Ethics of Vegetarianism

[Elfdude]

As a pediatrician I've grown a bit irritated with the number of parents I encounter who present to me these two fundamentally wrong ideas:

1. Vegetarianism is healthy

2. Organics are better than non-organic

I absolutely abhor these views. The number of children I've encountered who are malnourished due to these beliefs is astounding with roughly a quarter of the children I treat suffering from malnourishment brought on by their family's vegetarian, no dairy, raw foods only, or organic only diet. Usually, I recommend that the children consume milk or dairy products which contain the full suite of essential nutrients they're missing out on but all too often I see this recommendation met with, "Let's use soy milk instead, it's healthier right?"

No. It's not. Let me put it this way. We only recently have begun to understand how enormously complex digestion is. At one point we assumed all chemicals were broken down into their constituents and absorbed to be resynthesized in the body. While this is partially true we've begun to discover more and more that nutrient absorption is far more complex and that while the body can synthesize a lot of chemicals it cannot provide many chemicals at the levels we would recommend for health. This is doubly important in developing children as their brains need fats and sugars which parents have decided are borderline poisons.

In the last 5 years alone we have discovered numerous biological pathways which cannot be replicated via a Vegetarian diet. The simplest one I can mention is creatine. Now there's plenty of creatine supplements available but I believe all are from animal products meaning vegetarians, even if they knew about them probably wouldn't consume them. Creatine levels are critical for brain development and metabolism and a lack of creatine can easily contribute to mental effects that we would associate with poor decision making, anxiety and depression. Essentially speaking, your body can synthesize about half of the creatine you need but in ordinary diets your body wastes no time or effort synthesizing this.

The list goes on.

1. Vegetarianism is not a choice for children, it's forced upon them by their family
2. Children absolutely need meat products, it's unethical to malnourish your children purposely
3. Avoiding, dairy, eggs and fish is even worse for people
4. So-called raw-fooditarians are literally starving themselves forcing their bodies to expend nearly as much energy in absorption as they create placing the body into a constant food stress situation

Don't get me wrong, vegetables and fruits are great for you when they make up a third to a half of your diet. Anymore however and you're missing out on the essential nutrients needed for survival. Many people point out many animals who only eat a few separate items, and truly humans can survive on pretty meager rations almost indefinitely but the fact of the matter is that we are Omnivores, we evolved from Omnivores and because of the wide variety and availability of nutrients in our diet many synthesis pathways do not work as well or at all for a variety of nutrients which few animals have issues with.

Second, I absolutely despise the idea that Organics are somehow healthier for children. Barring the fact that the organic industry is almost completely deregulated looking at the largest producers of Organic foods (which is amusingly the same big ag which produces most of the non-organic food) the techniques employed to grow the food is highly unsustainable. Often extraordinarily toxic "natural" fertilizers and pesticides are used in place of synthetic pesticides which are literally thousands of times less toxic. Furthermore organic foods are usually far less healthier, the move to using altered cultivars was largely favored because the produce created was healthier, better tasting, and easier to produce. This remains the case in terms of practically every engineered foodstuff.

Anyways, this is my rant after explaining to a lady that her son required milk, fats, and sugars in his diet after he came into the office displaying classic signs of malnourishment. After two hours of arguing the point against her we were forced to give him nutrients (derived from animal products) via an IV. It's irritating to me how persistent this idea is and how bad the science is. Frankly I categorize vegetarians in the same category as HIV denialists and Anti-Vaccine Hipsters.

[RubiconDecision]

I cannot see how the vegetarian diet by purchasing products from Whole Foods is any more ethical than a typical diet for omnivores. It's also ridiculous because it takes specialty ethnic food from impoverished regions, so creating an artificial demand, which raises food costs for those folks.

Americans have switched to very expensive fresh produce, then throw it away based upon landfill studies. Meanwhile dehydrated vegetables and canned could save a ton of money. This practice is unethical.

If one gardens, there's a joy in growing your own produce, having variety, and preserving it for frugality. That is wholesome, and those folks are likely to use less pesticides as a result. Such care leads to creative balanced meals and a study of nutrition.

The average vegetarian is overweight and no more healthy than an omnivore. Okinawans eat lots of vegetables versus Americans and have a huge number of centenarians.

Sit down sometime and calculate how many calories you'd get from solely fruit and vegetables. There are practical reasons why human civilization switched from very labor intensive hunter gather societies migrating and stripping resources to agriculture and animal husbandry plus food preservation. In the wild, you'd starve to death on a vegan diet. Any woodsman can demonstrate this. To gather the necessary nutrients and calories solely from plants would require four times the energy you could possibly ingest. The exception is harvesting nuts, and if acorns, to remove the tannins is very labor intensive.

While animal husbandry requires a lot of water, and creates waste, these numbers are skewed by corporate livestock operations.

Few Americans own 5 acres to grow their own food. So vegetarians brag about saving animals while likely eating too much processed food and CHEESE and get fat. Or they buy food that one cannot grow in their region, but raises the prices for some 3rd world villager. In some cases that leads to monoculture farming and can be ruinous to farmers who once grew many crops.

[Elfdude]

One must wonder if you read the OP.

Vegetarians are typically underweight but they're also far less healthy. My assertion is that vegetarianism was unethical reversing the idea that eating meat is unethical, but it's nice you agree.

http://www.plosone.org/article/fetch...esentation=PDF

[RubiconDecision]

One must wonder if you read the OP.

Vegetarians are typically underweight but they're also far less healthy. My assertion is that vegetarianism was unethical reversing the idea that eating meat is unethical, but it's nice you agree.

http://www.plosone.org/article/fetch...esentation=PDF

I really don't care if we agree. I've seen slender vegans, but really obese vegetarian adults.
http://thedailyorbit.com/obesity-as-...se-vegetarian/

