Vegetarian Awareness Month (October)


levi said:
Just be aware that if you go vegan you'll almost certainly need to take B12 supplements, and most likely calcium supplements. I'm not sure how that's affected if you're veggie and still drink milk and eat cheese though.
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B12 deficiency (megaloblastic anemia) occurs in strict vegetarians but it can be easily avoided with a glass of milk everyday, same of calcium.
Similarly if one avoids vegetables totally they get Folate deficiency (again Megaloblastic anemia). Ultimately if you are strictly on either end of this veg/nonveg spectrum you get megaloblastic anemia. ;)
 
docbroke said:
B12 deficiency (megaloblastic anemia) occurs in strict vegetarians but it can be easily avoided with a glass of milk everyday, same of calcium.
Similarly if one avoids vegetables totally they get Folate deficiency (again Megaloblastic anemia). Ultimately if you are strictly on either end of this veg/nonveg spectrum you get megaloblastic anemia. ;)
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This is an old myth (much like raising the iron concentration in your blood via spinach).
Milk actually depletes the calcium from your bones.
https://saveourbones.com/osteoporosis-milk-myth/

Not saying it isn't related at all, but B12 deficiency is often rather the result of problems with the digestive system.
I've had my blood checked last year and many 8-10 year long vegans I know do regular blood tests and they usually have no deficiencies, probably because they have a healthier life-style (no driving around in cars, more movement and some regular but not extreme sport) and probably also a more varied diet as in not only a handful of different ingredients unlike most omni/vegetarian/vegan people in general.
Although I do take B12 supplement just to be on the safe side.

Here's some more detailed information on the topic which isn't propaganda for either side and is linked to from vegans as well as anti-vegans sometimes:
https://veganhealth.org/vitamin-b12/
 
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Klumpen said:
This is an old myth (much like raising the iron concentration in your blood via spinach).
Milk actually depletes the calcium from your bones.
https://saveourbones.com/osteoporosis-milk-myth/

Not saying it isn't related at all, but B12 deficiency is often rather the result of problems with the digestive system.
I've had my blood checked last year and many 8-10 year long vegans I know do regular blood tests and they usually have no deficiencies, probably because they have a healthier life-style (no driving around in cars, more movement and some regular but not extreme sport) and probably also a more varied diet as in not only a handful of different ingredients unlike most omni/vegetarian/vegan people in general.
Although I do take B12 supplement just to be on the safe side.

Here's some more detailed information on the topic which isn't propaganda for either side and is linked to from vegans as well as anti-vegans sometimes:
https://veganhealth.org/vitamin-b12/
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Now the article by Mr. Vivian Goldschmidt MA you linked lists two studies from 1994/1997 as it's source.
First one is this https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed...actures+in+women:+a+12-year+prospective+study
This study included only women. The most important cause of osteoporosis in women is not dietary deficiency but it is lack of estrogen after menopause. So obviously the study concluded that higher consumption of milk or other sources of calcium did not prevent osteoporosis in old age.

This is the second article
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8154473
This one is actually small study with only 209 cases of hip fractures in patient above 65 year age. They were asked questions about their lifestyle at the age of 20. And conclusion was that consumption of dairy products at the age of 20 increased risk of hip fracture after 65 year age.
This study design is real surprise for multiple reasons. 1.) 27% of the history was obtained from proxy respondents, 2) what is the correlation of dairy product consumption at age of 20 with hip fractures after age of 65, what about diet from 20 to 65 years. 3) how many will have good memory of their diet history before 45 years even when proxy respondents are not used. 4) Author of this study themselves writes that results were unanticipated and needs to be confirmed by other studies.

What Mr. Vivian Goldschmidt has written in saveourbones.com goes much beyond what this studied had said. He seems to have used plenty of imagination and ignored all the newer studies. ( you can search for yourself on pubmed) to brainwash susceptible audience.
[doublepost=1570540105,1570539575][/doublepost]About B12, it is practically not available in vegetable kingdom, so only sources of Vit. B12 are animal products, and for vegans it is Milk and dairy products. However excluding strict vegetarians (not using dairy products), B12 deficiency is usually caused by digestive problems, as Vit. B12 has very complicated intestinal absorption.

