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Veganism and the Raw Food Diet Movement

An Interview with Nazariah

By Frederic Patenaude

http://www.fredericpatenaude.com

 

 

March, 2004

 

 

 

Introductory Comments from Chet: It's a pleasure for me to share

this fascinating dialogue between Nazariah and Frederic Patenaude

because much of it confirms what I've been saying since 1999 about

long-term deficiency problems with raw food diets and strict

veganism. Throughout the interview, Frederic comments on some of

Nazariah's remarks. To further the search for truth in raw food

diets and strict veganism, I've added a few of my comments as well

in boxes like this one.

 

 

 

 

In March I had the pleasure to interview Brother Nazariah, who is

the founder of the Essene Church of Christ. In this fascinating

interview, Nazariah shares with us his experiences with a raw food

diet and the vegan movement. Nazariah may be reached on the Internet

at www.essene.org. I have made a few comments throughout the

interview which are in green. My questions are always in italic

typeface.

 

 

 

First Experiences With the Raw Vegan Diet

What is your background with the raw food diet?

 

I'm 46 now and I've been a vegetarian since I was 17. At that age, I

not only became a vegetarian but also a raw foodist. I included raw

dairy into my diet because I had met an elderly Essene teacher who

recommended that. Historically, that used to be the Essene diet. The

Essenes, for the most part, were not vegans. They were vegetarians,

and many of them were raw foodists, but they ate fermented dairy

products — yogurt and kefir. So that was my diet was for 7 years.

During that time, I did great — no problems at all.

 

Then, when I had moved to another location, I became very attracted

to the vegan philosophy, because it is a beautiful philosophy. I

then became a raw foodist.

 

After 5 years on a raw food diet, I lost the ability to walk. All of

my extremities — my hands, my fingers and my feet — were in such

pain that I couldn't move. I had central nervous system problems and

I was B12 anemic. All of that happened after 5 years on a raw food

diet.

 

So I switched back to eating the raw fermented dairy products. At

that point, being as nerve-damaged as I was, I also included eggs. I

healed myself by reintroducing those products.

 

At that point, I was wondering whether this was an experience unique

to myself, or whether other persons had had problems on the raw food

diet in the long-term. In the short term, you don't have those sorts

of problems. They're nutritional deficiencies that take several

years to manifest themselves.

 

Lack of Success in the Raw-Vegan Movement

So I did some research. I put a call out on the Internet at

different raw food chat boards. Because I was one of the speakers at

raw food events when they were held, I got to hang out with the

other noted raw food speakers. I started realizing that problems

like I'd had were rampant in the raw food movement, but don't get

talked about.

 

When the people who lecture and write the books start themselves

having problems on the diet, they hide that fact because they are

earning their livings being a raw food lecturer/author. I hate to

say that, but it's that way. I've seen it happen again and again,

when I will personally know a famous raw food speaker/teacher, and

because I personally know them, I know that they are going through

anxiety attacks, panic attacks, clinical depression, that they're

having pain in their joints, they're losing their teeth — things

like that. And yet, I'll see them speak at a raw food convention and

they never mention any of the problems they're actually

experiencing. They just praise how perfect the raw food vegan diet

is. And what happens is any time people are having problems on the

raw food diet, they get told that they're just experiencing detox

and cleansing. But that's just a pat answer.

 

(Comments by Frederic: There is often a big misconception in the raw

food movement, where people will believe that anytime something goes

wrong, it is because of " detox. " I keep reminding people that the

intense period of detoxification is often something that lasts less

than a few months — often only a few weeks. If symptoms persist,

they are often signs of nutritional imbalances.)

 

 

 

Yes, it's a great fallacy to think detox symptoms go on for years

and years, and many raw food vegans have damaged their health by

buying into this lousy idea.-- Chet

 

Deaths in the Raw-Vegan Movement

Here, in the Eugene area, where I live, a man in the local raw food

support group died about two years ago. He was only in his forties.

For two weeks before his death, he'd been telling the leader of that

group that he was having bad chest pains, but she just kept telling

him, " Oh, it's just detox, it's just cleansing. "

 

And he had been into this for a long time?

 

Yes, for a long time. He was one of the funding members of the raw

food support group there. His doctor, when he died, told his wife

(the man's wife) that her husband had died of starvation. His body

just starved to death, even though he was eating raw foods everyday.

He wasn't absorbing enough nutrients from it.

 

I was telling that story to a woman in Santa Monica who is part of a

raw food support group there, and she responded by saying: " Oh yeah,

we recently had a guy who died the same way, and he wasn't very old

either. The doctor said that his body just starved for lack of

nutrients. " Then I was telling another woman in Florida who's a

member of a raw food support group there the same story about both

these people, the one in Eugene and the one in Santa Monica, and she

responded by saying, " Oh yeah, we've had two die that way. "

 

Raw Vegan Fallacy #1: Protein

The more I got into looking into this, the more I found that a lot

of the things that get preached in the raw food movement just aren't

true. One has to do with protein. There is a real issue with getting

enough protein. On a cooked food vegan diet, you tend to eat a lot

of beans and grains, and that is a complete protein. But if a person

is a raw foodist, beans and grains would be sprouted, and most

people don't eat such a large amount of sprouts. Even if they do, as

soon as you begin to sprout, the protein is converted into something

else. So the protein content goes down. The vitamin content goes way

up when you sprout, so there are some good things about sprouting.

The vitamin content increases, but the protein decreases. So on a

raw diet, you think you're getting your protein from the little bit

of fermented seed cheeses, but you can't eat very much of that

because it really clogs you up. So over a period of several years,

people become really protein deficient.

 

Protein is what rebuilds everything in our body. Everyday we're

losing billions of cells, and they have to be replaced. Well, it's

protein that is used by the body to rebuild all those things. So

what happens is that over a period of time, the body just isn't

rebuilding all of that and you end up having nerve damage and

different repercussions. That can happen even in the cooked-food

vegan diet.

 

[Comments by Frederic: The amount of protein needed is different for

each individual. The problem is that those needing higher amounts of

protein who go on raw vegan diets are often the ones who experience

the most problems. Lack of strength, hair loss, and constant hunger

are some of the symptoms that can occur.]

 

Longevity of Vegans

The biggest study on the true mortality rates of vegetarians and

vegans was published recently, and the results were partly shown in

Ahimsa magazine, which is a vegan magazine. Even though the results

were not good for the vegan movement, that vegan magazine said in an

editorial that they felt that in fairness to the readers, they

needed to publish the information.

 

The information was that even though we've been led to believe that

vegans live longer, they actually live less long than many other

dietary categories. Vegans have a high incidence of degenerative

brain diseases — Alzheimer, dementia, and things of that nature.

 

In the past, all of the positive statistics about vegans, all

the " less this " and the " less that, " all the good things that were

taught in books like John Robbins's Diet for a New America — all

those statistics weren't from studies from large groups of people

who actually died. They were just extrapolated information. It was

like, John Robbins would say, " Okay, fat is one of the things that

cause heart disease. Vegans are eating 30% less fat, therefore they

will die of 30% less heart disease " It was all theory. As it turns

out, there are certain things that are good about the vegan diet —

such as less fat, less cholesterol — but the problem is that there

are certain deficiencies in the diet, even in the cooked-vegan diet,

that actually cause vegans to have more of certain serious diseases,

especially brain-related ones, because it's all having to do with

the central nervous system.

 

Are there other studies to back up your claim that vegans live less

long than meat eaters?

 

See, over the years, I've read many studies that have caused me to

come to this conclusion. But I've also spoken to many experts, such

as Gabriel Cousens, who have clinical experience with vegans. But it

goes back to the 1990's, when Vegetarian Times, which is a major

magazine, published the results of a study that was geared to just

women, and tried to see which ones lived longer, between meat

eaters, lacto-ovo vegetarians and vegan women. It turned out that

the lacto-ovo vegetarians lived the longest, the meat eaters lived

the next longest, and vegans lived the least long. And that was in

Vegetarian Times approximately in 1990. So as the years went by and

studies were done, it just became sort of overwhelmingly obvious

that a lot of the things that we believe in the raw food movement

and the vegan movement literally aren't verifiable by science, and

science actually discredits a lot of these claims.

 

The good news is that a vegetarian diet, which includes some dairy

and eggs, appears to be very healthy. That's the good news, is that

we can be healthy vegetarians. It's extremely questionable whether

very many of us can be healthy vegans. It might be possible, but

that it doesn't seem possible for the majority. The majority of

vegans are actually not healthy.

 

[Comments by Frederic: Actually, I haven't seen studies showing that

vegans live less long than vegetarians.]

 

 

 

The " gold standard " for a vegetarian or non-vegetarian diet is

mortality rates. I'd like to cite a study that traced over 76,000

vegetarians and nonvegetarians.

Entitled Mortality in vegetarians and nonvegetarians: detailed

findings from a collaborative analysis of 5 prospective studies, the

UK study published in Am J Clin Nutr 1999 Sep;70 reveals: " Mortality

from ischemic heart disease was 24% lower in vegetarians than in

nonvegetarians (death rate ratio: 0.76; 95% CI: 0.62, 0.94; P<0.01).

The lower mortality from ischemic heart disease among vegetarians

was greater at younger ages and was restricted to those who had

followed their current diet for 5 y. "

 

Those claiming vegan and vegetarian diets are healthier than diets

with foods from both plant and animal kingdoms will appreciate what

they just read. Even more interestingly, however is the next

conclusion of the study, which reveals: " Further categorization of

diets showed that, in comparison with regular meat eaters, mortality

from ischemic heart disease was 20% lower in occasional meat eaters,

34% lower in people who ate fish but not meat, 34% lower in

lactoovovegetarians, and 26% lower in vegans. "

 

Indicative of the point I try to make in my articles promoting a

balanced diet based on plants with moderate servings from the animal

kingdom, those in the study who ate fish -- just as Jesus used fish

to feed the multitudes -- had the best protection from ischemic

heart disease.

 

But it's the final point of the study that deserves our keenest

attention: " There were no significant differences between

vegetarians and nonvegetarians in mortality from cerebrovascular

disease, stomach cancer, colorectal cancer, lung cancer, breast

cancer, prostate cancer, or all other causes combined. "

 

One can, of course, quote studies or the Bible or various experts

until one's blue in the face, but I have no intention of doing

either. Instead, rather than sniping at each other, those of us

interested in natural health, be it biblical or secular, scriptural

or scientific, should be helping each other to advance the truth

about human diet.

 

We need to sublimate our egos and honestly discuss problems with our

favorite diet regimes as they are reported and recognized. -- Chet

 

 

 

B-12 Deficiency

Most vegans are not getting enough B-12. It's very important to take

a B-12 supplement if you're on a vegan diet, and a lot of vegans

don't. A lot of the sources vegans have believed they were getting

their B12 from actually aren't good. For instance, the blue-green

algae, the spirulina, sea vegetables, all of those things are listed

as having a lot of B12, but studies have shown that they're analog

B12, which can't be utilized by the human body. Analog B-12 competes

for receptor sites with the real usable B-12. It results that eating

any of those things, it's not only that you're not getting the B-12

you think you're getting, you're actually going to get less, because

the analog B-12 clings to the limited numbers of receptor sites in

the body for real B12 — and then real B-12 can't cling to it,

because it's already taken by the analog B-12. So, people who have

been eating those things in the vegan movement thinking that it's a

natural source of B12 and that they don't need to take a B-12

supplement, become very B-12 anemic.

 

Gabriel Cousens, a holistic M.D., has become very concerned about

the B-12 issue and is now publishing the results of new research. He

says that it's been demonstrated that 80% of vegans become seriously

B-12 deficient. He then lists the problems that can be related to B-

12 deficiency, and it's an incredible list of problems.

 

Vegetarianism Versus Veganism

Where I come out on all this, is that when we look at our own family

lines, most of us have not had a vegetarian ancestor. The vast

majority of us, living in America, have not had a single vegetarian

ancestor, going back all the way to this almost countless line of

generations. And certainly, there was not a vegan in that family

line. Therefore, that's a pretty radical thing to do, if you look at

it that way, to all of a sudden become a vegan, when no one in your

genetic line has been a vegan, going all the way back to perhaps

thousands of years ago. We've been eating animal products for all

that time, so the human system is expecting to get nutrients that

way.

 

So what I advocate now is that people become vegetarians, not

vegans. With that in mind, there are certain smart things that you

can do. For instance, the problem with dairy products that most

people have is the digestion of lactose. Lactose is what causes

mucus. But in fermented dairy the lactose is pre-digested by the

fermentation process. Even most people who are lactose intolerant

can tolerate fermented dairy. Fermented dairy is yogurt, kefir, etc.

You can also have some organic eggs from free-range chickens.

 

 

 

Fallacies in the Raw Movement #2: Cooking

Another one of the fallacies of the raw food movement is the idea

that once you cook vegetables, you destroy all of the nutrients. The

reality is that it simply isn't true, according to some tests that

have been done.

 

They did a test for cancer purposes where they knew that there were

certain nutrients in certain vegetables with anti-cancer properties.

So they fed one group of people raw vegetables and they fed another

group cooked vegetables. Then they checked their blood, to see which

group had the highest level of the positive anti-cancer properties

from the vegetables in their bloodstream, and it was the people on

the cooked vegetables that had it, far more than the people on the

raw vegetables.

 

The reason is simply because most people digest cooked vegetables

better than they digest raw vegetables. More nutrients get in the

bloodstream from the cooked vegetables.

 

There's an example that I give to a lot of the people that I know —

younger people, college students, old hippies, people like that —

who have at least at one time or another in their lives eaten

marijuana brownies. The interesting thing about eating cooked

marijuana is that you'll get high if you eat cooked marijuana, but

you won't get high at all if you eat raw marijuana. And a lot of

those people can relate to that. They tried raw marijuana — eating

it, and nothing happened to them. They've tried cooking it and

eating it, and they did get high. Well, the reason is because only

when the marijuana is heated does it break down the fibers enough to

where the THC seeps out and can be absorbed into the human

bloodstream.

 

What I point out is that it's the same thing with a lot of the

nutrients in vegetable matter. A lot of times, you'll eat the raw

vegetables and your body doesn't really break down the fibers enough

to absorb certain of the nutrients. In a tomato, for example, you

find lycopene, which is one nutrient that they've found which is

really good for the human heart and has anti-cancer properties.

Lycopene is not digested in a raw tomato. It is digested in a cooked

tomato. So, there are some nutrients that are more absorbed in

cooked vegetables than in raw vegetables.

 

If a person isn't defending a particular " ism, " but is just looking

for truth, you'll find that the healthiest diet is one that includes

a lot of both cooked vegetation, and raw vegetation — because that's

the best of both worlds. You're getting the things from the raw

vegetables that you can't get from a cooked vegetable and you're

getting things from the cooked vegetables that you're not going to

get from the raw vegetables.

 

The Healthiest Diet

That is the healthiest diet. A vegetarian diet that's not a junk

food vegetarian diet — but one based good, whole, organic foods.

