To think veganism is not for children?

[ohhhhlivia]

Yes, I am aware that it is perfectly possible to have a healthy vegan diet at any age. I know that.

However, it is more difficult and easier to get wrong if you want to be vegan. It still is restrictive (even with all of the new stuff coming out) as in you need to tell hosts, check menus in advance etc.

It's a barrier that has to be overcome. I don't understand why you would do that to someone who has no choice in the matter.

Lots of kids go through a fussy phase too, add veganism in and surely you're at a high risk of health problems?

I think what I'm getting at, is that childhood nutrition can be hard enough as it is, so it just feels wrong to make it harder for reasons that do not directly benefit the child.

Aldi chilli dark chocolate is vegan and also palm oil free .

It's also delicous and I think I may have a bit of an addiction .

If kids can get all the calcium, protein, carbs etc. or whatever specifics they need to grow on a vegan without needing supplements then i have no opinion

Also I have no issue with what my son eats at other peoples places as I have no desire to control him

I kind of agree with you OP.

Many children do really well on a vegan diet, most parents have done their research and are making sure that all their nutritional needs are being met. Unfortunately this is not always the case and especially sad when parents have fed their baby plant based milk leading to horrible consequences. There have been a few instances of this in the news lately but IMO it comes down to stupidity, not a vegan diet.

DS goes to a vegan nursery (we aren’t vegan ourselves, we chose it for other reasons).

It’s great - the menu is absolutely stuffed with fruit and veg, and he has grown up willing to eat all kinds of things. The chef puts a huge amount of effort into balancing the menu so there is plenty of protein, fat and calcium along with the vegetables and carbs.

Compare that to other nurseries that serve “normal” things like chicken casserole or spag bol, and he is definitely getting the more nutritious diet. Even though the meat-based diet is not in any way junk food.

For those worried about children being left out at parties, it’s worth pointing out that Oreos, party rings, skittles, some brands of jam doughnuts, lotus biscuits, Bourbon biscuits, starburst, some haribo, veggie Percy pigs, most varieties of crisps and chips are all vegan. You can also get vegan cupcakes, ice cream, nuggets, sausages and pizzas in every single large U.K. supermarket. It’s not like the poor vegan child is condemned to a childhood of carrot sticks at birthday parties.

Unfortunately this is not always the case and especially sad when parents have fed their baby plant based milk leading to horrible consequences. There have been a few instances of this in the news lately but IMO it comes down to stupidity, not a vegan diet

Agree - there are also plenty of cases of parents feeding their children normal cows’ milk instead of formula, sometimes for financial reasons and sometimes out of lack of education or parental negligence. But somehow these never get as widely reported as “stupid vegan” stories.

Any vegan or omnivore diet can be both healthy and unhealthy depending on the quality of the food and the balance of the diet.
The fact that a vegan diet has to be supplemented creates doubt for me that it is what the human body needs.

I am watching (obsessed) Artic alone at the moment where contestants live off the land for as many days as possible hunting and gathering. They all need animal fat for their brains. They place a high value on the organs of the animals as they contain essential fats. They need the oils in the fish to keep their brains functioning normally. If you are not getting these essentials from meat/fish you need to work hard to ensure it is in a vegan diet.
I am sure their are many conscientious vegan parents out there who put alot of though into their children's diets but conversely I am sure plenty don't. That being said I would consider a diet of crap nuggets/burgers/sausages and chips akin to child abuse.

@Lima1

Any vegan or omnivore diet can be both healthy and unhealthy depending on the quality of the food and the balance of the diet. The fact that a vegan diet has to be supplemented creates doubt for me that it is what the human body needs.

I am watching (obsessed) Artic alone at the moment where contestants live off the land for as many days as possible hunting and gathering. They all need animal fat for their brains. They place a high value on the organs of the animals as they contain essential fats. They need the oils in the fish to keep their brains functioning normally. If you are not getting these essentials from meat/fish you need to work hard to ensure it is in a vegan diet.
I am sure their are many conscientious vegan parents out there who put alot of though into their children's diets but conversely I am sure plenty don't. That being said I would consider a diet of crap nuggets/burgers/sausages and chips akin to child abuse.

