A while ago I did a literature search into "do people really need dairy"? A paper says yes, fat-removed milk products add nutrients to the otherwise complete catastrophe that is the average american diet.
so we gotta keep sticking the band-aid on instead of maybe subsidizing some vegetables among all that corn and meat?
🇳🇱
@coldwave That seems like a weak counterargument "dairy is nutritious therefore we should have it in your diet" isnt a band aid for a bad diet, so much as a good argument for it to be a part of any diet.
The thing is, dairy provides several nutrients that would be hard (though not impossible) from even a diet with veggies in it, unless you are mindful enough to pick veggies that specifically carry the wanted vitamins and minerals. Regardless if you eat your veggies or not having nutritiously rich variety in any diet is obviously the ideal.
@freemo dairy is nutritious, there's nothing literally false about that. it's a case of asking an oddly narrow question - willfully not considered is whether its worth it economically or environmentally, and the bigger problem in the population's nutrition and the food supply chain.
@coldwave Depends entirely on the details. If your primary goal is to argue that "cows are abused due to the milk industry and we shouldn't accept that", well I'd agree with you.
The environmental aspect is a little hairier, there are certainly bad environmental practices employed by the dairy industry, but there are also plenty of such practices employed in farming of vegetables. So that is less of an argument around "is it worth it for the environment" and more of an argument around "how do we make dairy more environmentally conscious"
