it’s gone more than a bit sideways, yes - but domesticated animals will be around as long as humans are.
KemPatrick,
I can make you some hotdogs that will taste better by far than the ones you fear missing. I call them Champagne Dogs.
Check out the brats at http://www.yvesveggie.com/
Slice them open lengthwise, brown in a little canola oil. Serve on Black Olive bread (if you can get it or any other micro-bakery fresh roll/bread) with an organic ketchup and brown mustard mix, add slices of avocado and Follow Your Heart Cheddar cheez http://www.followyourheart.com/cheese.php (vegan).
You can serve vegan Champagne with it or an organic fruit sparkler.
Also, you can make delicious vegan potato salad using Nayonaise!
______________
Replace Miracle Whip with Nayonaise. http://www.nasoya.com/nasoya/nayonaise_original.html
Nayonaise tastes better, is 100% natural and is much lower in calories.
The fundamental reason to shift to an all plant-based diet is that we are human herbivores, ecologically scripted (co-evolved in nature) to eat an exclusive plant based diet. We cannot be well until we recognize this and we cannot stop the ecological destructions engulfing our planet until we recognize this either.
Humans are anatomically and physiologically herbivorous and only culturally omnivorous. Comic video on this topic: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05zhL1YUd8Q
(And our cultural persuasions are ruled by inherited stupidities from a culture of disassociated elite orders and corporate conglomerates that today dictate and censor what goes into textbooks and what is aired in media.)
And it is for this reason alone (that we are not natural omnivores) that we almost instantly experience all sorts of spiritual, intellectual and physical benefits and awakenings when we embrace our herbivore natures.
By embracing our herbivore design, we demonstrate our reverence for all life including what is potential in ourselves.
Regardless of how long men have eaten meat, it has never been widespread (involving the majorities of any populations except in extremely isolated cases). And, meat-eating has generally been used as a means to demonstrate power, privilege and wealth.
Not until the advent of refrigeration was the blight of meat-eating able to involve such huge numbers of people. It is interesting to realize that even in the 1920’s, Scientific American ran an article on cancer pointing out that only in certain affluent societies where meat-eating was commonplace could one reliably predict incidences cancer.
So, even in the 1920’s it was scientifically recognized that meat-eating was a precondition to the development of cancer. (It is interesting to note that early cancer research (in the late 1800’s) was funded by European military agencies seeking ways to INDUCE cancer! And, not long afterwards, meat-eating exploded!)
“When we kill animals to eat them, they end up killing us because their flesh, which contains cholesterol and saturated fat, was never intended for human beings, who are natural herbivores.”
William C. Roberts, M.D., editor, American Journal of Cardiology
Great article by Dr. Mills (the author of the book “The Comparative Anatomy of Eating”) with simple reference chart appended below http://www.vegsource.com/veg_faq/comparative.htm
vasumurti,
Your comments are excellent.
What you say here:
“According to the editors of World Watch, July/August 2004: “The human appetite for animal flesh is a driving force behind virtually every major category of environmental damage now threatening the human future: deforestization, topsoil erosion, fresh water scarcity, air and water pollution, climate change, biodiversity loss, social injustice, the destabilization of communities and the spread of disease.””
Should not be overlooked by those who have been inculcated to eat meat… a la “…pry my burger from my cold dead hands…”
What we choose to do today will be the foundation for what will come. What we have been induced to do, arose from the foundation that had been set for us.
It IS long overdue that we take a step back and question the assumptions of those who reared us. What they gave us was often what they thought was best. But, we do not have the right to jeopardize lives simply because it is uncomfortable to face the facts; our meat-eating culture IS the problem and it MUST be changed to accord more closely with nature’s requirements for life.
As for those who find comfort in the fact that future generations can live in space because they refuse to alter their behavior so that life can continue on earth: I think they should go themselves, now!
http://www.zazzle.com/allinharmony/product/168322237064531730
BEHAVE!
OR GO TO YOUR SPACE STATION!
tech2–I just made a brown rice salad with white beans and fresh spinach in a delicious vinaigrette–heavy on the garlic. It was a perfectly balanced meal. Whole grains, legumes and vegetables, with a little fat (olive oil, nuts and seeds) make me feel just right! I can still vaguely remember the sick feeling I used to get after eating meat, but thankfully it’s a distant memory.
I’m sure your neighbor’s cows are very happy. Right up until they’re slaughtered. I’m sure he does it with great love though, huh?
I don’t entirely agree with #8. In my experience the best diet for losing weight is the paleolithic diet: a little meat, plenty of veggies and fruit, and no bread or pasta or sugar. Idea is to eat only stuff that cavemen ate. Nothing prepared or refined or with a list of ingredients. I followed that one for a while and lost a heckuva lot of weight very quickly. Now that I’ve switched to a vegetarian diet (except for some fish and free-range eggs) I’ve gained some weight, but that’s because I’ve been eating bread and pasta and sugar, not because I’m not eating meat. Think it’s the refined carbohydrates that pack on the pounds. Guess I should give that junk up.
But the author left out one more reason why it’s beneficial to eat a vegetarian diet, and that’s because it’s cheaper (as long as you don’t spend money on faux meat products, like fake bacon or cheese or whatever). Meat is a lot more expensive than potatoes or rice or lettuce or green beans or apples or etc.
It is quite amazing what homo sapiens can eat and still survive. Read the Last Kings of Thule to see how the greenland natives survived during the long winter.
Although I have been vegetarian for several years, I never prefer not to discuss it with non.
The real problem on our planet is mathematical numbers. But even when there were not that many humans it seems that hunters were able to make some of the larger species extinct. The usual models of population growth exponential at first then a crash are probably going to apply with a vengeance when the time comes.
It is quite amazing what homo sapiens can eat and still survive. Read the Last Kings of Thule to see how the greenland natives survived during the long winter.
Although I have been vegetarian for several years, I never prefer not to discuss it with non.
The real problem on our planet is mathematical numbers. But even when there were not that many humans it seems that hunters were able to make some of the larger species extinct.
The usual models of population growth exponential at first then a crash are probably going to apply with a vengeance when the time comes.
Example of what we can look foward too. The rich have vast caches of stored food, fuel, timber, etc. They hide behind their fortified mansions and private armys while vast numbers in the cities died of starvation, disease, etc.
Vegan is good, but even better if it’s whole, organic, heirloom and wild varieties, minimize cooking, fresh as possible (clean as possible too), germinate seeds (change water often), get a wide variety, balanced proteins (pulses/grains), deeper colored varieties, lots of spices, limit sugars, omega 3/6 balance (flax), investigate vitamin B12, and get more details.
twinsfanatic, oats are good food. i’m surprised we aren’t eating them up ourselves.
vasumurti___ (2:03 PM) Lovely idea you have there, just watch a poor old cow with no teeth left stumble around starving to death until she dies and then it is alright to go get the carcasss of bone and hide and eat what is left. That is not my idea of treating animals well, as I always tried to never keep an animal so that they died a slow, lingering death.