 

The healthiest diet would have one meal a day that is a raw

vegetable salad — a major vegetable salad, not a little iceberg

lettuce, but with romaine lettuce, broccoli, etc. — a real heavy-

duty salad.

 

Another meal would be cooked and feature things like steamed

veggies, or a stir-fry, so it would have a lot of cooked vegetation

in it.

 

A third meal simply would be fruit, like a fruit breakfast or a

smoothie.

 

In there, somewhere, you've got to get your protein. So either with

your salad, or with your cooked meal, you want to have yogurt or

kefir, or hard-boiled eggs on your salad, or something.

 

Could that be beans?

 

It can some days, but if it were going to always be that, then that

would be vegan, and the whole point of everything I've just told you

is that it seems that the vegan diet isn't beneficial in the long-

term. If a person were going to be a vegan, they could be having

some tofu, tempeh, or some sort of a bean-type protein with their

steamed veggies. That diet would be a healthy vegan diet, as far as

vegan diets go. But what I'm saying is that the latest research is

that the vegan diet itself is deficient in the long-term.

 

More Nutrients Lacking in the Vegan Diet

What about supplements? If someone takes B-12, vitamin D, etc.,

could that be complete?

 

 

 

They keep on discovering certain little things that we didn't know,

even three years ago, five years ago, ten years ago. You really

can't be sure that there's something else that they haven't

discovered that's lacking in the vegan diet.

 

For example, we only found out a few years ago about the need for

the omega-3. Omega-3 fatty acids are very important, and it's very

difficult to get them on a vegan diet. Several years ago, when that

got discovered, we got told that it's in flax seeds. So then people

in the vegan movement started having a lot of flax seeds or flax

oil, and stuff like that. Well, now, as recently as a year ago, they

discovered that we only absorb something like less than 6% of the

omega 3 in flax oil. So in other words, you'd have to eat an

incredible amount of flax oil to get very much omega 3 from it,

because most people don't absorb very much of it from flax oil.

 

And then, they discovered as recently as one year ago that there's a

long-chain fatty acid, which is really important to the brain and is

not found in any vegan source of food. Then about a month ago,

Gabriel Cousens said that this long chain fatty acid, called EPA, is

present in this kind of wild plant called purslane. But hardly

anybody knows that in the vegan movement, because that just got

discovered a month ago. And most of them don't know that they're

even missing this long-chain fatty acid.

 

What I'm telling you that for is that, even though the general idea

is that you just combine some beans and grains and maybe take a B-12

supplement and you're going to have everything that you need,

actually, there are little things, like certain fatty acids that

they keep on discovering that aren't in the vegan diet, until they

figure out some way that you can get it from a vegan source. So I

wonder, whether or not in the next five years, or 10-20 years,

they're going to keep on discovering little things like that, that

they didn't know before.

 

It certainly has been happening my whole lifetime. They keep on

discovering ether new tidbits of information. So if a person were

concerned about health, I wouldn't recommend a vegan diet.

 

Ethics and Health

If your main reason for being a vegan is the ethical concerns for

the animal world and if you're willing to take on the personal karma

of being less healthy because of your ethical considerations for the

animal world, then, that's an okay reason to be a vegan, but not

health, because it doesn't seem to be healthy in the long-term.

 

So you have to just decide, where you're at on that. If you don't

care about your own health, or if you're willing to sacrifice your

own health because of the ethical considerations for the animal

world, then I don't have any problems with that. If a person knows

that they're going to have an increased chance of dying prematurely,

and having different health problems, but are choosing that path

knowingly, because of their love for the animal world, well then

that's fine. As long as they're doing it knowingly.

 

My viewpoint is that I think that for the animal world, our

generation is making a good step in the right direction by simply

stopping eating animals. We're making a good step in the right

direction for our species. After a certain number of generations of

our family line actually being vegetarian, we could probably evolve

from a vegetarian species into a vegan species — the way evolution

works.

 

But you don't just go from a meat eating species to all of a sudden

being a vegan species without a lot of traumatic problems. So I

advise a more intermediate step. Let's first evolve into being

vegetarians for a number of generations, then let's evolve into

veganism and let evolution happen in that way.

 

Raw-Veganism During Pregnancy

I don't think that it's wise for a woman who is pregnant to eat a

raw-vegan diet, and the reason is that there are numbers of studies

and view points that believe that there is an insufficient amount of

nutrients comes in — especially vitamin B12. If a woman were taking

the vitamin B-12 supplement, and certain other supplements, then she

probably could stay on a raw-vegan diet. However, a lot of the

people that are on the raw-vegan don't believe in supplements — they

don't believe in taking vitamin B12. And according to the latest

research from Gabriel Cousens, 80% of vegans are B-12 deficient. A

vitamin B-12 deficiency in children leads to irreversible brain

damage. So even if later in their life, they're eating plenty of B-

12, there's been irreversible brain damage already done.

 

 

 

I understand the reasons that a woman would choose to be a raw vegan

herself and to attempt to raise her children that way, and even to

attempt to maintain that diet while she's pregnant. The reason is

that she believes that it's good for her and that it will be good

for her children. The problem is that actual scientific evidence

shows otherwise. It's very risky and dangerous for a pregnant woman

to be on a raw vegan diet, and it is risky and dangerous to raise

small children on a raw vegan diet.

 

 

 

Now, one might say, are there other problems besides the B-12 issue?

Well, the B-12 issue is very important. There would need to be a B-

12 supplement to be raising your child on a raw-vegan. But B-12

isn't the only issue. Many children who are being raised on a raw-

vegan diet are suffering various nutritional deficiencies that

affect them later in life. And even if a person believes that

perhaps a child can be raised successfully on a raw-vegan diet, they

owe it to their child to research the issue before attempting to

actually raise the child as a raw-vegan. It's not enough to research

the issue by asking raw-food experts, because as I've pointed out in

this interview, raw-food experts have been spreading incorrect

information for a number of years. You have to actually get into

talking to other sources of information, including nutritional

scientists — people who actually study nutrition.

 

Have you seen yourself children who've been raised on a raw vegan

diet?

 

I know friends of the family of the infant that died recently in

Florida, and they tell me that even the older children in that

family were emaciated and looked like Nazi workcamp inmates.

 

 

 

For an important article by former vegans whose seven child was

brain-damaged as a result of his mother's deficiency problems from

eat the predominantly raw and strict vegan Hallelujah Diet during

her pregnancy, -- Chet

 

Is 100% raw ideal?

Here's what I think now: a person on a raw diet, including fermented

dairy products or eggs, will do fine. But if a person was going for

what the healthiest diet is, I think having one meal of cooked

vegetables per day — steamed vegetables or an oriental stir-fry, or

something like that — is actually even healthier than being 100% raw

for this reason:

 

Studies have shown that certain important nutrients in vegetables

are better absorbed and utilized by a human being from cooked

vegetables. And other certain important nutrients are better

absorbed and utilized by a human being from raw vegetables. So, the

best of both worlds is each day to have cooked and raw vegetables in

our diet.

 

So actually, as far as what would be the most healthy diet, I think

it would be one meal each day that includes cooked vegetables, like

some steamed veggies or stir-fry and one meal per day that's

basically a big, raw, vegetable salad, and, if there's a third meal,

that can be a couple pieces of fruit or fruit smoothie for

breakfast, and that would be raw. So the diet that I just described

would be two third raw. And then there's got to be a good source of

protein in that diet, which means that perhaps with the cooked meal,

one might have some kefir, some yogurt, or perhaps, on the salad a

couple of hard-boiled eggs.

 

What's Missing in the Vegan Diet

This leads me to question the protein theories that I have learned.

The current RDAs for protein are 0.8 grams for every kilo of ideal

body weight, which seems fairly easy to get on a raw-vegan diet. So

where do you get the impression that protein is such an important

element in the diet?

 

Where we get the impression is from the actual crippled people and

people with nervous disorders on the vegan diet. See, on paper, like

you're saying, it all looks fine. But in reality, you have people on

long-term vegan diets having real problems.

 

So that's where we find out that there are problems. So then the

investigators say, " Okay, even though we thought that there was

plenty of these nutrients in a long-term vegan diet, we have these

degenerative brain diseases and things like that happening to

vegans: so what's the problem? " Then they discover that there are

certain long-chain fatty acids and other things that we're not

really thinking about when we're just looking at how many ounces of

protein is in this or that.

 

The real complexity comes in that there'd be these things that we

haven't factored in. And then even right now, there's no reason to

think that in the next five or ten years they're not going to

discover more of those little things that we don't currently know

about, because they keep discovering more. You have to realize that

in the 1900s, nobody knew what B-12 was, nobody knew what vitamin C

was, nobody knew what vitamin A was — that's all stuff that got

discovered later. And as the years go by, they keep discovering more

things. Rather than look at all the things they've discovered so

far, and then look at whether or not you can get them on a certain

diet, it's good to look at groups of people who have been following

a certain diet and if they're healthy or not.

 

Long-Term Vegans Don't Look Good

One of the things that I've just noticed, with my own eyeballs, is

that a lot of long-term vegans actually don't look healthy. They

look kind of emaciated, their skin is kind of yellow, they've got

bags under their eyes, their hair's not good — it's splitting, their

fingernails aren't good. So just looking at long-term vegans, like

if you go to a vegan's organization's meeting and look at the people

and you'll realize that they actually don't even look healthy,

especially when you look at the people that have been on it for

longer than 10 years. So then you start finding out that they're

having really major health problems related to certain nutritional

deficiencies.

 

I want to emphasize that I was a vegan. I was a radical vegan. I was

in favor of the philosophy, and I still think it's a beautiful

philosophy. I still think it's fine for a person, in spite of all

that I've said — to just knowingly become a vegan. But what they

shouldn't be under is the false illusion that they're following a

diet that's healthier than other diets, which is what they thought.

In fact, it's probably not as healthy as certain other diets. And

it's okay to do it, as long as you realize that you are taking a

risky dietary choice, and you're doing it for ethical reasons, not

health reasons.

 

[Comments by Frederic: I wouldn't generalize like that. Not all

vegans are unhealthy. However, there are some people who definitely

aren't doing well and do not look well, which can be attributed to

their diet because their problems go away when they stop being

vegans.]

 

Raw-Vegan Fallacy #3: Enzymes

You're probably familiar with the very recent case in Florida, where

a small child died on a raw-vegan diet. When that happened, there

were a lot of newspaper articles in Florida about the raw-food diet.

And those reporters were going around, asking different nutritional

experts for their opinion on the raw-food diet. Well, some buddy in

Florida sent me a couple of newspaper articles, and in those

articles, there were a few nutritional scientists interviewed. They

were pointing out, like I've mentioned before, that most of the

nutrients get absorbed better in a cooked vegetable, and a few get

absorbed and utilized better in a raw vegetable. Therefore, the

healthiest diet would be one that included both raw and cooked

vegetables, because then you're getting the nutrients that are

better absorbed in each way.

 

But there are other fallacies that nutritional scientists pointed

out. One of which is the whole living enzyme thing. Only one

researcher, in the 1940's, that Dr. Howell, who always gets

mentioned in the raw food literature, believed that there was a

chance that, when you ate raw foods, those enzymes in the food would

make it to the part of the digestion process where they could be

helpful, before they got themselves completely fried. But, your

other 99% of researchers don't believe that. And this is what people

in the raw-food movement don't realize, is that the idea that the

raw enzymes in food that you eat are going to help you digest your

food is not believed to be true by 99% of researchers. The reason is

because before food every gets to the point where the nutrients are

being extracted, it's already been totally broken down by your own

digestion process. When you eat food, it goes to a place in your

stomach where there's these incredible " fires " with acids, and stuff

like that, and it totally breaks down your food before it gets to

the point that those enzymes could help in the way that raw-foodists

believe they help.

 

But, the other thing is that the enzymes of a plant are not the same

as the enzymes of a human being, in our digestive tract. The enzymes

of a plant are designed by a plant to help the plant digest its

nutrients, its food. So the enzymes of a broccoli plant are for the

broccoli plant to digest its food. If you look at them with a

microscope, they aren't the same as the enzymes in a human digestive

tract.

 

Now there are a few plant enzymes that have been found to help

digest certain things, like for instance in papayas you have papain.

There are a couple of plant enzymes that seem to have a beneficial

effect in digesting certain things, but the idea that we have when

we are eating our salads and our raw foods that all of those living

enzymes in those plants are somehow going to aid our digestion

process actually is not what science has found.

 

Underweight Raw Vegans

If we go to a raw food conference, you notice that a lot of men look

quite skinny or emaciated. Some say it's detox and that the weight

will come back, but then many have been on this diet for quite a

while and still are quite underweight.

 

That's the big problem now, but there are a few exceptions to the

rule: people who have amazing digestive systems and are able to

digest nutrients properly on an all-raw diet. But the important

thing is that those are the exception to the rule. The vast majority

of people do not adequately break down and digest all the raw foods

that they're eating. And that's why they can't reach a healthy

weight.

 

I mentioned to you that several people have died on a raw food diet

and that when they died; the doctor said that their body had starved

to death. Those weren't people that were fasting; they were people

that were eating raw foods everyday. But their body starved to death

because these individuals had less effective digestive systems than

the average person. So, even though the average person would not

digest as many nutrients from the raw vegetables as from the cooked

vegetables, people with poor digestion digest so few nutrients on

the raw food diet that they can actually starve to death even though

they are eating everyday.

 

And so, when one sees things like that happen and then try to bring

that up and talk about it in the raw-food movement, then everyone

gets really defensive and starts attacking you and labeling you in

some negative way.

 

What raw-foodism has become is just another " ism, " that is defended

by the true believers. And any information that I've provided you in

this interview, what the true believers will do with it is that

they'll simply look at it and immediately start forming arguments

and opinions to counter it, without ever being open to the

possibility that it might actually be true. Just like a Jehovah

Witness would defend Jehovaism, and a Mormon would defend Mormonism,

raw-foodists will defend raw-foodism.

 

The Raw-Vegan Movement

When we talk to these leaders, people like Gabriel Cousens, they'll

acknowledge the B-12 issue. But you don't just recommend supplements

but move away from the vegan diet completely. Why?

 

The thing is that I'm not so personally invested in having to defend

the raw-food diet or the vegan diet. I simply got into all of this

because I was a seeker of truth, and I was looking for a diet that

was spiritual and healthy, and wherever truth has led me, I

followed. The problem is that with most of these noted leaders of

the movement are authors. That's how they got to be the noted

leaders, because they were writing the books. And they're on the

lecture circuit, they have clients, they're earning their living

from being an authority on veganism or raw-foodism. If they

completely just shift and say, " I no longer believe that the raw-

vegan diet is anything that should be advocated to the large number

of people, " then the problem is that it pulls the rug from

underneath them, personally, in regards to how they're earning their

living. So I hate to say a thing like this, but from what I've seen

with my own eyes, it seems to be part of the problem.

 

The leaders, the authority figures, are earning their living from

being promoters of this particular diet. So therefore — and even the

best of them — when they start to see some problems, their instinct

is to just recommend a particular supplement, or something like

that, and of course, usually they sell the supplements that they're

recommending. You'll notice that most of them do. So they sell those

things, but if they were to simply say, " Gosh, you know even though

I became a famous author on this topic, it doesn't actually seem to

be valid anymore, " they would have to change their entire career.

