Red meat plays vital role in diets, claims expert in fightback against veganism

[brooklynite]

The Guardian

Advocates of red meat will begin a fightback against the growth of veganism this week at the UK’s biggest farming conference, with claims that eating lamb and beef is vital because some plants and fish are being drained of their nutrition.

In a speech at the Oxford Farming Conference, Alice Stanton will tell ministers, farmers and environmentalists that key nutrients in some fruits, vegetables and grains have dropped by up to 50% over 50 years.

Stanton, professor of cardiovascular pharmacology at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, said nutrition levels had dropped because farmers were trying to meet a demand for cheap food. “For plant-based foods, there’s been drops in vitamins and key electrolytes by up to 50% over the past 50 years because of the genetic selection for large volume and uniformity of shape and appearance, so the things look good on the shelves. There hasn’t been selection for nutrient content,” she told the Observer.

Growing interest in veganism and flexitarianism – people trying to eat less meat – led to a drop in sales of red meat last year of about £185m, according to market researchers Nielsen. Research for veganuary, which promotes plant-based diets on health and ethical grounds, showed that more than 1.3 million people gave up animal products in January 2019. Retailers and food companies have launched thousands of products aimed at vegans – nearly a quarter of all launches had a vegan claim, according to Mintel – including Gregg’s vegan sausage roll, vegan BBQ ribs and vegan smoked salmon.

“I’m not against vegetarianism or veganism,” Stanton said. “It is possible to have a balanced diet with vegetarianism. It’s a little bit more challenging but still possible with veganism. However, it requires a lot of knowledge and effort, which doesn’t happen in the majority of the population. People don’t have time to invest in getting a really balanced diet through a range of plant-based foods.”

[Farmer-Rick]

1. This is kind of silly

Who cares what you eat? Each person has to find the food that suits their own metabolism. Everyone does Not have to eat the same. How would the Inuit and Yupik have survived without meat? How would the people in the tropics have all the necessary vitamins without fruits and vegetables?

Don't eat meat if you don't want to. Don't be a Vagan if you don't want to.

It reminds me of the silly anti-gay marriage people claiming that if others get married it would hurt their marriage. As if they had to stop 2 loving adults from having a kind of sex the disapproved of.

Eat what makes you feel the healthiest and don't worry about how different others are.

[Archae]

3. I think you hit it right on the head.

What bothers me about vegans is a few of them have an evangelistic viewpoint, they feel a "need" to make everyone eat only what THEY demand we as humans eat.

I've never seen a meat-eating group do this.

Want to go vegetarian? No problem? Vegan? No problem.

Want to evangelize for your choices? BIG problem.

[Merlot]

12. Funny, I've never met a vegan who evangelizes.

But I hear a lot about them on the internet.

I have had someone push a chicken drumstick in my face and say "eat."

[tblue37]

25. My son was vegan for 7 years--and he was very aggressive about it. Yes, some do

evangelize.

[Dorian Gray]

63. Maybe your son was trying to annoy you

kids sometimes do that to their parents when they wouldn't to others.

[tblue37]

64. No, he was like that with everybody, including his friends. nt

[LoveMyCali]

82. The same with one of my nephews

If I would mention him to someone who I didn't think knew him they would always ask if it was the vegan who works for UPS.

He unfriended me on facebook because I posted an article saying why it isn't safe for cats to be vegan. He's the crazy vegan, I'm the crazy cat lady, it was a standoff.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

41. They evangalize all the time here.

[Merlot]

47. Vegan bashing is much more common than "evangelizing"

[JonLP24]

57. Yes I agree

Evangelizing claims is part of the bashing.

[Clash City Rocker]

80. I had a coworker once who kept photos in her office of slaughtered animals

A nice person otherwise, but she would go out of her way to shame people when she saw them eating meat. I’ve known a couple others like her. But most of the vegans I’ve met were pretty chill about carnivores. It’s a small minority of vegans who make the rest look bad, and hurt the cause they are trying to advertise. We shouldn’t blame all vegans for the behavior of a few, but those people do exist.

[mmbrevo]

16. Evangelizing

I don't think a vegan needs to say one word to offend a meat eater. A meat eater just looks at what's on their plate and gets offended.

