You should all take your heads out of food conglomerates asses. When I was in University studying nutrition my professor showed us the stack of ads and “information” she received from good companies telling her why this and that, and their products were good for you. It’s all about cheap raw materials, and money.

Think of it this way. The cost to produce food is a money pie, and if you take a bunch of that money out to advertise and have marketing campaigns, pay people off, etc. …well that means there is less money for the raw materials to actually make the food. Therefore, those raw materials have to become CHEAPER AND CHEAPER, with whatever means possible. Therefore, the product is probably shit. Why do you think they feed cows grains and soybeans and so on, and pump them with stuff to give more milk. All this while farmers receive the lowest price for their milk in history. It is less than $9 per hundred-weight. INSANE.

Certain Asian societies nowadays definitely eat more soy, but if you look traditionally, and as look at my posting above, soy was not a huge aspect of their diet at all. PORK WAS. Okinawans traditionally cooked practically everything in lard, and ate lots of pork as well.

To say that soy is healthier is crap. We are all eating soy everyday and every single processed food we eat, as well as when we eat industrially raised animal products. They are fed corn, grains, and soybeans to fatten them up and give quick cheap energy. Get a little bit more in touch with reality and with actual farming and you will realize that we survived greatly off of milk and animals, and fermented foods.

According to KC Chang, editor of Food in Chinese Culture, the total caloric intake due to soy in the Chinese diet in the 1930′s was only 1.5%, compared with 65% for pork.
The chief concern we have about the consumption of large amounts of soy is that there is a risk of mega-dosing on isoflavones. If soy consumers follow the advice of Protein Technologies International (manufacturers of isolated soy protein) and consume 100 grams of soy protein per day, their daily genistein intake could easily exceed 200 milligrams per day. This level of genistein intake should definitely be avoided. For comparison, it should be noted that Japanese males consume, on average, less than 10 milligrams of genistein per day (Fukutake M, Takahashi M, Ishida K, Kawamura H, Sugimura T, Wakabayashi K; Food Chem Toxicol 1996, 34:457-61).

Ernest Tso is credited with the development of the first soymilk diet that was able to sustain an infant for the first eight months of life. Writing in the Chinese Journal of Physiology in 1928, Tso noted that soybean milk is a native food used in certain parts of the country as a morning beverage but it is little used as part of the diet for children. Its nutritive properties as a food for young infants are practically unknown.

Eight years later, Tso’s comments were still valid. Writing in the 1930′s, Dr RA Guy of the Department of Public Health of the Peiping Union Medical College found it ‘pertinent to note that we have never found soybean milk naturally used by Peiping women to feed their children. This beverage is not made in the home in Peiping, but is sold by street vendors, as a hot, very weak solution of soybean protein and is usually drunk by old people in place of tea. The milk, as reinforced for the feeding of young infants, is rather tedious and difficult to prepare. As dispensed recently by the various health stations, it is in demand, but is just as artificial in this community as cow’s milk’ (Guy RA. Chinese Med J. 1936; 50:434-442).

In a later publication, Guy reported on the use of soybean milk as a food for infants. The whole purpose of this report was to comment on the possible use of soymilk to address the problem of feeding those infants without sufficient maternal milk in a country where cow’s milk was not native. He again noted that although a weak soy milk or ‘tofu chiang’ was ‘sold hot in Peking by street vendors and was taken by old people in place of tea’, that ‘contrary to Western notions’ it was not usual to feed soy milk to infants (Guy RA and Yeh KS. Chinese Med J. 1938; 54:1-30).

Soy is insanely cheap to produce. Why do you think everything except for the fruits and vegetables have soy in them somewhere. Every single packaged food has soy or something derived from soy (or corn), and all the mass produced meats, dairy, and so on, the animals have been fed soy, grains, and corn.

We need to eat animals raised on pasture, farm fresh milk, bone broths, traditionally fermented foods, fresh organic vegetables and fruits. As well, as natural sweeteners, and unprocessed salt.