The thing that they're famous for would not be something that they

aren't in favor of anymore. It's a radical thing that they would

have to experience and go through.

 

Long-Term Raw-Food Authors Eating Cooked Food

Are you saying that these leaders may actually not be vegans

themselves but won't come out publicly and say that?

 

That's not what I just said. But since you are saying that, on

whether or not they are vegans or not, all I can say is that I have

seen with my own eyes certain things... One incident occurred when I

was one of the speakers at the raw-food convention in San Francisco,

a few years back. Two of the speakers were really insistent that one

has to be on a 100% raw-vegan diet and that 80% raw is not okay to

get the benefits. They said out loud that you have to be 100% raw-

vegan. And each of those speakers claimed to have been 100% raw-

vegans for 20 years. They were the most aggressive, assertive

speakers in the entire convention, really negative towards anyone

that would just eat partially raw. Well, before the end of that

weekend, I saw each of them sneakily eat cooked food.

 

I went for a walk and a few blocks away from the convention center

and I walked by a pizza restaurant, and there was one of the

speakers who had said those things, and he's eating a pizza. You can

order a pizza with no cheese on it, but even then it would be cooked

food and he was claiming that he hadn't eaten cooked food in 20

years. And it looked like it was a cheese pizza.

 

Then when I was leaving the San Francisco airport, and I was walking

around that round concourse in the airport, with little restaurants

and things like that, and there was the other speaker who had been

so aggressive and assertive about having to be 100% raw. He was

sitting at a table having a plate of spaghetti. I don't know whether

that was vegan or not, but it was certainly cooked. And, as I was

approaching him and he saw me coming up, he stuck up a newspaper and

hid his face behind it. But I didn't embarrass him by walking up to

him.

 

One of the real problems in that raw food movement with those

experts and authors is that they have a lot of guilt because they

get into this thing about having to be 100% raw. And when they

themselves have a binge or sneakily eat some cooked food, they don't

want to admit it because it would wreck their reputation as the

great raw-foodist that never eats cooked food. So therefore they eat

the cooked food on the sly and then have guilt about it. They start

to get into a very vicious cycle psychologically. Yet, when you

speak to them or when they do their lecture, they just still claim

to have never eaten cooked food in all these years. They put on a

fake front to the public. So I saw that with my own eyes with a

number of the leading individuals.

 

So, are there some of those leaders who really are 100% raw-vegans

through the years and are healthy? There might be. But, they also

might not be. I mean, all I know is that the ones that I get to

know, the more I get to know them, the more I see them eating cooked

food on the sly, or having really severe problems like anxiety

attacks, panic attacks, clinical depression, teeth falling out,

fingernails breaking, hair falling out. So I'm just not personally

impressed with my experience of the raw food movement and the raw-

food experts! That's just my own personal experience with all that.

 

My personal experience mirrors that of Nazariah regarding lies by

leaders in the raw vegan movement. -- Chet

 

But I'm sure some people will come to you and say, " Oh, I know this

guy who's been a raw-vegan for 30 years, and he's muscular and he's

really healthy. "

 

Yeah, and what I always think of when I hear that is those speakers

that I saw that said that they had been 100% raw for 20 years and

that very weekend of the raw food convention both of them ate cooked

food. So, I take it all with a grain of salt. In other words, those

people might believe they know somebody that's been raw-vegan for 30

years and is in great physical condition, but whether that person

really has been or not, or whether that person really is healthy and

isn't suffering some things behind the scenes, one doesn't know. And

so, I remain open to the possibility that there are some individuals

whose particular body type has permitted to be a raw-vegan for

thirty years and be in good health. I admit that possibility, but my

own experience tells me that that would be few and far between — it

wouldn't be most people.

 

Lack of Honesty in the Raw-Vegan Movement

There's not much honesty in the raw movement, as you're saying...

 

See, there's a definite problem there. And it's not, a " problem of

the raw movement. " The problem is just human beings. Whether you're

talking about politics, whether you're talking about sports,

whatever field you're talking about, you find that there are a lot

of things that are done for the profit motive. That individual

people are usually looking out for how they're earning their income.

 

Now we see that and criticize it, in things like the oil industry

and the munitions industry, but the same exact thing is true in the

health food industry. It's true in health movements, raw-food

movements, and things like that. There gets to be certain groups of

people who are earning their living from it and feeding their egos

by being the authority figures. The human species seems to, in

general, still have a problem struggling with basic honesty.

 

In the raw-food movement, you sort of set yourself up for the worst

of human nature, simply because you get into a one-upsmanship thing

where, " what percent raw are you? " , " How long have you been 100%

raw? " You get into this sort of like " raw-food one-upsmanship, "

which cultivates the worst in human behavior patterns.

 

Supplements

Many of the authors in the raw-movement, who used to recommend

really simple, basic raw-vegan diets, are now getting into all these

supplements and super-foods. It seems that they're noticing that

this basic raw-vegan diet seems to be deficient. Why is that?

 

There are two reasons for that. One is because of what you just

said. There's an interesting thing about the raw food movement,

which is different than other field. In the raw-food movement, if

you come into it and are a raw-foodist for a fairly short time —

like two or three years — you tend to start writing your books.

 

In the raw-food movement as a whole, people get into the idea of the

pristine version of the raw-food diet, which wouldn't include

supplements. They do that for a period of time and write a book or

two while they're on that version of the diet. Then, all of the

sudden in their own lives, they start having the problems of the

nutritional deficiencies, and then they start looking for the

answers. At first, the idea is that the answer is like some simple

fix, like, " Gosh, if I just take a B-12 supplement, or if I just eat

this algae " or something like that. So then, they start looking for

the answer in that direction. So, that's one reason why all these

raw-food guys end up getting into pitching supplements.

 

But the other reason is that once you've become a raw-food author

and are getting to speak at the raw-food events and are earning a

bit of money being on the lecture circuit, you quickly realize how

much more money you could make if you were selling supplements. It

just becomes really obvious that if all of these people who are

attending your lecture had the opportunity to buy from you some

vitamin C or buy from you some fatty acids or something like that,

well, you're going to walk away from that event with more money in

your pocket. Plus, you can only be in so many places in a year, you

can only do so many lectures, you can only earn so much money from

that. But the amount of money that you can make over your web page

if you're hulking supplements is astronomical —there's no limit to

it. So, once a person is viewing their career as being a raw-food

teacher, they soon learn that they'll make a lot more money if

they're also selling supplements.

 

But that first reason that we talked about, which was, they

themselves start to experience nutritional deficiencies and are

looking for answers — that's in there too. So there's these two.

 

Then, the question is, would that be possible to go on a raw-vegan

diet that wouldn't include supplements?

I'd recommend Gabriel Cousens' latest information. It's not in his

book. It's in his e-mail bulletin, and he actually contradicts

what's in his book — he admits that. He says that what he put in his

book is what he believed at the time. He now believes that problems

with B-12 in the vegan movement are much more severe. Before, he was

saying you could get B-12 from certain sources, like spirulina and

blue-green algae and certain sea vegetables. He now does not believe

that. He believes that those are analog B-12 that can't be absorbed

by the human body. And so now he's advocating that people take a B-

12 supplement. He says that maybe 20% of human beings could do a

vegan diet without having to take a B-12 supplement, but at least

80% can't. And people shouldn't just assume that they're in that 20%

category, because the odds are against them.

 

He believes that 20% might be able to go without a B-12 supplement

simply because when he tests vegans, 80% of them are found to be in

serious B-12 deficiency. But to me, that doesn't necessarily mean

that 20% of the people can go without B-12 supplementation on a

vegan diet. Because in fact, of those 20% people that he's testing

that right now, aren't deficient — how do we know that three years

from now, 10% of those people won't have become deficient? In other

words, a best-case scenario, which is what Gabriel is talking about,

is that maybe 20% of the people on a vegan diet wouldn't need the

supplement.

 

Long-Chain Fatty Acids

But that just B-12, though.

 

Yes, like I was was indicating, and it's really complex. What we

know, based on that article, the research published in the American

Vegan that I cited, is that vegans die more of degenerative brain

diseases. Now, then the question is why? And this is new

information; it didn't used to be known that vegans get more of

these brain-wasting diseases. Now that that is known, people are

looking for the answer. And they're coming up with certain answers,

like that there's a particular long-chain fatty acid that is not

available in a vegan diet.

 

What I stick on there as an extra is that we don't even know right

now what brain nutrients might be lacking in the vegan diet, because

they're just barely discovering this. They barely discovered this

long-chain fatty acid that isn't present in the vegan diet. So for

us to now buy a supplement of that one thing and think that we've

solved the problems with the vegan diet, I don't think that would be

valid.

 

How do we know that two years from now, six years from now they're

not going to be discovering other little things that we didn't know

existed before that are lacking on the vegan diet? What we do know

is that there are some sorts of nutritional deficiencies in the

vegan diet, and we're starting to discover what some of those

deficiencies are. For instance, David Wolfe and Gabriel Cousens want

to develop a supplement for that long-chain fatty acid.

 

DHA?

 

EPA. That's a long-chain fatty acid and one of the things it

protects against is depression, which is one of the reasons vegans

also have a higher incidence of suicide, clinical depression,

anxiety attacks and panic attacks. It may be because they're not

getting enough of this EPA long-chain fatty acid. So Gabriel and

David Wolfe are interested in developing a supplement they would

sell that would be a vegan source for EPA. Right now, there's one

plant source that some people can get their EPA from. It's an herb

that grows wild like a weed and is called purslane. The thing about

that is that only people with good digestion can absorb the EPA from

the purslane. People with good digestion can do that. But people

with less than average digestion can't.

 

If you were a vegetarian who eats dairy and eggs, would you get EPA

from the animal products that you're eating?

 

Here's what we know: we know is that vegetarians who eat a bit of

dairy and some eggs live longer and healthier and have less

nutritional deficiencies. You've got the possibility to eat some

dairy and/or eggs, but since some people have problems digesting

dairy, eggs are a good option. Eggs seem to have some nutrients that

dairy doesn't have, and it seems to me that eggs seem to have

everything in them that meat has, but the dairy only has most of

what meat has. So I think that the person who eats dairy will be

helping themselves nutritionally, but not as much as much as if they

eat eggs. So then the thing is to get organic eggs from free-range

chickens.

 

I guess this is my point: rather than try and figure out what exact

supplement or what exact fatty acid we need to take to be a vegan,

it seems to me that by far the safer thing to do is just be a

vegetarian who eats some eggs and a bit of dairy, because of that

point that I keep coming back to. They keep discovering these

different things that are deficient in the vegan diet every couple

years. So even if right now you take a particular supplement that's

supposed to handle some particular problem now, you don't really

know that in two years or eight years they're not going to discover

that vegans are still dying of these problems and so, we still are

lacking something. We don't know how this is going to come out. So,

the safest thing to do is to simply start eating some organic eggs.

 

Is Fish Healthy?

But then, if we take your arguments further and someone was just

interested in health, would that be healthier not to be a strict

vegetarian, and have fish occasionally?

 

If a person doesn't have the ethical considerations, then the

healthiest diet might be to include some fish. However, I do have

myself the ethical problems with that, so that's not what I'm

recommending to people. I feel that if we can make the step to

become vegetarian, this generation, that we're doing a great thing.

We are making a giant step in the right direction of ethics. Just

becoming a vegetarian is doing a good thing. But to answer your

question, if a person didn't have the ethical problems with eating

fish, would that be healthy? Well, the answer is probably yes, as

long as it wasn't fish from a polluted source that has mercury or

something like that.

 

One has to be careful with fish because so much of it these days is

polluted and unhealthy. Here at CasaDay, we only eat wild tuna and

Alaskan salmon from Vital Choice Seafood. The stuff is expensive,

but I feel it's worth every penny in taste and quality. -- Chet

 

Raw Versus Pasteurized Dairy Products, Eggs

Here in Canada you don't find raw dairy products, except cheese. You

only find pasteurized dairy milk. So what would you recommend?

 

What I would recommend is going to a health food store and buying

the health-food store variety of yogurt or kefir. The reason is that

those are live-foods, because of the fermentation process and the

culture, even though they're not raw.

 

So that still would give you the benefits?

 

You see, even though we all hear about all the problems with

pasteurization, we shouldn't forget the problems with non-

pasteurized dairy. For instance, dying of the worst case of diarrhea

you can possibly imagine! Because when you drink raw milk, there's

the possibility that it's contaminated with E-coli. So there are the

pros and cons of unpasteurized dairy products. If a person is not

concerned with things like E-coli in a raw egg, they could simply

put a couple of raw eggs in their smoothies, if they are trying to

be raw-foodists.

 

Just the yolk or the whole thing?

 

I would say the whole thing, and the reason is because the egg white

has the protein, but the yolk has certain fatty acids that seem to

be important for the brain.

 

[Comments by Frederic: Raw milk is definitely preferable to

pasteurized milk. It is much more assimilable. Also: It's not

recommended to eat raw egg whites. Egg whites contain strong enzyme

inhibitors and are close to impossible to digest raw. The best thing

is to have the yolk raw and the white cooked.]

 

I disagree with Frederic about egg whites. Would nature create a

whole food as excellent in so many nutritional factors as the egg

and then require half of it to be discarded as unhealthy? -- Chet

 

The Latest Raw Vegan Diets

Some people recommend a fruit-based, low-fat raw diet, and say that

you actually won't get the problems that all these other raw-food

people are getting because they're eating so much fat. What are your

thoughts on this?

 

Over the years, I've seen every imaginable variety of the raw food

diet, and the one common denominator that I've seen over a period of

time is that the raw-vegan diet over a period of years seems to be

nutritionally deficient. That's my opinion. It seems to me that a

raw-vegan diet, over a period of years, leads to severe nutritional

deficiencies.

 

This is one of the problems: there will always be people pitching

some particular variation of the raw diet, which is going to be the

true solution, if you just do this. And of course they'll write a

book about it and will be on the lecture circuit about it. The

problem is that a couple years go by and that's no longer the " in "

variation — it's some other variation take its place, a couple years

later some other variation. What I've seen is that no variation that

is raw-vegan for years in a row seems to be adequate.

 

The diet that you're particularly mentioning there: where is it

going to get that long-chain fatty acid that we're talking about?

Where is it going to get its B-12, where is it going to get its

complete protein? Those are very real issues. In the raw food

movement, people will read an old Arnold Ehret book, which talks

about the possibility of making protein from the air we breathe, and

they'll just believe they can do it. And yet, not one human being

has ever been shown to be able to do it. They'll read in an old

fruitarian book that suggests that we could make B-12 in our gut,

like some of the animals do. And even today, if you ask vegans, if

they believe that they can make B-12 in their own gut, more than

half of them believe that they do. Because I've asked that question,

and most people have that belief in the vegan movement that we are

making our own B-12 in our gut, in a way that we can live off that B-

12 and utilize it. In reality, not one human being has ever been

shown to be able to do. That's the science. Not one human being has

ever been able to demonstrate that they were living off the B-12 in

their gut. In Gabriel Cousens' latest bulletin on this B-12 problem,

he says that the only way a human being could live off B-12 made in

their gut would be if they ate their own feces. And I don't think

that that's going to become a popular option.

