Why take part in Veganuary? Well, why not?
There are so many reasons people decide to try vegan.
For most, a love of animals is the catalyst. Some people want to feel better about themselves and the impact they make on the world. Others would like to set themselves a challenge, and many combine Veganuary with their ‘New Year’s Resolutions’ and see trying vegan as the healthiest start to the year. Whatever your reason, we’re here to support you.
So try vegan for a month and discover a whole new world of taste and flavour. We guarantee that, by the end of the month, you’ll feel fantastic!
I’m on a keto diet so I eat meat almost exclusively. It’s made a big difference in the way I feel and look, switching to the polar opposite for a month would probably really screw me up.
Sorry, I can't stand most vegetables and trying to survive on nothing but vegetables would quickly lead to sheer misery. And by 'quickly', I mean 'in about five minutes' since it's nearly dinnertime.
Vulcan wrote: Sorry, I can't stand most vegetables and trying to survive on nothing but vegetables would quickly lead to sheer misery. And by 'quickly', I mean 'in about five minutes' since it's nearly dinnertime.
Vulcan wrote: Sorry, I can't stand most vegetables and trying to survive on nothing but vegetables would quickly lead to sheer misery. And by 'quickly', I mean 'in about five minutes' since it's nearly dinnertime.
Meat is tasty, vegetables are a necessary evil.
No vegan survives on "nothing but vegetables".
Well, Veggies/plants and Fungi. Otherwise, you’re not exactly Vegan.
It’s not for me. I get my meat from the butcher’s, so it’s higher welfare. I’d rather scoff cow than see further deforestation, endangering multiple species to grow more crops. Swings and roundabouts, but whichever way you butter it, some poor animal is going to suffer.
I can't even understand how becoming "vegan" would help me and my life. It will definitely have some downsides for my wallet. I hope this trend will quickly stop.
I eat a Vegan diet... Cows, deer, rabbits, and bison are all vegans, and I eat them.
Humans evolved to be omnivores, like bears. there are nutrients our bodies need that vegetables alone cannot provide. If you are taking vitamin supplements to cover those, you may want to find out where they are sourcing them. You may be surprised.
Not eating animal products is not enough, as many other products contain animal parts, so its a fad, we are omnivores so are designed to eat meat. ( pigs in blankets yum) , I sould be more concerned about how it was treated and killed rather than the fact it was an animal product.
I have tremendous sympathy with the vegan cause, but it's not a lifestyle I can commit to. If we hadn't fethed up the ocean, I might have been able to pull off pescatarianism (well, only fish and dairy products. I *need* cheese). Besides, my wife and son complain every time I secretly replace the meat with a vegan alternative. One of these days someone will find an economical way to grow meat in industrial vats, and I'll finall be able to shed the guilt while keeping the meat.
Got a $75 gift certificate from work for Christmas to a meat market. Stocked up on beef and pork products. I’ll be enjoying the most meat-filled month I’ve had for a while.
I’ll let the vegans think they’re doing the earth a favour while the organic farms around me fertilize the non-gmo foods they love so much with dead livestock remains and their excrement. Think all those poor domesticated animals on cattle, pig and poultry farms have nothing to do with those veggies on your plate? Think again.
Nostromodamus wrote: I’ll let the vegans think they’re doing the earth a favour while the organic farms around me fertilize the non-gmo foods they love so much with dead livestock remains and their excrement.
Oh god, don't get me started on that organic anti-GMO garbage. The level of ignorance displayed by anti-GMO advocates...
Nostromodamus wrote: I’ll let the vegans think they’re doing the earth a favour while the organic farms around me fertilize the non-gmo foods they love so much with dead livestock remains and their excrement.
Oh god, don't get me started on that organic anti-GMO garbage. The level of ignorance displayed by anti-GMO advocates...
It's not their fault, all the vaccines impeded their mental development.
Isn't there a strong ethical argument in favor of not supporting the meat industry? The but but but bacon argument always makes me lol because its such a go to. Fyi, I love meat more than average person.
godardc wrote: Do you really feel guilty when you eat ? Like, seeing your beefsteaks and sausages, you think about the pig from where they come from ?
To some degree. If it's really possible to obtain all my nutrition without any killing, even of the least consequential animals, then I feel I morally should pursue that option. In practice, I try to minimize the suffering experienced by the animals I eat: free range chickens, cage free eggs, cows that are not kept in a stall and fed bonemeal. I also hate wasting meat, because an animal had to die for that meat to be served, and it should not have died pointlessly.
godardc wrote: Do you really feel guilty when you eat ? Like, seeing your beefsteaks and sausages, you think about the pig from where they come from ?
To some degree. If it's really possible to obtain all my nutrition without any killing, even of the least consequential animals, then I feel I morally should pursue that option. In practice, I try to minimize the suffering experienced by the animals I eat: free range chickens, cage free eggs, cows that are not kept in a stall and fed bonemeal. I also hate wasting meat, because an animal had to die for that meat to be served, and it should not have died pointlessly.
I already eat very little meat, but I am never going to stop eating it entirely. It is a key ingredient in many very tasty dishes that I would be really sad to go without.
And veganism? Just no. I would never consider that. Yoghurt is the best food ever made, and it is also really healthy. I eat and drink lots of yoghurt, kefir and other dairy products, and quitting that would leave me without key parts of my diet not to mention really sad. In addition I would also have to give up on icecream (I had Vegan ice"cream" once but it just is not the same. It tasted like coconuts rather than cream and I really hate coconuts) which means I would pretty much have nothing left to live for. Besides, I don't like taking artificial supplements or enriched foods, which is necessary to stay healthy on a vegan (or even a fully vegetarian) diet.
So no. If you like eating vegan, great for you! But don't bother trying to convince me of it. I like the idea of vegetarianism (which is why I started eating meat only rarely instead of daily) but veganism is a step too far in the wrong direction imho.
Excommunicatus wrote: So, if you're not interested, maybe keep your ignorant and idiotic comments to yourself?
This is not a thread about veganism. It's about Veganuary. Sign up or GTFO.
If you are not interested in other people's opinions you should not be posting a thread on a forum. And if you can't be civil, then you should be the one to GTFO.
There’s no need for this kind of extreme hostility. Plus it’s also against our rules. Please keep in mind that Rule Number One around here is Be Polite!
AesSedai wrote: Isn't there a strong ethical argument in favor of not supporting the meat industry? The but but but bacon argument always makes me lol because its such a go to. Fyi, I love meat more than average person.
I'm assuming by "meat industry" you're referring to factory farming? If so, there are ways to get meat without supporting factory farming. Hunting and fishing is one method (I realize that's not an option for everyone). You can also purchase meat from more ethical sources. Free-range chicken, grass-fed beef, etc.
I'm not going to do Veganuary. I'm confident I could sustain myself on a vegetarian diet, but vegan is a bit too extreme for me. I don't really understand why someone would be completely against all animal products. What's unethical about eating eggs? What's wrong with eating honey? Both of those things are pretty readily available without supporting factory farming.
My girlfriend is a vegan. She'll be practicing "Veganuary" in January as much as she did in Veganember.
I shake my head and marvel. I eat many vegetarian and even occasionally vegan meals. Not every meal needs meat, and that's an important thing to realize. However, I will be continuing to eat meat as the fancy strikes me. If animals weren't supposed to be eaten, they wouldn't be so tasty.
Good on whoever thinks they can accept it though. The amount of improvisation that vegans perform to be able to make meals that resemble nonvegan meals is utterly extraordinary. For example, she got so excited when I introduced her to liquid smoke because it let her make something she thinks tastes like bacon. She also has been able to fabricate "eggs" in baked goods in a way that makes them almost indistinguishable from the store bought ones, and has made something she calls tiramisu that, while definitely not tiramisu, is still in fact quite the sweet dish.
I applaud vegans for doing their thing no matter how harsh (baselessly even!) the rest of the world is toward them. I just like food and flavor too much to do it myself.
The essential amino acids, which are the ones the human body cannot synthesise, which are found in meat, can be got from vegetables, especially beans. That's why it's perfectly possible to eat a vegetarian or vegan diet and not starve to death.
I'm not a vegan myself, but it's important that the scientific facts are known.
An Actual Englishman wrote: Or just try eating however you feel comfortable for the entire year without using a cheesy catchphrase month to justify it/test new diets.
Nostromodamus wrote: I’ll let the vegans think they’re doing the earth a favour while the organic farms around me fertilize the non-gmo foods they love so much with dead livestock remains and their excrement.
Oh god, don't get me started on that organic anti-GMO garbage. The level of ignorance displayed by anti-GMO advocates...
I’m in favour of GMO. Anything that helps us efficiently feed the world.
Do think it needs rigorous testing though, if only because I watch too much sci fi.
how about I just pretend to acknowledge you're a better person and carry on with my PETA way (the good people eating tasty animals one not the pet murdering loons to poor for scientology)
We don't kill animals by eating them: without mankind breeding and exploiting animals, there would be much, much less animals. They exist thanks to us, and are here, as the whole environnement, to be used, exploited, for the good of all humans on Earth.
I do respect freedom and see no problem with vegans (their lack of tolerance is an issue however. In France they destroyed several shops selling meat) but I have never found their arguments to be worth it.
I always wonder about the "ethical" argument for veganism. Yes, eating meat means killing stuff - you think eating vegetables doesn't?
Unless you pulled it out of the ground in your own back garden/allotment, odds are good whatever veggies & grains you buy were produced by the same horrifying industrial farming processes that made my bacon roll. Sure, producing meat is either A; cruel, or B; terrible for the planet because of the landmass consumed, but they clear plenty of carbon-sequestering plant life for arable farmland as well, and if you're the kind of person who feels bad for eating a fish or cares about plastic pollution, then I have some bad news about what agricultural runoff is doing to our rivers and oceans...
Nah, sorry. If you want to affect actual, meaningful change rather than just make yourself feel a little better, you'll have a far bigger impact engaging in activism to support things like freeing GM crop technology from corporate control, encouraging farms to switch to closed-loop hydroponic systems, and advocating for more funding to go into developing lab-grown meat than you ever will abstaining from meat and trying to make Passive Aggressiveanuary a thing.
