There is a sizeable community of people who practice raw veganism near where I live and these folks are hard core. Needless to say, these folks love the green smoothies diet.
This is easy to understand as those who embark on raw veganism typically feel fantastic for quite some time while eating this way. Raw veggies are extremely detoxifying! For several months or even a year or two, increased energy, clear skin and resistance to infection may be observed.
Is this because raw veganism is the right way to eat long term? Is the vegan Netflix film What The Health really on to something big?
Far from it.
Raw Veganism is for Cleansing the Body, Not Nourishing It!
Raw veganism is really a cleansing diet which helps to detoxify the body. It does not optimally nourish the body long term, however.
The raw, whole foods that vegans consume are certainly a huge leap forward from conventional processed foods and anyone would initially feel better eating raw vegan if he/she had been eating the Standard American Diet previously.
Over time, as the body becomes depleted of minerals, serious health issues start to emerge if raw veganism is continued.
This is because the fat soluble activators A, D, and K2 – only found in animal foods – supercharge mineral absorption and without these critical nutrients in the diet, mineral depletion and ill health is the inevitable result.
The bottom line? You can eat loads of mineral rich foods as a raw vegan and still be mineral starved.
Nutritional Deficiencies Rapidly Occur on a Raw Vegan Diet
Watch this 3 minute video below where Maria, a former fan of raw veganism and the creator of the Green Smoothie Challenge discusses her abrupt conversion to nutrient dense animal foods due to the health and tooth challenges she experienced after two years as a raw vegan. Her vegan catharsis came after reading Rami Nagel’s book Cure Tooth Decay.
You will be shocked how rapidly her health challenges resolved after she began to consume nutrient dense animal foods such as cod liver oil, raw butter, and organ meats.
If you know any folks that practice raw veganism, please forward this video. Folks who follow veganism are in serious denial about how this way of eating is going to eventually destroy their health if it hasn’t already and a testimonial from a former hard core vegan may be just what they need to realize that humans are not designed to subsist purely on plant foods.
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
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I read Denise Minger’s “critique” – she has trouble, IMPO, deciding which side of the fence she REALLLLLLY wants to be on. She supports veganism, basically, but at the same time supports animal foods. IOW, she supports eating the way it should be. But people aren’t getting that take-home message, especially if they only read the first few paragraphs, which a LOT of people do. They skim and don’t get into the heart of the article, and I’ve had a couple of people say “hey, I think she’s changed her mind about an animal based diet. At least that’s the way I read it. She’s very supportive of the vegan crowd. Not much of a critique if you ask me”. Well, mmmm – k. When I read it I sorta got the same feeling. She didn’t want to step on toes and she didn’t.
She doesn’t have any trouble with anything. I have no idea where you got that impression. It’s clear to me that she supports truth and honesty above all else, and goes where the science takes her. Thousands of outraged vegan toes were stepped on, to the point where she was denounced across the entire net as an imaginary creation of WAPF, a paid shill for the meat industry, you name it. She produced the best critique of The China Study since Chris Masterjohn’s, along with numerous follow ups until Colin Campbell slunk off with his tail between his legs. Her takedown of Forks Over Knives is just as rigorously constructed. I look forward with great interest to her upcoming book dismantling the USDA dietary recommendations.
@damaged justice: Then you need to reread the article. She falls all over herself basically apologizing to the vegan community. She says “I kind of loved this movie” and a lot of people stopped reading right there, or at least the people I talked to because they thought she was in favor of veganism. I tried to explain that they should keep reading.
I, too, look forward to her dismanteling the USDA. But her style better change because people are getting the wrong impression of her “critiques”.
Either you have a different opinion, or you’re the who who “needs to reread the article”.
And if people “skim and don’t get into the heart of the article”, that’s no fault of Denise Minger, but the fault of a lazy reader.