[Mariana]

37. Indeed. "No, thank you" is taken as a personal attack. nt.

[UniteFightBack]

27. The militant vegans do exist mostly on the internet and they are that way because they've seen the

videos. Once you really see the videos you can often lose your taste for the meat 'product'. I agree the way they go about trying to convince others is counter productive. Now all the vegans I know in real life may throw some truths at you but they've all been respectful. Online it's another thing.

[MFM008]

46. Cattle ranchers

And meat producers are just as aggressive.

[Mariana]

35. "I've never seen a meat-eating group do this."

The OP is about a meat-eating group that is doing this in the UK. In the US, meat producers advertise heavily to promote meat-eating. So do dairy producers, to promote the consumption of dairy products. There are t-shirts and bumper stickers that say "I love animals, they're delicious!" and "If God didn't want us to eat animals, he wouldn't have made them out of meat! and "PETA - People Eating Tasty Animals!" Are you seriously saying you've never, ever seen any of this?

[Archae]

49. Of course I've seen those.

AND I've seen t-shirts and bumper stickers saying "MEAT IS MURDER!" or posters for PETA saying we shouldn't eat fish because they are "sea kittens."

Like I said, it's the aggressive, evangelistic people who bother me.

[JonLP24]

56. It is more the other way around

I know a vegan and I am one myself says when their are lunch outings at her job (she has since been laid off as they laid off everybody and closed down) they would tell her she needs meat and try to get her to eat the meat there. Something like this would be impossible to go visit meat eating relatives for Thanksgiving.

Anyways I'm vegan for a variety of reasons mostly for environmental reasons. The 12 year climate change warning recommending switching to a plant based diet.

This OP is just bait IMO.

[Blues Heron]

5. The reason it matters is that a meat based diet is bad for the planet

The demand for meat is absolutely killing the planet, so it's not as if it's all the same.

[Farmer-Rick]

8. And all those chemicals used on our fruits and vegetables aren't hurting the environment?

Anything done in excess is dangerous to this planet.

We need to find more sustainable ways to raise livestock. We have to find more sustainable ways to raise fruits and vegetables. (The excess nitrogen from fertilizers leaching into our waterways alone is killing much of our ocean.) We have to find more sustainable ways to travel and ship products. We have to find more sustainable ways to manufactor products and produce energy.

It's all one planet. A meat based diet is just as bad as chemical based fruit and vegetable farming. Wiping out one way of eating is not going to stop the destruction of this planet. It is all part of the same picture and must be addressed as a whole.

[Blues Heron]

10. Meat's worse for the planet, that's a well established fact

there's no argument about it, they're not the same in their impact on the environment.

[Farmer-Rick]

13. No it is Not a well established fact that raising pigs, chickens, goats, rabbits, cattle is worse

Then drenching round up, pesticides, nitrogen, fungicides and using GMOs on millions of acres of fruit and vegetables. No scientific comparison with controls published in peer reviewed journals has ever been done. People have theories and estimates but no authentic scientific comparisons.

Yeah maybe too many cattle are raised. But what about rabbit and goat? Millions eat those meats routinely. Yeah New Zealand and Australia raise too much lamb. But what about pigs and chicken?

As you reduce the amount of meat available for consumption, how much more fruits and vegetables along with their chemical processing to make them ediable do you have to increase to compensate? Soy bean curd is not produced by simply cooking. Vegtable oil does not come in sufficient quantities to feed a family from a single acre of canola. Yet an acre will easily support 20 rabbits, 3 sheep or two pigs.

Rabbit and pigs can convert vegetable mass into fat and muscle mass in a surprisingly more efficient manner than humans or beef. I suspect the energy used to process one acre of canola into oil is more than the energy used by a pig to make 10 gallons of fat. I have seen studies that suggest this.....unfortunately it had not been experimentally studied.

So, considering all the animals in the world, the energy and poisons used to extract nutrition from vegetative matter (and mother nature does it through animals simpler and better than human processing) there is considerable argument about meat having a worse impact on the environment.

