A Physician Makes the Case for a Plant-Based Diet

This is a brilliant talk by Dr. Milton R. Mills, M.D., who makes one of the most convincing series of arguments I've ever heard that human beings are naturally herbivores, not omnivores. It is almost impossible to walk away from this incredibly informative speech without agreeing 100% that human beings were meant to consume a plant-based diet. Mills, a doctor from Virginia, Stanford University-trained and a member of the advisory board to the wonderful Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (which promotes alternatives to animal testing and advocates a vegan diet).

Dr. Milton R. Mills

One of the many omnivore arguments that Mills destroys is the notion that other animals feed on animals, therefore human beings ought to be able to do the same. He does this by showing that human beings simply aren't built like carnivores. We don't run through the forests chasing down wildebeests and wild boars, ripping our prey open with our mouths and tearing at their flesh as they buck madly. Well, maybe some of us do. But it isn't natural.

Mills very capably demonstrates the many ways in which human beings are really physically plant eaters. If you're interested in reading about his ideas online, the website Vegsource.com has published an excellent essay by Mills that covers much of the same ground as his speech. Mills makes extremely persuasive arguments that I do not hear often coming from defenders of the plant-based diet. We need more advocates like him to help us understand where human beings, as a species, went wrong, and how we might get back to doing things the right way.

Watching Omnivores Struggle

The slippery slope.

It's interesting to watch omnivores grappling with their food choices. I just finished reading an article in the Toronto Star defending meat eating. "Why Consuming Animals May Be the Right Thing to Do," said the headline.

Echoing a New York Times contest in March asking readers to defend meat consumption in 600 words or less (which, not surprisingly, the big food industry/factory farm shill Temple Grandin entered), the Star published a litany of familiar excuses justifying the act of killing animals and then devouring them.

Author and New Yorker contributor Adam Gopnik led the charge: "All animals die. The choice for a pig is not between painful death and perpetual life, but between one death and some other. If we ate only animals that died naturally, then could there be any rational objection to our eating them - to eating their flesh in celebration of their life rather than burying it to rot or merely burning it?"

Toronto butcher Stephen Alexander, a big supporter of buying local, "humanely" raised meat, is clearly wrestling with the ethics of meat eating when he tells the Star: "You're killing them to live, you're killing them because you enjoy meat and it's good for you. But at the end of the day, there is the cold, hard truth that you're killing animals to eat their meat.... You have to justify it to yourself and that's all there is to it."

"Ethics are an individual choice," reasoned Heather Travis, who handles public relations for Canada Beef Inc., which represents 83,000 farming families here in Canada. Travis said her organization "strongly advocates beef as part of a balanced diet," and warned that staying healthy on a meat-free diet "can be trickier if you eliminate animal protein sources from your diet."

The temptation is great to pick apart these arguments one by one, and most intelligent vegans would be able to dance circles around these people in a debate.

But to me the most interesting element of all of these defenses of meat eating is the extent to which omnivores feel the need these days to justify the act. Five years ago, when I was an omnivore, I never felt any need to defend my choices. I liked meat. I ate it. End of story.

Today, five years later, more and more people are either going vegan, or feeling the need to justify and explain their food choices. I run into thoughtful omnivores all the time who are really - really - struggling with consuming animal products. Increasingly, it's getting so only an over-the-top fruit loop like Ted Nugent gives absolutely no thought whatsoever to chowing down on the flesh of sentient beings.

Famous food journalist Mark Bittman.

For the rest of us, it's a different story. I personally think the New York Times' challenge - which triggered an avalanche of responses from across the country - was a useful exercise in getting omnivores to think about why they do what they do.

A decade ago, the renowned and widely respected New York Times food journalist Mark Bittman gave little or no thought to the animals he was cooking (by his own admission). But in recent years, Bittman has developed profound misgivings about eating animals. These days, he believes that "20 or at most 50 years from now, those of us still alive will express incredulity at the way we once treated animals destined to become food." (Source)

Gordon Ramsay and friend. 

Bittman is not alone. Not long ago, famous TV chef Gordon Ramsay watched a hidden camera video of the inside of a factory farm (in this case, a pig facility). Seeing the male pigs being castrated without any anesthesia, sows chewing nervously on bars, and pigs shrieking in horror during the last days of their short lives, Ramsay was visibly shaken - and disgusted - by what he witnessed. Of course, Ramsay didn't go vegan. But the treatment of animals, an issue that for the longest time was never on his radar, has entered into his consciousness.

