Let Them Eat Meat

Once upon a time-- and it was not a very good time for the Austrian princess become Queen of France-- an aide approached Marie Antoinette and told her that her peasant subjects were starving. They were crying out for bread.

To which the supercilious queen responded: Qu’ils mangent de la brioche.  The phrase is usually mistranslated: Let them eat cake, even though, for anyone who knows the most elementary French, a brioche is not cake-- it is a type of bread.

I promise you, no one who lives in France, native born or immigrant, cannot tell the difference between bread and cake.

There you have it.

Anyway, in today’s enlightened age, more than a few people, having apparently won battles against fossil fuels, have turned their attention to meat. Females especially, joined by great philanthropists like Bill Gates, have declared that meats are impure. They do not only claim that cow flatulence is destroying the troposphere, but that if you allow such impurities into your sacred corporeal envelope, they will make you seriously sick.

So, young females today, being more than a little confused about what it now means, in our liberated age, to be a woman, have often taken up the crusade against meat. They believe that eating grass and twigs will make them more pure, even more virginal. So, they declare themselves to be vegetarian vegans. God help you if you serve them chicken noodle soup.

Now, since we all bow down at the altar of science, we have some found some science to shed light on the question. Will meat-eating make you sick, cause you cancer and heart disease, or will a meatless diet damage your brain. Animal proteins are not the same as plant proteins. You might find some protein in soy products, but you will not find the same nutrients as you find in meat. Think choline.

That, my friends, is the question.

Now, hundreds of scientists have banded together to declare that abstaining from meat-eating-- I will not burden you with the Freudian interpretation of that phrase-- is bad for your health. As for the long term health of the planet, that is another story.

The New York Post reports:

“Livestock-derived foods provide a variety of essential nutrients and other health-promoting compounds, many of which are lacking in diets even among those populations with higher incomes,” the declaration states.

“Well-resourced individuals may be able to achieve adequate diets while heavily restricting meat, dairy and eggs. However, this approach should not be recommended for general populations.”

The initiative argues that livestock systems are “too precious to society to become the victim of simplification, reduction or zealotry.”

Missing out on meat will cause developing brains to miss out on important developmental stages. The Post continues:

The scientists also warned that it is difficult to replace the nutritional value of meat with plant-based substitutes and that poorer communities that don’t consume as much meat often suffer from negative health impacts, such as stunting, wasting and anemia due to lack of nutrients and protein.

“Animal-source foods are superior to plant-source foods at simultaneously supplying several bioavailable micronutrients and high-quality macronutrients that are critical for growth and cognitive development,” said Adegbola Adesogan, director of the University of Florida’s Global Food Systems Institute.

I will spare you an extended discussion of micronutrients. If I had to take a guess, I would guess that they are very small.

As for cow flatulence and its impact on the environment, the Telegraph reports on another aspect of the new manifesto:

Dr Wilhelm Windisch, a farming nutrition expert at the Technical University of Munich, said: “Farmed and herded animals maintain a circular flow of materials in agriculture by using and upcycling large amounts of materials humans cannot eat, turning them into high-quality nutrient dense food.

“One-size-fits-all agendas, such as the drastic reductions of livestock numbers could incur environmental and nutritional consequences on a massive scale.”

Again, I will spare you an extended disquisition about the circular flow of materials, a charming euphemism for cow digestion, but the truth remains, reducing the livestock population will starve many peoples in the developing world, and second, will damage the health of many young women in the developed world. I am sure that we do not want either of those two outcomes.

So, the moral of the story, and the message to the young females who refuse to allow any animal products to pass their lips, is:

Let them eat meat! Of course, English syntax being what it is, the implication is that we are allowing them to eat meat.

It’s better for their health, and we certainly do not want young women to compromise their brain development. Don’t we respect women for their minds?

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