I am assuming this is some sort of vegan talking point that since some human teeth are mostly flat, ignoring canines and some particularly sharp front incisors, humans are supposed to eat only plants? Aren’t humans omnivores though?
People have a real hard time separating Omnivores from Carnivores and Carnivores from Herbivores.
I suggest reading “The Nature of Predators”
Great learning tool for such things imo. The backbone of the story is those distinctions and their societal impacts. Vegans will hate it tho. As the BBEGs of the story use corruption, exploitation, coercion, genetic engineering, social engineering, and war to force omnivores and obligate carnivores to be obligate herbivores.
You are interpreting that backwards. I wouldnt say it’s a vegan talking point so much as a non vegan talking point in reverse. It’s commonly argued that because humans have canines were meant to eat meat. Whereas vegans fully acknowledge the capacity to digest meat and evolutionary history that evolved omnivorous diets (but argue the majority of (not all) people have a want rather than a need) . The vegans are just memeing back.
meh I’ve heard mostly vegans make this dumbass argument.
I definitely support vegans but I don’t support pseudoscientific bullshit no matter who says it.
If anything is dumbass pseudoscience, it’s the paleo diet, carnivore diet, and all other low carb diets.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FNIoKmMq6cs&pp=ygUhcGFsZW9udG9sb2dpc3QgZGVidW5rcyBwYWxlbyBkaWV0
https://nutritionfacts.org/video/the-problem-with-the-paleo-diet-argument/
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18596505-the-low-carb-fraud
Multiple different things can be dumbass pseudoscience, actually. Any time someone starts talking about what humans “were meant to eat”, I’m done listening. Humans can and do survive and thrive on an extremely broad variety of diets. It’s part of why societies were able to develop in so many different places.
Right, exactly. This is what I said. Humans _can _ survive on vegan diets. So the question becomes, if it’s possible to live a totally healthy normal life not eating meat, should you? This is the moral line that vegans come down on differently than the typical meat eater.
Nobody is arguing that humans can’t eat meat or that it wasn’t beneficial for our ancestors to be able to. The question is, if it’s not required, is it moral? Btw, veganism is about harm reduction. There are people to this day in impoverished countries who are actually required to eat meat to achieve sufficient nutrient intake. You will find 99% vegans having no problem with those people. But if you live in a country with basic infrastructure you probably have enough to at least significantly reduce meat intake
Hi there! You appear to be interpreting some type of meat eating ideology from my comment. Let me encourage you to take it at face value - the only intent is to criticize the idea that humans are “meant” to eat particular foods, an idea present both in the meme that started this thread and in the above mentioned paleo diet
We are agreeing lol. My point is that vegans do not actually make this argument. I have yet to ever hear it made unironically. Sometimes it is made in jest because it is made to us with sincerity from meat eater ideology.
Another question is: if it’s moral, are you gonna do it for that reason?
I have no arguments against veganism. Vegans are right. Yet I am not a vegan.
This is the “fuck off, I like guns” of meat eating and pretty much the only argument I’m receptive to. I get frustrated when people argue they should be able to do things using bad arguments. But if you say, I don’t have a good argument for this but I’m gonna do it anyway, that’s at least being honest with yourself and I respect that a lot more.
Have you realized you’re arguing with somebody named militant vegan yet?
Humans have teeth suitable for both meat and plant foods. So I would say humans are omnivores.
I may be wrong, but a 100% vegan only diet I think requires supplements to be taken for certain things like proteins that humans need in order to live. Of course, those certain proteins are found in meats.
However, I think saying humans are carnovires would also be incorrect, and a 100% meat only diet would be I think equally as unhealthy as a 100% plant only diet.