Bittman has been much more aggressive in moving away from cooking animal products than Ramsay. In fact, Bittman gained fame for his Vegan Until 6 diet, spotlighted in his book Food Matters, that advocated going vegan before dinnertime for improved health. Yet what began for Bittman as a health issue keeps coming back to the more significant matter of animals and their suffering. He can't get away from the issue. These days, in fact, he keeps bringing it up. It haunts him, just as it haunts any thoughtful omnivore. And this trend is working its way into corporate America. Burger King made headlines in late April when the chain announced it will switch to cage-free eggs and pork by 2017. Other fast food restaurants are likely follow.

Pigs in a factory farm. Many omnivores are troubled
by what's happening in the food industry. 

We vegans tend to be somewhat dismissive toward omnivores who are struggling with their food choices. But it's impossible to overemphasize the importance of this development, because it's a very new one. And it's becoming more and more widespread. Recently, I went on a local radio station to talk about these very issues on a program about farming and agriculture.  I could see the host, himself an omnivore and advocate of what he called "humane" livestock farming, was also grappling with these same issues. He and I shared a sense of uneasiness with the growth of big, corporate factory farms. A lot of omnivores, having watched documentaries like Food Inc. and Forks Over Knives, are experiencing these same feelings. I believe Bittman is absolutely correct, that  "20 or at most 50 years from now, those of us still alive will express incredulity at the way we once treated animals destined to become food." This is not a Pollyannaish notion. It's a reflection of the changing reality of our times.

A growing number of omnivores are troubled by their actions, and the increasing defensiveness of some is an outgrowth of a moment in history when the animal rights movement is gaining traction around the world. For those of us who feel passionately about animals and their rights, this shift may seem too slow and way overdue in coming. But it is happening, little by little, and it offers a glimmer of hope.

Of Cows and Justice

Videos Plucked From YouTube: The Mercy For Animals (MFA) videos depicting extreme cruelty at the E6 Cattle Co. in Hart, Texas, were plucked off the website. The folks at YouTube, it seems, didn't like the extremely shocking nature of the videos. They said that "if a video is particularly graphic or disturbing, it should be balanced with additional educational or documentary context and information." In response to YouTube's decision, the following statement came from MFA Executive Director Nathan Runkle:

MFA strongly agrees that videos of cruelty to animals are shocking and disturbing, but in the context of helping to expose and eliminate animal abuse they are extremely important. Consumers have a right to know how their food is being produced, especially when the production methods are shocking or disturbing, so that they can make informed choices. (Source)

What We Should All Know About Milk: The following primer comes from Robert Grillo, editor of freefromharm.org. It appeared on the website Eat Drink Better, where I found it. It ought to be mandatory reading for omnivores. I hope you find it useful. Take it away, Robert Grillo:

Dairy cows only lactate and produce milk when they become pregnant with calves, so to be considered a productive and economically-viable cow, she must be routinely impregnated, causing greater stress, greater likelihood of illness and premature death.

Newborn calves are separated from their mothers quickly, usually within 1-3 days, since the mother/calf bond intensifies over time and delayed separation can cause even worse emotional distress for the calf and mother.

Calves separated from their mothers are denied their mother’s milk, which is perfectly formulated by nature to provide all the essential nutrients and antibodies the calf needs.

Calves are fed “milk-replacement formulas” often in dried powder form and raised without a mother’s care. Under normal circumstances, mother’s teach their young critical survival skills and develop very deep bonds, much like humans.

Cheesemakers need veal processors. Rennet is a complex of enzymes required to coagulate cheese. Traditionally rennet is extracted from the inner mucosa of the fourth stomach chamber (the abomasum) of young, unweaned calves, the “by-products” of veal production. Many large cheese producers today use a bacterial, genetically-engineered rennet of both plant and animal origin.

Male calves are of little or no value to the dairy farmer. Healthy calves are typically sold at auction for a small price to veal farmers or raised as adult bulls for meat. Weak ones are often killed.

While they are productive and making money for dairy farmers, dairy cows can suffer from a variety of illnesses associated with intensive milk production. Hundreds of pharmaceutical products are available and administered to cows which can end up in their milk and cause adverse side effects.

