Veganism & Feminism

[fembow]

Over a billion people could be fed with just the grain that is fed to livestock in United States alone. (cattle, pigs, chickens, etc)

About 8 million people starve to death each year, so that's somewhere around 4 million females (women, children, babies) getting killed off each year due to the inefficiency of 'most' non-vegan diets.

The only exceptions I can think of for non-vegan diets that aren't as harmful, would be people who randomly fish (non-commercially) & people who hunt for their own food. Not that I'd want to support killing animals, but non-commercial fishing/hunting is less damaging to the human population and the environment in general.

Vegan Diet

It's pretty simple. High water content fruits/vegetables/root vegetables/nuts & seeds (hemp hearts/avocados/olives/etc for those who have nut allergies). Cinnamon helps regulate blood sugar levels & citrus (like hot lemon water) aids with the digestion of lipids.

Making sure to get in plenty of clean water & making sure to get in the recommended amount of salt per day (preferably sea salt), as salt is extremely important for digestion (especially for digesting fats). People who exercise need more salt & water on a daily basis.

www.saltinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Second-QTR-copy-of-digest-absorption.pdf

Pax man, I wonder if fembow knows aqua tiger.

Aquatiger exhorted us all to care about circumcision as he was very busy caring about veganism....

Humans shouldn't mistreat animals, any more than they should mistreat the rain forests. but animals are not people and mistreating animals is not remotely tantamount to mistreating women and children. that is actually an appallingly insulting suggestion.

In fact, humans are the only omnivores who have qualms (or a subset of whom have qualms) about killing or eating other creatures, so by having those qualms at all you demonstrate the absolute moral difference between animals and humans.

I wouldn't kick a dog, or annoy a hamster. but I would eat a rabbit or a sheep or a pig

aquatiger posted in feminism about circumcision, and was very, very interested in veganism. He was banned.

Sorry Doctrine am wearing a new name in and didn't realise you were talking to me :) That's exactly what I was thinking.

Capt
ANY little bit of feminism helps in my opinion.

Just because someone isn't a vegan doesn't mean they aren't a feminist.

Buffy "Are you representing the Salt Institute, fembow?"

Burn the institute down, I don't care, there's plenty of sea salt :P

And you can blame it on me if you want to _

Buffy

"I think it's sad that you seem to think we would only care about the 4 million females that starve sad"

I am sexist towards men in general (some exceptions) & that's why I only mentioned females. I apologize if that offends anyone, but that's who I am.

Because I am sexist, I tend to sometimes write in a sexist manner by instinct.

I am not pro sexism & I am for gender equality. So I am glad you brought that up Buffy.

So once again, I apologize in advance if I write anything sexist, I honestly can't help it a lot of the time.

teaandthorazine "OP, can you come back and explain your argument a little more?"

Well, it's simple, humans will go extinct with the way things are going right now in regards with animal product consumption.

Even reducing the amount of meat consumed helps out a lot

theflexitarian.co.uk/2013/05/23/on-why-eating-meat-is-bad-for-the-environment/

Agriculture is an activity that is very gendered, and as such, decisions about what crops are grown, on what land and for what purpose do have huge (and different) consequences for women. We can't resolve food distribution issues for everyone without looking at the gendered elements of it. It is an enormous leap to go from that to everyone should be a vegan. Clearly there are areas of land where the most appropriate and ethical use of that land is the rearing of livestock for both meat and dairy. Cuba is the only country in the world that has achieved sustainable development and although they certainly consumer fewer terrestrial animal products than we do, they are by no means vegan.

Switching what meats you are eating helps out a lot as well.

I actually believe eating chicken meat is less damaging to the environment than eating chicken eggs & most other meats.

Not that I'm trying to promote people to kill more chickens, but if people switched to eating chicken instead of beef, that'd help out drastically.

freyasnow
"Agriculture is an activity that is very gendered, and as such, decisions about what crops are grown, on what land and for what purpose do have huge (and different) consequences for women. We can't resolve food distribution issues for everyone without looking at the gendered elements of it."

I agree

Freya - if by sustainable you mean self-sufficient in food, then Cuba is not a great example to pick. They import most of their staple food, rice: 60% of it, mostly from Vietnam, and also a lot of another staple, beans.

