Dear Oprah,
I watched your Vegan Challenge show, http://www.oprah.com/oprahshow/Oprah-and-378-Staffers-Take-a-Vegan-Challenge. Your stuff is good, as usual, BUT I was blown away at how you chose to cover the meat angle (a slaughter house) and the vegan side, Kathy Freston (a gorgeous thin blond woman who does a supermarket tour in whole foods). I’m a meat eater and in my eyes, Ms. Freston won!
I definitely appreciated the conversation. Especially about how Lisa Lang still eats meat (she is a beautiful and intelligent woman) and how Kathy’s husband still eats meat, showing how we can all get along and still live together under one roof despite dietary preferences. BUT it is hard to get over the visual. It may have been more fairly portrayed if the Soy industry discussed possible dangers of genetically modified soybeans and other potential dangers, http://www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/, http://www.westonaprice.org/soy-alert/927-soy-alert-brochure.html.
Despite the interesting topic of conversation. I found it hard to erase my understanding of how extreme a vegan diet is and how the main source of vegan protein, soy, can affect hormones (sex hormones/thyroid) and fat balance (soy oil is an omega 6 high amounts of this is linked to increased inflammation). Eliminating animal protein (an entire food group) that is indigeneous to our dietary history and replacing it with soy is not natural to many populations indigenous diet at all.
A little soy will not hurt you but if you use it daily for meals and snacks you may not be doing yourself any good, www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=soybean-fertility-hormone-isoflavones-genistein”>tp://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=soybean-fertility-hormone-isoflavones-genistein. My concern is that when a large portion of the diet is soy (soybeans, soy flour, soymilk, tofu, soy protein isolates, texturized vegetable protein, soy oil, tempeh, miso, and especially commercially prepared products [soy “meats,” soy cheeses, soy “ice creams,”], there is a heavy soy load on the human system and less nutrients that we should be consuming, like iron. Iron helps deliver oxygen from your lungs to other areas of your body. I do not have to tell you how important oxygen is.
I along with the rest of the world will wait to see how you do BUT I have my guess on what’s going to happen. Anyone else have a guess to share?
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About the author
Valerie Goldstein
Valerie raises the bar for health and nutrition know how with unconventional expertise and unconditional support for wellness.
I asked about soy because I wasn’t sure if you had some info I wasn’t aware of. Maybe the average vegan does eat a lot of soy; I don’t, and if there was no such thing as a soybean, vegans would do fine.
I can see how a person could get the idea that soy is the mainstay of a vegan diet, since when you look at the “vegan products” section of a supermarket, that’s what you see, the weird products you mention. I think a lot of people think vegans eat tofu every night. But so much else in the supermarket is vegan, as you know; it’s just that people might not associate those things (dry beans, kale, wheat Chex, peanut butter) with us. And so it seems like that packaged stuff is what the vegans eat, at least for an entree.
So anyway I guess the issue I would take with your posting is that you imply that it is not healthy to cut out meat because we will have to replace it with soy. Whether most vegans actually do that or not, there does exist the third option to eat a meat-free whole-foods diet, without any soy at all if you wish.
I’m also not sure I’m on board with another thing you seem to suggest, that evolution acts so quickly that one race (for instance Asians) eating whole soy for thousands of years would be adapted to eating it and for other races it would be harmful. Perhaps I misunderstood the point you were making about “indigenous.”
I do get your point that soy is worked into a lot of processed foods and that people, both veg and non-veg, may be consuming more than they know or is good for them, no matter their culture.
Anyway, thanks!
I’m glad to hear that you are not eating too much soy. I apologize if I did not make myself clear. Yes, I was actually saying that most people, not just vegans, eat too much soy and too much corn if they eat packaged food. However, if you eliminate meat and you are using soy as a replacement from commercially prepared meat alternatives then it is likely that you may be eating too much. I was not generalizing for all vegans.
Although I’m not an expert on blood typing I do believe that there indigenous and very specific genetic areas about nutrition that we do not know enough about but deserve consideration. For example, African American are at higher risk for high blood pressure. If an Asian person eats the same amount of salt, the result on the body will be different. I do believe in adaptation.
Thank you for your comments!
I was really interested to see your take on this. As a vegan, I was disappointed in the way everyone on the stage seemed to be desperately agreeing that meat was fine, and I was wishing Oprah had just stuck to to main story, the employees’ experiences.
Since it wasn’t a tour of a typical slaughterhouse but their best one, was prepared for, and wasn’t a complete tour, that segment seemed like a whitewash to me, and one that cast a chilling shadow of undying gratitude over the rest of the comfy-chair chat, and yet from your perspective it was a big unfair minus. I guess I’m just so used to seeing worse.
(Chuckle) I’m really glad to know you felt the show was a wash towards the vegan side. If we’re both unhappy, maybe it was fair. 🙂
I don’t eat that much soy. Maybe couple times a week tops. There’s so much else to eat, and we don’t really need that much from the legumes group, two little servings a day. Where did you get the fact that soy is the main source of vegan protein?
Thanks for posting! Peace.
Thank you for responding to my blog! I love your comments. You made me laugh. It is interesting hearing your prospective. I guess maybe you are right, maybe it is fair, LOL! I used to be a vegetarian, not a vegan. I drank milk and ate eggs, fish and turkey. Yes I agree about the slaughterhouse. It almost turned me back into a vegetarian. I hate the thought of killing animals but it is a natural part of the food chain. I believe that some people do better on meat and for others it may not be as important.
From my experience soy (protein and oil) and corn (oil) are huge argri-crops that are overused in our food supply, for both meat eater and vegan. If you read the ingredient section of any package, you’ll likely see them on any package. I know some people eat real foods and steer clear of commercially prepared food. Yet most people eat from a package.
My point is that if a vegan consumes TVP, soy burger, tofu dog or any vegan meat it is usually soy. If I’m wrong, I apologize. Please set the record straight! Yes I agree the amount of soy you eat would be no problem to your health. I have heard that most soy is GMO and that I definitely do not like. I believe we should eat foods naturally the way they should be eaten, not trans or hydrogenated fats, GMO’s, high fructose corn syrup, etc…
Peace to you and your family!