Cows produce an average of 729 days of milk, which corresponds to 2.4 lactations, before they are considered “spent.”

Cows can live up to 20 years or more; however “spent” dairy cows are typically removed from the dairy herd at age 4-5 when their milk production weans and then marketed for slaughter. In their fragile end-of-production state, handling, transport, and slaughter add to their suffering and distress.

Artificial insemination and in vitro fertilization of dairy cows are common practices today. Embryo transfer is yet another, newer reproductive technology that consists of giving cows hormone treatments to produce multiple embryos. These embryos are then removed from the donor cows and transferred into other surrogate cows. This results in 3 to 6 calves instead of just one. These procedures are often invasive, causing physical pain and emotional distress.

Cows are social, complex animals with the ability to nurture friendships, anticipate the future, and experience pain, fear, and anxiety.

Grillo also included the following information in his article under the heading "Some Key Human Health and Milk Facts."

• Humans are the only mammals that drink milk, the secretions of the mammary glands, of another animal, though most of the world’s population does NOT drink milk or consume dairy products. While chronic diseases remain almost nonexistent in populations that consume little or no meat and dairy, affluent populations commonly have rates of chronic diseases to the extent they consume them.
• [The western diet rich in meat, dairy and eggs] “…is associated with a multitude of disease conditions, including obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, arterial hypertension and cancer. Malignancies typical for affluent societies are cancers of the breast, colon/rectum, uterus (endometrial carcinoma), gallbladder, kidney and adenocarcinoma of the oesophagus.” —The World Health Organization
• In the most comprehensive study of human nutrition ever conducted, “What protein consistently and strongly promoted cancer? Casein, which makes up 87% of cow’s milk protein, promoted all stages of the cancer process. What type of protein did not promote cancer, even at high levels of intake? The safe proteins were from plants, including wheat and soy. As this picture came into view, it began to challenge and then to shatter some of my most cherished assumptions.” — Dr. T. Colin Campbell, author of The China Study
• “The increase in cancer, heart disease, diabetes, obesity and asthmathat has occurred in the Western world over the past century directly correlates with the increase in dairy consumption.” —Dr. Adam Meade
• “…milk products may contain contaminants such as pesticides,which have carcinogenic potential, and growth factors such as insulin-like growth factor I, which have been shown to promote breast cancer cell growth.” —The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
• “Humans now carry dioxin levels in their bodies hundreds of times greater than the “acceptable” cancer risk as defined by the EPA, and 95 percent of that results from eating red meat, fish and dairy products.” —The Diet-Cancer Conncection
• “Any lactating mammal excretes toxins through her milk. This includes antibiotics, pesticides, chemicals and hormones. … the USDA allows milk to contain from one to one and a half million white blood cells per millilitre. … another way to describe white cells where they don’t belong would be to call them pus cells.” — Robert M. Kradjian, MD, Breast Surgery Chief Division of General Surgery, Seton Medical Centre
• 1 lb. of cheese requires 10 lbs. of milk. 1 lb. of ice cream requires 12 lbs. of milk. 1 lb. of butter requires 21 lbs. of milk.¹ So it’s easy to see how the contaminants in milk become highly concentrated in other dairy products. — ¹Dairy MAX, The National Dairy Council

And Finally, While We're Talking About Cows: Please, please, please read Tricia Orr's haunting poem about a beautiful cow named Billie who met a tragic fate. The poem, titled "Good 'Til The Last Drop," appeared on the website On Nonhuman Slavery, and it includes a short introductory statement by Orr that sets the context for the poem. The poem is devastating, absolutely devastating. It makes me ashamed to be part of the human race, a feeling I've felt an awful lot since opening my eyes and awakening from my ignorance about the treatment of animals.

The Agony of Winning Hearts and Minds: A few thoughts on a recent Facebook exchange...

I had a wonderful Facebook exchange with the good folks at LiveVegan. It was a debate, of sorts, about how best to win the Hearts and Minds of non-vegans. How best to win omnivores and vegetarians over to the cause?

A lot of us not only ask this question, we feel this question very deeply. We know the clock is ticking, and with each passing hour, millions of animals around the world die violent deaths, the victims of customs and traditions and economic markets that have robbed them of their dignity and reduced them to commodities, food, clothes and so forth.

