Centuries of milk marketing warped the way we think about dairy and nutrition

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/352359/milk-dairy-schools

by rntn • 2 years ago

44 44 2 years ago

It's been interesting watching the reactionary rally against dairy over the last 10 years. Watching laypeople with zero scientific background write editorials on nutrition-adjacent topics is always a great workout of patience.

One of the more bewildering things I see is comparison of mammalian milks to plant milks... despite the two not being even remotely comparable. Plant 'milks' are just going through a lot of effort to take generally decent foodstuff (oats, nuts, etc.) and watering them down, massively reducing the nutritional density and content. The macro and micro content of things like oat milk, cashew milk, and so on are next to water because that's basically what they are. They're made by leeching a tiny amount of these legumes and grains into water, often artificially fortified with one or two vitamins. I leave it as an exercise to the reader to compare the nutritional profile of cashews with that of cashew milk and that of cows milk.

But that talking point masks the reality that milk is only so convenient and affordable because the USDA, with taxpayer dollars, has made it so through intensive, sustained investments.

This is a really weird assertion to make when dairy has been a massively important staple of advanced societies for thousands of years, and continues to be in places like rural India, Turkey, Central Asia, and more. It's also not necessarily off-base, but that's because it holds true for all foodstuffs in the modern US. Because of how large our societies have gotten, the affordability of goods is directly tied to intentional prioritization of their supply chains by the organizational arm of society (government.)

reducesuffering2• 2 years ago

Ya, and with things like oat milk, most don't even realize they're consuming a cup of processed seed oil (imagine ranch/mayo) in that carton.

massively important staple of advanced societies for thousands of years, and continues to be in places like rural India, Turkey, Central Asia, and more.

I also find it interesting how well milk consumption correlates with increased height.[0] All the tallest countries (Montenegro, Netherlands, Sweden) have the highest milk consumption levels. Everyone using protein powder to bulk up for fitness is using milk-based whey protein. We know that malnutrition affects height. Is there any other food or activity that correlates with height as much as milk consumption?

[0] https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Correlation-between-aver...

kelipso• 2 years ago

Around 30% by calories of seed oil in many oat milks. Was so surprised when I discovered this. It's in the ingredients list but they never even hint at this anywhere else.

01HNNWZ0MV43FF2• 2 years ago

I drank lots of cow milk as a kid and wound up short because both my parents are short. I'm not too worried about it

dzonga• 2 years ago

this is what western idealists pretending to be journalists or scientists miss.

those of us who grew up in 3rd world countries know -- how much kids grow by drinking milk. and how much when the economy or agriculture goes to shit -- then milk production falls, how much kids tend to be shorter and frail.

and yeah it could be milk or milk related products. soy, oat etc that shit ain't milk. compare the nutrional values.

JumpCrisscross3• 2 years ago

when dairy has been a massively important staple of advanced societies for thousands of years

“Approximately 65 percent of the human population has a reduced ability to digest lactose after infancy. Lactase nonpersistence is most prevalent in people of East Asian descent, with 70 to 100 percent of people affected in these communities. Lactase nonpersistence is also very common in people of West African, Arab, Jewish, Greek, and Italian descent” [1].

Digesting cow’s milk relies on a new gene (<10,000 years old) that evolved in Northern Europe, East Africa and the Middle East [2]. Most adults—65 to 90%—have some degree of lactose intolerance. It’s simply untrue that dairy has been a staple of even a plurality of advanced civilisations over history.

[1] https://medlineplus.gov/genetics/condition/lactose-intoleran...

[2] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/lactose-toleranc...

dualogy• 2 years ago

But the quoted poster said "dairy", not milk. Lots of dairy has little to no lactose, from butter to cream-cheeses to indeed cream itself (clotted, double, or even the liquid 30% fat "whipping cream") to yogurts / kefirs, and pretty much all kinds of cheeses too...

I can't handle milk either, or anything high-lactose. The above things, though, no prob. I'd guess most of the "lactose-intolerant" will do alright with moderate (non-binge) amounts of such low- (but not no-) lactose foods.

