I just thought this quote was too hilarious to not share. Hopefully no vegetarians here on the Fray will be offended.

"Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace, or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, and an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food. The body, these waterheads imagine, is a temple that should not be polluted by animal protein. It's healthier, they insist, though every vegetarian waiter I've worked with is brought down by any rumor of a cold."

I love Anthony Bourdain. :) His show is one of my favorites. I feel the same way about food. Idealistically I could be a vegetarian, but when it comes down to it I enjoy food way too much. Although I don't share his love for veal or organs. I have tried both because I will try anything once (just to see what I'm missing), but I have never been impressed with either.

I've always been suspicious of people who don't hav a love affair with food (like vegans). Maybe that's why I've never gotten along with my in-laws. They see food as a way to get full. I see it as a way to connect with people and enjoy life. My family life growing up was centered around a busy kitchen with a mom that was always trying to stuff good food down me.

I don't think that vegans aren't passionate about food; they just have a different view about what people should eat. Frankly, though, I'm surprised at how they can live on what little they can consume. I once tried a vegan chocolate-chip cookie: no dairy, no eggs, no refined sugar. It tasted horrible. I guess they have to start a vegan diet at a young age to acquire a taste for it.

I do understand where you're coming from, Tex. I'm appalled at the thought of animal cruelty, but I like the taste of beef and chicken too much to stop eating it. The way I see it, if God didn't want us to eat meat, he either would have seen fit to have us evolve without the capacity to eat it, or he would have made it one of the commandments.

The vegan argument that humans aren't meant to consume meat does not make sense to me. We've been doing it for at least 2 million years and our bodies have adapted to needing that amount of protein. It's the only reason that the human brain evolved to its current size and we got smarter as a species. Also, other animals eat meat too, does that make them evil? In my opinion, it is just a natural chain of life.

I do applaud vegans and vegetarians for standing up for better conditions for animals that we use for food. I don't think it was ever meant for humans to treat other living creatures the way we do. That is apparent by the diseases that are created by smashing as many animals into tiny spaces and by feeding them inappropriate and unhealhy food. Inhumane treatment isn't natural, and is causing us to get sick in return.

<<<The vegan argument that humans aren't meant to consume meat does not make sense to me. We've been doing it for at least 2 million years and our bodies have adapted to needing that amount of protein. It's the only reason that the human brain evolved to its current size and we got smarter as a species. Also, other animals eat meat too, does that make them evil? In my opinion, it is just a natural chain of life.>>>

Stupid Vegan diet's should just be advertised for what they are. The pro-osteoporosis diet.

Did you see a thing on Discovery(think it was discovery) about cannibalism?

Not only are humans intended to eat meat, but a solid 50 percent of the human population is able to digest human flesh no problem.

If memory serves correctly, the other 50 percent of the population that cannot eat human flesh would contract a human form of mad cow disease if they were to dine on earthling-meat. And like die or something.

Now I'm not making a sales pitch for the other white meat, i'm just flabbergasted anyone would suggest human digestion wasn't made for meat and animal products.

I mean how have Eskimo's survived all these years? What about Native Americans?

They were polluting thier bodies with vile meat products, when should they have been dining on seaweed and beans.

If you want to suffer nutritional deficiencies and chronic flatulence talk to your doctor to see if the Vegan diet is right for you.

I didn't see that particular program, but I have heard that research about the mad-cow like disease. If I remember, the mad cow-like disease would happen when people eat human brain, and the people who don't get sick have a specific gene that protects them from the disease. One of my professors is a specialist in cannibalism, and her class is always one of the first to fill up. I think it had something to do with it being called "Good Eats, Forbidden Flesh" lol

Yeah, American Indians would not have been able to survive in the arctic and even in the sub arctic without seal and whale meat. They did not eat much plant material at all. The Plains Indians are an interesting case, though, because even though they had a good supply of buffalo available to them, buffalo meat is so lean that they would have died of starvation had that been their only food source. So to get more protein in their diet they had to eat the marrow and supplement their diet with other meat and plants (especially beans).

I agree, interesting topic. We are just one more link in the food chain, there is no reason that humans should not eat meat.

To say that eating meat is part of the natural chain of life ignores the intensive factory farming necessary to provide for the level of meat consumption of the average American. This intensive factory farming consists of hideously cruel lifelong torture for millions of animals followed by a frightening and cruel death. There is NO WAY the high level of meat in the standard American diet could have been sustained for the last 2 million years. Absolutely NO WAY. I for one just don't have the conscience to participate in that obscene cruelty.

Take a look at your cat or dog's teeth, then look at your own. Beyond the fact that they're all teeth, do you see much similarity? No. Then look at how wide they can open their mouths and how wide you can open yours. I could go on and on about the physiological differences between humans and meat eaters.

If you believe in evolution, then the fact that when looking at populations, disease rates rise in lock step with the level of meat consumption should tell you that we did not evolve to eat meat, or at least not very much. For more on this check out the book, The China Study.