The initial post on the Facebook exchange got me thinking. It said:

Gary Francione's twitter reponse to Woodstock Farm Sanctuary's post about a new study shows sheep are highly intelligent even smarter than primates in some respects: "This suggests that intelligence is morally necessary for personhood. It isn't. Only sentience is." -- GLF

Those of you who have read this Blog in the past know by now that "GLF" - Gary L. Francione - is one of my idols. I've always had huge amounts of respect for him. I always will. There are so many things I admire about him: His brilliance, his humanism, his consistency, his unwavering principles.

But I also know that a lot of omnivores don't know who Gary is, and unless they're looking to convert to veganism (like I did), they're probably not going to ever want to read his work or understand his point of view. Omnivores, with honorable exceptions, tend to circle the wagons. They don't want to hear things that go against their customs and traditions, their ways of doing things. Many wish to continue consuming food and clothing made of animals and they aren't willing to give those things up. Again, there are exceptions - omnivores teetering on the edge of going vegetarian or vegan - but most keep the walls high.

So I posted the following reply:

I agree with Gary Francione that intelligence is not morally necessary for personhood. But I also believe these kinds of studies make omnivores pause and rethink why it is OK to eat some animals (e.g., sheep) and taboo to even consider eating others (e.g., primates).

It triggered a very friendly debate, with the moderator emphasizing the importance of a consistent abolitionist vegan message. I don't disagree with that position necessarily. But I do feel that some flexibility is needed when it comes to winning over omnivores. Hence my follow-up post on Facebook:

Well, I was speaking from personal experience, as someone who went from being an omnivore to being a vegan. When I was thoughtlessly stuffing my face with meat (and other animal products) and I found out how intelligent pigs were... and then I learned that chickens understood math... and I learned that cows formed emotional bonds... (et cetera, et cetera), it did not "reinforce speciesism" in me, Far from it. It made me start to become aware about the centrality of sentientism.

In purely practical terms, I don't know what these sorts of studies do for other omnivores. Back when I was one, this kind of information helped me embrace veganism in a way that simply saying, "This being is sentient, therefore you have no right to use her/him or destroy her/him" could not have accomplished.

The exchange went on - congenial from start to finish - but in the end, I came away feeling despair because it is so hard to get through that Great Omnivore Wall. So many of the people in my life that I love and cherish are omnivores and show no signs of giving it up, despite having a "Black Sheep" vegan in the family. I can tell you one thing: As someone who grew up in a Red State where people love their meat and their eggs, their ice cream and their cheese, talking about "sentient beings" won't likely win them over to the cause. Will anything else win them over? I don't know.

I've heard lots of vegans attack "baby steps." Purists favor an all-or-nothing commitment. I can see why. I concur that strict veganism is the way to go.

But practically speaking, we are dealing with people who don't want to change their ways. The thought of giving up animal-based products - whether meat or cheese or milk or yogurt or cottage cheese or fish or lobster or leather jackets or whatever - seems more stark to them than the suffering of animals. Call them selfish. Call them "set in their ways." Call them destructive. Call them whatever you want. This is the reality that we must confront.

But every day of the week, I read about wonderful animal rights activists struggling to get their message across. They beam their message in a hundred different ways. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals stages protests and organizes advertising campaigns that are very "in-your-face." Groups such as Woodstock Farm Sanctuary issue studies about the intelligence of sheep and provide loving safe havens for beautiful animals. Gary Francione crisscrosses North America (and the world) giving lectures, he Blogs, he Twitters, he works endlessly. Philosopher Steven Best, based at the University of Texas at El Paso, advocates more militant forms of direct action. And there are some vegans who press for "flexible veganism" or "flexitarianism" (a.k.a., semi-vegetarianism), thinking that some animal product reduction is better than no animal product reduction.

So who's right? If you think about it, these struggles take on elements of religious and political debates. People argue. Some critique moderates and "welfarists." Others embrace sectarian positions and try to police the tiny vegan movement that does exist. And voices of moderation in the movement lament the presence of militants. Adherents of nonviolence argue with those who advocate more extreme forms of resistance.

Do you know what that makes us? A lot like every other social protest movement in modern history. This is a "Big Tent" movement, or as Walt Whitman might say, "A movement of movements." And yet, I think at the end of the day, most of us in the movement feel - at the very deepest level - the sorrow of losing these beautiful animals who are being obliterated en masse by a brutal social order.

