[wolf moon]

Originally Posted by Saya

If you think eating bacon is going to lower your cholesterol...do you understand what saturated fat is?

I understand what saturated fat is, but I don't think you do. I'm guessing you didn't actually look into any of those articles about the false science behind the lipid hypothesis. New links anyway: Saturated fat is completely unrelated to heart disease, oxidized polyunsaturated fatty acids are not. Polyunsaturated fatty acids are found in canola, peanut, soy, safflower, corn, and other cheap industrial oils. They are HIGHLY sensitive to heat, and oxidize almost immediately when exposed to it. This forms tight, dense LDL molecules that are sorta sticky. They get lodged in the epithelial lining of your arteries, causing immune response and inflammation, causing even more tiny LDL molecules to get stuck. That is how your arteries get clogged, my dear. Saturated fats don't oxidize when heated (because they are saturated!), resulting in big, "puffy" LDL molecules. Which are used to transport fat and vitamins around your body. Little tiny LDL = heart disease. Big, puffy LDL = decreased body fat, happy heart. Your doctor can test to see which is more present in your bloodstream. If you eat a lot of vegetable oils in processed foods, it's probably the little ones. You can read Know Your Fats by Dr Mary Enig if you want the long version of that. Or Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes (you read books about things before forming opinions, right?)

Originally Posted by Saya

Uh, I get pretty full on what I eat. And its not healthy to go days without eating, honestly that's kind of a disordered eating habit.

Skipping a day of eating is actually quite healthy. "intermittent fasting reduces oxidative stress, makes the animals more resistant to acute stress in general, reduces blood pressure, reduces blood sugar, improves insulin sensitivity, reduces the incidence of cancer, diabetes, and heart disease, and improves cognitive ability". It also decreases cancer risk, and slows aging. It's just really, really hard to do if your insulin and blood sugar levels aren't kept at a steady low - you'll get hungry, dizzy, and nauseated if you try intermittent fasting on a sugar-heavy diet. Also, eating enough protein and fat for breakfast that I don't have to spend my precious lunch break at work sitting around eating, and can instead read or play outside? It's awesome.

Originally Posted by Saya

Meat is very taxing, unless grass fed beef is all you eat, pigs are omnivorous and need a lot of food, hay has to be grown for the cows to eat in the winter when there is no grass, chickens also cannot live off of grass. Cows need to be kept pregnant to give milk, and they are not beef cattle, when they are spent they become low grade hamburger meat. Half of the US's corn goes to feeding livestock, and 90% of the world's soy. By refraining from eating meat, you contribute also the the decrease of demand for corn and soy. Meat is also subsidized and a luxury in countries where the price of meat is reflected of the input. Factory farming exists because of our booming population and our habit of focusing so much of our diet on meat...And meat is responsible for much of our greenhouse gases and desertification.

I still don't think you're reading carefully. Grassfed and pastured meats, along with organic vegetables and fruits are all I eat. I do not go to the grocery store. I do not participate in the industrial food chain or CAFO industry. At all. Ever. The things you're arguing about are the result of grain-fed CAFO animals. They're completely unrelated to what I'm talking about. Again, research Joel Salatin and PolyFace if you want to have an idea of what you're talking about. CAFOs exist because of corn and soy production, not the other way around. We started overproducing corn and soy in the 40's, when government subsidies really kicked in, and the incentive to grow diverse crops all but disappeared. CAFOs got their start in the 50's and took off in the 70s as a solution to the overproduction problem. It was impossible to raise animals on a large scale when they needed healthy, green grass to survive. The excess corn and soy made it possible to cram them into tiny spaces and feed them inside. The corn and soy industry is what created CAFOs, not the other way around. The soy in your "milk" and the soy being force-fed to the baby cows and pigs comes from the same farm.

Originally Posted by Saya

I also dont' get why grains are the devil but dairy, which was introduced ten thousand years later, is fine. Especially when its swimming in bacteria. You're also not supposed to eat milk, eggs or meat raw. Or you can, you know, die.

Most (rough estimate based on my experience) paleo eaters don't consume milk. Those who identify as primal rather than paleo are more likely to consume full-fat, raw dairy. I drink it occasionally (also, you don't seem to already know this: grassfed raw milk is a seasonal food, usually produced May-September). Interestingly, I am actually one of those "lactose-intolerant" people you keep referencing. Meaning I can't break down lactose because my body doesn't produce lactase. Funny thing? Neither can cows. No seriously... cows, by our definition, are lactose intolerant. Which is why milk naturally contains lactase - it digests itself. Of course, lactase is killed in the pasteurization process, so unless you produce your own you can't drink pasteurized milk. Most people (including me) who become ill when consuming pasteurized dairy do just fine when it's raw. Most bacteria is very good for you - raw milk dramatically improves guy health (healthy bacteria colonies in your intestines keep away all sorts of illness; particularly mental illnesses... research GAPS for more information). Also, I've always assumed this was common sense, but maybe it isn't... pathogens (disease-causing bacteria) only come from unhealthy animals. Like, you cannot possibly catch salmonella or listeria from the eggs, meat, or milk of a healthy animal. Pasteurization exists because commercial dairy is produced on such a large scale, in such an unhealthy environment, that it's not possible for them to make sure the animals are clean and healthy. So they just heat up the milk enough to kill the pathogens before serving it. Raw animal products from healthy animals are perfectly fine (Pasturization has been the standard for about a 100 years... you think just everybody died back then?). We wouldn't have survived as a species if we needed our food pasteurized and irradiated before we could eat it. Those methods are a response to industrial agriculture, which I don't participate in. I eat raw eggs all the time. Of course, I can choose my own eggs while chickens (they do eat grass, by the way - they're omnivorous. though they prefer little fly larvae. and sweet clover) stomp around happily in the field behind me.

Originally Posted by Saya

Anyway, cannot find a serious source that says leptins in cooked beans are harmful. All I can find is quack sources saying its going to kill you and make your son gay. When I look for "are beans healthy"? I just find peer reviewed papers saying diets that focus on grains, legumes, fruits and vegetables are healthy, good for you and particularly good if you want to avoid cancer.

Lectins are harmful toxins. Leptin is a hormone in your body that signals you to stop eating when you're full. Lectins decrease sensitivity to leptin, but they're drastically different things. Lectins in cooked and soaked legumes are exactly the same as lectins in raw legumes, they're just present in much smaller amounts. So, you know, you only get a little cell death in your intestinal lining and only some proteins get into your blood to cause immune response.

You can eat whatever you like - have a big dollop of hummus and soybean oil on whole wheat pita bread every day if it makes you happy. I never said anybody had to eat the way that I do. I answered some questions that were asked of me. You got upset, and I responded with my reasons for my lifestyle choices. If you don't want to give up processed foods, by all means, have at them. But you're never going to convince an extremely healthy person that they are not, in fact, extremely healthy. Particularly since I spent over a decade eating the way you advocate and researching it thoroughly (and was terribly sick pretty much the entire time). You don't seem to have attempted or researched the way that I live at all. So I'm not sure why you seem to take it so personally.