veganism

[Organic Revolution]

Veganism (What, Why, Animals, environment and health)

Veganism - a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as possible and practical, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, the animal kingdom for food, clothing, or any other purpose. In dietary terms it refers to the practice of dispensing with all animal produce - including flesh, fish, fowl, eggs, (non-human) animal milks, and their derivatives, with the taking of honey being left to individual conscience.

Why Vegan?

Veganism, often the next step from vegetarianism, is having a cruelty-free lifestyle. Being vegan provides many benefits to animals' lives, to the environment, and to our own health ... through a healthy diet and lifestyle.

Animals

Despite the common belief that drinking milk or eating eggs does not kill animals, commercially-raised dairy cows and egg-laying chickens, whether factory-farmed or 'free range,' are slaughtered when their production rates slowdown.

Environment

Animal agriculture takes a devastating toll on the earth. It is an inefficient way of producing food (if you can call it food), since feed for farm animals requires land, water, fertilizer, and other resources that could otherwise have been used directly for producing human food.

Health

Eating animal fats and proteins has been linked to heart disease, colon and lung cancer, osteoporosis, diabetes, kidney disease, hypertension, obesity, and a number of other debilitating conditions. Cows' milk contains ideal amounts of fat and protein for young calves, but far too much for humans.

[LSD]

Veganism, often the next step from vegetarianism, is having a cruelty-free lifestyle.

No, a "cruelty-free lifestyle" means not being cruel, not abstaining from meat.

You want to improve the treatment of animals? Fine, but you personally not eating meat isn't going to change a thing.

The whole "not participating" argument is and alwyas has been complete bullshit. It's an excuse for out of mind thinking. You want to change something? Change it!

...but not through veganism. You see, even if you do manage to inspire a massive boycott, you know "voting withy your dollars", you're just transfering the problem, not solving it. If you force farmers to spend more on animal treatment, they'll find a way to cut costs somewhere else, most probably with "human resources". That means making the lives of their underpaid often illegal employees even more miserable then they already are.

If you make it impossible for farmers to be cruel to animals, they will be cruel to someone else. It's the capitalist way. If you seriously want to change the way a capitalist industry operates you need to change capitalism. Petty sub-reformism doesn't cut it.

Not to mention even that this entire argument is built upon a faulty premise. Namely that all slaughtering techniques are "cruel". While a good deal of the meat industry is indeed terrible to animals (thanks, again, to capitalism), it's still a grossly incorrect generalization.

If your goal is to eliminate "cruelty" to animals, why not encourage the eating of "free range" meats? At least that way you provide farmers with a viable alternative other than getting out of the whole business and killing their stock.


Despite the common belief that drinking milk or eating eggs does not kill animals, commercially-raised dairy cows and egg-laying chickens, whether factory-farmed or 'free range,' are slaughtered when their production rates slowdown.

So then, logically, the best thing to do for these animals is to stop eating milk and eggs and slow down production rates. :rolleyes:

What the hell did you think was going to happen to all these animals when their products are no longer demanded?


Animal agriculture takes a devastating toll on the earth. It is an inefficient way of producing food (if you can call it food), since feed for farm animals requires land, water, fertilizer, and other resources that could otherwise have been used directly for producing human food.

Except that's never going to happen under capitalism.

If the land isn't used for raising animals, it will be used for something else profitable. Feeding the poor certainly doesn't qualify.


Eating animal fats and proteins has been linked to heart disease, colon and lung cancer, osteoporosis, diabetes, kidney disease, hypertension, obesity, and a number of other debilitating conditions.

And soy has been linked with pancreatic cancer; fruit sugars with hypertention, migraine, and diabetes; and many "natural" plants are linked with cancers.

And speaking of osteoporosis and malnutition, Children 'harmed' by vegan diets (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4282257.stm)

Life's tough, life's hard, and yeah, a whole lot of pleasurable things can kill you one way or another. But if it gives you a little joy and let's you experience happiness, it's worth it. Straight-edge ascetic vegan puritanism may give me an extra "10 years", but I don't think that they're ten years I'll want.

So excuse me if I go pick up some ribs tonight. My colon may not enjoy it, but I sure as fuck will!

[poster_child]

sometimes, things are more important than your pleasure. capitalism is fun for those on the good end of it.

the whole point of being a revolutionary is seeing what it's like for the other guy who is being oppressed, and realizing that something needs to be done.

this is how I see the vegetarian argument.

[LSD]

sometimes, things are more important than your pleasure. capitalism is fun for those on the good end of it.

So is murder, what's your point?

We're not talking about doing things to other people, we're talking about doing it to yourself. Eating meat doesn't "hurt" your health (if it even hurts it at all), it hurts mine. And as such there is no moral justification in preventing me from maximizing my pleasure by eating meat if I so choose.

Now if you want to be "healthy" and not eat meat, jolly for you, but I reject that I should surrender one of the few pleasures in this life out of a nebulous desire for a "longer life".

Again, if I am not enjoying myself, I have no desire for that life!


the whole point of being a revolutionary is seeing what it's like for the other guy who is being oppressed, and realizing that something needs to be done.

Or, more realistically, seeing that you are oppressed and that something needs to be done.

Precious few revolutions are won by altruists.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

I am actually a vegetarian for my own personal reasons, but I completely agree with what LSD has said. It's ridiculous to try to push your lifestyle on another person.

The most ironic part, is that I hear alot of this from the "lifestyle anarchists," who are so adiment about opposing all authority are actually being authoritarian by trying to force veganism on other folks!

The arguments made here for veganism, like those elsewhere are specious. They are attractive, but they don't really "stand up."

As LSD pointed out, things like soy have been proven to cause problems just as meats have, and -- more importantly, it's naive to think that if by some miracle "boycott," farmers stopped farming animals that they would begin growing vegetables for the poor in their place(not to mention what this would mean for so many farm workers!).

[black]

Originally posted by "LSD"
No, a "cruelty-free lifestyle" means not being cruel, not abstaining from meat.

No, cruelty-free involves not being cruel. Eating, consuming meat and contributing to the production of it by definition implies the taking of lives (en masse) of causing pain and suffering...

It is cruel.


you personally not eating meat isn't going to change a thing.

In your lifetime you will not eat (based on the average American)

15 cows, 24 pigs, 900 chickens, and 12 sheep.

Not to mention 1000 pounds of other assorted animals.

You will not be living on the death and misery of others, you will not be buying into a cycle of profit over life. And you will be, if you eat a wide variety of foods (and this is shit easy), healthy if not healthier than other people.


What the hell did you think was going to happen to all these animals when their products are no longer demanded?