In the end, my final post on Facebook read:

I really like this debate. I think it's a wonderful exchange (and very friendly, which I love). I do consider myself an abolitionist, and I ultimately reject welfarism. I suppose I'm trying to grapple with some of the complexities of winning hearts and minds (which we can all agree isn't easy). There are lots of issues to think about. But I'm glad this is such a lovely community of kindred spirits and we can talk about these things. And I also think veganism has made huge gains in recent years, thanks to lots of wonderful people like you and Gary Francione. I know we're all trying to grapple with the best way to spread the message. And, at the end of the day, I'm not even sure what I said above is right. It breaks my heart to think about all of those animals who are born into such a hellish short and violent existence. I think knowing what's happening to these sentient beings while I'm struggling with how best to convince omnivores of the error of their ways (the clock is ticking, precious lives are being taken) is what's most agonizing in this whole equation.

Some Thoughts on Compromise versus Militancy

I have several vegan and animal rights friends on Facebook and I read their posts every day.

One of my friends is very outspoken and militant and, well, he can be harsh at times toward omnivores and other people with whom he disagrees. He often has mean words for ominivores, calling them (among other things) "corpse munchers," and insisting that those who drink milk were just as guilty of abusing the cows and calves as the workers at the Conklin Dairy Farms in Ohio (see my post on that situation below). This friend loves controversy. He even posted a picture of Jesus Christ flipping the middle finger with the inscription "Dear Corpse-muncher" on it. Not surprisingly, that image triggered a heated debate.

Lots of the posts on this friend's page, in fact, involve debates that often turn downright nasty - and some even involve vegans ripping into other vegans.

The more militant veganistas and animal rights activists not only lambaste the omnivores; they occasionally go after the non-confrontational vegan moderates who don't necessarily enjoy trashing omnivores. The moderates, too, are sometimes guilty of fanning the flames by focusing too much on the tactics of militants instead of those institutions and ways of thinking that result in rampant animal abuse.

I have to admit, I am probably what one would call one of the "nice" people. I have lived a lifetime committed to nonviolence, and remain a firm believer in the power of nonviolent action as the only method of resistance in democratic society. I don't refer to my foes as "motherf---ers." When I come across a heated posting debate on Facebook that deteriorate into a heavy-duty trashing session, I feel incredibly uneasy.

Those of us who read a lot of history know that what I'm seeing on Facebook is actually a common trait of mass protest movements throughout history. All movements contain overzealous types who can be hardcore, harsh and even hateful at times. One can understand the level of animosity. A lot of animal rights activists are mindful of the thousands and thousands of animals who are being slaughtered every minute of every day.

Also, there have been times in the past when fanaticism has been effective. Look at abolitionist John Brown. Most historians agree that his utopian raid on Harpers Ferry in the summer of 1859, even though it had zero chance of liberating slaves (which was its purpose), was one of the key events that led to the coming of the Civil War.

Movements need moderates and militants. Moderates are needed to keep the discussion going; militants are needed to pull the pendulum leftward.

But speaking strictly personally, I feel far more comfortable with people who embrace Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s attitude of hating the sin, not the sinner.

It is, I think, profoundly unrealistic to say, "Hate the sin, love the sinner." Those sadists who kicked and beat innocent cows and calves do not seem like the kind of guys I can "love" (even though I like to hope that maybe the best among them can try to redeem himself). But don't ask me to love them. Not the way I deeply love those in my personal life, like my children or my companion and her children or members of my family. That's asking too much. We don't want to turn saintliness into a form of insanity. And let's not make a mockery or cliche' of the word "love."

But it is also important to remember that bad ways of thinking and harmful institutions are the real enemies, more so than individual people.

In addition, I think vegans need to try to reach out to omnivores. I know some omnivores can be frustrating. I like a lot of what Michael Pollan has to say about the food industry, but when he starts talking about animal rights or veganism, I often disagree fiercely with what he says. But I am grateful that he speaks his mind. Free speech should be celebrated. Dogmatism and rigidity should be rejected.

That doesn't mean we should become "flexible" vegans, or even adopt an "I'm OK, you're OK" attitude. We owe it to the animals who live in the worst conditions imaginable, and who are being murdered by the thousands as you read this post, to be decisive and vigorous in our fight for them.

But we should also recognize that most of us were omnivores at one point or another. And omnivores who are having doubts are potential comrades in the struggle for the liberation of animals and steering the human race toward a plant-based diet.