I wonder who you think is going to take care of all of these sick and dying animals that cannot be used for food while they are still in decent condition? I guess roadkill would be fine to eat with your humanitarian strategy but it never looked good to me and neither did a starving helpless cow that has been kept too long.
It must be nice to pat yourself on the back for being so concerned for the welfare of animals when obviously you know next to nothing about the subject.
First of all, I want to thank Bruce Freidrich for writing the article for Common Dreams and the work he has done for PETA and the soup kitchen. Thanks, Bruce!
I’m on my fort-first year as a vegetarian, and in spite of the junk food I still consume, have much more energy than when I was eating flesh foods. Pastries, cake, chocolates, pizza, pasta …I could live on that stuff! And heavy on cheese. Plus a lot of coffee, beer, wine, and hard liquor on ocassion. I supplement these delicacies with “organically grown” fruit, vegetables, sprouts, raw nuts and seeds. (Ya gotta have a balance)
I love mangos in season, but the past two years, they’ve been terrible, but before that, They were super sweet and meaty and I’d eat a half a lug at one time. Last year, in California, severe freezing weather did much damage to the citrus trees and the oranges weren’t too good. This year they are excellent, very sweet, and I’ll eat four navel oranges, drink three cups of coffee with half and half (no sugar) for breakfast and spend the day doing manual labor with no hunger pains. I’ll have more coffee in the afternoon and it holds me until supper.
The Life Force is in the seed, folks. How many of you grow or buy organic produce where you don’t feel energized after eating, or in the case of juicing, get any “oomph” from it?
By the way, I like what you said, Bruce Griffin. Very origional!
Pythagoras kept to a very strict vegetarian diet and taught, among other things, dietetics. Check him out if you are unfamilar with his teachings.
Not much is said about adrenalin, but when animals in the slaughterhouse are nearing their turn to be executed, the fear of “dying?” is so frightening that their adrenal glands secrete a lot of adrenalin, literally poisoning their body (meat), with this powerful substance. We consume the meat and the excessive amount of adrenalin indirectly harming our bodies.
The Hunza people in the Himalayas live healthy, vibrant lives on an almost vegetarian diet. They kill animals a few times a year for certain holidays. They also make their own wine. For you old-timers remembering Art Linkletter, he and the writer, Renee Taylor, traveled to Hunza and wrote a book about it in the early 60’s. They were impressed!
A fellow was telling me about a meat-packing place in Vernon, Ca. where he did some repair work. One of the employees asked the guy if he ate and liked hot dogs. The fellow answered in the affirmative. The employee brought him to a room with greasy, slimy slop on the floor. He said the guy told him all the parts that are not used or cut for packaged meats or the stuff at the local butcher shop is here on the floor. Eyes, intestines, feet, everything! It’s put into a large machine with some liquid and out comes nice smooth HOT DOGS! Babe Ruth would have been proud!
Eventually, I’ll go vegan. I love the dairy products, unfortunately. Years ago, when I lived in Southern California, I’d buy a pint of raw cream, put it in a bowl with raw honey, stir it and eat it all within two minutes. So delicious!
About 15 years ago I went to a doctor. My cholesterol was 202. He said try to get down to about 150. I said I’ll try. Then he was shocked at my trigyceride level. 563. I asked him if it was good or bad? He asked me if I ate a lot of sweets and I nodded, and he said I was on the verge of a heart attack or possibly getting diabetes if I didn’t change my diet. A word to the wise is sufficient. I haven’t been to a doctor for a checkup since!
Live and let live, “The Silver Rule.’ All animals and fish are sentient beings. Let em’ eke out their existence.
Are Bush and Cheney sentient?
A few more reasons:
CHICAGO — A Chicago company has recalled an “undetermined amount of beef products” distributed in 11 states, including Wisconsin, due to an E. coli scare, federal officials announced Saturday.
TRENTON, N.J. - Military officials say beef sold at some bases around the country _ including the submarine base in Connecticut _ may have be contaminated with E. coli.
I think I’ll donate my share of meat to the first born of filthy rich Republicans.
as a long time vegetarian one of my dilemmas is feeling comfortable about what i feed my cat and dog. i have done some research on the products i purchase and hope what i read is true. i feed both ‘kids’ a fish based diet…at least i know that the fish had the freedom to swim around in their natural enviroment before being hoisted into the air and slammed down on the surface of a boat prior to suffocating to death. i have conferred with a number of veternarians that i trust and have read also that dogs and cats are natural carnivores…my dog eats lots of veggies too…
cows look happy and the farmer treats them well…then he/she puts them in a trailer for a ride to the slaughter house…animal holocaust……
i too am hesitant to discuss vegetarianism with those who eat meat…most, i find, are beligerent in defending their right to go to the grocery store and purchase ‘picture perfect’ meat neatly wrapped in plastic and styrofoam…
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES!!!
good for the enviroment???
I live in the frozen north so how the hell can you say me eating veggies that are trucked from Cal or Mex or Brazil to Canada is helping the enviroment? Cars and trucks being the #1 greenhouse gas producers.
I grow alfalfa etc on my farm for cows to eat. I can get meat my local farmer raised 12 months of the year. He does not have to truck it from 2 or 3 countries away to get to my local store. I am not saying eat meat 7 days a week but a healthy mix of veggies meals that I eat 3 to 5 days a week and meat meals I have no problem with.
COFFEE anyone?
It takes 32 litres of water to grow the beans for that cup of coffee you drink in the morning. No meat in coffee but a shit load of chemicals and pesticides
This article presents some good reasons for being vegetarian, but is incorrect on the origins of SARS. A good summary of the origin is here .
SARS is not a result of factory farming, but of human expansion of territory into new areas resulting in exposure to new diseases. The origins of SARS is similar to the origins of Hunta and Ebola. They come from people being in areas they’ve not generally lived in before and being exposed to and eating animals they’ve not generally eaten before. In the case of SARS, it probably originated from civit cats–an omnivorous mammal that does not look or act at all like a cat.
The spread of SARS is not the result of eating meat, but due to the fact that humans now live in very high densities and move almost instantaneously around the planet (airplanes). So, you do not have to eat meat to get SARS, all you need is to be coughed on or otherwise exposed to someone who has it–a good reason to stay out of shopping malls and airplanes!
The problem with factory farming is that IF a disease like SARS or Avian Bird Flu infects a factory farmed animal, it will spread incredibly rapidly for the same reasons SARS spread rapidly–high population density. It will also increase the chances of our own exposure to the disease, since we already get quite a few diseases (e.g. Asian Flu) from our farm animals (including those we do not eat).
Edible Wild Plants
That is the book if you want to go real natural veggie diet and save money. You can make anything from wild plants and trees that are FREE TO PICK. Just a list of some of the things you can make from wild plants
Asparagus
candy
cereal
coffee
tea
cold drinks
cooked greens
cooked vegtables
flour
fritters
fruit
jams/jelly
nut
pickle
potato
seasoning/codiments
syrup/sugar
and poisons
the name of the book is Edible Wild Plants Eastern /Central North America by lee Allen Peterson of the Perterson Fieild guides series
That common dandelion on your front lawn you can make Salads, cooked greens, cooked veggies ( leaves are high in Vitamin “A”) and even make coffee and fritters ( from the flower) but people spend millions every year killing this free food source so they have a perfect lawn.