 

That's the problem with these variations of the raw-vegan diet, like

the one you asked me about specifically. Those variations don't

supply the essential fatty acids that the brain needs; they don't

supply enough of the complete amino acids. They don't supply enough

of the B-12 and other essential nutrients, and that's why people,

after they've been on those diets for lengths of time, end up having

nutritional deficiencies. So I don't know that there are exceptions

to the rule, but I acknowledge that there might be. What I say about

that is that the dangerous thing for everyone who comes to the raw-

food movement is to just believe that they are going to be the

exception to the rule, when statistically, most likely they're not

going to be.

 

But then these people, like in the case of that diet, would take

your argumentation and dissect it and then explain with science how

you can find all these things in their diet. That's usually what

happens.

 

You're right, that's usually what happens. However, if one takes

their science and shows it to a nutritional scientist, the

nutritional scientist will pooh-pooh their argument, and will show

the flaws in it. It gets as bad that in a lot of these books that

are used in the raw-food movement where it lists the amount of

protein available in certain food sources, and a lot of those table

are just plain old non-accurate. They're printed in a book, and it

looks scientific, but it's just not true. There are people that

believe that there's a whole bunch of protein in watermelon because

one of the old raw-food authors used to claim that and put it in his

book. There are people that I personally know who started eating

only watermelon, or made that the chief element of their diet,

thinking it's their primary protein source.

 

In the raw-food movement the problem is that you have a lot of

pseudo-science, which doesn't hold up to the scrutiny of actual

science.

 

True Raw-Vegan Believers

I want to say that you will never convince " true believers " of

any " ism " that there are problems with their " ism. " And so I don't

even attempt to do that. For the interview, I simply and honestly

answered questions that you've asked, but I'm not attached to

changing anybody's mind, and I'm not living in the illusion that I'm

going to change a bunch of raw-vegan minds, because I've already

experienced the fact that I'm not going to. Already, all that's

happened to me is by sharing honestly the information that I've

shared with you is that I got kind of blackballed by the raw-vegan

movement. They just tried to discredit me, instead of dealing with

these realities of nutritional deficiencies in a raw-vegan diet.

 

But there are some regular folks who come to the raw-food movement

because of all the hype and then start to experience problems in

their own bodies. If they see the information that I've given you, a

few of them might be moved to take positive steps, which could

result in saving themselves a lot of pain and misery, and that's why

I bother to share this information at all. It's not because I have

the delusion that I'm going to convince the defenders of an " ism " to

give up their " ism " — rather, I'm more concerned about members of

the public receiving all this hype, that if you get into the raw-

food vegan diet, you're going to live to be 120 years in really good

health. See, I used to believe that, and I used to teach that. I

believed it because that's what people told me, and that's what was

in the raw-food books, and so I parroted it.

 

A Challenge to the Raw-Vegan Movement

Is there anything you'd like to add before we end this interview?

 

I want to end with a challenge to the raw-vegan movement. Find us

one really old raw-vegan. One. I've been in the raw-vegan movement

for over twenty years, and I have never met a healthy, really old

raw-vegan, who's been on the raw-vegan diet for decades or anything

like that. In other words, if by eating the raw-vegan diet, we're

going to live to be a 120 years old and be disease free, then how

come, when you attend a national raw-food conference, there any

isn't old raw-vegans there? There's some in their 60's and 70s who

have been trying to do the diet and have problems in their own

lives. But why aren't there any 100 year old raw-vegans anywhere?

The raw-food movement is not new, but was popular in 1800's, when

the first Natural Hygiene movement started advocating the raw diet.

Then it was really big in the 1940's with Shelton. Why have we never

seen a single 100 year old raw-vegan? Why has there never been a 90-

year-old raw-vegan speaker at any of raw-vegan conferences?

 

So that's your challenge?

 

Yes, that's my challenge. And even if someone were to come up with

one 90 year old raw-vegan, I think that my point is still made,

because they'd have to struggle pretty hard to find that one. There

aren't a bunch of old raw-vegans! I'm a child of the 1960's. I was

born in the 1950's, and so, I was shaped by the 1960s, and believe

me, in the 1960's, we had raw-food gatherings then. Ann Wigmore,

before her Shelton — all these people existed back then. All of them

died. All the great leaders of the raw-food movement in the 1960s

are dead. And at no raw-food conferences in the 1960s was there ever

a 100-year-old speaker, or a 90-year-old speaker even. And in the

1970s, 1980s, 1990s, I've never met any of them. You hear legends

about Dr. Walker...

 

But he wasn't a raw-vegan?

 

He wasn't a raw-vegan and he wasn't a vegan. In one of his books, he

talks about how important goat's milk is, and he was drinking goat's

milk. And even with him, who wasn't a vegan, definitely there are

questions about how old he actually lived to be. Because, you hear

all sorts of different numbers. Unless someone actually produces a

birth certificate, we don't really know how old he was. But he's the

only example I've heard people give. And then I point out to them

that he wasn't a vegan. So you have to admit that most people who

come in and hear the hype believe that if they become a raw-vegan,

they are going to experience some great health benefits, and are

going to live a long time. And yet, if that's true, since the raw-

vegan movement has existed since the 1800s, and certainly was very

popular since the 1940's with natural hygiene and became even more

popular in the 1960s, why aren't there any old raw-vegans speaking

at the raw-vegan conferences?

 

Click here to read my article on what many of the classic vegan

gurus really ate. -- Chet

 

Final Comments by Frédéric Patenaude

Nazariah's experience with the raw vegan diet is not unique,

although not everybody will experience such dramatic problems. The

conclusion we can clearly draw from his experience (as well as

backed up by my own experience and research) is:

 

1. The raw vegan diet is not a guarantee for health.

 

2. Eating 100% raw is not necessary for optimal health. If this is

practiced, it should be done with careful planning.

 

3. Every vegan should be taking a B-12 supplement to insure optimal

health in the long-term.

 

4. We shouldn't believe invariably raw-vegan " experts " or what is

written in books, because the information is often not accurate.

 

As for whether we should be vegans or not, I do not necessarily go

in the same direction as Nazariah. I do not believe that everybody

should start eating some animal products. I believe that every vegan

should be taking a B-12 supplement, but also that the inclusion of

some animal products in the diet can be useful to many people.

 

I wish to say that I'm personally not convinced that a vegan diet

cannot be healthy. I think it depends on each individual. I

personally have found benefits in including some animal products in

my diet, and many others have found that too.

 

There are many health benefits to becoming at least mainly

vegetarian or even mainly vegan, as well as increasing the amount of

raw fruits and vegetables that we eat.

 

Final Comment by Chet: I continue to believe that eating a balanced

diet of healthy whole foods from both plant and animal kingdoms is a

smart way for most people to enjoy long lives free of chronic

illness. Although many people don't like to believe it, we are

opportunistic omnivores by heritage and to deny that simple fact is

to deny reality.

 

Click here for more articles about the dangers of strict veganism in

the long-term.

 

Click here for articles about Biblical nutrition and dangers with

the Genesis 1:29 Diet that is so popular in some Christian circles.

 

In closing , do your own homework where diet and health are

concerned.

 

Do not let the so-called gurus and experts do it for you.

 

-- Chet

 

 

 

 

 

 

---

-----------

 

P.S. If I wasn't doing what I'm doing with my website and

newsletters to earn my living online, I'd sell stuff on EBay using

the method I learned from an expert. Click here for details

 

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[Guest guest]

I enjoyed reading this article very much. Honestly, Ive had

difficulty figuring out the beneficience of raw foods on myself,

since Ive never really felt totally " healthy " as far as I can

remember regardless of diet.

 

I used to be a junk food eating 75% carnivore in college. I

literally and truly had maybe two salads during all 4.5 years of

college. Then I went on a journey around the country, where I became

about 95% vegetarian (fish or chicken occasionally, and maybe one

serving of beef in the past year and a half). During this time, I

remember feeling very lethargic, tho I felt that way in college too,

so its hard to say!

 

Then I tried macrobiotics for a little while, and that may be the

time I felt healthiest. I was also living in a very clean little

town way up north, and being very active. But I never got tired of

veggie stir fry and miso soup, including a great deal of brown rice.

 

It was Janurary of this year that I discovered raw. I began working

at a bed & breakfast that served all raw and offered massages et al.

It was a very small place, run by a single woman with help from

myself a a couple other part-time employees. I found the whole thing

fascinating. I wasnt 100%, but I did feel better in certain ways.

Especially when I ate blended food, like smoothies.

 

Then I moved to AZ to work at Gabriel Cousens retreat center, The

Tree of Life. I was 100% raw for 2.5 months (no cheating,

honestly!), and had been for almost a month before that, with one

exception the day I arrived in AZ (meant to be my last cooked meal

for a while, and it was).

 

Again, its hard to say. My job was really stressful, and I had

trouble digesting a lot of the food there (tons of nuts/seeds!). I

wasnt the only one, but I was the only one who made a fuss about it.

They kept saying " If you dont like it, dont eat it! " and I kept

saying " If its so healthy, why is it causing problems for everyone! "

 

In the end, I was fired. My complaining wasnt the only reason, but I

think it was a major one (the other reason was I didnt like my job

and instead of quitting, I just did a poor job (will I never

learn??)).

 

So now, Im a vegetarian eating about 50-60% raw, depending on the

day. Again, its hard to tell if I feel better or worse. Maybe half

the trouble is that I havent given any particular thing enough time

to see how it pans out. I dont even know what Im supposed to feel

like!

 

I can say this, for all the years that I ate few vegetables (ie.

since 1st grade), a lot of meat/pasta/dairy, and far too much sugar

and other junk food... I never once had a cavity. A few months after

becoming vegetarian last year, my first one appeared, then another,

and now possibly another. Theyre all very small and dont seem to be

growing, but theyre there.

 

Perhaps its detox? Who knows. But I can certainly appreciate the

position of Nazariah, that its more important to seek out truth

without the constraints of pride that come from attaching to an " -

ism " . But its also so hard. The only person I can really trust is

myself, but I dont even speak my own language.

 

JasonL

 

 

 

 

> Veganism and the Raw Food Diet Movement

> An Interview with Nazariah

> By Frederic Patenaude

> http://www.fredericpatenaude.com

>

>

> March, 2004

>

>

>

> Introductory Comments from Chet: It's a pleasure for me to share

> this fascinating dialogue between Nazariah and Frederic Patenaude

> because much of it confirms what I've been saying since 1999 about

> long-term deficiency problems with raw food diets and strict

> veganism. Throughout the interview, Frederic comments on some of

> Nazariah's remarks. To further the search for truth in raw food

> diets and strict veganism, I've added a few of my comments as well

> in boxes like this one.

>

[Guest guest]

Hi Jason and everyone-

 

Wow! You have certainly been around a lot. I don't know where these places are

or if they are in the United States or not. Well- I am in Oregon and I was 100%

raw for 4 years and this last 6 months I have been vegetarian- and the last two

weeks I have been back to 100% raw. I can say for me that whether I was 100% or

just vegetarian the thing that always made me feel better was eating more fruits

and vegetables. When on raw I couldn't eat too many dehydrated foods or rich

foods with nuts and grains without feeling groggy. The same goes with vegetarian

and starchy foods- breads- etc. The other thing that I found made me very groggy

and not feel healthy is choosing vegetable and fruits that were too high in

sugars. When I cut down on my sugars it's amazing how much more energetic I feel

(more leafy greens- mushrooms-asparagus..Etc...) The most important aspect of my

healthy has been the sugar thing- since I feel that is what makes me addicted to

cooked foods. I don't like the

dependency and comfort that I can get from eating potatoes- bread- and all

those things. To me the vitality of raw foods is what nourishes me- and although

I have tasted the BEST FOODS EVER- with raw foods- I would rather " discipline "

myself to eat for health (or course pleasure too- don't get me wrong- but

sometimes our emphasize on pleasure can divert us) and let my body be filled

with enzymes instead of some kind of emotional connection to the food. Anyways-

I kind of spurted out a little of my philosophy with raw food in my limited

experience and I feel I have SO MUCH TO LEARN. Today- I truly miss what being

raw was like. I saw it in my skin- my hair- my body. It is so much harder for me

to manage my weight with cooked foods. I don't really have a weight issue but I

feel ten or fifteen pounds heavier these last few months that I didn't even have

to think about with raw because I eat until I feel full- and with cooked I never

feel full!! I would be interested in the experiences

of other's as well as if anyone has resources for Portland Oregon- I had a guy

contact me telling me he had a restaurant in Portland- but besides that I would

like to know more about groups that meet in person. Thanks all!

 

 

 

 

 

Ivonne

@--)------

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

It was a true eye-opener!!

Many thanks for the article!

I've been waiting and waiting and waiting

for the promised improvement - looking ematiated with the hair falling out.

But there are some benefits too (clear thinking, etc).

T.

(a 16-year vegetarian service record, a few month vegan, not 100% raw)

[Guest guest]

Hey y'all-

 

Wow, I'm really surprised about the lack of responses from the

message below. I am not a raw foodist, but eat some raw foods, so

I'm no expert about raw foods. However, I'd love to hear some

feedback to this group, whether it's supporting or disagreeing with

the message below. Some of it makes sense to me, but think it would

be more credible if it had *more* specific references/sources,

rather than throwing up random percentages, etc.

 

Discuss!

 

Charlie

 

rawfood , " truthtogro " <truthtogro> wrote:

>

>

>

>

>

> Web chetday.com

>

>

>

>

> -

--

> -----------

>

>

>

> Veganism and the Raw Food Diet Movement

> An Interview with Nazariah

> By Frederic Patenaude

> http://www.fredericpatenaude.com

>

>

> March, 2004

>

>

>

> Introductory Comments from Chet: It's a pleasure for me to share

> this fascinating dialogue between Nazariah and Frederic Patenaude

> because much of it confirms what I've been saying since 1999 about

> long-term deficiency problems with raw food diets and strict

> veganism. Throughout the interview, Frederic comments on some of

> Nazariah's remarks. To further the search for truth in raw food

> diets and strict veganism, I've added a few of my comments as well

> in boxes like this one.

>

>

>

>

> In March I had the pleasure to interview Brother Nazariah, who is

> the founder of the Essene Church of Christ. In this fascinating

> interview, Nazariah shares with us his experiences with a raw food

> diet and the vegan movement. Nazariah may be reached on the

Internet

> at www.essene.org. I have made a few comments throughout the

> interview which are in green. My questions are always in italic

> typeface.

>

>

>

> First Experiences With the Raw Vegan Diet

> What is your background with the raw food diet?

>

> I'm 46 now and I've been a vegetarian since I was 17. At that age,

I

> not only became a vegetarian but also a raw foodist. I included

raw

> dairy into my diet because I had met an elderly Essene teacher who

> recommended that. Historically, that used to be the Essene diet.

