Pretend Vegans Often Do Fishy Things

I have met many people who call themselves vegan while
continuing to eat fish, chicken, and/or dairy. This list even
includes well-known personalities who wax poetically about
our evolving food revolution and then consume animal
products in the privacy of their homes or in restaurants.
I was a lunch guest in the home of one very famous vegan
author when his wife let it slip that he occasionally
ordered chicken at fancy restaurants outside of his home
state. Aside to friend and author: Your secret will
forever remain safe with me. Another speaks and writes
about the dangers of eating fish. A recent bout of sickness
and depression in which he "droped out" turned him and his
not-as-famous son into fish eaters.

We are all human and we all make errors in judgment. I
am not a food-Nazi who really gives a damn if you eat milk
chocolate or a slice of pizza. It is your body, and your
mission is to take responsibility for yourself. One vegan
meal times 300 million Americans saves he lives of 50
million chickens and tens of thousands of cattle.

One vegan day is better than zero vegan days. However, I do
hold authors of vegan books and vegan lecturers to a higher
standard than those people who simply call themselves vegetarian
or vegan. Eat what you wish, but be warned. This issue is much
more than simply extending spiritual compassion to animals. It
is also about physical compassion to your own body.

Forget for a moment the lack of spirituality in contaminating
one's body with the flesh of tortured creatures. Consider
only for a lifetime the harm being done to your body by eating
fish from the ocean.

If you watch TV, you've seen the Geico commercial with the
caveman who instructs the waiter: "I'll have the Chilean sea
bass." The fish caught in Chile swim in the same ocean as
the fish caught in Long Island, New York waters. Fresh fish
caught in Chile are jetted to the Fulton Fish Market in New York
City and fish markets in Baltimore and Boston.

Here is an interesting study to be published next month:

**********^^^^^^^^^^**********

Mercury in Chilean fish and Estimated Intake Levels

Authors: Sandra Cortes, Antonia Fortt
Affiliation: Universidad de Chile, Santiago 838-0453, Chile

Published in: Food Additives & Contaminants, Volume 24, Issue 9,
September 2007 , pages 955 - 959

Abstract

The intake of fish products is a major public health concern
due to possible methyl mercury exposure, which is especially
toxic to the human nervous system. This pilot study (n = 46)
was designed to determine mercury concentrations in fish
products for national consumption (Chilean jack mackerel, hake,
Chilean mussel, tuna) and for export (salmon, Patagonian
toothfish, swordfish, southern hake), and to estimate the
exposure of the general population.

Samples were analyzed at the National Environmental Center by
cold vapor atomic absorption spectrophotometry. Mercury levels in
swordfish and one canned tuna sample exceeded levels prescribed
by national and international standards. The remaining two export
products (Patagonian toothfish, also known as Chilean sea bass,
and salmon) complied with international limits, which are more
demanding than Chilean regulations. Theoretical estimates of
mercury intake varied from 0.08 to 3.8 µg kg-1 bw day-1 for high
fish consumers, exceeding the provisional tolerable intake for
tuna, Chilean seabass, Chilean jack mackerel and swordfish. This
group appears to be at the greatest risk from mercury contamination
among the Chilean population.

**********^^^^^^^^^^**********

Fishy? I think so. When meeting meat eaters, I always
recommend that they give up milk and dairy first. Most
vegetarians on the way to becoming vegan become so by first
giving up red meat, then poultry, then seafood, and finally
dairy products. The proper order, so far as I am concerned,
is dairy, then poultry, third seafood, and save the red meat
group for last. My list is based upon the actual harm done
to the human body.

To the pretend-vegans, some quite famous:

Be strong to your own self. Be true for the others who
may become inspired by your example.

Robert Cohen
i4crob@...