According to Barnard no-one who eats vegetarian or vegan could ever develop T2 so....
You know, the problem is that people call themselves vegan and aren't necessarily eating that many vegetables... I had an au pair from Italy last year who only stayed for 2 weeks. She told me she was vegan after she arrived. I thought, poor thing, you've landed in a house with one of the biggest meat eaters I have known (my husband)...
Anyway, I watched what she was eating while she was here. She did once or twice make a dish with some vegetables in it. But otherwise she subsisted on peanut butter and jam sandwiches. And sometimes that was all she was eating for the whole day - one little sandwich in the morning! She was starving herself. I actually think she had an eating disorder but was going around calling herself vegan.
Another vegetarian I knew was eating a few veggies here and there but filling up on pasta and rice and other such grains. Plus some of them eat sweets and all the naughty food like anyone else on a SAD.
Do you think vegetarians who eat a "clean" diet of vegetables, fruit, nuts, cheese, yoghurt, eggs, olive oil, (even fish?) would get diabetes? I think it's all the processed grains that are the problem, isn't it?
With vegans, I think, there is some clever social engineering going on. I mean, you can survive for a long time on vegetables alone. I was just watching some documentary of poor Chinese villagers who live off mostly white potatoes, and they somehow survive into old age... I'm not sure how healthy they are or how long they really live but they are all out in the fields working hard and not eating a great variety.
But I think the push to encourage people to be vegan is so that someone else can take the meat. Even if you choose not to eat meat, it will still be farmed in your country most likely and just exported to the places that want it. The damage to the environment will still happen. China already owns a great number of farms in Australia, for example, and they would be sending meat back to China for sure. Most of the best cuts of meat probably never arrive on an average Australian's dinner plate. I know that's what's happening with "our" seafood. We get the left overs. All the best stuff goes overseas. So why not convince everyone to be vegan and let all of the good animal protein be sent off to other countries who are willing to pay more for it? Clever ploy?
The difference is in our programming. I first noticed that cultural difference if you will when I was on a reef trip with some Japanese students. We went on a glass bottom boat to see all the beautiful reef fish. I was looking at the fish with wonder - all the colours and shapes and sizes. My students were looking at them and said "Yum!" It didn't occur to me to think of them in terms of food. I guess they were more in touch with the reality of where our food comes from... ha ha
Edited by a mod.