Kernel, your idea of uneaten cows dying of neglect and starvation all over the country is good imagery, but it’s not at all realistic, for the very simple reason that there’s no way everyone in America is going to convert to vegetarianism overnight. What will really happen, if America ever really does convert to vegetarianism completely (which is highly unlikely), is that people will convert to vegetarianism slowly, over a great many years, and that the business of raising animals for food will slowly die out as a consequence. And that’s your real concern, isn’t it?
from a scientific standpoint man is meant to be an herbivore by design. compared to carnivores in nature, true carnivores, lions, tigers etc. mans colon is far too short to digest meat. these animals have miles of large intestine compared to man. That flatulence you expereince after those hotdogs, is undigested, fermenting meat left in your bowels because there isnt enough colon to lend to the process of digestion. theres a great article out there somewhere, i am sure if you plug it into your search engine it’ll come up, 101 reasons to be a vegetarian. the best thing is it doesnt get cutsie, it gives very good scientific reasons. for self health, planetary health, and mutual respect and harmony within nature. you can go scientific, you can go spiritual, every good book, the bible, the quoran, the gita, they all preach vegetarianism. man being a carnivore is just another symptom of his programming….the media sells it and you live the role
***a little dyslexic this a.m. i meant to say the opposite, mans colon is too long and animals have shorter wider colons to pass meat easily….http://www.celestialhealing.net/physicalveg3.htm
Liberal…
A lion to a human, mmm interesting as they are two very different animals. The HUNKS of meat a lion eats since its teeth are NOT designed to chew food like humans is another factor. One after eating lays around for some times days doing nothing but conserve energy for the next hunt. ( don’t see many over weight lions but in the zoo.) Now house cats do eat grass to help with the digestive track and hair balls. Hard to compare apples and oranges as you are doing. It is the chemicals that are put into the meat that causes problems.
I know local farmers who are putting as little chemicals in their cow/chickens as legal and guess what it tastes like meat. Chicken that has a taste and not this white stuff that it is the BBQ sauce not the meat with taste. Plus as was said above in another posting where do you buy local fresh grown veggie in the middle of winter? With the cost of fuel the price of trucking veggies all over N.A. is going up.
hollow point, wow your names quite the double entendre,
the comparison is between carnivore and herbivore, check out the link I provided and folks alot more intelligent than you or i explain. i know most peoples egos dont want to hear that, but if you live your life knowing that youre never the smartest person in the room youll one day be.
whatfools: Last sentence…right on! Excellent choice.
jade: I appreciate your comments very much. Cats and dogs are carnivore and I feed mine meat and fish products as well. I tried vegetarian cat food which is expensive, but my three felines wouldn’t taste one morsel of the dry or wet food. Maybe some of you Cd’ers remember a scientific study done many years ago on cats being feed a vegetarian diet. They were actually healthier afterwards. A Hare Krishna devotee told me about rescuing two sickly feral cats and keeping them in her apartment with only vegetarian fare in their feed bowls. She said they wouldn’t touch anything for almost a week, then started to eat. She said they thrived and regained their health from a semi-emaciated condition from living on the streets of a large metropolitan city.
I had a dog who loved raw potatos. True story, comrades. My mother was slicing potatos to be fried with eggs and bell peppers and a piece fell on the floor. Penny went over, sniffed it, and gobbled it up as if it was filet mignon. My Mom and I laughed and gave her another spud and the same thing happened. For the next nine years, we’d give her a raw potato about four times a week (along with meat and everything canines love to eat) and it was amazing watching her devour a raw potato. Penny loved cucumbers and cantalopes too! But raw potatos?
Now to be fair and unbiased. If the statistics are correct, the people of Japan have the highest longevity rate in the world, per capita. The Japanese will eat just about anything that walks, crawls, swims, or flies, plus are heavy cigarette smokers. They eat their veggies, fruit, a lot of seaweed, natto, shoyu and miso (from fermented soybeans) which are excellent foods for the system. So many factors are involved in being healthy and long-lived.
good luck: I understand your being uncomfortable with us “pious” herbivores, and living in the northern hemisphere reduces locally grown agricultural products. If I were a cow, pig, chicken, walrus, penguin, fish or whatever, I’d hope the humans living in my habitat would “truck in or fly in” the foods they cannot grow in this environment and let us be. I’m not knocking you at all. My girlfriend eats fish and meat.
Regarding coffee, you do bring up good points. Ever since the “Fair Trade” people started working with small coffee growers, I’ve been purchasing organically grown coffee from various co-ops. In a restaurant or a 7-11 store, I’m probably dosing my innards with DDT and other pesticides.
Speaking of “alfalfa”, it is an Arabic word meaning “father of all foods.” One of the richest sources of chlorophyll, and we humans would be a lot healthier if we ate it too.
liberal with an attitude: Excellent points!
Time for me to make my second cup of coffee and feed the cats. Good health and happiness to all of you, no matter what you eat!
Yo Vegees,
Eat veg, no meat. Good, more B-B-Qs for me.
Real men eat meat. We were made to eat meat.
Of course vegees are good too. Little meat &
loads of vegges - mmmmmmm good. Wake up & smell
the B-B-Q people.Case closed.
George
your favoright neocon, retired army combat vet officer & Texican
Thank you very much, major hutton. First you made the people who are against the Iraq War look good with your posts, and now you’re making vegetarians look good. That’s very considerate of you.
This is a very dangerous article, to be placed in a spot frequented by progressives because they might pick up a diet habit that is detrimental to their health, and we need all the robust progressives we can get.
1. Store bought Vitamin supplements are artificial versions, and, in the case of vitD especially, do more harm than good. Where can you get good fat soluble A and D? Never in a vegetarian diet; you need animal fats and eggs for the best A and D.
2. Only grass-fed cows and free range chickens provide top notch nutrients for the body. Not coincidentally, these animals live a happy life, and do not need the intercession of PETA and other animal rights activists.
3. In the millions of years we have been evolving, we mostly ate hunted animals, and grew no grain at all. Only in the last ten thousand years did we grow grain. Ten thousand years is too short a period to evolve a digestive system adapted to grains, hence our health problems associated with a high carb diet. Millions of years of evolution fueled mainly by an animal diet led to a digestive system built mainly for animal fats.
4. The bio-energetics of grass fed animal farming vs soy/wheat/corn farming demonstrates unquestionable superiority in the former system. Calorie for calorie, grass fed open range animal nutrients require far less energy input to grow, as compared to grains. Confined animals feed is a different matter altogether, and is wasteful, polluting and corporatist.
5. Certain greens and fruits are good if available, but not essential to good health. Many historically successful traditional diets include bacteria fermented vegetables but no greens.