What pish. Everyone's not going to go veg*an over night, its not like one day everyone will stop eating meat (unfortuneately) and oh, what will we do with all these millions of animals we were going to destroy for their carcasses? In that fanciful situation you could provide for them all, as we had been, and let them live out their lives without breeding them. Ofcourse that's stupid, because it wont happen. As more people switch to a meat-free, cruelty-free diet you'll find the relience on the meat industry decreasing accordingly.


soy has been linked with pancreatic cancer; fruit sugars with hypertention, migraine, and diabetes; and many "natural" plants are linked with cancers.And speaking of osteoporosis and malnutition, Children 'harmed' by vegan diets

:rolleyes: The first case is scare mongering, disputed by countless other studies (sources?) and thousands of years of people consuming soya, often as a staple food of their diet with no harmful effects...compared to meat, where the majority of studies do not support a diet of more than 1/2 portions of meat a day and even then its been disputed whether that is well-suited to the human digestive system and even necessary. The second makes me laugh, and the third is pure bullshit. I've been a vegetarian all my life, vegan for nearly five years and my whole family converted after me. My sister has a baby, raised as a vegan likewise and that baby is not only healthy but better off with the diet he has compared to other children. His weight and growth are perfectly on target, he has shown advanced development in some cases and is fed on locally grown, organic foods (as well as being breast fed).

That study not only by countless other nutritionists and dieticians but even the USDA's own guidelines. Funnily, it "was partially supported by the National Cattleman's Beef Association [and] was conducted in a poor African community that was malnourished". Nice to know.


seeing that you are oppressed and that something needs to be done.

And realising that "you" and "they" aren't all that different, that your happiness depends on theirs and that we are part of an interdependent system. Compassion along with solidarity, self-help along with helping those who are weaker are fundamental parts of a revolutionary.



opposing all authority are actually being authoritarian by trying to force veganism on other folks!

You wouldn't say it was a tad "authoritarian" killing another animal for your palate, when you don't even need to?

[black]

BTW, an article a month later by the BBC says something different (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4389837.stm). And that's not even veganism, it's raw food veganism.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

You wouldn't say it was a tad "authoritarian" killing another animal for your palate, when you don't even need to?

I'm not an anarchist, so I'm not "anti-authoritarian" to the extent that they fetishize it. But no I wouldn't call killing another animal authoritarian, at all, in any form. Neither would Webster (http://webster.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=authoritarian&x=0&y=0). Would you?


And realising that "you" and "they" aren't all that different, that your happiness depends on theirs and that we are part of an interdependent system. Compassion along with solidarity, self-help along with helping those who are weaker are fundamental parts of a revolutionary.

This is laughable.

[Organic Revolution]

do you see me forcing you into a vegan diet.

[LSD]

No, cruelty-free involves not being cruel. Eating, consuming meat and contributing to the production of it by definition implies the taking of lives (en masse) of causing pain and suffering...


Not nescessarily. Death does not have to be painful. It is certainly possible to kill animals without causing significant pain. Do it quickly enough and they don't feel anything.


And you will be, if you eat a wide variety of foods (and this is shit easy), healthy if not healthier than other people.

But I'll be miserable.

If I gave up sex, I'd probably be healthier too. Certainly a vastly decreased risk of contracting STDs, and many studies have shown that castration lenghtens lives ...but that's never going to happen.

Why would I want a longer life, if I'm not enojoying it? I would much rather have 60 years that I love than 80 that I suffer through.

So I drink, I smoke, I fuck, I do drugs, I eat meat.

Again, puritanism may be healthier, but it's a lot less fun.


What pish. Everyone's not going to go veg*an over night, its not like one day everyone will stop eating meat (unfortuneately) and oh, what will we do with all these millions of animals we were going to destroy for their carcasses? In that fanciful situation you could provide for them all, as we had been, and let them live out their lives without breeding them.

Oh yeah, that's going to happen. :rolleyes:

"Live our their lives"? Try mass slaughter.


Ofcourse that's stupid, because it wont happen. As more people switch to a meat-free, cruelty-free diet you'll find the relience on the meat industry decreasing accordingly.

...and?

Let's do some basic economic theory here, what happens when demand drops?


I've been a vegetarian all my life, vegan for nearly five years and my whole family converted after me. My sister has a baby, raised as a vegan likewise and that baby is not only healthy but better off with the diet he has compared to other children. His weight and growth are perfectly on target, he has shown advanced development in some cases and is fed on locally grown, organic foods (as well as being breast fed).

That's lovely, tell me another.

Just let me know when you want to get back to actual facts, not that your family anecdotes aren't entertaining, of course. :)


And realising that "you" and "they" aren't all that different, that your happiness depends on theirs and that we are part of an interdependent system.

Nonsense.

Do you really think that the Petrograd workers were worrying about "them" and "us"? Do you think that the Cuban revolutionaries were evaluating "happiness dependencies"?

Revolution is self-motivated. Sure, there's often an element of compassiion, especially in the "higher-ups" and the "leadership". But the rank and file, the actual revolutionaries, they are fighing for themselves, their friends, and their families.

They are most certainly not fighting for chickens and gophers!


do you see me forcing you into a vegan diet.

No, although you clearly are advocating it. Likewise, I am merely pointing out my rejection of Veganism as a lifestyle choice, but if you want it, have it.

I have neither the right nor the desire to infringe on your right to control your own diet.

I only wish I could say the same for TAL advocates. <_<

[Organic Revolution]

Well hes what i call a vegfascist... but to each his own i suppose.

[Elect Marx]

Originally posted by Lysergic Acid [email protected] 31 2005, 11:20 AM
So I drink, I smoke, I fuck, I do drugs, I eat meat.

Again, puritanism may be healthier, but it&#39;s a lot less fun.

Oh come on LSD; I may agree with many of your points but the whole puritanism rhetoric is udder bullshit. You argue well, so I think you would do better to just lay off the propaganda lines.

I do have a drink here and there, also I take some risks in my life for practicality, basically those to keep my morale high enough to go on living but really, I am a rather strait edge guy :P I don&#39;t do the absolutist thing and I don&#39;t tell others what to do but obviously diluting yourself and deteriorating your heath isn&#39;t inherently productive; that is pure reason, not a puritanical agenda.

[LSD]

Oh come on LSD; I may agree with many of your points but the whole puritanism rhetoric is udder bullshit. You argue well, so I think you would do better to just lay off the propaganda lines.

It&#39;s rhetorical hyperbole, a perfectly valid argumentative tool.

I&#39;m not saying that veganism is puritanism or puritanical, merely that puritanism, like veganism, is a healthier lifestyle choice. My point being that healthier is not synonymous with better. Puritanism was a relevent example where that is demonstrated to be obviously true.


I don&#39;t do the absolutist thing and I don&#39;t tell others what to do but obviously diluting yourself and deteriorating your heath isn&#39;t inherently productive

Not inherently no, but then that&#39;s why it&#39;s called a side-effect. After all, nobody drinks to hurt themselves&#33;

I&#39;m not sure what "diluting yourself" means, but no one deteriorates their health for the sake of deteriorating their health. It&#39;s just that in life, it so happens that many independently pleasurable activities are unhealthy.

In those cases, their "productivity" must be judged based on what one gets from it along with what one loses.

I don&#39;t eat meat to hurt my colon, but if my colon suffers minor damage, I&#39;m willing to live with it.

