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You Are A Radical, And So Am I: Paleo Reaches The Ominous "Stage 3"
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March 18, 2012
9:14 pm
thebakingfairy
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hold on to your grass fed horses, this is not yet a science-fiction dystopia, quit acting like it is. 1) you can still eat "paleo" if you so choose and no one is going to arrest you. 2) I don't think your friends and co-workers would be that difficult to convince. After all they are living in the same society as you. 3) really? shed the term "paleo" and just go for "Real Food" "paleo" makes it sound like you want to eat nothing but what you can find in the woods, which is not exactly healthy either: even the Iroquios and Algonquins had to farm in order to supply all their dietary needs, I know a few Iroquois and Algonquins myself nice people actually, really know their stuff. Go spend a day talking with them, you won't be under such naive notions then. and 4) quit hating on grain, you need to eat it. if you don't you will find yourself feeling greasy and unhappy. People are omnivores, and we are evolved to eat grains, yes, even corn. However, only eat corn in small amounts as it is very high in calories, much higher than wheat, rice or any other grain. carbs are essential, and this diet is just another one of these low-carb diets like the Atkins, so yes, it's just a fad. Am I condoning grocery-store-bought "health food" no, that's got plenty of icky stuff in it. However, if you were to grow some wheat, and grind it yourself like people used to do, then I'd say sure eat it. Of course, everything in moderation, you should NOT be eating the kind of portions of grain that the government food pyramid recommends, but you should be eating some. Archaeology tells us that long before humans started farming THEY WERE EATING GRAINS. Even back on the African savannah, they were eating grains. They have found substantial amounts of grain in Paleolithic caves. Also realize that the people living at the sites where evidence of mostly meat eating was found WERE NOT MODERN HUMANS! that was Homo erectus, our ancestor, who had slightly different dietary requirements. I'd think twice about basing my dietary choices off another animal's no matter how closely related. For example: I would not be silly enough to design a diet primarily based around termites even though they are highly edible and form a large part of chimpanzee diets. There is also archaeological evidence that humans were once prey (google Swartkrans for more info) and more recently scavengers, so shed the "eat like a predator" thing too, we're not supreme predators, we're predators when it suits us, prey when we fail and scavengers otherwise. What humans are, is really smart rats (the other really successful omnivore in the world). We get into everything, eat anything we can, and infest every square inch of the planet. We love to live in large groups and we do really well in the competition for food. We reproduce like crazy (we even, alone of all the mammals, have no estrus cycle so we can have 5 times more babies). Our altruism, cleverness, tool-making abilities, and culture allowed us to succeed (culture extends are memory so that we do not have to individually learn everything we need to know). Our linguistic abilities (which enabled the ability to disagree without killing each other), religious tendency (which allowed us to live in otherwise too-large societies), and invention of moral rules (which again allowed us to disagree without killing each other) made us the dominate species. Our ability to make surpluses of grain through domestication enabled the great civilizations of the past. There is anthropological evidence to back this up (google Catalhoyuk if you don't believe me). Although it's nice to think of ourselves as "the best predators" we are not, there are plenty of predators who are far better equipped than we are (i.e. the man-eating lions, and those guys were maneless). Quit dick measuring and start actually eating. and yes, I am assuming you are male, since no woman in her right mind would believe any of this crap, she would have the ancestral memory of thousands of years of gathering wild grains. Even the eskimos eat grains, smarty. Still not convinced: here's more things wrong with your argument: Agave nectar is not a circumlocution for "table sugar" agave nectar is from the agave plant (duh) actually the same plant that gives us tequila. It is not "table sugar" any more than maple syrup is (also a sugar that comes from a plant). Besides, sugar is good for you in small quantities (which is the real problem with Agave nectar, it's too sweet to be used consistantly). And finally, never peel your potatoes, the skin is the good part! sheesh! in fact never peel anything, the skins of fruits and veggies have wonderful nutrients and minerals in them that you can't do without including: surprise! vitamin D. Just make sure you buy organic, or better yet, grow those fruits yourself. Do not however feel the need to eat citrus or bananas, if you don't live in a place where they naturally grow (if you're in Florida of course, go ahead and have some), you don't need them. As for cooking with meat fat if you want to do it I say more power to you, but realize that the people who invented that technique were farmers who worked outside all day trying to grow wheat in rocky soil. Don't do it unless you plan on exerting yourself fully for 16 hours straight. "vegetable oils" are not a lie, that's an umbrella term for things like peanut oil, corn oil (this one IS to be avoided) canola oil, olive oil, etc. lettuce oil? broccolli oil? what universe do you live in? I for one have never seen these particular oils, and would probably throw