[Blues Heron]

17. The rabbits really aren't the problem it's the cows

and its a huge problem They're tearing up the amazon rainforest to grow cattle feed and graze cows so we can eat cheap hamburgers. Eating rabbit would be a step in the right direction for sure.

[Farmer-Rick]

20. So it is Not meat farming you object to it's specifically cattle you object to.

Yeah, when capitalism and corporate/factory methods are implemented in major farming practises, it leads to the destruction of the environment.

Yup, corporate farming is very destructive and cattle is the more massive and expensive farm animal to exploit. That's why capitalists and corporations invest in it, and promote destructive practises, because beef does give larger returns than rabbits or goats.

[safeinOhio]

19. CFOs are terrible for the planet.

Small family farms suffer, along with the planet. Only concerned with input vs output ignores everything else.

I try to limit factory meat and focus on local farmers and butchers. I buy goat and lamb and harvest local deer.

But that’s just me.

[Farmer-Rick]

22. Yeah, going local and knowing your farmer is the most sustainable way to go.

[womanofthehills]

42. Living out here in the middle of NM, I only eat local grass fed beef

In fact, I can just pick up my beef order at my book club and check out how healthy the cows are. $5.00 a lb of hamburger - not bad.

I have my own chickens for organic eggs, but only buy organically fed range free chickens to eat. I do not want to eat chickens who eat Roundup grains and have lived tortured lives.

The majority of the people who sell at NM farmers markets, sell organic or pesticide free because that is what people want.

Roundup needs to be banned because it is ruining our planet and our health.

[muriel_volestrangler]

61. No, there is scientific research on it. It's about the greenhouse gas emissions

There is no doubt at all that the higher the proportion of meat in a diet (especially of ruminants that produce methane), the more greenhouse gases come from its production. This comes from the basic mathematics of keeping animals alive for a significant amount of time on plants, rather than using the plants directly. And in practice, the other things you mention, like pesticides and fertilisers, get used on animal fodder too.

"I suspect the energy used to process one acre of canola into oil is more than the energy used by a pig to make 10 gallons of fat. I have seen studies that suggest this.....unfortunately it had not been experimentally studied."

The yield from canola is " about 95 to 240 gallons of oil per acre", so comparing one acre to one pig is irrelevant.

[Farmer-Rick]

65. The problem with your studies is that they don't take into account the chemicals used to raise your

GMO fruits and vegetables or even the cost of processing and extraction let alone shipping.

They don't take into account the nitrogen from petroleum fertilizers, or petroleum stabilized round up, pesticides and fungicides. They don't account for all the petroleum used to ship fruits and vegetables from around the world. They don't even account for the vast amounts of petroleum based energy and chemicals used to extract oil from canola seeds. You only get those amounts of oil (note it is biofuel oil which can be contaminated with all sorts of deadly poisons.) from canola If you use chemicals and petroleum based energy to extract every last drop. The normal, natural processes can't get that much ediable oil from an acre of canola.

Then of course your studies totally ignore the amount of vegtable matter it would take to replace the natural fats and proteins in meat. They just compare oz for oz but meat is filling while GMO wheat leaves you hungry 2 hours later.

[muriel_volestrangler]

68. They do.

And it's not the least bit surprising that there's more CO2 from meat production. Throughout history, meat has been more expensive in the diet than vegetables, because it takes more to produce it.

No, of course the studies don't compare oz for oz. They look at calories, and amount of protein required.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jan/16/new-plant-focused-diet-would-transform-planets-future-say-scientists

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/environment/the-eight-most-climate-friendly-diets-according-to-the-un-report-1.3981560

[Farmer-Rick]

69. Again your studies aren't complete.

The 2 link are about establishing a worldwide diet to reduce CO2.

First, their diet plan is not support by science. The studies done on low carb vs low fat are routinely inconclusive. So if they can't even get studies that agree on which is a better method of getting weight off, how can they say their universal diet is healthy for everyone?

And none of them address the GMO, Round Up drenched, petroleum excess nitrogen fertilizers, pesticides covered and fungicide laced wheat, corn, rice and soy the US ships to feed the world. Those inputs in farming of most vegan foods are ignored and minimized as if all vegetables are raised in organic methods. The mass quantities of vegetative matter we currently produce is not produced without CO2 emitting produced chemicals that are shipped around the world before they end up on pampered easily damaged plants.