[Elect Marx]

Originally posted by Lysergic Acid [email protected] 31 2005, 10:03 PM

Oh come on LSD; I may agree with many of your points but the whole puritanism rhetoric is udder bullshit. You argue well, so I think you would do better to just lay off the propaganda lines.

It&#39;s rhetorical hyperbole, a perfectly valid argumentative tool.

I&#39;m not saying that veganism is puritanism or puritanical,


I don&#39;t do the absolutist thing and I don&#39;t tell others what to do but obviously diluting yourself and deteriorating your heath isn&#39;t inherently productive

Not inherently no, but then that&#39;s why it&#39;s called a side-effect. After all, nobody drinks to hurt themselves&#33;
Okay; well, I thought you where really trying to equate the two. Sorry to jump to conclusions but some people here like to call puritanism&#33; whenever people argue about views on different substances and forget to make valid arguments. I do think that diverts attention from the bulk of your argument though.


merely that puritanism, like veganism, is a healthier lifestyle choice. My point being that healthier is not synonymous with better. Puritanism was a relevent example where that is demonstrated to be obviously true.

I would disagree; people of the puritan mold seem mentally unstable and the physical health of mentally ill people can often fail accordingly.


I&#39;m not sure what "diluting yourself" means, but no one deteriorates their health for the sake of deteriorating their health. It&#39;s just that in life, it so happens that many independently pleasurable activities are unhealthy.

I am talking about escapism, as in doping your problems away but really substances (including food) are only a fractions of the ways to aviod reality.

Many pleasurable activities are healthy too; so it isn&#39;t about avoiding pleasure.


In those cases, their "productivity" must be judged based on what one gets from it along with what one loses.

True&#33;


I don&#39;t eat meat to hurt my colon, but if my colon suffers minor damage, I&#39;m willing to live with it.

Me too but I do sometimes avoid unhealthy foods to lead a more productive life.

[poster_child]

Do you really think that the Petrograd workers were worrying about "them" and "us"?

Revolution is self-motivated

and how did it work out for them?

[LSD]

and how did it work out for them?

Pretty damn good.

Do you see a Czar in Russia today?

Sure, in a few years, certain elements would co-opt their revolution and reverse their accomplishments, but that is entirely irrelevent to the question of launching a successful revolution itself.

Remember, I can point to virtually every successful revolution in history for examples of self-interested revolutionary masses. You have yet to demonstrate a single instance in which a revolution was primarily motivated by altruistic concern for others.


I would disagree; people of the puritan mold seem mentally unstable and the physical health of mentally ill people can often fail accordingly.

:lol:

Perhaps, but I don&#39;t think that it&#39;s reasonable to say that puritanism causes mental instability and accordingly it&#39;s still valid to day that puritanism, whatever the general characteristics of its average adherents, is still a healthier alternative than a more standard lifestyle.


Me too but I do sometimes avoid unhealthy foods to lead a more productive life.

Well, of course. I&#39;m not suggesting that one eat copoous amounts of Uranium-232, merely that increased health in and of itself is not a sufficient argument for veganism.

And that the potential harmful effects of meat is not enough to convince me not to eat it.

[Elect Marx]

Originally posted by Lysergic Acid [email protected] 1 2005, 12:29 PM
:lol:

Perhaps, but I don&#39;t think that it&#39;s reasonable to say that puritanism causes mental instability and accordingly it&#39;s still valid to day that puritanism, whatever the general characteristics of its average adherents,


Me too but I do sometimes avoid unhealthy foods to lead a more productive life.
I think a study would prove that puritanism coincides with deteriorating mental health and from there, harming others. Just look at the sexual repression and self degradation... that is a recipe for pedophiles, serial killers and worse.


is still a healthier alternative than a more standard lifestyle.

I don&#39;t know the statistics but if you are the one killed by a mental breakdown; you lose out on health benefits ;)


Well, of course. I&#39;m not suggesting that one eat copoous amounts of Uranium-232, merely that increased health in and of itself is not a sufficient argument for veganism.

And that the potential harmful effects of meat is not enough to convince me not to eat it.

Right but eating it moderately makes sense and by extension, so does cutting it out. Still, this doesn&#39;t work for everyone, namely the working class people that cannot afford the time/effort. Cutting meat out of your diet wont wholly avoid the harmful chemicals in food either.

[Vallegrande]

Veganism - a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as possible and practical, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, the animal kingdom for food, clothing, or any other purpose. In dietary terms it refers to the practice of dispensing with all animal produce - including flesh, fish, fowl, eggs, (non-human) animal milks, and their derivatives, with the taking of honey being left to individual conscience.
How old is the idea of veganism? I cant think of any culture that didn&#39;t eat some kind of meat. For instance, season change meant a change in eating habit, such as animals and insects instead of vegetables. Over time we have developed an intrinsic relationship to them. In these current times, that relationship has been fucked up by business profits.


Despite the common belief that drinking milk or eating eggs does not kill animals, commercially-raised dairy cows and egg-laying chickens, whether factory-farmed or &#39;free range,&#39; are slaughtered when their production rates slowdown.
However I dont think that means to stop eating meat, but the way we eat meat. There are piles of meat rotting right now, from large meat houses, and that&#39;s what takes up most of the land&#33;&#33; Small farmers dont do it that way, and I support them.


Animal agriculture takes a devastating toll on the earth. It is an inefficient way of producing food (if you can call it food), since feed for farm animals requires land, water, fertilizer, and other resources that could otherwise have been used directly for producing human food.
There are sustainable ways to coexist with animals. It&#39;s not the small farmers who are taking up all the land and devastating it.



Eating animal fats and proteins has been linked to heart disease, colon and lung cancer, osteoporosis, diabetes, kidney disease, hypertension, obesity, and a number of other debilitating conditions. Cows&#39; milk contains ideal amounts of fat and protein for young calves, but far too much for humans.
That is a false report you just gave. What&#39;s the reason why animal fats and proteins are linked to heart disease? It is the way the animals are raised and how their products are processed. Pasture fed cows produce much healthier milk whereas factory farm grain fed cows dont. In raw, high-vitamin butter oil, there is an X-factor and a Wulzen factor, which are both very important for the body. There is no plant that produces the X or Wulzen factor. However, the butter and milk you are talking about, that which most people buy today, is unhealthy, and highly carcinogenic.

[TheReadMenace]

I don&#39;t know about you guys, but it is the WORST when I get to the foamy stuff at the very bottom of the chocolate or vanilla soymilk.

But other than that, I would call it a gift from heaven if I believed in God :lol:


Andrew

[Anarchist Freedom]

I know that this may be a stupid question to ask but. What do vegans think of animals eating other animals? Like a lion eating an elk or a bear eating a fish?