About your comment on iron and spinach. Bioavailability of iron from vegetable sources is low as iron in these sources is in ferric form ( not ferrous )+ there are inhibitors like tannins/phytates in veg. diet that inhibits iron absorption. But still people taking good vegetable diet, can maintain iron concentration without supplements. So spinach is not bad iron source at all.

Just to add some weight to about text, I happen to be MD (Pathologist), and if you need I can provide references from standard text/articles for all I have written.
 
docbroke said:
Bioavailability of iron from vegetable sources is low as iron in these sources is in ferric form ( not ferrous )+ there are inhibitors like tannins/phytates in veg. diet that inhibits iron absorption.
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Which is why you have to prepare oats in a certain way to gain something from the included iron at all, afaik.
docbroke said:
About B12, it is practically not available in vegetable kingdom
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Not directly, but indirectly. Since plants don't need it the ground is usually full of it and afaik taking in a bit of dirt with the food on the ground is how some animal like Gorillas usually get their B12.
Since industrially produced food is not ideal in that regard, supplements are the logical alternative.
 
Vit C greatly increase bioavalability of iron from veg source. Also one may avoid taking tea and cabbage at the same time with iron containing food.
 
Only if people drink tea or coffee with or just before/after meals. Morning or evening coffee should be well gone from digestive system at meal time.
 
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Klumpen said:
To be frank, I don't get vegetarianism at all. It's using results of the animal production system but shuns parts of it and as I understood it milk cows have an even worse life than meat cows.
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I'm currently a vegetarian even though I agree with you that it doesn't quite make sense. With eggs and milk from the farming system, the males are killed young, and the females are killed at the age when their production drops. Fundamentally, the difference is only in quantity, so why not eat a little meat? But actually I'm finding it much easier to be vegetarian, because meat stopped seeming like food after a while. On the other hand, hard cheese is highly concentrated milk, so just as bad as meat, and if I'm going to be consistent with my own logic I should stop eating that too.

Welfare is a separate question (some milk cows have a better life than some meat cows), and depending on where you live, it might be possible to have some say in it.
 
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Klumpen said:
Ok, I hoped for a vegan version.
To be frank, I don't get vegetarianism at all. It's using results of the animal production system but shuns parts of it and as I understood it milk cows have an even worse life than meat cows.
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Tofu makes an excellent creamy sauce in my opinion.

I'm essentially pescitarian but am a little conflicted when it comes to intelligent sea creatures such as octopus.

However, diet aside, we're steadily heading to the point where the only creatures other than us that are likely to survive are those that are deemed cute, tasty or useful, and others will die out or be killed.

So my argument is to have a varied and diverse diet, but with everything in moderation.
 
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Nintendo said:
Which begs the question...

Is it possible for a person to be 100% animal (non-human) cruelty-free?
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Well, insects can probably feel pain too (they seem to have most of the building blocks required but who knows what they actually feel). You can go full vegan and not have any involvement with any kind of animal due to your diet, but you're still likely to be using gas heating (in this country at least) and even electricity comes from fossil fuels still in most parts of the world, which releases climate change factors into the air and moves habitation zones for animals around. And if you drive you'll release particulates which can irritate lungs, or theoretically even if you just walk the rubber soles on your shoes will release particulates. But I can guess you could argue that's not cruel, even if it shortens the lifespan of animals.
 
The main problem with diet is that the development of our habits has overtaken our biological evolutionary rate. We're evolved to eat both meat and veg - we have incisors at the front of our mouths specifically for tearing flesh, we have molars at the back for grinding plant material. We need fibre in our diet in surprisingly large quantities, and that's mostly because we're still evolutionary-speaking suited to a diet that comprises mostly vegetables, and meat when we can catch it.

Back when I was a kid, we had meat twice a week - and the midweek meat was leftovers from the sunday roast. Fish on fridays as a treat from the chippie if we could afford it. As owning a car was something of a luxury round our way, the veg was strictly seasonal - what we grew in our gardens or allotments. Now though, you can have meat three times a day every day - and we're not developed physically to handle that. But we've used our big brains and our tools to breed the animals and gather them in one place for easy killing, so we can have MacDonalds on demand. It would seem our brains are advancing quicker than we are.

