EPT*While veganism is word that means much more than just a diet for the context of this discussion we will sticking purely to the intake of animal products.*
Within the last month I have radically changed my diet. I was raised a typical southern boy. I hunted, ate lots of meat, and drank my milk with every meal like I was told. I never gave a second thought to the consumption of meat or animal products as it was how I was raised.
Within the past few years I have watched many documentaries on the food industry. Everything ranging from GMO food to the industrial meat farms. To put it quickly and simply, the more I learned about the health, ethical, and environmental consequence of the typical American diet I could no long stay inactive. Below I will quickly cover the three things above.
Health
While there are many different studies which cover the relationship between animal products and various disease I will stick to the "mother of them all": The China Study. It is the most comprehensive study of nutrition there has been thus far. Here are the 8 principles that the book covers:
1.Nutrition represents the combined activities of countless food substances. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
2.Vitamin supplements are not a panacea for good health.
3.There are virtually no nutrients in animal-based foods that are not better provided by plants.
4.Genes do not determine disease on their own. Genes function only by being activated, or expressed, and nutrition plays a critical role in determining which genes, good and bad, are expressed.
5.Nutrition can substantially control the adverse effects of noxious chemicals.
6.The same nutrition that prevents disease in its early stages can also halt or reverse it in its later stages.
7.Nutrition that is truly beneficial for one chronic disease will support health across the board.
8.Good nutrition creates health in all areas of our existence. All parts are interconnected.
How the study was done was quite simple. They went into many small and rural china towns. They studied their diet and the existence (if any) of various diseases. The results are quite shocking
A good summary can be read here: http://tctutoring.net/pdf/ChinaStudy.pdf
Also I will post the "10 Point Cheat Sheet" in spoilers
+ Show Spoiler +
1. American health statistics are scary. You may feel fit as a fiddle, but the country is unwell. Almost a third of adults over 20 are obese; one out of thirteen people have diabetes; and heart disease kills one out of every three Americans. We also pay more for our health care than any other country, and we don’t have better health to show for it.
2. Animal protein promotes the growth of cancer. The book author T. Colin Campbell, PhD., grew up on a dairy farm, so he regularly enjoyed a wholesome glass of milk. Not anymore.
3. Pesticides are gross, but none switch on cancer like poor nutrition. The food you eat affects the way your cells interact with carcinogens, making them more or less dangerous. “The results of these, and many other studies, showed nutrition to be far more important in controlling cancer promotion than the dose of the initiating carcinogen.”
4. The study findings are bulletproof. After years of controversial lab results on animals, the researchers had to see how they played out in humans. The study they created included 367 variables, 65 counties in China, and 6,500 adults (who completed questionnaires, blood tests, etc.). “When we were done, we had more than 8,000 statistically significant associations between lifestyle, diet, and disease variables.” In other words, there’s no arguing with the findings, Meat Council of America. Sorry.
5. The results are simple: Eat plants for health. “People who ate the most animal-based foods got the most chronic disease. People who ate the most plant-based foods were the healthiest.”
6. Heart disease can be reversed through nutrition. Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr., M.D., a physician and researcher at the best cardiac center in the country, The Cleveland Clinic, treated 18 patients with established coronary disease with a whole foods, plant-based diet. Not only did the intervention stop the progression of the disease, but 70 percent of the patients saw an opening of their clogged arteries. Dr. Dean Ornish, a graduate of Harvard Medical School, completed a similar study with consistent results.
7. Carbs are not the enemy. Highly-processed, refined carbohydrates are bad for you. But plant foods are full of healthy carbs. Research shows that diets like the Atkins or South Beach can actually cause dangerous side effects. While they may result in short-term weight loss, you’ll be sacrificing long-term health.
8. Plants are powerful. It’s not just cancer and heart disease that respond to a whole foods, plant-based diet. It may also help protect you from diabetes, obesity, autoimmune diseases, bone, kidney, eye, and brain diseases.
9. You don’t have to tailor your diet for specific health benefits. Eating healthy can seem segmented—broccoli will prevent breast cancer, carrots are good for eyes, did you get enough vitamin C today? “Nutrition that is truly beneficial for one chronic disease will support health across the board.”
10. Plants do it better. “There are virtually no nutrients in animal-based foods that are not better provided by plants.” Protein (YES, PROTEIN!), fiber, vitamins, minerals—you name it, they’ve got it, and the health benefits.
2. Animal protein promotes the growth of cancer. The book author T. Colin Campbell, PhD., grew up on a dairy farm, so he regularly enjoyed a wholesome glass of milk. Not anymore.
3. Pesticides are gross, but none switch on cancer like poor nutrition. The food you eat affects the way your cells interact with carcinogens, making them more or less dangerous. “The results of these, and many other studies, showed nutrition to be far more important in controlling cancer promotion than the dose of the initiating carcinogen.”