Think about it.

What do you do if: A) people are eating less meat and more soy foods, B) people are drinking less milk and more soymilk and, C) the soybeans you feed to your cows and/or chickens are costing you more because other companies are turning them into soyfoods.

And as was mentioned by another, what’s really worse for you a little soy or meat and dairy that’s been pumped full of hormones, anti-biotics, and other drugs?

I read something once about how little girls in Puerto Rico were developing breasts and starting their periods at 3-5 years old. And that the boys were growing pubic hair because someone had fed too many hormones to the chickens there, but I think it was a fluke and they took care of it.

I’ve also read that plastic has chemicals that mimic estrogen and so you should NEVER microwave your food in plastic or any kind. NO frozen food tray. NO Tupperware. NO Rubbermade. And that you shouldn’t leave plastic waterbottles in your car on hot sunny days or warm them in the microwave.

And I’ve read that antibacterial soap mimics estrogen too because of the germicides they contain. It gets absorbed through the skin.

As someone who has been a vegetarian in the past and hopes to be vegan in the future, I hate to admit that the most “realistic” diet for myself might be eating limited amounts of chicken and fish, but concentrating on getting more fruits, veggies & fiber in my diet.

“Realistic” meaning more convenient and “doable.” I’m not currently vegetarian or vegan, but I usually limit the amount of meat that I consume.

Also, if soy made you gay they probably wouldn’t have a billion people in China, would they?

And eating meat & dairy increases impotence (and reduces penis size) by clogging the veins of the penis with plaque. OUCH!

seriously, aren’t the super-strength hormones and antibiotics that are crammed into meat animals, in modern factory farming operations, of significantly greater concern than some weakened plant estrogen in a bean that’s been consumed for ages?

it may be comforting and convenient to a contented-meat-eater to believe some hyped-up charges about soy because it helps them justify their current food choices. but really, learn more about where your meat comes from, the awful substances farm animals are fed, the disgusting living conditions, the slaughterhouse operations, and *then* decide which is scary – that piece of meat or a soybean!

Here’s just a few of the errors/omissions/misconceptions in this article:

Messina is indeed a ‘soy expert’. He’s at the top of the soy industry food chain. His interest in soy is massive, it’s called money.

It’s not the Western A. Price Foundation, but the Weston A. Price Foundation. They are not paid by the meat or dairy board. Their main slant is not to knock soy, but to advocate traditional foods, including hormone-free, grass-fed, compassionately farmed meats, fats that are not rancid and artificially processed, and chemical free whole foods. The foundation follows the work of Weston Price, a dentist, who went around the world to study tooth decay and health, expecting to find vegetarian cultures that fit his paradigm of health. His studies of nutritional anthropology and modern health advocate whole and traditional foods, as does the foundation. Dr. Kaayla Daniel, who is a member of the foundation, wrote a book called The Whole Soy Story.

This whole idea that soy is a health food comes from- the soy industry! But the roots of soy are deep and dirty. Soy’s big thrust here was as oil. Processed, poisonous ‘vegetable oil.’ You know, the stuff of margarine. Hydrogenated oil. Trans fat. Heart-healthy! the margarine companies chirped. For years we used the plastic on our food as a healthy alternate to butter. The cheap oil was used in all processed foods. Junk foods. As science came around, soy saw the bottom falling out of their market and began pumping another batch of health food stories. Think about it. Hydrogenated oil is one of the most toxic heart dangers, with ZERO as a safe limit. Why are the new ‘health’ products any different?