The idea that a pure plant-based diet can’t provide all the protein we need has been thoroughly debunked for a long time.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DMwf_9wqWY0&pp=ygUdc3RhbmZvcmQgc2NpZW50aXN0IG9uIHByb3RlaW4%3D
The nutrient you’re thinking of is b12. Vegans need to supplement b12 (for now, discoveries are still being made on that front). But at the same time, in a sense, so does everyone else.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UUyiiNwDNLU&pp=ygUOZWQgd2ludGVycyBiMTI%3D
Humans don’t have to kill things with their teeth. Sharks do.
Yeah one thing you notice about the ocean is the teeth are designed so if you catch something it can’t get away. Look at anglerfish and baleen. White sharks have hundreds of teeth. Most omnivorous land mammals have teeth just like ours.
This is just a bad comparison, but it is funny.
Humans generally don’t need to kill animals.
It’s true. I usually eat animals that were killed for me. Thanks, grocery stores!
Neither do cows but I’ve seen one too many slurp a Snake like spaghetti and eat baby birds as if they were KitKats
Just because an animal does it doesn’t mean it’s okay for humans to do it
Just because an animal does it doesn’t mean it’s okay for humans to do it
Then comparing human teeth to animal teeth is irrelevant no? Because what the animals do is irrelevant.
Don’t kid yourself, Jimmy boi. If a cow ever got the chance, he’d eat you and everyone you care about!
Nah, don’t you understand? I’m literally designed to hunt and kill animals, just like other predators.
This gun? Well how else am i supposed to kill them? I don’t have any sort of claws or sharp teeth or anything designed to kill animals for sustinence
What do you mean why am i cooking the meat? I’ll get sick if i don’t, just like every other predator on the planet. Plus, i couldn’t even chew it if it were raw.
And all that is assuming natural = moral, which, if your moral code is equivilant to a lions, is not compatible with society. But it’s convenient to not change most people’s behavior, so they’re cool ignoring the logical conclusion of that argument.
This is not a valid argument. We literally evolved to use tools. And humans absolutely can eat raw meat
Maybe we evolved to use our brains to make and use tools. Maybe we’re currently evolving to use our brains to eat fewer animals.
Our ancestors fought their way to the top of the food chain over millions of years. It just feels wrong and ungrateful to eat a purely plant based diet. Like I’m betraying my own species.
I wouldn’t mind eating a vegan diet if there was a way to compensate. We could, for example, have a system where for every vegan meal sold someone strangles a small rodent.
The reason we cook most meats is because capitalism dictates it should be produced the cheapest possible way, leading to contaminations and other nasty stuff in the meat that require cooking it. Even salmonella isn’t present in raw chicken if the chicken grew in a clean environment eating clean food.
Dude what the fuck are you on about? Wild animals carry parasites and other harmful microorganisms that cooking removes. Are you seriously implying that modern farming is the reason we cook our food?
I know that capitalism is the boogeyman on lemmy and is the cause of all things bad, but this one really takes the cake.
Why so aggressive? I realize my original comment was maybe not clear and lacked context because I honestly just typed it in a bit of a rush without thinking too hard about it, but that’s no reason to put words in my mouth and attack me.
Obviously, wild animals can carry parasites and we certainly started dying from food born illnesses much less often once we figured out to cook the meat, that’s so basic I didn’t even think my comment could be interpreted that way. But that has little to do with the topic (which was whether we can digest raw meat) and ignores the myriad of dishes that are made of raw meat like steak tartare, torisashi, charcuterie, carpaccio, sushi, poisson cru a la tahitienne, etc etc.
The common theme of all these dishes is the meat is of high quality, butchered and prepared well (Vs minced meat full of cow shit because they don’t bother butchering them properly, for example). That was my only point.
Your statement, “Even salmonella isn’t present in raw chicken […]” implies that wild fowl–animals that don’t have to worry about sanitary conditions in modern, industrial farming–would be safe to eat raw. Taking sushi and sashimi as another example, that’s safe(-ish) only because they use ocean fish; there’s no freshwater sushi because freshwater fish carry parasites that can infect humans, and so isn’t safe, even from the most pristine lakes and streams in the world.
