Sounds like you have some rude friends.
My neighbors had my van towed away TWICE from my own parking spot by lying to the towing company. I’ve seen them barbecuing on the back porch. Damn those meat eaters! They are such rude people!!!
What? You say that rude people come in every flavor? That it isn’t fair to label an entire group because a few of its members are rude? Hmmmm… I think you are right!
Hi!
(It started years and years ago because I refused to post lists with fewer than 3 items. I’d put in a bogus item to pad out the list, like “3. nothing really, just don’t like short lists” and after a while, other people would pad out their lists with “3. nothing really, but Opal doesn’t like short lists” and things just sort of devolved from there.)
I think that people are calling them vegans because the couple identified as such-didn’t they?
Beef. It’s what’s for dinner.
cough
And no one I know considers breatharianism a form of vegetarianism or veganism. But then, I’ve seen Scylla’s inability to deal with reason before… not gonna get into it this time.
Sorry for the many posts, but I was replying while reading and lost track heh.
They didn’t kill their child, she’s still alive. Why is everyone being so hard on them? They didn’t STARVE their daughter by not giving them food, they just fed her an improper diet. They obviously cared about her, they were just ignorant. Yes, they ignored their doctor, but as one poster already mentioned in this thread, doctors are not always knowlegable about vegan diets.
Because even ignorant people should have enough of a fucking clue to realize that babies should be fed milk or formula, or that their baby was severely underdeveloped.
Just a question…not trying to be rude…
Why is it that people who include meat as part of their overall diet are always called “meat-eaters” (as if they eat nothing but meat) when they should be called omnivores?
I refer to them as omnivores most of the time (refer to my previous post about placenta eating, for example). Dominic uses the term “meat eaters” on his own. He was told that vegetarians don’t eat meat, so the non vegetarians are meat-eaters. Sorry, but I didn’t really think at the time that it was neccessary to teach a 4 year old the word “omnivore” and now that he’s 6, and most of the people he talks to are in that same age group, I think that “meat eater” is the better term. How many of his kindergarten classmates are going to know what the hell he is saying if he asks them if they are omnivorous?
So I guess the answer to your question is: They aren’t. You just notice it more when they are.
Interesting question, Biblio. I’ve wondered why Vegetarians are called that when we also eat fruits and other stuff in addition to vegetables.
Mrs. Vegan is pregnant again. Mr. Vegan states that he didn’t let her breastfeed cause she smoked pot and wasn’t “pure” enough. And of course, according to him the baby was fine until she was put into the hospital.
About feeding the child nuts. You can make a delicious milk by putting nuts in a blender with water. Makes for great milkshakes if you add ice cream.
There was another case a few years back where a vegan couple had their son taken away for the same reasons, and then took him from the hospital. Faced all kinds of charges and she got pregnant again. Scarey that these people breed.
I’m a vegetarian cause I have a blood condition where I cannot eat meat. I never make an issue of it with anyone. I’ll go to your house and fill up on pasta, bread and veggies.I don’t drink either. If you want to serve meat & booze, go ahead.
MMMMMM… Snickers!
Lezlers:
You still seem to be missing point. So, I’ll start again from the beginning.
There is nothing wrong with indulging one’s preferences, to a degree. We all do it.
It is very easy to go too far with this indulgence. These things become compulsions, and they may be symptomatic, or may lead to mental illness, or be a conduit for it, or whatever. Psychiatrists don’t claim to know what causes all mental illnesses, so your statement that “eating habits” are somehow excluded as a cause is somewhat ill-advised.
This doesn’t apply to vegetarians alone, it applies to anorexics, obese people, alcoholics, breatharians, compulsive water drinkers etc. etc. etc. In short, when you indulge your preferences to the point of putting yourself at risk you’re crossing the line.
Now, according to the FDA, the recommended nutritional guidelines suggest 2 servings of meat per day to maintain good health and nutrition. With growing children, pregnant women, the elderly, and a couple of other groups, this is particularly important. Certain proteins, calcium b12, vitamin D, etc are most easily gotten from animal-based foods. There is also the issue of maintaining calorie intake necessary to support growth, or an active lifestyle.
What a vegetarian is doing is indulging their personal preferences. If they are careful and conscientious, they can do safely.
A vegetarian who falls into one of the groups mentioned above needs to be extra careful to ensure they are getting the proper nutrition and calorie intake, but it’s still possible to safely indulge the preference in most cases. It would not be possible for me, for example as I engage in strength training, long distance running, and have a large body that naturally consumes lots of fuel.
People are different, and for others it might not be such a problem.