4. The study findings are bulletproof. After years of controversial lab results on animals, the researchers had to see how they played out in humans. The study they created included 367 variables, 65 counties in China, and 6,500 adults (who completed questionnaires, blood tests, etc.). “When we were done, we had more than 8,000 statistically significant associations between lifestyle, diet, and disease variables.” In other words, there’s no arguing with the findings, Meat Council of America. Sorry.
5. The results are simple: Eat plants for health. “People who ate the most animal-based foods got the most chronic disease. People who ate the most plant-based foods were the healthiest.”
6. Heart disease can be reversed through nutrition. Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr., M.D., a physician and researcher at the best cardiac center in the country, The Cleveland Clinic, treated 18 patients with established coronary disease with a whole foods, plant-based diet. Not only did the intervention stop the progression of the disease, but 70 percent of the patients saw an opening of their clogged arteries. Dr. Dean Ornish, a graduate of Harvard Medical School, completed a similar study with consistent results.
7. Carbs are not the enemy. Highly-processed, refined carbohydrates are bad for you. But plant foods are full of healthy carbs. Research shows that diets like the Atkins or South Beach can actually cause dangerous side effects. While they may result in short-term weight loss, you’ll be sacrificing long-term health.
8. Plants are powerful. It’s not just cancer and heart disease that respond to a whole foods, plant-based diet. It may also help protect you from diabetes, obesity, autoimmune diseases, bone, kidney, eye, and brain diseases.
9. You don’t have to tailor your diet for specific health benefits. Eating healthy can seem segmented—broccoli will prevent breast cancer, carrots are good for eyes, did you get enough vitamin C today? “Nutrition that is truly beneficial for one chronic disease will support health across the board.”
10. Plants do it better. “There are virtually no nutrients in animal-based foods that are not better provided by plants.” Protein (YES, PROTEIN!), fiber, vitamins, minerals—you name it, they’ve got it, and the health benefits.
There is also a little absurdity involved in our consumption of cow's milk. I mean we literally are consuming a substance made for an infant cow. Does that many any sense? But of course for humans to get that milk we have to take it away from the infant cows (which are sold as veal regardless). Milk is something we were made to consume as a baby from our mother during a very special stage of our development and not our entire life. Especially from a whole different species of animals!
Also, something to keep in mind, an egg is simple a hen's "period".
.Ethical Reasons
There is a wealth of information to be found out about the industrial meat industry. Too much for me to type, but I will share some resources that cover the basics.
One of the most famous websites (and short video) is find at meat.org. The video is called Meet Your Meat and covers the treatment of the most common animals raised purely for slaughter. Every second which passes by 300 animals are killed in the US for human consumption.
Now as I stated before I used to hunt. By no means am I about to join the Animal Liberation Front, but in no way, shape or form is the treatment of animals anywhere remotely near ethical. Animals getting their neck slit while still being alive, putting live pigs in boiling water, throwing live male chicks in the garbage, castrating bulls with no anesthesia, etc. Not even to mention the horrible living conditions where some animals can't even turn around or lie down. There are many other videos like the one above which highlight these standard industry practices. Animals can be happy and sad. They can feel pain just like we do, and have a strong desire just to stay alive.
Environmental
"According to Environmental Defense, if every American skipped one meal of chicken per week and substituted vegetarian foods instead, the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more than half a million cars off U.S. roads."
At a global scale, it has been estimated that livestock contribute, directly and indirectly, to about 9% of total anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions, 37% of methane emissions (which is far worse than carbon dioxide environmentally) and 65% of nitrous oxide emissions (per the book Livestock's Lone Shadow)
The sustain global meat demands we are literally killing the planet. The rainforests are being burned down to provide more cattle grazing room. We have to create more room to grown grain for the animals (which if everyone adopted a mostly plant-based diet we could feed everyone in the world, but that's a different topic!). If every other people group had the consumption levels as American's we literally would need about 4 more Earths, and we are exporting the American diet all over the world.
Then their is the problem with what to do with animal waste. This has been the cause of many water contamination leading to dirty drinking water to fish kills.
This is a very brief and informal post about a very complex and important topic. This isn't meant to explain every little detail. I ask you read and watch the little bit of information I provide, but don't stop their. If after all this research you still want to eat meat, then go for it. I am not here to tell you what to think, eat, etc. I don't think it is morally wrong to eat meat, but I would say it is immoral to participate in the modern meat industry by using its products.
This is what I want to discuss. The impact of meat production and consumption on the human body and the environment.
Also, please excuse any misspellings and grammatical errors. I am currently at work, and have been writing this hastily throughout the day.
