| ruior said: [...]Doctor told me most people going vegetarian/vegan that have health problems is because of bad information and going to the internet instead of consulting a specialist. |
That much is true, except that it's not at all limited to people going veg. In North America (for example), vegans on average are deficient in three essential nutrients, but ominovres are deficient in 7 essential nutrients. Source: http://nutritionfacts.org/video/omnivore-vs-vegan-nutrient-deficiencies-2/
| Mnementh said: [...]Our (the humans) digestive system is badly equipped for a purely herbivore diet, our intestines are too short. Still we are able to digest fruits, nuts and mushrooms (although the last one poorly). Unlike most herbivores we cannot digest grass, leaves or bark, we just aren't equipped for it. these foods make us sick. Some plant products like seeds we can only digest if we help our digestive system: by breaking it down into flour and baking it into bread. No actual study I'm aware of is connecting meat and diseases, only excessive consumption of it. So no, not eating meat isn't natural. That said, a vegan diet poses also no big problem for human adults if done right (look out for Vitamin B12 and maybe iron). It is strongly recommended not to feed children a vegan diet, the risks of malnutrition are way too high. But for adults it is fine. |
Why does our inability to eat grass mean we're poorly suited to be herbivores? That statement isn't scientific. Our intestines average about 10x our trunk length, which puts us in the herbivore range. A pure carnivore is like a feline, it dies if it doesn't eat meat. A pure omnivore is like a canine, it can live on meat alone or it can live on plants alone. If humans don't get the nutrients from plants, we'll die of scurvy. Humans must eat plants to survive. And we can eat many raw seeds simply by chewing them, or soaking them in water. B12 and iron? See my source above, omnivores tend to have more nutrient deficiencies than vegans. A typical whole food, plant-based diet will contain more total nutrients than a typical omnivorous diet. Meat, dairy, eggs have very high caloric densities. So if you're trying to manage your weight (as we all should be), then you'll eat less total food and get fewer total nutrients as an omnivore. A tiny bit of tuna has as many calories as a gigantic garden salad, but the tuna has fewer nutrients and has a smaller variety of nutrients.
Traditionally we ate mostly fruit and flowers (though the fruit we used to eat was less sweet than the fruits we have today, it was kind of halfway between a modern fruit and vegetable in its fibrousness and nutrition profile). Omnivores and carnivores can produce vitamin C, that's why dogs and cats don't need to eat fruit and leafy greens to get vitamin C like we do, their bodies produce it. We're a whole heck of a lot closer to herbivores than we are omnivores. And you see that in the diseases we get. 14 of the top 15 things that kill North Americans are related to omnivorous diets (in whole or in part).
There are lots of studies that connect animal products and disease. Here's a study that shows that the less meat and dairy you eat, the lower your risk of diabetes drops: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3638849/pdf/nihms330464.pdf That's one of hundreds I could cite. Eating even small amounts of meat increase your risk of many diseases.
There is zero risk of malnutrition to children on an appropriate vegan diet. Quite the opposite, see my point above about the high caloric density animal foods reducing the total nutrient density of the diet. Got a source for your claim?
B12 comes from bacteria, it's not synthesized by animals. They're giving B12 supplements to farm animals these days, as they've made the soil too sterile for them to get it the old fashioned way. If you eat factory farmed animals, you're effectively eating B12 supplements filtered through animal flesh, rather than taking a B12 supplement directly. Source: http://baltimorepostexaminer.com/carnivores-need-vitamin-b12-supplements/2013/10/30#sthash.cy38jSbk.dpbs
| ruior said: About meat being natural/unnatural: are you a naturalist? |
Do I use a car? Do I eat fast food? Do I add sugar to my food? Do I eat canned food? Do I eat cookies? Do I use air conditioning? No to all of the above. (Well, once in a blue moon I'll eat canned black beans, I suppose.) Obviously our lives have changed, but I dispute that our current diet shouldn't be at the top of our list of worries. Our top killers are all corrolated to diet (heart disease, diabetes, many cancers, and so much more). Seems to me that should be a big concern given it's avoidably killing millions of people every year. It's the #1 avoidable public health cost.
| bonzobanana said: I look up to vegans/vegetarians who have become so for moral reasons. Most of humanity is pretty low end scum and I don't exclude myself from that description. It's nice to see some of humanity that understand the cruelty and horror of eating animals. Sadly I am a meat eater and do enjoy it but I've managed to cut down hugely on the amount of meat I eat. Most of my freezer is vegetarian food with some exceptions being chicken breasts. I also have a few tins of tuna that I have with salad. I just don't think I can go fully vegetarian and not sure I actually want to. I certainly couldn't go vegan. [...] |
For what it's worth, I had a similar journey. I started gradually reducing my meat consumption about 25 years ago. I went pescetarian about four years ago, and feared going vegan. I wanted to always go forward, and I was paranoid that I would slip backwards. No such worry, I'm enjoying my food now more than ever. Hilariously, my diet is more omnivorous as a vegan than it was when I was an omnivore. As an omnivore I tended to eat the same few things over and over again. As a vegan I have experimented to find new things I like, but I also eat a larger volume of food now to get the same calories, which also tends to promote greater variety. It's been awesome. That said, we're all at different stages of our journeys, and it's taken me over two decades to reach the end of mine. :)
| fory77 said: [...] also just saw this is fuckin old ,fuck |
Of course it is, I bumped this thread expressly for that reason, to see how the last half-year or so had gone for the OP. :)