Variations of all those are indeed much-loved staples all over the world, whether of the cow or the goat or the sheep (or gazelle? caribou? ruminant species abound!) variety, depending on regional grazing conditions I guess.

ljsprague• 2 years ago

You vegan?

thrownv7032g• 2 years ago

Many today eat dairy knowing they are lactose-intolerant even without their pills, because it is delicious and satisfying. The past wasn't so different[1]. The Mongols conquered 15% of the world eating saddle yogurt.

[1]https://www.science.org/content/article/humans-were-drinking...

valec• 2 years ago

i get the opposite take from this info. the fact that, in just 10,000 years, the gene spread to over 1/3 of the population shows how useful of an adaptation it is.

johnnyjeans4• 2 years ago

Things are not so cut and dry. For instance, did you know that a diet which includes fermented dairy populates the gut biome with bacteria that will break it down for you[1][2]? And that the placebo effect plays a role in symptoms of lactose intolerance[3]? The idea that milk wasn't drunk in East Asia in antiquity is a misconception as well. It was artificially dropped in Ancient China while assimilating pastoral societies as part of a larger scale dietary reform[4].

Additionally, cow milk represents a single dairy product amongst a plethora of ones. Everything from Horse milk to Goat's milk is consumed globally, and much dairy is consumed as further processed food like fermented milk, yogurt, cheeses, etc. which generally aren't considered by Americans when talking about dairy, for whatever reason, even when supposedly attempting to "unplug" from the dairy industry's propaganda.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4066025/

[2] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15277142/

[3] https://gut.bmj.com/content/41/5/632

[4] https://www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/china...

dyauspitr2• 2 years ago

Who cares, so you fart a little. Plus if you just don’t care and just power through, it almost completely goes away. The only times I’ve had lactose intolerance is when I go long periods without any milk product and then reintroduce it into my diet. Totally worth essentially having something so nutritional complete at a very cheap price.

antman• 2 years ago

"Simply untrue" is not accurate. "History" starts after written records 3200bc so well within 10k BC, "Dairy" includes cheese which existed through all of history as in written records and before electricity people could not store pure milk.

From your links: "Harpending and co-author Gregory Cochran, both at the University of Utah, argue that the ability to digest lactose shaped human history. Lactose-tolerant populations, they claim, could better survive famines, and may also have been better conquerors, aiding the spread of their civilizations and cultures."

racional• 2 years ago

Plant 'milks' are just going through a lot of effort to take generally decent foodstuff (oats, nuts, etc.) and watering them down, massively reducing the nutritional density and content. The macro and micro content of things like oat milk, cashew milk, and so on are next to water because that's basically what they are.

People don't reach for plant milk (or butter) for the nutritive content; but rather for the texture and taste, which make other foods (smoothies, porridge), not to mention coffee / tea (for some), more palatable -- or in the case of baked goods (or pudding, ice cream, etc) they essentially are the texture of these foods. Thus expanding their range of what they can eat (and enjoy).

And to do so in a way not involving animal milk.

johnnyjeans4• 2 years ago

And yet the rhetoric is not about the usage of dairy in its role as a garnish, it's about presenting plant milks as a genuine dietary alternative to mammalian milk. I don't find that it's the people who buy plant milk for their coffee to be the same people implying that milk's popularity was invented out of thin air by mad doctors of the post-renaissance.

m4632• 2 years ago

This is a really weird assertion to make

The problem is the US government has propped up milk, just like it has propped up high fructose corn syrup. It has chosen winners artificially against market forces. Unfortunately some of its choices also affect the health and well being of the population (losing HFCS might not be bad?)

The only decent reason I can find to do this is strategic domestic food independence (calorie wise) and prevention of some black swan famine.

ein0p• 2 years ago

One of those things is not at all like the other. HFCS isn’t good for anyone at all, under any circumstances.

inkyoto• 2 years ago

It's been interesting watching the reactionary rally against dairy over the last 10 years. Watching laypeople with zero scientific background write editorials on nutrition-adjacent topics is always a great workout of patience.
One of the more bewildering things I see is comparison of mammalian milks to plant milks […]

It is a case of hypocrisy on both sides.