There are two different arguments for veganism. One is based on environmental concerns as you mention, the other is based on not causing suffering to animals.
Excommunicatus wrote: So, if you're not interested, maybe keep your ignorant and idiotic comments to yourself?
This is not a thread about veganism. It's about Veganuary. Sign up or GTFO.
A thread about a made-up catchphrase to promote veganism is not about veganism? Pull the other one, this one's got bells on.
Slightly more on-topic: while I applaud most vegans' attempt to save the world, it's my opinion that they're treating a symptom, not the cure. There's too much cattle, true, but there's too much cattle because there are too many people, and the only real solution is to reduce that.
Unfortunately, the political will doesn't exist to tackle that problem, and in fact our entire economic and largely our social structures are actively opposed to that kind of solution.
Kilkrazy wrote: There are two different arguments for veganism. One is based on environmental concerns as you mention, the other is based on not causing suffering to animals.
But in either case, the argument doesn't go away, it just makes it one step removed. Is having your habitat cleared away and slowly starving to death not suffering? Is there really a difference between dying to the blade/bolt-gun of a slaughterer, or being minced by accident in an industrial mechanised thresher? Neither would be happening if not for humans needing to eat. Industrial farming - the source of the vast, vast majority of food we eat regardless of what part of the food pyramid it falls into - causes animal suffering, period. You can eat "ethically" if that's your focus, but then all the "veganism isn't expensive that's a myth" type stuff goes right out the window.
So again, the solution is spend your time trying to change the system, not trying to persuade people to participate in the system in a slightly different way to give themselves the illusion of superior ethics.
Excommunicatus wrote: Veganuary is exactly intended to show non-vegans that 95% of what they think they know about being vegan is total and complete nonsense.
Oh really? The list of tasty meats that are not available is a lie? I can still eat BBQ and cheese and such? I don't need to try such a terrible idea to know that I have zero interest in giving up those things to save some dumb cows that wouldn't exist at all if not for the meat industry. But I guess we're supposed to overlook the fact that the success of veganism means the complete extinction of all those species we eat?
Excommunicatus wrote: Veganuary is exactly intended to show non-vegans that 95% of what they think they know about being vegan is total and complete nonsense.
Oh really? The list of tasty meats that are not available is a lie? I can still eat BBQ and cheese and such? I don't need to try such a terrible idea to know that I have zero interest in giving up those things to save some dumb cows that wouldn't exist at all if not for the meat industry. But I guess we're supposed to overlook the fact that the success of veganism means the complete extinction of all those species we eat?
Excommunicatus likes his false appeal to authority arguments.
Of the several Vegan people I of, and some I personally know, all of whom are due to medical conditions, none have ever tried to enforce their diets on me.
Why? Because they know that their specific diets are designed for their specific conditions, needs, and tolerances. If my doctors were to tell me that I needed to follow such a restricted diet, I would take it under advisement with consultations with others and nutritionists to work out the best diet for me.
A balanced diet, moderate exercise and/or activity, social interaction, sufficient hydration and appropriate amount of sleep should keep you healthy, but consult your doctor.. 'cause... like he/she's the expert on these matters.
Very few general practitioners, at least in the U.K., U.S.A. and Canada, receive any formal education or training in nutrition. For sure speak to a qualified healthcare professional about nutrition. I'd advise against seeing your GP for that purpose. If you must, maybe ensure they're qualified first.
Very few general practitioners, at least in the U.K., U.S.A. and Canada, receive any formal education or training in nutrition. For sure speak to a qualified healthcare professional about nutrition. I'd advise against seeing your GP for that purpose. If you must, maybe ensure they're qualified first.
Do you apply this standard to yourself and to other vegans, and refuse to speak on nutrition issues unless you have formal training and licensing in the field? Including making statements like "a vegan diet can provide all you need, claims otherwise are false"?
(Granted, maybe you do, but you'd seem to be a rare minority among vegans.)
I have a fair amount of formal education and training in such matters, far more than your average GP has, so I'm able to confidently state that there is not a nutrient your body needs that cannot be provided for on a vegan diet. Not a single one.
Very few general practitioners, at least in the U.K., U.S.A. and Canada, receive any formal education or training in nutrition. For sure speak to a qualified healthcare professional about nutrition. I'd advise against seeing your GP for that purpose. If you must, maybe ensure they're qualified first.
Nothing about his point was an appeal to authority.
I have a fair amount of formal education and training in such matters, far more than your average GP has, so I'm able to confidently state that there is not a nutrient your body needs that cannot be provided for on a vegan diet. Not a single one.
This bit, this bit right here? That's why this whole post is counter-productive if you actually want people to try a vegan diet, because it comes off as incredibly condescending.
It's entirely possible for someone to be thoroughly educated on these matters and still, shock-horror, not agree with you.
EDIT: Also, I hereforth declare this to be Baconanuary, and I will be thoroughly trying bacon as often as possible over the next month. Just for you chief.
It is this holier-than-thou superiority complex surrounding veganism that bothers me more than the actual diet. Excomminicatus is doing a fine job demonstrating that.
I have a fair amount of formal education and training in such matters, far more than your average GP has, so I'm able to confidently state that there is not a nutrient your body needs that cannot be provided for on a vegan diet. Not a single one.
Nostromodamus wrote: It is this holier-than-thou superiority complex surrounding veganism that bothers me more than the actual diet. Excomminicatus is doing a fine job demonstrating that.
That superiority complex exists only in the heads of people who wish to dismiss the topic without thinking about it.
At no point have I alleged that being a vegan is in any way superior. I have said that it would be swell if you tried it for a month.
I have a fair amount of formal education and training in such matters, far more than your average GP has, so I'm able to confidently state that there is not a nutrient your body needs that cannot be provided for on a vegan diet. Not a single one.
I have also asked Vegans the same question in the past and they all, without fail, take some sort of supplements.
Coolbeans.
Point out where I said a vegan diet doesn't include vitamins and supplements.
I take a B12 supplement daily. I consider it part of my diet.
Do you want to embark on a long and ultimately futile argument about the semantics of it, are do you want to accept that every nutrient your body needs is freely available in a vegan form, a position your link confirms?
Nostromodamus wrote: It is this holier-than-thou superiority complex surrounding veganism that bothers me more than the actual diet. Excomminicatus is doing a fine job demonstrating that.
That superiority complex exists only in the heads of people who wish to dismiss the topic without thinking about it.
At no point have I alleged that being a vegan is in any way superior. I have said that it would be swell if you tried it for a month.
When would you recommend something to complete strangers unless you sincerely felt it was in some way better than what they're already doing?
Still, you have at least fulfilled the enduring cliché about "how do you find out if somebody's vegan?"
After your last post, it didn't need to be confirmed that you don't actually know what an appeal to authority is.
Vegan Vitamin D is on the market and freely available.
Try Veganuary and educate yourself.
Yes, I do. So supplements.. So not part of the actual diet.
Automatically Appended Next Post: If you need to supplement your diet for it to be healthy, (eg not merely using them as extras for fitness etc) then its inferior to a regular diet.
Point out where I said a vegan diet doesn't include vitamins and supplements.
I take a B12 supplement daily. I consider it part of my diet.
Do you want to embark on a long and ultimately futile argument about the semantics of it, are do you want to accept that every nutrient your body needs is freely available in a vegan form, a position your link confirms?
You don't see the disparity in those two quotes? And no, having to take a supplement to provide the nutrients your body needs is not part of a diet.
For what it's worth, I don't have a problem with veganism, I don't have a problem with trying to emphasise the alleged health benefits of it. It's just the wanky, right-on, self-righteousness of it all that really gets on my tits.
I just wish vegans would be honest; that the diet is restrictive and there are compromises that need to be in place instead of trying to smoke screen and obfuscate.
Taking suppliments shouldn’t be a stand in for proper nutrition from eating actual food. If the food in said diet can’t provide everything you need, it’s a gak diet.
Incidentally, my brother has recently turned vegan, and he hasn’t stopped trying to push it onto everyone he knows. Just another aspect of his increasingly self righteous journey up inside his own arsehole.
Supplement. Singular. Like those vitamin supplements that millions of people eating an omnivorous diet also take and which, for some convenient reason, don't invalidate their diet. Again, it's still perfectly possible to get everything you need from a vegan diet without using supplements. It's just easier to take a supplement sometimes, just like it is with an omnivorous diet.
So y'all wanna deliberately miss the point and get bogged down in a totally-irrelevant semantic debate, eh?
I can't say I'm surprised.
FWIW, I eat BBQ and cheeses all the time. The idea that you can't BBQ without meat and that there are no cruelty-free cheeses is yet another invention of an uneducated mind.
Actually, yes, I would quite like to get bogged down in semantics, as you put it. because that link I posted that you hand waved away suggested there are, in fact, a number of supplements that vegans must take that are not supplied by their diet. And you may well say many omnivorous people take supplements for whatever reason but the bald fact is; if they are eating a balanced diet, there is no need to take supplements whatsoever and that is the key here; a vegan diet is not balanced.
It is this sort of disingenuous and bad faith debate that harms your position quite frankly.
filbert wrote: Actually, yes, I would quite like to get bogged down in semantics, as you put it. because that link I posted that you hand waved away suggested there are, in fact, a number of supplements that vegans must take that are not supplied by their diet. And you may well say many omnivorous people take supplements for whatever reason but the bald fact is; if they are eating a balanced diet, there is no need to take supplements whatsoever and that is the key here; a vegan diet is not balanced.
It is this sort of disingenuous and bad faith debate that harms your positions quite frankly.
So I'll modify my statement to "there are no nutrients your body needs that are not available in a vegan form" and your entire 'argument' goes away.
Do feel free to continue pretending that one vegan using a phrasing that you personally don't care for invalidates the entire concept of veganism, though.
Excommunicatus wrote: FWIW, I eat BBQ and cheeses all the time. The idea that you can't BBQ without meat and that there are no cruelty-free cheeses is yet another invention of an uneducated mind.
Try Veganuary and educate yourself.
Heresy. "BBQ" that does not involve dead pig and vinegar sauce is not BBQ, it is an abomination before the Lord and the surest path to hell.
