beforewisdom

A long time back here someone posted a funny comic. It was describing a "vay-gun", not a vegan, but a fictictious humonoid species ala comic books who come from the vega solar system. I tried using searching this forum and Google with several strings but couldn't find it. Does anyone have a link? Thanks

I don't use Vega myself ( I don't need it ), but I see it everywhere these days. It looks like it is a big success.

http://veganhealth.org/articles/dailyrecs http://veganhealth.org/articles/vitaminb12 If you are a man you shouldn't take iron at all. It can build up and become toxic. Everything you need to know about vegan supplements and vegan nutrition on one page: http://veganhealth.org/articles/dailyrecs

Raw diets may temporarily feel nice as they give overloaded systems a break, but they aren't good for the long term. The beliefs behind them aren't based on medicine or research. The best book on the subject is "Becoming Raw", it is written by a top RD and vegan who has a reputation for sticking to facts. If you are looking to eat healthy, try "Vegan For Life" by Jack Norris RD, another vegan. It doesn't have the glitz of the latest magic diet, but it will teach sensible vegan nutrition. In other words, you don't have to go to an extreme to clean up.

I don't disagree with any of this, but anyone can say anything on the web. Do you have any references to people with relevant educations, relevant research who are not paid by big dairy, who are not paid by big soy, who are saying the things you are?

Wamrage; I had similar thoughts. I see many female Facebook friends who worship this one woman who makes youtube videos, blog posts etc advertising her rawness. They think she is in incredible shape because she has a flat stomach and has a chest. I reacted that way to her too, until one day I looked at her arms, legs, hips and jaw. They she just looked undernourished to me. Same thing with another "web personality" who made a big deal about being a raw, ex-vegan ( eating lots of salads and raw fed beef ). I think people, at least Americans, if they see someone with flat abs, especially with ab muscles showing, will not see the rest of the body and proclaim the person as being in shape, even if that rest of that person looks undernourished.

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To lose body fat you need to expend more calories than you consume. To grow muscle you need to overload the muscle with exercise, take in enough calories for the exercise, take in enough calories to fuel the cellular growth, get adequate sleep to allow the growth to happen and you need to take in enough protein. It doesn't matter where you get your calories and protein from. All else is commentary or bullshit. Is fat, fat? No. Is a carb a carb? Is a slice of white bread or a soda the same as eating a sweet potato ? There are healthy sources of fats and unhealthy ones. Your chicken and eggs have a ton of saturated fat, the bad kind as well as all sorts of chemicals, pathogens and filth from the factory farms from where they came from.

Unless you are a scientist yourself you don't have the training to evaluate the validity of criticisms of the China Study. People can tell you anything and you wouldn't know if it was right. Its like one mechanic telling you another mechanic is full of bullshit. Unless you know anything about cars yourself you just have to trust one of those mechanics as telling you the truth. No disrespect to anyone, but raw foodists are full of bullshit. Their dietary beliefs contradict basic boiler plate medicine and physiology. I wouldn't trust any information from a raw food site or an anti=forks over knives site. I would go check out those claims out elsewhere. Again, ask yourself how someone knows what they know. Do they have a degree in what they talk about? Do they keep up with research in what they are talking about? What is their professional reputation like?

That is what I was trying to say, but you put it more powerfully and succinctly. Thank you.

Its all about asking yourself how that person knows what they claim to know. On webboards there often isn't an answer for that, beyond someone's anecdotal account, which isn't reliable information. The authors of many blog articles do not list their educations, do not list their credentials nor do they list how their article relates to the way they make their money. The sources of information recommended on my site is not my information, but citations to information written by people with authoritative credentials and educations.........not self appointed diet gurus, but registered dietitians with respected reputations in their field. So if you ask yourself if you can be sure that their nutrition advice is safe, if it is effective, you can ask yourself how they know what they know. You can look up their degrees, their publications, their reputations, etc.

The ABC News Show 20/20 had a segment about orthrorexia Part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-RinnfW52c Part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZupQCDAHgnk

From http://www.orthorexia.com/index.php?page=katef The bolding in the quoted article is mostly mine.

I've noticed a number of people coming here to discuss orthorexia, so I thought I would open up this thread. Orthorexia is a word for a new kind of eating disorder. Many people who care about their health and who are willing to do something about it think that the word "orthorexia" is a criticism of them, their exercise regime or their diet. As someone in another thread put it, the question is whether you control your diet or if your diet controls you. Orthorexics become obsessive compulsive about following rules for healthy eating even if those rules hurt their health or get in the way of them having a happy life.

