Not to want our children to eat red meat?

[Flymeaway4]

I'm vegetarian, have been for 20 years, partner is not. Since before they were born, I've said I'll let them have chicken, fish etc, but not red meat including pork. Once they're old enough to properly understand that meat was once an animal, then they can decide for themselves whether they want to eat red meat too, or be vege if they like, their choice. Partner thinks I'm ridiculous and said "why can't she have a ham sandwich" at a party yesterday, "what harm will it do". There were plenty of other options there anyway: chicken, cheese and egg sandwiches, quiche, fruit etc.

In case you think it's relevant, my reasoning behind no red meat is that I think cows and pigs are too intelligent, they know exactly what is happening when they arrive at the abattoir and I think that's just too cruel (and lambs are babies). Allowing chicken and fish, until they can make their own informed decision, was my compromise. If it were purely up to me, I'd be happy raising them vege!

So, am I being unreasonable?

It's still better for you. And its really not. You cant argue with with a butchers daughter. Everything can cause cancer nowadays. Its a load of bollocks.

Will it shite 🤣🤣

Feed your children songbirds, beautiful lambs or the content and plucky chickens if you wish, but at least educate yourself on the harm you are causing to both your child’s health and the animals themselves.

One day you may have to justify your reasoning to your teen or adult children.

We live in a free word agreed, you can eat whatever you want. Dogs, horses, bats anything but please remember that most of the poor souls you eat live a hideous short life in captivity in overcrowded conditions before they are slaughtered.

@kikisparks

There are at least 336 million vegetarians in India, are they all unhealthy

'Are they all healthy?' is a better way of asking this? Your own experience isn't universal. Some may fare ok on it, but how do you know yourself that you couldn't be healthier? Your methods are unscientific and based around confirmation bias. How many vegetarians become unwell or deficient as a result of their diet?

May I borrow you crystal ball please? I want to know the numbers for this week's Lottery. Ta.

Yes beef and lamb from a butcher or anywhere IS carcinogenic.

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/cancer-causing-foods

Yep which means around 336 million people in India don’t (there are a lot more than 336 million people in India!)

If meat was harmful, how did we eat it throughout our evolution until the agricultural revolution, @GCalltheway ? How did we make it through the constant abuse we were putting ourselves under for all those millions of years? Did most humans die or become ill, and just a select few who chose mostly gathering over hunting survived? How does the evolution of humankind fit with 'Meat is harmful to humans'?

What do you mean? You are making assumptions saying “some may fare ok on it”. You have no data to say that either. Most people could be faring amazingly on a vegetarian diet, it is impossible to say. Some long term vegans have excelled in physical sports.

What do you mean I could be healthier? In what way? My bloods showed I had good levels of everything tested, so at a personal level I see no reason to start eating the body parts of dead animals after 33 years of not doing so.

@Watchkeys
Some people, and I would hazard a guess that @GCalltheway would be one of them, me too as it goes, would prefer people to be less healthy than to eat meat, at least in the way it is produced and consumed now.

I mean, we've hardly evolved into a species that one can be proud to be a member of.

What you have at home, fair enough, I don't cook red meat hardly ever. I think what a child accepts at a party should not be as restrictive if they eat meat.

I'm saying that you don't know and neither do I, @kikisparks, so there's no place for grand statements about what's best for humankind, based on your blood tests. I don't think India has the best health record, does it?

That's of course if it is more healthy to eat meat, at least in the quantities and quality many people do now, which is highly debatable.

My dh eats meat . When we became serious I told him I could never allow my children to eat flesh, blood or tissue from any animal.

Isn't it funny how we're all different? I would've told you to go and fuck yourself binned you at that point.

I mean, we've hardly evolved into a species that one can be proud to be a member of

Agreed, @redboxer321 . But when you say you'd prefer people to be less healthy, what does that mean? Bit of a crappy immune system? Few spots? Lank hair? Bit porky? Or watching your loved ones suffer and die with cancer, diabetes, CHD, dementia? Are you really ok with that? If they could have eaten more healthily, you'd rather those were the options they chose?