[rioters bloc]

Originally posted by [email protected] 31 2005, 07:44 PM
The most ironic part, is that I hear alot of this from the "lifestyle anarchists," who are so adiment about opposing all authority are actually being authoritarian by trying to force veganism on other folks&#33;
i didn&#39;t feel organic was trying to impose anything on anyone, just throwing up an alternative



i&#39;m not a vegan or even vegetarian

but i have been thinking about it a lot lately, reading up on it, weighing up the pros and cons

when it comes down to it though i don&#39;t want to change my diet unless i start to feel very morally opposed to consuming meat

i think it undermines the entire concept of veganism if i don&#39;t truly believe in it and am only doing it because i think thats what i SHOULD be doing and thats what i SHOULD be eating

plus i don&#39;t like most vegetables

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

I didn&#39;t say he was, I said lifestyle anarchists tend to... are you calling him a lifestyle anarchist? :lol:


plus I don&#39;t like most vegetables

That pretty much settles it :)

[rioters bloc]

haha im trying to force myself to like vegetables...apparently theyre good for me or something :P

[poster_child]

you&#39;re right.. I can&#39;t think of any successful revolutions that were by altruists. But I can name 1 revolutionary: Che

If we could have only seen his revolution...


Pretty damn good.

hmm.. so I do agree the revolution was successful, but the regime was not. I didn&#39;t work out pretty damn good for the people. Sure, the Czar was gone, but the people had a whole bunch of new problems, Stalin for one.

[LSD]

you&#39;re right.. I can&#39;t think of any successful revolutions that were by altruists. But I can name 1 revolutionary: Che

Guevara was a revolutionary, but individual revolutionaries do not make revolutions, they help them.

If the Cuban people had not been motivated by material conditions to revolt, all of Guevara&#39;s "altruism" would have meant nothing.


hmm.. so I do agree the revolution was successful, but the regime was not.

Of course not. But the advent of Leninist dictatorialism has nothing to do with whether or not the original revolution of 1917 was successful.

By any definition, it was.

[poster_child]

If the Cuban people had not been motivated by material conditions to revolt, all of Guevara&#39;s "altruism" would have meant nothing.

Regardless, he still was one.

But yes, your argument does make sence about the 1917 revolution. Maybe it wasn&#39;t the best way to agrue... but I just meant that sure, you like to eat meat. It tastes good, it&#39;s protein, yadda yadda, but given the current situation of the meat industry, is it best to eat meat?

[Elect Marx]

Originally posted by [email protected] 3 2005, 01:21 AM
given the current situation of the meat industry, is it best to eat meat?
I would say that it depends on the danger that meat poses. How much damage does this do to people? That said, this is a vegan thread, not vegetarian :P

Obviously, the part of the working class that is health and/or politically conscious, should not be spending a disproportionately high amount of their money on meat-supplement products if this does not substantially benefit them. Putting your cause into poverty is not progress and avoiding meat products is not going to make a significant difference unless there are enough people to change the system by their numbers anyway; organize, don&#39;t cannibalize&#33;

[rioters bloc]

had a weird bus trip today, i think i thought more than i ever have in 20 minutes. mostly about reconciling anarchism and religion, but also about vegetarianism [mainly cos i was listening to propagandhi&#39;s Nailing Descartes To The Wall- (Liquid)Meat Is Still Murder, and because pretty much everyone ive met at uni is vegetarian and have discussed the benefits of it with me]

anyway i decided to become vegetarian [not vegan though. i don&#39;t think i could be vegan and still be healthy because i dont eat that many vegetables.]

and im going to try very very hard to stick to it. like i said heaps of my friends are, so it shouldnt be too hard really. wish me luck ;)

[Elect Marx]

Originally posted by rioters [email protected] 7 2005, 02:35 AM
and im going to try very very hard to stick to it. like i said heaps of my friends are, so it shouldnt be too hard really. wish me luck ;)
At least you have a support network ;)

Hope it works well for you.

[Dark Exodus]

Originally posted by organic [email protected] 31 2005, 03:47 AM
Veganism (What, Why, Animals, environment and health)

Veganism - a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as possible and practical, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, the animal kingdom for food, clothing, or any other purpose. In dietary terms it refers to the practice of dispensing with all animal produce - including flesh, fish, fowl, eggs, (non-human) animal milks, and their derivatives, with the taking of honey being left to individual conscience.

Why Vegan?

Veganism, often the next step from vegetarianism, is having a cruelty-free lifestyle. Being vegan provides many benefits to animals&#39; lives, to the environment, and to our own health ... through a healthy diet and lifestyle.

Animals

Despite the common belief that drinking milk or eating eggs does not kill animals, commercially-raised dairy cows and egg-laying chickens, whether factory-farmed or &#39;free range,&#39; are slaughtered when their production rates slowdown.

Environment

Animal agriculture takes a devastating toll on the earth. It is an inefficient way of producing food (if you can call it food), since feed for farm animals requires land, water, fertilizer, and other resources that could otherwise have been used directly for producing human food.

Health

Eating animal fats and proteins has been linked to heart disease, colon and lung cancer, osteoporosis, diabetes, kidney disease, hypertension, obesity, and a number of other debilitating conditions. Cows&#39; milk contains ideal amounts of fat and protein for young calves, but far too much for humans.
Oh noes, will the cute little chickens and cows and pigs be hurt if I have a bacon and egg sarnie?

We have canines for a reason, man has hunted for a very, very long time. And we should not stop eating animals becuase of some new form of delusional thinking

Also, the last paragraph seems a little strange, people who have a vegen diet are less likely to have these diseases, so this is a reason to go vegen correct? Yet for some reason I can&#39;t shake the feeling that these same vegens will strongly oppose any research involving animals even if it is to cure the said diseases...

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I just like eating meat, and no prosletysing vegan is going to change that.

[Black Dagger]

Ditto, i dont really enjoy eating many veges either except if they&#39;re in a curry or something where they&#39;re more texture than taste... like onions or capsicum. Ooh but i like chilis, do they count as veges?

[poster_child]

We have canines for a reason, man has hunted for a very, very long time. And we should not stop eating animals becuase of some new form of delusional thinking

Actually, humans have canines that do not even compare to carnivores. We actually have MOLARS that are meant to chew plants. Humans are not fit to hunt animals in the natural world, physically. We do not have sharp teeth, claws or any of that stuff.

[rioters bloc]

Originally posted by Black [email protected] 8 2005, 08:07 AM
Ditto, i dont really enjoy eating many veges either except if they&#39;re in a curry or something where they&#39;re more texture than taste... like onions or capsicum. Ooh but i like chilis, do they count as veges?
i LOVE chilis

www.pepperfool.com

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Originally posted by [email protected] 8 2005, 03:57 AM

We have canines for a reason, man has hunted for a very, very long time. And we should not stop eating animals becuase of some new form of delusional thinking

Actually, humans have canines that do not even compare to carnivores. We actually have MOLARS that are meant to chew plants. Humans are not fit to hunt animals in the natural world, physically. We do not have sharp teeth, claws or any of that stuff.
But we are not herbivores either - consider the appendix, which in herbivores is larger and serves to break down cellulose, while in humans it&#39;s just a useless piece of flesh that could kill you.