The

> Essenes, for the most part, were not vegans. They were

vegetarians,

> and many of them were raw foodists, but they ate fermented dairy

> products — yogurt and kefir. So that was my diet was for 7 years.

> During that time, I did great — no problems at all.

>

> Then, when I had moved to another location, I became very

attracted

> to the vegan philosophy, because it is a beautiful philosophy. I

> then became a raw foodist.

>

> After 5 years on a raw food diet, I lost the ability to walk. All

of

> my extremities — my hands, my fingers and my feet — were in such

> pain that I couldn't move. I had central nervous system problems

and

> I was B12 anemic. All of that happened after 5 years on a raw food

> diet.

>

> So I switched back to eating the raw fermented dairy products. At

> that point, being as nerve-damaged as I was, I also included eggs.

I

> healed myself by reintroducing those products.

>

> At that point, I was wondering whether this was an experience

unique

> to myself, or whether other persons had had problems on the raw

food

> diet in the long-term. In the short term, you don't have those

sorts

> of problems. They're nutritional deficiencies that take several

> years to manifest themselves.

>

> Lack of Success in the Raw-Vegan Movement

> So I did some research. I put a call out on the Internet at

> different raw food chat boards. Because I was one of the speakers

at

> raw food events when they were held, I got to hang out with the

> other noted raw food speakers. I started realizing that problems

> like I'd had were rampant in the raw food movement, but don't get

> talked about.

>

> When the people who lecture and write the books start themselves

> having problems on the diet, they hide that fact because they are

> earning their livings being a raw food lecturer/author. I hate to

> say that, but it's that way. I've seen it happen again and again,

> when I will personally know a famous raw food speaker/teacher, and

> because I personally know them, I know that they are going through

> anxiety attacks, panic attacks, clinical depression, that they're

> having pain in their joints, they're losing their teeth — things

> like that. And yet, I'll see them speak at a raw food convention

and

> they never mention any of the problems they're actually

> experiencing. They just praise how perfect the raw food vegan diet

> is. And what happens is any time people are having problems on the

> raw food diet, they get told that they're just experiencing detox

> and cleansing. But that's just a pat answer.

>

> (Comments by Frederic: There is often a big misconception in the

raw

> food movement, where people will believe that anytime something

goes

> wrong, it is because of " detox. " I keep reminding people that the

> intense period of detoxification is often something that lasts

less

> than a few months — often only a few weeks. If symptoms persist,

> they are often signs of nutritional imbalances.)

>

>

>

> Yes, it's a great fallacy to think detox symptoms go on for years

> and years, and many raw food vegans have damaged their health by

> buying into this lousy idea.-- Chet

>

> Deaths in the Raw-Vegan Movement

> Here, in the Eugene area, where I live, a man in the local raw

food

> support group died about two years ago. He was only in his

forties.

> For two weeks before his death, he'd been telling the leader of

that

> group that he was having bad chest pains, but she just kept

telling

> him, " Oh, it's just detox, it's just cleansing. "

>

> And he had been into this for a long time?

>

> Yes, for a long time. He was one of the funding members of the raw

> food support group there. His doctor, when he died, told his wife

> (the man's wife) that her husband had died of starvation. His body

> just starved to death, even though he was eating raw foods

everyday.

> He wasn't absorbing enough nutrients from it.

>

> I was telling that story to a woman in Santa Monica who is part of

a

> raw food support group there, and she responded by saying: " Oh

yeah,

> we recently had a guy who died the same way, and he wasn't very

old

> either. The doctor said that his body just starved for lack of

> nutrients. " Then I was telling another woman in Florida who's a

> member of a raw food support group there the same story about both

> these people, the one in Eugene and the one in Santa Monica, and

she

> responded by saying, " Oh yeah, we've had two die that way. "

>

> Raw Vegan Fallacy #1: Protein

> The more I got into looking into this, the more I found that a lot

> of the things that get preached in the raw food movement just

aren't

> true. One has to do with protein. There is a real issue with

getting

> enough protein. On a cooked food vegan diet, you tend to eat a lot

> of beans and grains, and that is a complete protein. But if a

person

> is a raw foodist, beans and grains would be sprouted, and most

> people don't eat such a large amount of sprouts. Even if they do,

as

> soon as you begin to sprout, the protein is converted into

something

> else. So the protein content goes down. The vitamin content goes

way

> up when you sprout, so there are some good things about sprouting.

> The vitamin content increases, but the protein decreases. So on a

> raw diet, you think you're getting your protein from the little

bit

> of fermented seed cheeses, but you can't eat very much of that

> because it really clogs you up. So over a period of several years,

> people become really protein deficient.

>

> Protein is what rebuilds everything in our body. Everyday we're

> losing billions of cells, and they have to be replaced. Well, it's

> protein that is used by the body to rebuild all those things. So

> what happens is that over a period of time, the body just isn't

> rebuilding all of that and you end up having nerve damage and

> different repercussions. That can happen even in the cooked-food

> vegan diet.

>

> [Comments by Frederic: The amount of protein needed is different

for

> each individual. The problem is that those needing higher amounts

of

> protein who go on raw vegan diets are often the ones who

experience

> the most problems. Lack of strength, hair loss, and constant

hunger

> are some of the symptoms that can occur.]

>

> Longevity of Vegans

> The biggest study on the true mortality rates of vegetarians and

> vegans was published recently, and the results were partly shown

in

> Ahimsa magazine, which is a vegan magazine. Even though the

results

> were not good for the vegan movement, that vegan magazine said in

an

> editorial that they felt that in fairness to the readers, they

> needed to publish the information.

>

> The information was that even though we've been led to believe

that

> vegans live longer, they actually live less long than many other

> dietary categories. Vegans have a high incidence of degenerative

> brain diseases — Alzheimer, dementia, and things of that nature.

>

> In the past, all of the positive statistics about vegans, all

> the " less this " and the " less that, " all the good things that were

> taught in books like John Robbins's Diet for a New America — all

> those statistics weren't from studies from large groups of people

> who actually died. They were just extrapolated information. It was

> like, John Robbins would say, " Okay, fat is one of the things that

> cause heart disease. Vegans are eating 30% less fat, therefore

they

> will die of 30% less heart disease " It was all theory. As it turns

> out, there are certain things that are good about the vegan diet —

> such as less fat, less cholesterol — but the problem is that there

> are certain deficiencies in the diet, even in the cooked-vegan

diet,

> that actually cause vegans to have more of certain serious

diseases,

> especially brain-related ones, because it's all having to do with

> the central nervous system.

>

> Are there other studies to back up your claim that vegans live

less

> long than meat eaters?

>

> See, over the years, I've read many studies that have caused me to

> come to this conclusion. But I've also spoken to many experts,

such

> as Gabriel Cousens, who have clinical experience with vegans. But

it

> goes back to the 1990's, when Vegetarian Times, which is a major

> magazine, published the results of a study that was geared to just

> women, and tried to see which ones lived longer, between meat

> eaters, lacto-ovo vegetarians and vegan women. It turned out that

> the lacto-ovo vegetarians lived the longest, the meat eaters lived

> the next longest, and vegans lived the least long. And that was in

> Vegetarian Times approximately in 1990. So as the years went by

and

> studies were done, it just became sort of overwhelmingly obvious

> that a lot of the things that we believe in the raw food movement

> and the vegan movement literally aren't verifiable by science, and

> science actually discredits a lot of these claims.

>

> The good news is that a vegetarian diet, which includes some dairy

> and eggs, appears to be very healthy. That's the good news, is

that

> we can be healthy vegetarians. It's extremely questionable whether

> very many of us can be healthy vegans. It might be possible, but

> that it doesn't seem possible for the majority. The majority of

> vegans are actually not healthy.

>

> [Comments by Frederic: Actually, I haven't seen studies showing

that

> vegans live less long than vegetarians.]

>

>

>

> The " gold standard " for a vegetarian or non-vegetarian diet is

> mortality rates. I'd like to cite a study that traced over 76,000

> vegetarians and nonvegetarians.

> Entitled Mortality in vegetarians and nonvegetarians: detailed

> findings from a collaborative analysis of 5 prospective studies,

the

> UK study published in Am J Clin Nutr 1999 Sep;70

reveals: " Mortality

> from ischemic heart disease was 24% lower in vegetarians than in

> nonvegetarians (death rate ratio: 0.76; 95% CI: 0.62, 0.94;

P<0.01).

> The lower mortality from ischemic heart disease among vegetarians

> was greater at younger ages and was restricted to those who had

> followed their current diet for 5 y. "

>

> Those claiming vegan and vegetarian diets are healthier than diets

> with foods from both plant and animal kingdoms will appreciate

what

> they just read. Even more interestingly, however is the next

> conclusion of the study, which reveals: " Further categorization of

> diets showed that, in comparison with regular meat eaters,

mortality

> from ischemic heart disease was 20% lower in occasional meat

eaters,

> 34% lower in people who ate fish but not meat, 34% lower in

> lactoovovegetarians, and 26% lower in vegans. "

>

> Indicative of the point I try to make in my articles promoting a

> balanced diet based on plants with moderate servings from the

animal

> kingdom, those in the study who ate fish -- just as Jesus used

fish

> to feed the multitudes -- had the best protection from ischemic

> heart disease.

>

> But it's the final point of the study that deserves our keenest

> attention: " There were no significant differences between

> vegetarians and nonvegetarians in mortality from cerebrovascular

> disease, stomach cancer, colorectal cancer, lung cancer, breast

> cancer, prostate cancer, or all other causes combined. "

>

> One can, of course, quote studies or the Bible or various experts

> until one's blue in the face, but I have no intention of doing

> either. Instead, rather than sniping at each other, those of us

> interested in natural health, be it biblical or secular,

scriptural

> or scientific, should be helping each other to advance the truth

> about human diet.

>

> We need to sublimate our egos and honestly discuss problems with

our

> favorite diet regimes as they are reported and recognized. -- Chet

>

>

>

> B-12 Deficiency

> Most vegans are not getting enough B-12. It's very important to

take

> a B-12 supplement if you're on a vegan diet, and a lot of vegans

> don't. A lot of the sources vegans have believed they were getting

> their B12 from actually aren't good. For instance, the blue-green

> algae, the spirulina, sea vegetables, all of those things are

listed

> as having a lot of B12, but studies have shown that they're analog

> B12, which can't be utilized by the human body. Analog B-12

competes

> for receptor sites with the real usable B-12. It results that

eating

> any of those things, it's not only that you're not getting the B-

12

> you think you're getting, you're actually going to get less,

because

> the analog B-12 clings to the limited numbers of receptor sites in

> the body for real B12 — and then real B-12 can't cling to it,

> because it's already taken by the analog B-12. So, people who have

> been eating those things in the vegan movement thinking that it's

a

> natural source of B12 and that they don't need to take a B-12

> supplement, become very B-12 anemic.

>

> Gabriel Cousens, a holistic M.D., has become very concerned about

> the B-12 issue and is now publishing the results of new research.

He

> says that it's been demonstrated that 80% of vegans become

seriously

> B-12 deficient. He then lists the problems that can be related to

B-

> 12 deficiency, and it's an incredible list of problems.

>

> Vegetarianism Versus Veganism

> Where I come out on all this, is that when we look at our own

family

> lines, most of us have not had a vegetarian ancestor. The vast

> majority of us, living in America, have not had a single

vegetarian

> ancestor, going back all the way to this almost countless line of

> generations. And certainly, there was not a vegan in that family

> line. Therefore, that's a pretty radical thing to do, if you look

at

> it that way, to all of a sudden become a vegan, when no one in

your

> genetic line has been a vegan, going all the way back to perhaps

> thousands of years ago. We've been eating animal products for all

> that time, so the human system is expecting to get nutrients that

> way.

>

> So what I advocate now is that people become vegetarians, not

> vegans. With that in mind, there are certain smart things that you

> can do. For instance, the problem with dairy products that most

> people have is the digestion of lactose. Lactose is what causes

> mucus. But in fermented dairy the lactose is pre-digested by the

> fermentation process. Even most people who are lactose intolerant

> can tolerate fermented dairy. Fermented dairy is yogurt, kefir,

etc.

> You can also have some organic eggs from free-range chickens.

>

>

>

> Fallacies in the Raw Movement #2: Cooking

> Another one of the fallacies of the raw food movement is the idea

> that once you cook vegetables, you destroy all of the nutrients.

The

> reality is that it simply isn't true, according to some tests that

> have been done.

>

> They did a test for cancer purposes where they knew that there

were

> certain nutrients in certain vegetables with anti-cancer

properties.

> So they fed one group of people raw vegetables and they fed

another

> group cooked vegetables. Then they checked their blood, to see

which

> group had the highest level of the positive anti-cancer properties

> from the vegetables in their bloodstream, and it was the people on

> the cooked vegetables that had it, far more than the people on the

> raw vegetables.

>

> The reason is simply because most people digest cooked vegetables

> better than they digest raw vegetables. More nutrients get in the

> bloodstream from the cooked vegetables.

>

> There's an example that I give to a lot of the people that I know —

 

> younger people, college students, old hippies, people like that —

> who have at least at one time or another in their lives eaten

> marijuana brownies. The interesting thing about eating cooked

> marijuana is that you'll get high if you eat cooked marijuana, but

> you won't get high at all if you eat raw marijuana. And a lot of

> those people can relate to that. They tried raw marijuana — eating

> it, and nothing happened to them. They've tried cooking it and

> eating it, and they did get high. Well, the reason is because only

> when the marijuana is heated does it break down the fibers enough

to

> where the THC seeps out and can be absorbed into the human

> bloodstream.

>

> What I point out is that it's the same thing with a lot of the

> nutrients in vegetable matter. A lot of times, you'll eat the raw

> vegetables and your body doesn't really break down the fibers

enough

> to absorb certain of the nutrients. In a tomato, for example, you

> find lycopene, which is one nutrient that they've found which is

> really good for the human heart and has anti-cancer properties.

> Lycopene is not digested in a raw tomato. It is digested in a

cooked

> tomato. So, there are some nutrients that are more absorbed in

> cooked vegetables than in raw vegetables.

>

> If a person isn't defending a particular " ism, " but is just

looking

> for truth, you'll find that the healthiest diet is one that

includes

> a lot of both cooked vegetation, and raw vegetation — because

that's

> the best of both worlds. You're getting the things from the raw

> vegetables that you can't get from a cooked vegetable and you're

> getting things from the cooked vegetables that you're not going to

> get from the raw vegetables.

>

> The Healthiest Diet

> That is the healthiest diet. A vegetarian diet that's not a junk

> food vegetarian diet — but one based good, whole, organic foods.

>

> The healthiest diet would have one meal a day that is a raw

> vegetable salad — a major vegetable salad, not a little iceberg

> lettuce, but with romaine lettuce, broccoli, etc. — a real heavy-

> duty salad.

>

> Another meal would be cooked and feature things like steamed

> veggies, or a stir-fry, so it would have a lot of cooked

vegetation

> in it.

>

> A third meal simply would be fruit, like a fruit breakfast or a

> smoothie.