So I'll modify my statement to "there are no nutrients your body needs that are not available in a vegan form" and your entire 'argument' goes away.
Do feel free to continue pretending that one vegan using a phrasing that you personally don't care for invalidates the entire concept of veganism, though.
That just yells good faith.
It's not phrasing I don't care for and neither is it 'just one vegan', it's every vegan I have ever tried to engage on the subject; it all gets hand-waved away 'oh it''s just a supplement' - it is a fundamental concept here. I eat what I want and I don't have to go to the chemists to buy pills to make up for what my diet lacks; that's what a balanced diet means. It means the nutrients I need to function as a human being are provided by the food I consume, not the pills I buy.
Whether you label those pills as 'vegan' or part of a 'vegan diet' in your head is irrelevant. And continuing to try and belittle and reduce that point just makes you look like an ass.
So I'll modify my statement to "there are no nutrients your body needs that are not available in a vegan form" and your entire 'argument' goes away.
Do feel free to continue pretending that one vegan using a phrasing that you personally don't care for invalidates the entire concept of veganism, though.
That just yells good faith.
It's not phrasing I don't care for and neither is it 'just one vegan', it's every vegan I have ever tried to engage on the subject; it all gets hand-waved away 'oh it''s just a supplement' - it is a fundamental concept here. I eat what I want and I don't have to go to the chemists to buy pills to make up for what my diet lacks; that's what a balanced diet means. It means the nutrients I need to function as a human being are provided by the food I consume, not the pills I buy.
Whether you label those pills as 'vegan' or part of a 'vegan diet' in your head is irrelevant. And continuing to try and belittle and reduce that point just makes you look like an ass.
The chances are that you're actually massively deficient in lots of things but you just don't know it because you haven't asked anyone qualified or competent to give you a meaningful answer.
Dietary supplements are not a uniquely vegan thing and as with everyone who takes them, they're a convenience. Continue to bang on and on and on about them doesn't advance your cause. I can survive perfectly healthily on only nutrients that are available in vegan form. The fact that I used 'diet' and you don't like it has been corrected and was never relevant to begin with.
I have been a vegetarian since I was a kid and don't think I would ever start eating meat at this point, I do it just because I am a huge animal lover but it is nice to know that I am doing a tiny bit to help the environment at the same time.
Not sure I could go full vegan though, I am a naturally skinny person and have a tough time getting enough protein as it is and feel that cutting dairy out of my life would be, personally, an unhealthy life choice. Milk would be an easy substitute as I don't mind nut milks but cheese and eggs are an almost daily thing for me.
Anyone who is considering being vegan though should definitely pick this book up though.
Most vegan baked goods are pretty awful, cakes in particular are in a word, dusty. Everything I have tried from this book was awesome though which is quite an achievement as I have made many a failure from other books and websites!
I don't know what the science behind it is but a few of my friends have cut meat out of their diets for a month or so and always come to me saying that they feel a lot less groggy and healthy, easy way to start a diet if nothing else...
Also at the rate this thread is going I feel like dakka will soon have a ban on religion, politics, and vegans!
The chances are that you're actually massively deficient in lots of things but you just don't know it because you haven't asked anyone qualified or competent to give you a meaningful answer.
Dietary supplements are not a uniquely vegan thing and as with everyone who takes them, they're a convenience. Continue to bang on and on and on about them doesn't advance your cause. I can survive perfectly healthily on only nutrients that are available in vegan form. The fact that I used 'diet' and you don't like it has been corrected and was never relevant to begin with.
Engage with the point actually being made.
Nope, you can try and deflect as much as you like and it is nothing to do with my like or dislike of the word diet or whatever you think it encompasses. The bottom line is that I do not need to take vitamin supplements to supply my body with what it needs and you, as a vegan do. However you try to dress that up by saying those same pills are a part of your 'diet' is neither here nor there. The bald fact is that as a vegan, you do not ingest all the correct vitamins and minerals from your choice of diet that your body requires to survive and must therefore receive them from external forms, usually in pill format.
Again, you can try and hand-wave as much as you like by claiming I'm not as healthy as I imagine and you may well be right but I don't think you can seriously claim that a balanced omnivorous diet is more deficient in minerals and minerals than a vegan diet. It simply is not true; a vegan must take supplements to survive because you cannot obtain certain vitamins from plants alone.
a vegan must take supplements to survive because you cannot obtain certain vitamins from plants alone.
That's an outright falsehood. The link that you provided says as much.
Try Veganuary and educate yourself.
I haven't claimed that a vegan necessarily gets better nutrition than an omnivore, but I am saying that unless you've recently been checked over by someone competent and qualified, your assumptions that you're perfectly healthy and eat a perfectly balanced diet are just that; assumptions.
And launching a position from the back of an assumption is... what's that phrase again?
Veganuary is exactly intended to show non-vegans that 95% of what they think they know about being vegan is total and complete nonsense.
Which is why you should actually try it, rather than dismissing it with comforting and exculpatory lies.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. If you want to be vegetarian/vegan, be my guest. It's your choice and your right.
When you start insisting that I need to be vegetarian/vegan, even to the extent of 'you need to try this', that we have a problem. Because at that point you're infringing on my rights.
Every time you say “try Veganuary and educate yourself”, I’ll eat another mini pork sausage roll.
I got roped into going to a Morrissey concert once, and he played Meat Is Murder. With accompanying footage of an abattoir. It pissed me off to no end. So much so, I went to the food bar to get a chicken and bacon burger with cheese. Because feth him.
Future War Cultist wrote: Every time you say “try Veganuary and educate yourself”, I’ll eat another mini pork sausage roll.
I got roped into going to a Morrissey concert once, and he played Meat Is Murder. With accompanying footage of an abattoir. It pissed me off to no end. So much so, I went to the food bar to get a chicken and bacon burger with cheese. Because feth him.
I can only hope that in future you don't get so easily triggered by the actions of strangers you claim not to care about, so that you act under your own volition instead of slavishly trying to troll people who, again, you don't know and who don't care about you.
Future War Cultist wrote: Every time you say “try Veganuary and educate yourself”, I’ll eat another mini pork sausage roll.
I got roped into going to a Morrissey concert once, and he played Meat Is Murder. With accompanying footage of an abattoir. It pissed me off to no end. So much so, I went to the food bar to get a chicken and bacon burger with cheese. Because feth him.
I can only hope that in future you don't get so easily triggered by the actions of strangers you claim not to care about, so that you act under your own volition instead of slavishly trying to troll people who, again, you don't know and who don't care about you.
From a cookbook series titled "The Encyclopedia of Cookery" an article by Dr. F. Stare, then Chair of the Dept. of Nutrition at Harvard outlined some practical food habits for adults.
Don't be a mere calorie counter.
Enjoy your food.
Don't eat the same food every day.
Don't be misled by food faddists. Exercise regularly.
He also lists reliable sources for information on food and nutrition as the people who are the authorities on the subject: Your Doctor (should know your medical history), a dietitian, nutritionist, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, The Nutrition Foundation and the American Dietetic Association (both now listed Here - https://www.eatright.org/)
I'm not a vegan and never will be. I frankly need to push myself to eat more vegetables because I dislike most of them.
*Shakes my fist in anger toward the brocoli and mushrooms I will have to eat*
But I do think that a vegan or vegetarian diet is more ethical then a omnivorus diet. On the subject of health, I suppose its easier to have a healthy diet when eating a bit of everything meat included, but most people have more or less unhealthy diets. Many vegans probably have unhealthy diets, but some probably have good ones too.
There are way more layers to it than just ethical. unless you are literally picking the food from walking distance from a local farm or your own farm with your own cultivated seeds, you are adding fuel costs to your food, if you are buying most produce, its probably owned by various Monsanto type companies which would have their grubby fingers in most live stock companies as well, indirectly supporting the "suffering of animals"
its a deep rabbit hole. not that you cant do it all on your own but dont think its easy.
He also lists reliable sources for information on food and nutrition as the people who are the authorities on the subject: Your Doctor (should know your medical history), a dietitian, nutritionist, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, The Nutrition Foundation and the American Dietetic Association (both now listed Here - https://www.eatright.org/)
I actually wouldn't trust a regulatory agency or professional association's official position on much, because they're very easily swayed by special interests. Often, their official guidelines are approved by a small board of administrators without any input from their actual professional membership, which is how you end up with absurdities like the food pyramid. Your individual doctor or nutritionist, who may be a member of such an organization, should be able to steer you the right way, however.
He also lists reliable sources for information on food and nutrition as the people who are the authorities on the subject: Your Doctor (should know your medical history), a dietitian, nutritionist, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, The Nutrition Foundation and the American Dietetic Association (both now listed Here - https://www.eatright.org/)
I actually wouldn't trust a regulatory agency or professional association's official position on much, because they're very easily swayed by special interests. Often, their official guidelines are approved by a small board of administrators without any input from their actual professional membership, which is how you end up with absurdities like the food pyramid. Your individual doctor or nutritionist, who may be a member of such an organization, should be able to steer you the right way, however.
Here's the kicker....
That advice hasn't really changed much since it was first published,
in 1966.
I mean obviously a diet that includes some meat is going to be more nutritious than one without but it is fairly easy to substitute that stuff with other proteins once you get into the swing of things. I don't have any issue with what anyone else chooses to eat (though I fail to see the appeal of stuff like MacDonalds ) and would never tell someone to change their lifestyle but trying out being veggie/vegan even for a week isn't gonna kill anyone. At the very least you might get to try out some new meals that you normally would not try.
Just in the last few years in North America I have noticed that a lot of restaurants have a vegan option that I like to try out for a change. I went to a cafe the other day that had a toasted sandwich with thin bits of fried tofu and veggies that was so good I ordered another, how they made tofu taste good I don't know but it was great... The vegan sausages and other meats are also pretty good and also and easy way to catch up on nutrients you would otherwise miss, no one has invented decent vegan bacon yet but everything else fits right in on a barbecue.
All that being said, I thing Veganuary is a stupid idea. Meat and dairy makes up a huge chunk of people's meals in NA and parts of Europe and cutting all that out at once is bound to sour anyone to being vegan. A smarter initiative would be to get people back into the habit of only having meat 2 or 3 times a week rather than making it a daily thing.