[Dark Exodus]

Originally posted by [email protected] 8 2005, 03:57 AM

We have canines for a reason, man has hunted for a very, very long time. And we should not stop eating animals becuase of some new form of delusional thinking

Actually, humans have canines that do not even compare to carnivores. We actually have MOLARS that are meant to chew plants. Humans are not fit to hunt animals in the natural world, physically. We do not have sharp teeth, claws or any of that stuff.
But we do actually have have canines even if they arent as large as dedicated carnivores and we can easily digest meat. We are omnivores.

[Vallegrande]

Our canines have become smaller, but there are still people out there that have the pronounced canines, such as Indonesia or Africa. Ours have become smaller due to our lack of nutrient rich foods, from processed foods.

People need to learn the history of animal fats. Cows have been fucked around with our hormone treatment, pesticides, pasteurization, etc. Thats why the statement that animal fats is linked to cancer and heart disease is actually true. On the other side of this, people who are eating dairy without these substances are actually much healthier. However, we dont really know because there is no study on people consuming pasture fed beef or raw milk.

I can see why vegan is one approach to this problem. Vegans have a hard time though, trying to get alternatives from their ancestral diet. Whatever the choice, I suggest avoiding soy products, as many vegans use this. Processed soy releases MSG, a natural defense mechanism, so many vegans who use this are susceptible to thyroid malfunctions. Maybe baby soy or something, but overall it is not as great as Americans have thought.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

Originally posted by [email protected] 8 2005, 07:37 PM

I can see why vegan is one approach to this problem. Vegans have a hard time though, trying to get alternatives from their ancestral diet. Whatever the choice, I suggest avoiding soy products, as many vegans use this. Processed soy releases MSG, a natural defense mechanism, so many vegans who use this are susceptible to thyroid malfunctions. Maybe baby soy or something, but overall it is not as great as Americans have thought.
I thought MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) was a flavour enhancer?

[Vallegrande]

I thought MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) was a flavour enhancer?
Yes, I take back what I said of MSG as a natural defense mechanism. It is an amino acid, but it is freed after being processed. It is the &#39;free glutamic acid&#39; that is the most tasty yet deadly, and it comes from hydrolyzed vegetable protein like soy. People just dump loads of that in the foods they cook at restaurants, and that&#39;s why I distrust any place to eat out.

I remember my friends or family would eat the &#39;organic&#39; tofu, I just didn&#39;t realize that this processed soy contained this free amino acid, which is toxic to our bodies. Most soy products are like this, except fermented soy sauce is actually ok because the glutamic acid is not free anymore.

[TheReadMenace]

[...]udder bullshit[...]


Hahaha, how fitting&#33;


:lol:
Andrew

[tantric]

(uh, can a vegan baby breastfeed?)

you are all missing the obvious point.

there is not enough food in the world. period. if everyone on earth is to receive enough food to live and be healthy, in a way that is sustainable, that food will be vegetarian.

not eating meat *drastically* reduces your global footprint. it is the A#1 thing you can do to ease off the earth.

http://ecofoot.org/

btw, humans are not really capable of chasing down and killing large herbivores without technology, but they are capable of raping, killing and torturing each other. in all likelihood, they ate much more carrion than fresh meat - which would have been raw, of course. nevertheless, what pretechonological humans are evolutionarily suited for is irrelevant: they are extinct. if you really want to base your diet on this pretext, however, feel free chew on the roadkill.


"most people on the planet eat beans and rice,
they can&#39;t afford meat or they think cows are nice.
about table manners don&#39;t believe all they told ya
i eat with my fingers like an african soldier"
-spearhead

veggies for the masses, dammit&#33;

[LSD]

there is not enough food in the world. period.

Actually, there is.

The problem is distribution, not production. And, by the way, we have not even come close to maxing out production.

Of course, If the neo-luddite "preservationist" crowd has its way, we never will... <_<


if everyone on earth is to receive enough food to live and be healthy, in a way that is sustainable, that food will be vegetarian.

It will be mostly "vegetarian", yes, but not entirely.

That is, we all eat mostly "vegetarian", since most of what we eat is not meat. But we are still able and always will be able to eat some meat as well.

Will the average first worlder have to put up with less meat in their diet? Probably. It depends on population levels and production levels.

After all, it is certainly concievable that we will develop more productive methods of raising stock. Certainly that&#39;s the direction we&#39;ve been heading in for over a thousand years. It&#39;s logical to predict that we will continue the trend of increased efficiency.

Further more, if we are talking about a hypothetically "free" world in which equality of diet is even an issue, then population growth will probably have leveled. Indeed slowing reproduction is probably a prerequisite for such a society.

If not, then at the very least it will be an inevitable byproduct.

Either way, there&#39;s no way that a functioning socialistic world community will maintain present population conversion figures -- unless some way of accomodating it is found, of course.

All of this, of course, is moot anyways, since we&#39;re not in that society and by all indications not anywhere near it.

So the real question is can and should we eat meat now. What effect does out eating meat have now.

The answer, byt the way, is negligable.


not eating meat *drastically* reduces your global footprint. it is the A#1 thing you can do to ease off the earth.

I don&#39;t know if it&#39;s "A#1" or not, but I do know that in the context of the world that most of us here are living in, it&#39;s ineffectual.

"reduce our global footprint"?

Sorry, but my "footprint" is about the size of tom thumb&#39;s, and it ain&#39;t cattle that are fritzing the environment.

You want to fix ecological problems caused by capitalism? Fix capitalism. Eliminating an industry isn&#39;t going to cut it.

If we stop wasting resources on raising animals, we&#39;d waste it on something else. As long as the socio-political system is underpinned by an economic model predicated on maximizing local short-term gains, the environment will always be forfeit.

Remember, veganism isn&#39;t anti-capitalist, it&#39;s just anti-meat. It just redirects funds and bolsters a different market, one which, by the way, is just as exploitive and oppressive as the meat industry.

[Latifa]

there is not enough food in the world. period. if everyone on earth is to receive enough food to live and be healthy, in a way that is sustainable, that food will be vegetarian.

No, that really isn&#39;t true. There&#39;s plenty of food, meat and otherwise for everyone.


At the moment I just eat what tastes good without exception.

[Vallegrande]

Actually, most of our food can come from insects and plants, as the insects take up a hell of a lot of space. Now of course, many of us dont want to eat them or think its disgusting, and we havent even begun to understand why eating little critters is important. That&#39;s the way I would do it, I would eat more insects, plants, and drink the milk from my happy cow who grazes on land, eating occassional insects, and then, giving fertilizer back to the land. Goes to show that the cow is not ruining the land, and I can get my &#39;meat&#39; from the fast growing grubs.

Dont forget the beautiful mushrooms that grow out of cow dung ;)

[poster_child]

Sorry, but my "footprint" is about the size of tom thumb&#39;s

Perhaps YOUR global footprint is small. The entire continent&#39;s is NOT. You are a memeber of North America, and you can change this. If everyone&#39;s attitude was that "my footprint won&#39;t do anything", then nothing would ever get better. In fact, if would get worse. Take responsiblity for your actions.

[LSD]

You&#39;re missing the point, ecological "footprints" aren&#39;t an individual problem, they&#39;re an institutional one.

Meat isn&#39;t the problem, capitalism is.

