Why do people eat soy?!
Why do people eat soy?
with the recent findings that the plant estrogen found in soy causes cancer, why do people still eat the stuff in such a large quantity, I mean shure the asians have been eating the stuff for a long time but only on the condoment level, the same way we eat mustard and mayo, not as a main corse
why are people doing this to themselfs?????????!!!!!!!!!??!...
Answers:
I do not think that most people realize that it could harm them in some way or they believe it is still better to use as a meat substitute.
Because everything causes cancer these days
This is from an article that is given in the source, which gives a better picture:
Asians who eat a lot of soy have lower incidence of certain cancers, most notably breast cancer and prostate cancer.
Are these two factors causative or are they mere associations? In other words, I sing in the shower every morning and the sun rises. Does my singing cause the sun to rise or are these two factors merely happening at the same time? You get the picture.
So scientists first looked to see if there was a causative factor. And they found two components of soybeans with anti-cancer activity. The first are phytoestrogens - a group of compounds (eg genistein and daidzein) that have estrogen-like activity in humans and animals.
Question. Why would a plant develop chemicals that affect the hormone levels of animals?
Answer: Protection. Remember the name of the game? (all together) survival. And if you’re a soybean plant, survival depends on not getting eaten by bugs or animals. So soybeans evolved the ability to create estrogen-like hormones that mess up the reproductive cycle of such would-be soybean eaters.
VR
Because for every study that states soy causes cancer, there is another that says it prevents it. Honestly, finding what causes cancer is like finding a needle in a haystack, there are just too many variables and unknowns. Also studies are easily corruptible, who's to say that the studies finding a link to cancer weren't funded by the meat industry? Likewise one's linking soy to prevention could be the result of soya farmers.
It is impossible to avoid everything that a study has said may be linked cancer, so you pick your evils, and for some people, soy is a lesser evil because it has many other benefits.
In large enough quantities, anything will kill you, even water. Do you have any idea of the sheer concentration of stuff they have to pump into rats till they developed cancer?
Course not. If you did you wouldn't have posted this. Try reading the actual studies.
And a word to the wise- try not to fall prey to media scare tactics. You'll start freaking out over everything
*rolls eyes*
Too much of anything isnt good, no matter what it is. Having a lot of soy in your diet is becoming hard to avoid. With all the things that can cause this and cause that and the 500 lists of "FOODS THAT WILL KILL YOU" its a wonder we arent all crawling around with the cows and goats looking for organic grass to eat! If you want to be REALLY scared and paranoid but informed, look up mercoladotcom. Dr.Mercola has a vast amount of information on the foods we all eat.
And we do these things to ourselves because we are always trying to improve our health and lives so we rush out to try the newest thing (in this case soy everything) without truly investigating it, hoping for a quick and easy answer to better health and living.
Soy is a protein and is used as such in many Asian dishes. That's why I find it so very easy and so very necessary to discount those so-called experts who try to tell us the estradiols in plants can cause cancer - if it were the case, cancer rates in most of Asia would be sky-high, and they're not.
People eat soy products because they'd rather not eat rotting animal flesh. Now that stuff will kill you.
As far as Asians eating soy, it depends on where you are and the type of people. Tofu has been around for about 2000 years, so people have been eating it all that time. Of course the main difference is most of the soy stuff is freshly made without extra things that might be added today.
I know many people (and know of their past relatives) who have eaten soy their whole lives, and they don't have any notably worse health than anyone else.
It would be interesting to know about why you think this is true? Think about this, the milk industry advertises all the time to help sell milk. How many soy milk ads have you ever seen? Yet it continues to show up in more and more markets. Many industries compete against soy products (dairy and meat). So bringing up "bad" things is a means to make people unsure of competing products.
Also, realize that the number 1 killer in the US is heart disease, which in many cases is due to excess fat and cholesterol in the diet. That's why a diet after having a heart attack is supposed to limit fat and cholesterol. Only animal products have cholesterol. Someone substituting tofu for food with cholesterol cuts that out of their diet. So we already are familiar with what can lead to the main cause of death in the US, yet we don't hear so much about it. People talk about cancer more.