You know what might help your cause? Actually explaining the why of it not being obvious or true, rather than posting in a manner that's simply pissing people off and completely drowning any positive intent you might have originally held.
1. Don't eat honey
2. Bees keep making honey and run out of room in their hive
3. No room in hive to lay larva
4. Bees die with no larva to keep the hive thriving
5. No honey means mead is no more...
WHYS THE MEAD GONE!!! no........ I will enjoy Veganuary with a double bacon cheese burger and hot mead on January 1st.
I’ve got other health issues and I’ve found when I tried cutting out meat it made my other health problems worse. Maybe it’d be possible to supplement and get back to my regular level of crap health, but I have no great desire to experiment with vegetarianism let alone veganism.
Commander Cain wrote: I mean obviously a diet that includes some meat is going to be more nutritious than one without
It is neither obvious, nor true.
You are trying to convince people to try being vegan for a little while correct? Maybe don't play into the stereotype so much and act so aggressive to people in this thread, particularly those on your side!
Not sure what you hope to gain by quoting half of a sentence I wrote, I also said you can replace said nutrients with other foods just that it is a little harder. I have been vegetarian for 25 years and am acutely aware that by not eating meat I have to be much more watchful over what I eat in order to get all those tasty nutrients compared to someone who eats meat on a regular basis. No one person's diet is the exact same but a meat-eater who doesn't pay much attention to their diet is going to be better off than a vegan doing the same. I know a few girls who went vegan in order to lose weight but they simply cut out meat and dairy without replacing those things adequately which is super unhealthy.
Perhaps you are just playing a complicated game of 3D chess and forcing people to research being vegan in the hopes of proving you wrong thus going back to the "educate yourself" but there are better and more polite ways to have a discussion than that.
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Ruberu wrote: Soooo, don't eat animals or animal made products.
1. Don't eat honey
2. Bees keep making honey and run out of room in their hive
3. No room in hive to lay larva
4. Bees die with no larva to keep the hive thriving
5. No honey means mead is no more...
WHYS THE MEAD GONE!!! no........ I will enjoy Veganuary with a double bacon cheese burger and hot mead on January 1st.
A better argument would be that no bees means no pollination which means no plants which means the end of the world!
Americans and Brits are fat AF by global standards, so if one falls into that category, perhaps a brief pause to genuinely consider lifestyle choices is warranted before ramming that double bacon cheeseburger down your gullet. Swallowing a bit of ego > swallowing bacon wrapped bacon? Food for thought.
AesSedai wrote: Americans and Brits are fat AF by global standards, so if one falls into that category, perhaps a brief pause to genuinely consider lifestyle choices is warranted before ramming that double bacon cheeseburger down your gullet. Swallowing a bit of ego > swallowing bacon wrapped bacon? Food for thought.
Meat doesn't really make you fat, though. It's all of the things that people eat with meat; refined wheat buns, French fries, corn syrup drinks, etc. Americans are fatter on average because they eat nutrition free poison.
Also, nothing is better than bacon, except bacon wrapped bacon.
AesSedai wrote: Americans and Brits are fat AF by global standards, so if one falls into that category, perhaps a brief pause to genuinely consider lifestyle choices is warranted before ramming that double bacon cheeseburger down your gullet. Swallowing a bit of ego > swallowing bacon wrapped bacon? Food for thought.
Meat doesn't really make you fat, though. It's all of the things that people eat with meat; refined wheat buns, French fries, corn syrup drinks, etc. Americans are fatter on average because they eat nutrition free poison.
Also, nothing is better than bacon, except bacon wrapped bacon.
Gotta be careful with this info...there is a recent study that claims meat contributes to obesity prevalence worldwide at the same extent as sugar, so it's worth looking into your sources. Its actually a issue related to protein surprisingly. Nevertheless, i agree with you that the other factors you mentioned are horrifying contributers to obesity.
AesSedai wrote: Americans and Brits are fat AF by global standards, so if one falls into that category, perhaps a brief pause to genuinely consider lifestyle choices is warranted before ramming that double bacon cheeseburger down your gullet. Swallowing a bit of ego > swallowing bacon wrapped bacon? Food for thought.
Or understand that portion sizes are more important than eating meat or not? The problem is not having a bacon cheeseburger, it's having a huge bacon cheeseburger and a bucket of fries and a bucket of HFCS.
AesSedai wrote: Americans and Brits are fat AF by global standards, so if one falls into that category, perhaps a brief pause to genuinely consider lifestyle choices is warranted before ramming that double bacon cheeseburger down your gullet. Swallowing a bit of ego > swallowing bacon wrapped bacon? Food for thought.
Or understand that portion sizes are more important than eating meat or not? The problem is not having a bacon cheeseburger, it's having a huge bacon cheeseburger and a bucket of fries and a bucket of HFCS.
Yes, totally! Thank you for drawing attention to portion size! Thats a biggie! Also, we can aknowledge that eating red meat can increase our risk of developing type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and even some types of cancer, right?
AesSedai wrote: Americans and Brits are fat AF by global standards, so if one falls into that category, perhaps a brief pause to genuinely consider lifestyle choices is warranted before ramming that double bacon cheeseburger down your gullet. Swallowing a bit of ego > swallowing bacon wrapped bacon? Food for thought.
You're assuming that people care if they're "fat AF"? Especially when what you mean by that, for most people, is "a bit overweight", and no matter how much the dieters and gym bunnies throw hissies at people about it, most folk don't really consider a bit of a belly to be a national emergency, especially if it's a consequence of bacon wrapped bacon.
Nobody's advocating striving for obesity, but crikey health nuts don't half seem determined to suck the fun out of life for the rest of us. EDIT: Oh christ, here we go, it's Cancer O'Clock. You know, before you go fully down that rabbit hole, it's probably easier to just list the things that don't, in some way and under some circumstances, contribute towards the risk of some kind of cancer
AesSedai wrote: Americans and Brits are fat AF by global standards, so if one falls into that category, perhaps a brief pause to genuinely consider lifestyle choices is warranted before ramming that double bacon cheeseburger down your gullet. Swallowing a bit of ego > swallowing bacon wrapped bacon? Food for thought.
You're assuming that people care if they're "fat AF"? Especially when what you mean by that, for most people, is "a bit overweight", and no matter how much the dieters and gym bunnies throw hissies at people about it, most folk don't really consider a bit of a belly to be a national emergency, especially if it's a consequence of bacon wrapped bacon.
Nobody's advocating striving for obesity, but crikey health nuts don't half seem determined to suck the fun out of life for the rest of us.
The only thing I'm assuming is that people generally prefer being alive to being dead. Can you clarify a bit of belly as some point on the BMI so we can discuss this from an objective place? Im going to say a BMI of 40 or more is cutting your life short and before you die, you will suffer deleterious effects on you quality of life.
You are the worst poster I've ever seen on this site. Now I understand why you got banned at B&C. You make self righteous threads and posts, then cry when people take you up in debate or disagree. Your critical thinking is atrocious and your arguments constantly boil down to weak appeals to authority or ad hominem.
Also, repeating a statement does not add any weight to it.
AesSedai wrote: Americans and Brits are fat AF by global standards, so if one falls into that category, perhaps a brief pause to genuinely consider lifestyle choices is warranted before ramming that double bacon cheeseburger down your gullet. Swallowing a bit of ego > swallowing bacon wrapped bacon? Food for thought.
Meat doesn't really make you fat, though. It's all of the things that people eat with meat; refined wheat buns, French fries, corn syrup drinks, etc. Americans are fatter on average because they eat nutrition free poison.
Also, nothing is better than bacon, except bacon wrapped bacon.
Exactly. Bacon is one of the most nutrient rich meats pound for pound too.
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Azreal13 wrote: You know what might help your cause? Actually explaining the why of it not being obvious or true, rather than posting in a manner that's simply pissing people off and completely drowning any positive intent you might have originally held.
I need to know so that I can determine if I need to completely give up on flavor.
Nah, bro, you should be fine unless of course you have the palette of a four year old. Trust me, I have a four year old and sometimes eating veggies is tough for her.
Just veggies? I have a four year-old who eats yoghurt, bread, some fruit, and that's about it. Flat-out refuses to eat anything else, other than the occasional sweet.
My mom says it'll pass. I hope so...
Bacon is one of the most nutrient rich meats pound for pound too.
What..on...earth?? I guess you are being clever with your phrasing. You aren't advocating that bacon is healthy, I hope. While its true that bacon has a range of nutrients, it also has tons of saturated fat, sodium, nitrates, etc. If you care about your health, its best eaten in moderation. The unhealthy aspects more than negate the nutrients it contains. Id guess that people mainly eat bacon because it tastes great (imo) and a lot of people tend to focus on the short term in life and have little thought for the long-term consequences of their actions--colorectal cancer being a slow burn. Let's call a spade a spade.
Bacon is one of the most nutrient rich meats pound for pound too.
What..on...earth?? I guess you are being clever with your phrasing. You aren't advocating that bacon is healthy, I hope. While its true that bacon has a range of nutrients, it also has tons of saturated fat, sodium, nitrates, etc. If you care about your health, its best eaten in moderation. The unhealthy aspects more than negate the nutrients it contains. Id guess that people mainly eat bacon because it tastes great (imo) and a lot of people tend to focus on the short term in life and have little thought for the long-term consequences of their actions--colorectal cancer being a slow burn. Let's call a spade a spade.
I could probably stomach being vegetarian; I used to do it for a few weeks at a time when the girlfriend when veggie and I stayed with her. Quorn is sufficiently like a flavourless battery chicken that it can fill up nuggets or burgers and the difference be imperceptible; whilst their sausages are reasonably pleasant. She found out that she had a problem with getting iron out the veggie diet though despite trying quite hard; and the doctor recommended she went back to meat as a medical necessity (which she was quite sad about).