Okay, there no GOOD way to spot reduce fat I haven't researched it, but I've heard that liposuction removes the fat cells in specific spot. So, if someone overeats after that, the fat has to go to another spot on their body, one where they might like it even less. For example, someone may get their stomach, ass and thighs liposuctioned.....they they might start accumulating huge amounts of fat on their arms and shoulders.

People who think they are crazy( out of touch with reality ) aren't crazy, because they are still in touch with reality enough to see that something is wrong. If a person has orthorexia, they wouldn't THINK they had it, so they wouldn't answer your question. Orthorexia isn't about being devoted to healthy eating. It is about being obsessed with dietary rules to the point that you either destroy your health with that obsession or that maintaining your way of eating takes over your life such that you don't have a life. Supposedly if you are eating a vegan diet for ethical reasons or because you read about medical facts you aren't following rules for the sake of following rules which orthorexics do. If you are healthy while doing it, have interests OTHER than your diet, have a social life, etc you aren't letting your diet take over your life and you aren't orthorexic. Setting aside the ethical concerns of someone who is a vegan, you have a healthy relationship with your diet, if your diet is nothing more than what you eat. If you get offended if someone says something disparaging about your diet or you feel like a failure if you don't adhere to the rules, then you are making psychological issues for yourself that MAY lead to orthorexia.

Go to this link, it has a SHORT description of the best, most reliable, authoritative sources of vegan nutrition information. If you ask for information in an internet forum about nutrition you get BS back. All of the sources listed at this site are from people with formal credentials, degrees and who keep up with research. http://beforewisdom.com/blog/vegan-diets/

Wamrage; I know a number of people with gluten intolerances. When they stopped eating gluten they felt relief. You have something else going on.

I agree with you if you are talking people being condescending or ridiculing to others. People don't listen when they are being dissed. I disagree that people shouldn't be told the truth when they are mistaken. They can't change if they don't hear the right information.

Thank you. I don't think telling the truth that other people don't want to hear is "hate". I think calling that "hating on them" emotionally manipulative. It communicates the message "Don't have a public discussion that will expose me to things I don't want to hear OR I will label you as a bad person to discourage you from doing that" I'm not saying what that is what you are are doing, I am speaking about that phrase in general. I agree with you that ridiculing someone isn't the way to persuade them to do something differently. My own approach is to write the truth, plainly, so there is no mistake about my opinion. I believe it always has a positive effect, on someone, somewhere, if not now than down the road. If people go around saying things that are patently untrue, in a very public, in a very vociferous way other people are going to something about it. It will lead to public debate and public ridicule/venting of frustration........hence the quote from the Jezebel article.

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October 6 & 7, 2012 - 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. 13th San Francisco World Veg Festival hosting the 40th IVU International Vegetarian Congress http://www.sfvs.org/wvd/images/IVU_in_SF.jpg

The word "vegan" was coined in the 1940s to refer to people who have the ethical belief that it is wrong to exploit animals ( use for our own reasons only ). Thus, one can eat a 100% plant based diet without being a vegan. Raw foodism started in the late 19th century as an alternative health kick. While some raw foodists are also vegans the two sets of things don't logically have anything to do with each other. Raw foodists that food prepared below a certain temperature have beneficial things to human health that cooked foods do not. The only book that looks at the facts (scientific evidence ) around this idea is "Becoming Raw". Most of the scientific evidence seems to indicate that the benefits of raw foodism, if any, are really the benefits of cutting out junk and increasing produce consumption.

Why the use of the word "safe"? It isn't that vegans can't eat those things, it is that they choose not to. Those warnings are put on labels to warn people who have such extreme food allergies that even a trace of those products will make them sick.

I agree. Being ashamed/apologetic about what you are about or what you support doesn't help you or what you support. People can sense it. If you don't feel good about it, why should they? That is why I don't listen to animal protection orgs that ask me not to use the word "vegan" when volunteering for them. That is only part of the story though. Veganism, AR and vegan diets tend to be freak magnets. There are a number of loud, foolish and obnoxious people giving all 3 of those things a bad name. You have to be aware of and honest about those things too, picking your battle accordingly. In situations that have nothing to do with diet ( work, other pursuits ), I will wait until someone else brings it up. If they do, I will not dance around it. Like others wrote here, the best way to undo the damage to the word is to be a cool person and cool vegan.