a tantrum if I did. if you ate a balanced diet you wouldn't need supplements, so the fact that your diet includes taking supplements means that it is clearly not balanced or "paleo": Stone Age hunter-gatherers didn't have supplements instead they had grains, and fruit skins. in addition, DO NOT get rid of legumes, they are excellent for you, perhaps the best foods you could eat with all sorts of great and wonderful vitamines and minerals that you DON'T get from other sources including potassium for those of us who don't live in Florida, and nitrogen (not to be confused with nitrates which are bad for you), and often times iron, magnesium and other minerals (depending on what's in your soil) iron deficiency is really not cool, it makes your brain fuzzy believe me, I have trouble with it all the time. Beans are not birdseed or rabbit food, they are People Food (birds won't eat them, neither will rabbits, believe me I've tried this). Even for a committed carnivore beans of some kind are essential.Do I advocate eating soy everything? no, particularly not fake meat, as that is simply disgusting (and doesn't at all replace meat). tofu in every form is just a way for vegans with low self-esteem to fit in with the general population. However, a nice meal of succatash (corn beans and squash, cooked together on an open fire) is a whole different matter. In fact that's a perfectly balanced meal (as the Iroquois living in my hometown realized long ago, which is why they ate it all the freakin' time) right there (all the starch, veggies, protein, sugar, fat and carbs you could need for a long day of working on a farm, or hunting in the woods) WITHOUT ANY MEAT! a good meat substitute that is very cheap and obtainable (and very "paleo") are mushrooms, which your "diet-guide" completely glosses over, which is why I know your "diet" is just a fad. You have ignored nature's greatest invention: fungi, in all their forms. Mushrooms have most of the same fats and other things that are in meat, but lots more vitamins and minerals as well. Some even taste a bit like meat. They are, like animals, incapable of photosynthesis, and can be easily obtained from the woods. You are not truly "paleo" and cannot call yourself that until you have gone foraging for mushrooms, hunting for meat, foraging for nuts and berries or something else like that. I am sorry, you do not know what it is to eat off the land, I do, I've had to do it in the dead of winter, in New England (even if only for a day, I have done it). As for dairy, well, take it or leave it, it's not essential, but nice and won't cause any problems if you do eat it. and finally: flaxseed oil (or linseed oil) is furniture polish yes (not to mention all sorts of other things like shampoo and varnish, and paint sealer), but it is ALSO food, and very good food, which although not necessary can be an excellent substitute for other fats, for those who aren't exerting themselves to the max 16+ hours a day. I am of Welsh and Irish peasant heritage, and believe me while I enjoy my meat it is not something that I can or should eat all the time. My ancestors ate meat maybe 4 times a year (on the Celtic festival days), even back in the Iron Age, meat was difficult to get especially if you weren't the one who owned the deer-hunting forest. My family ate lots of fish (which unfortunately I can't eat anymore, because fish are now toxic since we dumped mercury and other crap in our rivers, another thing your diet seems to overlook) and lots of mushrooms and lots of veggies but not a whole lote of starches or meat fats. I am also an Anthro major, do your research, Paleolithic people ate meat maybe twice a week if even that, and that was only those who had a hunter in the family. They got most of their nutrition from roots and plants that they gathered. considering that I just poked enough holes in your argument to make it look like Swiss Cheese (and that was just off the top of my head, if I actually had a book in front of me I could likely have found more errors), I suggest you do some research and revise your theory. Humans are not the most effective predators on earth, which is why if you are on safari in Africa you still have to be aware that at any moment a leopard could eat you, and believe me you don't stand a chance agains the leopard. We are however the most arrogant animals on the planet, but I happen to live in a place where despite all modern conveniences and technology every winter storm still threatens to wipe us out. Every cold snap could be the end of my pipes, which could make water leak onto my roof which could bring my entire house down around my ears while I sleep. So, what have I done about it? prepared myself with the knowledge of how to actually survive in the woods in winter should I need to, and by collecting as many seeds as I can. Seeds are wonderful things for those who need to carry large amounts of calories around with them all the time. They have lots of calories, lots and lots and lots (think about it, what are seeds? they are plant eggs, as with all eggs they contain the nutrients that the baby plant needs until it can grow on it's own, which includes a prodigious amount of calories) put that way seeds don't seem so much like bird-food anymore do they? and you can carry more seeds than beef jerkey (or even pemmican). Now, I know how to make pemmican, I know how to make a bow and arrow, and how to shoot it well enough to kill something. I know what berries to eat and which to leave alone so long as I am in the woods I grew up in. I could survive a winter in my hometown if the entire economy suddenly shut down, could you do that? no you're just compensating for your small dicks by eating lots of meat and talking like macho men. Well, we'll see who survives when the apocalypse comes me or you.