Obesity As A Disease: How I Became An Obese Vegetarian

by Michael Harper
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Last week the American Medical Association declared obesity a disease, sparking plenty of outrage and new conversations on the matter of weight, moral ineptitude and even poverty.
It’s no surprise that Americans (and others in the world) are getting fatter. We even know precisely why this is happening. Our portions are getting larger, our food is getting richer, and our daily activity is decreasing. The cause and effects of the obesity epidemic aren’t just anecdotal, they’ve been noted in formal studies. At one point in my time spent here at redOrbit, I was asked to cover a story about obesity, diabetes, or something along those lines. Though I am not and have never been a fitness buff, I did have some interest in the topic, so I covered it willingly, despite the fact that I have almost no medical experience. If I may speak to you candidly, writer to reader, after writing about obesity and the diseases that spin off it for so long, I’m growing agitated by it all.
Mercilessly Beating a Dead Horse
Researchers are still conducting studies that mercilessly beat a dead horse. Time and time again, studies have shown that eating fat, sugar and (I’m not sorry to say this) red meat make you overweight. Overweight turns into obesity and obesity leads to diabetes, heart failure, hypertension, etc. At this point it’s not enough to say “eating insane portions of bad-for-you-food could kill you,” so researchers are looking for other causes, be it genetics, environment, predisposition, or what have you.
One study found that disruptions in sleep patterns lead to obesity, but what led to the sleep disruption? Eating too much too late in the evening.
Another study found that stress is also linked with obesity and diabetes, but how? Stress eating.
A recent study even found that infants could be trained to be obese at an early age when their parents begin giving them carbohydrate-rich solid foods early on.
In almost every study, there is a clear link to obesity: eating too much bad food. Sure, there are some who claim like the last study that we’re trained to eat too much at a young age. We can blame our parents for that one. There are some who say obesity cannot be avoided in people due to certain conditions and chemical reactions in their bodies. There are others who claim obesity goes hand in hand with poverty, a seemingly counterintuitive fact if ever there were one, as those with small paychecks can only afford to eat foods with the highest processed ingredients and sugar content.
This is an issue to which our nation needs to take a sincere and urgent interest.
There are a number of reasons an obese person can list to explain why they’ve become so large, and it is my belief that some of these are legitimate concerns which need to be addressed by a doctor.
Yet one issue with the new AMA classification that particularly bothers me is the discussion of insurers reimbursing health care costs incurred by obesity or treatments (medications, etc.) to rid a person of obesity.
I Was An Obese Vegetarian
I’ll share something personal with you, readers. I’ve always been a large man. I’ve weighed over 200 pounds for as long as I can remember and once, at a particularly low emotional point in my life, I tipped the scales at 300 pounds. As recently as two months ago, I was technically considered obese for my height and build. I had a BMI of 32 (two points higher than most doctors consider the threshold for obesity) and was watching my weight climb every day.
Hell of it is, I’m a long time vegetarian, proof that even if you don’t eat meat you can still get fat.
Cheese pizza, after all, is vegetarian.
In the past three months, I’ve sweated and starved enough to lose 30 pounds and I’ve another 40 to go until I reach my ideal weight.
Why do I mention this?
I had written so many articles about obesity and diabetes that I became increasingly aware of how my poor food choices were literally killing me, and I knew only I could turn the tide.
I didn’t go to a doctor, I didn’t look into surgery, and I didn’t join a gym. I knew that I possessed everything I needed to begin losing weight, (a brain and two working legs) all it took was me actually doing it and sticking with it for longer than a week.
I put myself on a low calorie diet (as it turns out, tapping away at a keyboard burns so few calories) and began tracking the number of steps I take with a FitBit.
I hate running. I always have. So, I started walking and tried to get my heart rate up for about 30 minutes at a time five days a week. I finally gave in and adding running to my workout regimen and now that I’m 30 pounds lighter, it doesn’t bother me as much as it once did. I’m still not crazy about it but you know what? It works.
So, I do it.
Growing up, my father always told me there was only one sure fire way to lose weight: sweat and starve. I haven’t starved myself so much as I’ve rethought the foods I was eating and in what amounts.
I hated being an obese vegetarian, so I cut out the cheese pizza and the macaroni and cheese and the grilled cheese sandwiches. In fact, I rarely eat any kind of dairy these days. I began dishing my food out on a smaller plate to eat less. Now, when I’m about to tuck into a meal, I compare the size of my portion to the size of my innards. The portion was almost always larger than my stomach should ever be and my favorite enchilada plate from my favorite Tex-Mex dive suddenly became less of a challenge, a dare of sorts, and it became dinner and tomorrow’s lunch.
I still eat out, of course. The difference now is that I don’t think of dining out as a money for value exchange wherein I try to get my money’s worth by eating as much as I can. Now, eating out is about the experience of dining with my wife or with our friends. If I pay $15 for a meal and only eat a quarter of it, that’s fine. I’ll either take it home with me or leave it there. My $15 is better spent on spending time with those I love than a meal which will almost certainly kill me.
(Restaurant food is almost always terrible for you, if you weren’t aware.)

https://veganwhore.wordpress.com/201...n-obese-vegan/

My name is Megan and I am an obese vegan.
Two words that don’t usually go together. The first word brings to mind a image of a giant blob of a human being, grease dripping from the chin and chowing down on McDonalds for every meal. The second makes associate with grossly thin and sickly looking people who need to be force fed a meat product. Well, I am neither of those ideals.
From a young age, I was skinny and tiny. It wasn’t until puberty hit and I started showing signs of bi-polar and social anxiety disorder. Around age 14, I went on my first anti-depressent and I began to pile on weight. Rather then deal with my problems, I would eat, get stoned, eat some more, and get drunk while eating more. It was a vicious cycle. Not to mention it was around that time that I saw my father regularly. His way of showing love to me was buying me whatever grossly fattening, sugary and salty foods I wanted since at the time, he himself was large and a 2-pack-a-day smoker. He would buy me cigarette’s (at age 15!!) And we would down 20 chicken wings and a pack of smokes in one meal. We were a disgusting pair. Since I was usually in a stoned drunk stupor, I didn’t usually give a what went into my body.
Fast forward 8 years.
I was miserable, in a manic stage, dating a guy that had another woman besides myself, drunk, in trouble with the law and suicidal. I was a disgusting mess of a human being and I needed help and guidance fast.
After a two week stint in a psyche center, I was on the road to emotional recovery. Or so I thought.
Mind you at this point, I was still eating my life away. Double quarter pounders with JUST cheese (no veggies. Gross!) and LOTS of cheese. Hell, what did I care?
Then came the life changer that brought everything to my attention.
He died.
And as the story goes, two weeks after he died, I was vegan.
With being vegan, I assumed I would drop the weight! At first, I was the typical new vegan. I ate processed meat substitutes, lots of chips and other package . I figured I would drop the weight like that. Well, that didn’t happen. My best friend and I did a short stint in Curves, which helped me drop 20 lbs, but I gained it all back and then some.
I finally got a brain and realized I couldn’t eat the processed junk if I wanted to be healthy. It just wasn’t enough to sit there and abstain from meat. I had to help save the animals while saving myself.
I began to actually enjoy cooking, which i give 100 percent of the credit (and eternal gratitude) to my best friend, Alisha. Prior to meeting her and prior to being vegan, I saw cooking as a chore. An annoying chore. She helped me see how fun and amazing it is to make something from scratch and be proud of it.
This led me to start cooking more healthy foods, which again, I thought would be the miracle weight loss I needed.
I was wrong again.
I have always, ALWAYS had a major problem with portion control. If something is just that good, well, I just don’t want to stop eating it!!! That has always been my main problem. Food is my greatest joy in life.
Not to mention, with going vegan I became engrossed in the awesomeness that is vegan baking. As a cake decorator by trade (for a little while anyway) and a lover of all things sweet, I assumed I would be able to eat as much as I wanted without any horrible side effects. Its void of animal products so why the hell not?!?!
Ha.
That is the way I have been living for the past two years.
Two years of seeing myself in a blind, vegan haze.
It wasn’t until I saw the pictures from Laura’s wedding last week.
I saw them and cried.
Was I really THAT enormous?! What happened?!?! Dear god, look how lumpy I am!!!!
I had never seen myself in that way before. I assumed that since I felt healthy inside (sort of) that I was that way on the outside.
I was sorely mistaken.
I then took to the scale.
I am 5’2″ and I weigh….
Wait for it……
Wait for it……
246lbs.

I'll bet that pattern follows. Some foolish vegan forces their kids AND DOGS to starve, while some vegetarian gorges themself on whole milk products and gets fat.

Why?

See what a diet of whole milk does.

Or this, vegans are slender even malnourished.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/1...n_4039441.html

Researchers found that average BMI was lowest among vegans, while average BMI was highest among the meat-eaters. Looking specifically at obesity (defined as having a BMI over 30), researchers found that vegans had the lowest percentage of people who were obese -- just 9.4 percent -- while meat-eaters had the highest percentage of people who were obese -- 33.3 percent. About 24 percent of semi-vegetarians were obese, 17.9 percent of pesco-vegetarians were obese, and 16.7 percent of lacto-ovo vegetarians were obese.