Fundamentally those universal diets being pushed by your 2 links still include meat and animal products, are based on science that is still in its infancy, continually ignores CO2 creating chemicals used for farming vegetative matter, and fails to address the CO2 emitted while processing the vegetative matter.

[muriel_volestrangler]

71. No, it is supported by science.

The CO2 and methane is produced by the animals.

" So if they can't even get studies that agree on which is a better method of getting weight off, how can they say their universal diet is healthy for everyone?" - what a ridiculous red herring. You have just said that if the science of diets is not perfect, then no-one can know the basics of climate science. Nice try, but no-one's buying that.

You keep on claiming things, without evidence, about how vegetables are grown in a much worse way than animals are fed. But animals are fed on mass-produced plants too. They get fed antibiotics too. They get hormones injected into them in some countries. And non of that is relevant to the basic point, which is about greenhouse gases.

"CO2 emitting produced chemicals" - WTF? You're just throwing words at the screen, in the hope some of them will make sense when seen together. You are making stuff up, without any reason or backing, in the hope of projecting the basic problem with meat - the greenhouse gases - onto anything you see as "the enemy" - "pampered easily damaged plants". Jesus, you're even anthropomorphizing plants is the desperate hope that makes them look bad.

No, the studies do look at the greenhouse gases involved in plant production; it's just that they're far smaller than for meat.

I assume from this you are a livestock farmer, and you can't bear the thought that you're involved in a significant climate-altering industry, so you're in denial.

[Farmer-Rick]

72. Again nowhere in your links is there science supporting your diet.

It references something but does not provide the scientific studies and the parameters used to determine that this worldwide diet is even healthy.

The US government in its food pyramid and other massive literature has been promoting low fat, high carb, high vegetative matter, low calorie diets for decades in the US AND the average American has been getting fatter and fatter, with diabetes increasing and an obesity epidemic.

But a worldwide diet based on a very similar plan is the solution? It is not a red herring it is the basis of your linked articles titles. Changing the world's diet is important and should look at the science (currently in its infancy) to provide a Healthy diet not one that merely repeats diets causing an obesity crisis in the US.

[muriel_volestrangler]

73. You are unaware of reality. Or of what the links say.

The average American has been getting fatter and fatter, but that is from a high meat diet. The links say "eat less meat than the average American".

Trends in meat consumption in the United States

OBJECTIVE
To characterize the trends, distribution, potential determinants, and public health implications of meat consumption within the United States.

DESIGN
We examined temporal trends in meat consumption using food availability data from the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and United States Department of Agriculture (USDA); and further evaluated meat intake by type (red, white, processed) in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) linked to the MyPyramid Equivalents Database (MPED).

RESULTS
Overall meat consumption has continued to rise in the U.S., European Union, and developed world. Despite a shift toward higher poultry consumption, red meat still represents the largest proportion of meat consumed in the U.S (58%). Twenty-two percent of the meat consumed in the U.S. is processed. According to NHANES 2003–2004, total meat intake averaged 128 g/day. The type and quantities of meat reported varied by education, race, age, and gender.

CONCLUSIONS
Given the plausible epidemiologic evidence for red and processed meat intake in cancer and chronic disease risk, understanding the trends and determinants of meat consumption in the U.S., where meat is consumed at more than three times the global average, should be particularly pertinent to researchers and other public health professionals aiming to reduce the global burden of chronic disease.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3045642/

And, yet again, the point is that high meat diets produce a lot of greenhouse gases. The science on that is unambiguous and extensive:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/slideshow/the-greenhouse-hamburger/
https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/111/33/11996.full.pdf
https://www.ewg.org/meateatersguide/a-meat-eaters-guide-to-climate-change-health-what-you-eat-matters/climate-and-environmental-impacts/
https://phys.org/news/2019-04-greenhouse-gases-demand-meat.html
https://www.ceu.ox.ac.uk/publications/470132

[Farmer-Rick]

74. You are all over the place in your arguments...so are we back to CO2 emissions?

Here are some links that disagree with yours.