I’d say that modern farming–when the best practices are used–is the reason we’re able to eat things raw at all. When you look at feces from Romans up through late medieval Europeans, you see that most humans had all kinds of nasty intestinal parasites. (Also, a certain amount of parasitic infection seems to be good, because it keeps your autoimmune system from always being on ultra-high alert.)
Yes that’s fair, I can see how it was interpreted that way. The chicken example I had in mind was a specific one, and the chickens aren’t wild at all just well cared for and extreme care is given to the preparation, I didn’t have wild animals in mind at all which carry a whole bunch of other well known risks, only ones that are farmed in good conditions and used to prepare raw meat dishes every day across the globe.
Vegans who actually believe what they preach spend more time on education and less on shaming or meaningless memes.
This is just posturing.
Part of vegan education has carnist shame as a condition.
Man, it really is entertaining when religious zealots try to meme
Veganism isn’t a religion. It’s a simple moral framework, a practical moral baseline, and a social movement like any other. Would you call a social justice, anti-genocide, or lgbtq+ rights advocate a religious zealot?
Suuure.
And not all social justice advocates treat it like a religion. But some do.
Also, trying to compare veganism, a system of belief, to genocide resistance and human rights is absurd to the point that it exactly makes my point.
There is no world in which fighting genocide is the same thing as avoiding animal products. None, no way, no how. The arrogance of your statement is so far beyond the usual responses my little troll statement gets that I’m outright flummoxed. I can’t believe anyone would be that stupid, that arrogant, that ridiculous.
And that goes just as much for lgbt+ rights. You are outright absurd making that comparison.
And that absurdity is exactly why veganism is a religion to way too many vegans. Like, I’m not anti vegan, I know and love many, I just like getting online vegans riled up for entertainment. But you jumped the damn shark big time homie. That kind of thinking, that’s why people that hate vegans hate them.
Man, I find it hard to not just start calling you names because damn, son.
You are completely ignoring the fact, that for many it is too time consuming and involved to go vegan. And then you are imposing your belief that others should invest the same amount of resources, be it time or money, or they are worse human beings not caring about animals. In other words, being able to switch your diet is usually a sign of at least slight financial privilege. I just had some tofu so you don’t have to preach to me. But let others be and do not compare veganism to anti-genocide. It is absolutely ridiculous.
Don’t compare veganism to anti-genocide? My anointed sibling (gnostic gender-neutral idioms >> orthodox gendered ones), every animal product eater/user is complicit in the largest perpetual genocide in human history.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Hershaft
In the first place remember that veganism isn’t only about diet. And it’s about doing the best that you can, with what you have. Not everyone can go fully vegan, and that’s understandable and okay as long as they’re doing their best.
Also, I’ve never owned property. I’ve never worked a job that paid enough to afford it (or rent) on my own. When I started transitioning my diet, it was when I had switched jobs to a factory setting with 40-48 hour work weeks (post-covid it was almost always 48 hours), 10 hour shifts on my feet all day. Prior to that I was dependent on eating fast food every day (with predictable rapidly declining health). I also lived in a food desert where going vegan meant that I had zero options for takeout.
I had no one in my life willing to help, in fact all the people around me made it even harder to change. I also have adhd, and can’t stand the concept of meal prep. So what I did was save up for an Instant Pot, and started making the largest batches of grains and legumes that I could, along with frozen veggies (mainly broccoli). I generally cooked only once a week, and then would combine the helpings of leftovers in different ways each day (to keep it from getting too boring) for both my work lunches and dinners.
And I also sought community. Having vegan friends helps immensely.
Don’t assume that I’m as privileged as you think just because I’m vegan. On the other hand I know there are too many people who are far worse off than I am, and everyone who is struggling too much to go fully vegan should never be condemned, on the contrary we should seek to help - because our current food system is killing everyone who is most disadvantaged and impoverished.