Given recent tech advances though, it's highly likely that in twenty years times vat grown meat will be a thing. So I'm essentially waiting for that to become a serious possibility; then I'll probably swap my meat-sourcing over to the new animal-free version. I don't have a massive hang-up on the moral aspect of meat-eating, and I normally source well enough I'm not overly worried about animal welfare; but if there's the choice between 'bacon with dead pig' and 'bacon with no dead pig', I'll pick the latter.
This morning Radio 4 had Martha Lane Fox going around San Francisco talking various tech entrepreneurs. One of them was a guy whose company "Finless Foods" is trying to vat grow salmon and tuna.
I do wonder what will happen to all the farm animals if the world ever does move to vat grown meat and fish.
I have a question for people who are vegans for ethical reasons (this doesn't apply to people who are on that diet for medical reasons, of which i know a few).
Do you hold the same standards when eating vegetables. funghi or insects (if you do, i know some don't and some do). I.e. if you choose to rip a plant out of the ground, or grind up insects to use in bread for example, do you not feel the same way as when eating meat? As surely you're still growing these organisms for your own consumption. Is it not inherently the same?
Y'know, I've heard some compelling arguments for Veganism before. I'm just a nipper compared to a lot of people in this thread, but I've heard the arguments too. Not just the health benefits and the ethical arguments either. Economically, switching to veganism as a species would save so much water, food and landmass that are currently used for livestock that we, as a species, would be far better off.
But, see, I never see vegans arguing that one. This thread has (perhaps predictably) run the usual trend: vegan tries to convert others, runs into resistance, becomes sanctimonious. Conversation spirals.
I'm not interested in veganism, personally. Like most others here, I don't care what anyone else eats, but cutting all animal products out of my life just doesn't appeal to me. It's a big sacrifice to change my lifestyle which ultimately wouldn't really benefit me. That is to say, I'm aware of the benefits and have chosen to pass on them.
However, I am curious about the benefits of BBQuary. Being a brit, there's not often excuse to BBQ, so health/flavour benefits of BBQuary are naturally rather exciting
Explain this to me then, if you would. If plants can't be exploited and do not feel pain (for the lack of a better term) why have they evolved numerous examples of defence over tens of thousands of years? We seen thorns, barbs, poisons, venoms etc. If plants are there to be eaten, why have they evolved these defences? There's even a poisonous tree in OZ: Excoecaria agallocha
I don't think vat grown is the answer. Because then there will be huge populations of cows and chickens that will need culling anyway. Its not like they're going to return to a feral existence.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: I don't think vat grown is the answer. Because then there will be huge populations of cows and chickens that will need culling anyway. Its not like they're going to return to a feral existence.
The real question, is how would we humanely deal with the tens of billions of livestock animals (93.7 million cattle and 8.5 billion chickens in the US alone) left after we all theoretically switch to Veganism? These animals wouldn't exist in such massive numbers in the wild. And we would then deal with the additional pollution put out by replacement products for feathers and leather.
Inquisitor Gideon wrote:I have a question for people who are vegans for ethical reasons (this doesn't apply to people who are on that diet for medical reasons, of which i know a few).
Do you hold the same standards when eating vegetables. fungi or insects (if you do, i know some don't and some do). I.e. if you choose to rip a plant out of the ground, or grind up insects to use in bread for example, do you not feel the same way as when eating meat? As surely you're still growing these organisms for your own consumption. Is it not inherently the same?
I hate when people use this argument. A living, breathing animal is hardly similar to a vegetable! You can make a bond with an animal, they clearly have a limited range of emotions and are a little more intelligent than a carrot. You can keep a pet pig but I have yet to see someone keep a pet potato...
Now as someone who drinks milk I am a bit of a hypocrite in that cows definitely don't have a good life while they are producing that but to me is is better than just straight up eating them. I make sure all my eggs are free run though, not only do they taste so much better and are generally larger, I hate the idea of thousands of chickens crammed together in such small compartments pooping on each other and living awful lives. I don't really care about insects but I do tend to avoid stuff made from them for the most part.
Inquisitor Gideon wrote:Explain this to me then, if you would. If plants can't be exploited and do not feel pain (for the lack of a better term) why have they evolved numerous examples of defence over tens of thousands of years? We seen thorns, barbs, poisons, venoms etc. If plants are there to be eaten, why have they evolved these defences? There's even a poisonous tree in OZ: Excoecaria agallocha
Seriously? What do you think fruit is if not a specific evolution in order for the plant to pollinate itself. Plants that develop defenses like thorns and poison did not come around because it felt pain but because it was the best way to ensure it could reproduce without being destroyed.
I will be the first to recognize that people who go around proclaiming that all life is precious are going a bit ott, we are humans and we gotta eat! You also have to recognize that there is a huge difference between complex animal life that can feel pain, form personal attachments, and be oh so fluffy compared to fruit and veggies.
Apologies for the rant but this argument really frustrates me! When brussel sprouts start screaming when they get roasted let me know and I'll switch to a diet consisting only of dirt and shadows
queen_annes_revenge wrote: I don't think vat grown is the answer. Because then there will be huge populations of cows and chickens that will need culling anyway. Its not like they're going to return to a feral existence.
The real question, is how would we humanely deal with the tens of billions of livestock animals (93.7 million cattle and 8.5 billion chickens in the US alone) left after we all theoretically switch to Veganism? These animals wouldn't exist in such massive numbers in the wild. And we would then deal with the additional pollution put out by replacement products for feathers and leather.
I think I would be fine with eating vat grown meat, seems like a pretty nifty way around the ethical situation.
I don't think anyone (other than one) in this thread is suggesting we stop eating all meat completely just that it wouldn't hurt to tone down the level at which we consume meat products. We have complete control over how much cows and chickens breed and could very easily slow their population growth down over the course of a couple of decades, no one is advocating we just stop eating meat and then immediately kill 10 billion animals to save some space!
The pollution point is interesting though. I wonder if producing faux leather and replacements for stuff like gelatin would be worse for the environment than all those fields of stinky cows?
Going vegan is really hard work. I would be surprised if 1 out of 10 people in this thread actually possess the discipline to reconfigure their diet in such a way. I wonder if some of the backhanded comments stem from awareness of this inadequacy. Veganism is too extreme for me, after trying it and failing years ago, vegans earned a new respect in my eyes. If the hard choices reflect ethical awarness all the better, even more respect.
Inquisitor Gideon wrote:Just sounds hypocritcal to me, that's all. You're placing different values on different forms of life just because it happens to be fluffier to you.
Vegetarians are natural hypocrites, we don't eat animals because we love 'em but happily drink their milk and eat their eggs! My point was just that the differences between intelligent animals and veggies are so many that it is a pretty unfair argument to make that we should treat everything equally. I doubt even the staunchest vegan sheds a tear when they cut their grass or trim their hedges for example...
AesSedai wrote:Going vegan is really hard work. I would be surprised if 1 out of 10 people in this thread actually possess the discipline to reconfigure their diet in such a way. I wonder if some of the backhanded comments stem from awareness of this inadequacy. Veganism is too extreme for me, after trying it and failing years ago, vegans earned a new respect in my eyes. If the hard choices reflect ethical awarness all the better, even more respect.
Yeah I tried going full vegan for a week and even that was tough. Making your own meals is easy enough once you get into the swing of things but the real hard part for me was going out with friends and finding that your food menu had shrunk by 90%. I totally get the backlash, trying to convince people to go a month without trousers would probably be better received
I guess that's why i can't take ethical vegetarians and vegans truly seriously. Far too much flip flopping about based on beliefs and ideals. I hope it works for you, but it's done nothing to give me any real inclination to try it.
Fair enough, I'm not out to guilt anyone into changing their lifestyle I just wanted to explain my reasoning for it since you asked.
liquidjoshi wrote: Y'know, I've heard some compelling arguments for Veganism before. I'm just a nipper compared to a lot of people in this thread, but I've heard the arguments too. Not just the health benefits and the ethical arguments either. Economically, switching to veganism as a species would save so much water, food and landmass that are currently used for livestock that we, as a species, would be far better off.
But, see, I never see vegans arguing that one. This thread has (perhaps predictably) run the usual trend: vegan tries to convert others, runs into resistance, becomes sanctimonious. Conversation spirals.
This is a much more interesting topic to discuss for sure and more productive also. I wish I could find the map of land usage in the states the showed up in this forum a few months back. The amount of farmland used for cattle is insane and the resources the animals consume even more so.
My stepson has been a hardcore vegan for about a decade now. He's been healthy, and doesn't spend a ton on food. He also has never felt the need to proselytize his lifestyle either, if he didn't come to stay with us now and then I imagine I'd have no idea what he ate. So it is possible to be a vegan without being a jerk.
This is not a lifestyle that I myself could live, however. I would be utterly miserable without steak. I understand that the beef I eat is doing enormous damage to the world we live in, but I guess I don't care enough; or at least I rationalize it in some morally indifferent way.
It is totally possible. There's a guy at work who's vegan and he gets no end of s**t for it from the rest of us, but I respect him because he doesn't lord it over everyone else or try to convert people.
This is a much more interesting topic to discuss for sure and more productive also. I wish I could find the map of land usage in the states the showed up in this forum a few months back. The amount of farmland used for cattle is insane and the resources the animals consume even more so.
However, a lot of the land used for grazing cattle is marginal land that can't be put to much use in other ways because it is not fertile enough for crops or desirable enough for Human habitation. If we stopped keeping animals entirely a lot of the world's landmass would suddenly become largely worthless. But overall I would say that we currently do dedicate too much land to livestock, which is damaging natural habitats. However, the underlying problem beneath is not the keeping of livestock itself, but rather the fact that the world is rapidly getting overpopulated.
liquidjoshi wrote: However, I am curious about the benefits of BBQuary. Being a brit, there's not often excuse to BBQ, so health/flavour benefits of BBQuary are naturally rather exciting
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbecue_in_North_Carolina, specifically the eastern NC style. The primary benefits are taste and spiritual correctness. Be sure not to confuse proper BBQ with that awful spicy ketchup garbage that western heretics call "BBQ" and often put on dead cows. That heresy is almost as sure a path to damnation as being a smug vegan.
How much of our meat production is for our pets? Or is there a good alt for them?
Just wondering - I know the PETA loons want to take them away from us but I assume that without meat production a number of animals will become quite scarrce if they are no use to us?