And on the subject of farming - dairy is fine, if you don't have the large super-dairies that they have in some developed countries. Those really are hell for the animals. See, that's the other issue we have now - we've farmed for so long that our dairy cows will literally die if we don't milk them. We've genetically modified them (through breeding) to produce lots of milk, and now we have the responsibility towards those animals to milk them to keep them comfortable. I've worked on dairy farms and the cows in the smaller places really are well treated - they're grass fed when it's available, they have shelter and warmth. They play in the sunshine - even the older ones. they literally play like dogs and can have a wicked sense of humour. And the smaller places also use automation - milking machines, cow scratchers etc, but they're really quite pleasant and the cows have no complaints.

Don't get me started on the mass-chicken industry though. Those places can all burn in hell for all I care - I've worked in those too, and had to quit shortly after. They're horrific and I won't eat chicken from KFC ever having seen what happens to the chickens. Get them from reputable local farms though, and your conscience will be pretty clear. unfortunately, so will your wallet, but we all need to cut down on our meat, don't we?
 
B12 is produced by some bacteria present in grasses and also in guts of some grass easing animals, where they produce Vit. B12. Vit. B12 in drugs comes from bacterial colonies grown in labs.
 
thanks @docbroke and all for these interesting infos. verry welcome to keep us all healthier here.
as i drink a lot of tea lately, i just learned to change my tea and meal timings a bit.

i'm also in the process to not eat too much meat myself and when i do, certified from local sources to minimize animal cruelty.
i really want to get veg to reduce animal cruelty and be more green to the environment.
as with all addictions/bad habits, it has to make 'click' in the brain to stop it.
 
rSl said:
i'm also in the process to not eat too much meat myself and when i do, certified from local sources to minimize animal cruelty.
i really want to get veg to reduce animal cruelty and be more green to the environment.
as with all addictions/bad habits, it has to make 'click' in the brain to stop it.
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You also need to make sure you get your veggies locally grown too - so that means pretty much seasonal only. Anything that requires shipping is, in the current climate (ha! DYSWIDT?) almost as harmful as mass meat farming and production and arguably so. Oh, and chocolate should also be avoided, as the ingredients require specialist handling, storage and shipping procedures due to us not able to produce the necessary stuff in temperate regions.

But then you have to balance these things out - ceasing your consumption of such foodstuffs as cocoa, coffee etc due to their environmental impact (via transport) will have a hugely negative effect on those farmers that rely on our custom and they tend to be some of the poorest people in the world.

As usual, it boils down to a choice. Yes, we all want to save the environment. But how much of it? Everything we do - including conservation, green energy production and carbon-neutral living, has some negative impact on the world. There's the old trope that if everyone stopped eating meat then cows would end up extinct. And it's true, along with many other species. But we would save a lot of indigenous human cultures from extinction as their homes are no longer needed for meat production. Or would we? They might live in areas where our veggies thrive...
 
the nature is in such a fucked up state that we all have to change, so i want to rescue as much of it as possible ofc.
the best for nature would be no humans at all. but we are here and we are really a lot now. and we are all equal.
so to not kill nature and us completely right now, we, the system needs to change fundamentally.

the main problem is overboarding capitalism, enabled by technology. tech to be everywhere anytime. tech to destroy all things easily. tech to
transfer money in a fraction of a second. etc. etc. this makes it waay to easy for greedy people to constantly suck the life out of our resources.
this really has to stop. or we stop living a relativly good life here on planet earth verry soon.

it makes me angry that people are doing this, just because... they can. politicians say we can go on like this because better tech will solve it in the future. total bullshit.
fridays for future, xr, anticoal groups are all verry needed these days and i support them wherever i can. be it with money, going on strikes, talking to others etc...
i allready purchase a *lot* less things, buy local grown food from the organic store and with my beloved tea, i only buy the ship transported one. all things that have to travel a lot should be avoided at best, right.

we are all verry spoilt by this "western" lifestyle, me too. my tea comes from china, japan, india. coffee and cocoa comes from latin america and so on.
i really like to support the people there doing fine stuff. so i get tea from teashops where i know where and how the tea is produced. coffee comes from a local roaster using fairtrade organic beans. cocoa is the gepa one. and so on...
i like to see things that make my life enjoyable as real precious things. less quantity but quality. they become more valuable for me this way and it helps consuming a lot less.
don't buy it often or better, at all. use it longer. recycle.
 
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