Obese vegetarians often due to high whole milk products to compensate and satiate their hunger. Lots of kefir, yogurt, and cheese, and often too much peanut butter.

[Elfdude]

So, I'm talking about the malnourishment caused via Vegetarianism and you instead try to talk about supposedly obese vegetarians getting big on overeating dairy products? I would love if vegetarians by and large consumed dairy products, at least then their children would be getting the essential nutrients they need. I'm not sure what any of your copy-pasta has to do with anything or what point you might be trying to make.

[RubiconDecision]

What a whiny post.

Outside of med students taking biochemistry, almost no one else knows what metabolic pathways are. If you are solely focused upon precusor requirements for a specific metabolic pathway that only happens with meat consumption, you posted to the wrong forum.

I seriously doubt 10 people in this community could reasonably discuss say amino acid metabolism from vegetarian issues.

I'm discussing the dubious ethics of vegetarianism as this is the EMM.

Kids have different requirements than adults. I've seen lots of healthy kids who were omnivores in summer camp settings, mostly due to lots of exercise and balanced meals.

I've seen very obese pasty vegetarian teens and adults in the same setting.

The vegans were frequently malnourished but required ridiculous diets.

For a remedial review, vegans are a subset of vegetarians.
http://health.usnews.com/best-diet/vegan-diet

How does Vegan Diet work?

Dos & Don'ts

Don't: Eat any animal products.

---

While vegetarians eliminate meat, fish and poultry, vegans take it a step further, excluding all animal products – even dairy and eggs. (Vegans are often animal rights activists who don’t believe in using animal products for any purpose.) So say goodbye to refried beans with lard, margarine made with whey and anything with gelatin, which comes from animal bones and hooves, too. Fruits, vegetables, leafy greens, whole grains, nuts, seeds and legumes will be your staples.
Exactly how you shape your diet each day is up to you, but you’ll typically aim for six servings of grains, likely from bread and calcium-fortified cereal; five servings of legumes, nuts and other types of protein, such as peanut butter, chickpeas, tofu, potatoes and soy milk; and four daily servings of veggies, two servings of fruit and two servings of healthy fats, such as sesame oil, avocado and coconut, according to an American Dietetic Association guide. There’s also no need to give up dessert: Vegans can eat baked goods (cupcakes and cobbler, for example) made without butter, eggs or albumin.

I sincerely doubt a child should be a vegan. It would be impossible to get enough Calcium even eating tons of leafy green vegetables. You would damage their bone formation.

There are height differences in Japan postWW2 as a result of Calcium fortification through soy milk and regular milk consumption in children.

[Elfdude]

You're clearly not understanding my posts. This thread is about the ethics of vegetarianism and my thesis is that vegetarianism is unethical. The reason vegetarianism is unethical is because of the poor health it imparts to both individual (self-destruction) and dependent (child-neglect). Your sidebar about vegetarian obesity is a pointless fallacious anecdote and makes your argument look incredibly disingenuous. My largest concern is vegan parents forcing vegetarianism on their children. Your posts seem to indicate that you think omnivorous diets are healthy. I agree. No one has stated they aren't. You're arguing against no one about a topic no one has contested and obfuscating the purpose of the thread.

Again, you are never going to prove vegetarians are more obese than meat-eaters. The literature is pretty one sided. The science supports the idea too, the largest problem with vegetarian diets is the difficulty in getting enough nutrition, this leads to chronic underweightness not to mention consequences to every bodily system. You're engaging in a pointless off-topic discussion which has nothing to do with the ethics of vegetarianism but rather an attempt to link vegetarianism and obesity together which is utterly ridiculous.

[RubiconDecision]

Why would anyone engage your argumentative unscientific nonsense? Newsflash: a good portion of the world is vegetarian. You cannot seem to grasp the difference between vegans and vegetarians.

Creatine is synthesized from glycine and arginine. It is NOT as essential nutrient. You are baffling people with BS. Yes, vegans have a terrible time due to their diet; vegetarians less so.

[Elfdude]

Are you serious? What about my argument is unscientific?

I'm not saying anything different than you other than Vegetarians aren't obese. Are you saying obese = healthy?

Regardless of what part of the world you're in a vegetarian diet is fundamentally less healthy than a well-balanced diet. Specifically, my argument is that vegetarians aren't getting enough vital nutrients.

As far as distinction between vegans and vegetarians I've defined the two groups as distinct as to why you think there's semantic confusion I can only assume you don't understand that my argument applies to both Vegans and Vegetarians. The problem is with the low consumption of animal products. Yes you can get the nutrients you need from dairy products but few Vegetarians eat or drink enough to supplement the loss of meat.

So what the hell is your point or are you just trying to be contrary and didn't bother to read the posts enough to understand you're just offtopic?

[RubiconDecision]

What does this diagram say?

http://www.livestrong.com/article/27...in-l-arginine/

Most amino acids fall into one of two categories: essential or nonessential. L-arginine, or arginine, is different. While it's essential for children, arginine is only conditionally essential for adults. If you’re healthy, your body makes enough to meet metabolic needs, but if you’re sick you need to get extra amounts through food or supplements, reports an article in the July 2009 issue of the “British Journal of Pharmacology.” Either way, you can count on getting it through a variety of protein-containing foods

http://aminoacidstudies.org/glycine/

Although the body can manufacture glycine, this amino acid can also be sourced from many high-protein foods. In particular, fish, meat and dairy are rich sources of glycine. Vegetarian glycine sources include soybeans, spinach, kale, cauliflower, cabbage, pumpkin, banana, kiwi fruit, cucumber and beans.

The body can produce creatine as long as precursors are available by ingestion or synthesized in the case of arginine.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog...brain-creatine

Are you a vegetarian or a vegan? Besides vitamin B12, depending upon what you eat and the supplements you take, you can find your diet somewhat low in zinc, long chain omega 3 fatty acids, and even some amino acids. One of these amino acids is called creatine, and the best source is meat.
Researchers who study cognition and athletic performance simply love giving vegetarians creatine supplements (1 (link is external))(2 (link is external))(3 (link is external)). This practice might seem curious until you look at the following facts:
1) Creatine is an amino acid found only in animal flesh but most abundantly in skeletal muscle flesh (like steak). It is not an essential amino acid, as we can synthesize is from other amino acids found also in plant foods, but as with changing the plant-based omega 3 fatty acid ALA to the marine animal based omega 3 acid DHA, the synthesis is inefficient. It is known that vegetarians have lower tissue (measured directly via muscle biopsy) amounts of creatine than omnivores (4 (link is external)).
2) Why should we care if we have creatine? Well, if you recall, our cells run on energy supplied by a molecule called ATP. Think of ATP as the gasoline of the body. Whether we fuel up with glucose or ketones, eventually those raw materials get transformed into ATP, which as it is broken down powers all sorts of energy-requiring processes. We will obviously burn through ATP faster in our muscles when we are running or jumping or performing various feats of strength, but we also burn through ATP faster when we are using our noggins for something a bit complicated. Our little brain (the size of your two fists held together) burns through 20 percent of the energy we use each day, primarily to keep those ion gradients fueled that allow our neurons to charge up and then be discharged to communicate information.

elfdude is baffling with BS mostly because few understand Biochemistry and arcane metabolic pathways. Sheesh.
...
The primary concern is vegan diets in children due to B12 and insufficient Calcium intake, not creatine.