6. Sex hormones are made from cholesterol, and cholesterol is found only in an animal diet. Your body makes only as much as it needs. But what if your body does not need estrogens (if you are a man, say) but you are fond of eating soy products? In that case, you are getting female sex hormones whether you need it or not, in the form of plant estrogens (phyto estrogens).
I could have called the above the ‘Top Six Reasons’ not to become a strict vegetarian, implying that there are more reasons. There are, but I won’t go into them here. For a more educated review than I can give here, read http://www.westonaprice.org
.
wow its something to see reactionary neocons define themselves with their behavior isnt it. do whatever you want idiots no one is trying to make anyone do anything or convert or whatever, its simply enlightenment, take it or leave it, always needing to combat, what the fuck is wrong with you people (republicans) you have some serious sickness…….here we have a good article on the benefits of vegetarianism and their comments are that their having a baconator enema……
and ian kocher your just chock full of disinformation
“Store bought Vitamin supplements are artificial versions, and, in the case of vitD especially, do more harm than good. Where can you get good fat soluble A and D? Never in a vegetarian diet; you need animal fats and eggs for the best A and D.”
Vitamin D is available from sunlight. It is now widely believed that just 15 minutes of sunlight a day can also substantially alleviate depression as well.
Vitamin A is abundantly available in fruits and vegetables.
Ian Kocher, you are full of sh–! But, I guess you knew that.
“Sex hormones are made from cholesterol, and cholesterol is found only in an animal diet.”
ALL hormones require fat to produce. And, ALL animals, including human animals produce cholesterol. Human animals produce all the cholesterol they need. We are not designed to consume animal products and doing so means that we have EXCESS cholesterol in our bodies!
If you want a better sex life/experience, clean out your veins and arteries. It takes about four years for an ALL plant based diet to fully rid us of arterial plaque… and free blood flow is necessary to a robust sex life; sans Viagra.
Next, if you want sex, DON”T over eat! The idea of the ‘ROMANTIC’ dinner before sex is absurd. Better is have the sex first on an empty stomach! Why, because when our stomachs are full, that is where the blood has gone to aid in digestion… the same principle about not swimming after eating.
As mentioned, Ian Kocher, you are full of sh–!
Oh, and said condition can best be alleviated by a return to your natural herbivore diet.
Please view this video by Dan Piraro… http://youtube.com/watch?v=05zhL1YUd8Q
where the question of sh– is covered comprehensively and comically:)
Idiot speak:
“In the millions of years we have been evolving, we mostly ate hunted animals, and grew no grain at all. Only in the last ten thousand years did we grow grain. Ten thousand years is too short a period to evolve a digestive system adapted to grains, hence our health problems associated with a high carb diet. Millions of years of evolution fueled mainly by an animal diet led to a digestive system built mainly for animal fats.”
What are some of the facts: http://www.goveg.com/naturalhumandiet.asp
The Natural Human Diet
According to biologists and anthropologists who study our anatomy and our evolutionary history, humans are herbivores who are not well suited to eating meat.
Unlike natural carnivores, we are physically and psychologically unable to rip animals limb from limb and eat and digest their raw flesh. Even cooked meat is likely to cause human beings, but not natural carnivores, to suffer from food poisoning, heart disease, and other ailments.
People who pride themselves on being part of the human hunter tradition should take a second look at the story of human evolution. Prehistoric evidence indicates that humans developed hunting skills relatively recently and that most of our short, meat-eating past was spent scavenging and eating almost anything in order to survive; even then, meat was a tiny part of our caloric intake.
Humans lack both the physical characteristics of carnivores and the instinct that drives them to kill animals and devour their raw carcasses. Ask yourself: When you see dead animals on the side of the road, are you tempted to stop for a snack? Does the sight of a dead bird make you salivate? Do you daydream about killing cows with your bare hands and eating them raw? If you answered “no” to all of these questions, congratulations, you’re a normal human herbivore, like it or not. Humans were simply not designed to eat meat.
Proud to be a Vegetarian.
Living a cruelty free life matters..
great 10 list
been one sort of since 1977,
except of course seafood
never did like eating anything i could outrun
i do like iguanas and gators though, them you cannot outrun, unless you know to move at angles, very quickly
eat mo fish,
but NOT full of chemical, antibiotics, fast foods destroyers of the planet ANIMAL MEAT
ugggggh
oh well not all are enlightened and educated and especially of the functioning of one’s own body-machine-spirit
“Should we put lions and tigers on trial? Ooh, maybe they’ll be more non violent if they mend their ways!!–lmao”
Dude, how smart are you?
Lions and tigers need to eat meat! You need NOT to eat meat!
Is that so hard to understand? Choice of what we eat is fine, but there is an acceptable range. And what defines that acceptable range is our particular anatomies. Lions are carnivores. You are an herbivore!
That means, some creatures are co-evolved to kill and consume animals (or parts of animals) and some creatures are co-evolved to consume plants (or parts of plants).
Humans are NOT carnivores. Just because you ‘think’ (actually have been inculcated to believe) you need animal products or even that you ‘like’ them, it is NOT so.
Your ‘liking’ is a conditioned response that is NOT supported by your anatomical and physiological requirements. Without cultural conditioning, you would never have had any inclination to consume animal products!