>

> In there, somewhere, you've got to get your protein. So either

with

> your salad, or with your cooked meal, you want to have yogurt or

> kefir, or hard-boiled eggs on your salad, or something.

>

> Could that be beans?

>

> It can some days, but if it were going to always be that, then

that

> would be vegan, and the whole point of everything I've just told

you

> is that it seems that the vegan diet isn't beneficial in the long-

> term. If a person were going to be a vegan, they could be having

> some tofu, tempeh, or some sort of a bean-type protein with their

> steamed veggies. That diet would be a healthy vegan diet, as far

as

> vegan diets go. But what I'm saying is that the latest research is

> that the vegan diet itself is deficient in the long-term.

>

> More Nutrients Lacking in the Vegan Diet

> What about supplements? If someone takes B-12, vitamin D, etc.,

> could that be complete?

>

>

>

> They keep on discovering certain little things that we didn't

know,

> even three years ago, five years ago, ten years ago. You really

> can't be sure that there's something else that they haven't

> discovered that's lacking in the vegan diet.

>

> For example, we only found out a few years ago about the need for

> the omega-3. Omega-3 fatty acids are very important, and it's very

> difficult to get them on a vegan diet. Several years ago, when

that

> got discovered, we got told that it's in flax seeds. So then

people

> in the vegan movement started having a lot of flax seeds or flax

> oil, and stuff like that. Well, now, as recently as a year ago,

they

> discovered that we only absorb something like less than 6% of the

> omega 3 in flax oil. So in other words, you'd have to eat an

> incredible amount of flax oil to get very much omega 3 from it,

> because most people don't absorb very much of it from flax oil.

>

> And then, they discovered as recently as one year ago that there's

a

> long-chain fatty acid, which is really important to the brain and

is

> not found in any vegan source of food. Then about a month ago,

> Gabriel Cousens said that this long chain fatty acid, called EPA,

is

> present in this kind of wild plant called purslane. But hardly

> anybody knows that in the vegan movement, because that just got

> discovered a month ago. And most of them don't know that they're

> even missing this long-chain fatty acid.

>

> What I'm telling you that for is that, even though the general

idea

> is that you just combine some beans and grains and maybe take a B-

12

> supplement and you're going to have everything that you need,

> actually, there are little things, like certain fatty acids that

> they keep on discovering that aren't in the vegan diet, until they

> figure out some way that you can get it from a vegan source. So I

> wonder, whether or not in the next five years, or 10-20 years,

> they're going to keep on discovering little things like that, that

> they didn't know before.

>

> It certainly has been happening my whole lifetime. They keep on

> discovering ether new tidbits of information. So if a person were

> concerned about health, I wouldn't recommend a vegan diet.

>

> Ethics and Health

> If your main reason for being a vegan is the ethical concerns for

> the animal world and if you're willing to take on the personal

karma

> of being less healthy because of your ethical considerations for

the

> animal world, then, that's an okay reason to be a vegan, but not

> health, because it doesn't seem to be healthy in the long-term.

>

> So you have to just decide, where you're at on that. If you don't

> care about your own health, or if you're willing to sacrifice your

> own health because of the ethical considerations for the animal

> world, then I don't have any problems with that. If a person knows

> that they're going to have an increased chance of dying

prematurely,

> and having different health problems, but are choosing that path

> knowingly, because of their love for the animal world, well then

> that's fine. As long as they're doing it knowingly.

>

> My viewpoint is that I think that for the animal world, our

> generation is making a good step in the right direction by simply

> stopping eating animals. We're making a good step in the right

> direction for our species. After a certain number of generations

of

> our family line actually being vegetarian, we could probably

evolve

> from a vegetarian species into a vegan species — the way evolution

> works.

>

> But you don't just go from a meat eating species to all of a

sudden

> being a vegan species without a lot of traumatic problems. So I

> advise a more intermediate step. Let's first evolve into being

> vegetarians for a number of generations, then let's evolve into

> veganism and let evolution happen in that way.

>

> Raw-Veganism During Pregnancy

> I don't think that it's wise for a woman who is pregnant to eat a

> raw-vegan diet, and the reason is that there are numbers of

studies

> and view points that believe that there is an insufficient amount

of

> nutrients comes in — especially vitamin B12. If a woman were

taking

> the vitamin B-12 supplement, and certain other supplements, then

she

> probably could stay on a raw-vegan diet. However, a lot of the

> people that are on the raw-vegan don't believe in supplements —

they

> don't believe in taking vitamin B12. And according to the latest

> research from Gabriel Cousens, 80% of vegans are B-12 deficient. A

> vitamin B-12 deficiency in children leads to irreversible brain

> damage. So even if later in their life, they're eating plenty of B-

> 12, there's been irreversible brain damage already done.

>

>

>

> I understand the reasons that a woman would choose to be a raw

vegan

> herself and to attempt to raise her children that way, and even to

> attempt to maintain that diet while she's pregnant. The reason is

> that she believes that it's good for her and that it will be good

> for her children. The problem is that actual scientific evidence

> shows otherwise. It's very risky and dangerous for a pregnant

woman

> to be on a raw vegan diet, and it is risky and dangerous to raise

> small children on a raw vegan diet.

>

>

>

> Now, one might say, are there other problems besides the B-12

issue?

> Well, the B-12 issue is very important. There would need to be a B-

> 12 supplement to be raising your child on a raw-vegan. But B-12

> isn't the only issue. Many children who are being raised on a raw-

> vegan diet are suffering various nutritional deficiencies that

> affect them later in life. And even if a person believes that

> perhaps a child can be raised successfully on a raw-vegan diet,

they

> owe it to their child to research the issue before attempting to

> actually raise the child as a raw-vegan. It's not enough to

research

> the issue by asking raw-food experts, because as I've pointed out

in

> this interview, raw-food experts have been spreading incorrect

> information for a number of years. You have to actually get into

> talking to other sources of information, including nutritional

> scientists — people who actually study nutrition.

>

> Have you seen yourself children who've been raised on a raw vegan

> diet?

>

> I know friends of the family of the infant that died recently in

> Florida, and they tell me that even the older children in that

> family were emaciated and looked like Nazi workcamp inmates.

>

>

>

> For an important article by former vegans whose seven child was

> brain-damaged as a result of his mother's deficiency problems from

> eat the predominantly raw and strict vegan Hallelujah Diet during

> her pregnancy, -- Chet

>

> Is 100% raw ideal?

> Here's what I think now: a person on a raw diet, including

fermented

> dairy products or eggs, will do fine. But if a person was going

for

> what the healthiest diet is, I think having one meal of cooked

> vegetables per day — steamed vegetables or an oriental stir-fry,

or

> something like that — is actually even healthier than being 100%

raw

> for this reason:

>

> Studies have shown that certain important nutrients in vegetables

> are better absorbed and utilized by a human being from cooked

> vegetables. And other certain important nutrients are better

> absorbed and utilized by a human being from raw vegetables. So,

the

> best of both worlds is each day to have cooked and raw vegetables

in

> our diet.

>

> So actually, as far as what would be the most healthy diet, I

think

> it would be one meal each day that includes cooked vegetables,

like

> some steamed veggies or stir-fry and one meal per day that's

> basically a big, raw, vegetable salad, and, if there's a third

meal,

> that can be a couple pieces of fruit or fruit smoothie for

> breakfast, and that would be raw. So the diet that I just

described

> would be two third raw. And then there's got to be a good source

of

> protein in that diet, which means that perhaps with the cooked

meal,

> one might have some kefir, some yogurt, or perhaps, on the salad a

> couple of hard-boiled eggs.

>

> What's Missing in the Vegan Diet

> This leads me to question the protein theories that I have

learned.

> The current RDAs for protein are 0.8 grams for every kilo of ideal

> body weight, which seems fairly easy to get on a raw-vegan diet.

So

> where do you get the impression that protein is such an important

> element in the diet?

>

> Where we get the impression is from the actual crippled people and

> people with nervous disorders on the vegan diet. See, on paper,

like

> you're saying, it all looks fine. But in reality, you have people

on

> long-term vegan diets having real problems.

>

> So that's where we find out that there are problems. So then the

> investigators say, " Okay, even though we thought that there was

> plenty of these nutrients in a long-term vegan diet, we have these

> degenerative brain diseases and things like that happening to

> vegans: so what's the problem? " Then they discover that there are

> certain long-chain fatty acids and other things that we're not

> really thinking about when we're just looking at how many ounces

of

> protein is in this or that.

>

> The real complexity comes in that there'd be these things that we

> haven't factored in. And then even right now, there's no reason to

> think that in the next five or ten years they're not going to

> discover more of those little things that we don't currently know

> about, because they keep discovering more. You have to realize

that

> in the 1900s, nobody knew what B-12 was, nobody knew what vitamin

C

> was, nobody knew what vitamin A was — that's all stuff that got

> discovered later. And as the years go by, they keep discovering

more

> things. Rather than look at all the things they've discovered so

> far, and then look at whether or not you can get them on a certain

> diet, it's good to look at groups of people who have been

following

> a certain diet and if they're healthy or not.

>

> Long-Term Vegans Don't Look Good

> One of the things that I've just noticed, with my own eyeballs, is

> that a lot of long-term vegans actually don't look healthy. They

> look kind of emaciated, their skin is kind of yellow, they've got

> bags under their eyes, their hair's not good — it's splitting,

their

> fingernails aren't good. So just looking at long-term vegans, like

> if you go to a vegan's organization's meeting and look at the

people

> and you'll realize that they actually don't even look healthy,

> especially when you look at the people that have been on it for

> longer than 10 years. So then you start finding out that they're

> having really major health problems related to certain nutritional

> deficiencies.

>

> I want to emphasize that I was a vegan. I was a radical vegan. I

was

> in favor of the philosophy, and I still think it's a beautiful

> philosophy. I still think it's fine for a person, in spite of all

> that I've said — to just knowingly become a vegan. But what they

> shouldn't be under is the false illusion that they're following a

> diet that's healthier than other diets, which is what they

thought.

> In fact, it's probably not as healthy as certain other diets. And

> it's okay to do it, as long as you realize that you are taking a

> risky dietary choice, and you're doing it for ethical reasons, not

> health reasons.

>

> [Comments by Frederic: I wouldn't generalize like that. Not all

> vegans are unhealthy. However, there are some people who

definitely

> aren't doing well and do not look well, which can be attributed to

> their diet because their problems go away when they stop being

> vegans.]

>

> Raw-Vegan Fallacy #3: Enzymes

> You're probably familiar with the very recent case in Florida,

where

> a small child died on a raw-vegan diet. When that happened, there

> were a lot of newspaper articles in Florida about the raw-food

diet.

> And those reporters were going around, asking different

nutritional

> experts for their opinion on the raw-food diet. Well, some buddy

in

> Florida sent me a couple of newspaper articles, and in those

> articles, there were a few nutritional scientists interviewed.

They

> were pointing out, like I've mentioned before, that most of the

> nutrients get absorbed better in a cooked vegetable, and a few get

> absorbed and utilized better in a raw vegetable. Therefore, the

> healthiest diet would be one that included both raw and cooked

> vegetables, because then you're getting the nutrients that are

> better absorbed in each way.

>

> But there are other fallacies that nutritional scientists pointed

> out. One of which is the whole living enzyme thing. Only one

> researcher, in the 1940's, that Dr. Howell, who always gets

> mentioned in the raw food literature, believed that there was a

> chance that, when you ate raw foods, those enzymes in the food

would

> make it to the part of the digestion process where they could be

> helpful, before they got themselves completely fried. But, your

> other 99% of researchers don't believe that. And this is what

people

> in the raw-food movement don't realize, is that the idea that the

> raw enzymes in food that you eat are going to help you digest your

> food is not believed to be true by 99% of researchers. The reason

is

> because before food every gets to the point where the nutrients

are

> being extracted, it's already been totally broken down by your own

> digestion process. When you eat food, it goes to a place in your

> stomach where there's these incredible " fires " with acids, and

stuff

> like that, and it totally breaks down your food before it gets to

> the point that those enzymes could help in the way that raw-

foodists

> believe they help.

>

> But, the other thing is that the enzymes of a plant are not the

same

> as the enzymes of a human being, in our digestive tract. The

enzymes

> of a plant are designed by a plant to help the plant digest its

> nutrients, its food. So the enzymes of a broccoli plant are for

the

> broccoli plant to digest its food. If you look at them with a

> microscope, they aren't the same as the enzymes in a human

digestive

> tract.

>

> Now there are a few plant enzymes that have been found to help

> digest certain things, like for instance in papayas you have

papain.

> There are a couple of plant enzymes that seem to have a beneficial

> effect in digesting certain things, but the idea that we have when

> we are eating our salads and our raw foods that all of those

living

> enzymes in those plants are somehow going to aid our digestion

> process actually is not what science has found.

>

> Underweight Raw Vegans

> If we go to a raw food conference, you notice that a lot of men

look

> quite skinny or emaciated. Some say it's detox and that the weight

> will come back, but then many have been on this diet for quite a

> while and still are quite underweight.

>

> That's the big problem now, but there are a few exceptions to the

> rule: people who have amazing digestive systems and are able to

> digest nutrients properly on an all-raw diet. But the important

> thing is that those are the exception to the rule. The vast

majority

> of people do not adequately break down and digest all the raw

foods

> that they're eating. And that's why they can't reach a healthy

> weight.

>

> I mentioned to you that several people have died on a raw food

diet

> and that when they died; the doctor said that their body had

starved

> to death. Those weren't people that were fasting; they were people

> that were eating raw foods everyday. But their body starved to

death

> because these individuals had less effective digestive systems

than

> the average person. So, even though the average person would not

> digest as many nutrients from the raw vegetables as from the

cooked

> vegetables, people with poor digestion digest so few nutrients on

> the raw food diet that they can actually starve to death even

though

> they are eating everyday.

>

> And so, when one sees things like that happen and then try to

bring

> that up and talk about it in the raw-food movement, then everyone

> gets really defensive and starts attacking you and labeling you in

> some negative way.

>

> What raw-foodism has become is just another " ism, " that is

defended

> by the true believers. And any information that I've provided you

in

> this interview, what the true believers will do with it is that

> they'll simply look at it and immediately start forming arguments

> and opinions to counter it, without ever being open to the

> possibility that it might actually be true. Just like a Jehovah

> Witness would defend Jehovaism, and a Mormon would defend

Mormonism,

> raw-foodists will defend raw-foodism.

>

> The Raw-Vegan Movement

> When we talk to these leaders, people like Gabriel Cousens,

they'll

> acknowledge the B-12 issue. But you don't just recommend

supplements

> but move away from the vegan diet completely. Why?

>

> The thing is that I'm not so personally invested in having to

defend

> the raw-food diet or the vegan diet. I simply got into all of this

> because I was a seeker of truth, and I was looking for a diet that

> was spiritual and healthy, and wherever truth has led me, I

> followed. The problem is that with most of these noted leaders of

> the movement are authors. That's how they got to be the noted

> leaders, because they were writing the books. And they're on the

> lecture circuit, they have clients, they're earning their living

> from being an authority on veganism or raw-foodism. If they

> completely just shift and say, " I no longer believe that the raw-

> vegan diet is anything that should be advocated to the large

number

> of people, " then the problem is that it pulls the rug from

> underneath them, personally, in regards to how they're earning

their

> living. So I hate to say a thing like this, but from what I've

seen

> with my own eyes, it seems to be part of the problem.