In the dietetic association’s position paper on vegetarianism (and you can find it yourself pretty easily,) it is recommended that vegetarians have occasional meals of fish, or chicken to ensure they’re getting proper nutrition, even though they also say a completely nutritionally balanced diet can be had either according to vegetarian or vegan guidelines.
The bottom line is that a human is omnivorous and has a body that expects to recieve nutrients found in meat. A careful and conscientious vegetarian/vegan can indulge their preference, and find a work-around that gets them those nutrients elsewhere in most cases.
Clearly many people overindulge in meat and fatty products and a vegetarian does not and may recieve certain health benefits.
That’s not an argument for vegetarianism, it’s an argument for not overindulging.
Now we get to the part that’s my opinion based on what I’ve read.
My opinion is that a vegetarian diet should be occasionally supplemented by fish, eggs, or chicken or equivalent meat products just to be safe.
To fail to do so is simply not prudent. There’s not that much margin for error in a vegetarian diet with the workarounds, so why not follow the FDA and the dietetic association’s recommendations and occasionally supplement if it is the safe and prudent thing to do?
Why not do it if you or people you are responsible for are in one of the categories where it is particularly important (gorwing kids, elderly, nursing, pregnant, active, etc?)
If you don’t, you are taking risks that IMO are not particularly prudent. If you are being vegetarian to be healthy than some fish or egg whites eaten occasionally will ensure that your lifestyle is a healthy one and greatly inrease your margin for error in nutritional planning.
It is my opinion that if you are not doing so, you are indulging your preference to an irrational and unjustifiable extent.
It is also my opinion that the majority of people don’t pay too much attention their diets. For an omnivore this is not as much of a concern, because their choices are not as limited as a vegetarian’s and good nutrition is not as hard to attain.
So, a vegetarian who is indulging their preference strictly and who is not extremely concerned and diligent about proper nutition is putting themselves and those in their care at risk. Doubly so if they fall into one of the special risk categories.
If they are being diligent, that is at odds with the perception that I have that most vegetarians are somewhat insistent as to the benefits of their eating choices and are rather cavalier and dismissive about the risks (and steps necessary to reduce those risks,) of going completely and totally meatless.
The couple above would be an extreme example.
But, the statmement “vegetarianism is a healthy alternative,” is not a blanket one.
“Carefullyand well managed vegetarianism may be a healthy alternative” is better.
“Carefull and well-managed vegetarianism with occasional fish/low saturated meat supplements.” is better still.
The fact is that strict vegetarian/veganism is not the healthiest choice.
Scylla’s preceeding opinions brought to you by the US Beef Council:
Beef, it’s what’s for dinner.
Actually, they’re brought to you by the FDA, and the American Dietic association,
***and by pork… The other white meat.
But no Charybdis? Why not?
(Which reminds me, I must get a friend to register as Doc Anode)
-Re Opal
Occam’s razor is demonstrated again. I’ve wondered for a while if the two were the same person. I’ve added OpalCat to the list of Clique members. The conspiracy is almost clear now.
Sigh
Look, i’m not going to get into a “which is better herbivour or omnivoure” argument with you, because I don’t have the time or energy (insert your own “weak vegan” joke here), but there are a few things I cannot just let slide in your post.
#1. A true vegetarian or vegan will most certainly not “supplement” their diets with MEAT because then they would not BE a vegan or vegetarian. I think I’ve JUST managed to pull my lower jaw off of the floor after reading that nonsense.
#2. Imagine this: there is an experiement being conducted by three different parties. Each of these parties holds a different intrest. I gurantee you that each of these parties will conclude the experiement with different results that help “support” their original position on the hypothesis. A vegetarian can argue with a meat eater until they are both blue in the face, each of them holding hard “evidence” to support their positions. It’s a neverending circle and no one party will ever be “right” in the others eyes. It’s a matter of “to each their own”
My problem lies when a meat eater says things like “the fact that strict vegetarian/veganism is NOT the healthiest choice”. You are insisting you are right because the almighty FDA told you so. Do you believe everything your government tells you? That seems pretty naiive to me. You know, because the gov. has NEVER been wrong about anything before. 
I can turn that right around and say “the fact is that a meat eating diet is NOT the healthiest choice.” and base it on hundreds of statements by dietiticans, doctors and research studies that I have read. Would you believe me then?
The fact is, everyone believes what they want to believe and back it up with proof obtained by sources that support their position. Any piece of evidence you give me to say that meat eating diet is healthy I can give you one to the contrary. My point being that in each of our minds, we are the correct party. The difference is, I’m not trying to force my position on you as the only right one.
