Brianna
05-28-2006, 06:16 AM
I've not been raw for five years or more, but I can tell you that B12 is not actually a vitamin, it is a bacteria produced by our intestines. The problem is that because of the toxic world we live in, we no longer produce it as we should. Therefore, I believe it is crucial to take a b12 supplement along with eating some fermented foods, algaes, unwashed produce from your garden, etc. It is interesting to note that meat eaters have about the same levels of B12 deficiency as vegans do. This is because when meat is cooked, the B12 it contains is destroyed.
rawnora
07-25-2006, 08:36 PM
Hello,
Thanks for the plug, Gosia. :)
Long term raw fooder Robert Rust has been posting extensively on this topic on other lists, so I'll just copy one of his recent essays below. Robert is one of the few people in the raw world (or elsewhere, for that matter) who can talk about b12 with knowledge and conviction instead of irrational fear. This essay incorporates some info on following our senses that may give rise to questions if the ideas are new. If anyone is interested in learning more along these lines, my discussion list is the only place where I've seen them discussed truthfully and in full alignment with nature. There's a button on my home page is anyone's interested in joining.
Hope this is helpful.
Regards,
Nora
www.RawSchool.com
A return to health is about returning to following full
bodily senses again. The ability to think is merely one
sensing ability of the brain, and humans have become
overly dependent on that one sense, at the expense of
not listening to the rest of their bodies senses - the
innumerable senses that are in taste, vision, hearing,
touch, feeling, emotion, perception, sensation, psyche,
and other nerve (brain included) operations.
To pursue the intellect over the rest of the senses and
not seeking overall balance is to be "in the head".
Humans are sensuous creatures, as all animal species are.
The B12 issue is an "in the head" game. It's a head
game used by the meat industry and a misinformed
nutrition/medical/supplement-exspurt industry. It hooks
people into meat eating, supplement eating, following
exspurts, and otherwise remaining "in the head" and not
learning how to follow and trust their own full senses.
No other species plays head games with its diet. It is
not necessary for life. What is necessary is to follow
the full senses when making food choices. It takes a
processed food eater (cooking is a processing) many
years to slowly tune into their full senses again as
s/he gradually improves the diet from an intellectual
artificial diet to a natural, normal full sense-based
diet.
The definitions for frugivore, carnivore, herbivore, etc.
have been made by the science of biology, just as biology
has defined the words horse, animal, flower, etc., and
just as the dictionary is full of commonly used, defined
words. These terms are used to distinguish and classify
animals, based on the foods animal species are observed
to eat under normal and natural conditions, not under
civilized or domesticated conditions. All non-natural
diets are a product of civilized intellectualizing
overriding full sense based diets. The various foods
that an animal normally eats make up its diet. The
food types that a species mostly eats, becomes the
determinant for the diet classification - herbivore,
frugivore, carnivore, etc. I.e., a carnivore mostly
eats meat, so its called a carnivore. A carnivore
does not eat only meat. There are other foods in
its diet. Excessively hungry, starving, or desperate
animals will try to eat just about anything.
People who make up terms like vegan, vegetarian, fruitarian,
and breatharian are trying to impose their beliefs, opinions,
morals, ethics, or other intellectual pursuits on nature's
ways while pursuing idealism rather than observing how nature
works. Nature's life doesn't use intellect or idealism to
determine its food supply. Nature's life uses a full platter
of living senses. The life of Nature is full sense based,
not single intellect based. Humans are full sense creatures
of nature, and every creature of nature must use its full
senses to achieve health. Humans have only recently started
trying to override their full bodily senses with their
intellects.
Humans also make up terms like chemist, doctor, lawyer,
mother, father, etc, but everyone knows that these terms do
not mean that these people only do what the term strictly
means. These terms only describe what the person mostly does
in one area of their life. Biology terms work the same way.
A civilized human can still use its natural senses and
physical abilities to determine the extent to which it is
a meat eater. A human can go out in the woods and see how
hard it is to catch wildlife, compared to the plentiful
fruit and plant food available. Fish are hard to catch.
Insects and grubs are not that appealing and are hard to
eat in large volumes. Unless the human is extremely hungry and
desperate, animal flesh and parts do not appeal to human
senses. These are senses that can be trusted, as much as
the meat pushers would love to have people think otherwise.
Just because most humans have domesticated and civilized
themselves, does not mean that their senses have suddenly
disappeared. We can still see, hear, smell, taste, think,
imagine, feel, emote, perceive, etc.