Rickets is a possible concern too.
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandst...-safe-children

Can a vegan diet damage your child's health? Social workers in Lewisham believe it can, which is why they tried to take a five-year-old who appeared to have rickets into care. The boy's parents have just won their legal battle to prevent this, and they have also succeeded in having their son removed from the at-risk register. The couple say they don't eat dairy produce because asthma runs in the family – but they're not vegans, as social workers claimed, because they do eat fish. However, the case raises questions about how difficult it is to nourish a young child adequately on a restrictive diet – and whether the risks involved are too great.
Paediatric dietician Helen Wilcock, a member of the British Dietetic Association, says she tries not to be judgmental about the rights and wrongs of vegan diets for young children, but any parent wanting to raise their child as a vegan needs to be very well-informed. "Vegan children can be deficient in vitamin D, calcium, iron and possibly vitamin B12, so they need supplements," she says.

Another big issue is that a vegan diet isn't very energy-dense: you have to eat a lot of it to get enough energy. But children typically don't eat a lot, so getting enough calories into them can be difficult. "I recommend adding oil to their food," Wilcock says, "because that gives them more calories."
Another difficulty is protein. "If a child eats meat and fish, it's easy to get all the right amino acids. But if a child is getting protein from pulses, the problem is that one type of bean might not provide every amino acid, so there has to be a good balance of pulses. In other words, a child who only eats chicken will get all the amino acids – but a child who only eats one type of bean won't."
So information is the key – but do families really try to raise their children on vegan diets without being adequately informed? Sometimes, says Wilcock, they do – often because they are taken in by misleading information on the internet. And when a vegan diet starts to go wrong, the first symptom is usually that the child fails to thrive or grow properly. It's the shortage of calories and protein that kicks in first, she says, with rickets (caused by deficiencies in vitamin D and calcium) usually much further down the line. "Families are then referred to a dietician like me for advice – and every parent I've seen has been happy to make the changes I've recommended, because first and foremost they want their child to be healthy."

The most challenging time for parents raising vegan children is when they are under five – although another crucial time is for girls around puberty, when iron levels can dip.
But the risks of inadvertently malnourishing a child aren't restricted to veganism. According to Claire Williamson of the British Nutrition Foundation, one of the mistakes parents can make is to assume, wrongly, that what's healthy for an adult is healthy for a child. "For example, semi-skimmed milk, low-fat foods and high-fibre foods may be best for adults, but under-fives need full-fat dairy produce, while high-fibre roughage can fill them up too quickly, so they don't eat enough nutritious food."

See above concerning energy and vegan diets.

[Elfdude]

You've put the creatine pathway there. Creatine is rarely synthesized and your body would prefer to spend other time synthesizing other things. http://www.clinchem.org/content/35/8/1802.full.pdf

So yes, your body can synthesize Creatine, however you are an omnivore, you are designed to acquire some creatine in your diet, hence Vegetarians have dramatically lower amounts of Creatine. Creatine is a thriving chemical, it's not something you need so much as something you utilize when you're healthy, it tells your body, hey we're in a food surplus, lets waste resources on muscle, growth and brains. Because we cannot produce the normal levels of creatine you would otherwise acquire from your diet via synthesis Creatine is one of the many nutritional deficiencies found in vegetarians. This is especially concerning for children.

I still don't understand your initial posts because now it seems like you're arguing for vegetarians.

[RubiconDecision]

It's obvious this topic has no business as Ethics, but is Science, but poor science at that. You've made a mountain out of a molehill with creatine.

The BEST diet is an omnivore diet. However much of the world gets by fine as vegetarians. No one should be a vegan especially a child.

For young athletes, an omnivore diet with Creatine supplementation may add muscle mass or be pissed out. It depends upon their training.
...
In the US, Vegetarianism is a spiritual/philosophical matter, but rather fake as they don't grow their food, but act to artificially raise the cost of imported food. Which is unethical.

[Elfdude]

This thread is literally about whether the choice to be a vegetarian is ethical or not. You have no clue what you're talking about and if it wasn't so pitiful it'd be amusing. Creatine is a simple representative example, I could break down thousands of other pathways but as you've stated that's not what this thread is about. Unfortunately you either haven't bothered to read it or are too busy trying to be contrarian or have literally no self-awareness.

As for poor science, until you can state how it's poor science your statements are meaningless. Keep trying though buddy, you'll get there someday.

The fact of the matter is half of the world is malnourished, you appealing to the number of vegetarians in the world does nothing to dissuade the science that it's bad for you. I might as well count the number of smokers, or the number of people who engage in unprotected sex.

[Rolanbek]

Is this about the ethics of vegetarianism, or the ethics of inflicting vegetarianism on minors too young to give informed consent?

As a lifestyle choice in the western world, i see few issues that can't be overcome with planning and finances. If you are prepared to spend a lot of your time thinking about how to replace the nutrition you would have got from the missing meat, then fine.

As for raising your children vegetarian, well there are cultural groups who are habitual vegetarians, so it is difficult to single out the "Hipster" parent just because they have chosen one of those lifestyles.

The issue is probably broader and as you allude to in the original post, I suspect that the wilful ignorance of the parent is the main problem. In any society where all opinions are valued irrespective of how ludicrous, it is difficult to argue that they are wrong. In a world where we have to accept that we have people who put their hands together to ask the great sky creature for help, or think that the Blue Marble is part of an elaborate conspiracy, listening patiently to pseudo-intellectuals trash your hard won professional expertise with a grab bag of hastily cobbled together internet rumours and half understood factoids is now our reality.

You are not even allowed to punch them. Not even a little.

I feel for you elfdude, it must be hard not to lose your patience with your patients. And their parents.

R

[Elfdude]

I feel like I could go a step further and construct an argument that Vegetarianism, even for adults, is a form of self destruction. It's minor I suppose but I think it has far reaching consequences when we factor in things like anxiety and depression. I do not believe even with a nutrition specialty and years of research you could plausibly supplement the nutrition you lost without consuming animal products, the argument becomes even more direct when it comes to veganism or rawfood. However yes, I think inflicting Vegetarianism, Veganism or rawfood diets on children, especially those children before puberty is directly harming their development.

As for considering all opinions valid, they're not and I believe this concept while often blamed on the liberals has it's roots in conservatives and the need to obfuscate science on the issues of climate change, and religious disagreement. Republicans spend billions each year publishing fake science. Denialism has become politically convenient. http://www.amazon.com/Denialism-Irra.../dp/1594202303

[Rolanbek]

I am not a Medical Doctor so don't have enough of a grounding in the Biochemistry of human nutrition to add or detract anything to or from you claim regarding Vegetarianism as broadly harmful for humans.

I would comment that if it can be demonstrated, with evidence, that there is a causal link "Vegetarianism equals harm" then it would mean that a caring society would then legislate against such harm to minors. Oh to be a fly on the wall of that discussion.

People may hold any opinion they like, and that is fine with me. That does not mean that I endorse their opinion, just that I am comfortable with them being opinionated and objectively wrong. I do not understand the self flagellating need of some people to put themselves at a material disadvantage by choice.

I do find the irksome need of people to express their opinion in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary tiresome. It appears a modern disease that open discussion is now equated to who can shout the loudest and who can throw as much extraneous garbage into a discussion as possible.

As a sidebar you have written a nice piece on evolution and with that in mind should we not let hipsters fall foul of the selection pressure to "not be a self destructive waste of space"?