Every diet requires supplements. Meat and other animal products are fortified with B12 because we don't eat dirt any more. Vegans simply skip the animal products and go straight to the supplement.

Everyone should be taking vitamin D because we don't get enough sun light. I know that some dairy is fortified with vitamin D and some fish has vitamin D but it's often still not enough. In my cheese loving pre-vegan days I was still often deficient in vitamin D. Now I just take a multivitamin. It's not a big deal.

@ChristmasCarcass

Unfortunately this is not always the case and especially sad when parents have fed their baby plant based milk leading to horrible consequences. There have been a few instances of this in the news lately but IMO it comes down to stupidity, not a vegan diet

Agree - there are also plenty of cases of parents feeding their children normal cows’ milk instead of formula, sometimes for financial reasons and sometimes out of lack of education or parental negligence. But somehow these never get as widely reported as “stupid vegan” stories.

Indeed. Definitely in absolute numbers, and probably also in percentage terms, I am sure there are far less children harmed by inadequate vegan diets than inadequate omnivorous diets, but people get far more worked up about the vegans. If a case of abuse/neglect occurs in which a child has been harmed by being fed a wholly inadequate omnivorous diet you don't see hundreds of comments assuming that a mixed diet is dangerous or calling for all parents who feed their children meat to be referred to social services do you ? The same happens with anything that isn't mainstream. Take home education. If there's a story about a home educated child having anything go wrong, then HE should be banned and all parents who do it are irresponsible idiots. But if a child is severely bullied in school, or leaves unable to read or write do we see calls for schools to be banned and posts castigating all parents who send their children to school, even though these are far more common scenarios? No. People are quite willing and able to accept that bad things that happen in mainstream settings are due to the failings of individuals and particular processes rather than writing off the whole system, but if something similar happens in a less conventional setting, the whole thing is at fault. It doesn't impact on me personally - I am about as conventional as they come - but the knee jerk reactions that so many people have against anything that is slightly out of the ordinary is depressing. The fact that a very small number of children have tragically been basically starved by their vegan parents is not evidence that a vegan diet is unsuitable for children, it is evidence that some parents are inadequate.

YANBU. Veganism is NOT healthy. By all means cut out other things and eat gluten free blueberry muffins or mushroom pasta etc but humans need meat. Even our teeth need it!

And before anyone asks - Ive tried being pescatarian, vegetarian, vegan etc (for years). Myself and many people I know have since gone back to meat and Im thankful I did - so much happier and healthier person now ! Wouldnt dear to force a child to be vegan !!

Veganism is NOT healthy. By all means cut out other things and eat gluten free blueberry muffins or mushroom pasta etc but humans need meat. Even our teeth need it

Yet whole swathes of people live quite happily without meat.
They have less heart disease, less cancers than meat eaters and in communities where a non meat diet is the norm you will find some of the most healthy long lived people in the world.
Only place where I saw on a tv programme that had long lived residents that ate meat was a small village in Italy and one family who ate meat but seemed to live extraordinary long lives,

@Zuzu5

YANBU. Veganism is NOT healthy. By all means cut out other things and eat gluten free blueberry muffins or mushroom pasta etc but humans need meat. Even our teeth need it!

And before anyone asks - Ive tried being pescatarian, vegetarian, vegan etc (for years). Myself and many people I know have since gone back to meat and Im thankful I did - so much happier and healthier person now ! Wouldnt dear to force a child to be vegan !!

Our teeth aren't strong enough to rip raw meat from the bone like carnivores, our teeth are more like cows teeth

@Zuzu5

YANBU. Veganism is NOT healthy. By all means cut out other things and eat gluten free blueberry muffins or mushroom pasta etc but humans need meat. Even our teeth need it!

And before anyone asks - Ive tried being pescatarian, vegetarian, vegan etc (for years). Myself and many people I know have since gone back to meat and Im thankful I did - so much happier and healthier person now ! Wouldnt dear to force a child to be vegan !!

