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Delete this entry please, sorry.
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The "Natural" Fallacy
- Thread starter medicate
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These are the statements that are so entirely wrong that it should be painfully obvious they should not be repeated.
So if I were to eat an entire cooked boneless chicken minus the skin, I would have consumed zero calories, no protein, no fat, no vitamins, nothing, it would be nutritionally inert?
"Nutritionally inert" is defined as an indigestible bulking agent. A cup of cooked boneless/skinless chicken contains about 5g of fat, 1g saturated fat, 120mg cholesterol, 43g of protein, calcium, iron, other minerals and non-heat sensitive vitamins like vitamin A, B6, phosphorus, niacin, selenium, etc. Yes, the heating destroys some of the vitamins and sensitive amino acids like taurine (which even grinding raw meat will mostly destroy) but these are clearly added back in to the recipes as seen right on the label. No offense, I know you mean well, but I believe it is very irresponsible to keep repeating this misinformation about commercial cooked food.
I find it rather tedious to answer questions I have specifically addressed not only in this thread but numerous times before. Clearly you aren't asking a question but making a statement, so what is the point of a question mark?
You can disagree, but let us not pretend that I haven't elaborated as much as I can on why I believe that industrialized farmed meat is nothing like eating a healthy animal raw on the spot in the wild.Originally Posted by Ducman69
Yes, cats are obligate carnivores, but as with the fish analogy this is inherently fresh meat eaten while the prey is still twitching more often than not. It is an obvious fallacy to believe that this is the same as industrialized farmed chicken that you find at your grocery store.
Take the "fresh" chicken you find at your Kroger's meat section. Starting from the egg, the hens are typically cramped in very tight cages in very close proximity to vast numbers of other chickens which introduces health concerns. The egg itself passes through the same passageway as feces down a constantly reused conveyor belt. After incubating and brought to the hatchery, they are crowded with other chicks, debeaked, and injected which may or may not kill all pathogens already in the animal at this point. The chicken is then fed massive amounts typically with little sunlight crammed together in large lots in a dust cloud of fecal particulates. When they reach market weight, they will be brought for slaughter which passes it through various machines that will prepare well over a hundred thousand other chickens that day alone before shut down and cleanup. The meat is then usually not frozen but transported fresh to the grocery store in trucks and then reach the shelves for consumers to purchase generally within approximately 24 hours. The meat then sits waiting until it is purchased, typically another day or two before the consumer transports it unrefrigerated for typically an hour before finally has it in their refrigerator many more hours before serving.
This is why the FDA so strongly urges the public to heat meats to various minimum temperatures before consumption, as this meat is not considered fresh or sanitary enough to be consumed raw, nor is this man-made meat processing of non-prey animals for cats somehow natural to their evolutionary diet.
The claim that carnivore digestive systems are shorter and thus handle higher bacterial loads is also one of those internet claims that has never actually been tested or verified by any field experts. You see it on raw advocacy sites, but when asked for a source to substantiate this claim... *crickets chirping* We certainly have many cases of infection in racing greyhounds, where raw feeding has the longest history to date, so much so that it has been given the name "Alabama rot".
Now would I feel the same about a neighbor farmer that I know is raising whole-prey for me and freezing it right after slaughter? Absolutely not, I would consider that entirely safe as long as I were educated on the right portioning of meat/bone/organ to provide a properly balanced diet. Pathogens are not an innate part of meat, eggs, and dairy after all, they are contaminants primarily caused by limitations of large scale industrial meat manufacture/processing. But those limitations are a fact of life, and thus represents a risk that I believe is unnecessary and find that cooking and supplementing lost nutrients from the high heat a safer long-term practice.
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>>You can disagree, but let us not pretend that I haven't elaborated as much as I can on why I believe that industrialized farmed meat is nothing like eating a healthy animal raw on the spot in the wild.<<
Right, but you're writing off all raw food for cats (commercial, Frankenprey, whole prey, store-bought) where the risks from canned/dry are actually worse. What's your position on dry food? What kind of food do you feed your cats?
I think you have a minor point about factory-farmed food vs. prey from the wild, but my point in response is that wild prey is not always so clean either...but even if we remove the human-targeted raw food sitting in store freezers, I don't think it's fair to write-off commercial raw or commercial frozen whole-prey intended as food along with everything else. Like anything, there are quality gradations (same as with canned or dry cat food).
