Read Online The Kind Diet: A Simple Guide to Feeling Great, Losing Weight, and Saving the Planet by Alicia Silverstone - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Alicia Silverstone
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in dairy food are now thought to be a factor in reproductive cancers and even precocious puberty. In 1900, American girls started menstruating, on average, at the age of 14. These days, they begin at 12 1 / 2 , with the first signs of puberty showing up in some girls as young as 7. Some argue that the excess estrogen found in milk kickstarts the body to enter puberty earlier, and it also wreaks unnatural havoc on men’s hormone levels. Yes, organic, hormone-free milk is better for the drinker with respect to the hormone issues, but it’s still milk, and it still causes all the other problems mentioned earlier.
Dairy is bad for your heart: Milk, like meat, is full of saturated fat and cholesterol, which clog arteries to your heart. In study after study, incidence of heart disease increases with milk consumption. Researchers for the Journal of Internal Medicine write: “It is clear that saturated fats, mainly dairy fats, are closely associated with the mortality rate from ischaemic [artery blocking or constricting] heart disease.” 11
NASTY TO THE PLANET
Dairy cows create greenhouse gases: More burping = more methane = more global warming = Uh-oh.
Dairy cows produce toxic, freaky waste: These cows produce millions of tons of waste filled with antibiotics and growth hormones that seep into the earth and the water supply. Residues of antibiotics used only in animals have shown up in rivers and soil samples far from the original sites—even getting into drinking water supplies.
The hormones from dairy waste found in rivers have begun to alter the hormone balance of certain fish, causing female eggs to be found in the testes of the males. By forgoing that latte (or making it with soymilk), you will keep our soil and water cleaner and less freaky.
Pregnant cows eat a lot of food: Just like pregnant women, cows need lots of food to make a baby. All that food requires land, water, energy, fertilizer, labor, and transport we could be using for other things, like growing food for people. By saying “no” to that frozen yogurt, we can feed ourselves and others more cheaply and efficiently.
And they drink even more water: You need to drink water to make milk, so a lactating cow drinks 30 to 50 gallons of the stuff a day. 12 That’s a bathtub full. Your eight glasses of water a day is half a gallon. The average dairy farm, between hydrating the cows and washing down the facilities, uses many millions of gallons of water per year.
----
Water
The planet’s supply of fresh water is finite, so let’s conserve it. Turn off the tap when you brush your teeth. Be mindful of saving water when you do your dishes and laundry or when you wash yourself. Flush only after number 2. Watch the film FLOW to learn more about the global water crisis. For more ideas about conserving and to figure out your water footprint, go to www.thekindlife.com and type in keyword water footprint .
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Making milk takes a lot of energy: Dairy farms use hundreds of thousands of kilowatt-hours of electricity per year to run the pumps that milk the cows. Not to mention the lights, filters, heating systems, and other energy-sucking devices. Since 90 percent of the electricity in the United States comes from nonrenewable sources—and dirty ones at that—the dairy industry is a big, unnecessary drain on the global light socket.
NASTY TO ANIMALS
The dairy industry is, in a word, cruel: That is why I gave up dairy in the first place. You see, cows don’t produce milk all the time. I thought that, by milking them, we were basically doing them a favor. I assumed they would sort of . . . explode if they weren’t milked! Well, they don’t. Just like humans, they only produce milk when they give birth to a baby. So in order to have careers in lactation, cows are kept pregnant almost constantly.
Once she gives birth, her calf is taken away from her; baby boys become veal and girls become milkers. The separation anxiety she feels is as real to her as it would be
Dairy is bad for your heart: Milk, like meat, is full of saturated fat and cholesterol, which clog arteries to your heart. In study after study, incidence of heart disease increases with milk consumption. Researchers for the Journal of Internal Medicine write: “It is clear that saturated fats, mainly dairy fats, are closely associated with the mortality rate from ischaemic [artery blocking or constricting] heart disease.” 11
NASTY TO THE PLANET
Dairy cows create greenhouse gases: More burping = more methane = more global warming = Uh-oh.
Dairy cows produce toxic, freaky waste: These cows produce millions of tons of waste filled with antibiotics and growth hormones that seep into the earth and the water supply. Residues of antibiotics used only in animals have shown up in rivers and soil samples far from the original sites—even getting into drinking water supplies.
The hormones from dairy waste found in rivers have begun to alter the hormone balance of certain fish, causing female eggs to be found in the testes of the males. By forgoing that latte (or making it with soymilk), you will keep our soil and water cleaner and less freaky.
Pregnant cows eat a lot of food: Just like pregnant women, cows need lots of food to make a baby. All that food requires land, water, energy, fertilizer, labor, and transport we could be using for other things, like growing food for people. By saying “no” to that frozen yogurt, we can feed ourselves and others more cheaply and efficiently.
And they drink even more water: You need to drink water to make milk, so a lactating cow drinks 30 to 50 gallons of the stuff a day. 12 That’s a bathtub full. Your eight glasses of water a day is half a gallon. The average dairy farm, between hydrating the cows and washing down the facilities, uses many millions of gallons of water per year.
----
Water
The planet’s supply of fresh water is finite, so let’s conserve it. Turn off the tap when you brush your teeth. Be mindful of saving water when you do your dishes and laundry or when you wash yourself. Flush only after number 2. Watch the film FLOW to learn more about the global water crisis. For more ideas about conserving and to figure out your water footprint, go to www.thekindlife.com and type in keyword water footprint .
----
Making milk takes a lot of energy: Dairy farms use hundreds of thousands of kilowatt-hours of electricity per year to run the pumps that milk the cows. Not to mention the lights, filters, heating systems, and other energy-sucking devices. Since 90 percent of the electricity in the United States comes from nonrenewable sources—and dirty ones at that—the dairy industry is a big, unnecessary drain on the global light socket.
NASTY TO ANIMALS
The dairy industry is, in a word, cruel: That is why I gave up dairy in the first place. You see, cows don’t produce milk all the time. I thought that, by milking them, we were basically doing them a favor. I assumed they would sort of . . . explode if they weren’t milked! Well, they don’t. Just like humans, they only produce milk when they give birth to a baby. So in order to have careers in lactation, cows are kept pregnant almost constantly.
Once she gives birth, her calf is taken away from her; baby boys become veal and girls become milkers. The separation anxiety she feels is as real to her as it would be
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