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You are what you eat, sort-of

This is kind of US-o-centric but includes some amazing reading.

It doesn’t say so outright, but this matches up with so much I’ve read about our intake altering our behaviour. Much grotty behaviour — say the nutritionists with some justification — should mostly be blamed on the junk-food commonly consumed by the offenders. Research in prisons and amongst teenagers backs this up solidly.

This reading covers a wider variety of topics, but does include some interesting snippets, including the improvements in heart-rate, blood pressure, disease rates and so on. Steeper gains for Vegans than for Ovo-Lacto-Vegetarians.

A couple of studies caught my eye: non-smoking non-drinking vegetarian religious group outlasted non-smoking non-drinking omnivorous religious group by 7 years (& I betcha the veggos weren’t even 100% veggo); veggos move the same amount of blood around inside their circulation with 20 beats-per-minute less; infection rates drop 97% for non-meat users; cancer rates plummetted in veggos (cancer type is dependent on primary aminal eaten by competitors); grazing-land uses over 30 times as much water as needed for fruit or veggies; 80 times as much energy to process; etc...

Yes, additives & artificials have their place in this system. No cola, no sweeteners (who needs to sweeten bananas or figs or strawberries, anyway?), no artificials, no ’backy — they all hurt, one way or another.

So... if we’re to be logical about this, it’s fruit & veggies for everyone for tea tonight, yes? There’s lots of very tasty ones to eat, too.

Think of it as “less grotty” food and you won’t be too far wrong.

Sorry if you happen to plan steak or chook or lobsters, it was time for this rant to be born.

Comments

Leon RJ Brooks said…
Uh, checked a few references in the linked text.

The Isaiah 66:3 reference is talking about something else, but a bit of hunting turned up Genesis 1:29 to replace it.
Major said…
Hmmm. Fruit and grains for humans, greens are for animals [Genesis 1:29-30]. Might have a nasty effect on the health benefits if we took that one literally.
Leon RJ Brooks said…
In real life, you'd be hard-pressed to take it too literally.

However, we can clearly see the results of not taking it literally enough, around us, today.

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