[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('seldom_seen', 'I')ndeed we are. Our brains need those EFAs and Amino acids. Paleoanthropologists seem to be converging on the theory that it was meat that allowed us to develop such a fancy cerebral cortex in the first place.

[smallpoxgirl]

The way meat is produced in the US is seriously screwed up. Which is really suprising considering that the rest of our agriculture and all of our industry and our military system are so careful and almost never produce any pollution at all.

The truth is that we are the land of degenerate wastful illconcieved industrialism. There are millions of items in America that you can point at and say, "Well if we just got rid of that, we could cut down on pollution and save energy."

The truth is that eating meat is a very natural very healthy part of existance as a human. I don't like feed lot cattle, but then I don't like industrial-petrochemical agribussiness corn either. I really think this idea from the vegan fringe that we should all stop eating meat so that we can reduce our footprint and pack more flipping people onto the planet, we...it's just screwed up. You want to pick on something, pick on something that hasn't been a healthy part of human existance for tens of thousands of years. Pick on cars, or air planes, or refrigerators, or central heating. Leave my steak alone.

Actually....better yet. Come out to Montana and enjoy some road-kill elk steaks with me. We have more former-vegans in Montana than anywhere else on earth. I myself was a vegetarian for 6 years before I started hanging out here.

[TheTurtle]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '
')Actually....better yet. Come out to Montana and enjoy some road-kill elk steaks with me.

[seldom_seen]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'W')ell, that's misleading

[eastbay]

Respectfully everyone,

Religious views aside for a moment, there is no sensible comparison between living in an isolated rural area eating a periodic deer or other wild animal you may have killed on your own and the fantasmagoric and sickening factory animal harvesting facilities and infrastructure humans have created to provide beef to the worlds teeming urbanized areas.

The point of the issue discussed as it's related to resource waste is in the recently created madness of mass-harvesting animals.

[FossilFool]

Maybe, that worked for people during the Great Depression, but I doubt it will work here. I have heard that grass-fed meat could meet everyone's requirements.

It's hard to say if we are really meant to eat the meat. We need B-12. That's the only thing we can't get any other way. So, maybe we ate a little meat maybe before we were like Cro-magnon. Because we are a unique animal that can think so complexly, it's hard to know if we are meant to eat meat or we just fancied to decide to do that too and doing that would maybe sustain even higher populations as is seen in the correlation of the development of population rise and agriculture. I mean, who knows where our instincts end and our thoughts begin?

But there is also peak arable land and how much land we are using and degrading. Cut meat out and you could use a lot less, 86% less. Sounds good to me.

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('eastbay', 'R')eligious views aside for a moment, there is no sensible comparison between living in an isolated rural area eating a periodic deer or other wild animal you may have killed on your own and the fantasmagoric and sickening factory animal harvesting facilities

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('seldom_seen', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'M')ost hunter-gatherers, like other primates, eat mostly plant material.

[eastbay]

Smallpoxgirl... oh please... wanna compare pictures of soybean processing and mammal harvesting? I didn't think so... I wouldn't either.

Posting images of factory mammal slaughtering is probably a violation of the Code of Conduct. or should be anyhow. Hopefully you and the other moderators would delete graphic slaughterhouse images.

But Google Image search soybean production or tofu production and see the results of that search.

Eating factory-processed animals and promoting peak oil is like pulling up in a Hummer to speak at a global warming conference.

[smallpoxgirl]

Hey. At least my steak is a naturally occuring substance, not some genetically modified science project from Monsanto. Mass producing food is icky and environmentally destructive. That is just as true whether you are mass producing corn or beef. If we are using too much energy producing food that is not evidence of too few vegans. It is evidence of too many people and screwed up processes for food production.

Becoming a vegan to stop peak oil is just as niave as thinking that you will change anything by buying a hybrid.

[eastbay]

Becoming a vegan to stop peak oil is just as niave as thinking that you will change anything by buying a hybrid.

I couldn't agree more... lol. Except it's impossible to stop peak oil my dear SPG. And it takes more than simply being a vegan to warn people about the harsher effects of the coming PO disaster and how the damage can still be somewhat mitigated. And it's true, you might as well buy an SUV or a Hummer if you buy a hybrid. Owning a hybrid sucks up more energy in the lifetime of the car than a small fuel efficient diesel or gas-powered car will. In fact, most hybrids are now being touted as 'more power!!' It's disgusting I tell ya! We really need to approach this crisis from all areas of our lives to make a positive impact.