March 19, 2012
9:35 am
Lauren
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Well I don't suppose anyone needs to feed that particular troll; she seems to have a gut full already.

March 20, 2012
12:16 am
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thebakingfairy:

I apologize for being unable to respond to your essay: I'm not smart enough to figure out where the line breaks should go.

If you're willing to re-format it into a readable form, I'll do my best to reply.

Lauren:

I find there's usually an inverse correlation between the vehemence of a comment and the likelihood that the commenter will return to participate in a discussion.  However, it's a statistical tendency, not a hard-and-fast rule.

JS

April 3, 2012
5:07 am
BT
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for the exercise I tried reformatting that rant and inserting replies to each point...but found the task tedious and pointless...each point has been adequately answered here anyway.

April 3, 2012
11:39 am
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BT:

That was my impression on skimming it.  As I noted above, most such comments aren't honest attempts to start a dialog: they're the Internet version of leaving flaming dog poop on your doorstep.

JS

April 21, 2012
9:28 pm
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Cameron, Tx
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Has paleo reached a stage 4? Why are all these ppl falling off and suddenly to them, "paleo" is too limiting, or "not truly backed by science" (ahem Matesz), and other such rubbish. I believe that we have a lot of posers out there.

In my line of work I spend a lot of time analyzing reports, doing interrogations, and exposing liars. I'm really good at it too. From what I've read, it seems that we have several bloggers that found something they could gain a following with and since paleo actually works and has become popular, they are now stirring up contentions in the community just to keep their hits high. Or perhaps they have a pathological need to "be different" and just can't stand agreeing with anyone. Anyway, i think this is just plain stupid and it only serves to confuse newcomers who are really just seeking to improve their health. So when they get referred to said blog, it makes the paleo ppl seem flaky and well, rather superficial.

Sounds to me like we have a bunch pontificators and they could put a dent in an otherwise scientifically sound idea. I'm not saying that all is lost or that any of that would actually happen but they can take away from something that has helped 1000's by preventing certain folks from ever getting started. Evolving within a movement or ideal is natural and even preferred but we should be responsible to the noobs and try to present things with a consistent scientific basis, not by writing posts that have nothing to do with anything factual or even useful in a practical way.

I've stopped reading all but a couple of blogs for this reason. Im all for progress but let's not forget that we do have a responsibility to those that know less and confusing them is not the way to go about living up to that responsibility. We fail as leaders when we don't carefully consider our words and post things that only have soap opera value. A person's blog is their blog and their business. I don't really care what one may post about. What I do care are about are all the sick people that need help, not blowhards. Idk, maybe that's just me.
Cheers

April 22, 2012
2:54 am
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I think Don's problem was that he did not (appear) to understand that paleo is global and that there can be all manner of paleo diets; he just didn't find the combination that fitted him. In fact, the way he is eating now is a paleo diet.

When diets get linked to money, I wonder whether the authors are so dogmatic that they discard evidence that doesn't fit their programme. I resisted Sissons' 'Primal Blueprint' book for having a "cheesy American beefcake" on the sleeve, fitted the description over everything I abhor about diet books. I'm glad I bought it, though - this is one of two books that I have retained, Paul Jaminet's 'Perfect Health Diet', the other.

Paleo is scientifically sound, or as much of the science as I, and its interpreters can understand; not to mention, historically sound.