Man, the lack of honest engagement in this thread is crazy. I'm about one page of nonsense away from locking it.
I'm not arguing for or against vegans. I've known vegans. I eat meat. We've all heard the jokes:
How do you know someone's a vegan?
Don't worry, they'll flipping tell you.
(You can replace vegan with Crossfitter, runner, and a few other activities)
But if you're going to comment in this thread, either honestly engage or go visit Kilkrazy's thread on cheese.
Iron_Captain wrote:But overall I would say that we currently do dedicate too much land to livestock, which is damaging natural habitats. However, the underlying problem beneath is not the keeping of livestock itself, but rather the fact that the world is rapidly getting overpopulated.
A fact I already pointed out on page 2. Any efforts made to reduce livestock in favour of vegetarian diets without also controlling our population are at best a stop-gap measure.
And if we've gotten our act together enough to control our population, there's no reason we can't control it enough to be able to still have the occasional steak or bacon - even steaks and bacon without excessive animal suffering (the problem there being capitalist corporatism, not ecology).
So yeah, while I applaud the efforts of vegans to save the world, IMO they're at best misguided, at worst presenting a false solution to a very real problem.
daedalus wrote: Is BMI still the only standard, or is there any credence given to BMI adjusted by waist size?
I need to know so that I can determine if I need to completely give up on flavor.
Actually BMI is such a horrible standard that the Marines have stopped using it in favor of body fat ratio. The BMI scale at the low end is so tight that the difference between underweight and overweight is about 10 pounds. At the upper end of the scale that difference is 60 pounds. A 6'4" male at 220# is considered "Overweight", regardless of his fat ratio. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is considered to be morbidly obese according to his BMI alone.
daedalus wrote: Is BMI still the only standard, or is there any credence given to BMI adjusted by waist size?
I need to know so that I can determine if I need to completely give up on flavor.
Actually BMI is such a horrible standard that the Marines have stopped using it in favor of body fat ratio. The BMI scale at the low end is so tight that the difference between underweight and overweight is about 10 pounds. At the upper end of the scale that difference is 60 pounds. A 6'4" male at 220# is considered "Overweight", regardless of his fat ratio. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is considered to be morbidly obese according to his BMI alone.
Yeah, but Dwayne Johnson is almost at the point where he is so big that it is still unhealthy, even if it is muscle. That said, BMI is still garbage and is only useful for non athletes/weight lifters as a rough estimate.
daedalus wrote: Is BMI still the only standard, or is there any credence given to BMI adjusted by waist size?
I need to know so that I can determine if I need to completely give up on flavor.
Actually BMI is such a horrible standard that the Marines have stopped using it in favor of body fat ratio. The BMI scale at the low end is so tight that the difference between underweight and overweight is about 10 pounds. At the upper end of the scale that difference is 60 pounds. A 6'4" male at 220# is considered "Overweight", regardless of his fat ratio. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is considered to be morbidly obese according to his BMI alone.
Yeah, but Dwayne Johnson is almost at the point where he is so big that it is still unhealthy, even if it is muscle. That said, BMI is still garbage and is only useful for non athletes/weight lifters as a rough estimate.
How so?
No snark, no ulterior motive, just curious.
daedalus wrote: Is BMI still the only standard, or is there any credence given to BMI adjusted by waist size?
I need to know so that I can determine if I need to completely give up on flavor.
Actually BMI is such a horrible standard that the Marines have stopped using it in favor of body fat ratio. The BMI scale at the low end is so tight that the difference between underweight and overweight is about 10 pounds. At the upper end of the scale that difference is 60 pounds. A 6'4" male at 220# is considered "Overweight", regardless of his fat ratio. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is considered to be morbidly obese according to his BMI alone.
Yeah, but Dwayne Johnson is almost at the point where he is so big that it is still unhealthy, even if it is muscle. That said, BMI is still garbage and is only useful for non athletes/weight lifters as a rough estimate.
How so?
No snark, no ulterior motive, just curious.
Officially he is 6'5" 260#, which is down from his peak of, I think 285, so his current bmi is @31 which still puts him in obese territory. At his age, 46, it becomes harder to maintain muscle and can lead to other health issues, like heart issues. Look at how the bodies of Stallone, Schwarzenegger, and others have changed over the years.
Back on topic:
Before making ANY major changes to your diet, even for a month, it is best to consult with your doctor and any other professionals they may suggest. This would fall under the heading of what the OP would list as "Educate yourself".
AesSedai wrote: The only thing I'm assuming is that people generally prefer being alive to being dead.
Be careful with that assumption. I'd rather die in my fifties living a happy life instead of living to ninety being miserable eating nothing but vegetables.
(A point to consider: I'm 47 now...)
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Kilkrazy wrote: This morning Radio 4 had Martha Lane Fox going around San Francisco talking various tech entrepreneurs. One of them was a guy whose company "Finless Foods" is trying to vat grow salmon and tuna.
I do wonder what will happen to all the farm animals if the world ever does move to vat grown meat and fish.
They get slaughtered and buried. The whole point of raising farm animals is for slaughter and eating. Farmers aren't going to pay to keep vast numbers of farm animals alive if there's no payoff for them.
I suppose the milk cows and laying hens will be kept, but that's about it.
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liquidjoshi wrote: Y'know, I've heard some compelling arguments for Veganism before. I'm just a nipper compared to a lot of people in this thread, but I've heard the arguments too. Not just the health benefits and the ethical arguments either. Economically, switching to veganism as a species would save so much water, food and landmass that are currently used for livestock that we, as a species, would be far better off.
Well, yes... and no.
Yes, a lot of land that could be used for growing edible plants is used for raising animals instead, for less nutritional yield. However, there's also a lot of land that is not useful for growing edible plants, but CAN be used for raising various animals. Here in the central valley of New Mexico we're in a high plateau desert. Get very far away from the Rio Grande and there's not enough water for farming, but you can still raise cattle. There's quite a lot of land like that around the world. So while there's a morsel of truth to your statement, it's not the WHOLE truth.
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Commander Cain wrote: This is a much more interesting topic to discuss for sure and more productive also. I wish I could find the map of land usage in the states the showed up in this forum a few months back. The amount of farmland used for cattle is insane and the resources the animals consume even more so.
Just make sure you separate 'land that can be farmed but is instead used for animals' and 'land that can't be farmed and is only useful for grazing'.
Yeah there is a bunch of land that is pretty much useless on this continent other than for cattle but we are still pumping a heap of freshwater and grains to those spots to feed the animals which I think is the main issue.
And you are making it sound like the whole planet is going to go vegan instantly meaning we have to kill all the extra animals but I do not think we are ever going to cut out meat entirely from our diets. I bet that as meat alternatives grow in popularity then we will see a steady decrease in cow/pig/chicken populations over the next few decades . Perhaps hundreds of years from now these animals will be confined to just petting zoos and the occasional farmhouse but nothing as drastic as you are describing.
daedalus wrote: Is BMI still the only standard, or is there any credence given to BMI adjusted by waist size?
I need to know so that I can determine if I need to completely give up on flavor.
Actually BMI is such a horrible standard that the Marines have stopped using it in favor of body fat ratio. The BMI scale at the low end is so tight that the difference between underweight and overweight is about 10 pounds. At the upper end of the scale that difference is 60 pounds. A 6'4" male at 220# is considered "Overweight", regardless of his fat ratio. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is considered to be morbidly obese according to his BMI alone.
Yeah, but Dwayne Johnson is almost at the point where he is so big that it is still unhealthy, even if it is muscle. That said, BMI is still garbage and is only useful for non athletes/weight lifters as a rough estimate.
How so?
No snark, no ulterior motive, just curious.
Too which one, BMI or Dwayne Johnson? The Dwayne one is simpler, there's simply a limit to how big people can get (it varies based on the person ofc) even if it muscle mass without the extra weight having an impact on their health. Factor in that he's likely been on some kind of PEDs for the last decade and the unknown risks of that.
Bran Dawri has been the only poster that has hit the bullseye.
I am a farmer.
I have spent well over a decade with Vegetarians and their friends and have learned to defend myself from aggressive attack. Most of which are based partially on misconceptions.
I ethically OPPOSE any type of vegetarianism. As Commander Cain has pointed out truthfully, most of our herd land is useless for much of anything else. AND we do use vast resources to maintain those herds. However 90%+ vegi-whatevers will use lame in false claims that we are wasting said land and should use it to grow veggies.
Some facts.
Vegetarians rarely survive on vegetables....in fact many it is a tiny portion to their diet.
Bacon has all 21 Amino acids in 1 slice. Almost no plant material has more than 1 or 2. AND in NO place on the planet was all available from plant sources.
Research has shown Broccoli and brassica plants can feel pain for up to 28 days after being cut.
90% of food volume in the NA continent does NOT require pollination. So if it comes down to bees or not....my Vegetable farm is on the cutting block...it is simple numbers people. [yeah we covered overpopulation already....looking at you non-western world]
GMO is everywhere. Even the EU that bans GMO has like 44 GMO approved items. Your sugar cane...gmo....your sugar beets...gmo....your Corn sugars....gmo. So guess what.....you eat sugar....in ANYTHING...except in rare circumstances....you eat GMO
GMO is the ONLY possible way to feed our growing population
SUSTAINABLE FARMING.....real sustainable....requires FIVE times the land mass to even have a hope to replicate conventional farming production. If you cant math it up.....that means having a much larger human footprint on the planet....much larger. {a poor path to choose for everyone}
Ive employed hundreds of hard workers.....Some of my nicest and most enjoyable to socialize with are your vegans, vegetarians, regular health nuts, body fitness guys, etc. YOU know what they all have in common.....NONE of them can output as much as your average junk food guy/gal. Yes ....they can put out about 80 hours a week and once in a while 90....but ask them to do that for several weeks....and NONE have been able to. I have handsful of junk food guys who do it easily.
My vegetarian EX, her vegetarian friends and some of my vegetarian kids have health issues. I blame their diet. My son grew up that way. He changed to a normalized diet. He is one of the healthiest in our family. The people who said I ate crap....are now in health problems. Most teenagers cannot keep up with me.