Even if all of North America stopped eating meat, it wouldn&#39;t make a difference. It would just mean that McDonalds with drop its prices and market to the third world. Even if the whole world stopped eating meat, it wouldn&#39;t help. It would only divert the resouces from one "wasteful" industry to another. All that would change would be the name on the bulldozer -- that and a whole lot more dead animals, of course.

True environmental protection is impossible under capitalism. As long as there are resources to exploit, someone will be there to exploit them. If we "ban" eating meat, some entrepeneur will just find something else to do with former grazing lands; some other reason to clearcut the rain-forrest and drain the rivers.

If demand drops in one market, it will just be inflated in another. Capitalism cannot survive a cumulative drop in demand; it requires infinite demand to function. If oversupply shuts down McDonald farms, something else will grow up in its place. Maybe a big sticker factory for all those sleak yet elegant "Vegan Power" bumper stickers.

As long as people live within the paradigm of accumlating material possessions, they will accumulate material possessions. Changing which possessions they accumulate is ultimately meaningless.

At least with meat, it does help people. It does provide useful nutritional value and offers genuine pleasure. That&#39;s a lot more than you can say for the vast majoriy of capitalist industries.

And so it seems socially masochistic to me to sacrifice a functionally useful industry only so that it can be replaced by an almost certainly less useful one.

If the rain-forrests are going to be destroyed, at the very least it should be for something helpfull. It&#39;s called the lesser of two evils. It&#39;s a choice we have to make because, unfortunately, as it stands, saving them isn&#39;t an option.

...at least not through market redistribution. That is, there are ways to help the environment. But boycotting one specific industry isn&#39;t one of them.

Fighting capitalism is&#33;

[tantric]

not eating meat is one part of being a responsible human being. it is a BIG part of not being a consumer-addict. eating meat and hifat foods is PHYSICALLY ADDICTIVE, and once addicted, you are an ADDICT, period.

take only what you need to survive, no more. if you are free from capitalist desire, that should not be a problem. you do NOT need meat to survive. eating vegetarian is cheaper. what is the problem?

if you want pleasure, cut to the chase and smoke crack. it&#39;s the same concept, it leads to the same place.

if you must eat meat, and do not want to contribute to capitalism, go to the pound. hundreds of thousands of pounds of cat and dog flesh, perfectly edible, goes into landfills. they might even give it to you. hell, go to new orleans and hunt. it&#39;d be a public service.

[Eastside Revolt]

Originally posted by [email protected] 11 2005, 01:10 AM
not eating meat is one part of being a responsible human being. it is a BIG part of not being a consumer-addict. eating meat and hifat foods is PHYSICALLY ADDICTIVE, and once addicted, you are an ADDICT, period.

take only what you need to survive, no more. if you are free from capitalist desire, that should not be a problem. you do NOT need meat to survive. eating vegetarian is cheaper. what is the problem?

if you want pleasure, cut to the chase and smoke crack. it&#39;s the same concept, it leads to the same place.

if you want a better world, shut up and work. do not live for pleasure. try it.
Whatever fuck that puritanical bullshit.

Considdering all the differentent vegetables, and, or vitamin supplements required for proper nutrition, in a vegetarian diet. It is much cheaper to take a multi-vitamin, after eating some (poisonous :rolleyes: ) animal fat, and drinking a glass of water.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

if you want pleasure, cut to the chase and smoke crack. it&#39;s the same concept, it leads to the same place.

Bullshit, crack doesn&#39;t make you fat.

Besides, eating a little meat won&#39;t hurt - the problems being when you&#39;re diet is exclusively meat, since human evolved to be omnivores, not carnivores.

Even small amounts of poisons will not instantly kill you or lower your quality of life - hell, there are heavy metals in my drinking water, and I feel fine.

[tantric]

eating meat does not cost less. vegetables have plenty of nutrients, you do not need supplements. that&#39;s just silly. if you know so much about it, which essential nutrient is not available from plant products?

if you eat for pleasure, why not crack? it&#39;s much more fun. it gives pleasure in the exact same manner - a dopamine rush. live it up. hell, tell yourself it&#39;s supporting the sendero luminoso or whoever.

"there is not enough food to go around"

operative word here, GO. food is not a product of magic. it takes chemical fertilizer, pesticides, machinery and fossil fuels to produce. there is not enough energy to produce the food we need. we can&#39;t teleport food to hungry people. producing food in the above manner has a terrible toll on the land. we take nitrogen from the soil, eat it and flush it out into the ocean. bacteria do not fix it rapidly enough to replace what we need. the only way is with chemicals, which are made using energy from fossil fuels. i&#39;ll grant you this - invent cold fusion, and you can have your meat. for another generation, at least. *sustainable* agriculture to feed the current population requires a vegetarian diet.

[Eastside Revolt]

*begin sarcasm*

Okay everybody.

instead of worrying about capitalism. It is time to worry about the horrors of pleasure, industrialisation, free choice.......

......you know progress.

It is now of the utmost importance that we become vegetarians, and demand regulations, regulations, regulations. Forget emancipation, that is but the equivelant of smoking crack. Forget feeding people, that is but romantic idealism. We will never become productive or efficient enough, so why even try. No, vegetarianism is thw answer.

*end sarcasm*

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

eating meat does not cost less. vegetables have plenty of nutrients, you do not need supplements. that&#39;s just silly. if you know so much about it, which essential nutrient is not available from plant products?

Meat is a source of protein and is cheaper than soy.


if you eat for pleasure, why not crack? it&#39;s much more fun. it gives pleasure in the exact same manner - a dopamine rush. live it up. hell, tell yourself it&#39;s supporting the sendero luminoso or whoever.

Meat is actually good for you in small amounts.


operative word here, GO. food is not a product of magic. it takes chemical fertilizer, pesticides, machinery and fossil fuels to produce. there is not enough energy to produce the food we need.

We are already producing enough food to feed everybody - it&#39;s just that capitalism is not very good at distributing it.


producing food in the above manner has a terrible toll on the land. we take nitrogen from the soil, eat it and flush it out into the ocean. bacteria do not fix it rapidly enough to replace what we need. the only way is with chemicals, which are made using energy from fossil fuels. i&#39;ll grant you this - invent cold fusion, and you can have your meat. for another generation, at least. *sustainable* agriculture to feed the current population requires a vegetarian diet.

Granted, the current method of producing food is fixated on short-term profitability rather than long-term sustainability.
However, sustainable farming methods do not require everone to convert to vegetarianism - animal manure, processed sewage, (Esp human waste, which is rich in nutrients) and compost can be used instead of chemicals to fertilise, and trust me there is no shortage of the above. Crop rotation can be used to avoid exhausting the soil. Genetic modifications can be made to plants so that they can grow in areas previously denied, etc etc. The solution is a combination of the application of both modern science and techniques used since the dawn of civilisation.

One individual, or even the entirety of North America converting to vegetarianism will not solve the problem.