Two of the greatest dietary revolutions are: first, the passing into the neolithic, with domestication of animals and the cultivations of crops, and second, industrial food - really, post WW2, the advent of margarine, I think being the first serious fail and then how we've managed to get sugar into absolutely everything that we eat. Corn is not so much a big deal this side of the pond, but I gather folks in the US cannot move without bumping into the stuff.

Even eating a pre-WW2 neolithic diet, it wasn't that bad and for folks who largely did, refining to a paleo diet was not a huge step.

What worries me is the growing trend towards, "I'm more paleo than you", even to the point that hate mail is being left on paleo bloggers websites by paleo people! Fine, you don't "do" dairy ... I do. Fine, you don't "emulate", well, other paleo people do. Fine, you don't ever eat bacon, well, many do.

Paleo is a wide spectrum and I think it is more important to focus upon the approach than the diet. Bloggers like J, here, or Richard Nikoley begin with the approach. Writers often being with the diet - to make a diet book.

Is it paleo, or is it simply a gluten-free real food diet?

Beginning with the approach develops an attitude. That attitude might well lead to people pontificating on their own blogs, which might read as an ego. So be it. I always try to read opinionated blogs as if I as sitting with then enjoying a beer and shooting the breeze. You see the subtleties in what people are saying then.

Again, just as paleo is a wide spectrum, the paleosphere (blogs, websites, books and so on) is a wide spectrum - there's room for the straight down the line diet researchers, like Jaminet, lifestyle "gurus" like Sissons and Wolf and then the folks who come straight out of left field with a completely new approach, like J.

It'll go through phases and go through trends. Some folks will want to be heard, arguments will happen, but if it can be as civilised, reasoned and with a real respect for the other party, as was the case with Jimmy Moore and Paul Jaminet over starches, I think we'll be alright in the long term.

If not, and people fall out, leave, whatever ... more meat for the rest of us!

Living in the Ice Age
http://livingintheiceage.pjgh.co.uk

April 22, 2012
11:14 am
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Cameron, Tx
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Right on, Paul! What a great attitude, I agree with you completely although I do maintain that responsibility is paramount. Something that is not lost on our dear J STANTON.

Since you have some well informed opinions, what do you think of this Ray Peat? He's gotten off into aspects of biochem I'm not familiar with yet, so I'm floundering without a jumping off point. Not that it matters: I am a Gnoll and have decided this is my home. I've never joined any kind of group, intentionally or by proxy, but this is where I belong. I still find an ever present need to challenge all my own and other's ideas. Alas, I am an iconoclast by nature....

How's the car detailing going, btw? While I'm here I'm gunna look at those pics you posted a while back again. Simply beautiful! I find anyone that has that kind of personal pride to be a constant source of inspiration. It parallels my own innate need for completion in a very incomplete world.
Cheers!

April 22, 2012
12:50 pm
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Hey Daniel - Ray Peat is a new one to me. I'll absorb what he has to say. J's recent article about the pitfalls of nutritionalism really struck a chord with me - I enjoy the science, if someone else can distill it for me, but in the end I rely upon principles. That may well mean I eat something non-paleo, don't get sick and consume it blissfully unaware until it's pointed out. Then, I'll ask about it.

Fact is, we know very little about what makes the human body and how it works. We know a lot more about it than we did when Da Vinci was making his first documentation and that was a lot more than we knew a hundred years prior. Imagine what we'll know in another hundred years. To that end, I guard against scientific facts - they don't tell the whole story.

Luckily, paleo massively pre-dates science which is a mere sliver of a second on the clock of human history, so attempting to emulate that is the cornerstone of paleo. Science today helps us work out which modern food is okay to eat.

Yeah, I'm a Gnoll - there is an attitude to paleo, which marks us apart from gluten-free eaters, real food eaters and organic/pastured eaters. We'll have a lot of cross-over with those people, but we're a very organised set of fiercely individual people who can work as a pack when it comes to problem solving, resourcing and finding new ground. Beyond paleo, 'The Gnoll Credo' introduces us to a number of concepts which define that attitude. Many of us attracted to this website already held those concepts; just didn't have the words for it. Is the internet Gnoll? Well, when I whoop, it's often here and my calls are responded to. You know what I'm saying ...