EATING is not as important as what you do with your body. We sleep, We sit while we eat, we sit while we drive, we sit at work, we come home and sit and watch tv. It is rare for the average person not to be a 20 hour sedentary beluga whale. 2 hours at a gym a day will not fix that.
You can put the best fuel and fluids in your car.....if you drive it like crap you will tear it up and ruin it. Same with your body. Keep moving...and it wont matter much what you eat.
Try not to eat too much acid.....keep balance as others have said and DONT STRESS.....that is worse than any other thing.
If you STRESS over your diet....cant help ya....and not much probably will....those things will hurt your body way more than any good you think you are doing.
That's quite a post! I'm on a phone so can't easily address all your points but you said some very interesting stuff. Regarding sustainable farming taking 5x more land do you think that difference would be negligible if we converted land for cattle (that was useable) to instead host crops?
I have often wondered how my fitness levels would change if I started adding a little meat to my diet, not sure how my body would react to the change though!
I am not an expert on sustainable farming...but it is all about different crops and crop rotation and to some extent animal manure. So animal byproducts are needed. I am sure you can find a model somewhere that doesn't need it....but I doubt that all junk land is in areas where you can find all the components for a good sustainable system.
weather, land quality, water, resources, etc.
Drive through the vast plains out west and you could not really grow any grain. even the scrub grasses rarely get over a foot or 2 high.
I had a minister from the Midwest give a sermon how the Ukraine has 6 feet of topsoil. He grew up in an area where 6 inches was norm. He did not understand how we could farm with our 1" of topsoil. I think there are like 23 good areas on the planet identified with good growing soils. The USA has like 20% of them. They are limited and they are not everywhere.
In my opinion, most people in North America do eat far too much meat and far too much cheap meat by that. The average North American diet and lifestyle is hardly healthy. We could certainly cut the average North American diet of 70% of its meat and replace it vegetables, fruits and nuts and it would probably far better. Plus we could also improve a lot the life and death of our cattle. Right now, the living conditions of a lot of those animals is abyssal to save cost.
About the animal farms. I am against cruel animal farms as much as a heated PETA crusader. It is just that local farms get swept up in the rhetoric.
I have only seen photos of big corporate farms....never in person so I don't know much.
The farms out west have herds in useless land, The cattle ive seen in the south/Florida is pretty much useless swampland {and they look horribly underfed!!} The farms around the north east and great lakes area tend to have herds on hillsides and in the woods. NONE of that is very good for farming even if it is fertile.
Now Dairy farms tend to place herds on fairly nice flat and fertile land. So I cannot defend those practices. I am not familiar with day to day care and treatment/production of those animals. I do think they try to give them easy non calorie draining areas so more can be focused on milk.
Same with the bigger farms. You do not want your herds moving around on hills and such as they will burn thru too much energy moving their large sizes around and cut into the profits. So I imagine that big corporate farms have those numbers in mind and use the best land for their herds to maximize calories.
Dairy farms tend to rotate their fields between two crops, usually corn and alfalfa, hay, and grazing land. This keeps the land from burning out from overuse on one crop and usually provides more than enough of the materials they need to keep their herds fed and such. They also tend to have areas that are not suitable for crops due to steep slopes, rocky terrain, or being part of the local flood plain.
Kroem wrote: It would be interesting to find out exactly what vegans eat! I couldn't go without milk in my tea or an egg at breakfast though...
I think something like 'meat free mondays' is much more reasonable, and would be better for forming longer term habits.
A true vegan doesn't just eliminate meat from their diets, it's EVERYTHING even peripherally animal related. Not only that, but they are supposed to not wear anything made with animal byproducts or anything even inconveniences an animal in the process. THIS is why I am not afraid in the least to call any vegan I meet wearing leather ANYTHING a hypocrite.
The quote says to eat vegan because of a love of animals...I love cows!! And pigs! And chickens!! Especially when they lay between a pair of buns and with peppers and vinegar rubbed all over them. Mmmmmmm. Meat. Vegans are evil.
epronovost wrote: In my opinion, most people in North America do eat far too much meat and far too much cheap meat by that. The average North American diet and lifestyle is hardly healthy. We could certainly cut the average North American diet of 70% of its meat and replace it vegetables, fruits and nuts and it would probably far better. Plus we could also improve a lot the life and death of our cattle. Right now, the living conditions of a lot of those animals is abyssal to save cost.
This is my opinion as well. I work swing shift and some weeks I don't eat meat except for weekends - people can get by healthily on a lot less meat, but I've seen people struggle with their nutrition on a vegatarian diet, so I think a omnivorous diet is still the best option for most people.
Definitely meat is too cheap and this causes a lot of food waste as a result, which is tragic considering how much resources go into making meat.
A true vegan doesn't just eliminate meat from their diets, it's EVERYTHING even peripherally animal related. Not only that, but they are supposed to not wear anything made with animal byproducts or anything even inconveniences an animal in the process. THIS is why I am not afraid in the least to call any vegan I meet wearing leather ANYTHING a hypocrite.
Watch out, there is such a thing as synthetic leather, it's almost impossible to differenciate from ral leather at the naked eye and far, far more popular then real leather as real leather cost a fortune. If you have a leather jacket that didn't cost a few hundred dollars, you have a jacket in synthetic leather not a real one. Don't insult people unless you are sure it's real leather. The same goes for furr, the vast mojority of it is fake since real furr costs a fortune.
A true vegan doesn't just eliminate meat from their diets, it's EVERYTHING even peripherally animal related. Not only that, but they are supposed to not wear anything made with animal byproducts or anything even inconveniences an animal in the process. THIS is why I am not afraid in the least to call any vegan I meet wearing leather ANYTHING a hypocrite.
Watch out, there is such a thing as synthetic leather, it's almost impossible to differenciate from ral leather at the naked eye and far, far more popular then real leather as real leather cost a fortune. If you have a leather jacket that didn't cost a few hundred dollars, you have a jacket in synthetic leather not a real one. Don't insult people unless you are sure it's real leather. The same goes for furr, the vast mojority of it is fake since real furr costs a fortune.
Actually, fake leather is super easy to spot, as it doesn't smell of leather. Real leather can also vary wildly in price, depending in the weight and quality of the hide used, and can be had relatively cheaply, especially in smaller items like belts or shoes, to the point where using artificial product isn't worthwhile.
There's actually more of an issue with fur. Many items sold as fake fur are, in fact, real pelts farmed in some pretty horrendous conditions and sold into the industry as fake, so even the manufacturers and retailers don't know. It's nearly impossible to distinguish between them casually either. There's no distinctive smell or anything like leather, one has to either examine the fibers microscopically or examine the base of the hair where it attaches and know what you're looking for.
Speaking of synthetic leather, yal see that crazy fungus leather made of kombucha?
i recall seeing a yt vid about it and man the initial prototype looks like something out of a horror film.
the garments made of it look like tanned human skin :X
also how far deep do vegans go concerning animal products?
i used to weld and we always put on our leather welding gear. would a buildings, structures and equipment that were welded be considered non vegan? lots of industry works use leather gloves for various reasons.
I tend to avoid clothes with leather in just because I do not like the smell that they have. A few coats I have spotted at the mall have coyote fur in them but other than that it is mostly synthetic stuff these days.
Not using anything with animal products in is a tricky path to follow though I bet! So many items have had something to do with animals even if it is just using a weird glue as a binding agent.
Not using anything with animal products in is a tricky path to follow though I bet!.
Strictly speaking, even some plant products, including what I'd imagine are fairly important components of a vegan diet like avocados and almonds, are not technically vegan.
That's because bees don't naturally pollinate the plantations as they're too big, so hives are moved around in trucks to "force" the bees to work the needed areas. By, an admittedly fairly strict and literal, definition, the bees are being exploited by man to produce that food, rendering it non-vegan.
It isn't an equation. Most people just don't feel like they are doing anything wrong at all (or what they do wrong is excused by whatever rationalization).
They don't 'do just enough' to achieve some sort of fake balance, which then allows them to do as they see fit.
They just start with doing as they see fit, and work on any necessary rationalizations afterwards, if they feel like they've crossed whatever invisible lines their particular moral system has.
Warping this all around to not eating meat is just navel gazing of the most self-indulgent sort.
I'm not sure the 'if you're not vegan enough then it's a waste of time and you're a hypocrite' position is anything more than handwaving. There aren't many people out there thinking 'I'd love to be vegan but manuring and forced bee migration means I can't even eat vegan root vegetables or avocados so why try?'. It's an excuse and nothing more.
The assertion that someone cares more about developing world exploitation of humans than developed world animals holds more weight but I think it's still usually deployed as a justification for not doing something rather than a reason to do something else.
No. Generally, if you eat meat, you do so because you want to and not because your heirarchy of moral acceptabilities prioritises attention to something other than animals.
However, that's fine! There's no fundamental problem with doing what is convenient for you or your family - whether that's for reasons of time, financial abilities, health reasons etc.
'Shut up vegan, I love bacon' is juvenile and tedious, but it's every bit as valid as citing the complexities of really living life free of animal exploitation, and usually far more honest.
You know that something is wrong when people say that something is ''too cheap''...
If it is cheap, it is affordable for people, even poor people. For me it is a good thing.
I eat meat twice a day.
No. Generally, if you eat meat, you do so because you want to and not because your heirarchy of moral acceptabilities prioritises attention to something other than animals.
No, see, this is still navel gazing. Generally people eat meat because human are omnivores and there isn't anything wrong with that. It isn't a question of 'moral hierarchies.' It's a matter of biology.
No. Generally, if you eat meat, you do so because you want to and not because your heirarchy of moral acceptabilities prioritises attention to something other than animals.
No, see, this is still navel gazing. Generally people eat meat because human are omnivores and there isn't anything wrong with that. It isn't a question of 'moral hierarchies.' It's a matter of biology.
I'm not sure if you're trying to find something to disagree with here because you aren't refuting anything in my post, nor disagreeing directly with anything I said.
Insofar as they have inherited eating patterns derived from a combination of ability, availability, and cultural proclivities, yes people eat meat because they're omnivores, but not in the sense that they make specific choices based on their species' ability to ingest and digest food types. They make those choices on the basis of what they want to eat - and that's fine.