Both the NHS and the British Dietetic Association disagree with you on that one.

However do feel free to get in touch with them to let them know they're wrong. I'm sure they will be delighted to hear from you.

I am actually quite sceptical about the click-baity neglected vegan child headlines. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure there are vegan parents who starve and neglect their children just like there are meat eating parents who neglect and starve their children.

However I know for a fact that at least one of those cases where so-called vegan parents starved their baby to death weren't even vegan. What happened was that they had decided their baby was allergic to milk and some other things (without actually taking the baby to a doctor to get these 'allergies' diagnosed) and instead of seeking advice about what to feed their baby instead, they gave the baby hemp milk or some other fancy milk alternative. The newspapers then decided the parents were vegan and ran with it.

@rainingallday

YANBU. I am dead against people forcing their views on their children, and particularly when it could be (and probably WILL be ) detrimental to their child/children's health.

I would not hesitate to report someone to social services if I saw them raising their child(ren) as a vegan. Fortunately, most people I know have more sense than to do that.

Yes and I'm sure they'd really appreciate you putting that additional pressure on their very stretched resources. I wouldn't be surprised if they told you where to go on a report like that, and they'd probably share it as a funny anecdote in the staff room afterwards.

Fine for you not to agree with raising a child vegan; utterly ridiculous for you to compare it to child abuse!!!

Our teeth aren't strong enough to rip raw meat from the bone like carnivores, our teeth are more like cows teeth Absolute rubbish

Oh come on, there are people so twattish as to think "is vegan" is worthy of a social services referral? Whatever diet they're on, they should probably review it on the grounds that it's making them incredibly stupid.

Whatever diet they're on, they should probably review it on the grounds that it's making them incredibly stupid.

There are a lot of idiots running around unfortunately.

@EveryPlanetHasAYorkshire

So because I dont agree with your opinion I must be misinformed and ridiculed... right... good luck with that kind of mindset. If you read my post you'd know I was vegetarian and later vegan for years so yes, Im well aware of what they recommend and have spent thousands of hours reading both sides of the argument and experimented myself. Im actually able to use my own brain to make a decision and not just follow what Ive been told. The NHS are far behind when it comes to nutrition. Anyone in the field will agree to that.

@Oliversmumsarmy and @EveryPlanetHasAYorkshire

Studies in the 20's showed smoking cigarettes was healthy, studies can be great but can also be very skewed. Who has founded the study? Other than meat, what other variables are being looked at ? How do you know that meat is the actual cause of heart disease, cancer etc? What other variables like gut inflammation, anxiety, cortisol levels, blue light exposure, genetics/epigenetics, poor biomechanics etc could have influenced the participants? Was there a test for the quality of meat eaten by participants? What about the affect going vegan/vegetarian has on your biomechanics and thus your overall wellbeing? Does living longer automatically mean being healthy? How's quality of life measured? What areas of the world were those vegan villages and how does their geographical location affect their overall health? Might living in a rural area with more vitamin d exposure, functional movement in their daily life and more nutritious vegetables have had an impact? Would that translate into being a vegan living in polluted big city when stuck in an office all day with high cortisol levels? Has there been studies on the longterm affect of turning vegan (previous meat eater in UK and not from a vegan village)?

Theres many variables to consider not just eat meat bad, vegan good.

@Zuzu5, I think you're mixing me up with someone else.

Zuzu5

These aren’t studies. These are people who live like this from birth from Japan to the US.

The fact is in these areas that are vegan/vegetarian the residents live longer and healthier lives.

www.nydailynews.com/news/world/ny-australian-couple-daughter-brain-damage-vegan-strict-plant-diet-20200929-bhnfsirtxrdnfhut3xgayzbfru-story.html

@formerbabe

I completely agree op. Developing brains surely need saturated animal fat (which I believe has been unfairly demonized). I've read a lot about animal fats versus vegetable oils and I've started cooking with lard again.

In terms of obesity risks, a diet high in lean protein and veggies with some animal fats definitely better than vegetable oils. Vitamin d too probably.

Preventing obesity, of course, not causing it! No one wants that!