In addition, a large percentage of Asians are lactose intolerant. They drink soy milk, and having it for breakfast everyday is not uncommon for people in certain regions, that's why Asian stores sell lots of soy milk (usually not the Western kind). Also, the white block tofu that is made is typically not fermented, reference tofu making processes here: http://www.fao.org/docrep/t0532e/t0532e1...
Again, this product is sold alongside the soy milk that can be bought at various tofu shops in different parts of Asia. Attempting to summarize in a few sentences what over a billion people eat is ridiculous, especially when it comes from people who didn't grow up in that area or in that culture. That would be like trying to summarize what all of Europe eats in a few sentences, when everyone knows each country/region there has their own specializations.
If you believe what everyone puts on the internet then well... you should check out the actual sources of fact.
Dairy is at war with soy for a reason my friend. The medical text books are sponsored by the meat and dairy industry. Your media is paid for by big pharmaceutical giants.
See http://www.notmilk.com and see the whole truth and nothing but the truth, and wake up...
There is soy and plant foods with estrogenic mimickers by Monsanto chemical company (billion dollar chemical and pharmaceutical company dominating our dairy and seed supply) to keep insects from breeding and we eat the food and get cancer.
Then there's non GMO (genetically modified organism), soy... which is not tampered by science that block estrogenic receptors and block cancer. Pure plant foods that have not been tampered by big pharmaceuticals like Monsanto, means it blocks cancer.
Dairy, causes cancer. Monsanto has been injecting our cows with IBGF Factor 1, a growth hormone to increase milk production which has been increasing cancer at an alarming rate.
Who do you think owns your media?
Go to http://www.notmilk.com and the truth will set you free.
Yes, it's true that your wife, girlfriend or significant other has been eating a lot of soy lately, mainly to boost her female hormones. That doesn't mean it's bad for you, fella. Instead of pushing aside that soy milk, go ahead and pour some on your morning cereal. Dig into the soy burgers at the office cafeteria and the tofu that appears in your takeout stir-fry.
It turns out that soy, at least in the doses most people will consume it in food, may be good for guys, too. A growing number of studies suggest that soy has plenty of health benefits for men -- from lowering cholesterol levels to protecting against prostate cancer -- and few downsides.
"Real men should eat soy," said Kenneth Setchell, professor of pediatrics at the Cincinnati Children's Medical Center, who has studied soy for 30 years. "Generally, men are put off by soy. It tends to be sort of a woman's thing. That's a great pity, because the evidence that soy protects against prostate cancer is quite strong."
While there have been worries that men who consume large quantities of low-carb soy bread, soy cereal or other soy-filled foods may get a little too in touch with their feminine sides, research findings have generally not borne out those fears.
"Soy is a very healthy food," said physician James Anderson, who has studied soy for 15 years at the University of Kentucky in Lexington and is convinced enough of its benefits to eat about a dozen servings of soy per week. "It's very safe."
Most concerns about soy have centered around the fact that it is a rich source of isoflavones, substances that mimic the effects of the female hormone estrogen. To determine what these plant-based chemicals might do, Steven Zeisel and his colleagues at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill fed megadoses of soy to men as part of a recent National Cancer Institute study.
Nipple discharge, breast enlargement and slight decreases in testosterone occurred with the megadoses. But "we still couldn't find anything that was serious, and we went up to doses that are probably 30 times what you could get from normal foods," Zeisel said. "I don't think that there are a lot of estrogenic worries. Your testicles will not shrink and you won't have massive breast enlargement" from eating soy.
And if you stick with foods rich in soy as opposed to supplements, researchers say, there's no evidence of harm, unless you happen to be among the one in every 1,000 people who are allergic to soy. "It's quite difficult to overconsume soy, to be honest," said Setchell.
Not only is soy a rich source of high-quality protein, but it also contains complex carbohydrates that don't raise blood sugar as high as more processed carbohydrates. It has fiber, folic acid (a key B vitamin), healthy fat and antioxidants that help protect against cancer.
There's also evidence that soy acts as a probiotic in some people, promoting growth of healthy bacteria in the gastrointestinal tract that in turn produce health-promoting substances. While it's possible these days to eat soy at every meal and snack, it only takes a small amount of soy to produce health benefits. Less than a handful of soy nuts, about a fifth of a cup, provides 12 grams of protein, said Anderson, who keeps a stash near his desk for snacks. "If you can eat a third of a cup a day, that would give good protective levels in terms of heart disease."