Life is Always about moderation & balance RT @ActualOrganics: Raw Veganism May Steal Your Health – via @HealthyHomeEcon http://ow.ly/6Mqi3
@BoulderVegan @BSidesNarrative Have you heard of this (it is specific to raw)? MT: Raw Veganism May Steal Your Health http://t.co/2460ECoQ
Warning: Raw Veganism Will Steal Your Health – The Healthy Home Economist http://t.co/NYyXPjr8
oops-meant to say that the vegetarian myth was written by a former hardcore vegan…and after reading a few more of the comments above-I highly recommend it to those people-you wants facts and stats-this book has them. 🙂
I just today finished reading The Vegetarian Myth; a former hard core vegan. Great book-though I’m not a vegetarian (did it for a year about 10 years ago-didn’t like my lack of energy); I just hope I can get my vegetarian friends to read it. Hard though-they are so steadfast in their beliefs.
Good post!
Raw Veganism May Steal Your Health – via @HealthyHomeEcon http://ow.ly/6Mqi3
Warning: Raw Veganism Will Steal Your Health – The Healthy Home Economist
http://ow.ly/6M8i3
Warning: Raw Veganism Will Steal Your Health – The Healthy Home Economist http://t.co/m3tlrH73
I got Nourishing Traditions and subscribed to this site, and reluctantly began consuming local, grassfed animal products because all the arguments from your multiple sites, including yours, as well as the WAP sources, seemed to make sense. The thing is, before, as a vegetarian, I felt fine! But now after all the milk, butter, etc. I feel much worse. The problem with the NT and WAP sources is that there is no diet that suits everyone. And it gets turned in to a nasty, my-diet-is-better-than-yours full on assault. The bottom line is, consuming animal products is one way to find health, but I feel that my since-childhood aversion to meat is my body’s way of telling me to avoid it for my health. And when I do, I feel MUCH better. Trust what your body tells you, either way. We are not robots. And there are many many vegetarians and vegans who are healthy. It’s really silly and insulting to say that all people who don’t eat animals are fraile, scrawny, nutrient-starved beings. I mean, really. Once again there is a murky line between your personal opinion and researched, documented, backed up facts. I am unsubscribing. Thanks for the recipes I have been able to use.
Nothing in this post is personal opinion. It is written about, documented by pictures and lab work in the book Nutrition and Physical Degeneration.
It is very important to point out the negatives of veganism as it affects fertility and young women who are vegan for even a few years can harm their fertility permanently.
The fact that this book is published by the Weston A. Price Foundation, and it was first published over 70 years ago, sends up all kinds of red flags. Nutritional science and biochemistry has come a long way. Not to mention that the ways of going about anthropological research has changed A LOT since the early 20th century (and this book is largely based on anthropological research). When it’s endorsed by an entity like The Harvard School of Nutritional Science, then I’ll take a second look at giving it some credibility. As is stands now, I was thoroughly unimpressed. It doesn’t prove or convince me of anything.
I support you completely. Humans were not meant to eat meat (see my reply on how we are similar to herbivores and how our digestive system is clearly not meant to handle meat). We can get all our nutrients from plants and there are many credible sources supporting this. This article is a completely uninformed opinion from someone who does not know anything about nutrition and taxonomy. Here is some information on raw vegans getting vitamin A. One point, how do animals get vitamin A? FROM PLANTS!!! It’s true that the preformed active type of this vitamin is found only in animal foods. But plants are abundant in vitamin A precursors like beta-carotene. In fact, these provitamin A compounds are important enough that the USDA measures vitamin A content of foods as “retinol activity equivalents (RAE),” which includes both preformed vitamin A and the compounds that the body turns into vitamin A. There is no separate RDA or recommendation for animal-derived pre-formed vitamin A.
You can meet your vitamin A requirement for the day by drinking just one-quarter cup of carrot juice or eating a cup of kale or spinach. Other foods that make significant contributions are sweet potatoes, cantaloupe, and dark orange winter squashes, including pumpkin. A word of caution though: Earlier assessments of retinol activity equivalents in plant foods over-estimated amounts. This is because more recent data show that conversion rates of the vitamin A precursors are lower than previously believed. As a result, vitamin A is a nutrient that deserves some attention in vegan diets. This doesn’t mean you can’t get enough; it does mean that it’s a good idea to make sure you eat vitamin A rich foods every day.
Are you denying the canine teeth in your own mouth staring back at you in the mirror? WAKE UP!