Agriculture is still recovering from the decades of sugar production as a virtual monoculture, and the diet there is pretty monotonous: rice, beans, pork, chicken, cabbage - though the tropical fruit provides a bit of variety, and at least the legacy of excessive sugar production means that rum is cheap.

No, I don't mean self sufficient. I mean that Cuba is sustainably developed. It reaches development indicators - life expectancy, child mortality etc while using resources at a level that would allow everyone to continue that standard of living in the long term. The other two scenarios are us - reaching development indicators but doing so while using resources to an extent that do not allow that standard of living globally in the long term, and less developed countries which don't reach development indicators but use resources to an extent that is sustainable globally in the long term.

Self sufficiency is another matter. Cuba uses some of its agricultural land for growing crops for medicine, which makes sense as it is an exporter of medical care to other countries, and trains more doctors than it needs for that purpose. I don't think a country has to be self sufficient in food to be sustainable; I don't see that as part of the definition.

Sustainable is definitely key here.
We have a lot of people on this planet and very little of it is suitable for arable farming. Artificially making it "suitable" is an environmental nightmare.
Only by eating fish and animals that are indigenous to places that don't support grains (like the sheep, as someone upthread pointed out, happy in hilly, rocky places) do we have a long-term chance.

Also there is the nutritional aspect but I think that is highly individual - I am prepared to believe that some people can live happily and healthily as vegans, but I know for sure not all can

The meat and dairy industry is a MAJOR cause of world (human) hunger!

I am a vegan, I don't consume dairy products because I don't want to contribute to the excruciating torture of innocent animals.

Female cows are artificially inseminated, kept in cramped conditions and then when they give birth the calf is taken away. I have heard the gut-wrenching screams of mother cows having their calves taken away. The calf is then taken away, if it's a male he will most likely be kept in a cramped, dark space and then killed for veal. If it's a female, she has the same fate as her mother.

The mother will then be pumped full of hormones to force her to produce more milk, she will be milked by force, her udders will be painful, infected and full of pus. She will get no relief from the pain, she will continue to be milked until she's artificially inseminated again to repeat the cycle.

I don't consume dairy products because I don't think it's very feminist to do so!

We must remember that we are animals too, it isn't right to enslave other species for our own selfish wants. It isn't right to torture animals on a daily basis and force them into a life of constant agony. It isn't right to support these industries

I want women to have freedom and to stop being oppressed, it would be ridiculous if I limited this to humans. Other animals feel pain and love just like we do, we don't own the world and everything in it, that attitude is what is destroying the earth for us, for others and for future generations.

We can live without grains in our diet, but not without protein and fat. If we stopped growing so much useless cheap grain used for processed foods we could graze animals the way nature intended and all be much healthier.

Still don't understand how feminism and veganism go together. I have tried being vegan - I just got sick. tried feminism and stuck to it for my whole life time. seems that one suits me better than the other.

Animals corpses aren't the only way to get protein and fat...

I think it is fair to say that large amounts of grain does go to feeding animals and that more people can be fed if they eat cereal crops rather than meat. Even in areas of the world where the best use of land is animal grazing, those animals often cannot graze on that land in winter and require supplementary sources from arable land. Calculating winter fodder has always been part of how humans decide livestock numbers.

Veganism in the west can cause its own problems, as particular grains such as quinoa ( not sure of spellling) can lead to shortages among traditional growers who use it as a staple.

A diet high in complex carbohydrates and lower in meat and dairy will feed more people an adequate diet, but veganism is not the same thing at all. And in some parts of the world.saying a diet that is high in, say fish,, and low in cereals is the best use of the available resources locally.

freyasnow "And in some parts of the world.saying a diet that is high in, say fish,, and low in cereals is the best use of the available resources locally."

yes, I could definitely live off of cooked fish with some added sea salt much better than I could live off of cereals

There is a very specific reason why people keep on adding salt in with meat. It aids with digestion tremendously.

This is why I have stuff like avocados, but also make sure to get in the recommended amount of salt per day (sea salt) & also make sure to have a lot of water.

So many people randomly start trying some random fruit & veggie diet, ending up with little to no salt in their diet (especially the raw food/801010 people), and then they can't even digest plant-based foods with fat, because they aren't getting in enough salt, and sometimes not enough water.

Because they can't digest the fat from a lack of salt, they end up only eating the foods that are easier to digest like sugary fruits & veggies. That is exactly why people fail on a vegan diet long-term.