Will such soy-filled products as low-carb bread, soy cereal, soy crackers and cookies have the same benefits as traditional soy sources?
"My feeling is that soy milk and tofu have the best test of time," said David Jenkins, professor and chairman of nutrition and metabolism at the University of Toronto and St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto. The soy isolates found in meatless burgers and hot dogs "have also been shown to be very effective," Jenkins said. By contrast, soy sauce has only minimal levels of active soy ingredients and comes with massive amounts of sodium.
Just resist any urge to eat raw soy. Uncooked soybeans contain a substance that inhibits trypsin, a key enzyme required for protein digestion. "Horses who eat raw soybeans die," said Zeisel. While raw soybeans may not be as deadly for humans as they are for horses, Zeisel said it's not worth the risk: "Don't ever eat soybeans raw."
Here's how cooked soy stacks up in health benefits:
Bone health Studies suggest that soy helps preserve bone and may help build it in some people. While nearly all the research has been done in women, who suffer more extreme bone loss with age than do men, researchers say there's no reason to suggest that soy may not also help protect older men from osteoporosis.
Blood pressure Soy appears to lower blood pressure slightly. It also seems to lower blood pressure by "improving elasticity of blood vessels," Setchell said.
Cholesterol Since 1999, foods containing 6.25 grams of soy protein per serving can be promoted for their ability to lower blood cholesterol when combined with a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol. About 25 grams of soy protein daily helps lower the most damaging form of blood cholesterol -- low-density lipoprotein (LDL) -- by up to about10 percent and total cholesterol by up to 7 percent, according to Anderson. There's also evidence that blood triglyceride levels rise less after a meal containing soy and that eating a diet rich in soy may help reduce the metabolic syndrome -- a constellation of symptoms that include elevated cholesterol, blood pressure and extra fat at the waistline.
Colon cancer A few studies suggest that soy may help protect against colon cancer, but the evidence is still emerging.
Diabetes Soy contains healthy carbohydrates with a low glycemic index, meaning they are less likely than more-processed carbs to raise blood sugar levels. New research also suggests that eating soy food appears to help protect the kidneys of those with diabetes, especially those with type 1.
Studies in Europe and at the University of Illinois also suggest that soy helps reduce protein in the urine of people with diabetes, which can help reduce kidney damage, a common complication of diabetes.
Hair loss Soy helps boost production in the intestines of equol, a substance that binds to dihydrotestosterone, the chief culprit in causing hair follicles to die. Although still in early investigation, Setchell and other researchers theorize that boosting equol could help protect against baldness.
Muscles As a protein source, soy ranks at the top of the list. But no need to take massive doses of soy protein supplements or powder to build more muscle. Eating a soy burger, a handful of soy nuts or a soy smoothie after a weight training session is plenty to help repair muscle, according to Jeff Potteiger, an exercise physiologist at Miami University in Ohio.
Prostate In Asian countries, where soy consumption is high, incidence of prostate cancer is similar to that in Western countries, but the disease is much less likely to kill. Studies of Seventh-Day Adventists, who eat no meat, have found that drinking one glass per day of soy milk appears to lower prostate cancer risk by 30 percent; two glasses per day may lower risk by up to 70 percent. At the University of North Carolina, researchers found men with elevated blood levels of prostate-specific antigens (PSA) who took megadoses of soy showed a significant slowing in rise of the PSA.
Waistline Soy foods are lower in calories, total fat and saturated fat than comparable meat products, and they have zero cholesterol -- all benefits that can help protect against obesity. There's also some evidence that soy may help reduce buildup of dangerous visceral abdominal body fat, according to Anderson.
For that reason, some soy researchers, including Anderson, Setchell, Jenkins and Zeisel, say they're putting their findings into practice by pouring soy milk on their cereal, snacking on soy bars and eating a soyburger instead of a hamburger. Example: A beef burger has about 190 calories, 11 grams of fat, four grams of saturated fat, zero carbs and no fiber, while a soyburger contains 50 fewer calories, a third of the fat, 10 grams of carbohydrates, three grams of fiber and zero saturated fat and cholesterol.
Asian people don't eat tofu, miso? they are made from soybean and not just "on the condoment level"