(no subject)

[jianantonic]

My coworkers are going on and on about how horrible it is of my boss (who isn't here to explain/defend herself) to raise her daughter vegetarian.
"But kids need meat!"
"She eats the stuffing, what's the difference?"
"She'll be so unhealthy!"
"Why deprive her?!"
It makes me want to scream. Ignorant bitches.

ETA: I have been a vegetarian for 14 years, and I've never even bothered (until recently) to watch my intake of protein or other nutrients supposedly provided by meat and meat alone. In all those 14 years, I've never had abnormal levels of anything - totally healthy across the board. When I mention this to one of the complainers, she says, "Well, that's just you. You're special." To which I reply more than half the world doesn't have meat in their regular diets, if at all. And she says, "Well, that's just them. But people need meat." Wha? Seriously. I'm pretty good about not preaching vegetarianism to others, though I do believe it's a wonderful lifestyle for a plethora of reasons, but this pisses me off. I think I'll yank a bunch of health data off the web and leave it on their desks on Monday. Heh.

Peace.

Comments

[flamingophoenix.livejournal.com]

ARGH! I'm not even a vegetarian (not really) and that still frustrates me! Ignorance is universally offensive.

Interestingly enough, two of my friends refuse to eat vegetables. One of them is a vegetarian. They're both healthy as can be.

I think the lesson I take from that is that overall it's good for a population to eat healthily, but there's no guarantee that it's necessary for any one given person. You may keel over from a heart attack from eating too much saturated fat, or you may not. It's just a gamble.

[natertots.livejournal.com]

See, I feel it's wrong to raise a kid vegetarian, but... for different reasons.

I just feel it's unfair to limit culinary experiences... there is far too much good food out there to let one's own hangups limit the experiences of a child.

[jianantonic.livejournal.com]

Being a vegetarian is not a hangup. There are tons of health, environmental, and ethical reasons to be one. And there's so much good vegetarian food that you'd never miss meat if you do it right. There are meat substitutes that even carnivores can't tell are soy. I don't proselytize out of respect for differences, but please believe that my reasons for being a vegetarian are well thought out as well as many.

[natertots.livejournal.com]

sorry, poorly worded

But, my point was that I don't think one should limit the experiences of the child.... each person should be allowed to experience as much as possible (within reason) growing up, and then be able to make their own choices.

[jianantonic.livejournal.com]

Parents restrict their children from lots of activities because of health, ethical, and moral reasons. If I have children, restricting their diet would be the same. I've always thought that if I had kids, I'd let them do mostly as they pleased, once they are educated enough to make informed decisions. Jeremy and I had this discussion yesterday, actually. It's my belief that any person educated enough would cut meat from their diet - but so many carnivores refuse to look at the facts because they don't want to. You may only eat meat in the healthiest of ways, but even then, the environmental impact of raising livestock and poultry is huge and extremely harmful to the environment. Maybe that's not something that most people think or care about, but if I raise kids the way I hope to (if I ever have them, which I probably won't), they will care.

[natertots.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I guess we just disagree on the ethical and moral reasons.

and to say there's a health reason is just silly. I mean, nobody is a carnivore. humans are omnivores. it's healthy for us to have a mix of various food sources. Granted, many people have an unhealthy diet, but that's not due to eating meat or not.

In any event.... we'll have to agree to disagree, I guess. :)

[flamingophoenix.livejournal.com]

I wish I were capable of a reasoned debate like this one. I'm jealous now.

I agree, they're ignorant

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, eating a healthy vegetarian diet (as opposed to a poor diet without meat, sometimes called a junkfood vegetarian diet) is very good for your health.

Humans might be omnivores, but the sort of meat eaten today is not the sort of animal protein our ancestors ate. If you really want to be natural, eat a small percentage of grubs and insects, in a largely vegetarian diet full of fruits, tubers and massive amounts of leafy greens. We're better suited to ingesting that than eating muscle tissue of large animals, which in our species leads to various diseases and chronic conditions.

Since I'll pass on the grubs and insects, I've been vegetarian for twenty years now. When I go in for my check-ups, my doctor grins from ear to ear. I think it would be difficult to get such good blood levels as mine if I ate meat. I believe it's been good for my body not subjecting it to something difficult to digest, for which it is not perfectly evolved to assimilate. I've also spared it from massive doses of acidity, which is aging. Plus, eating vegetarian has helped with my a chronic condition, keeping my fibroids from becoming a serious problem. If I ate meat, bathing my fibroids in hormones, I might have had to have surgery (hysterectomy) a long time ago. My story isn't unusual.

I've done my best to raise my kids vegetarian, and I believe they are healthier, and more aware and compassionate beings due to it. I do not dictate their diet now that they are teenagers. They eat what they want, at least outside of the house. Most of the time, however, that is vegetarian. As it turns out, if you don't make it into a forbidden fruit, and you're not raised to think you need it to live, it really isn't that compelling a food choice.

But beyond that, the sort of conversation you're subjected to sounds maddening. What silly twits.

Re: I agree, they're ignorant

[(Anonymous)]

Sigh, this is one of my tender button issues. Don't mean to go off on a tangent, but there's just so much willful ignorance out there in the world on this topic.

Re: I agree, they're ignorant

[flamingophoenix.livejournal.com]

I like your outlook on it!

However, I'm curious as to your opinion on "organic" meat. I know that word is heavily abused and misused, but when I say it I mean either animals that are raised in a hormone/etc-free environment--true, old-fashioned family farming type of situation--or hunted animals that live in a similarly natural world. In these instances, hormones, antibiotics, pesticides (or whatever) are not an issue.

I know most of our ancestors probably didn't eat mastodons every day, either (despite popular conceptions), but do you think that occasional (maybe 1/week?) large-animal meat could be healthy?

(I'm asking this as a current omnivore who has been vegetarian in the past and might be so again in the future.)