Skeptic Project

You all need to do a little more reading about the science of food. There has been a lot of very good science documenting the effect of animal protein (and of course the fats that go with it) on the body. Until you study the works of people like T. Colin Campbell and Dr. John McDougall you are all just falling for the media hype pumped out by the meat and dairy industries. Read learn and find out why the standard American diet results in heart disease, diabetes, many cancers, osteoporosis, heartburn, and on and on and on. After you have read the science, THEN come back and claim that fast food is just fine.

Identify WHAT fast food is OK--salads without cheese and oil, vegan burgers on a whole wheat bun without cheese and mayonnaise. Learn how proteins are digested into amino acids, turning the blood acidic, so that your body must pull calcium from your bones to neutralize it, causing osteoporosis, kidney stones, etc. Learn how a high protein diet in affluent families allows kids to get and die from liver cancer when eating peanut butter contaminated with aflatoxin, while kids on a lower protein diet were found to not get the cancer.

There is so much real science to understanding why a vegan diet is best. So learn before you decide."

http://skeptoid.com/episodes/4088

Immediately starts with a standard trope: do more reading...but I won't give you my sources! I decided to do some quick reading and research on the two people this commenter names. First, T. Colin Campbell. Here's his website: http://www.tcolincampbell.org/

Immediate red flags - he's selling you things, and the site is dedicated 100% to promoting this vegan diet. We have celebrity endorsements (like Bill Clinton) and testimonials. He's been on media outlets, like Dr. Oz and HuffPo, which of course are both well known sources of excellent health info. Also, plenty of things right on the home page to claim that vegan diets prevent cancer. Otherwise, at face value, it at least SEEMs scientific, with an articles database. But the monkey wrench...Campbell was involved in the thoroughly debunked China Study. Courtesy of Eric: http://rawfoodsos.com/2010/07/07/the-china-study-fact-or-fallac/ <-- Cherry picked and misrepresented facts. The China study is one thing contributing to many bad diets that support consuming little to no animal protein.

Second guy...Dr. John McDougall. Here's his wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_A._McDougall Again, no animal protein, eat vegan and raw/unprocessed. He had a stroke in the 60s, which he attributed to his diet containing animal protein, without any real evidence for this whatsoever. His personal observations were that elderly patients from the far east who ate rice, vegetables and little animal protein were trim. Thus began his philosophy.

This is his website: http://www.drmcdougall.com/index.html <-- Again, immediate red flags. He's got stuff to sell you and it's all about promoting his philosophy. Also, this page on his site, http://www.drmcdougall.com/medical.html, claims there's science. No peer-reviewed articles, just McDougall's articles promoting this stuff, and claims that many people have gotten health with his program. His newsletter, the McDougall Newsletter, is also listed as a publication to "promote misinformation, espouse unscientific theories, contain unsubstantiated advice, are insufficiently skeptical, and/or fail to distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources of advice" by Quackwatch.org. http://www.quackwatch.org/04ConsumerEducation/nonrecperiodicals.html

I'm not really convinced these two people are the best people to go for your dietary advice.

Onto other claims. Let's start with amino acids turn the blood acidic, and thus your body pulls calcium from the bones and cause osteoporosis. I ran pubmed searches on amino acids and osteoporosis, using many different search terms, combined and separate. Couldn't find a single article linking the two in any way, shape, or form. I call bogus on this claim, and it's up to claimants to provide evidence for this.

On acidity of blood...blood acidity means nothing to health. The body's excretory processes keep acidity balanced. Urination and exhalation both get rid of compounds that make the blood acidic. This happens every day. Acidity is not governed by what you eat and drink, and it doesn't matter to health anyway. Most acids and alkalines that are in food are too weak to change acidity of blood to any degree where it would be harmful or cause any diseases. Thus, eating amino acids, like those in animal protein, would not increase blood acidity and pull calcium from bones to neutralize it. I would like to hear an explanation of the mechanisms of how amino acids turn the blood acidic enough that calcium will be drawn from bones to neutralize it, causing osteoporosis and kidney stones. Further reading on body acidity here here: http://www.chem1.com/CQ/ionbunk.html#ABCP

Next claim...aflatoxin in peanut butter. I first did a quick reading on aflatoxin, and it's produced by some species of fungus. It is carcinogenic. Odd...it's natural, so how come it's harmful? (yes, I know, commenter didn't use the all-natural fallacy). Also, peanuts ARE from plants, thus peanut butter is plant-derived. Want to point that out. On the aflatoxin wikipedia article, "Crops which are frequently affected include cereals (maize, sorghum, pearl millet, rice, wheat), oilseeds (peanut, soybean, sunflower, cotton), spices (chilli peppers, black pepper, coriander, turmeric, ginger), and tree nuts (almond, pistachio, walnut, coconut, brazil nut)." Oops! This toxin contaminates many plants, not meats. Yes, it can contaminate peanuts, but now, I'm not sure exactly what the commenter is trying to say. Kids on a 'lower protein (presumably vegan) diet' can consume peanut butter just like kids on a 'high protein' diet. So wouldn't both thus be able to consume this toxin from peanut butter, and in fact, the kids on a vegan diet would be more likely to consume it? Seems logical to me. Aflatoxin can cause illness with chronic exposure. Let's now turn to FDA regulations. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aflatoxin

FDA does regulate levels of aflatoxin. It is allowed in small amounts that are not enough to cause acute illness, due to it being an unavoidable contaminant. After all, fungus is everywhere, especially out in nature. The FDA rigorously tests products prone to aflatoxin contamination, including peanuts and derived products, and:

believes occasionally eating small amounts of aflatoxin poses little risk over a lifetime. It is not practical to attempt to remove aflatoxin from food products in order to make them safer.

From the link:

You can reduce aflatoxin intake by:

-Buying only major brands of nuts and nut butters
-Discarding any nuts that look moldy, discolored or shriveled

I bet the local organic peanut farmer is more likely to have aflatoxin contaminated nuts than the big evil company that's under heavy FDA-scrutiny that uses fungicide. But I imagine, via crank magnetism, the commenter only does organic too. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002429.htm

How good is vegetarianism/veganism? Well, depends on how you do it...but watch out and make sure you get everything you need. But if you DO eat animal products you are less likely to suffer from deficiencies. Neither a vegetarian nor omnivorous diet is the best, neither has a "monopoly on health." http://www.quackwatch.org/03HealthPromotion/vegetarian.html

Also, implying a conspiracy and using a sheeple argument ("you are all just falling for the media hype pumped out by the meat and dairy industries") is not a good way to support your case.