Vegetarian Rugby Player

[oenamen]

This can be well explained by human anthropometry ...

[vivek]

Red meat will optimize gene expression in response to whatever strength training stimulus.

If you are vegetarian, you are taking a longer, less effective road in achieving your strength training goals.

I don't have the "science" on this one, nor am I a nutritionist, but I have conducted this experiment on myself, and the more red meat I ate (read beef, lamb, pork) the better I recovered, and the stronger I got. This is in spite of an otherwise shitty training schedule, sleep habits, and meal "schedule"......

Why someone would be a vegetarian in a country that is wealthy with the access to good quality, cheap animal protein is beyond my comprehension...

[Mark Rippetoe]

I stopped eating meat out of principle, not preference.

I still don't understand.

[aussieluke]

But I stopped eating meat out of principle, not preference. Actually, the whole reason I chose burritos as my staple was because they're the closest "real" food I can get to meat.

Eating grains but not eating meat "out of principal" = fail

Grains aren't grown from magic beans and hand picked by fairies. Grains are grown in massive fields full of wildlife, which are routinely poisoned with pesticides, and then killed to death by massive fucking combine harvesters and machinery on a massive scale.

Insects and small animals have feelings too, you know. Tasty, delicious feelings.

[skipbeat]

I think any living thing that doesn't speak english is fine to eat, that's likely just me though

[PressesPeople]

Eating grains but not eating meat "out of principal" = fail

Grains aren't grown from magic beans and hand picked by fairies. Grains are grown in massive fields full of wildlife, which are routinely poisoned with pesticides, and then killed to death by massive fucking combine harvesters and machinery on a massive scale.

Insects and small animals have feelings too, you know. Tasty, delicious feelings.

Ahhhh, you had to go and make me angry though your fucking INTOLERABLE stupidity. Alright. Let me explain this to you so that your child-like critical thinking can digest it: Using animals as a method of turning grain into meat, which we then eat, is a FAR less efficient process than eliminating that step and simply eating the grain straight up. So, to feed the cows that then feed us, 2 acres of land might have to be destroyed, rather than 1.

So yes, by living (which I have to eat grain to do), I do cause destruction of small animals, faeries and insects. However, I would cause much MORE destruction if I lived off of meat.


To Mark: it's from a standpoint of humanity/empathy. I realized when I was 16 that it made NO sense, from a civilized species' perspective, to actually raise animals solely for the purpose of being slaughtered. I had to take a step back, and once I did, I realized how utterly fucked up that is. It's not that I'm on some sort of "better than everyone else" bandwagon. It's simply that once I grasped what was actually happening, rather than just integrating it into my life like I would normally do, it gave me a feeling of intense guilt and disgust at what I was supporting by eating meat. The thing is, I would eat meat if I had to in order to survive. But I don't. Our level of civilization makes it not only possible, but PREFERABLE (in an environmental/humane sense, anyways) to eat a vegetarian diet. There's no excuses anymore, except that some of us just accept that it's ok for an animal to be raised and killed, painfully, simply because it is not of our species (so that we can have protein that is better assimilated/delicious).

I don't believe animals to be below us, or anything of that nature. They're simply more stupid than us. And more significantly, most slaughter process are inhumane. There's no quick shot to the head (though their PR would have you believe that). Rather, they are "stunned" and bled out through the heart or central arteries. That, combined with how they're raised; often in very small cages in order to increase the fat in the meat. The whole thing is just really fucked up when you take a step back and look what we are doing.

So, that's what I mean when I say principle, not preference.

PS: I do admit that there are certain ranches/slaughterhouses that are WAY ABOVE the others in terms of raising and killing animals in a proper fashion. That doesn't change the base of what's happening, though.

Vivek: So the limit of your comprehension is how much something costs?

[Mark Rippetoe]

Using animals as a method of turning grain into meat, which we then eat, is a FAR less efficient process than eliminating that step and simply eating the grain straight up.

It's simply that once I grasped what was actually happening, rather than just integrating it into my life like I would normally do, it gave me a feeling of intense guilt and disgust at what I was supporting by eating meat.

Our level of civilization makes it not only possible, but PREFERABLE (in an environmental/humane sense, anyways) to eat a vegetarian diet. There's no excuses anymore, except that some of us just accept that it's ok for an animal to be raised and killed, painfully, simply because it is not of our species (so that we can have protein that is better assimilated/delicious).

And more significantly, most slaughter process are inhumane. There's no quick shot to the head (though their PR would have you believe that). Rather, they are "stunned" and bled out through the heart or central arteries. That, combined with how they're raised; often in very small cages in order to increase the fat in the meat.

Now I understand. It's a combination of not understanding your own digestive physiology, no actual knowledge of the beef industry, and a preference for feeling over thinking. That's fine, many people believe this way, and believing is certainly one way of going about things.

[PressesPeople]

Omitting all the extraneous variables there, the core difference here is our view of ethics. You are right in that I have a preference for feeling over thinking. But in many ways (BESIDES in the goal for maximal strength, obviously) being vegetarian is a logical choice.

But yes, it comes down to how I Feel about it, combined with the fact that I do not NEED meat to survive, or even to thrive. I understand my digestive physiology well enough to know that a vegetarian diet hasn't changed the way I feel, physically.


By the way, anyone notice how hostile carnivores are generally towards vegetarians? I understand this when it comes to the type that goes out and tells everyone they're evil for eating meat, but I am not that type (unless you ask me to give my opinion, of course). So is it because they're expectant of hostility, and they feel more comfortable having a preemptive strike?

[Mark Rippetoe]

Perhaps it's just impatience.

[joe_mama]

A lot of the above poster's concerns are tackled in the Vegetarian Myth. Summed up here:
http://www.fathead-movie.com/index.p...getarian-myth/

On the ethics of killing:
"...living without killing is impossible, beginning with a fascinating, detailed description of the cycle of life … and “cycle” is the crucial concept. There is no food chain, with humans sitting at the top. We are members of a food cycle, with all of us eating each other. As Keith explains, even the soil is alive, with literally millions of organisms in each tablespoon. Take the animals out of the equation — along with the urine, feces, blood and bone that the soil “eats” — and the soil will die.

Keith discovered this for herself when she decided to grow her own food. She soon learned that her soil required nitrogen, and discovered to her horror that she had two choices: natural nitrogen — mostly blood meal and bone meal — or synthetic nitrogen made from fossil fuels … another form of dead animals. As she reluctantly concluded, “My garden wanted to eat animals, even if I didn’t.""