I recently read a blog by another ProU user titled “Meat is...manslaughter?” encouraging others to reduce their meat consumption based on the prominence of E coli. This blog, though very well-written, is an excellent example of alarmist material written by vegans and vegetarians to force others to make the same choice that they have. It leaves out some very important information about E coli, and when this information is included the original poster’s argument against the consumption of meat falls apart at the seams.
The E coli foodborne illness is not specific to beef. It is also commonly spread from unpasteurized juice and milk, or contaminated bean sprouts and leafy green vegetables. In case you have forgotten, last year there was a huge outbreak of E coli from bagged Dole Spinach which sickened 200 people, and killed 3. This particular outbreak dwarfs the approximately 30 people who have gotten ill before the beef recall last month, and it came from vegetarian foods. The 2006 recall of spinach was the 9th outbreak since 1995 that California’s Salinas Valley was implicated in an E Coli outbreak for a leafy vegetable product.
Which brings me to the difference between beef products and vegetable products: if you choose to consume meat products, you can protect yourself. What do I mean by that? Well, E coli can be destroyed in beef by properly cooking your food. The CDC recommends heating beef all the way through to at least 160°F in order to kill all unwanted bacteria. However, with lettuce and raw spinach products, you have to rely on the producers and the FDA to protect you from E coli and salmonella. Which do you think is the better choice to make, the foods which you can protect yourself from by taking precautions, or the foods whose safety are out of your control?
References:
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/diseaseinfo/escherichiacoli_g.htm
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/10/3/211156/102
http://www.grist.org/comments/food/2006/09/21/E-coli/index.html
Meat is good. It is good for you (and tastes good too!).
Cook it, and you're fine. I do love a nice medium rare steak, but would never eat ground beef that way......
You are right, the anti-meat crowd does spend alot of time and money trying to get people to be like them.
I even remember seeing people talk about how their 'sweat is clean' now that they stopped eating meat... all sorts of insane claims.
But, people will believe anything... just so long as someone pretty says it or it is written down on paper.
It's hard not to notice that not a single vegan or vegetarian has defended their claims on either of these blogs. I took the time to comment and defend mine on theirs. Guess they have no valid responses. Hypocrites.
I also like my prime rib and steak medium rare. As long as it's not super-rare... it's delicious and juicy... no overcooked beef for me.
They have nothing to defend with. Apart from "Meat is bad because I said so!" and "You're supporting animal murder if you eat meat!" (and the recent "Cows cause global warming"), they don't have much to really use in defense of why meat is bad.
I've kicked around exploring the idea that I've had, that the vegan lifestyle is being forced upon us in an attempt to mentally emasculate men.
Soy was recently found to contain a chemical that is very close to estrogen, so close that the body treats it as such. In adults there is not much of an affect, though a constant intake can cause feminizing affects in the body. The effect is much stronger in babies, and soy formula had been, and is, kind of popular.
Vegan men tend to be, from all of the evidence I've seen, less developed, not as strong, and more frail.
The cows cause global warming post was funny. I'm going to cry and huddle in the fetal position for at least five minutes if Al Gore wins tomorrow.
The whole vegan man thing, I wouldn't know, because I don't know a ton. But I have noticed a lot of vegetarian men and women are awful scrawny and unhealthy looking.
There are a lot of things about soy that are bad... but also some good things. I'm about to write an article about corn and ethanol... stay posted.
I've had some lefties try to push the "Don't eat beef because cows produce global warming!"
I tell them that it is a good reason TO eat beef.
Recently, Greenpeace (idiots so useless that even the FRENCH navy sunk one of their ships), recently released a report in Australia saying that people should eat Kangaroo rather than cows because cows produce methane, and that roos are 'like cows' in terms of their meat.
Now, from what I've been told by everyone that's eaten roo, they don't really taste like beef any more than deer or lamb tastes like beef.
I won't be suprised if Gore wins tomorrow... after all, they gave one to yassir arafat for his work in bringing peace to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and also gave one to Jimmy Carter for his work in brining peace to North Korea....
heh.
