These vegans are scaring me... (Read 1069 times)

Think I'll make steak for dinner tonight. (yep, that's all I'm saying, I'm not brave enough to say more) Modified to add: NO, JakeKnight - I will not be cooking fried ferret.

Perhaps. But how do we judge. Is the "organic" strawberry sold in December at Whole Foods (kept cool using petroleum-fueld refridgeration, flown in at great airplane fule petroleum costs from Brazil, packaged in plastic) or the "organic, free range" chicken from Wild Oats (raised in a 2-acre shed full of genetically identical chickens, with a door to the outside opened for the first time 5 weeks into their 7 week life, living under such austere unnatural sterile conditions so as to eliminate the risk of illness which would wipe out the flock overnight) better for being organic and free range than the beef fed corn and antibiotics in a concentrated animal feeding operation, but at a lower environmental cost in terms of petroleum use? What about, as Pollan points out, the out of season Sourth American organic asparagus that contain about 50 calories, but require 500 calories in airline fuel energy to get them to your plate? Not everybody can access pasture-fed beef or biodynamic vegetables. And even with access, it takes time and energy to prepare them for eating. It is terribly hard to eat seasonally and locally. Relying on simple labels, such as "organic" and "free range" may be deceiving. How to judge?

Unless you go Amish you can't.

Sure. But while you're considering it, actually consider it. As in, what it actually says, and the actual facts, as opposed to what your first link up there claims the research says. I followed the links and did my own considering: Worst case: a 24.3% lower sperm count in your sons. Maybe. If you absolutely gorge yourself on beef, while you’re pregnant. Maybe. But this "study" (cough) is based solely on self-reporting; not a shred of medical data. Just an apparent correlation between self-reported dietary habits and lowered sperm counts in sons, without any attempt to 1) verify the self-reporting, or 2) actually consider the billion other possible variables. And then it gets funnier: this correlation - assuming the self-reporting is somewhere close to accurate - only appears among women who eat beef SEVEN or more times a week. If you're eating beef SEVEN frickin' times a week, you've got more to worry about than your son's sperm. Like needing a root canal in your colon. Also - none of the big beefy sons of beef-loving cow-hating moms were infertile, by the way. Not one. Just the opposite. They'd all gotten their mates pregnant. Ironic, isn't it? Which could suggest an alternate conclusion: eat lots of beef while you’re pregnant, and your son is going to be quite the stud (literally) – even with less sperm! Nice. More efficient sperm! Where's that cheeseburger? Wait - it gets even better. Remember that "self reporting" bit? Any study based solely on self-reporting is potentially fatally flawed, of course - but this wasn't even that accurate. Know how they actually got their data? You ain't gonna believe this silliness: "For this study, the first to look at beef consumption and semen quality, researchers analyzed semen samples and questionnaires from 387 male partners of pregnant women. The men, born between 1949 and 1983, had reported (with the mothers' input, if possible) on their own mothers' diet during pregnancy." You read that right. The whole study is based on asking men what their mothers ate, when they were pregnant. With the men in question. Decades ago. "With the mothers' input, if possible." Jesus wept. I can’t remember what I had for breakfast, and you’re asking me what my mother ate for lunch on a Tuesday in April of 1969? And basing your “study” on my answers? Awesome. Good times. For the record, I do remember my Mom stuffing her face with some bad burritos right about the time Golda Meir became Prime Minister of Israel (it was a slow news day, if I remember right), and it frankly didn’t agree with me. But they were chicken burritos, so that’s probably covered in another study. Okay, so once you're through laughing (or crying) about where they got their “data,” make sure you consider the "researchers" own comments, too. Their advice is good, and goes a little beyond “beef = no sperm = bad!”: ----------------------------------------------------------------- Last thing you should do, while you're considering the above: find out who financed this "research." I'll bet a Quarter Pounder w/Cheese that the answer to that particular question would be ... interesting. I love this thread. Not only did I learn that running will kill me any day now, I've also discovered that I'm an unethical, intolerant, unhealthy, mindless killing machine burdened by slow decomposing waste and weak, flabby sperm. Awesome. Where's that boar I gotta kill?

Jake you MUST join the debates at Hannity.com!!! I hope you do!! Too funny!!!!

10 acres? How big is the garden? Could you graze a few head of cattle and some broiler chickens and egg layers?

How about some wild boar? I hear that's good eatin' right there.

Yeah, but it ain't kosher. That's the rub.

Indeed. The supermarket is designed (like a casino in Vegas) to disorient you, to detach the experience from the realities that underpin it. In one view, the myriad choices in the supermarket obscure the fact that most items are processed (my machine or by animal) from soy and corn. And petroleum. The vast selection, the atmospherics, the corn-row-like layout (almost agricultural in its design) have become the new garden, and we are comfortable there. By contrast, when we go to the farmers' market, the produce is disorganized, dirty, inconsistent in appearance, and sold by the people who toild in the mud and sweat to bring it to you. These are the people who killed the cow, who raked the chicken shit into the fields, who birthed the pigs. There is pure transparency there, and it is not comfortable anymore. We are no longer happy to eat food. We want food-product. Detached from its dirty, sweaty, bloody source. Remind me of the attachment and I've lost my appetite. (Well, I haven't, I write rhetorically.) Meat does not come in packages. It comes from semi-intelligent animals. If you eat the meat, you should be willing to look the cow in the eye and tell it that you respect the life it led, the death it sacrificed, and the body it shared. If you think your cow did not lead a good life, did not have a good death or did not have its body used in a respectful manner, you should question why. If you cannot do that, perhaps you should not participate in that food chain. If you eat meat, you should wonder if you are capable of hunting and killing it yourself. Or raising it and slaughtering it. If you cannot, you should question why. Just sayin.

Yeah, but it ain't kosher. That's the rub.

Neither is the deer you are hunting. You need to get it from the Schlaff farm in Long Island. And do you have meat dishes in your house? Even if kosher steak was available in Nashvegas, I dont have anything to cook it on! (BTW - I didnt know you were a virtual vegetarian. I think we eat pretty much the same foods, and I too just tell peeps that I am veg because it is easier. I do eat fresh tuna, salmon, or smoked salmon. And tempura-battered halibut. And that rare steak at Thanksgiving '05 when my parents were at the kosher supermarket and had the meat dishes out for their poultry dish.) Actually, Trent, I had a random peds question: is there any problem with raising veg kids? I realized that if I ever have kids, they probably wont eat meat at home. As long as they eat a balanced diet is it OK? You all are hippies. All of you. Even JN. Go eat some granola.

...weird, i thought i had posted earlier...must have been deleted by the vegan gods.. anyway, i remember going to a tiny little restaurant with a vegetarian friend when we were down in Chile...it seems like in every restaurant the main menu is steak and wine. So she asked the waitress if they have any vegetarian menu, she said yes, we have chicken salad. I love Chile by the way...great steaks and great wine.