From “The Comparative Anatomy of Eating”, by Milton R. Mills, MD
Facial Muscles
CARNIVORE: Reduced to allow wide mouth gape
HERBIVORE: Well-developed
OMNIVORE: Reduced
HUMAN: Well-developed
Jaw Type
CARNIVORE: Angle not expanded
HERBIVORE: Expanded angle
OMNIVORE: Angle not expanded
HUMAN: Expanded angle
Jaw Joint Location
CARNIVORE: On same plane as molar teeth
HERBIVORE: Above the plane of the molars
OMNIVORE: On same plane as molar teeth
HUMAN: Above the plane of the molars
Jaw Motion
CARNIVORE: Shearing; minimal side-to-side motion
HERBIVORE: No shear; good side-to-side, front-to-back
OMNIVORE: Shearing; minimal side-to-side
HUMAN: No shear; good side-to-side, front-to-back
Major Jaw Muscles
CARNIVORE: Temporalis
HERBIVORE: Masseter and pterygoids
OMNIVORE: Temporalis
HUMAN: Masseter and pterygoids
Mouth Opening vs. Head Size
CARNIVORE: Large
HERBIVORE: Small
OMNIVORE: Large
HUMAN: Small
Teeth: Incisors
CARNIVORE: Short and pointed
HERBIVORE: Broad, flattened and spade shaped
OMNIVORE: Short and pointed
HUMAN: Broad, flattened and spade shaped
Teeth: Canines
CARNIVORE: Long, sharp and curved
HERBIVORE: Dull and short or long (for defense), or none
OMNIVORE: Long, sharp and curved
HUMAN: Short and blunted
Teeth: Molars
CARNIVORE: Sharp, jagged and blade shaped
HERBIVORE: Flattened with cusps vs complex surface
OMNIVORE: Sharp blades and/or flattened
HUMAN: Flattened with nodular cusps
Chewing
CARNIVORE: None; swallows food whole
HERBIVORE: Extensive chewing necessary
OMNIVORE: Swallows food whole and/or simple crushing
HUMAN: Extensive chewing necessary
Saliva
CARNIVORE: No digestive enzymes
HERBIVORE: Carbohydrate digesting enzymes
OMNIVORE: No digestive enzymes
HUMAN: Carbohydrate digesting enzymes
Stomach Type
CARNIVORE: Simple
HERBIVORE: Simple or multiple chambers
OMNIVORE: Simple
HUMAN: Simple
Stomach Acidity
CARNIVORE: Less than or equal to pH 1 with food in stomach
HERBIVORE: pH 4 to 5 with food in stomach
OMNIVORE: Less than or equal to pH 1 with food in stomach
HUMAN: pH 4 to 5 with food in stomach
Stomach Capacity
CARNIVORE: 60% to 70% of total volume of digestive tract
HERBIVORE: Less than 30% of total volume of digestive tract
OMNIVORE: 60% to 70% of total volume of digestive tract
HUMAN: 21% to 27% of total volume of digestive tract
Length of Small Intestine
CARNIVORE: 3 to 6 times body length
HERBIVORE: 10 to more than 12 times body length
OMNIVORE: 4 to 6 times body length
HUMAN: 10 to 11 times body length
Colon
CARNIVORE: Simple, short and smooth
HERBIVORE: Long, complex; may be sacculated
OMNIVORE: Simple, short and smooth
HUMAN: Long, sacculated
Liver
CARNIVORE: Can detoxify vitamin A
HERBIVORE: Cannot detoxify vitamin A
OMNIVORE: Can detoxify vitamin A
HUMAN: Cannot detoxify vitamin A
Kidney
CARNIVORE: Extremely concentrated urine
HERBIVORE: Moderately concentrated urine
OMNIVORE: Extremely concentrated urine
HUMAN: Moderately concentrated urine
Nails
CARNIVORE: Sharp claws
HERBIVORE: Flattened nails or blunt hooves
OMNIVORE: Sharp claws
HUMAN: Flattened nails
“eat mo fish,”
Fish poses ALL the same problems (and more) to human health as other types of animal flesh.
It is full of fat and animal proteins that cause acidification of the blood, type II diabetes, kidney problems, osteoporosis, artherosclerosis, etc.
Fish is equally unhealthy for humans.
Look folks, most of us were raised to eat meat. I was too.
But, just because that is what we were conditioned to believe is correct, and just because it is supported in ALL places, schools, restaurants, etc… does not make it right.
Human herbivores do not thrive eating a flesh based (or flesh inclusive) diet. And, any amount of flesh consumption does cause some damage for humans.
What’s wrong with fish? There are large government signs all along our coast lines telling us it is safe to eat ONE sea bass dinner a month and or ONE fluke or flounder a year. That is unless one is a child or is pregnant, then don’t eat any.
No major problem there anyway, it isn’t very likely you’ll catch more than one that is large enough to keep.
Then in almost all of the states now, the annual game and fish books tell us which lakes or rivers where the fish should NOT EVER be eaten, which is the vast majority of lakes and rivers. __Yummy yum.__ Eating fish is similar to eating the sludge from the bottom of a tozic waste dump.
I use canned tuna for mouse and rat poison.
Judith for peace: You spoke for me, minus the corny stories. Bless your soul.
KEM,
I’m crackin’ up! You gotta go on Comedy Central.
Ian kocher, I’m not to bother going over your whole post, but I would like to address #3:
First, although our first prehuman ancestors appeared on earth several million years ago, in our present human form we have only existed for 40 or 50,000 years. Second, all the evidence suggests that, although we have, as bona-fide humans, hunted many different kinds of animals over that time span, the vast majority of our caloric intake has always been from vegetable and fruit sources, with meat comprising only about 10% or our diet. So, theoretically, the ideal diet for humans is a largely vegetarian one, sans grains and processed foods, supplemented with a small amount of animal protein. However, the reverse is not true: a diet comprised of largely animal protein, supplemented with a small amount of vegetarian foods, is not what we’re designed by nature to eat.
It is possible, though, to remain healthy on a pure vegetarian diet, although it requires more research and dedication than it does to stay on a largely vegetarian diet that’s supplemented with a little animal protein.
But by far the worst type of diet is the one most Americans eat, which is one that consists of far too much animal protein.
Oh, and our body produces all the cholesterol it needs. Sometimes it produces too much, however, especially when it has been subjected to the stress of all the chemicals in our artificial diets, and also alcohol and tobacco.
Oh, and I almost forgot, but the one animal product that we are absolutely not designed by nature to consume is milk, which is designed to feed baby cows, and not adult (or baby) humans. In fact no animal on earth naturally drinks the milk of another species, and no animal on earth naturally drinks milk at all once it’s weaned.
But I’m willing to bet that most vegetarians and vegans choose their diet not for health reasons, but because they just don’t want to be responsible for the deaths of any more innocent animals than necessary. I say “than necessary” because it’s impossible to be pure, since most shoes are made of leather and so are belts, and many books are held together with glue made from animals and, for artists, the sizing used on watercolor paper and artist canvases is usually made from animal products, as well. So you do the best you can.
But it is possible to remain perfectly healthy on a vegetarian, and even a vegan, diet.
Okay, folks, let’s get real. For most of our 1.5 million year evolution we were hunters and gatherers. In virtually all H&G populations we know about, the gathering of edible plant foods constituted perhaps 80% of our diet. [The one major exception is the Inuit peoples of the arctic coastlines.] The meat from hunted animals was the other 20%. But that meat contributed mightily to the growth of larger brains and better brains. We did not evolve and then start to hunt, or to make tools. Our hands, our brains and our tool use evolved simultaneously. Our teeth are omnivore teeth, some for grinding veggies, some for ripping flesh. Most of the gathering in our history was done by women, who ultimately became our first agriculturalists, as well as our first medicos and therefore our first scientists. Men hunted. Men killed. We still do those things. The chap who thinks the cave man diet is the one to use should try living like a caveman. I’d give him three months to live on the outside. It is silly and foolish and uneducated to think that we are ‘evolved to be herbivores’. That being said, it is healthier for a grown man to eat a vegetarian diet, given our current lifestyle. It is NOT healthier for little children to do so, and if children are fed a vegetarian diet, it must be done with great care and knowledge - not idiology. It is also unhealthy for our planetary future for us to support the meat industry. So read some anthropology. When I got my PhD we were required to take courses and do research in more than what kind of plants to eat. We had to know evolutionary biology, archeology of ancient peoples as well as linguistics and cultural anthro. These things I mention above here were common knowledge a few years ago, but they seem to have fallen under the onslaught of idiology, as have our freedoms, our rights, our country. Idiology is balderdash. The only salvation of mankind is in science. NOT technology. Knowledge - based solidly in science. The rest is midieval bullcrap.
“It is possible, though, to remain healthy on a pure vegetarian diet, although it requires more research and dedication than it does to stay on a largely vegetarian diet that’s supplemented with a little animal protein.”