Regarding Detailing, I'm still very much enjoying it and hope to bring our black SAAB 900 convertible back to its full glory this summer. The edges are getting a bit tatty. I've some roof work to do and some painting around the sills and bodykit, but after that ... polishing, refining and burnishing.

I actually do very little on my own cars - wash and dry regularly, wax regularly over a nice glazing cleanser and try to keep on top of wheels and that damn shiny exhaust I have on my red SAAB 9-5 Aero. There are plenty more pictures and writing about detailing on my website, which I won't derail this topic by posting, but it's there in my profile.

Today, I've been building a wall. Yesterday, I was, too. Britain has a vernacular style for what is called "dry stone walling" - building a wall that holds together under its own strength, rather than with cement. It is an art, a skill and puts you very much in touch with the stone you're working with which can be all sorts of sizes, lengths, depths and heights. Working with each stone to find its friends and neighbours is frustrating at first, but like so many activities in which we have to just let go and have the subject tell us how to work, tuning out and just letting it happen it the best way forward. When you find stones that just lock together naturally, you then have to work around it.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_stone

Living in the Ice Age
http://livingintheiceage.pjgh.co.uk

April 22, 2012
8:12 pm
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Cameron, Tx
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Yeah Ray Peat is new to me as well. He seems to advocate eating lots of sugar but everything else is paleo. Not sure how that works....

I suppose we find ourselves here bc we don't know much about the body. I love this site bc of the atmosphere JS imposes on it: it's very inclusive and since we actually talk to each other and he replies to most all the comments posted so I always get a very tribal feeling which I suppose it fitting.

"Many of us attracted to this website already held those concepts; just didn't have the words for it."

Very true, sir. When I finished TGC, I felt like I had found something that hadn't ever been lost. Like the Buddhist story of the jewel sewn into the traveling monk's sleeve. It was there all along.

So the stone walls you build are like the ones we see in the idyllic country Pictures we see of Britain? That's what I had in my head anyway.
I think I'll pop over to your site and check it out. Didn't know you had one. I'm really at a turning point in my life where Im tired of my career and I have all these things that I'm way more passionate about and having a blog and a website about this is one of them. My wife has MS (we are treating it somewhat successfully with an uber strict paleo diet of course-we embarked on this way before the now famous TED video which is an awesome one btw) so after we get some things straight I'm leaving all non-essentials behind and I'm starting over at bottom. It's super exciting.

Anyway, thanks for chatting with me. Always nice to make new friends!
Cheers

April 24, 2012
2:41 am
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(There's a lot here so I'll be taking it message by message.)

Daniel:

I wrote this comment at Perfect Health Diet, and it applies to what you've said as well:

* Stirring up controversy is much easier than doing science.

* N=1 isn’t science even if you’ve got letters after your name.

* I’ve found none of it interesting or convincing so far…and some of it is flat wrong.

Moving ahead: The bar has been raised.  What was interesting in 2008 (hmmm...maybe saturated fat isn't so bad after all) is no longer worthy of attention.  It takes careful, patient, hard work to add to the knowledge of the paleo community in 2012 and beyond...

...and there are some who aren't willing to do that work.  Instead, I see bold, unsupported pronouncements, personal attacks, and pot-stirring.  I agree that it's absolutely detrimental to the community, and to all the people who just want to get and stay well.  This is too important a goal to be diverted from by those who value ego gratification over the advancement of knowledge.

Please continue to point people here, to gnolls.org: I promise to maintain it as a calm, reasoned, reliable source of information.  And I must tip my hat to others in the community who continue to do useful work: people like Paul Jaminet, Chris Masterjohn, Jamie Scott, Ned Kock, and Peter @ Hyperlipid.

Paul:

I have no plans to abandon the 'paleo' label, because it's the best description for what I do that doesn't require additional explanation.  I'd rather deal with occasional "caveman diet" gibes than having to continually explain some term I made up.

And I fear the current problem isn't people being "too paleo"...it's people who are either bored with paleo, or don't want to do the work to advance the state of knowledge, and are passing off N=1 as science.  Kurt Harris saying "The idea that starch or even gluten are per se NADS is wrong" is basically the endpoint of this erroneous line of thinking.  Gluten is fine?  Really?  I believe some biochemistry is in order.

