My family had a mixed farm in the Lower Mainland of
British Columbia; we made a “good” living on about 140 acres. My father was a
pilot in WW2, having seen enough excitement for one life time, he declined to
participate in the development of the British Properties in Vancouver to become
a farmer, thanks Dad. We did have a good life there and the 140 acres did raise
a family of five and when he pasted in 1963, his family lived off the proceeds
of the his efforts by liquidating the assets his farming effort generated. How
is this defending beef, well think about it, we had a life because people ate
beef.
We were a mixed farm, dairy, mink, sheep, grain, and of
course a few beef. I get perturbed when people with some weird fetish about
“human” conduct, or some misinformation campaign, or some dietary preference,
or some unfounded environmental perspective engage in bashing a whole industry,
absent any experience in the industry or any understanding about how the
environment works. Can we do better, yes, but in the main, the modern
agro-complex is producing more and better food AND better health outcomes than
all of our preceding history.
Myth One
One article I reviewed “6 Reasons to Avoid Eating Meat”,
said by avoiding eating meat you were doing the environment a favour.
Statements like this make me want to scream – you idiot – it is critical to
have livestock in the “crop” cycle. The “beef haters” are perpetually
attempting to steer us away from meat to soy and veggies, soy requires cultivation,
fertilizer – forage production has a greatly reduced requirement in this
regard. The diet for a cow is predominately forage and augmented by grain. In a
mixed farm setting the grazing of livestock contributes to the management of
the soil by providing organic matter and fertilizer. In a more extensive
ranching operation, cattle are released into the mountains to covert grass to protean;
absent cattle there would be no means by which to harvest this grass in a
meaningful way for human consumption. The beef industry’s overall interface
with nature nets out positive for the environment and the industry is trending
to do an even better job with people starting to migrate to grass feeding and finishing of beef.
Myth Two
Another article I reviewed said to avoid beef because it
was high in cholesterol and saturated fat and suggested to change to Vegetarian
diet instead. There was a push away from the “high fat diet” in the late 70s
and 80s, the government issued direction to “reduce saturated fat”, the worst
obesity epidemic in human history ensued. In the North American diet, the enemy
is ubiquitous easily digested carbohydrates. There are studies that support the
fact that in consuming more meat protean there is a reconfiguration of
cholesterol in the blood, Hdl increases & Ldl lowers. Saturated fat as a
source of energy is better than carbohydrates because it metabolizes more
slowly. One article suggested eating cooked Salmon is stead of beef so the
consumer could access healthy fats, when you cook fish the “healthy” fat saturates
in the cooking process; the healthier option is, a lean New York strip and
supplement healthy oils via cold pressed flaxseed oil and small fish oils. Red
meat is high in iron, B vitamins, protean … it is a healthy part of our diet,
and most of all, it tastes good. Be a vegetarian if you like, I’ll take a New
York strip, lightly grilled veggies and a bottle of robust Shiraz any day.
My Three
All growth enhancements are bad. There are products used
for growth enhancement that have no human health effect, yet make the bovine
digestive process more effective – the enhancements reconfigure the enzymes or
acids in the rumen and enhance feed utilization, this is good for the producers pocket book AND
the environment. There are also rumen enzyme enhancements that reduce the
production of methane gas from the digestive process. There are implants used
that alter digestive related hormones ONLY. There are commonly used “sex
hormone” implants, these are the ones that excite public concern, largely due
to miss-use in other jurisdictions that caused negative health outcomes; as
they are utilized by the Canadian Beef industry they are relatively benign. So
in the main the use of enhancements in our industry is safe and humane; there are
organic / grass finished beef options if you’re worried.
Myth Four
One person asserted that eating meat causes Colon Cancer,
this is a complete scare tactic. Colon health is important, unhealthy things do
accumulate in the colon over time – seeds, hard to digest items like gum and
yes gristle from meat. So it is important to attend to colon health, however,
this imperative is in no way specific to meat eaters. Focus on fiber, healthy
foods, lots of veggies and fast from time to time. There are lots of fasts
around that really do flush your system, I use the Master Cleanse, some fasts
for specific challenges and others that focused more on heavy metals. There was
a study done in England that included the assessment of 50,000 people, they
found an increase in the risk in colon cancer with the daily consumption of “cured”
meats; people who consumed cured meat three times of week had no greater health
risk than the control group. The consumption of “uncured” red meat offered no
variance from the norm.
The reality is that diet and religion seem to generate
the same fervor, so people will do what they will – I’ll be eating meat.
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