By the way I was arguing against your Worldwide diet (because it is very similar to the diet that has resulted in the US obesity crisis) and even it does NOT eliminate red or white or rabbit meat and animal products.

https://grist.org/article/2009-08-07-debunking-meat-climate-change-myth/

https://skepticalscience.com/animal-agriculture-meat-global-warming.htm

https://climateandcapitalism.com/2018/06/26/why-avoiding-meat-and-dairy-wont-save-the-planet/

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.usatoday.com/amp/1804090001

https://www.google.com/amp/s/theconversation.com/amp/yes-eating-meat-affects-the-environment-but-cows-are-not-killing-the-climate-94968

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/cows-beef-farming-reverse-climate-change-global-warming-a8202121.html%3famp

[muriel_volestrangler]

75. Read links before using them. Bjorn Lomborg? Infamous climate change denier/minimiser

Your other links say that meat production does produce more GHGs than vegetables, and are just saying it's not as much as some reports have said.

You still haven't got it about the American diet, have you? The suggestions for diet in general are not saying "use the American diet". They are saying we need one with less meat than that - and that would be both healthier, and better for the environment. The argument has always been about CO2 (and methane). It's just you who has been trying to divert attention from that.

[Farmer-Rick]

81. You should take your own advice considering you posted a worldwide diet that includes meat

Yet you claim you shouldn't eat meat at all to save the earth from CO2.

All the links I have presented, present the same arguments I have been trying to get across to you. You just ignored my real arguments and argued your own strawmen instead.

This from Eliot Coleman says it best: https://grist.org/article/2009-08-07-debunking-meat-climate-change-myth/

"I am dismayed that so many people have been so easily fooled on the meat eating and climate change issue following the UN report. The culprit is not meat eating but rather the excesses of corporate/industrial agriculture."

I'm not going to argue your strawmen anymore.

[muriel_volestrangler]

83. No, you need to read what that "worldwide diet" is. And then read this thread.

At no point did I say "you shouldn't eat meat at all". I'm saying that meat consumption produces more greenhouse gases than vegetable. With that fact, we can decide, individually or collectively, what we'll do about it. You haven't made a vague attempt to see what other people say. Your links (which only turned up in your last post - before that, you were making stuff up about "CO2 producing chemicals" ) agree that meat production produces more GHGs; they are arguing about the size of it.

Coleman's letter is just that - a letter from a livestock farmer. Not someone who has done any research, or shown any numbers. His implication that the ancient buffalo herds in North America were the equivalent of the world's current livestock are without any attempt at numbers, and is frankly ridiculous (he mentions 70 million buffalo; there are about 1000 million cattle in the world now - and imagine how many would be needed to give the whole world a western, or, god help us, American, diet). The research, in the 10 years after he wrote it, has continued to show that the GHGs from meat production are significantly worse that for vegetables.

You dismiss the research from the UN, and other reliable sources, as "strawmen". You are denying reality.

[Farmer-Rick]

84. You need to read your own straw men arguments.

[SQUEE]

87. Odd, I have lost 30 lbs on a high meat diet.

Grains and other starches are the problem in the current government oushed diet.

[at140]

76. Good post!

[still_one]

32. +++

[FM123]

2. The ridiculous price of beauty:

“For plant-based foods, there’s been drops in vitamins and key electrolytes by up to 50% over the past 50 years because of the genetic selection for large volume and uniformity of shape and appearance, so the things look good on the shelves."

[pandr32]

26. We need more locally grown-to-market vegetables

Our problem is centralized corporate food sources. Also, processed grains lose much of their nutrition and "enriched" after the fact does not make up for the vital nutrients lost.

[Cartoonist]

4. Nature

Millions of years of evolution has made humans omnivores. To go against that is to go against nature.

[UniteFightBack]

29. This is true but the it's the way we are doing it now that is the problem. The factory farm is the

problem.

[Cartoonist]

36. I also don't like the meat industry

Pink slime.
I won't eat fast food meat.

[rusty fender]

43. We, the LGBTQ, go against 'nature'

all the time. I guess it’s how people define their natures

[Cartoonist]

50. Not necessarily

There are many instances of same sex relationships in nature.