R

[Maiar93]

Alright elfdude, I'll accept your point that (pure) vegetarianism has an unethical aspect in that it's unhealthy to your body. When people talk about 'vegetarians', though, they generally don't mean the ones who don't even eat fish or eggs. They mean the ones who have dropped red meat, chicken etc. but kept the more beneficial meat, fish, in their diets. That's what I do, as well (even though I occasionally allow myself to eat some deliciously spiced chicken at the local thai restaurant).

The reason I don't eat red meats (and chicken, for the most part) is because I don't approve of the treatment of these animals before they are slaughtered. I think that it's unethical, and by eating that food, I am unwillingly supporting the industry which causes this misery. I wonder what you would say to this. Or perhaps this is a question of pros and cons?

[RubiconDecision]

Hopefully this will clear up the nonsense in this topic.

http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/830697

Editor's Note: A commentary^[1] in the September issue of the American Journal of Medicine criticized the deficiency of nutrition education in medical training. Citing a 2013 report^[2] on US health that identified dietary factors as the single most significant risk factor for disability and premature death, the authors (who included diet gurus Drs. Dean Ornish and Andrew Weil) call for changes in medical school curriculum to address the deficit. Lead author Stephen R. Devries, MD, spoke with theheart.org | Medscape Cardiology.
theheart.org | Medscape Cardiology: What prompted this commentary?
Dr. Devries: It's been clear to me for some time that nutrition has not been high on the radar in clinical cardiology. I know from my own training 25 years ago that I received essentially no education in nutrition in 3 years of internal medicine residency and 4 years of cardiovascular fellowship training. Unfortunately, despite the knowledge gained in the interim about the link between nutrition and health, very little has changed regarding the paucity of nutrition education over the past 25 years.
It struck me as a peculiar paradox that clinical practice guidelines highlight the primary importance of nutrition and lifestyle, yet the physicians who are expected to implement these guidelines receive absolutely no education in these areas during their residency and subspecialty training.

How can doctors not be required to learn about nutrition?

It seems hard to imagine that current accreditation guidelines in cardiology, for example, outline very detailed requirements regarding procedures, yet don't mention a word about nutrition. As I go around the country speaking to this point, the reaction is an incredulous "How can doctors not be required to learn about nutrition?"
Two years ago, I transitioned from a full-time academic practice to become director of an educational nonprofit, the Gaples Institute for Integrative Cardiology. One of our primary goals is to create a space for nutrition education within all levels of medical training programs. This new paper emerged as one of our efforts to emphasize the role of nutrition in medicine.
theheart.org | Medscape Cardiology: What is the relationship between the authors of this paper -- do they represent a particular body or group?
Dr. Devries: Our goal was to bring together as broad a group of physician educators as possible to help strengthen the message. My own work over the years has involved critically evaluating the evidence for nutrition and lifestyle practices, and the authors include many of the individuals I have collaborated with along the way. My personal belief (and a guiding philosophy of the Gaples Institute) is that we can best improve health care and the patient experience by bringing together the wisdom of passionate experts who may not normally be in dialogue with each other. Accordingly, the authors of this work include highly published academicians, natural health advocates, preventive cardiology researchers, directors of residency programs, and a former medical school dean.
theheart.org | Medscape Cardiology: Are you advocating any particular type of diet?
Dr. Devries: We're not aiming to promote a particular diet -- which is reflected in the diversity of authors, many of whom have slightly different takes on an optimal diet. Our message is much bigger: Let's give nutrition and lifestyle the attention they deserve in medicine. The goal is to create a space that doesn't currently exist for nutrition in medical training and practice.
And despite the diversity of opinions regarding diet, it's important to recognize there is a great deal of common ground: the need for greater consumption of vegetables and fruit, preferred intake of whole grains over refined, and avoidance of sugar-sweetened beverages.
theheart.org | Medscape Cardiology: Why do physicians need to learn about nutrition when there are dietitians? Can't they just refer patients to the experts?
Dr. Devries: I'm glad you raised that point. First of all, it's important to acknowledge that nutrition is a group effort and that patients can benefit from a wide range of health experts -- including dietitians, nutritionists, and nurses -- to help with dietary concerns. And certainly it's not realistic to expect that doctors will be able to take the time for detailed nutritional tasks, such as making daily meal plans, especially for those with complex nutritional needs.
Nevertheless, a solid foundation of nutritional knowledge will empower physicians to emphasize to patients that nutrition is a priority, and to encourage patients that the food-based "medicine" they consume is just as vital to their health plan as their medication. When it is apparent that nutrition is a priority for the doctor, it becomes a greater priority for the patient. Making that point doesn't take a lot of time.
Our goal is to leverage maximal impact from the physician's limited time. If only 15 minutes is slated for a return clinic appointment, devoting as little as 1 or 2 of those minutes to nutrition would be a huge advance from the status quo. Spending a couple of minutes to encourage vegetable and fruit intake or to discourage sugar-sweetened beverages is time well spent. And for those who need more extensive counseling, an appropriate referral is ideal -- and probably have all the more impact if the physician has already "premedicated" the patient to appreciate the importance of nutrition.

Medical students DO NOT get much nutritional education.

There is an intentional push in American medicine for a plant-based diet.

Why?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11063473

Origin of atherosclerosis in childhood and adolescence.

McGill HC Jr¹, McMahan CA, Herderick EE, Malcom GT, Tracy RE, Strong JP.
Author information


Abstract

Atherosclerosis begins in childhood as deposits of cholesterol and its esters, referred to as fatty streaks, in the intima of large muscular arteries. In some persons and at certain arterial sites, more lipid accumulates and is covered by a fibromuscular cap to form a fibrous plaque. Further changes in fibrous plaques render them vulnerable to rupture, an event that precipitates occlusive thrombosis and clinically manifest disease (sudden cardiac death, myocardial infarction, stroke, or peripheral arterial disease). In adults, elevated non-HDL-cholesterol concentrations, low HDL-cholesterol concentrations, hypertension, smoking, diabetes, and obesity are associated with advanced atherosclerotic lesions and increased risk of clinically manifest atherosclerotic disease. Control of these risk factors is the major strategy for preventing atherosclerotic disease. To determine whether these risk factors also are associated with early atherosclerosis in young persons, we examined arteries and tissue from approximately 3000 autopsied persons aged 15-34 y who died of accidental injury, homicide, or suicide. The extent of both fatty streaks and raised lesions (fibrous plaques and other advanced lesions) in the right coronary artery and in the abdominal aorta was associated positively with non-HDL-cholesterol concentration, hypertension, impaired glucose tolerance, and obesity and associated negatively with HDL-cholesterol concentration. Atherosclerosis of the abdominal aorta also was associated positively with smoking. These observations indicate that long-range prevention of atherosclerosis and its sequelae by control of the risk factors for adult coronary artery disease should begin in adolescence and young adulthood.