"Corn is not so much a big deal this side of the pond, but I gather folks in the US cannot move without bumping into the stuff."  Absolutely...our government subsidizes its production so heavily that we are forced to turn it into ethanol and feed it to cars at a net energy loss!

Daniel:

I find Ray Peat to be a mixture of interesting insights and biochemistry -- and utter bunk masquerading as such.  I think a lot of people like him because it gives them an excuse to down ice cream and sugar ("It's for my thyroid.  Really!")  Your body temporarily ramping up thermogenesis in order to dispose of sugar far in excess of your body's ability to store the energy is not the same thing as fixing your HPTA dysfunction.  I don't recommend becoming too distracted by it.

Far more important, though, is that being a gnoll goes far beyond diet and exercise.  I'm concentrating on it right now because there is much of importance to be learned, and I enjoy being able to teach people why eating like a predator works so well...but as you know from reading TGC, it's just the first step of a very long journey.  The real journey is the future of humans.  Is it the endless servitude of agriculture, or the proud freedom of the hunt?  Most people don't even know that we have a choice...and that is where our task begins.

Paul:

I've been doing a lot of trailbuilding the past few years...there's lots of drystone work involved, though it's mostly under the tread and only partially visible.

Paul and Daniel:

"When I finished TGC, I felt like I had found something that hadn't ever been lost."  

Writing TGC was similar: I was remembering events that had already happened, not making them up.

I do my best to be open and welcoming...but I can't force anyone to participate.  gnolls.org is a community because you, and people like you, make it one.  

JS

April 24, 2012
12:29 pm
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Cameron, Tx
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JS: You never disappoint.

Because I'm so vocal and opinionated I direct someone here at least once a day. I stayed up super late last night talking to two of my friends about the paleo lifestyle and your site was the first one I told them to go to. The others I save for when I email them my bookmarks list.

Gnolls.org has what all the others lack, and that's the ATTITUDE. There is so much more to this than diet, like you mentioned, and they will need the attitude and mentality shift to truly understand just what our genetic heritage means for our future. It's not enought to eat butter and steak, lifts weights, and sleep 10 hrs a day. We must think and feel the way we are meant to as well (although without those things dialed in, the mentality of a predator is lost-mostly, not getting into that here).

The need for a tribe is genetic as well and your attentiveness to not only the science, but the comments posted and the emails sent helps to make this a home for us too. Although we are all leaders, there has to be voice since humans are just so damn lost at this point in history.

Thank you for not shirking your RESPONSIBILITY. We all have responsibilities to fulfill whether they be to a spouse, a child, your employees, the human race in general, or all of them at once.

I am changing my entire life at this moment. I'm working on my personal trainers liscense while I maintain an 80 hr a week job and take care of wife who is struggling with a chronic pain disorder. It's hard but I remind myself everyday that I only get one shot in this life. Just one. There is no reset button, no bearded hippie in the sky, no eternal peace crap. All that mess makes one weak and complacent. I cannot waste my time on stupid ego games, political or religious fetters, or trying to make another dollar.

Well. We certainly have a job ahead of us and you will be hearing more from me- I've decided to stay and while I need my breaks from all this (as we all do) I won't be vanishing.
Cheers

Oh yeah, Peat smelled like woo woo to me; prob another "almost paleo" site propped up by BigAgra.

April 24, 2012
11:44 pm
Eddie
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Awesome post, you've completely nailed the issue. The only thing I can think of to preserve our sanity is another Gandhi quote:
"We need to be the change we wish to see in the world".
Short of being forced at gunpoint to surrender my grass-fed beef and eat hummus, I'm going to carry on living the Paleo lifestyle and let the results speak for themselves!

April 27, 2012
12:04 am
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Daniel:

Thank you.  Our task is monumental -- but that's fine, because our task is joyous.  It is the task of reclaiming our evolutionary heritage, both as humans and as a species.

I wish you the best in the transformation of yourself and your family!

(However, I sincerely doubt Ray Peat is a shill for anyone.  I think he's smart, well-intentioned, and not entirely correct.)

Eddie:

Keep speaking out.  When Steve Cooksey is facing fines and jail time for telling people with a disease of impaired glucose metabolism to eat less glucose -- while the "dietitians" continue giving advice that, quite literally, kills millions of people each year -- it's no time to remain silent.  