[Mujer Libre]

I CANNOT believe tantric just berated people for eating for pleasure&#33;

Eating is an inherently social experience -part of being a human animal.
Should we deny ourselves anything that causes pleasure? o0

[Vallegrande]

eating meat and hifat foods is PHYSICALLY ADDICTIVE, and once addicted, you are an ADDICT, period.

How is high fat foods physically addicting? If that is the case, then fruit and vegetables are addicting as well?

Some plants produce an ample amount of saturated fat. And besides, it is the most important source for our bodies to function correctly (without fat our cells do not function). So yes, I am addicted to keeping my body alive.

[tantric]

eating foods that contain high amounts of fat and protein cause a dopamine rush. mammals are wired to enjoy this and seek out these foods. this is the origin of the addictive mechanism.

this is fact, look it up.

junk food, vegan or not, is addictive. very lean meat, especially fish, generally is not. this is also partially psychological - you can get the same rush *looking* at certain types of food.

you can enjoy eating many types of food. sweets, in particular, are not dopamine-addictive. have at it. i enjoy my lean veggie meals very much.

if you found a society where every single person were addicted to smack, and worked like a dog to get it, would this be oppression? 33% of americans are obese. up to 90% are food addicts. food addicts are almost always mass consumers. this is not by chance. addiction is one of the best tools of a state to control it&#39;s populace. consider it - who needs mind control drugs? you&#39;ve got Snickers ™.

just consider - your body doesn&#39;t need protein every day to be healthy, and you likely have huge stores of fat. try, just try, to live off juice, fruit and rice for two days. it is very educational. i can do this, easily. i&#39;m not attacking you here, just suggesting you try something simple and very informative.

i am suggest that by changing your diet, you can be cured of consumerism. just consider the implications. isn&#39;t it worth trying?

basic fact: when you go up a trophic level in a foodweb, 80% of the energy is lost. a cow turns only 20% of the calories in grass into cow calories. you turn only 20% of the calories in beef into you calories. of the rest, about half becomes heat and CO2. thus you cannot have sustainable agriculture with meat animals - you cannot account for the lost energy, even if all waste is returned. thermodynamics aside. sustainable agriculture means NO fossil fuels. consider this....

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

I&#39;m going to address this as it&#39;s the only point you&#39;ve made RE meat eating.



basic fact: when you go up a trophic level in a foodweb, 80% of the energy is lost. a cow turns only 20% of the calories in grass into cow calories. you turn only 20% of the calories in beef into you calories. of the rest, about half becomes heat and CO2.

Heat is not wasted energy - it is used to keep both you and the cow warm. I needn&#39;t state why that is important.
You&#39;re also forgetting about the CO2 cycle. CO2 from plants and animals is absorbed by various naturalm and artificial structures - Algae, mineral formation, asphalt roads, paper.
Of course, the huge cattle farms in south america probably produce more CO2 than nature and man can &#39;fix&#39;, but once again, that is an excess of capitalism, not meat eating.


thus you cannot have sustainable agriculture with meat animals - you cannot account for the lost energy, even if all waste is returned. thermodynamics aside. sustainable agriculture means NO fossil fuels. consider this....

Wrong actually. Although you can never fully eliminate lost energy (Even with crop farming energy is wasted), you can lower it to acceptable levels.
Plus I have just explained how sustainable agriculture (including meat) an be utilised without the addition of fossil fuels.


just consider - your body doesn&#39;t need protein every day to be healthy, and you likely have huge stores of fat.

Some of us have wierd metabolisms - I cannot get fat no matter how much food I seem to eat.

[Vallegrande]

eating foods that contain high amounts of fat and protein cause a dopamine rush. mammals are wired to enjoy this and seek out these foods. this is the origin of the addictive mechanism.
I can understand this, but who said it was addictive because of dopamine? If dopamine is considered an addiction, then a little addiction is needed because low levels of dopamine are not good either. Besides, vegetables also contain protein and fat, so even vegans get some source of fat.

I have learned so much more about the importance of fat, yet not enough. For instance it helps minimize dehydration (Even camels in the M. East have a large lump on their back, which contains pure fat. This helps them to keep cool in the extreme desert heat, and they dont need as much water&#33;). So whether or not fat is addicting, it has benefits.


junk food, vegan or not, is addictive. very lean meat, especially fish, generally is not. this is also partially psychological - you can get the same rush *looking* at certain types of food.
Are you saying that all fat is junkfood, or are you referring to trans fat?


just consider - your body doesn&#39;t need protein every day to be healthy, and you likely have huge stores of fat. try, just try, to live off juice, fruit and rice for two days. it is very educational.
Fat stores dont mean that we dont need them there. Animals, like the camels, or us, need fat stores for many tasks, such as preventing dehydration or wrinkles, or sitting down on our asses :) (the cis fat, not the trans). Anyways, I have eaten only rice or whatever there was at times, but I think that fat is essential to my body. Even rice contains some fat, so you cant get away from it&#33;

[TheReadMenace]

veganism isn&#39;t anti-capitalist

That&#39;s up for debate. but I&#39;m vegetarian because I&#39;m anti-capitalist. And I strongly feel that should go the same for every vegan/vegetarian. If you follow that diet, follow it to it&#39;s entirety - that is, oppose the situation that creates the unethical practices of meat industries.

Every vegetarian should be anti-capitalist; but not every anti-capitalist needs to be vegetarian.

Andrew

[tantric]

X amount of land given to growing vegetables will feed 4x as many people as the same land growing animals. FACT. sustainable agriculture requires much more land than intensive agriculture. climate change generally hurts farmable land, cutting down forests for farms accelerates climate change.

okay, if you MUST have meat - take fish. humans do not eat plankton or much seaweed (demo, nihonjin wa sore ga daisukinatabemono desune&#33;). thus, eat fish. if done SANELY, with totally protection of the nurseries, the oceans MIGHT feed us. still, it works much better to eat lots of small fish rather than big fish. the 80% loss per level of the food chain still applies, and tuna are high order predators. mercury, YUM&#33;

besides, factory farm animals lead lives of unimaginable horror and pain. you do not have to eat meat to live. you pay people to torture these animals for your pleasure. this is the epitome of capitalist immorality. even the happy chicken commercials to sell it on TV. eat up, and have some crow while you&#39;re at it.

about food as an addiction:

"Rats fed a high-fat diet don&#39;t then continue to overeat because they suddenly lack &#39;personal responsibility&#39; or rat will power, or because they become couch potatoes, watch television, or play rat video games. They continue to overeat and become obese because high-fat foods have caused a hormonal change in their body which causes a biological compulsion to overeat - virtually the definition of an addictive response," says public interest law professor John Banzhaf.

from: http://www.vegsource.com/articles2/banzhaf.htm

also:

(ignore the god bit, please&#33;)

http://www.healthrecipes.com/eat5.htm

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3606198/

this is important&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;

there is no real difference between crack and Snickers ™. i contend that the addictive combo is fat and protein, and that sugar works differently, but nevertheless, the science supports it.

the relationship between junk food, obesity and consumerism is not casual, it is causative. once addicted to food, you can only eat so much, despite lessening returns. thus shopping, gambling, porn, TV violence, etc, which all provide the same kind of neurochemical rush.