Why? Red meat consumption.
...
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-bl...tion-education

Sue LaFortune was in excruciating pain. For more than 20 years, Sue had battled severe migraines. Often, the pain dragged on for days on end. She saw dozens of doctors, tried seemingly endless prescription pills, and had even undergone surgery. But nothing provided relief.
Then, in a clinical study at the Physicians Committee, Sue tried something new: a plant-based diet of fruits, veggies, legumes, and grains. Out with the meat, dairy products, and eggs. She saw an almost immediate difference. Decades of painful migraines came to a stop, and she has been almost completely migraine-free since then.
ADVERTISEMENT

Everyone who suffers from a chronic disease—from migraines to type 2 diabetes to heart disease—deserves the relief that lifestyle changes can bring. But most doctors feel ill-equipped to provide it. Doctors learn about prescription drugs and about surgery. But the role of food is underemphasized in medical education.Currently, most patients who seek doctors’ help for these problems only find a cocktail of drugs or a scalpel—approaches that continually fail to treat or heal. The vast majority of American doctors never learn that dietary approaches exist—so neither do their patients.
In 1985, the National Academies of Science recommended that every aspiring doctor in the United States receive at least 25 hours of nutrition instruction. But the most recent survey of U.S. medical schools offers a harrowing diagnosis: Very few schools meet that recommendation, and only one in four requires even a single course on nutrition. Despite the prevalence of diet-related disease, the number of schools offering the minimum nutrition instruction is declining.
Faculty, medical students, and doctors are conscious of their deficiency. More than three-quarters of medical school instructors admit that students need more nutrition education, and more than half of graduating medical students rate their nutrition knowledge as “inadequate.” A study in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition found that although 94 percent of physicians feel that nutrition counseling should be part of primary care visits, a mere 14 percent feel qualified to offer it.
The only stakeholders not-so-blissfully unaware of this problem, it seems, are the patients: Surveys show that consumers consider physicians credible sources of nutrition information.
Of course, they’re the ones paying the price. Four years ago, diet surpassed smoking as the largest risk factor for disease and death in the U.S. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 7 out of every 10 deaths are caused by chronic diseases like heart disease, cancer, and type 2 diabetes that can be prevented and treated through lifestyle changes. Chronic diseases account for a whopping 75 percent of the $2 trillion annual U.S. health care spending.
The evidence to support using diet to prevent, treat, and reverse disease is overwhelming. Plant-based diets have been shown to surpass even the strongest drugs as an effective prevention and treatment strategy for conditions ranging from high cholesterol to even some cancers. Last spring, Kaiser Permanente, the largest HMO in the U.S., urged physicians to “consider recommending a plant-based diet to all their patients, especially those with high blood pressure, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, or obesity

...
http://www.bu.edu/themovement/past-i...-a-vegetarian/

It is also important to mention that the studies included in this paper were all done in the United States and Europe. The vegetarian diets in these populations may be quite different from those in other areas of the world so the findings may not be generalizable to other populations. Furthermore, vegetarians in these studies are compared to non-vegetarians and their diet, which is a Western omnivore diet that contains significant amounts of meat and meat products. This may also not reflect the non-vegetarian diets of other populations of the world.
And finally, I should mention something about vegetarian study subjects. In the United States many studies of vegetarians use cohorts of followers of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, a Christian denomination that promotes, among other things, a wholesome and healthy lifestyle. Many Seventh-Day Adventists also avoid alcohol and smoking. Given attributes of this study population it is important to keep in mind that research findings may not be generalizable to other vegetarian populations.
Photo credit: vegetarianfighter.com

Vegetarian versus Non-Vegetarian diets
Vegetarian diets, given their restricted nature, are different from omnivore, non-vegetarian diets in many ways. They tend to have higher proportions of whole grains, nuts, fruits and vegetables, and as a result have higher dietary amounts of fiber, antioxidants, vitamins C and E, potassium, and magnesium. They are also generally lower in calories, saturated fats, cholesterol, long-chain n-2 (omega-3) fatty acids, eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), decosahexaenoic acid (DHA), iron, zinc and vitamin B-12. Meats and meat products are a rich source of these nutrients.
Vegetarian diets that restrict dairy or egg consumption are also lower in vitamin B-2 and D, and calcium [3]. This lack of calcium may put vegans who do not supplement with calcium at risk for bone fractures; A comparative study of vegetarians and omnivores showed no difference in risk for bone fractures between omnivores and ovo-lacto vegetarians, but vegans had a 30% higher risk [4]. In fact lacto- and ovo-lacto vegetarians may consume more calcium in their diets than non-vegetarians.
A review of vegetarian diets based on ten studies found that vegetarians had lower intake than omnivores for only a few nutrients: vitamins B-12 and C, calcium and zinc [2]. Overall conclusions were that vegetarian diets can be nutritionally adequate. Any nutritional deficits can be addressed by taking supplements, eating fortified foods, or preparing and combining foods to enhance absorption of vitamins and minerals (for example, soaking and sprouting beans and grains, or taking iron or zinc-rich foods with fruits rich in vitamin C to enhance iron and zinc absorption) [2]. B-12 is of particular concern to vegetarians, especially vegans, as there is no unfortified plant food that contains any significant amounts of it [2]. B-12 is found in dairy foods and eggs so ovo-lacto vegetarians generally consume adequate amounts. For those who don’t, however, B-12 fortified foods are available including soy and rice beverages, and some cereals.
Differences between Vegetarians and the General Population
Vegetarians also tend to differ from the general population in ways not related to diet intake. Studies show that vegetarians, on average, are more physically active, drink less alcohol, and smoke less than the general population, and also have higher socioeconomic status and a lower prevalence of being overweight or obese [5].
Health Benefits of being a vegetarian
A number of studies dating back to the 1950s have been done to examine diet-disease associations and many of these looked specifically at the effects of a vegetarian diet on health. These studies focused primarily on prevalent conditions that have high mortality and morbidity, including different cancers, heart disease, and diabetes [6]. In addition, studies have also examined if vegetarians have lower rates of mortality compared to non-vegetarian counterparts [7]. Taken together these studies suggest that vegetarian diets (that are appropriately planned and nutritionally adequate) may lower the risk of certain chronic diseases, notably cardiovascular disease, diabetes and hypertension. I’ll go into the studies related to these conditions in a little more depth.
Cardiovascular Disease:
There appears to be strong evidence for the association between vegetarianism and lower risks for cardiovascular disease (CVD). A combined analysis of 5 prospective studies involving two cohorts of Seventh Day Adventists [8, 9] and a cohort of British [10] and German vegetarians [11] showed that mortality from heart disease was 24% lower in vegetarians compared to non-vegetarians after adjusting for sex, smoking status and age [12]. These studies categorized individuals by degree of vegetarianism and showed that different groups had different rates of mortality from heart disease: pesco and lacto-ovo vegetarians had a 34% lower rate of mortality and vegans had a 26% lower rate. Vegetarians in the studies as a whole had higher nut and whole grain consumption, foods that are associated with lower CVD risk, and had lower total or LDL cholesterol levels, which are also associated with lower CVD risks. Furthermore, in each of the studies the vegetarian subjects had lower body mass indexes compared to their non-vegetarian counterparts; The association between body mass and blood pressure, and studies of hypertension in vegetarians [13, 14]suggest that the vegetarians in these studies also had a lower prevalence of hypertension, another risk factor for CHD, although blood pressure was not measured in these cohorts.
Another comparison study between vegetarians (Californian Seventh-Day Adventists) and non-vegetarians (Californians from five cities) examining risks of having a first-time, fatal heart attack showed that the risks (adjusted for age) were about half that for vegetarians compared to their non-vegetarian counterparts [15].
While these results support a conclusion that a vegetarian diet may protect against heart disease, it can be argued that it is not the restriction of meat from the diet that provides the benefit but an increased consumption of whole grains, nuts, fruits and vegetables. Diets rich in these foods are associated with higher fiber content, lower cholesterol levels, a lower prevalence of obesity, lower blood pressure levels and a higher antioxidant status, all things that may reduce the risk of heart disease [5, 16].
Diabetes:
Most studies also agree on the association between a vegetarian diet and diabetes, with vegetarians having lower rates of diabetes. A large study showed that the risk of diabetes (adjusted for age) was about twice as high for non-vegetarians as for vegetarians [14]. Another large study looking at the prevalence of self-reported diabetes and diabetes-related mortality showed that non-vegetarians reported having diabetes 1 ½ to 2 times more often than vegetarians, and that non-vegetarian men were about twice as likely to die from a diabetes-related cause then vegetarian men, after adjusting for age and weight. No difference in diabetes-related mortality, however was noted between vegetarian and non-vegetarian women in the study [17].
Lower rates of diabetes in vegetarians can be ascribed to having lower body weights. A study of body mass index (BMI), diabetes and hypertension in different types of vegetarians showed that non-vegetarians have the highest average BMIs (average of 28.26) and vegans have the lowest (average of 23.13). BMIs between 18.5 and 24.9 are considered to reflect a healthy weight [18]. In fact BMI tracks along the gradient of vegetarian food restriction, with those with the most restricted diets having the lowest BMIs [6]. Of note, hypertension and diabetes also track with BMI and vegetarian diet restriction, with those having the most restricted diet (vegans) having the lowest levels of hypertension and diabetes- about a quarter of the levels of diabetes or hypertension that is seen in non-vegetarians [14].
Cancer:
Many studies have looked at the association between a vegetarian diet and the risk of different cancers [6]. A noteworthy association has only been found with colorectal cancer, but the evidence is mixed. A large six year study of individuals with no reported history of cancer showed that those who regularly ate red meat had nearly twice the risk for colon cancer compared to those who did not eat red meat [19]. In addition an inverse association was found with legume intake (legumes include foods like peas, beans, and lentils): A higher colon cancer rate was associated with a lower legume intake. In addition a positive association with BMI was noted. Therefore, in summary, overweight meat eaters who did not eat legumes had the highest rates of colon cancer.
However, these results are not supported by other studies. A study of 34,000 subjects showed that the risk of colon, breast, lung, prostate and uterine cancer, adjusted for age, sex and smoking, were no different between vegetarians and non-vegetarians [14]. In addition, in a pooled analysis of five larger studies looking at cancer mortality rates in vegetarians and non-vegetarians, no differences were found between the two groups after adjusting for age and smoking status in mortality rates of colorectal, lung, stomach, prostate or breast cancer [12].
All cause mortality:
Finally, many studies have looked at the association between vegetarianism and the risk of mortality (due to all causes). These give mixed results. The thought is that if a vegetarian diet is healthier than non-vegetarian diets then mortality rates for vegetarians should be lower compared to non-vegetarians. One study suggests that the association between mortality and vegetarianism differs depending on the age group (an age modification effect) with regular meat consumption only associated with increased mortality up until age 60 years. After age 60 years the mortality rates between the two groups (vegetarians and non-vegetarians) does not differ significantly [6]. Other studies, however, differ and suggest that there are no differences between vegetarians and non-vegetarians in terms of all-cause mortality, regardless of age. In a British study of 64,000 individuals 20-89 years old, the risk of mortality for both vegetarians and non-vegetarians was identical after adjusting for age, sex, smoking and alcohol consumption [7]. These results, in turn, are at odds with results of an eleven year follow up study of about 2,000 German vegetarians that showed that all-cause mortality was lower among vegetarians than non-vegetarians. However BMI, socioeconomic and smoking status were not controlled for in this study and it is known that similar low mortality rates are found in non-vegetarian populations that have a low prevalence of smoking and alcohol consumption (notably Mormons) [20]. Furthermore, to confuse the situation even more, the healthiest Europeans as judged by longevity- the Swiss, Swedes, Norwegians and Icelanders- consume large amount of animal products, although primarily fish, dairy and poultry [5].
In summary there is evidence that a vegetarian diet protects against cardio-vascular disease, particularly heart disease, and there may be some health benefits related to diabetes and colon cancer. Evidence is lacking, however, for any benefits related to other cancers, other conditions, or mortality rates. Whether the benefits are related to not consuming meat/meat products or having a higher consumption of whole grains, nuts, fruits and vegetables is not clear. In addition, the fact that vegetarians generally have lower BMIs, lower blood pressure, lower alcohol intake, smoke less, have higher levels of physical activity and have higher socioeconomic levels confounds the issue. The take home message is that there may be health benefits to being a vegetarian, but these may be due mostly to eating a balanced diet, exercising regularly, limiting alcohol consumption and not smoking.

