ROFL! Yes, sailor, it would. But if I said ‘Bitch milk’ and not ‘dog milk’, I would immediately be banned for sexism that I didn’t mean. Female members of the SDMB would be taking up a collection to hire Lorena Bobbitt to make love to me. The ones that weren’t doing that would be racing to the tire store to buy ‘Michelin Man’ dolls to stick pins into. Manhattan would be pounding his ‘delete’ key with a hammer. I would have to move to some island in the Pacific. No thanks, man. I’d rather stay here in Hawai’i.
Posters seem to be responding that milk is not bad for you. Maybe it is or maybe it isn’t.
The OP also asked if milk is good for you or if we need it at all.
What is the straight poop? Who came up with the USRDA for calcium?
One thing I read says this:
Eskimos have about the highest intake of calcium of any ethnic group. (From eating fish bones. Mmmm.) They also have rates of osteoprosis higher than or equal to Joe average American. This would seem to indicate that getting plenty of calcium is not enough tp prevent osteoporosis.
The above is paraphrased from Diet for a New America, which is a totally biased book intent on encouraging people to be vegan, so take it with a grain of salt. (And a swig of milk) Oddly enough, DFANA was written by Jon Robbins the heir to the Baskin-Robbins millions. I bet he could get all the ice cream he wanted for free, but he won’t touch the stuff.
My vegetarian (but not completely vegan) relatives attribute every health problem known to Man to drinking too much milk, and cite their own health as proof. Myself, I’m more inclined to credit an active, outdoor lifestyle, but anyway,in the interest of science, I once tried their suggestion that I go without dairy for a week. I was just as congested as ever, and by the end of day 4 or 5, I was getting cravings.
It’s true that a great many people are lactose intolerant… I’ve heard that it’s the most common allergy in the world, and I have no reason to doubt it. For such people, certainly, milk isn’t too good, but for the rest of us (including, thank God, myself), there’s no known health risks.
I’m lactose intolerant so I don’t drink cow’s milk at all, and neither do my kids or husband. I do cook with it on occasion, though and have fewer problems with it that way.
Dairy consumption has been linked to increased mucus production and higher risk of ear infections in children.
I heard also that the USRDA for calcium is so high because they figure that you’re getting all of your calcium from dairy products, and the calcium in dairy products is more difficult to assimilate due to the high protein content of milk and milk products.
Well PETA is wrong, again. Elderly Chinese women have a much higher rate of osteoporosis than similar white women. This is from personal experience, not anecdotal.
Personally, if I had to be a cow. I’d much rather be a dairy cow than a beefsteak cow.
The only thing I’m concerned with is whether they inject milk cows with hormones or antibiotics, or feed them other dead cows.
Where the heck did you meet this Chinese girl? In some little town in the boondocks where no one ever visits? Or did you time travel and meet her in the 18th century?
Chinese drink milk. They do not eat cheese. Even we don’t really eat cheese. The stuff on a Whopper doesn’t count. And Kraft singles is not real cheese. Real cheese is what the English and the French eat. With your hands, on crackers, or with wine.
I also know in American manners you cannot accept a gift the first time. I don’t accept gifts from people for the first time either. She’s probably thinking, what’s up with this guy? He probably has some ulterior motive. And what’s this thing with foreigners and barbarians? They’re not living in the 18th century, you know.
Actually, I once learned that 90% Chinese and other East Asians are lactose intolerant, whereas only 10% of people of European genetic background have this problem (IIRC Sub-Saharan Africans were about %30 lactose intolerant.) This does a lot to explain (healthy) attitudes towards dairy in China, and a lot to explain the macrobiotic (Japanese) aversion to it as well.
Anecdote part of post:
When I used to work in a Chinese restaurant, one of the Chinese workers there (who was probably one of the 10% tolerant) used to flamboyantly drink copious amounts of milk. You should have seen the looks he got from the others in the kitchen!
Major Feelgood, I detect some incredulity in your post. Let’s see…
I met her in GuangZhou which is a city of several (8?) million people located not far from Shenzhen and Hongkong and is probably one of the most developed in China.
I have not been to northern China but I can assure you it is not easy to find milk in GuangZhou. First of all they lack refrigeration. You can find UHT milk in westernized upscale supermarkets and it costs an arm and a leg. I can assure you it is not part of their everyday diet. If you say the opposite, you have not been there and you are mistaken.
As for American consumption of cheese I recently read that it has more than tripled in the last three decades (it was an article about obesity and unhealthy eating habits). I can assure you westerners eat way more cheese than the Chinese.
You misunderstood what I said which goes to show you do not know Chinese manners. The Chinese reject a gift the first few times it is offered even if they have known you for years and you are a close friend. To accept a gift the first time it is offered makes them appear greedy so you have to insist several times.
I do not know how muh you know about China but I have travelled there a few times for several weeks at a time and I have quite a few Chinese friends.
I quit all dairy just before the beginning of the new year. Replaced cow milk with soy milk on my breakfast cereal. Otherwise, not much difference. I used to eat a lot of yogurt every day. My body made a sour acid smell which went away after I quit the yogurt, so I don’t miss it. I quit dairy for health reasons – to cut down on fat and protein and animal hormones and other junk that gets into modern agribusiness.
I used to love milk, I used to indulge in all the Indian sweets and desserts and puddings made of condensed milk. I sort of miss those but don’t think about it very much.
Robert Anton Wilson’s book Ishtar Rising goes into the love for, and fear of, the human woman’s breast. He is in favor of loving the breast, and says that those who repress it and censor it are anal-retentives by nature. The oral personality loves the breast and milk; the anal hates milk as well as breasts.
I still love breasts as much as ever; I’m not repulsed by milk but I have found that I can get by just fine without it in my diet.
So all things considered it’s probably not a big deal either way.
OT, a Hong Kong cafeteria near me sells this tea, and it’s become my favorite beverage. It’s tea blended with fruit pulp, and served on ice over tapioca. At least here the tapioca is sautéed in something to give it a dark brown color.