I know life is a happy little game of pick and choose for some people but a diet should consist of what our millenia of ancestors ate, with adjustments made the foods you ate growing up and serious consideration given to the proven health benefits of available foods. Namely how green leafies and other raw vegetables can promote colon health and chelate toxins from beef, junk food, the environment and illness.
Oh and about the environment: beef means methane cow flop is one of the biggest contributors to green house gasses.
No doubt that we ran around the plains catching and eating what we could for eons once we got a taste for meat and Alution peoples (Eskimos: Nanook et al) have managed for as long as the have getting the vitamins they needed from blubber but they led a very vigorous lifestyle. So red meat does have a place in a natural diet, but humans evolved primarily as vegetarian, so a human being would do just fine eating only optimally digested simpler proteins (snails and bugs mmm) .
I'd be interested to learn how you would defend the deplorable conditions "food units" known as beef cattle have to suffer through their entire miserable existences
Oh and by the way I put a signal out on the Veggan Grapevine they will all be responding to your calling them hypocrites shortly.
Restoring Faith In Humanity One Acquaintance At A Time
Sorry, I do not ascribe to the myth of global warming (see my blog on the subject)... so the one argument does not fly with me.
Millennia of our ancestors have consumed meat and leafy greens, in a balanced and wholesome diet. That's the way to eat, not just one or the other. The very design of our teeth proves that we are omnivores, designed to consume both meat and veggies.
If you read my previous blog on this subject, you would know that I do not defend the deplorable farms. Rather I ask the reader to educate themselves on where their food comes from, and purchase accordingly. Consumer choice will put the feedlot farms out of business, not advocating vegetarianism.
I've been signaling the Veggies regularly and they have refused my call to arms... I think they are too angry for my avid and open attacks.
I'm angry for their uneducated attacks on the very agricultural societies that they ought to support. It's an interconnected network of farmers, and you can't just support the "Veggies" and not the "Meat guys". It doesn't work that way.
sure. In order?
Our ancestors ate meat. Cow, chicken, even birds, pigs and lamb.
as for methane.... it is a naturally occurring gas that comes from anything biodegrading. That cows produce more of it is woefully ignorant of the actual causes of it.
The idea that humans 'evolved primarily as vegetarian' is total bunk. We CAN eat vegetables, which seperates us from many animals. It does not, however, change the fact that we are omnivores, able to eat meat and vegetables.
As for 'deplorable conditions' . . . how many cattle ranches have you been to? I've been to a few. Even saw a chicken farm. Don't believe what you see on the internet, or the recycled pictures at PETA meetings. While there ARE some places that treat animals poorly (most of which are actually in other countries), the vast majority of ranches treat animals pretty well. I would contend that your opinions are based on nothing more than stuff you do not know.
Funny that you post an insulting post, insulting the one who put up this thread, then end with your signature "Restoring Faith in Humanity One Acquaintance At A Time."
I've yet to see anything from you that would make me want to be an acquaintence... I just see a mixture of hippies and al gore.
Don't feel like digging up the stuff about the three Cs of global Warming (chainsaws, cars and cattle) just to have you dis the source. As far as proof of global warming, if I have to provide it for you, you really don't care to know the truth anyway.
The validity about that humans "evolved primarily as vegetarian" refers to um uhh how to say this getting your hawkish tail feathers ruffled, the human species advanced for a lot longer, granted a long time ago, as plant eating primates that ate mostly insects as a a source of protein.
I just mentioned farm conditions for fun, I know that most cattle ranchers are decent people and I don't worry a bit when have my occasional steak (yes beef steak).
And about insult(s) in my previous reply, proffering debate to an opinion is all that I'm doing. So exactly what is the insult? Or do you think this is just an occasion to put stuff up on a public site and slap the backs of people that you agree with?
Restoring Faith In Humanity One Acquaintance At A Time is just my little original motto. Take it any way you want to.
Restoring Faith In Humanity One Acquaintance At A Time
I live more Green than Al Gore, the current head of your man-made global warming myth.
Don't you think that if he really believed the crap he said that HE'D live a bit more green? Or, at least, not so wastefully?
According to the Tennessee Valley Authority, his energy bill averages about $30,000/month for his Nashville estate. What a hypocrite.