The things they mention, I have mentioned.
...
http://www.pcrm.org/health/diets/veg...from-the-start

Vegetarian Diets for Children: Right from the Start


Eating habits are set in early childhood. Choosing a vegetarian diet can give your child—and your whole family—the opportunity to learn to enjoy a variety of wonderful, nutritious foods.
Children raised on fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes grow up to be slimmer and healthier and even live longer than their meat-eating friends. It is much easier to build a nutritious diet from plant foods than from animal products, which contain saturated fat, cholesterol, and other substances that growing children can do without. As for essential nutrients, plant foods are the preferred source because they provide sufficient energy and protein packaged with other health-promoting nutrients such as fiber, antioxidant vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals.
Complete Nutrition for Children

Vegetarian diets provide excellent nutrition for all stages of childhood, from birth through adolescence. Of course, an infant’s nutritional needs are best met by his or her mother’s breast milk. It’s nature’s way of boosting the baby’s immunity as well as his or her psychological well-being.
Doctors recommend introducing solid foods in the middle of the first year of life. The best weaning foods are soft plant foods such as ground, cooked cereals, mashed fruits, and well-cooked vegetables. Given a chance, toddlers and young children usually enjoy a wide variety fruits, vegetables, grains, and legumes—even more so if they are involved in the preparation. School-aged children are often curious about where their food comes from and delight in learning how to cook, visiting farmers’ markets, and gardening. Adolescents raised on a vegetarian diet often find they have an easy time maintaining a healthy weight and have fewer problems with acne, allergies, and gastrointestinal problems than their meat-eating peers.
Some studies suggest that the growth of vegetarian children is more gradual than that of non-vegetarians—in other words, vegetarian children grow a bit more slowly at first, but they catch up later on. Final heights and weights for vegetarian children are comparable to those of meat-eating children. Interestingly, breast-fed babies also grow more slowly than bottle-fed babies. Somewhat less rapid growth during the early years is thought to decrease disease risk later in life.
On the other hand, diets rich in animal protein, found in meat, eggs, and dairy products, appear to reduce the age of puberty, as shown in a 2000 study from the Harvard School of Public Health, which found that girls who consumed higher levels of animal protein compared to vegetable protein between 3 and 8 years of age went through menarche earlier. Nature may well have designed the human body to grow up more gradually, to reach puberty later, and to last longer than most people raised on omnivorous diets experience.
In a 1980 study in Boston, researchers measured the IQs of vegetarian children. Some of the children were following a macrobiotic diet, a few were Seventh-day Adventists (many of whom follow a plant-based diet), and the rest were from families that had simply decided to go vegetarian. On intelligence testing, the kids were considerably above average, with a mean IQ of 116. Now, the diet may have had nothing to do with their intelligence. Rather, these vegetarian families were better educated than the average meat-eating family, and it is probably the parental education, rather than a dietary effect, that was reflected in their children’s measured intelligence. However, this study should reassure vegetarian parents who wonder whether animal products contain something necessary for brain development. Clearly, they do not.
Perhaps the most important consideration for feeding children is this: Lifelong dietary habits are established at a young age. Children who acquire a taste for chicken nuggets, roast beef, and French fries today are the cancer patients, heart patients, and diabetes patients of tomorrow. Children who are raised on whole grains, vegetables, fruits, and legumes will have a lower risk of heart disease, stroke, diabetes, cancer, and many obesity-related illnesses compared to their counterparts raised on the average American diet. Because of this, they will also tend to live years longer.
Nutrient Needs

