Lately I’ve heard that cow milk is the “worst beverage on earth.” There are several Web sites about it like www.milksucks.com and www.notmilk.com and books that seem a little nutty but make some sensible arguments that I know to be grounded in truth, like (1) many people, including myself, lack the enzyme to digest milk; (2) cow milk is actually bad for cats; and (3) you don’t see people drinking rat milk or dog milk despite the fact that they too produce milk. After that some of their many arguments against milk, while seemingly exaggerated, do make sense. Please help, my wife is six months pregnant and drinking milk like a fish! –Wade Morris
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Uh, Wade? Fish don’t drink milk. Other credibility issues we need to address include: (a) the milksucks site is run by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, the any-publicity-is-good-publicity animal-rights group that urged college students to avoid milk with a “Got Beer?” campaign and asked the governor of Wisconsin to change the state’s official beverage from milk to beer; and (b) the notmilk site is run by Robert Cohen, who has been publicly disavowed by his onetime vegetarian allies (see www.vegsource.com/articles/cohen/). Nothing personal, but these aren’t the first guys I’d want called as witnesses for the defense during my murder trial. Let’s run through the claims one by one:
Milk causes heart disease. Sure, if you drink whole milk. It’s easy enough to switch to the low-fat variety. But milk opponents say: the skimmed fat just gets recycled into ice cream, cheese, and processed foods. Also true–to keep fat consumption under control, you need to stick to low-fat everything, not just milk.