>

> The leaders, the authority figures, are earning their living from

> being promoters of this particular diet. So therefore — and even

the

> best of them — when they start to see some problems, their

instinct

> is to just recommend a particular supplement, or something like

> that, and of course, usually they sell the supplements that

they're

> recommending. You'll notice that most of them do. So they sell

those

> things, but if they were to simply say, " Gosh, you know even

though

> I became a famous author on this topic, it doesn't actually seem

to

> be valid anymore, " they would have to change their entire career.

> The thing that they're famous for would not be something that they

> aren't in favor of anymore. It's a radical thing that they would

> have to experience and go through.

>

> Long-Term Raw-Food Authors Eating Cooked Food

> Are you saying that these leaders may actually not be vegans

> themselves but won't come out publicly and say that?

>

> That's not what I just said. But since you are saying that, on

> whether or not they are vegans or not, all I can say is that I

have

> seen with my own eyes certain things... One incident occurred when

I

> was one of the speakers at the raw-food convention in San

Francisco,

> a few years back. Two of the speakers were really insistent that

one

> has to be on a 100% raw-vegan diet and that 80% raw is not okay to

> get the benefits. They said out loud that you have to be 100% raw-

> vegan. And each of those speakers claimed to have been 100% raw-

> vegans for 20 years. They were the most aggressive, assertive

> speakers in the entire convention, really negative towards anyone

> that would just eat partially raw. Well, before the end of that

> weekend, I saw each of them sneakily eat cooked food.

>

> I went for a walk and a few blocks away from the convention center

> and I walked by a pizza restaurant, and there was one of the

> speakers who had said those things, and he's eating a pizza. You

can

> order a pizza with no cheese on it, but even then it would be

cooked

> food and he was claiming that he hadn't eaten cooked food in 20

> years. And it looked like it was a cheese pizza.

>

> Then when I was leaving the San Francisco airport, and I was

walking

> around that round concourse in the airport, with little

restaurants

> and things like that, and there was the other speaker who had been

> so aggressive and assertive about having to be 100% raw. He was

> sitting at a table having a plate of spaghetti. I don't know

whether

> that was vegan or not, but it was certainly cooked. And, as I was

> approaching him and he saw me coming up, he stuck up a newspaper

and

> hid his face behind it. But I didn't embarrass him by walking up

to

> him.

>

> One of the real problems in that raw food movement with those

> experts and authors is that they have a lot of guilt because they

> get into this thing about having to be 100% raw. And when they

> themselves have a binge or sneakily eat some cooked food, they

don't

> want to admit it because it would wreck their reputation as the

> great raw-foodist that never eats cooked food. So therefore they

eat

> the cooked food on the sly and then have guilt about it. They

start

> to get into a very vicious cycle psychologically. Yet, when you

> speak to them or when they do their lecture, they just still claim

> to have never eaten cooked food in all these years. They put on a

> fake front to the public. So I saw that with my own eyes with a

> number of the leading individuals.

>

> So, are there some of those leaders who really are 100% raw-vegans

> through the years and are healthy? There might be. But, they also

> might not be. I mean, all I know is that the ones that I get to

> know, the more I get to know them, the more I see them eating

cooked

> food on the sly, or having really severe problems like anxiety

> attacks, panic attacks, clinical depression, teeth falling out,

> fingernails breaking, hair falling out. So I'm just not personally

> impressed with my experience of the raw food movement and the raw-

> food experts! That's just my own personal experience with all that.

>

> My personal experience mirrors that of Nazariah regarding lies by

> leaders in the raw vegan movement. -- Chet

>

> But I'm sure some people will come to you and say, " Oh, I know

this

> guy who's been a raw-vegan for 30 years, and he's muscular and

he's

> really healthy. "

>

> Yeah, and what I always think of when I hear that is those

speakers

> that I saw that said that they had been 100% raw for 20 years and

> that very weekend of the raw food convention both of them ate

cooked

> food. So, I take it all with a grain of salt. In other words,

those

> people might believe they know somebody that's been raw-vegan for

30

> years and is in great physical condition, but whether that person

> really has been or not, or whether that person really is healthy

and

> isn't suffering some things behind the scenes, one doesn't know.

And

> so, I remain open to the possibility that there are some

individuals

> whose particular body type has permitted to be a raw-vegan for

> thirty years and be in good health. I admit that possibility, but

my

> own experience tells me that that would be few and far between —

it

> wouldn't be most people.

>

> Lack of Honesty in the Raw-Vegan Movement

> There's not much honesty in the raw movement, as you're saying...

>

> See, there's a definite problem there. And it's not, a " problem of

> the raw movement. " The problem is just human beings. Whether

you're

> talking about politics, whether you're talking about sports,

> whatever field you're talking about, you find that there are a lot

> of things that are done for the profit motive. That individual

> people are usually looking out for how they're earning their

income.

>

> Now we see that and criticize it, in things like the oil industry

> and the munitions industry, but the same exact thing is true in

the

> health food industry. It's true in health movements, raw-food

> movements, and things like that. There gets to be certain groups

of

> people who are earning their living from it and feeding their egos

> by being the authority figures. The human species seems to, in

> general, still have a problem struggling with basic honesty.

>

> In the raw-food movement, you sort of set yourself up for the

worst

> of human nature, simply because you get into a one-upsmanship

thing

> where, " what percent raw are you? " , " How long have you been 100%

> raw? " You get into this sort of like " raw-food one-upsmanship, "

> which cultivates the worst in human behavior patterns.

>

> Supplements

> Many of the authors in the raw-movement, who used to recommend

> really simple, basic raw-vegan diets, are now getting into all

these

> supplements and super-foods. It seems that they're noticing that

> this basic raw-vegan diet seems to be deficient. Why is that?

>

> There are two reasons for that. One is because of what you just

> said. There's an interesting thing about the raw food movement,

> which is different than other field. In the raw-food movement, if

> you come into it and are a raw-foodist for a fairly short time —

> like two or three years — you tend to start writing your books.

>

> In the raw-food movement as a whole, people get into the idea of

the

> pristine version of the raw-food diet, which wouldn't include

> supplements. They do that for a period of time and write a book or

> two while they're on that version of the diet. Then, all of the

> sudden in their own lives, they start having the problems of the

> nutritional deficiencies, and then they start looking for the

> answers. At first, the idea is that the answer is like some simple

> fix, like, " Gosh, if I just take a B-12 supplement, or if I just

eat

> this algae " or something like that. So then, they start looking

for

> the answer in that direction. So, that's one reason why all these

> raw-food guys end up getting into pitching supplements.

>

> But the other reason is that once you've become a raw-food author

> and are getting to speak at the raw-food events and are earning a

> bit of money being on the lecture circuit, you quickly realize how

> much more money you could make if you were selling supplements. It

> just becomes really obvious that if all of these people who are

> attending your lecture had the opportunity to buy from you some

> vitamin C or buy from you some fatty acids or something like that,

> well, you're going to walk away from that event with more money in

> your pocket. Plus, you can only be in so many places in a year,

you

> can only do so many lectures, you can only earn so much money from

> that. But the amount of money that you can make over your web page

> if you're hulking supplements is astronomical —there's no limit to

> it. So, once a person is viewing their career as being a raw-food

> teacher, they soon learn that they'll make a lot more money if

> they're also selling supplements.

>

> But that first reason that we talked about, which was, they

> themselves start to experience nutritional deficiencies and are

> looking for answers — that's in there too. So there's these two.

>

> Then, the question is, would that be possible to go on a raw-vegan

> diet that wouldn't include supplements?

> I'd recommend Gabriel Cousens' latest information. It's not in his

> book. It's in his e-mail bulletin, and he actually contradicts

> what's in his book — he admits that. He says that what he put in

his

> book is what he believed at the time. He now believes that

problems

> with B-12 in the vegan movement are much more severe. Before, he

was

> saying you could get B-12 from certain sources, like spirulina and

> blue-green algae and certain sea vegetables. He now does not

believe

> that. He believes that those are analog B-12 that can't be

absorbed

> by the human body. And so now he's advocating that people take a B-

> 12 supplement. He says that maybe 20% of human beings could do a

> vegan diet without having to take a B-12 supplement, but at least

> 80% can't. And people shouldn't just assume that they're in that

20%

> category, because the odds are against them.

>

> He believes that 20% might be able to go without a B-12 supplement

> simply because when he tests vegans, 80% of them are found to be

in

> serious B-12 deficiency. But to me, that doesn't necessarily mean

> that 20% of the people can go without B-12 supplementation on a

> vegan diet. Because in fact, of those 20% people that he's testing

> that right now, aren't deficient — how do we know that three years

> from now, 10% of those people won't have become deficient? In

other

> words, a best-case scenario, which is what Gabriel is talking

about,

> is that maybe 20% of the people on a vegan diet wouldn't need the

> supplement.

>

> Long-Chain Fatty Acids

> But that just B-12, though.

>

> Yes, like I was was indicating, and it's really complex. What we

> know, based on that article, the research published in the

American

> Vegan that I cited, is that vegans die more of degenerative brain

> diseases. Now, then the question is why? And this is new

> information; it didn't used to be known that vegans get more of

> these brain-wasting diseases. Now that that is known, people are

> looking for the answer. And they're coming up with certain

answers,

> like that there's a particular long-chain fatty acid that is not

> available in a vegan diet.

>

> What I stick on there as an extra is that we don't even know right

> now what brain nutrients might be lacking in the vegan diet,

because

> they're just barely discovering this. They barely discovered this

> long-chain fatty acid that isn't present in the vegan diet. So for

> us to now buy a supplement of that one thing and think that we've

> solved the problems with the vegan diet, I don't think that would

be

> valid.

>

> How do we know that two years from now, six years from now they're

> not going to be discovering other little things that we didn't

know

> existed before that are lacking on the vegan diet? What we do know

> is that there are some sorts of nutritional deficiencies in the

> vegan diet, and we're starting to discover what some of those

> deficiencies are. For instance, David Wolfe and Gabriel Cousens

want

> to develop a supplement for that long-chain fatty acid.

>

> DHA?

>

> EPA. That's a long-chain fatty acid and one of the things it

> protects against is depression, which is one of the reasons vegans

> also have a higher incidence of suicide, clinical depression,

> anxiety attacks and panic attacks. It may be because they're not

> getting enough of this EPA long-chain fatty acid. So Gabriel and

> David Wolfe are interested in developing a supplement they would

> sell that would be a vegan source for EPA. Right now, there's one

> plant source that some people can get their EPA from. It's an herb

> that grows wild like a weed and is called purslane. The thing

about

> that is that only people with good digestion can absorb the EPA

from

> the purslane. People with good digestion can do that. But people

> with less than average digestion can't.

>

> If you were a vegetarian who eats dairy and eggs, would you get

EPA

> from the animal products that you're eating?

>

> Here's what we know: we know is that vegetarians who eat a bit of

> dairy and some eggs live longer and healthier and have less

> nutritional deficiencies. You've got the possibility to eat some

> dairy and/or eggs, but since some people have problems digesting

> dairy, eggs are a good option. Eggs seem to have some nutrients

that

> dairy doesn't have, and it seems to me that eggs seem to have

> everything in them that meat has, but the dairy only has most of

> what meat has. So I think that the person who eats dairy will be

> helping themselves nutritionally, but not as much as much as if

they

> eat eggs. So then the thing is to get organic eggs from free-range

> chickens.

>

> I guess this is my point: rather than try and figure out what

exact

> supplement or what exact fatty acid we need to take to be a vegan,

> it seems to me that by far the safer thing to do is just be a

> vegetarian who eats some eggs and a bit of dairy, because of that

> point that I keep coming back to. They keep discovering these

> different things that are deficient in the vegan diet every couple

> years. So even if right now you take a particular supplement

that's

> supposed to handle some particular problem now, you don't really

> know that in two years or eight years they're not going to

discover

> that vegans are still dying of these problems and so, we still are

> lacking something. We don't know how this is going to come out.

So,

> the safest thing to do is to simply start eating some organic eggs.

>

> Is Fish Healthy?

> But then, if we take your arguments further and someone was just

> interested in health, would that be healthier not to be a strict

> vegetarian, and have fish occasionally?

>

> If a person doesn't have the ethical considerations, then the

> healthiest diet might be to include some fish. However, I do have

> myself the ethical problems with that, so that's not what I'm

> recommending to people. I feel that if we can make the step to

> become vegetarian, this generation, that we're doing a great

thing.

> We are making a giant step in the right direction of ethics. Just

> becoming a vegetarian is doing a good thing. But to answer your

> question, if a person didn't have the ethical problems with eating

> fish, would that be healthy? Well, the answer is probably yes, as

> long as it wasn't fish from a polluted source that has mercury or

> something like that.

>

> One has to be careful with fish because so much of it these days

is

> polluted and unhealthy. Here at CasaDay, we only eat wild tuna and

> Alaskan salmon from Vital Choice Seafood. The stuff is expensive,

> but I feel it's worth every penny in taste and quality. -- Chet

>

> Raw Versus Pasteurized Dairy Products, Eggs

> Here in Canada you don't find raw dairy products, except cheese.

You

> only find pasteurized dairy milk. So what would you recommend?

>

> What I would recommend is going to a health food store and buying

> the health-food store variety of yogurt or kefir. The reason is

that

> those are live-foods, because of the fermentation process and the

> culture, even though they're not raw.

>

> So that still would give you the benefits?

>

> You see, even though we all hear about all the problems with

> pasteurization, we shouldn't forget the problems with non-

> pasteurized dairy. For instance, dying of the worst case of

diarrhea

> you can possibly imagine! Because when you drink raw milk, there's

> the possibility that it's contaminated with E-coli. So there are

the

> pros and cons of unpasteurized dairy products. If a person is not

> concerned with things like E-coli in a raw egg, they could simply

> put a couple of raw eggs in their smoothies, if they are trying to

> be raw-foodists.

>

> Just the yolk or the whole thing?

>

> I would say the whole thing, and the reason is because the egg

white

> has the protein, but the yolk has certain fatty acids that seem to

> be important for the brain.

>

> [Comments by Frederic: Raw milk is definitely preferable to

> pasteurized milk. It is much more assimilable. Also: It's not

> recommended to eat raw egg whites. Egg whites contain strong

enzyme

> inhibitors and are close to impossible to digest raw. The best

thing

> is to have the yolk raw and the white cooked.]

>

> I disagree with Frederic about egg whites. Would nature create a

> whole food as excellent in so many nutritional factors as the egg

> and then require half of it to be discarded as unhealthy? -- Chet

>

> The Latest Raw Vegan Diets

> Some people recommend a fruit-based, low-fat raw diet, and say

that

> you actually won't get the problems that all these other raw-food

> people are getting because they're eating so much fat. What are

your

> thoughts on this?