I also find it interesting that you take issue with both the greater bacterial load cats can (and do) tolerate as well as their shorter (and faster) carnivore-evolved digestive tracts. But, don't take it from me...the facts are out there and this is something you can catch up on quickly with a few choice Google searches.
Good convo either way. My goal here is to learn and also vet my knowledge so I can be a purveyor of increasingly more-accurate information. For me this is never about dogma. In fact, the reason I switched to raw was due to everything I read and learned pertaining to cat nutrition in the past few months. Simply seeing my cat respond to raw food was pretty amazing too, just as some cats are more motivated by canned food than kibble, or particular flavors/brands. I consider diet as important to a cat's physiology and psychology as play or socialization is for behavioral development.
Right, but you're writing off all raw food for cats (commercial, Frankenprey, whole prey, store-bought) where the risks from canned/dry are actually worse. What's your position on dry food? What kind of food do you feed your cats?
I think you have a minor point about factory-farmed food vs. prey from the wild, but my point in response is that wild prey is not always so clean either...but even if we remove the human-targeted raw food sitting in store freezers, I don't think it's fair to write-off commercial raw or commercial frozen whole-prey intended as food along with everything else. Like anything, there are quality gradations (same as with canned or dry cat food).
I also find it interesting that you take issue with both the greater bacterial load cats can (and do) tolerate as well as their shorter (and faster) carnivore-evolved digestive tracts. But, don't take it from me...the facts are out there and this is something you can catch up on quickly with a few choice Google searches.
Good convo either way. My goal here is to learn and also vet my knowledge so I can be a purveyor of increasingly more-accurate information. For me this is never about dogma. In fact, the reason I switched to raw was due to everything I read and learned pertaining to cat nutrition in the past few months. Simply seeing my cat respond to raw food was pretty amazing too, just as some cats are more motivated by canned food than kibble, or particular flavors/brands. I consider diet as important to a cat's physiology and psychology as play or socialization is for behavioral development.
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First of all, there IS no chicken breast meat in the vast majority of canned or kibble products, there is only the wastes from the agricultural process that brings us OUR chicken breasts. And secondly, boiling, frying or otherwise preparing a chicken breast in our own kitchen is worlds and worlds apart from what goes on in the pet food manufacturing plants. There has been extensive research done on this topic by better people than I, and you can read about it any time you like. I recommend Susan Thixton's Buyer Beware as one of the most thorough and easy to read, but there are many, many readily available sources for this information.These are the statements that are so entirely wrong that it should be painfully obvious they should not be repeated.
So if I were to eat an entire cooked boneless chicken minus the skin, I would have consumed zero calories, no protein, no fat, no vitamins, nothing, it would be nutritionally inert?
"Nutritionally inert" is defined as an indigestible bulking agent. A cup of cooked boneless/skinless chicken contains about 5g of fat, 1g saturated fat, 120mg cholesterol, 43g of protein, calcium, iron, other minerals and non-heat sensitive vitamins like vitamin A, B6, phosphorus, niacin, selenium, etc. Yes, the heating destroys some of the vitamins and sensitive amino acids like taurine (which even grinding raw meat will mostly destroy) but these are clearly added back in to the recipes as seen right on the label. No offense, I know you mean well, but I believe it is very irresponsible to keep repeating this misinformation about commercial cooked food.
...
Please be more careful when you're cutting and pasting your quotes - this is NOT my query, but MaxKitteh's, who is new to this board and is asking a perfectly reasonable question from his point of view.I find it rather tedious to answer questions I have specifically addressed not only in this thread but numerous times before. Clearly you aren't asking a question but making a statement, so what is the point of a question mark?Originally Posted by Auntie Crazy
How do you square the idea that cats eat raw food in the wild and yet you're against domesticated cats eating raw at home?
....
Regards.
AC
What evidence do you have that they are worse? All evidence presented in this thread shows the opposite. My position on dry food is in my signature. And no, I am not writing off all raw food for cats, but I have linked to scientific scrutiny that shows various commercial raw food was found lacking and advised against by industry authorities, and store-bought due to concerns highlighted by the FDA that the food is not fit for raw consumption due to dangers of contamination that are inherent to high-yield industrial manufacture. Third time is the charm?
I find that bad form to make a claim as statement of fact and then use the "well, prove me wrong" argument to support it. It is usually the responsibility of the person making a claim to actually be able to support it IMO.
This is actually not my first debate regarding the recent raw fad, and to date no one has been able to actually back up such claims with real scientific peer reviewed evidence that concerns over e-coli and salmonella contamination inherent to industrial meat manufacture per the FDA should be dismissed.