Supplements are an obvious intellectual pursuit, and many
persons are lured into this head game. To conclude that
they are not necessary is as simple as observing that pills,
bottles, elixirs, potions, concentrated dried foods,
blenders, compactors, mixers, spoons, tablets, etc., do not
grow on trees or on any other type of plant. Ten million
other simple observations can be made by our senses.
The intellects are very motivated to have people trust
intellect over full senses because money and self glory
can be had if an exspurt is followed by people who are
intellectually programmed to not trust their full senses.
It is very wise to observe that the natural world, the
most healthiest world on earth, follows its full senses
when eating its foods and doesn't depend on intellect or
exspurts.
Civilized humans must of course use their intellects to
get themselves out of unhealthy habits, but their
intellects need to be used to direct themselves to
learning how to follow and trust the full senses
they've been ignoring and abusing for so long.
If a person has been lured intellectually into falling
for the b12 scare, that person can use their same
intellect to realize that b12 is a vitamin of the b
complex, and fruits are especially rich in this complex
of vitamins. In fact, fruit is the richest of all foods,
in vitamins. That is fruit's forte, or strong point.
Fruits are also the most easily digested, absorbed, and
assimilated of all foods. That means that no other food
comes near to fruit's ability to provide vitamins. A
person frightened by the b12 boogey man under the bed
needs to reach for a ripe fruit, not the pill-ow or
bottle. In their shivering, they need to remember not
to overeat at one meal, and to eat the fruit alone,
simply, following the healthy habits of the rest of
the wild, natural world.
B vitamins are energy vitamins and they are used in
sugar and energy metabolism, along with other vitamins.
Glucose is a simple sugar and it is the fuel of the
cells of the human body, like gasoline is to a car
engine. Fruits supply an ideal quantity of simple
sugars (fructose, glucose), served in a liquid form
(fruit is mostly water). This is why fruit is so high
in b vitamins, and other vitamins.
Meats supply proteins and fats. They require lots
of energy to break down and use, while supplying
little energy, but they don't supply enough vitamins
and minerals, let alone sugars, for humans to run
their energy metabolism. Meat eaters have the least
endurance of all civilized eaters. Meat digestion
impairs b12 absorption. B12 is not needed for meat
digestion and use, because meat is not sugar rich
and is not a fuel source for humans. Of course meat
has b12 in it (just like our human flesh does), but
only in very low quantities which were for the use
of the animal the meat used to be a part of.
If one follows the logic of the b12 promoters, the
best source of b12 should be human meat, and taking
that logic even further, the best food for humans
would be humans. There it is. Humans are humanivores.
They all remain super healthy by eating b12 rich
humans (tongue in cheek).
It's interesting how b12 promoters hang on to the idea
that b12 from bacteria in the gut is somehow not
absorbable but b12 from meat is. Meat is made up of
animal cells requiring b12 for metabolism. Bacteria
are simple animal cells requiring b12 for metabolism.
Bacteria in our guts are digested by us just like
animal cells in our guts are digested by us. The b12
intellectualizers do not hold themselves to logic and
sensibility. B12 is used by animal cells, it doesn't
need to get it from animal cells. Animal cells get
their b12 from the foods they are evolved to eat.
Humans get it from fruit, since humans are frugivores
(digest fruit best). Cows get it from grass, since
cows are herbivores (digest grass best).
I don't eat meat. I have eaten meat in the past, long
ago. B12 promoters will make their intellectual claims
that I still have supplies of b12 left from eating meat.
By their logic, I should be running short of cooked
food nutrients any day now too. It's been years since
I've eaten meat and cooked foods. I am boundless in
energy, and I'm very sharp minded and clear headed.
I can and have made 27 mile mountain hikes, on back to
back days. I easily hike 10 to 20 miles each day, days
on end. I feel great, better than ever. My health has
done nothing but improve for the last 17 years on raw
non-animal-product food. If these are signs of b12
shortage, I'm looking forward to having less b12 in me.
Why I have so much energy and sharpness is because the
fruit I eat supplies me with readily and easily
available fuel and nutrients, including most adequate
amounts of the b-vitamin complex, b12 included. I don't
worry a second about b12. It never crosses my mind,
except when I try inform others they don't need to
worry either.
The b12 issue is absurd and flies in the face of
sensibility and rational thinking. I don't know any one
who has more energy than myself, and who eats less meat
or animal products. There are many I know who don't use
animal products while following sensible eating habits
and who have lots of energy, of course.
