So, how much do you actually know about how your body works? (Page 2 of 3)

No.  Clarification.  There's a difference between seeing through what somebody's words are trying to do, manipulation-wise, and actually being affected by them.   If anything, you bringing up eggs yesterday inspired me to buy some when we went to Whole Foods last night.   

Ummmmmm....eggs. 

Did you realize that the foods that you eat in lieu of meat, eggs and dairy could also be spun in a negative light?  This is something I was laughing about in fact last night, how vegans get all snooty about describing dairy, eggs and meat, not realizing how the foods they eat can be spun in the same way.  ALL food can be spun in a weird light...if one really wanted to try hard enough.   Eggs are ova?   So aren't fruit.  (I assume that as a vegan, you're consuming fruit at some point?  If not, then this doesn't apply to you.)

"A fruit is a structure that develops as the ovary of a flower that nourishes and protects developing seeds." - http://www.jmu.edu/biology/k12/fruitdev/fruit.htm

"I can't understand why somebody would want to eat the ova of a plant."  Ptwey!  All foods could be spun in that light if one really wanted too.  Anything that's alive that we're ingesting can be seen in a gross way, and as "killing."  Just depends to what extent you want to take it.

(This reminds me of another related thing - how certain parts of an animal are more acceptable to eat than others.  In poor societies, they eat and use nearly everything - stuff you couldn't pay me to eat!  So I can understand the mentality of thinking products from animals is gross...and let's face it, based on one's culture and upbringing, there's going to be a "sliding scale" of grossness.  For vegans, no animals parts are acceptable.  It's all nasty.  "Cow secretions!  Unfertilized chicken ova!  Flesh dripping in blood!  Ptewy!" For many meat eaters, only certain parts of certain animals is okay.  For other meat eaters...anything goes.  If it moves and it can be killed and it'll keep you alive, then it's all good...)

from http://www.pranaspirituallifecentre.cof … health.htm

Very helpful website about body PH:

http://www.alkalizeforhealth.net/

Lyra, it is just a bit frustrating to have people explain to me that I'm being "snooty" when it was not within my intention. I was not aiming to be emotionally manipulative with what I was writing. Many people dismiss all vegans as snotty and cranky, and never bother thinking about changes they could make in their own eating/health.

I don't really want to list all the reasons I am aware of to not eat meat. I made the decision because when I look at meat, I am reminded that my body is made of meat, and so yeah that grossed me out. I don't want someone to eat the meat of my body, therefore I choose not to eat other people's (haha, I mean animals! typo!) meat.

And yeah, you can spin vegetables as being gross too, but I dunno... I guess I just think its different to stop an animal's heart beating than to pick an apple off a tree, even though both die. Also, have you ever seen footage of a slaughter house killing floor? Its quite different than watching a piece of broccoli being hacked to bits by sharp knives and exposing the "glistening broccoli-inards". But I really don't want to argue about it, or hurt your feelings.

I don't think that everyone needs to/ought to go vegan, either! I just think it is a good response to a world very much out of balance.

I have recently been very depressed by the cattle industry, and what it has done to America, not to mention England and Ireland before that. I read an amazing book called Beyond Beef : The Rise and Fall of the Cattle Culture by Jeremy Rifkin. I will post some of the data from the opening chapter here later, because it is kind of brain-bending. You can read some reviews at Amazon. This one reader had a very good point, and he lives near me:

I will post some of the stats later, but it is something to the effect that out of all the grain produced in the world, over 20% of it goes straight to feeding cows. And then, out of all the beef grown in America, 80% of it is exported to England! English and Scottish elite families have maintained control over America by way of buying massive plots of land and filling them with cows. Literally tens of millions of buffalo were slaughtered to make room for the first 600,000 head of cattle in America. The buffalo was an animal with spiritual significance to the Native Americans, and the slaughter basically eliminated their ability to conduct their rituals with the buffalo. So the drive towards cattle farming was directly related to the genocide of the Native Americans. Well, the book is plenty to read, there are tons of factoids in it like that.

We recently moved out of the city and into the sparsely-populated countryside. Unfortunately, we are finding that although the scenery is very expansive... everything is FENCED OFF! There are fences everywhere, across these huge vast plains. And it turns out, no public access. Cow grazing land only! So we end up having to drive for 30+ minutes to get to an accessible trailhead, even though we are literally surrounded by millions of wide-open acres. They are reserved for the cows, and the farmers will shoot at us if we trespass.

Tim

Well, don't assume I haven't thought about making changes...I have.   

But moving on!

Well, no worries, nobody is making you have to explain anything or answer for anything.  I mean, if you're able to go without animal products, more power to you.  I'd like to ideally.  But for me it doesn't seem possible while in this body, without getting sickly.  But I admire anybody who can pull it off.

True. 

No...but I have seen pics.  It's not pretty.  I've also read descriptions in books and write ups and such.  (btw....I only eat beef here and there, just poultry and fish mostly.)

