this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2025
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Well, I mean, first of all it is my job as a parent to "impose my beliefs and limitations" onto my child. We pretend it's not, but it is in everything I tell my children.
And then
No, it's not. It can be for vegans. But just not eating meat (aka vegetarian) has no malnutrition risk.
No, it's not. There is no malnutrition risk from avoiding meat.
That's...that's exactly what I wrote there?!
Apologies. Meant there is no risk from avoiding animal products.
Depends on which diet you come from. For having a "standard, western, unhealthy diet" changing nothing but avoiding meat: you have no challenges.
When you take the same diet and substitute all animal products, you could run into issues. Depends on where you're coming from with your previous diet. Especially true for growing children. But it's certainly doable, but more effort then just vegetarian.
What issues?
Vegan milks, meats, etc are fortified with everything hard to get and most macro levels are naive and based on studies performed on the general population/omnivores. It’s actually harder as a vegetarian as you don’t get the metabolic pathway benefits like the improved omega6 conversion. This is why you don’t get actual negative outcomes shown for low levels of certain nutrients in vegans.
It’s effortless unless you’ve got a selective eating disorder. Just chuck some flax and nooch in sauces and you’re good to go.
My point is just that.
Vegetarian: do everything the same, just don't put meat in your dishes
Vegan: your whole paragraph.
You need to find substitutes for milk to benefit of the additives and need to try out. Took me a long time to find a milk substitute I like. Soy based stuff can cover for Calcium, but soy based stuff is rare in a lot of western diets, so you need to experiment.
That's my whole point. Certainly it is doable, but not as plug and play as a vegetarian diet. And, when you don't try the stuff mentioned in your paragraph and mine, you might run into issues, especially with children. That's what I am saying, that's a subjunctive.
I mean it was like one sentence hardly challenging? I’ve been vegan for over a decade and been round most of the west, where doesn’t have a ton of plant milks? The only struggle is out of comfort.
Just going veggie and cutting out a major source of your nutrients without considering a replacement is far more dangerous than simply switching to readily available vegan alternatives.
One might argue your job is to do what’s best for the child despite your beliefs.
And sure, the risks are lower for vegetarians but you’re still depriving a young child in your care of nutrition because of something you chose for yourself.
You seem to equate your diet with religion or some other deep rooted belief that you feel obligated to pass down. While the people who heard you were forcing this upon a child were thinking it’s more like choosing to smoke or drink heavily. Those two camps aren’t going to find common ground.
If anything, passing down ethical beliefs about what is ok to consume and support with your money is more valid to pass down than 2000 year old fairy tales about who should be allowed to do what with their pee pee, not less.
That's what I meant with pretend. What's best boils down to my beliefs, there is no objective criteria.
No, there are simply no risks in not eating meat. There are risks in eating only potatos, but there's just as much in eating only bacon. The potential risks in vegetarian and carnivore diet come from not enough diversity. But take a "normal Western" diverse diet, strip out the meat, and you're perfectly fine in all macro- and micronutrients.
I'm not OP of this subthread btw. Nobody ever came at me for my children's diet. Which they honestly should, as we eat way to much pasta, but that's what's always accepted 😅
That! Noone ever gets side eyed for taking their kids to McDonald's, which is the acme of malnutrition. But as soon as you don't serve meat to your kid every day, you get hassled by strangers. There are 35 million malnourished, mostly meat eating kids in the US, just by looking at the number of overweight children. But somehow the 1‰ of those who are vegan seem to be the issue.
Btw. I'm also not the OP of this thread, I'm not even vegan myself. But I get annoyed with these militant carnivores that pop up every time someone mentions veganism, just to spread FUD.
Hmmm, no, it's the same as eating meat. You pass it down to your children, yes? it's the exact same, and it presents no health risks whatsoever. No animal products on the other hand (=veganism) has to be carefully controlled for protein and B12 intake. And then it also presents no risks. But it's definitely more of a balance
You do not need to worry about protein at all. It’s impossible to design an amino acid deficient diet with enough calories.
B12 requirements and recycling also drop in vegans and there’s no evidence lower levels lead to negative outcomes.