[rusty fender]

52. There also many instances of

vegetarianism in nature, too

[Cartoonist]

54. Nature has 3 categories

Herbivores
Carnivores
Omnivores

I don't think there are any vegans in nature except for the artificial diet of some humans. Even then they can't avoid consuming microscopic life.

[JonLP24]

58. We won't have much of a nature if factory farming continues at this pace

We have 12 years to limit climate change catastrophe, warns UN

Huge reduction in meat-eating ‘essential’ to avoid climate breakdown

Major study also finds huge changes to farming are needed to avoid destroying Earth’s ability to feed its population

The researchers found a global shift to a “flexitarian” diet was needed to keep climate change even under 2C, let alone 1.5C. This flexitarian diet means the average world citizen needs to eat 75% less beef, 90% less pork and half the number of eggs, while tripling consumption of beans and pulses and quadrupling nuts and seeds. This would halve emissions from livestock and better management of manure would enable further cuts.

In rich nations, the dietary changes required are ever more stark. UK and US citizens need to cut beef by 90% and milk by 60% while increasing beans and pulses between four and six times. However, the millions of people in poor nations who are undernourished need to eat a little more meat and dairy.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/10/huge-reduction-in-meat-eating-essential-to-avoid-climate-breakdown

This isn't the link I was looking but it is close enough including others on Google search results.

I'm not preaching here as you don't even have to go full vegan you could limit meat once a week or something like that. I'm just explaining why I do it. For me it is harm reduction including for our planet.

[rusty fender]

67. I was referring to vegetarianism,

not veganism

[ProudMNDemocrat]

6. I am a Dietary mess.....

I am one of those millions of people who are unable to process Wheat, Corn, Soy, Legumes, all Dairy, Sugar. Even WHite potatoes, which ferment in my gut. . So for me to go vegan would be disastrous to my digestive system. Gas Bloat, pain fluid retention, Diarreah......No thank you.

Give me Meat, certain veggies and fruits, healthy oils. That is how I must eat in order to live and stay healthy.

[Farmer-Rick]

9. Exactly...You may have some Inuit or Yupik genes.

[ProudMNDemocrat]

11. 53% Eastern European...

From Russia, Yugoslavia, the Balkans. So it is very possible.

[muriel_volestrangler]

62. ? Russia, Yugoslavia and the Balkans are half a world away from the Inuit

Lactose persistence, for instance, is quite common in Eastern Europe: https://bmcevolbiol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2148-10-36

[tman]

18. Same, all grains and most fruit gives me issues.

There's so much we don't yet know about genetics, the microbiome and how it relates to diet.

[Farmer-Rick]

23. So true. We are just starting to really scientifically study diet.

One size shoe does not fit everyone.

[womanofthehills]

45. Maybe grains give people issues because they are high in glyphosate/Roundup

My significant other has this problem, so I make organic sourdough bread and he has no issues.

Non organic wheat, oats, corn, legumes, soy, and sugar have the highest levels of glyphosate of all of our foods because these foods are often sprayed with Roundup pre-harvest for desiccation.

Sugar in Louisiana and Florida sprayed with Roundup big time pre-harvest. I'm sure this is also feeding their red tides.

[mainer]

7. There's scientific support that grains/veggies are losing nutrients

And it may not all be the farmers' fault -- it could be global warming. This NPR link discusses how rice has lost so much of its nutritional value due to environmental changes that nations that have relied on rice as a staple are now seeing malnutrition on their traditional diets.

The study's finding is disheartening, if not surprising, to researchers in the field. Scientists already knew that higher carbon dioxide concentrations can decrease protein, zinc and iron levels in important crops, and this study shows a similar effect for B vitamins, says Camilo Mora, a climate change scientist at the University of Hawaii Manoa who was not involved with the new work. "It's just another piece of evidence to show how bad climate change is," he says.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/05/24/613939464/as-the-planet-warms-well-be-having-rice-with-a-side-of-co2

[Wounded Bear]

14. I wouldn't blame "farmers" for loss of nutrients in plant foods...

I would blame Big Ag, who have pushed their profit driven agenda.