Our capitalist wasteland, particularly when you factor in health outcomes, means it’s even more important to at least go plant-based (not the same thing as veganism), and to help others do the same.
There is evidence to suggest that low income households are more likely to be vegan or vegetarian than high income households. So financial privilege is not a good deflection. The reason so many vegans are not sympathetic to the argument about time or effort is that for the vast majority of them they have lived experience contradicting it so it comes across as an excuse. they are not spending any more time or mental effort to eat than anybody else. When you first make the switch maybe you spend 10% more effort to learn new recipes, what you buy or whatever, but it quickly becomes routine as any other dietary system.
(I say they because I don’t identify as vegan for a variety of reasons, but it does make it easier to have a conversation to use labels. I don’t advocate people become vegan, but I do advocate they try to reduce their animal product intake the best they can. In the rare circumstance that the best they can is nothing I don’t judge.)
To me It seems you are upset that people are putting you in a moral category below themselves and your reaction is to assume that means they are wrong. Firstly, don’t think of people as putting you below them morally, but putting your actions into less desirable outcomes. Also, sit with that. Should you feel uncomfortable? If so, what is an appropriate reaction to that discomfort?
I don’t think it’s productive to quibble about whether it’s comparable to human ethical questions, so no comment on the genocide. People have been in trouble in the past for making comparisons to Jim Crow or slavery. I don’t think it’s appropriate either, just as it would be inappropriate to argue whether Palestinian genocide or slavery was worse.
nonetheless, during any time of ethical or moral awakening, there were people complicit with status quo in those scenarios, maybe even sympathetic to some of the arguments but valued social order over progress, who were asked to confront their complicity and they blamed the people pointing this out as the judgy problem starters rather than addressing the root problem.
I have many friends which are vegan and we live in an area + work in an industry with a comparatively high amount of people with such a diet. We have talked about the topic at lengths, and my understanding is that in order to have a healthy diet you have to do quite a bit of research and spend time planning your meals. And then going out on a dinner is often a pain, although this has improved in the recent years.
We eat much less meat than the general public. But going the next step and eliminating meat and then diary products is not trivial. Unless you have less responsibilities and or more prior knowledge to get you up to speed. I simply do not have the time for that, I have a small kid to take care of. And we often struggle to plan enough meals ahead of time in the short period of time between finishing work and doing groceries.
It might sound like an excuse to you. It feels the same on my end, when my concerns are dismissed with some hand waving by people which usually are in a completely different place in their life than me.
The thing is, you could argue you need to do all that research to verify you’re eating enough of the right things, but in some sense you should be doing that regardless of whether your diet is vegan. But most people don’t bother, they just eat whatever and go to the doctor every once in a while and if there is a big gap somewhere the doctor will point it out. The lazy vegan diet is no more unbalanced than a lazy Omni diet. You can just not think about it, it’s not like you will immediately die if you are lacking in some nutrient. If you are supplementing with a multi vitamin or even just taking only B12 and iron, chances are you’re eating enough different kinds of things just by happenstance that you don’t even have to think about “complete proteins”.
If you only eat potatoes and Oreos then yeah you’ll have a bad time, but who is doing that? Do you count your carb, protein, fat intake? Daily caloric intake? Your lysine? Your riboflavin? Why don’t you? How are you so sure you’re getting enough already? Do you think vegans sit around counting that stuff too? I buy the usuals at the grocery store, I just make/eat whatever I feel like and have a couple weeks worth of recipes I rotate through same as everyone else, eat out once or twice a week at normal restaurants with vegan options. It’s not hard no matter how much you insist it should be.
When I hear its too hard my lived experience tells me it’s entirely possible to think about food the absolute minimum required, so it seems either like an excuse or ignorance.
