what we are now. Even if this were the case and eating meat did help us to evolve, look at what we evolved from . We looked liked friggin’ apes and had massive heads, strong jaws, and brute strength. Maybe back then we were supposed to eat meat.
But the last time we checked, we aren’t cavemen anymore.
The second we put food in our mouths, the digestion process begins, thanks to our saliva. Guess what? Our alkaline saliva is not meant to break down animal flesh; carnivores have acid saliva, perfectly designed for the task. And hydrochloric acid, essential for digesting carcass, is secreted in very small amounts in our stomachs.
However, the stomachs of carnivores have ten times more hydrochloric acid than ours. Our enzymes, digestive tracts, and organs are all different from those found in carnivores. Like it or not, our kidneys, colon, and liver are ill-equipped to process animal flesh. Compared to carnivores, our intestines are very long, so food that doesn’t get adequately processed becomes clogged in our intestines. Animals quickly pass food through their digestive systems, but we have food rotting, decomposing, and fermenting in our intestinal tracts and colons, hence the need for colonics (aka: enemas). You don’t see many tigers getting colonics, do you? You do see them napping, though. Even though their bodies are designed to digest meat, animals generally sleep all day while doing so because it is such a taxing process. Genetically and structurally, we are designed to thrive on plant foods.46 Whether it is “lean meat” or a “skinless chicken breast,” animal fat is still animal fat.
Don’t be fooled by terms coined by the meat industry. Your body can’t handle animal fat, so it settles like lumpy shit all over your ass, thighs, sides, arms, and stomach.
And then there are the gross, stomach-turning realities of the meat-production industry.
Of the ten billion animals slaughtered each year in America for human consumption, the vast majority of them come from factory farms. Factory farms that raise cattle, pigs, chickens, egg-laying hens, veal calves, or dairy cows have an enormous amount of animals in a very small space. There are no vast meadows or lush, green pastures. The animals are confined inside buildings, where they are literally packed in on top of each other. Egg-laying hens are crammed into cages so small, they are unable to open their wings, and their mangled feet actually grow around the wire mesh floors. This overcrowded, stressful environment causes chickens to peck at each other and factory farm workers, so the ends of their beaks are seared off their faces using a hot knife. Pigs and cows are imprisoned in stalls so small, they are unable to turn around or lie down comfortably. Cattle are subject to third-degree branding burns and having their testicles and horns ripped out. Pigs also suffer from branding and castration, in addition to the mutilation of their ears, tails, and teeth. They all live in the filth of their own urine, feces, and vomit with infected, festering sores and wounds.
To keep animals alive in these unsanitary conditions, farmers must give them regular doses of antibiotics.
Half of all the antibiotics made in the United States each year are administered to farm animals, causing antibiotic resistance in the humans who eat them.47 A study at the University of California-Berkeley linked eating beef to urinary tract infections (UTIs) in women. It just so happens that the most common infectious disease in women is UTIs.48 You do the math.
For shits and giggles, we’ve compiled a partial list of what’s in meat, poultry, seafood, and dairy: benzene hexachloride (BHC), chlordane, dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT), dieldrin, dioxin, heptachlor, hexachlorobenzene (HCB), and lindane.49 Perhaps that’s why eating “meat” has been linked to obesity; cancer; liver, kidney, lung, and reproductive disorders; birth defects; miscarriages; and nervous system