I went on a first date last night and when we got to the restaurant it turned out she was vegan. I still ordered chicken, she didn't make a fuss. Maybe it's only internet vegans who bang on about it.
It's a first date, dude. As time goes on and she makes her attempt to mold you into something she wants a little more, THEN you'll get "meat is murder" sung to you. Repeatedly. Personal experience on this one.
Riquende wrote: I went on a first date last night and when we got to the restaurant it turned out she was vegan. I still ordered chicken, she didn't make a fuss. Maybe it's only internet vegans who bang on about it.
Yeah I've never met the stereotype vegan in person and I have a lot of vegan friends, they are all great people, cheap dates as well!
godardc wrote: You know that something is wrong when people say that something is ''too cheap''...
If it is cheap, it is affordable for people, even poor people. For me it is a good thing.
I eat meat twice a day.
The issue arises when the low price is arrived at by making significant compromises in quality or welfare. If a meat product can only be sold because the animals are kept in horrendous conditions and live a life of fear and pain and the subsequent contents of that meat product are made with the absolute dregs of the carcass in order to hit the target price, then it's too cheap.
Riquende wrote: Maybe it's only internet vegans who bang on about it.
IMO it's not surprising that you'll hear all about the crusading vegans who make a point of evangelising to anyone who'll listen because that's what they do, but those who're quiet about it and just get on with it generally you wont hear from because they wont mention it unless necessary, add into the mix a degree of exaggeration for effect for good measure.
It's not unique to veganism by any stretch, pretty much any kind of dietary or other lifestyle choice will have a generally irritating few amongst their number who will introduce that fact quicker than they'll introduce themselves and try to convert you to the cause.
I was a strict vegetarian for more than a few years at one point, but I generally kept that to myself unless I was invited to someone's for a meal or someone offered meat-products, in which case it was only reasonable IMO to explain that I wasn't being rude or difficult and where possible pre-warn them (I never expected special treatment either, I always made it clear I was happy to eat whatever vegetables were being served, just without the meat).
A true vegan doesn't just eliminate meat from their diets, it's EVERYTHING even peripherally animal related.
From my understanding, it's not that strict. Veganism AFAIK is a self imposed restriction on eating or using animal products, so whilst a "True" vegan shouldn't wear leather (Although I'd argue that it's still possible to follow a Vegan diet and wear leather without necessarily being a hypocrite), eating fruit or vegetables that are grown with a certain amount of other animal involvement should be OK (The example of using bees to pollinate plantations for example), although if an individual were to avoid those too they'd probably be going above-and-beyond as far as veganism went. Otherwise pretty much everything is off limits.
That said, I did and still do take issue with the "I'm a vegetarian, except for...." crowd. If what follows that statement is any form of animal life you're not a vegetarian, you're just a picky omnivore. If you're a pescetarian that's fine, but call yourself that rather than claiming to be a vegetarian because fish aren't plants.
godardc wrote: You know that something is wrong when people say that something is ''too cheap''...
If it is cheap, it is affordable for people, even poor people. For me it is a good thing.
I eat meat twice a day.
It is just that you are not familiar with the economic concept of externalities.
So what are the consensus of using animal products that have lived and died naturally. So you see that fresh killed deer on the road?
Is that off limits? Or is it just going to waste away there to propagate parasites and diseases.
Your dog dies......can I use his fur to make a useful item. What about his skull, etc.
And if you did not drive or use transportation that deer wouldn't have been road kill and if you did not train that pet dog to be conditioned to behave beneficial to humans......
It seems that the vegan argument can have a host of variable boundries.
It seems that the vegan argument can have a host of variable boundries.
The same can be said about our boundaries about killing other humans. Or any prohibition of a specific behavior. We all agree that some behaviors and actions shouldn't be tolerated, but the devil is always in the detail. Ethical vegans (those who adopted a vegan lifestyle for ethical consideration) aren't a monolithic group either.
I'd never turn to Veganism for even 1 day.
Heck with the price of being a Vegan you can sod right off.
I can give myself 2 meals a day for less than £1.50
simonr1978 wrote: That said, I did and still do take issue with the "I'm a vegetarian, except for...." crowd. If what follows that statement is any form of animal life you're not a vegetarian, you're just a picky omnivore. If you're a pescetarian that's fine, but call yourself that rather than claiming to be a vegetarian because fish aren't plants.
For non-Brits, Greggs is a UK-wide chain of baker shops which sells typically British fast food items such as steak bakes, sausage rolls, and beef pasties.
I always thought stuff like that was like alcohol free beer.. What's the point? If I'm not drinking alcohol why would I want something that tasted like beer? I'd just drink Coke.
One of the things I miss about living in the UK is Quorn, a lot of their products were super tasty but it is not available in Canada.
And meatless meats are oftentimes a decent substitute for the real thing, plus you can go to a BBQ and not look like a fool eating nothing but a hotdog bun with ketchup on it
Just... read the ingredients of some of those meatless meats. Some of them - the cheaper ones - read like a chemistry experiment instead of food.
Which is where the 'vegetarian diets are expensive' arguments come from. Sure, you can get cheap vegan stuff... but it's not exactly healthy for you. The all-natural vegan stuff tends to be significantly more expensive than it's non-vegan equivalents.
Vulcan wrote: Just... read the ingredients of some of those meatless meats. Some of them - the cheaper ones - read like a chemistry experiment instead of food.
Which is where the 'vegetarian diets are expensive' arguments come from. Sure, you can get cheap vegan stuff... but it's not exactly healthy for you. The all-natural vegan stuff tends to be significantly more expensive than it's non-vegan equivalents.
Yeah. Even the "cheap" stuff is about twice as expensive per weight as cheap meat would be, and probably a little scarier ingredient-wise.
Outside of meat, if you're looking at the fake substitutions for butter or cream cheese, they're about double the price of what the real one costs and often in slightly smaller packages.
You CAN do vegan food on the cheap, but it's going to look like beans, vegetables and carbs carbs carbs.
Vulcan wrote: Just... read the ingredients of some of those meatless meats. Some of them - the cheaper ones - read like a chemistry experiment instead of food.
Which is where the 'vegetarian diets are expensive' arguments come from. Sure, you can get cheap vegan stuff... but it's not exactly healthy for you. The all-natural vegan stuff tends to be significantly more expensive than it's non-vegan equivalents.
Yeah. Even the "cheap" stuff is about twice as expensive per weight as cheap meat would be, and probably a little scarier ingredient-wise.
Outside of meat, if you're looking at the fake substitutions for butter or cream cheese, they're about double the price of what the real one costs and often in slightly smaller packages.
You CAN do vegan food on the cheap, but it's going to look like beans, vegetables and carbs carbs carbs.
But if you are a vegan why bother with all the imitation stuff.
Vulcan wrote: Just... read the ingredients of some of those meatless meats. Some of them - the cheaper ones - read like a chemistry experiment instead of food.
Which is where the 'vegetarian diets are expensive' arguments come from. Sure, you can get cheap vegan stuff... but it's not exactly healthy for you. The all-natural vegan stuff tends to be significantly more expensive than it's non-vegan equivalents.
Yeah. Even the "cheap" stuff is about twice as expensive per weight as cheap meat would be, and probably a little scarier ingredient-wise.
Outside of meat, if you're looking at the fake substitutions for butter or cream cheese, they're about double the price of what the real one costs and often in slightly smaller packages.
You CAN do vegan food on the cheap, but it's going to look like beans, vegetables and carbs carbs carbs.
To be honest, though, if you take meat, fish and dairy out of anyone's diet then what is left will look like beans, vegetables and carbs.
daedalus wrote: Personally, I think that the diet would probably get boring super quick without anything resembling dairy or meat.
I think that's the best part about the diet. I'm not vegan by a long stretch but I love how creative proper vegan food is, and I can enjoy it without actually being vegan (which seems to upset a lot of them). People should be encouraged to go vegan by being shown how awesome vegan food is for a food lover (I have some friends that do this), rather than showing that you can be a vegan by eating the same crap as everyone else but without the meat (I've got a vegan friend who does this - it's all vegan pretend meat junk food, it looks awful and must cost a fortune).
I'd love to see more "this is how awesome veganism is" rather than shame or "just try it".
I try to go for a low waste / environmental impact lifestyle - local foods, less travel, less plastic and so on, but beyond going for the occasional vegetarian/vegan meal I'm not that bothered about the lifestyle.
To be honest, though, if you take meat, fish and dairy out of anyone's diet then what is left will look like beans, vegetables and carbs.
Point taken. I meant to suggest that the difference between doing it on the cheap and otherwise was that expensive things such as the fake meat and fake cheese looks like meat and cheese, more or less, regardless of actual composition, and less like the cheap option, which literally looks like beans, vegetables, and carbs.
daedalus wrote: Personally, I think that the diet would probably get boring super quick without anything resembling dairy or meat.
I think that's the best part about the diet. I'm not vegan by a long stretch but I love how creative proper vegan food is, and I can enjoy it without actually being vegan (which seems to upset a lot of them). People should be encouraged to go vegan by being shown how awesome vegan food is for a food lover (I have some friends that do this), rather than showing that you can be a vegan by eating the same crap as everyone else but without the meat (I've got a vegan friend who does this - it's all vegan pretend meat junk food, it looks awful and must cost a fortune).
Yeah, the girlfriend nails it sometimes and winds up with really spectacular stuff that I do enjoy eating. A lot of times though she winds up eating what is by all accounts cardboard or rubber to me. She expresses a weird notion that she has more variety NOT eating animal products, but I can't really understand that line of thinking that less options = more variety. Maybe it's that needing to get creative that you talk about? Honestly, there's more than enough food I've never tasted that I'm not worried about needing to go to such great lengths.
There are also conflicting reports of health concerns regarding thyroid disorders and soy heavy diets, of which a fake food vegan diet consists predominantly. If not already for the taste, that keeps me far away from it as well.
I'd love to see more "this is how awesome veganism is" rather than shame or "just try it".
that nonsense. That's more than enough downside for me.
