Latest news with #vegetarianism
Bloomberg
18-07-2025
- Health
- Bloomberg
Were Americans Ever Really Healthy?
In the early years of the 20th century, American doctors recommended three heavy meals a day, laden with meat — steaks, roasts, bacon and ham. But the influencers of the day took a contrarian view: They advocated lighter eating or vegetarianism, sometimes flaunting their own physical fitness to bolster their case. More than a century later, the same debates are still raging, but the party lines are more complicated. Doctors have embraced lighter eating, influencers exist for every lifestyle choice under the sun, and US public-health departments are overseen by their own influencer, who touts the health virtues of beef fat and shows off his physique. Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s role as secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services has brought his often contrarian views in direct conversation with government policy — as encapsulated in the initiative known as Make America Healthy Again.
Bloomberg
14-07-2025
- Lifestyle
- Bloomberg
Flipping Burgers This Summer? They Won't Be Cheap.
I should disclose my bias from the start: I'm a carnivore. Hamburger? Check. Chops? Yes please. Steak? Yum. To my palate, all delicious and, right now, also incredibly pricey. As the barbecue season peaks, the cost of meat has jumped to an all-time high. Don't expect relief anytime soon. Record prices for beef may sound counterintuitive when vegetarianism seems to be on the rise. Skipping meat, and particularly beef, even if only for a few days a month is a popular trend among climate-conscious social media influencers. But the issue behind sky-high prices isn't consumption; if anything, demand is lackluster.
The Independent
09-06-2025
- Health
- The Independent
Vegetarians are more power-hungry than meat eaters, research suggests
Vegetarians are more likely to seek power and prize achievements over their meat -eating counterparts, new research has suggested. A study which assessed the values of more than 3,500 adults in Poland and the United States found that the 800 participants who were vegetarian were most likely to align themselves with values that improved their social status. Those included higher levels of personal ambition and a keener appetite for 'novelty and challenge in life'. Meanwhile, meat-eaters were found to align themselves closer to values of tradition, such as respecting established norms, and conformity, meaning a desire not to upset others and to comply with socially accepted conventions. They also placed more emphasis on benevolence, such as kindness towards friends and family, and security. Professor John Nezlek of SWPS University in Warsaw, who led the research, told The Times said: 'There's this long association between meat and masculinity. It's far more common for women to adopt vegetarianism than men, and there are three main reasons that people become vegetarians: health, the environment and animal welfare ethics. 'When you pile all of that together, you might start to think that vegetarians would be more benevolent, a little less assertive, generally more 'huggy' people — but I found the complete opposite.' Participants in both Poland and the US were handed brief sketches of fictional individuals accompanied by descriptions, such as: 'Being very successful is important to him. He likes to impress other people.' They were then asked to rank how much they related to the character from a scale of one to six. The report found that those who follow a vegetarian diet were likely to be independent thinkers who are not afraid to 'march to the beat of a different drum', given that they are a minority in many countries. 'In the face of such beliefs and in the face of the experiences of rejection and criticism that may accompany the expression of such beliefs vegetarians need to be committed and hold their beliefs strongly,' the report found. It concluded: 'The present results suggest that although vegetarians may be more sensitive to the pain and suffering of animals and may be more aware of threats to the environment than non-vegetarians, this sensitivity and awareness do not reflect the basic human value of benevolence. 'Moreover, the present results suggest that vegetarians hold values consistent with being members of a social minority who are willing to stand by their principles. Although the present studies leave important questions unanswered, they suggests a path forward.'