The complex carbohydrates found in whole grains, beans, and vegetables provide the ideal energy to fuel a child’s busy life. Cultivating a taste for brown rice, whole wheat breads and pastas, rolled oats, and corn, as well as the less common grains barley, quinoa, millet, and others, will boost the fiber and nutrient content of a child’s diet. In addition, steering children away from sweets, sugary drinks, highly processed baked products, and overly sweet cereals will help them avoid overeating and gaining unwanted weight.
Naturally, children need protein to grow, but they do not need high-protein, animal-based foods. Many people are unaware that a varied menu of grains, beans, vegetables, and fruits supplies plenty of protein. The “protein deficiencies” that our parents worried about in impoverished countries were the result of starvation or diets restricted to very few food items. Protein deficiency is extremely unlikely on a diet drawn from a variety of plant foods.
Very young children may need a slightly higher fat intake than adults do. Healthier fat sources include soybean products, avocados, and nut butters. Soy “hot dogs,” peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, seasoned veggie burgers, and avocado chunks in salads, for example, are very well accepted. However, the need for fat in the diet should not be taken too far. American children often have fatty streaks in the arteries—the beginnings of heart disease—before they finish high school. In contrast, Japanese children traditionally grew up on diets much lower in fat and subsequently had fewer problems with diabetes, heart disease, obesity, and other chronic diseases.
Parents will want to make sure their child’s diet includes a regular source of vitamin B12, which is needed for healthy blood and nerve function. Deficiencies are rare, but when they happen, they can be a bit hard to detect. Vitamin B12 is plentiful in many commercial cereals, fortified soy and rice milks, and nutritional yeast. Check the labels for the words cyanocobalamin or B12. Children who do not eat these supplemented products should take a B12 supplement of 3 or more micrograms per day. Common children’s vitamins contain more than enough B12. Spirulina and seaweed are not reliable sources of vitamin B12.
The body also requires vitamin D, which children and parents are happy to know can be obtained by simply playing outdoors in the sun. Fifteen to twenty minutes of daily sunlight on the hands and face is enough sun exposure for the body’s skin cells to produce the necessary vitamin D. Children in latitudes with diminished sunlight may need the vitamin D found in multivitamin supplements or fortified non-dairy milks.
For calcium, beans, dried figs, sweet potatoes, and green vegetables, including collards, kale, broccoli, mustard greens, and Swiss chard, are excellent sources. Fortified soymilk and rice milk and calcium-fortified juices provide a great deal of calcium as well. In addition, eating lots of fruits and vegetables, excluding animal proteins, and limiting salt intake all help the body retain calcium.
Growing children also need iron found in a variety of beans and green, leafy vegetables. The vitamin C in vegetables and fruits enhances iron absorption, especially when eaten together with an iron-rich food. One example is an iron-rich bean burrito eaten with vitamin C-rich tomato salsa. Few people are aware that cow’s milk is very low in iron and can induce a mild, chronic blood loss in the digestive tract, which can reduce iron and cause an increased risk of anemia.

For a child, an omnivore diet is best. The worst diet for a child is a vegan diet for all of the reasons I mentioned.

I see no emphasis on creatine. In only a few cases do medical students get nutritional education, as metabolic pathways in biochemistry, in pharmacology as diet like grapefruit can block drug efficacy or stimulate it, in pathological conditions due to nutritional defficiency, in embryology mostly due to folic acid(which is why foods are fortified). Doctors have a terrible reputation for inadequate nutritional knowledge.

An omnivore diet with a focus on plants but including animal and seafood protein, plus milk for calcium, is the best diet. A moderate amount of nonplant protein to minimize artherosclerosis and heart disease.

A vegetarian diet is common (10%) to the world without malnutrition. An omnivore diet offers significant advantages to children. A vegan diet could harm children's skeletal growth or delay puberty.

[Phier]

As a pediatrician I've grown a bit irritated with the number of parents I encounter who present to me these two fundamentally wrong ideas:

SNIP

I... I don't know what to say. I actually agree with a post of yours 100%, its been a while.

I am not a Medical Doctor so don't have enough of a grounding in the Biochemistry of human nutrition to add or detract anything to or from you claim regarding Vegetarianism as broadly harmful for humans.

I would comment that if it can be demonstrated, with evidence, that there is a causal link "Vegetarianism equals harm" then it would mean that a caring society would then legislate against such harm to minors. Oh to be a fly on the wall of that discussion.

People may hold any opinion they like, and that is fine with me. That does not mean that I endorse their opinion, just that I am comfortable with them being opinionated and objectively wrong. I do not understand the self flagellating need of some people to put themselves at a material disadvantage by choice.

I do find the irksome need of people to express their opinion in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary tiresome. It appears a modern disease that open discussion is now equated to who can shout the loudest and who can throw as much extraneous garbage into a discussion as possible.

As a sidebar you have written a nice piece on evolution and with that in mind should we not let hipsters fall foul of the selection pressure to "not be a self destructive waste of space"?

R

Medical education on nutrition varies greatly and is usually pretty bad over all. I'd love to tell people to just "ask their doctor" but I know too many that are clueless on nutrition. "Nutritionists" tend to be even worse.

Part of the problem, is there is a lack of good studies. Most nutrition studies are "we took 30 obese, sedentary individuals, and gave them a food log and told them them to do this". Useless on a lot of levels. Few studies are done on fit people, few studies are done long term, few studies are done with monitoring so people can't cheat/lie.

Then when you do have a study they get misinterpreted. If you ever heard someone talk about "starvation mode" then you have heard a misinterpretation. There was a very good study done on starvation where fit men were given low calorie diets and a lot of physical activity. They lost weight, muscle, BMR was reduced. They were in extreme calorie deficit. Now its used by fat people explaining that they need to eat more to lose weight or they go into starvation mode.

[athanaric]

I was wondering, based on past workplace experiences - is it possible/sensible to report people to the authorities if they raise their offspring on a Vegan diet? I mean, I'd report anyone trying it on a cat or dog (hell, even if it was "just" a Vegetarian diet), but not sure what the law says about humans.

The reason I don't eat red meats (and chicken, for the most part) is because I don't approve of the treatment of these animals before they are slaughtered. I think that it's unethical, and by eating that food, I am unwillingly supporting the industry which causes this misery. I wonder what you would say to this. Or perhaps this is a question of pros and cons?

You can still eat meat from organic production or local providers who you know to treat their animals appropriately, though.

A point about organic food, since it's come up in the OP - the idea behind it is on the one hand to avoid the unintended side-effects (harmful for natural bio-diversity and/or ground water, that is) of artificial substances such as hormones in the food, modern fertilizer, insecticides etc., and on the other to give animals a more ethical, "species-appropriate" treatment. This theoretically results in better meat than in the industrial meat production. Of course, when you're producing organic food, you have to understand that not all natural substances are suitable for treating your crops (I guess the OP is referring to the copper-based stuff they allegedly use in organic wine production). After all, uranium is also natural...
The problem arises when people don't understand that in order for organic food to be better, certain criteria have to be met (see above), and that even when those criteria are met, it's not necessarily healthier than all non-organic food. In the extreme (but frequent) cases, they turn it into a cult.