Absolutely and irrefutably false! NO amount of animal proteins are completely digestible! You need to take a class in biochemistry… pay close attention to the part about amino acids and how they are combined to form protein chains.
As for your understanding of meat consumption throughout man’s history, it is likewise false.
MOST PEOPLE since humans first appeared ate NO meat! The idea that meat-eating was generally and widely indulged is absurd. It was until last century only an indulgence of the few… and the further back in time we go, the fewer that few becomes.
No amount of apologies or apologists are going to credibly refute the fact that humans are herbivores. The ONLY healthy diet for herbivores is an ALL plant based diet.
I have been eating an all plant diet for decades. No medical issues. No deficiencies, no problems with energy… no cancer, no strokes like many others in the family, etc, etc., etc.!
How much meat is good for herbivores?
Ask any herbivore on the planet. They all know the answer. Only humans have become so stupefied with their indoctrination assisted by quack science that they can’t even get the simplest things correct!
“It is silly and foolish and uneducated to think that we are ‘evolved to be herbivores’.”
Why? Because that is what the data says?
Concept:
If the anatomical data contradicts the law (modern western cultural assumptions that humans are designed to eat meat), then don’t change the data, change the law…
Thus: Humans are NOT omnivores, humans are herbivores and as the evidence suggests, only healthy when eating accordingly.
Following excerpts from (regarding the most ambitious cross-cultural scientific study of human nutrition ever undertaken): http://www.thechinastudy.com/about.html
The science is clear. The results are unmistakable.
Change your diet and dramatically reduce the risk of cancer, diabetes, heart disease and obesity.
Respected nutrition and health researcher, Dr. T. Colin Campbell reveals the truth behind special interest groups, government entities and scientists that have taken Americans down a deadly path”
“After a long career in research and policy-making, I have decided to step ‘out of the system.’ I have decided to disclose why Americans are so confused,” said Dr. Campbell.
“As a taxpayer who foots the bill for research and health policy in America, you deserve to know that many of the common notions you have been told about food, health and disease are wrong.”
The findings?
“People who ate the most animal-based foods got the most chronic disease … People who ate the most plant-based foods were the healthiest and tended to avoid chronic disease. These results could not be ignored,” said Dr. Campbell.
________
Why are these the findings? Humans are herbivores!
Well, itsaNaziWorldOrder, I can see that you’re a purist re this vegetarian thing. Good for you. I’m not. I eat free range eggs and some fish, along with lots of veggies and fruit, although I never eat beef, pork, venison, buffalo, squirrel, rabbit, woodchuck, chicken, turkey, duck, pigeon, guinea fowl, ostrich or lammergeier (a large vulture that the Bible tells us we shouldn’t eat). Sorry.
But you know what? You’re rude as heck. And, if our primitive ancestors NEVER ate meat, as you claim, why have bones of animals that appear to have been cooked and split been found in caves and kitchen middens from 40,000 years ago to the present? Why have paintings of wild cattle, bison and deer, with men chasing them with spears, been found in, for example, the caves at Lascaux? Why did and do primitive hunter-gatherer societies use spears and blowguns and bows and arrows and boomerangs if they NEVER ate or eat meat?
You’re wrong on this one. The truth is somewhere in the middle, like it so often is. Humans have eaten meat since the beginning of their evolution. It’s just that they ate a lot less meat back in the caveman days than is popularly supposed, and a whole lot less than most Americans do today.
Cheese is an issue. I see many people who call themselves pure vegetarians but still eat cheese with Animal Rennet in it. It’s hard to get some cheeses with non-Animal Rennet. So >
I’ve been veg for a while and I can add to the many voices that it’s the most wonderful choice an adult can make in being a better human being. But I do miss one thing: I really miss Smoked Cheddar. I’m salivating at the thought of it now! Does anyone one know where I can get some vegetarian-friendly smoked cheddar with no animal rennet in it? I can’t find any here in Australia unfortunately. Oh how I miss the indulgence!
Michaelc, you said, “The chap who thinks the cave man diet is the one to use should try living like a caveman. I’d give him three months to live at the outside.”
Then you said, “Okay, folks, let’s get real. For most of our 1.5 million year evolution we were hunters and gatherers. In virtually all H&G populations we know about, the gathering of edible plant foods constituted perhaps 80% of our diet. [The one major exception is the Inuit peoples of the arctic coastlines.] The meat from hunted animals was the other 20%. But that meat contributed mightily to the growth of larger brains and better brains. We did not evolve and then start to hunt, or to make tools.”
I’m the chap who thinks the caveman diet is the one to use.
What I actually said was, “First, although our first prehuman ancestors appeared on earth several million years ago, in our present human form we have only existed for 40 or 50,000 years. Second, all the evidence suggests that, although we have, as bona-fide humans, hunted many different kinds of animals over that time span, the vast majority of our caloric intake has always been from vegetable and fruit sources, with meat comprising only about 10% or our diet. So, theoretically, the ideal diet for humans is a largely vegetarian one, sans grains and processed foods, supplemented with a small amount of animal protein.”
I also said this, “I don’t entirely agree with #8. In my experience the best diet for losing weight is the paleolithic diet: a little meat, plenty of veggies and fruit, and no bread or pasta or sugar. Idea is to eat only stuff that cavemen ate. Nothing prepared or refined or with a list of ingredients.”
* * *
I have to admit I’m confused. It seems to me that you and I postulated almost the same diet. The only difference is that I said our primitive ancestors ate mostly vegetable matter, along with about 10% animal protein, while you said they ate mostly vegetable matter, along with about 20% protein. As far as I can tell we both said almost the same thing, so why did you say that I’d only live three months on my diet? I agree that I might not live long if I lived like a caveman, since I might end up getting killed by a saber-toothed tiger or something like that if I did, but am I going to get sick and die from eating a diet of veggies and 10% meat, instead of veggies and 20% meat? I just don’t get it.
There have always been bigots, but I’ve encountered born-again types who are afraid of vegetarianism…which is kind of like being afraid of nonsmoking, nondrinking, or recycling.
ticonderoga,
“You’re wrong on this one. The truth is somewhere in the middle, like it so often is. Humans have eaten meat since the beginning of their evolution.”
No, they have not and I am certainly NOT wrong. BTW, 40,000 years is more likely to be the time when the first temple societies emerged (and where we first see acts of animal and human sacrifice). Humans though have apparently walked the earth for 100’s of thousands of years, possibly a few million. And most of those never ate any meat.
(BTW, the middle thing is just cultural nonsense, the truth is the truth, if you don’t know it, anyone’s opinion may be as good as anyone else’s but… once the facts have been established, that’s it. Life is not really the same as a debate between two people who are anxious to ‘win’. It is something that moves according to definite law… break the laws… it stops working, or stops working as well.)
“Put a small child in a playpen with an apple and a bunny. If s/he eats the apple and plays with the bunny, s/he’s normal; but if s/he eats the bunny and plays with the apple, I’ll buy you a new car. Somewhere along the line we must have been TAUGHT to do the wrong thing.”