You are correct in your observation that most plant «milks» are nutritionally poor substitutes for mammalian milks. «Milk» perhaps should not be used in this context, but it is an accepted convenience due to the concept of «milk» being well known and recognised. The base of such drinks is effectively a sediment obtained through grinding grains or nuts and fixed with a plant based thickening agent (e.g. tapioca starch or xantham gum) to prevent the grounds from separating from the water. Extra nutrients may be added (cheap maltodextrin as a sweetener or plant oils) and most of them do not increase a nutritional value of such a drink.

Without descending into a debate discussing the merits (or the lack thereof) of the nutritional profile of the cow's milk, the story of it is convoluted at the very least.

The nutritional profile of the cow's milk can vary wildly depending on what the cow was fed with, and grain fed cows and «free range» cows will produce will produce milk with a vastly different balance of fatty acids:

– The former: «forcefully» increased Ω-6 (through the grain ingestion) and lower Ω-3 and monounsaturated fatty acids (due to most grains being poor in both) in the content;

– The latter: balanced Ω-3 and monounsaturated fatty acids composition due to the lack of interference with the cow's biology. The actual balance is a tricky affair as it depends on how nutritionally rich is the soil that the grass has grown on and which the cow has grazed on.

That is the first problem. Secondly, there is an issue of cows being tended to by veterinary professionals and farmers who inject antibiotics for the animal's wellbeing reason (the former) and add growth hormones to encourage faster cow's growth and milk producing readiness (the latter). Whilst the antibiotics are fairly quickly removed from the body (whilst at least temporarily disturbing the biological homeostasis), the hormones are particularly tricky as they have a propensity to stay in the body for a very long time, and they usually disturb the hormonal balance in the body. Hormonal therapy (in humans and in animals) is still not well understood and is an area of active research, hence why hormonal treatments are a sparely used medicine oftentimes laden with complications. Both types of substances, however, leech into the milk and end up in consumer's hands, which has been acknowledged as an issue and even resulted in actions of different governments around the world to put specific regulations into place. And since lactation is also a hormonal process, humans ingesting the mammalian milk have been receiving a steady supply of animal's own hormones that are exogenous to the human body and with largely unknown long term effects. We have certainly not developed horns, tails and udders by virtue of drinking milk, but the long terms effects have been questioned at least.

Therefore, the nutritional composition of the industrially produced cow's milk today is complicated.

The real issue is that both sides push their own respective agenda, oftentimes driven by questionable motives, aiming to win or gain a upper hand at any cost.

This is a really weird assertion to make when dairy has been a massively important staple of advanced societies for thousands of years, and continues to be in places like rural India, Turkey, Central Asia […]

Goat/buffalo, sheep and camel milk, respectively, – for each named region and in limited amounts. Not even remotely comparable to the Western scale.

Consuming camel milk in Central Asia specifically has been a historical necessity due to it being vast, too dry or too rugged for farming, therefore a quick fix for the malnourishment problem was required. It became the camel, an animal that dwelled in and was adapted for life in a harsh climate and did not require large pastures. Should there have been the lush greenery and an abundance of plants, the history of nutrition in Central Asia would have taken a different turn.

Also, further down below you mention the milk consumption in China.

China is big, the climate is different in different parts of China: northern China has long winters that are cold, dry, below freezing, and long summers that are hot and humid. Southern China, on other hand, is mostly subtropical and evergreen. Nutritional habits are also different in the north and in the south: wheat is used instead of rice in the north as rice requires a lot of water to grow, and wheat is virtually unheard of in the south and rice is ubiquitous. Even if the cow's milk is consumed in China, it would be predominantly in the north but not in the south where it is missing from the local dietary intake altogether.

Having said that, I do not think it is correct to project that, based on the limited milk consumption in a few isolated parts of China, it was a commonplace in the past.

johnnyjeans4• 2 years ago

Therefore, the nutritional composition of the industrially produced cow's milk today is complicated.