Vegans are generally cooked and processed food eaters.
Cooked and processed foods are the ingredients for
disease. Vegans (and vegetarians, who are similar in
habits) use harmful meat substitutes like tofu and grains,
take harmful and unnecessary supplements and use
irritating substitute foods. The average vegan/vegetarian
diet is almost as far from a healthy diet as the average
meat eating diet is. The only major difference is meat.
And the average vegan is known to be healthier than the
average meat eater. Meat eaters have the most plentiful
and horrific diseases. Processed grain, which is a staple
of the vegan diet, is probably worse than meat as a human
food, since it is eaten heavily, is an acid causing food
like meat, and depletes the body of its reserves and life
force. Processed grain eating leads to long, slow-building
diseases. Meat eating supports sudden disease onset. Humans
don't have gizzards, one of the requirements for grain
eating, and sensibly are not classified as graminovores.
Raw food vegans are head and shoulders above average
cookie vegans, especially if they eat a lot of fresh,
ripe fruit and juicy vegetables. One cannot group all
vegans together, just as one cannot put all humans in
one pot.
There exists a natural and normal diet and behaviour
that brings the human species pure health, as is the
case for each living species. To the extent that a
human doesn't follow that diet and behaviour, is the
extent to which that human will suffer poor health.
Harmful habits build dis-ease, healthful habits build
ease.
If a person wants to discover the reason for another's
health issues, they need to look no further than that
persons disobeyance of natural and normal health
habits required by the human species. Eating tofu is
unhealthy. Meat can be eaten in small quantities,
since humans are able to digest small amounts of
concentrated proteins. Meat is not needed for its b12.
It provides concentrated proteins, and the body has a
need for small amounts of protein (proteins are in all
living things, since protein is fundamental to life).
The same goes for concentrated fats and sugars.
Overeating anything, no matter how good the food is,
is very unhealthy. Eating grain is unhealthy. Eating
irritating weeds is unhealthy. Eating supplements is
unhealthy. Harmful or less-than-good foods can be eaten,
of course, but harm comes in their use. Only our natural
foods, eaten in adequate quantities, supply us with
nothing but nutrition and health.
Health is simple, so simple a baby, whose brain is still
greatly in the development stage (and has no intellect
to speak of), can achieve it, just by following its
full bodily senses. Adults can come to depend on their
full senses again by letting go of their over-dependency
on their intellect, while initially using their
intellects to do so.
Peace, Robert
Tirza
07-25-2006, 09:04 PM
It is interesting to note that meat eaters have about the same levels of B12 deficiency as vegans do....
...This is because when meat is cooked, the B12 it contains is destroyed.
Is it true that cooking destroys B12? If so, then why aren't a lot more people deficient than are now?
When people want to know if and where I get B12 from. I ask, "Do you think that only vegans get B12 deficiencies? Meat eaters get it too. How do they get it? It must be an inability of that person's body to process it. How does a vegan get a deficiency? Maybe for the same reason????"
We were not raw but we were vegan for 17 + years. We had 3 children who were brought up without meat, poultry, fish, eggs, or dairy of any kind. (We did eat some honey and use leather so were not technically vegan) They were always exceptionally healthy. They did not get the colds and flus that other kids were always beset with. In fact, they did not even catch the usual childhood diseases like measles, mumps, chicken pox, etc. I was so worried that they would get them later in life with devastating results that I would intentionally expose them to other children who were sick with them - Nothing - I was worried that my son would catch mumps later and become sterile. He caught them as a teenager (after eating SAD for awhile) and I was really nervous. He is now the father of 4 children and I don't see them stopping anytime soon.
Okay so that is off the topic of B12. I searched and found many sites talking about pernicious anemia (B12 deficiency). Here is one: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000569.htm
2% of all adults over 60 have it!
Most people who get it are of Scandinavian or Northern European descent.
.....Were all those people vegans or raw vegans?????
Nevertheless, we should not "boo" too loudly. It IS a serious condition and may not show up for decades they say. So our family may yet have problems. I am not 60 so who knows... I think we should give due care and attention to anything that might cause our health to be compromised. We can't blow this one off on the basis of being vegan or raw vegan for a year or even 10 years. IF it is an inherited tendency, there is nothing we can do.
But there must be things we can do to help make sure we don't get this through our own negligence or willful ignorance.
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