Confused as to how parents making their children eat meat are not forcing their views on them, but parents bringing their children up veggie are forcing their views on them.

Aren't parents taking their little kids to church forcing their views on them?

You keep reproducing this sound bite, I will repeat. What was the life span of the average person early 20th century and thousands of years before? 40-46 years. We would be dead by now, most of us.
20th and 21sr century our longevity expanded with the development of antibiotics and other medication and a vastly improved varied diet.

So your argument will never stack up because our ancestors didn’t live long enough to develop cancer from carcinogenic meat!

Given our recently achieved long life and now our challenges into older age even if you don’t care about you or your children dying from cancer surely you do at least want a working health service capable of looking after you? Do you really think the nhs can even cope with the incoming timebomb or the one that is unfolding right now?

Social responsibility tells us it is beneficial to be as healthy as possible in order to protect ourselves and our health structures.

Of course you can eat shit every day and see the consequences of that in due course, we live in a free country, but at least own what you are doing to animals, to the humans working in abattoirs, your own body, the environment, the nhs. to society, it carries the most enormous cost when you really consider the mass industrial scale of it and the impact.

We would not be a good match agreed 😂

Anyway the cost of living will probably have a far larger impact than waiting for some people’s conscience to finally kick in. Silver linings and all that.

20th and 21sr century our longevity expanded with the development of antibiotics and other medication and a vastly improved varied diet

But we have been eating meat all through this time, so how does this suggest anything about how removing meat from the diet makes us healthier? Are those who live longer predominantly eating less meat? Are vegetarians winning this game?

What studies are you working from @GCalltheway ? You speak as if you have definitive proof, and that anybody who doesn't agree with you is an idiot who's killing their own children. Why are you so sure? Where's your evidence coming from?

I’ve reduced my red meat intake to 6 days a week , due to the cost of living on the 7th I eat the grass cuttings from mowing the lawn 🌾

I'd let them make their own choice. Explain mummy doesn't like eating animals and daddy doesn't mind. Everyone is entitled to their own choice?

Incidentally - dairy cows don't have a good life either so if the issue is the cows intelligence then you maybe want to think about a vegan upbringing rather than a vegetarian one.

People have a hierarchy of animals too depending on where they live. In the UK they'd deem eating cats and dogs disgraceful but happily eat pigs and cows which like you say are also intelligent. Yours includes chicken as acceptable and cows unacceptable which is hard for me as an adult to understand so maybe also difficult for your husband and children.

Can you compromise on a semi vegan/vegetarian diet?

I don't tell meat eaters what to feed their children. In return, I would hope that no one tells me I am harming my children by not feeding them red meat. Different diets suit different people.

None of us are anaemic and we don't take supplements either.

I’ll find the research paper I read later when I’m on my laptop. But the impact is pretty big. Plus endangered species end up in cat and dog food. My point is I know meat eaters who source their food ‘ethically’ (I say that with a pinch of salt as I know some will argue it can never be ethical) and do a lot for the environment, reduce their carbon footprint, support wild animals and I know vegans who eat loads of avacados and mangoes and keep cats which go out and kill wild birds and animals. Just not eating meat doesn’t necessarily have a better impact overall, if that makes sense.

Please show me where I made a grand statement about what was best for humankind? I responded to someone who said meat is needed to be healthy because we’ve evolved that way by asking if all of the around 336 million people in India who follow a vegetarian diet are unhealthy due to their diet, which was to demonstrate that not all cultures focus on an animal product based diet and as far as I can see there are no studies suggesting that to be the case. Plus if the poster was correct and meat is needed to be healthy you’d think my blood tests would show that after 30+ years of not eating it.

In any event the British Dietetic Association (the largest association in the U.K. of dieticians I.e. those actually trained to advise on nutritional matters) confirms well-planned vegan diets can support healthy living in people of all ages. Which is much more valid than random posters saying we need meat to be healthy with no basis whatsoever.