[FM123]

39. There was a Rachel Maddow episode about this

trump's administration was trying to suppress studies showing that climate change was affecting rice in the world and what a crisis that could be since so many folks all over the planet rely upon it as a dietary staple.

[tman]

15. I did 2 years on a strict whole food vegan diet.

It wasn't great for my health, but it's an improvement over the SAD diet. There's a lot of vegan propaganda out there, which I bought into myself.

Now I eat a grassfed red meat based diet and I've never felt better, reversed several autoimmune conditions and I never get sick. Not even a cold.

When I was vegan more than half of my produce was shipped from half way across the world and produced via monocropping methods that destory countless insects, animals and eco-systems.

We should strive to improve animal agricultural systems but If the whole world went Vegan, it would have a fractional effect on actual greenhouse gas emissions.

[Claritie Pixie]

21. No it is not. This is pure propaganda disguised as concern for health.

Does anyone here really think that corporations who grow and slaughter cattle for profit care if you're healthy?

I've lived for years perfectly healthy without consuming meat. Two pregnancies, two healthy children. I will never believe consuming red meat is needed to be healthy. But don't just take my word for it, science says so too.

[Farmer-Rick]

24. Some societies lived on only meat.

Some people are descended from them. An all vegetable diet can severely hurt them.

You are different from them. You seem to thrive on an all vegetable diet. That is great and healthy for you.

One size shoe does not fit everyone.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

31. In some parts of the world growing vegetables on a large scale isn't an option.

In those places - mostly the far north - people have to eat fish, meat and dairy products because although there might be enough vegetation to feed animals, they can't maintain large-scale farming of enough vegetables for human consumption. I would assume the process of evolution has had some effect on those populations and people descended from them insofar as what kinds of foods are most nourishing for them. Lactose intolerance, for example, is rare in northern Europe and in some other parts of the world where people domesticated animals that could be milked, such as the modern Middle East and northwestern India. Populations that raised animals not used for milk made up the rest of the world's populations, and lactose intolerance is common in those populations.

[hunter]

53. It's as much a matter of what lives in your gut.

A meat eater is going to get gassy if they switch suddenly to a rice-and-beans diet.

A vegan who switches suddenly to a meat diet is going to spend many unhappy hours on the toilet.

There are only a few exceptions that involve genetics. Lactose intolerance can be one.

My wife doesn't tolerate milk partly because her Native American ancestors didn't drink milk. As with most humans, indeed most mammals, it was of no benefit and energetically wasteful to maintain the ability to digest lactose into adulthood.

My ancestors drank milk as adults, but milk still disagrees with me. That's because I quit drinking it more than forty years ago. The microbiota in my gut are no longer adapted to milk. But lactase production is merely on standby, it's not shut down. I could gradually accustom myself to drinking milk again.

Humans are a young species. Most of our genetic differences are insignificant in the modern world except as we choose make them so.

[rusty fender]

44. Exactly this!

We thank the meat industry for their concern

[evertonfc]

28. True to a point

Im 47, fit and in best shape of my life. Ive tried all diets, plans and been vegan and vegetarian. Now, I eat a high protein, low carb diet with lots of healthy fats. I eat chicken but limit red meats. I stay active 6 days a week, drink a few beers 3 days a week. I supplement with multi vitamin and fish oil. I drink one 32oz protein shake and a 12 oz beet juice daily. It works for me.

[UniteFightBack]

30. I'm glad the 'meat industry' is feeling threatened because more people are eating more plants. nt

[mucifer]

33. Exactly, their ag gag laws and their lawsuits prove it

[Vinca]

34. This might sort itself out by the cost of meat at the grocery store.

You have to take out a second mortgage to buy a decent rib roast these days.

[lame54]

38. Let's arm wrestle over it

[hunter]

40. Every diet "requires a lot of knowledge and effort."

People learn their culture's version of a healthy diet as children, which is why learning other sorts of diets as adults seems difficult.

Some cultures have healthier diets than others, but no culture has a traditional diet that is so unhealthy it can't sustain the population.

Human diets evolve. In human history people have created healthy diets by trial and error. They may not have had specific scientific knowledge of nutrition, they just knew which combinations of foods they needed to eat to stay healthy.