Not eating meat is one simple and easy small way anyone can easily help. You'll help your own karma while making the world happier. That's two 'good' for the effort of one!! Driving a hybrid contributes nothing at all, in fact, I think they actually do more harm than good.

[seldom_seen]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', '"')Bull poop" isn't a very nice way of debating. Myabe it would be better to cite our references.

[Ludi]

Stoll's book must contain very recent anthropological information, because all sources I've read say most HG peoples eat primarily plant materials. Staple foods were/are plants for most groups. I'm not saying HG peoples don't eat meat when they can get it, of course they do, just as chimps do. And as bears do. Peoples living near a ready source of animal food would of course exploit that source (bison, salmon). Keep in mind bison were much more difficult to obtain prior to the introduction of horses and that numbers of plains tribes were semi-agricultural/horticultural before horses were introduced into North America.

Humans are not adapted physically to be hunters. This is obvious. Clearly hunting big game and fishing evolved after we became advanced tool users. So, probably after we evolved into Homo sapiens. Prior to advanced tools, people would have been opportunistic meat eaters - stealing kills from predators, scavenging, eating insects and small animals. Advanced tools used by your examples the Inuit, Pacific Northwest tribes, and Japanese fishermen, came late in our development.

Here's a nice overview of human diet and tool development and how these changes worked together to produce the modern human:

http://anthro.palomar.edu/homo/homo_3.htm


Factory-farmed meat and fish also can't be compared to wild meat and fish for health. Grain fed animals have a much higher proportion of saturated fat than wild animals. So simply eating more meat, any meat, is not healthier.


Good article on HG diets and the proportion of animal to plant foods:

http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/71 ... g3n3ipAk16

[seldom_seen]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', 'H')umans are not adapted physically to be hunters. This is obvious.

[untothislast]

Here's what's wrong with eating meat.

Any society predicated on the exploitation - or murder - of another species, just because those species are vulnerable either through being less 'intelligent' or unable to defend themselves adequately - hardwires such injustices into every fibre of its being. Filtering through the system, the implicit value of 'the strong must always triumph over the weak' stamps itself on everything we aspire to do - and we end up with all forms of social injustice; from intolerance and racism, through to violence and war.

Meat eaters, examine the justifications for your habits - and why you're able to practise them - then honestly ask yourself the following questions:

1. Meat is good and sustaining - and choc full of B12 - why don't we eat other humans when they're dead?

2. Why shouldn't we euthanase the sick, infirm, or intellectually impaired?

3. What's wrong with paedophilia?

4. Why don't we take schoolkids on educational trips to the slaughterhouse/abbatoir? Are we secretly ashamed of something?

[TheTurtle]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('untothislast', ' ')
Any society predicated on the exploitation - or murder - of another species, just because those species are vulnerable either through being less 'intelligent' or unable to defend themselves adequately - hardwires such injustices into every fibre of its being. Filtering through the system, the implicit value of 'the strong must always triumph over the weak' stamps itself on everything we aspire to do - and we end up with all forms of social injustice; from intolerance and racism, through to violence and war.

[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', 'T')here are millions of items in America that you can point at and say, "Well if we just got rid of that, we could cut down on pollution and save energy."

[Ludi]

seldom seen, if you refuse to read my posts or the references, I don't think we can communicate. I didn't say humans didn't eat meat, I said the evidence is they were not big game hunters and efficient fishermen like your examples until they became Homo sapiens. Please read the references.

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('eastbay', 'N')ot eating meat is one simple and easy small way anyone can easily help. You'll help your own karma while making the world happier.

[eastbay]

SPG,

If a teacher took her grade school kids on a tour of a beef slaughterhouse she would be fired and would probably never teach again. If she took them on a tour of a flour mill or a soybean processing plant it would be a happy day for all.

I doubt if anyone chomping into a hamburger from Burger King pauses for a second to make a compact with a cow; making sure the other cows go on living in a good way.

Again, there is no way to anyone can seriously compare eating flour with eating factory-harvested cows.