The quote from the Asian girl about the flat earth was very cute and so on, and strategically used to make us think that anyone who thinks soy is dangerous is a lunatic. Recall that at first, EVERYONE thought the earth was flat because that’s what they were told. The insinuation is, if we are thinking soy is harmful, we are idiots. But considering the massive amounts of evidence against it, we are actually the first to stop believing in that flat earth and consider a wider science. I don’t know the measurement of soy products in Asia, and I am not Asian, and I do believe many Asians eat soy products. However, Asian cultures eat a lot of fish, raw fish, and vegetables, and less processed foods or wheat-based products. There are many many reasons why they don’t have our diseases. Also, Chinese cultures eat a lot of eggs and pork. I mean, A LOT. Maybe this is why they have less cancer? Finally, there was no mention of something very important: soy foods in Asia are fermented. The entire miso-making culture was about learning fermentation secrets. Why is this important? Because unfermented soyfoods are poison. Soy beans were used as fertilizer, and fermenting the bean made it edible to the people, all those years ago. Asians do not eat isolated soy protein or vegetarian soy and gluten patties. They eat pork, fish, vegetables, and traditionally fermented tofu. Tofu here, and most soyfoods, are not fermented. The fermenting process removes many of the toxins in the soy. Go ahead, ask a real Asian miso maker why they ferment the soy. They’ll tell you why.

Finally, if the aim is to make soy dissidents feel like neanderthal redneck homophobes, whatever. I’m pretty in pink, believe me. But that doesn’t change the fact that hormone disruption is a dangerous thing. Artificial or natural, screwing with your hormone function is risky business. Plants are drugs, don’t forget. Chemical drugs are based on plant science. So it makes sense, just possibly, that estrogen might not be a good idea to feed either boys or girls. You have the estrogen you need already. It’s not about making anyone gay. It’s about girls menstruating before age ten and little boys growing moobs. It is happening out there. It makes sense to question the hormones in meat, the estrogen in plastics, and the estrogen in soy foods.

Those are just a few of my thoughts. Those interested can read more, in my article on the great soy deception, Spilling the Beans, at Gremolata dot com.

Cheers,
Lorette

So for me at least I don’t trust anything on that website.

There was a very interesting article on Discovery a few weeks ago how the male species in general is in trouble due to the chemicals used from soaps to weed killers – how the testes are shrinking and that the male birth rate has dropped considerably since the 50′s.

Maybe it’s all just part of the “big plan” conducted by Nature.

Overall I think we are all f^*#ed anyway.
Have a good day!

More importantly, don’t lose sight of the good news story here! Straight couples who procreate & have gay children can now blame soy. Or a mix-up at the nursery. Or soy-filled baby bottles. or…..hmmm….oh well, one of these days, something will explain it….

Charlotte, soy is not a fat-free food. Soy contains oil. But I have never heard of it being touted as a weight-loss product. Soy protein may be used in some “diet foods”, but that was mostly for the low-carb diet fad.

Also, just because food manufacturers take advantage of the “latest discovery” and over-use it, or use it in a very refined form, or over-hype it, that doesn’t make the food itself “bad”. So, use it the way it’s supposed to be used (as a bean, as tofu, miso, tempeh, soy flour, etc.) and don’t eat so many packaged foods! It’s simple!

People are not fat because they eat “diet foods”. They are fat because they a.) don’t get enough exercise, and b.) because they eat too many packaged or fast-food fat, salt and sugar-laden foods instead of home-cooked foods, and c.) because they eat over-large helpings. Then they get sucked into buying “diet foods” thinking that they can still eat packaged foods and be skinny. It doesn’t matter whether you are a meat-eater or a vegetarian, or whatever– you have to eat a little less, exercise (i.e. walk) more, and eat real food.

Notice for example that soy is contained in several ‘low fat’ and ‘fat free’ items on the grocerery store shelves. I’ve always been somewhat dubious about the whole notion of ‘fat free’ foods. In particular, those that contain dairy or are primarily cheese based in nature.

I do believe that the general public has been somewhat duped by the claims of food manufacturers in this area. And oh gee…isn’t it amazing how the general public is fatter now than ever before??
Hmmm….
Interesting indeed.

I’m not worried so much about estrogen levels in soy sauce as I am in it actually killing somebody close to me.