–Maynard
I am certain that you are NOT an anthropologist. And I do recall from my anthropology studies that there were many indigenous societies even at the turn of last century that were 100% vegetarian.
So rather than repeat nonsense, I have asked myself what in the world could make sense of the fact that in some communities, we do indeed find traditions of meat-eaters. And historically, in temple cultures, we find meat-eating correlated with the elite classes and their political/religious sacrifices.
I have proposed an historically logical solution to all the seemingly contradictory evidence:
http://allinharmony.com/index.cfm?id=391227&fuseaction=browse&pageid=118
As for being rude, that is a matter of opinion. Cows do not find me rude in the same way you do. Their complaint is more along the lines of, “Now that we have informed you, are you planning to do anything?”
I see no reason to not strike hard at ignorances that result in unnecessary suffering, even murder. I am not the least bit concerned that you befriend me or support me or even like me. I am though very concerned that you awaken and become a force for positive change and a beacon to enlighten others…
Don’t like my tactics? I could care less! I do care about results and when you have fully realized the facts of your herbivore nature so completely that you are sufficiently informed and also energized and empowered to share them…
…I will fall asleep with a greater sense of hope for all life.
A hint to all who want to put their carnivorous friends and family off meat. Find out what meat in on the dinner table and then find a cute picture of that animal, then one of it getting murdered.
People wont be eating lamb here for a while
Hi ~Ticonderoga~. You sure listed a lot of animals you never eat, but I see you didn’t list the beaver. ___Well, you didn’t mention the duck bill platapus either come to think of it.
I agree, we should only eat animals that have a cloven hoof and also chews their cud. For example rabbits chew their cud, but thay have pause. __ Pause? ___ And swine have cloven hoofs but they don’t chew their cud.
I’ve never noticed if beavers chew their cud and have never paused to obsreve any other appendiges.
Well, WorldNaziOrder, I noticed that you never did answer my questions about the cave and kitchen midden bones (or the cave paintings), and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen lots of photos of members of hunter-gatherer societies hunting animals in articles written by anthropologists in various books and magazines, and I’m also sure I’ve seen lots of photos of prehistoric spear points and so on written by anthropologists in other books and magazines. Also I’m pretty sure I’ve read a number of books written by anthropologists that stated that people in primitive hunter-gatherer societies actually did eat meat on occasion. Maybe the people who wrote those books and articles didn’t belong to your approved list of “veggies only” anthropologists, I don’t know.
You’re a purist, and you’ve got a specific agenda to prove, so I guess you must be right. Sure. Personally, I think there are many reasons why being a vegetarian is better for individuals and for society, and I’ve articulated many of them on posts here: health, compassion toward animals, concern for the environment, and etc., but I don’t feel the need to get this point across by trying to convince people that our primitive ancestors NEVER ate meat, because that simply isn’t true.
To tell you the truth, you sort of remind of the Christian fundamentalists, who feel the need to convince people of the existence of God by convincing them that the Bible is the literal truth. Do you think that people won’t choose a vegetarian lifestyle unless you convince them that hunter-gatherer people never ate meat? And why in the heck are those people called hunter-gatherers if they never ate meat, anyway? Why not just call them gatherers?
This is kind of ironic, because both of us are vegetarians (okay, so occasionally I eat fish, and I eat free-range eggs - sue me), but now what has happened is that this little argument of ours may actually convince someone who’s reading it and is not a vegetarian to think vegetarians are kind of cuckoo.
So, let’s make a deal: you be a vegetarian, using whatever rationale you want to justify your choice of food, and I’ll be a vegetarian who occasionally eats fish and free range eggs, using whatever rationale makes sense to me.
And everyone else can do the same.
Being a vegetarian is good for people, animals and the environment. Does it really matter whether vegetarians believe that our ancestors never ate meat or not, as long as they’re willing to consider the benefits of being vegetarians? It doesn’t to me.
Liberal…
sorry I took so long to get back to you. Name calling ?
I guess you missed my other posting. It is OK, we understand.
Probably should post this during world sustainable farming week instead, but I don’t think it exists. PETA’s arguments for turning vegetarian are laced with a heavy ppm of self-righteousness. I turned vegetarian when I realized that my lousy meat cooking skills remurdered the dead animal and that the option of a cheap burger at McDonalds was based on false economy. We can target agribusiness as a bad practice at all levels. There is nothing good about it as it now operates: the huge tax subsidies, irresponsible corporate practice (remember when Archer Daniels Midland was convicted of fixing copper prices on the world market?), raising prices of farmland so high that family farmers can’t afford it, irresponsible use of pesticides and antibiotics, genetic engineering and obliterating from collective memory freshness and flavor in favor of shipability and shelf life. Making the U.S. economy more viable for small farms based on sustainable agriculture even while producing meat, is NOT an idea to discard. (In Cuba, farm animals roam the woods, fertilizing, turning over tilth, and stargazing when visited with insomnia. Amish farms in Pennsylvania are more productive and have higher quality products than their automated neighbors.) Monocultures is what we should criticize. We should get away from both animal and plant monocultures. We need many more small, local farms based on sustainable practices.
Excellent reasons, thanks Bruce! I first went vegan for ethical and health reasons (I even beat breast cancer by going vegan) but I’ve since learned that meat production destroys the planet, causes famine, and leads to animal-borne disease epidemics, so I’m really happy that my decision has such a far-reaching impact.
Hi Kem,
You’re right, there’s a lot of animals I don’t eat that I didn’t list. Sorry about that. I’ll try to rectify that situation, though - just for you.
Here’s a few more: bats, aardvarks, pangolins, capuchin monkeys, chimpanzees, moles, shrews, chipmunks, coyotes, bear, hummingbirds, eagles, dogs, cats, caribou, elk, skunks, red-winged blackbirds, robins, crows, black-throated green warblers, red-eyed vireos, barn owls, rats, goats, sheep, wolverines, badgers, gazelle, zebra, hyenas . . . oh heck, there’s just too darned many to list.
“Also I’m pretty sure I’ve read a number of books written by anthropologists that stated that people in primitive hunter-gatherer societies actually did eat meat on occasion.”
You have a very non-specific way of using the term ‘hunter-gatherer’, but most primitive societies did not involve hunting. ‘Primitive societies’ refers to a wide range of unique social expressions and environmental adaptations and mal-adaptations.
There were far more unique cultural groups 150 years ago than there are today. (A thousand to one is probably not a bad guess.) And certainly many more before that had been systematically genocided by the advances of empire across Africa, Asia, the Americas, the Middle East, etc.
I assume that you are aware of that. The research I am referring to is the ethnographies done around the turn of last century that included primitive total vegetarian societies and war-making meat-eating ones.
I recall that the general understanding was that vegetarian societies, by virtue of non-aggressive responses, were over and over again displaced by more violent societies.
What I recall is that the war-making societies ate meat.
This is what I was referring to. I was not a ‘veggie’ in those days anyway, and frankly thought ‘veggie’ issues were beside the point, mine being anti-war and anti-other types of social violence.