The thing is, you could argue you need to do all that research to verify you’re eating enough of the right things, but in some sense you should be doing that regardless of whether your diet is vegan. But most people don’t bother, they just eat whatever and go to the doctor every once in a while and if there is a big gap somewhere the doctor will point it out. The lazy vegan diet is no more unbalanced than a lazy Omni diet. You can just not think about it, it’s not like you will immediately die if you are lacking in some nutrient. If you are supplementing with a multi vitamin or even just taking only B12 and iron, chances are you’re eating enough different kinds of things just by happenstance that you don’t even have to think about “complete proteins”.
If you only eat potatoes and Oreos then yeah you’ll have a bad time, but who is doing that? Do you count your carb, protein, fat intake? Daily caloric intake? Your lysine? Your riboflavin? Why don’t you? How are you so sure you’re getting enough already? Do you think vegans sit around counting that stuff too? I buy the usuals at the grocery store, I just make/eat whatever I feel like and have a couple weeks worth of recipes I rotate through same as everyone else, eat out once or twice a week at normal restaurants with vegan options. It’s not hard no matter how much you insist it should be.
When I hear its too hard my lived experience tells me it’s entirely possible to think about food the absolute minimum required, so it seems either like an excuse or ignorance.
If they act like a zealot, then yes. Most, like most vegans, are not zealots and we can have a great conversation. Your name gives me the feeling that a productive conversation might be difficult. But, I’ll try my best. 😁
I chose my username to make fun of all the people who categorize vegans as militant anytime we speak out at all. It’s to highlight that the only vegan who isn’t seen that way is a vegan who stays silent and does nothing to speak out against the atrocities being committed against animals.
Human teeth are omnivorous.
We have TWO semi-pointy teeth. Two.
*Even Wikipedia agrees the bottom two are bullshit.
Human teeth also have sharp peaks and deeper valleys within them which is the case for the overwhelming majority of omnivorous creatures. Most obligate herbivores have flatter teeth or will regrow them unless they have teeth explicitly for a particular use case.
Source: You can check out scads of scientific resources on herbivores versus omnivore versus carnivore teeth. I assume you know how a search engine works, but here’s a solid article on differences.
Also my sister has been one of the veterinary bigwigs at several zoos through her lifetime and we’ve had multiple discussions on it.
How is a blog a source? All you’ve given is anecdotal evidence. I have that too. Pandas, sharp teeth, claws, obligate herbivores. Gorillas, sharp teeth, big muscles, obligate herbivores.
I’m sure your sister is a fine veterinarian, and if we’re going to get anecdotal I have a degree in biology and don’t really care what opinion your sister has. I work for real medical doctors who are anti-vax. Someone’s job doesn’t make them sensible.
Errrr… are you looking for me to provide you a primary scientific source for how teeth work in animals with differing diets? Most of that is in veterinary texts (which is an amalgam of info), but it’s akin to asking for a scientific evidence for gravity. What you’re asking is too broad to be covered in a single paper and shows a misunderstanding of how scientific studies focus and function. I was simply giving you a primer since you asked, and that blog is good enough for that (and accurate from the portion I read).
I can point you at papers (such as this one on Tooth root morphology as an indicator for dietary specialization in carnivores) which can help explain part of how food selection works in evolution, but I’m not sure what level of information would satisfy you or why you’d even want it?
Here’s one on how tooth wear affects teeth differently based on evolutionary eating habits.
Here’s one on the development and evolution of teeth.
Here’s one on mammalian teeth in specific.
If you’d like more, feel free to use https://scholar.google.com/ to look for more.
I would be a vegan but I just don’t have the time or willpower.
I mean, the amount of time you have to spend bitching about other’s dietary choices is exhausting.
I’ve considered being like A half vegan Like a vegan but I’ll occasionally splurge at like events and restaurants
It’s not really considered as admirable tho and is just frowned upon by both vegans and non vegans
What if you just did it without getting any credit. You don’t need others approval to make a positive change
vegancirclejerk banned be for this image XD