As it is for most things found within the grocery store. Modern cultivars of produce for instance, have been bred within a short time-frame for size, productivity, shelf-life and consistency. All of this has created a result of the food that we eat having a massively hampered nutritional profile. Personally, I hypothesize that it's this same effect behind the fact that heirloom vegetables bought directly from small, independent farms tend to have a much higher subjective quality in taste. The changes we've experienced in our society have been drastic over the last few hundred years, and it's allowed our population to explode in such a way that hasn't been seen since the agricultural revolution, but nothing comes for free.

The real issue is that both sides push their own respective agenda, oftentimes driven by questionable motives, aiming to win or gain a upper hand at any cost.

As is usually the case. Hence why I don't hesitate to call out the existence of dairy industry propaganda which erases the concept of non-bovine milk, and uses language like "necessity" to describe its products. Anybody even remotely versed in nutritional science will know that there is no essential nutrient with a singular source. You can even stay hydrated without actually drinking pure water for fucks sake, but it hasn't stopped charlatans from using misleading language to assert some ridiculous picture with no bearing to reality.

China is big

It's important to note that that the time of these assimilations (~2000-300BCE) China was not even remotely close to what it was today. What is now South China was in fact a completely different society, and a precursor to what is now called Vietnam. Vietnam itself meaning "southern viets", and not in the 1960's sense.

gehwartzen• 2 years ago

Milk and milk products with beneficial bacteria useful in digesting and tolerating said milk is what’s been around for millennia not the stuff we pick up at the grocery store.

Even though we’ve been doing it for a long time it still feels like an odd thing for the human animal to do. If one exists I can imagine a creator yelling “you’re not humming correctly!”

euroderf• 2 years ago

massively reducing the nutritional density and content

Making faux anything out of cashews is criminal. The destruction of flavor counts too.

mattpallissard• 2 years ago

This is a really weird assertion

But not surprising, it is vox, and hit pieces are kind-of their schtick.

throwaway220322• 2 years ago

I find it really difficult to take this sort of stuff seriously.

I drink at least one pint of milk per day and eat mostly red meat, chicken, green vegetables and pasta/rice/bread. I work out and this diet provides the proteins and fats I need to grow and repair. I feel the best I ever have done and I'm pretty sure that I'm fitter than most of my peer group.

The idea seems to be that I should stop doing this and replace it with a bunch of processed stuff.

It just seems obvious from first principles to me that the motivation behind this messaging isn't to improve my health, but to increase the efficiency of feeding a large population.

There are so many areas in life in which I feel this sort of manipulation now and it's getting tiring to constantly feel as if my rational choices are pitting me against others. I don't want to continuously argue with my friends about basic lifestyle choices, I wish everyone could just chill the fuck out.

drekk• 2 years ago

I don't know where you're getting processed stuff from. I make my own oat milk. It's just oats and water. You can add a sweetener like honey if you want. Unlike dairy milk I know exactly what's going in my body. I'm also a vegetarian and don't consume meat. Instead I eat a lot of legumes and dark leafy greens. I work out and this diet provides the proteins and fats I need to grow and repair. I feel the best I ever have done and I'm pretty sure that I'm fitter than most of my peer group.

The idea seems to be that I should stop doing this and replace it with a bunch of unnecessary, more expensive staples that are worse for my body. Or that if I bring it up I'm being manipulative. Maybe people need to be manipulated a little. It doesn't make environmental or economic sense to produce a bunch of useless shit and truck it halfway across the country to line the pockets of some lobbies. You want milk and flesh every day? Go for it. But stop making me subsidize your inefficient diet

throwaway220322• 2 years ago

I don't want to continuously argue with my friends about basic lifestyle choices, I wish everyone could just chill the fuck out.

I'm glad you like oat milk, that's fine. I like it too. I resent that this is even a discussion, it's just food, eat what you want to eat, let's do something fun instead.

henryhenryhenry• 2 years ago

White people colonized much of the world and brought dairy with them.

Centuries of milk marketing warped the way we think about dairy and nutrition

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