Certaintly there is plenty of room for disagreement and science is a continuously evolving force as new evidence and understanding comes to light. However, there are various claims made that are outright false and others stated as fact without even a shred of evidence support it, hence the motivation for speaking up on my part. IMO that is wrong, just as the last example saying that cooking meat makes it nutritionally inert, which does a great disservice to the community.
Here was the other study I referenced earlier that I didn't have a link/quote of before, but just found and it also addresses the bacteria claim:
And as mentioned, the longest group of raw fed domestic animals are the greyhound race dogs, and complications have been known long enough to warrant picking up a nickname "Alabama Rot". Its thought to help win races though, so the risk was considered acceptable. There are other more scientifically documented examples of the risks: "Septicemic Salmonellosis in Two Cats Fed a Raw-Meat Diet;" Jour Am Animal Hosp Assoc 39:538-542. http://www.jaaha.org/cgi/content/abstract/39/6/538
I can't recall what keyword to search, but there was also an article I had posted before from the president of the regulatory body overseeing food safety for the pet food industry and he specifically spoke to the greater risks of commercial raw food over traditional commercial wet, and that evidence indicated these loads would not be safe for all animals due to varying fitness levels. I'll see if I can link it in the morning.
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Another unsubstantiated claim, but irrelevant to the point. Again, I have to ask this directly, do you understand what "nutritionally inert" means? Please humor me and define it.
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That was already specifically answered in this thread, but yes, I misquoted and fixed that. Sorry about the mistake, I did when cutting and pasting assume that was from you again, which explains the *sigh, this again* tone since I usually have to repeat the same thing five times, heh.
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Yes, I do. And no, I won't. Do the research, Ducman; you might be very surprised - shocked even - at what you learn about how pet food products are manufactured, and from what.
Buyer Beware: The crimes, lies and truth about pet food by Susan Thixton, Food Pets Die For: Shocking Facts About Pet Food by Ann Martin and Not Fit for a Dog!: The Truth About Manufactured Dog and Cat Food by veterinarians Michael W. Fox, Elizabeth Hodgkins (who worked for many years as a staff veterinarian for Hills), and Marion E. Smart are all good options, but in my opinion, Thixton's book is the most detailed and well-written.
Best regards.
AC
I will define it for you then, nutritionally inert mean that it doesn't change chemical state during digestion and no nutritional value is derived from it whatsoever. Insolluble fiber is nutritionally inert for example, and only adds bulk to stool. Nutritionally inert means that not a single calorie, not a gram of protein, nothing is digested as it passes through the system, and this is so obviously wrong for cooked chicken. Unfortunately, it is clear that you will continue to make these types of statements though.
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hmmm....I haven't read those books. What are in the canned food? How about those premium brands like Nature's variety and Innova? Is there anything I should know??
My cats are partically raw (commercial raw though cuz I don't know how to prepare it myself).
My cats are partically raw (commercial raw though cuz I don't know how to prepare it myself).
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Thixton's book is less than $15 on Amazon... make it a Christmas gift to yourself (or better yet, your kitties).
While you're waiting for your book to arrive, you can watch a documentary called “Pet Food: A Dog’s Breakfast” that aired in Canada, available through several venues, including the blog "Poisoned Pets" (scroll down to the bottom of the page).
And here's something available online by Ann Martin: Why Is the Pet Food Industry Killing Our Pets?, an article by Born Free USA: What’s Really in Pet Food, and another article by Purely Pets: What's in your Pet's Food?.
I almost forget - Thixton has a website, TruthAboutPetFood.com that I highly recommend you regularly check for recalls and other detailed pet food-related info.
If you google "What's in my pet's food?", you'll get pages and pages of information, but I would really recommend one of the books, as they are more thorough and go into details such as the connections between AAFCO, the FDA and the pet food industry - stuff you might find very interesting.
Best regards!
AC
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The remarks in this thread are getting way to personal. This is not the IMO forum. If the personal remarks continue, this thread will be closed.
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Greetings, AbbysMom. Can you cite an example of where it got *too personal? I'm new to the site and am curious what you deem to be too personal. Thanks. When I debate I like to keep it on-topic and avoid personal attacks (Ad Hominem).
Also, this is just a debate and in my view it's pretty normal to have some back and forth like this. I feel everyone has been fair so far and would hate to see this thread closed prematurely. We're just adults discussing a topic because we care about our cats, and perhaps bystanders might learn some things.
Thanks,
Max