JS

May 1, 2012
8:55 pm
Susan
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JS,
I had no intention of becoming a radical, I just was determined to find health. I'm alarmed and repulsed by the truth that the promotion of human suffering is so profitable. I'm also feeling a little vulnerable as the only gnoll in my neck of the woods. I can't decide whether to curl up in a ball and cry, or just go eat a little more meat. I am comforted in my paranoia to hear from the rest of you out there. Where is our tribe meeting after the apocalypse? Please wait for me...

As for thebakingfairy, I'd rather just step in the flaming dog poop rather than try and read that again.

May 2, 2012
1:58 pm
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April 26, 2012
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As we speak out, we have a duty to be informative without being hateful.  Remember that people have been told by so called experts for decades that eating the way we do (Paleo, Primal, Ancestral, whatever you want to call it) is unhealthy and barely short of evil.  The sheep should not be blamed for the shepherd's stupidity.  We need to look at our knowledge as a gift we are sharing, without letting it become contentious. 

The fact is that the comparison is easy to make.  I ask people daily, "Why should you take dietary advice from the government of the fattest people on Earth and the "experts" they taught? Really??? When there are so many examples of relatively effortlessly fit, healthy people who follow an ancestral nutrition plan, you still listen to the conventional wisdom?"

That is only the dietary component.  Too many of us have been suckered into wasting many years in pursuit of monetary and status goals.  I picture the gnolls saying, "Nerga, nerga, nerga." and then laughing at our expense.  Gah! I can give countless examples of people who live simply and with minimal attachment to "stuff" who are much happier than many people of great wealth.  As well as my own experience of being on the debt/work treadmill.

In all of this, it is easy to give in to hard feelings, but shouldn't we who have heard the song of our blood understand that a life full of memories and good relationships is important enough to not be so forceful in our spreading the word that we alienate the very people we are trying to educate.

May 2, 2012
2:00 pm
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Pensacola, Florida
Gnoll
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April 26, 2012
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Susan said:

JS,
I had no intention of becoming a radical, I just was determined to find health. I'm alarmed and repulsed by the truth that the promotion of human suffering is so profitable. I'm also feeling a little vulnerable as the only gnoll in my neck of the woods. I can't decide whether to curl up in a ball and cry, or just go eat a little more meat. I am comforted in my paranoia to hear from the rest of you out there. Where is our tribe meeting after the apocalypse? Please wait for me...

As for thebakingfairy, I'd rather just step in the flaming dog poop rather than try and read that again.

Susan, being the only gnoll means an unhindered hunting ground.  🙂  I get your point, though.

May 2, 2012
7:56 pm
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First-Eater
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February 22, 2010
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Susan:

As you continue to eat this way, you'll grow stronger both physically and mentally -- and the lack of local packmates will bother you less, because you'll be stronger than those who oppose you.  Feel free to find support here when you need it.

As for myself, after the apocalypse I'll be summering right here at the lake and wintering down in the Carson Valley, just like the Indians used to.  (Unless I've moved.)

MasterNinja:

I've heard it said: "Don't take diet advice from a fat man, or cooking advice from a thin man."

Status for gnolls is much simpler than it is for us.  It starts with who your mother is (or was), and is only maintained by your ability to justify and protect it, by ability or force.  They don't really comprehend the idea that an elaborate hat, or something abstract like "money" or "laws", could give someone else a "right" to eat first or live on an area of land.

And you're right: don't be a vegan.  Q: "How do you know if a stranger is vegan?"  A: "Don't worry, they'll tell you."  But we can't afford to be wallflowers, either...if someone is spreading misinformation, polite disagreement is warranted.  (And, if appropriate, a link to one of my articles.)

JS

October 9, 2012
7:13 pm
Ahsan Irfan
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Having followed Paleo (both as a personal WOE and on blogs and such) for a while, I have come to the conclusion that if we value our own futures, as well as the futures of our children, it would be best that we consider a move to the third world, where such government control is less ominous.

October 12, 2012
1:22 am
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Ahsan:

Someone will always be attempting to exert that sort of control...if not the government, then some guerilla insurgency or drug lords (which are often the same thing).  The question is "Are the things they want control over things I care about or disagree with?"

JS

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