The remarkable correlation between social and inter-group violence with meat-eating escaped my serious attention (hard to believe but true) in those days because I had been reared by a scientist who promoted meat as necessary to health… she was smart, I was dumb… so in matters about which she was certain, I failed to question…
Like so many others, I believed that meat-eating was simply a necessary part of healthy human life and did not think of it as being an ‘act of violence’.
Thus, I had a culturally induced inability to imagine that the war/meat-eating correlation was indicating root cause of human to human violence.
After making the discovery (that meat-eating is the root cause of war) in another way, I recalled this connection (that had been highlighted by early anthropologists) and wondered at my ability to not find this fact compelling … which became another lesson in how amazingly conditioned perception is, and how culture determines to a very great degree what we find salient and what we do not.
“I don’t feel the need to get this point across by trying to convince people that our primitive ancestors NEVER ate meat, because that simply isn’t true.”
This has never been my position. My position is that our anatomy speaks very clearly to meat-eating being mal-adaptive, thus, we did not ‘evolve’ to eat meat.
Meat-eating was clearly undertaken for cultural reasons.
Understanding that is very important because it is at the root of our disassociation from the rest of nature (and our own nature) and it is at the root of the war to control whatever is allowed to express in the greater biosphere…
How much or how little meat (no meat) is a choice. Maybe it depends on how evolved you are? Like some people declare war while others are repulsed by killing our human brothers and sisters. Inuits or San have to eat vaste quanities of meat to survive but Hindu’s and Buddhists are vegetairians/vegans. If you believe human souls evolved from lower beings such as animals or insects we all ate meat at some stage but can evolve to higher life forms. Don’t slate meat eaters, they will eventually get there.
“Well, WorldNaziOrder, I noticed that you never did answer my questions about the cave and kitchen midden bones (or the cave paintings), and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen lots of photos of members of hunter-gatherer societies hunting animals in articles written by anthropologists in various books and magazines, and I’m also sure I’ve seen lots of photos of prehistoric spear points and so on written by anthropologists in other books and magazines.”
In the mid-nineties, the FBI publicly identified vegetarians as the next ‘threat group’ that they were targeting.
One feature of this targeting has always been the emergence of concerted disinfo campaigns. And it was launched on many fronts, and it was certainly well orchestrated throughout the scientific community.
A rash of panels and papers were produced promoting the idea that there was an irrefutable and historical basis for generalized meat-eating… (which is simply not true).
Here’s one of them: “Food for Thought or Food for Propaganda?” in which a propaganda piece (’academic paper’) that appeared in the New York Times Science Section is dissected.
http://www.ecologos.org/fft.htm
Also, a few years back, my eldest was at U of Mich working on her master’s in public health… when there was another mad cow scare… almost immediately, a spokesperson form Harvard showed up to ‘inform’ them on the real issues … in which he explained that there was no way for mad cow to be transmitted by blood…
Since my daughter was already somewhat familiar with the research that had been published years before, she realized that the spokesperson was wrong… was he lying too? She called me to ask why someone would do this and why would the school support it?
I am quite sure you are familiar with the fact that most science is being supported by government and corporate grants and most of those government grants are tied to military interests and/or corporate military interests. Meat and dairy concerns are a government supported industry, so much so that TWO former NIH officials are on record stating that they were told their first day on the job to NEVER advocate eating less meat as a means to lessen disease.
Objective science is not what is getting the funding and politics rather than ethics is determining who is identified as an ‘expert’.
But, there is some hope for finding the truth in this landscape of corporate shortsightedness and the disinformation culture with which they protect their interests.
An excellent link for many scientific articles on diet:
http://www.ecologos.org/ttdd.html
________
** Prior to Industrial Revolution…
Little meat consumption, nearly anywhere (compared to today’s standards).
** ~1900-1960…
Meat consumption rises dramatically in Western cultures as transportation and refrigeration becomes easier
(http://www.springerlink.com/content/rr78052089583418/)
Vegetarianism- The Recommended Diet by Ayurveda, the Science of Life
1) The Scientific Aspect
2) Acid-Alkaline Balance - Key Indicator of Health
3) The Philosophic aspect
4) The Ethical Law of Reason
5) The Consequences of the Law of Karma
6) Medical Reason
7) The Spiritual Reason
+ + + …
more….
http://www.eastrovedica.com/html/vedic.htm
“You’re a purist, and you’ve got a specific agenda to prove, so I guess you must be right.”
I am (and have been most of my life), a researcher into the causes of violence. The fruits of this research and ‘lucky’ insights is what I am attempting to share.
My efforts are based upon the realization that not until humanity rediscovers his ecologically defined place will the hundreds of millions of daily murders, tortures and other sorts of violence in which he ignorantly indulges come to an end.
“¿ Do tigers and lions become disassociated from the rest of nature - by eating antelopes ?”
No. That is their connection to nature. Obvious, I would think.
But, killing is NOT our connection/point of interface. Humans are herbivores.
And it is for this reason that our anatomical scripting is essential to understand for it is the manner in which humans have been designed to be most intimate with the rest of life. It is our window so to speak on the grand miracle.
WorldNaziOrder, I agree with you completely that we are not designed by nature to eat meat. Our teeth are the teeth of a vegetarian, as you’ve already pointed out, and we are not physically capable of running fast enough to catch an animal as, for example, a wolf is. And we’re just not strong enough (and also don’t have sharp teeth or claws) to kill a sizable animal, either. You get no argument from me on those points.
I also agree with you that there has been a conspiracy to make vegetarianism seem to be an unhealthy dietary choice. How the conspiracy works exactly I don’t know, although I do appreciate your links. But there is a conspiracy, however it’s designed. Do you remember those old commerials featuring James Garner that used to have the words “Beef, for real people” emblazoned on the screen? The implication being, of course, that real people eat meat and unreal people don’t. That’s just Madison Avenue marketing, of course, and not an FBI tactic, but I’m not going to argue with you that we have all been the target of an enormous conspiracy that’s designed to make the animal products industry profitable. You’re right.
My only argument with you is whether or not hunter-gatherer societies ever ate or still are eating meat. You say they never did and I say they did, although not all that much. Our ancestors eating meat is kind of like how today we fly in airplanes, even though we don’t have wings: we do it, even though we’re not designed by nature to do it.
So it looks to me like we don’t have all that much to argue about, when you get right down to it. Hey, that’s kind of cool.
I’ve been on a vegan diet for approx 4 years and really couldnt be happier…Really!
The only issue I have is with a small niche of vegetarians who say…”Oh I only eat white meat,or I only consume fish but Im like totally vegetarian see!” No..your not.A chicken is not a vegetable neither is a fish. Thank you and have an average day.
“It is scientifically thought the the enormous brain-size’s RAPID growth of humankind ( as we primitively know it ), was a direct result of high protein intake due to
self-promoting ( i.e. positive feedback ) changes to being able to successfully hunt and acquire associated skills needed to better survive in the veldt grasslands, as contrasted with the previous species “hanging out” in the trees eating fruits ( … etc, and pretty much staying there for parallel evolution ) ”
This is an