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-I know several vegans and vegetarians. They have to WORK hard to eat a diet which will maintain their health... and often still look pale and sickly.
TO say nothing of the fact that THEIR DIET costs more.
While I eat like an omnivore, I have to take issue with this.
My mother and stepfather have been vegetarian for over 40 years...they are both close to 80 and still work physically every day and manage a farm. As well as doing yoga daily, including free headstands and positions or excercises most American 20-somethings could not manage. Their social circle (mostly aged hippies LOL) are similar to them...vegetarian, many Indians, very vital and healthy, active people. Two of my three siblings, all of us middle-aged, are also vegetarians and healthy as all get out.
(And by no means PETA types I assure you!)
I was raised on a hippie/Small Planet type diet...we ate extremely cheap and well, I have to say, and well into my 50s I am still very healthy and active.
I have no problems with vegetarians as long as they're not weird and evangelical about it.
I have no problems with people who eat meat, either.
It is barely possible that our food budget might be smaller with a vegetarian diet, but my medical bills would soar (this is based on experience with a carefully balanced vegetarian diet). As far as being healthier, not for someone with my particular genetic make-up - I need a certain amount of meat, preferably red meat or shrimp, in order to stay healthy. (Not every day, but two or three times a week.)
If I DO go on a high protein diet, consisting of mostly meat, that's when I'm healthiest by all barometers.
Leave meat out of my diet, again, as I said, carefully balancing the vegetarian diet, and I'm sick as a dog in no time.
Not everyone is the same. My late best friend did wonderfully on a vegetarian diet (it had nothing to do with the cancer that did her in, that was genetic, though now that I think about it, I've known several women now who have had breast or ovarian cancer, two who have died of it very early (50's), and all of them ate either vegetarian or extremely low-fat diets and were very careful about their health and did everything "right" - hmmmm).
What works best for each person from a health perspective is best determined individually and not on the basis of some philosophy.
This thread is stupid, do what you want, who cares.
I'm a vegetarian, and if it can get expensive if you want good vegetarian food, so I don't know about that saving money thing. I know that a lot of celebrities are vegetarians/vegans, and you can bet they spend a whole lot on there grocery bill without meat. Soy milk, fake meat,etc that stuff is pricey. Although your arteries might thank you later for laying off that red meat.
My bottom line opinion, because I've dealt with this my whole life (raised a vegetarian), stupid PETA people that tell people what to eat and how badly animals are treated need to shut up. On the other side of the coin, people that act like freaking cave men, saying how meat is the end all and be all of life are stupid also.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Themanwithnoname
There have been several studies done on 'mountanmen' type people in the artic who eat a year round diet of mostly to totally meat and animal related products.
They are/were very healthy.
-I use them because they arn't one of the 'tribal examples' where you could claim genetic adaptation.
Now, I DO try to eat organic beef, not raised with all those growth hormones etc.
But I eat a steak about once a week along with my fruits and veggies.
We are omnivores. Anything else does NOT make 'health sense'
-I know several vegans and vegetarians. They have to WORK hard to eat a diet which will maintain their health... and often still look pale and sickly.
TO say nothing of the fact that THEIR DIET costs more.
As has been stated, Cut back, sure could.
Not gonna.
How do I say this nicely, you are waaaay off . You are the other end of the spectrum I was talking about above, just uninformed, sounding really stupid. For every "mountain man" you supposedly know, there are plenty of doctors out there doing bypass surgeries because of years of red meat and fried chicken. As for the "pale and sickly" comment, being a vegetarian is becoming popular with a lot of MMA fighters, not exactly pale and sickly. Does Brad Pitt look "pale and sickly"?
Like I said before, I don't care if people eat meat, I might too if I was raised different, but the above comment is just ignorance.
A vegetarian diet with proper nutrition is far more expensive than an omnivore diet.
I suppose it depends on how much diversity you need/want in your diet. A diet of beans and rice and a few fresh veggies every day is not going to cost an arm and a leg. However, if you require interesting and different components or need to have out-of-season fruits to make you happy YEAH it's going to cost a lot.
Meat is not the most expensive part of our food budget, fresh produce is (fruits and veggies). We go through it so fast. I try to grow what I can but it is difficult, hard to keep deer and squirrels and other pests off things.
Which is one of the reasons why it is so expensive, that and now gas is going up again.
and our fruits and veggies come from California to all over the world.
So I could actually save more money by eating more meats, and giving up fruits/vegs.
That doesn't actually save anything because it will very likely raise health care costs for yourself and the taxpayers (if you're on Medicare/Medicaid).
I don't consider a Big Mac to be meat.... it is fast food/junk food.
MY idea is a nice steak, fresh from the butcher's store.... and it's cheaper than fresh veggies, especially this time of the year.
I'd go a step further and say Big Macs are not even food. The term "junk food" is an oxymoron.
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