I'll tell you, it's a weird conflict.  I can look at animals and think they're the cutest most wonderful things............and still get hungry.  My body knows how much nutrition is there and no matter what I read, I can't help but finding animals tasty.  Here's a funny anecdote you'll probably roll your eyes about   but one time back in California I was feeding the ducks at a lake....totally cute, wonderful ducks full of fiesty pep and personality..........and as I'm sitting there on the bench I'm watching one of the ducks waddle away from me and was like, ummmmmmmmmmmmmm....duck..........   I totally envisioned this big fat duck on a plate with like, Chinese sweet and sour duck sauce or something.  It was terrible!  Vision overlaid the scene of me feeding the duck.  I don't think I've ever actually eaten duck...it just suddenly seemed like a tasty idea!  Ah well.   Oh yeah...and there's the time I was on a train heading to San Francisco and passing through one of the many fields in California's Central Valley area.....and there were cows.....and I was looking out the window at these cows in the field and my stomach started grumbling.....ummmmmm....hamburger!  Steak!  YUM!   I got up and ran off to the dining car to see if they had hamburger.  No, just had chicken.  Not the same, dammit!

It's terrible.  I know.  I've tried.  But these evil meat eating tendencies persist.   But it would be different I know if I had to kill the animal myself.  I probably couldn't and would just starve and waste away rather than do that.  It's obviously easier when somebody else is doing it behind closed doors. 

Hurt my feelings? It would take more than that, trust me. haha 

That is interesting, definitely.  I think the reason that this has been so rampant is that people have been in the dark about it for decades.  People aren't exactly seeking out the information about what's really going on here, and nobody has exactly stepped forward to show them.  But we've seen the tide turning in the last 10 years alone, with a rise in the green movement, more and more people going vegetarian....I used to work in an office that had 18 computer software programmers...and fully half of them were vegetarians.   Numbers like that were unheard of years ago.   Vegetarians/vegans are becoming so common that restaurants are changing their menus to cater to them.  And now we have documentaries like Super Size Me and mockumentaries like Fast Food Nation, (based on the book of the same name) among the many MANY exposes out there, that are bringing awareness of the situation to the masses. People are now becoming informed.  It may not be enough though, or too little too late, I don't know.   Maybe it's all a part of the shift.  You never know.

Now, here's the kicker though, back to the cattle farm stats you were relaying, and avoiding meat because the world has become unbalanced.............all those cows aren't just going into hamburger and prime rib.  They're going into the bezillion products that people are using everyday. !!!  The obvious one, "leather" aside, there's Kodak film to face cream to who knows what else.  Products that you yourself may be using. 

They've basically got the cow thing rigged so that there's almost no escaping products that have cow in it, some way, some how, from ground hooves to the organs, etc.   I read an article about this several years ago in Discover Magazine, and even saved the issue for that reason, feeling like it might come in handy some day to know which common every day products utilize which particular cow parts, as a useful "FYI."  I'll see if I still have this issue laying around....

Hey Lyra, just for the record, I was totally not even referring to YOU when I wrote "many people". I'm quite sure you've put a lot of thought into your own health, its clear from all the stuff you've posted! Anyway, so I hadn't assumed YOU, Lyra, had not thought about making changes. I was more thinking of my girlfriend's mom.

It is frustrating to try to express oneself in print, it is really tricky!

Tim

I was going to hold off on posting this until a little while longer, but I can't help it, I'll spill it now...but today was Day 6 of:

- No caffeine
- No processed foods
- Minimal to almost no dairy

and Day 5 of:

- No caffeine
- No alcohol
- No refined sugar
- No processed foods
- Minimal to almost no dairy

!!!!!!!!!!  It's kind of exciting.  I just might be able to pull this off.   But there wasn't a day that was going by where I wasn't consuming several cups of caffeinated tea and coffee, with sugar, and those junk snacks that they give away for free at my job, and maybe wine with my dinner, (and big piles of jellied/whole cranberry sauce that has like 10 pounds of sugar in it too...) and eating out a lot, getting pizza, bagels with cream cheese, just whatever I felt like, and whatever additional junk in general.  I'd so fallen off the wagon of healthy eating it's not even funny.  But for the last six days it's been a huge salad of raw veggies every night, fish, chicken, avocados, bananas, apples, muesli cereal...nothing but real food.  And no caffeine, refined sugar, or alcohol.  I even turned down attending the company Christmas party at my temp job, which is going to be held at some fancy schmancy Virginia Inn, you know, one of those old 1800's mansion houses that are now converted into a hotel, which would have had things like prime rib in red wine sauce, cream brulet and a full open free bar.   Not to sound like an alchy, but I mean seriously...who can resist a free open bar, you know?    haha And I had the chance for a free bottle of Merlot wine today...and said no.   Have had all kinds of free holiday junk snacks waved in my face since last week from companies that send tins and baskets full of junk for the Holidays...said no.  And said no to the office birthday thing last Friday where they had Ben and Jerry's ice cream cake.  It's not that I don't still want these things....Ben and Jerry's ice cream cake??  Yum!  But I just keep remembering everything I've read recently, and can't do it anymore.

I wanted to wait until I've made it a full week, because otherwise maybe I'm jumping the gun, but, we'll see.  So far it looks pretty good.............Let's hear it for Tim O'Shea and his big kick in the pants website!