I think this is the key part of your post. I always tell people who assume that I chose a vegetarian diet for health reasons, that it’s also quite easy to have poor nutrition - lacking in nutrients, overindulging in fat and cholesterol, or both - as a vegetarian. Omnivores might well have an easier time getting the range of nutrients that they need, but probably also find it easier to have too much cholesterol in their diets. Of course, since this is massive generalization, it doesn’t apply to everyone.
My point is that being a vegetarian is not automatically more healthy or less healthy than being an omnivore. It does have its own nutritional issues to be aware of, but so does, say, being an omnivore who only likes a few vegetables (like my husband). He isn’t the best cook and gained a lot of weight until I took over cooking for him (we used to each make our own separate food); now he’s dropped ~50 lbs, eats meat (that I prepare) every night, and feels great. Regardless of your eating preferences, knowledge of good nutrition and actually eating food that fits into that healthy plan is most important.
My body expects of receive the nutrients found in meat? Like humber and tuna? It expects me to be killing cows and swimming into the ocean to kill tuna fish. I don’t think so. If you want to eat the kind of meat your body “expects” to receive, I’d suggest killing and eating squirrels and pigeons.
Vegetarians and Vegans have to plan their diets carefully? Excuse me, but shouldn’t we ALL be doing that? Just to eat a healthy diet? How much “planning” does it take to eat cereal, fruit and yoghurt for breakfast, fruit and cheese or popcorn or yoghurt or soup for lunch, and some pasta with veggies, sauce, and maybe cheese for supper. Along with the occasional ice cream, that’s my diet about 90% of the time.
I’d just like to add that I do not spend hours “planning” my vegan diet. I’ve been vegan for 5 years and am a hellava lot healthier now than I was when I ate meat and dairy.
I barely pay attention to what I eat, neither does my boyfriend. He eats meat and dairy. I don’t. We both just recently got checkups. My doctor went on and on about how my blood pressure, cholesterol and overall health was great, while he got lectured for about a half hour on how crappy his health was. Interesting…
This also caused boyfriend to stop giving me shit about my diet and actually try some of my food. He kinda likes it. Go figure. And it only took off and on about 5 years, heh.
Lezlers:
I’m not belittling you, but you run into a classic debating problem here, known as the “True Scotsmen” fallacy. It goes like this:
No true Scotsmen wheres anything under his kilt.
Angus was seen to wear bloomers one windy day.
Angus is therefore not a True Scotsmen.
While that statement is logically true, it’s not rational. All of a sudden because Angus wore bloomers to protect a rash on a single occasion he’s not a Scotsmen anymore?
What is this true quality anyway.
When you are saying “true vegetarian/vegan” you are applying absolutes to something that is only a matter of degree.
There is no such thing as a “true vegetarian/vegan” because every breath you take, and every swallow you ingest and kill animals by the thousands if not millions.
The way I’ve always heard it, a vegetarian leads a meat restricted diet. Some eat fish, or chicken, or dairy products, etc. A Vegan eats no animal products.
So, let’s dispense with this true Vegan/vegetarian bullshit, and admit that there is not often solid agreement about what’s edible and what’s not among Vegans/vegetarians, ok?
Unfortunately, this is pure bullshit. Replicability of experimental results is the keystone of scientific advancement. The truth may be elusive, but it’s not malleable.
I’ll give you an example, my car gets into an accident and no longer runs. An insurance adjustor will experiment to see what is wrong with the car. His interests suggest that he would find it in perfect working order. The mechanic at the body shop’s interests would suggest that he would find it in need of a massive overhaul. I need it to go to work so my interests would suggest it would remain in running condition.
However, when I turn the key, when the adjustor turns the key, and when the mechanic turns the key we are extremely likely to see the same result to this experiment. Likewise when we observe a fendor or a tire we are likely to observe the same results.
A hypothesis does not dictate results in any experiment. If it does, it’s not an experiment. You’re trying to prove or defend a conclusion.
No. It’s a matter of accepting evidence, or giving in to wishful thinking.
No. I believe I’m right until somebody presents better evidence and methods that are duplicable and auditable from credentialed and reviewed parties that suggest otherwise.
You’re not really going to try to play the government conspiracy/coverup hand, are you?
I don’t automatically mistrust something just because it comes from an official source. I look at the methods, reviewability and credentials and try to take it for what it’s worth.
The American dietetic association seems pretty favorably disposed towards the benefits of vegetarianism. If I’m to mistrust their caveats, should I mistrust their premise?
Maybe that’s your fact, but I doubt it’s a blanket truism. Some people try to weigh evidence and believe the best supported hypothesis. The fact is, that believing something is a worthless position.
Beleiving your car will start won’t fill it with gas.
Beleiving you can ignore the potential hazards of strict vegetarianism with impugnity is equally foolhardy.
Denise V:
I see nothing to disagree with in your statements.