>

> Over the years, I've seen every imaginable variety of the raw food

> diet, and the one common denominator that I've seen over a period

of

> time is that the raw-vegan diet over a period of years seems to be

> nutritionally deficient. That's my opinion. It seems to me that a

> raw-vegan diet, over a period of years, leads to severe

nutritional

> deficiencies.

>

> This is one of the problems: there will always be people pitching

> some particular variation of the raw diet, which is going to be

the

> true solution, if you just do this. And of course they'll write a

> book about it and will be on the lecture circuit about it. The

> problem is that a couple years go by and that's no longer the " in "

> variation — it's some other variation take its place, a couple

years

> later some other variation. What I've seen is that no variation

that

> is raw-vegan for years in a row seems to be adequate.

>

> The diet that you're particularly mentioning there: where is it

> going to get that long-chain fatty acid that we're talking about?

> Where is it going to get its B-12, where is it going to get its

> complete protein? Those are very real issues. In the raw food

> movement, people will read an old Arnold Ehret book, which talks

> about the possibility of making protein from the air we breathe,

and

> they'll just believe they can do it. And yet, not one human being

> has ever been shown to be able to do it. They'll read in an old

> fruitarian book that suggests that we could make B-12 in our gut,

> like some of the animals do. And even today, if you ask vegans, if

> they believe that they can make B-12 in their own gut, more than

> half of them believe that they do. Because I've asked that

question,

> and most people have that belief in the vegan movement that we are

> making our own B-12 in our gut, in a way that we can live off that

B-

> 12 and utilize it. In reality, not one human being has ever been

> shown to be able to do. That's the science. Not one human being

has

> ever been able to demonstrate that they were living off the B-12

in

> their gut. In Gabriel Cousens' latest bulletin on this B-12

problem,

> he says that the only way a human being could live off B-12 made

in

> their gut would be if they ate their own feces. And I don't think

> that that's going to become a popular option.

>

> That's the problem with these variations of the raw-vegan diet,

like

> the one you asked me about specifically. Those variations don't

> supply the essential fatty acids that the brain needs; they don't

> supply enough of the complete amino acids. They don't supply

enough

> of the B-12 and other essential nutrients, and that's why people,

> after they've been on those diets for lengths of time, end up

having

> nutritional deficiencies. So I don't know that there are

exceptions

> to the rule, but I acknowledge that there might be. What I say

about

> that is that the dangerous thing for everyone who comes to the raw-

> food movement is to just believe that they are going to be the

> exception to the rule, when statistically, most likely they're not

> going to be.

>

> But then these people, like in the case of that diet, would take

> your argumentation and dissect it and then explain with science

how

> you can find all these things in their diet. That's usually what

> happens.

>

> You're right, that's usually what happens. However, if one takes

> their science and shows it to a nutritional scientist, the

> nutritional scientist will pooh-pooh their argument, and will show

> the flaws in it. It gets as bad that in a lot of these books that

> are used in the raw-food movement where it lists the amount of

> protein available in certain food sources, and a lot of those

table

> are just plain old non-accurate. They're printed in a book, and it

> looks scientific, but it's just not true. There are people that

> believe that there's a whole bunch of protein in watermelon

because

> one of the old raw-food authors used to claim that and put it in

his

> book. There are people that I personally know who started eating

> only watermelon, or made that the chief element of their diet,

> thinking it's their primary protein source.

>

> In the raw-food movement the problem is that you have a lot of

> pseudo-science, which doesn't hold up to the scrutiny of actual

> science.

>

> True Raw-Vegan Believers

> I want to say that you will never convince " true believers " of

> any " ism " that there are problems with their " ism. " And so I don't

> even attempt to do that. For the interview, I simply and honestly

> answered questions that you've asked, but I'm not attached to

> changing anybody's mind, and I'm not living in the illusion that

I'm

> going to change a bunch of raw-vegan minds, because I've already

> experienced the fact that I'm not going to. Already, all that's

> happened to me is by sharing honestly the information that I've

> shared with you is that I got kind of blackballed by the raw-vegan

> movement. They just tried to discredit me, instead of dealing with

> these realities of nutritional deficiencies in a raw-vegan diet.

>

> But there are some regular folks who come to the raw-food movement

> because of all the hype and then start to experience problems in

> their own bodies. If they see the information that I've given you,

a

> few of them might be moved to take positive steps, which could

> result in saving themselves a lot of pain and misery, and that's

why

> I bother to share this information at all. It's not because I have

> the delusion that I'm going to convince the defenders of an " ism "

to

> give up their " ism " — rather, I'm more concerned about members of

> the public receiving all this hype, that if you get into the raw-

> food vegan diet, you're going to live to be 120 years in really

good

> health. See, I used to believe that, and I used to teach that. I

> believed it because that's what people told me, and that's what

was

> in the raw-food books, and so I parroted it.

>

> A Challenge to the Raw-Vegan Movement

> Is there anything you'd like to add before we end this interview?

>

> I want to end with a challenge to the raw-vegan movement. Find us

> one really old raw-vegan. One. I've been in the raw-vegan movement

> for over twenty years, and I have never met a healthy, really old

> raw-vegan, who's been on the raw-vegan diet for decades or

anything

> like that. In other words, if by eating the raw-vegan diet, we're

> going to live to be a 120 years old and be disease free, then how

> come, when you attend a national raw-food conference, there any

> isn't old raw-vegans there? There's some in their 60's and 70s who

> have been trying to do the diet and have problems in their own

> lives. But why aren't there any 100 year old raw-vegans anywhere?

> The raw-food movement is not new, but was popular in 1800's, when

> the first Natural Hygiene movement started advocating the raw

diet.

> Then it was really big in the 1940's with Shelton. Why have we

never

> seen a single 100 year old raw-vegan? Why has there never been a

90-

> year-old raw-vegan speaker at any of raw-vegan conferences?

>

> So that's your challenge?

>

> Yes, that's my challenge. And even if someone were to come up with

> one 90 year old raw-vegan, I think that my point is still made,

> because they'd have to struggle pretty hard to find that one.

There

> aren't a bunch of old raw-vegans! I'm a child of the 1960's. I was

> born in the 1950's, and so, I was shaped by the 1960s, and believe

> me, in the 1960's, we had raw-food gatherings then. Ann Wigmore,

> before her Shelton — all these people existed back then. All of

them

> died. All the great leaders of the raw-food movement in the 1960s

> are dead. And at no raw-food conferences in the 1960s was there

ever

> a 100-year-old speaker, or a 90-year-old speaker even. And in the

> 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, I've never met any of them. You hear legends

> about Dr. Walker...

>

> But he wasn't a raw-vegan?

>

> He wasn't a raw-vegan and he wasn't a vegan. In one of his books,

he

> talks about how important goat's milk is, and he was drinking

goat's

> milk. And even with him, who wasn't a vegan, definitely there are

> questions about how old he actually lived to be. Because, you hear

> all sorts of different numbers. Unless someone actually produces a

> birth certificate, we don't really know how old he was. But he's

the

> only example I've heard people give. And then I point out to them

> that he wasn't a vegan. So you have to admit that most people who

> come in and hear the hype believe that if they become a raw-vegan,

> they are going to experience some great health benefits, and are

> going to live a long time. And yet, if that's true, since the raw-

> vegan movement has existed since the 1800s, and certainly was very

> popular since the 1940's with natural hygiene and became even more

> popular in the 1960s, why aren't there any old raw-vegans speaking

> at the raw-vegan conferences?

>

> Click here to read my article on what many of the classic vegan

> gurus really ate. -- Chet

>

> Final Comments by Frédéric Patenaude

> Nazariah's experience with the raw vegan diet is not unique,

> although not everybody will experience such dramatic problems. The

> conclusion we can clearly draw from his experience (as well as

> backed up by my own experience and research) is:

>

> 1. The raw vegan diet is not a guarantee for health.

>

> 2. Eating 100% raw is not necessary for optimal health. If this is

> practiced, it should be done with careful planning.

>

> 3. Every vegan should be taking a B-12 supplement to insure

optimal

> health in the long-term.

>

> 4. We shouldn't believe invariably raw-vegan " experts " or what is

> written in books, because the information is often not accurate.

>

> As for whether we should be vegans or not, I do not necessarily go

> in the same direction as Nazariah. I do not believe that everybody

> should start eating some animal products. I believe that every

vegan

> should be taking a B-12 supplement, but also that the inclusion of

> some animal products in the diet can be useful to many people.

>

> I wish to say that I'm personally not convinced that a vegan diet

> cannot be healthy. I think it depends on each individual. I

> personally have found benefits in including some animal products

in

> my diet, and many others have found that too.

>

> There are many health benefits to becoming at least mainly

> vegetarian or even mainly vegan, as well as increasing the amount

of

> raw fruits and vegetables that we eat.

>

> Final Comment by Chet: I continue to believe that eating a

balanced

> diet of healthy whole foods from both plant and animal kingdoms is

a

> smart way for most people to enjoy long lives free of chronic

> illness. Although many people don't like to believe it, we are

> opportunistic omnivores by heritage and to deny that simple fact

is

> to deny reality.

>

> Click here for more articles about the dangers of strict veganism

in

> the long-term.

>

> Click here for articles about Biblical nutrition and dangers with

> the Genesis 1:29 Diet that is so popular in some Christian

circles.

>

> In closing , do your own homework where diet and health are

> concerned.

>

> Do not let the so-called gurus and experts do it for you.

>

> -- Chet

-

--

> -----------

>

> P.S. If I wasn't doing what I'm doing with my website and

> newsletters to earn my living online, I'd sell stuff on EBay using

> the method I learned from an expert. Click here for details

>

> -

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[Guest guest]

Good morning! I have attached a fairly lengthy document which is a response to

the Nazariah article by Jinjee Talafaro, who has a website at

www.thegardendiet.com. If it does not come through and you want to see it, let

me know and I will email the article to you separately. Jinjee's responses are

interspersed throughout the article, and I think she makes some pretty good

arguments.

 

Peace,

 

Valerie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

Hi Valerie. I'd love to read the article. As I said Im interested in raw food,

but I need answers to some questions have'nt been able to find. I did'nt get the

article, please send again. thanks

 

Valerie Mills Daly <valdaly wrote:

 

Good morning! I have attached a fairly lengthy document which is a response to

the Nazariah article by Jinjee Talafaro, who has a website at

www.thegardendiet.com. If it does not come through and you want to see it, let

me know and I will email the article to you separately. Jinjee's responses are

interspersed throughout the article, and I think she makes some pretty good

arguments.

 

Peace,

 

Valerie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

Hello, the attachment did not come through. Sheila

 

 

rawfood , Valerie Mills Daly <valdaly>

wrote:

>

>

> Good morning! I have attached a fairly lengthy document which is a

response to the Nazariah article by Jinjee Talafaro, who has a

website at www.thegardendiet.com. If it does not come through and you

want to see it, let me know and I will email the article to you

separately. Jinjee's responses are interspersed throughout the

article, and I think she makes some pretty good arguments.

>

> Peace,

>

> Valerie

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

Dear Valerie,

I would like to read the article. Michele at alohacookie

Thank you,

/m

 

Valerie Mills Daly <valdaly wrote:

 

 

Good morning! I have attached a fairly lengthy document which is a response to

the Nazariah article by Jinjee Talafaro, who has a website at

www.thegardendiet.com. If it does not come through and you want to see it, let

me know and I will email the article to you separately. Jinjee's responses are

interspersed throughout the article, and I think she makes some pretty good

arguments.

 

Peace,

 

Valerie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

Valerie, I would love to read the article. Please send to

waveoflight. Thank you!

Eva

-

Valerie Mills Daly

rawfood

Wednesday, November 03, 2004 6:37 AM

Re: [Raw Food] Re: I Have QUESTIONS,PLS READ> WHAT DO U THINK?

 

 

 

 

Good morning! I have attached a fairly lengthy document which is a response to

the Nazariah article by Jinjee Talafaro, who has a website at

www.thegardendiet.com. If it does not come through and you want to see it, let

me know and I will email the article to you separately. Jinjee's responses are

interspersed throughout the article, and I think she makes some pretty good

arguments.

 

Peace,

 

Valerie

 

 

[Guest guest]

Well, I don' t think that some type of alimentation is ideal for everyone just

because it sounds rationally. One has to listen to his or her body, too, and to

observe whether the things work for him or her.

 

Raw food has to serve to be healthy and not to become more sick then before or

even for die. I personally know a raw foodist that uses to give a classes of

rawfoodism for many years and in her 35 years she barely can walk.

 

I think that in many cases it is not dangerous the alimentation itself but the

fanatism and the pride it can create when one feels a radiant health and the

problems begin to disappear.

 

One should be careful about this and learn from people that although are not raw

foodists have so nice hearts. The alimentation is not the aim just the way how

to become more healthy and above of all better people. Otherwise it doesn't make

any sense.

 

Katarina

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

HI, Katarina,

 

While I agree with what you are saying, at the same time, I think this kind of

article claims an authority it does not have. Most of his evidence is anecdotal

at best, and he also makes the conclusion that the pure raw diet isn't really

good for anyone, which is a faulty claim to make. It's good to have different

voices in the discussion like his and Jinjee's, but I think the bottom line for

folks is to try to give whatever they choose an honest try before they dismiss

it as unworkable. Even within the raw food arena, I have friends who insist on

all fruit, no veg except greens, others all veg, no fruit, even others who

support the use of nuts and seeds, some who don't, etc. I guess we really do

need to learn to listen to our own bodies and see what they respond to best.

 

Peace,

Valerie

 

gagan <gagan wrote:

Well, I don' t think that some type of alimentation is ideal for everyone just

because it sounds rationally. One has to listen to his or her body, too, and to

observe whether the things work for him or her.

 

Raw food has to serve to be healthy and not to become more sick then before or

even for die. I personally know a raw foodist that uses to give a classes of

rawfoodism for many years and in her 35 years she barely can walk.

 

I think that in many cases it is not dangerous the alimentation itself but the

fanatism and the pride it can create when one feels a radiant health and the

problems begin to disappear.

 

One should be careful about this and learn from people that although are not raw

foodists have so nice hearts. The alimentation is not the aim just the way how

to become more healthy and above of all better people. Otherwise it doesn't make

any sense.

 

Katarina

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

Rawfood is great. As I had reported earlier in the group My wife who was

afflicted with a very dangerous kidney aliment that was degenerative could

control her kidney degeneration because of rawfood. A three month on rawfood

made her healthy. Now she is partly rawfood but steals to eat vegetarian cooked

food made for other family members but is still healthy and happy. Rawfood won

where allopathy failed!

 

 

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[Guest guest]

Right on!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

sreekumarB <vezhambal2000 wrote:

Rawfood is great. As I had reported earlier in the group My wife who was

afflicted with a very dangerous kidney aliment that was degenerative could

control her kidney degeneration because of rawfood. A three month on rawfood

made her healthy. Now she is partly rawfood but steals to eat vegetarian cooked

food made for other family members but is still healthy and happy. Rawfood won

where allopathy failed!

 

 

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