[tambourine_man]

i think it is mean to eat meat. so i don&#39;t. some people recognize the possibility of living a meat-free life, but choose not to for reasons of self-interest (i.e. for pleasure). some capitalists recognize the injustice of the system they propogate, but do not care...for reasons of self-interest (i.e. for money -> for pleasure).

maybe the reason there are no/have never been any successful, enduring communist states is because the notions of "stateless society" and "gift economy" necessarily demand of man a certain will to sacrifice his own potential ability to accumulate power, wealth, etc. for the welfare of others less fortunate (in whatever respect) than himself. in other words, the essence of the revolution should be one of altruism, not self-interest.

[Vallegrande]

about food as an addiction:

"Rats fed a high-fat diet don&#39;t then continue to overeat because they suddenly lack &#39;personal responsibility&#39; or rat will power, or because they become couch potatoes, watch television, or play rat video games. They continue to overeat and become obese because high-fat foods have caused a hormonal change in their body which causes a biological compulsion to overeat - virtually the definition of an addictive response," says public interest law professor John Banzhaf.

Now, has this been the case historically? No, because every culture relied on fat when it was necessary for times of famine. I cant think of any culture that didn&#39;t rely on fat. People in the tropics got more fats from vegetables, people in cold areas relied on animals. Fat is what helped them keep "satiated" from eating more than they needed. So, saying that fat causes overeating is erroneous. It actually does the opposite. Trans fat probably causes overeating, but this report about blaming all fats for this "addiction" problem is false.

What is the reason why they are saying this fat is addicting? They haven&#39;t even mentioned what type of fat, trans or cis, animal or vegetable, unsaturated or saturated, that these rats were being fed. This also has to do with why these rats are becoming obese. Perhaps if they ate pure non-refined fats, their hormones and such wouldnt be so fucked up, which causes overeating, obesity, diabetes, etc. (shit that we dont even know of yet).

Just read about the history of the industry on oils, how Proctor & Gamble changed it to Trans fat, told the Americans how good it was&#33; It was cheaper to keep, because changing cis fat to trans fat enables more shelf life, which means more profit with less perishable goods. However, they were telling everyone how good this fat was, so I live in a country where the last two generations have been mislead about fats, our bodies have changed dramatically due to this change in processed fats.

And now the US media considers ALL fat to be bad. I dont follow their reports, because I already know they are not telling the entirety of the situation.

[tantric]

Now, has this been the case historically? No, because every culture relied on fat when it was necessary for times of famine. I cant think of any culture that didn&#39;t rely on fat. People in the tropics got more fats from vegetables, people in cold areas relied on animals. Fat is what helped them keep "satiated" from eating more than they needed.

k, here we go. why do people eat fat? it makes them feel good. not because they can survive famines, this is not a rational planned behavior. having body fat allows one to survive famine, thus there is a mechanism to make the organism seek out fats. the mechanism is addiction. you speak only of humans, as if bears and all other mammals don&#39;t do the same thing. do they do this because they wisely prepare for upcoming shortages? it is the mammalian five year plan in action? no. people eat more than they need because food is addictive. overeating has nothing to do with nutrional requirements. overeating *was* a prosurvival behaviour, because extra fat allowed one to survive hardships.

vegetables have very little, if any fat. seeds and nuts have fats. nonembryonic plants have no need to store energy in this manner - they use chains of glucose in the form of cellulose. take away meat and junkfood, and it&#39;s very difficult to be fat. sure, you can eat coconutmilk and peanutbutter every meal.

your brain does not care about what kind of fat you are eating. yes, there are "essential fats" that you need to eat to be healthy, but you need only very small amounts of these. this kind of fat, that kind of fat - you listen to what you want to hear. wake up. junk food is the opiate of the people.

look at the no trans media phenom in action&#33;

http://www.sanstrans.com/lev1apps/sanstran...enForm&Cat1=LA1 (http://www.sanstrans.com/lev1apps/sanstrans.nsf/fCNTDspRead1?OpenForm&Cat1=LA1)


perhaps there is some magical nondigestable healthy fat out there, that you can eat in quantity and not become obese. you will still be an addict, and your addiction will still transfer to other areas, like shopping (mostly women), pornography (mostly men), sex, gambling, etc. the capitalists would love this. total dependence on something manufactured, total addiction, slaves that are healthier and live longer. well, the medical industrialist might hate it, but more than likely, they&#39;d own the patent on this magical fat anyway.

there are specific enzymes that are involved in addictive withdrawal. analysis of the brains of rats johnsing for heroin and those craving fatty foods show those chemicals, in the same quantities.

[Vallegrande]

perhaps there is some magical nondigestable healthy fat out there, that you can eat in quantity and not become obese.
Yes, that is saturated fat. Because saturated fat is used so fast, our bodies dont become fat. Look at the Filipinos before US industrialization there. They ate high fat coconut products, but were they fat? Hells NO&#33; Makes me wonder why the US had to create the Colt. 45 specifically for the Filipinos, because they were so tough that the old war rifles did not make them fall.

Check out another fact that hasn&#39;t been mentioned:
The Framingham Heart Study is often cited as proof of the lipid hypothesis. This study began in 1948 and involved some 6,000 people from the town of Framingham, Massachusetts. Two groups were compared at five-year intervals—those who consumed little cholesterol and saturated fat and those who consumed large amounts. After 40 years, the director of this study had to admit: "In Framingham, Mass, the more saturated fat one ate, the more cholesterol one ate, the more calories one ate, the lower the person&#39;s serum cholesterol. . . we found that the people who ate the most cholesterol, ate the most saturated fat, ate the most calories, weighed the least and were the most physically active."3 The study did show that those who weighed more and had abnormally high blood cholesterol levels were slightly more at risk for future heart disease; but weight gain and cholesterol levels had an inverse correlation with fat and cholesterol intake in the diet.4 -"The Skinny on Fats"

There&#39;s much more where this comes from, with actual facts supporting the lipid hypothesis. Weston A. Price Foundation (http://www.westonaprice.org/knowyourfats/skinny.html) I dont know if you care to read it though.


you will still be an addict, and your addiction will still transfer to other areas, like shopping (mostly women), pornography (mostly men), sex, gambling, etc.
So... then everything is an addiction right? If you want to blame fat for addiction, then blame the air you breathe for you being addicted to live on it. I still dont see the evidence behind the "fat addiction".


your brain does not care about what kind of fat you are eating. yes, there are "essential fats" that you need to eat to be healthy, but you need only very small amounts of these. this kind of fat, that kind of fat - you listen to what you want to hear. wake up. junk food is the opiate of the people.
Actually, the brain (60% fat) relies most on DHA to build its Myelin Sheath. We dont produce this on our own, and a deficiency can cause Parkinson&#39;s, Alzerheimer&#39;s, etc.

The fluid from the lung surfactant usually contains 100% saturated fat. Depending on where we get our fat, and if we are deficient in saturated fat, the lungs will substitute other fats, which can cause asthma and other lung related problems.