In some animals this dietary knowledge is largely instinct, in other animals such as humans, bears, sea otters, etc., specific diets are learned behaviors.

There are seven and a half billion people on this planet now. We can't all eat large quantities of meat every day without doing very significant damage to whatever is left of the earth's natural environment.

About half the people in my extended family are vegetarian, many of them nearly vegan. The reason they have chosen these diets are varied. I've seen children thrive on such a diet and grow up to be very healthy adults.

Times change. Three of my grandparents were the children of ranchers and dairy farmers. All of my great grandparents were Wild West, the meat they ate they killed themselves. As a little kid I used to watch my great grandmas cut up fish, chickens, and small mammals for dinner with awe. Their hands moved faster than I could follow.

My dad doesn't like hunting much, but he's an avid fisherman. When my siblings and I were children most of the animal protein we ate was fish he caught, followed by cheap powdered milk, bulk cheese, and ground up dairy cows.

[MFM008]

48. Im not a vegan.

But i will not eat red meat again.
My choice.
Eat whatever the hell you want
And let your arteries deal with it.

[Newest Reality]

51. Studies...

I have read some detailed and unbiased studies that do point out the benefits of a vegan-style diet by way of evidence.

On the other hand, those same studies point out nutrition-related problems that crop up with long-term vegan diets that seem to indicate that there are some nutrients not readily available in those foods alone. We are talking no meat, chicken, fish, dairy, cheese, eggs, etc.

I have warned a vegan friend, (who has had a short-term improvement in health) about that because the deficiencies are spelled out and do require supplementation, plus you really can't eat a "mono diet" as a vegan; it requires a broader sampling of foods in order to makeup for the losses and variety is essential. The danger is that the malnutrition can take several years to begin to show effects that, in turn, may be subtle at first. So, it is a tit for a tat in that case.

My sense of it, (having been a vegetarian for a decade way back when) is that we are most likely omnivores as per our teeth an digestive systems and that is what humans have been accustomed to in our evolution. However, moderation and variety are a part of that and meat/dairy heavy diets may contribute to the rate of chronic illness, which is NOT natural. Many doctors are now realizing the impact of food on long-term diseases and stressing changes in diet for that reason.

[Binkie The Clown]

55. Throught the entire animal kingdom...

... all true carnivores eat their meat raw. If you don't eat your meat raw, you are not a carnivore.

Carnivores have VERY short intestinal tracts so that meat can pass through quickly before it putrefies. The human intestinal tract is too long to get the meat digested before it putrefies." Meat: It's what rots in your gut."

Humans have many enzymes tailored to digest starchy vegetables, and no enzymes tailored to the digestion of raw meat. Cooking meat (which true carnivores obviously do not do in nature) makes it tolerable to the human gut, but for good health you should avoid eating things that your body can merely tolerate.

[Kali]

78. !

Carnivores have VERY short intestinal tracts so that meat can pass through quickly before it putrefies. The human intestinal tract is too long to get the meat digested before it putrefies." Meat: It's what rots in your gut."

[The_jackalope]

59. If there weren't so many people, we wouldn't need as much food of all types

The root cause is the constantly rising number of people who are eating food.

Just sayin'.

[Dagstead Bumwood]

60. Yep, less meat and less sex.

Everyone on board? Good, that was easy

[hunter]

66. Birth control exists. Healthy low meat and no meat diets exist.

There, that was easy.

It's a bummer that religion frequently gets in the way.

Anti birth control cults and bacon eating cults don't make the world a better place.

I'm not going to get into any internet battles, or even battles around my own holiday table, but in the aggregate we humans ought to be having fewer children and eating less meat. We know how to do that. It's not Star Trek warp drive technology.

[at140]

77. Less sex? Get me off that train!

[Dagstead Bumwood]

85. No kidding. I don't even want to get near the station.

[Meowmee]

70. I became very ill when I was vegetarian and then

vegan.. It is not for everyone. I have since seen a few videos of people who also became ill. When we are babies we drink and eat animal protein, our natural diet, mom’s milk.

[JCMach1]

79. We are omnivores... go too far either direction, there are consequences...

[at140]

86. -----This-----