Someone I know was recently on a retreat with David Wolfe who was talking about ant-eating.
Evidently he talked about the multitude of ants on the surface of this planet and what a superior protein source they are.
Um...anyone hear of this kind of thing?

Haven't heard him say that in any of his recorded lectures.

I'm sure insects are a great source of protein though. AFAIK, all primates eat insects.

I'm vegetarian but if any ants are foolish enough to get trapped in my honey I certainly have no problem eating the little communists.

Yes, they are little communists.
I was just wondering how someone vegan reconciles the consumption of a little being with vegan ethics? Not trying to judge so much as understand someone else's rationale.

I would be surprised if David really promoted that. He`s a passionate vegan or so I thought. Now of course we would eat insects in the wild and we still probably do without knowing it but it doesn`t sound appealing. David himself says that in his book " Sunfood Diet"

I get plenty of protein so I`m not about to go eat them

I wouldn't be surprised at all. David's not a vegan. A true vegan would never sell honey of any kind on their website or pollen. Also, he's been accused of eating animal flesh on one or two occassions and never claimed otherwise. Beyond that, NFL is a completely plagiarized book stolen from A.T. Hovanessian who wrote the original, Raw Eating. So, why would it surprise me that he's eating a precious being? It doesn't because he's a hypocrite.

Peace,

Marcos

Go Vegan for your life, your health, the planet and, most importantly, the animals that we share this wonderful world with!

NFL's book is plagiarized? Why didn't you tell me sooner, Mark?!

I've heard the rumors before and didn't expect much when I found myself at one of his retreats, but I was beyond pleasantly surprised, I was blown away, I just learned and grew so much from the experience. Also, I listened to a rawveganradio podcast interview of him recently where he is asked about that plagiarism--listen for yourself! His basic response, though he doesn't like to dignify the question with a defensive answer, is he could understand the accusations if the writer of Raw Eating wasn't acknowledged at the very start of the book. I have the book, so I went and looked soon after and sure enough, --I paraphrase--the authors of NFL say that rather than quote every single thing taken from the other book, which was huge for them, they just acknowledge at the beginning the huge amount of material...hmmm, I'm tired and don't feel I can paraphrase right, I'll get the book out and quote it later.

Anyway, it's all a bent-up rumor, as far as I'm concerned...

peace
Adrienne

Adrienne,

It's not a rumour. Nature's First Law refused to acknowledge A.T. Hovanessian in the first three printings of the book. Someone contacted the FTC and the agreement that was made was that they have to mention A.T. Hovanessian in any future copies as a major source to the book. If you put the two books side by side and go through each chapter it's downright frightening that they stole the whole dang book. Yes, they changed a few words around but the sentence structure, paragraphs and body are the same as Raw Eating.

Buy a copy and see for yourself. Of course, they're gonna play dumb. To admit that they made their first million on a lie would cause them to lose all credibility. This is why they won't debate the issue and they delete virtually all threads that address this subject on the rawfood.com website.

Peace,

Marcos

Go Vegan for your life, your health, the planet and, most importantly, the animals that we share this wonderful world with!

i have a second edition printed in 2000 that has zero mention of hovanessian.
i haven't heard of him eating ants but i can ask. not that i really want to know though so,
why the f are we even talking about this anyhow? the guy's a bit of a jerk really so who cares?
are YOU vegan? well then, that's all that really matters eh?
these days i slap mosquitos without remorse. flies too. but i still wouldn't put them into my mouth, eww!

Hunh....it just doesn't make sense to this child...why would three people get together passionate on a "revolutionary" subject and...rewrite someone else's book about it???
Don't ask???

woah...Adrienne

And the point is....? What is vegan anyway but an ideal, no-one can be truly that pure, it's impossible. To be vegan is to live an approximation of this ideal. I would never deliberately kill another creature, unless my life depended on it. To squash insects without remorse is pointless, why do it? Why not try to live as peacefully, and tread as lightly on the earth, as possible?

Plagiarism, well I guess I was sucked in. If you look at the big picture, NFL is getting the word out where maybe Raw Eating was not. Maybe I'm wrong here. I don't think anyone should be making money from someone else's work though.

I think it's actually pretty cool David Wolfe made a ton of money on the raw food thing... and what not. I know it's not really ethical to plagurize. I do think it's neat that he's helped create an institution though.

In his own words, sometimes the worst ever is the best ever, like George w. Bush, because he is so blatantly icky, is turning more people on than Gandhi (course, that's open to debate)

we've all done things we would no longer do, we channel many different energies through the course of a lifetime, in a sense..

" To squash insects without remorse is pointless, why do it? "

because they are Biting me and little, that's why. i crush those little bitey monsters. No Remorse whatsoever. i'd shoot a bear before i let it have my son too. sorry if that offends anyone but i live in the wilds like and it's important to protect yourself unless you're prepared to lay down yours and your family's lives for your high ideals. personally, i'm not.

so it's ok to plagiarize because it got the word out there eh? the end justifies the means? we're treading on dangerous territory there dontcha think? it's pretty much how bush justifies everything he does. yucky behaviour that, i wouldn't even let my five year old get away with it.

i agree, I don't favour squishing bugs without thought, but when living in Hawaii with a baby, I was all for buying an electric bug zapper racket (though I felt a little guilty, and didn't get around to it..)

:~)

rawmark:
"Also, he's been accused of eating animal flesh on one or two occassions and never claimed otherwise".

I heard about this and I don't really care but makes you wonder. Also there's a website talking about and pics of Douglas Graham eating fish.... If I didn't have such a slow webtv then I'd search for this stuff.

There's also an interview recently with NFL's Stephen and David (I think fortune 500 or something) talking about only eating 80% rawfoods and the other 20% whatever suits your needs..

If one truly believed that nothing should be killed, the best thing one could do is lay down and die... that way, one would only be killing.. uh, "one".

I am not for mindless killing... but remorse is an emotion that is best discarded (it is based on contradictions anyway).

Eating ants is fine by me, I don't know whether or not it should be done, but I'm not morally opposed to it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/18/2006 11:45PM by ThomasLantern.

I don`t think what David Wolfe did was right. It just shows us that although eating raw is great, it doesn`t automatically translate into a person having strong values and ethics... It doesn`t send the right message either, that you can copy someone else`s work and be let off simply because you are promoting raw.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/19/2006 12:14AM by vegangoddess.

The cost of stealing another man's work vs the benefit of more people being exposed to it. Hmm....

It reminds me of the dilemma post-Holocaust whether or not to use the data obtained by Nazi doctors via unconscionable means. It seems there are degrees...

So has anyone ever actually SEEN this mythical book by E.T. Jahovaeasyant?

How does anyone know it even exits?

Maybe David Wolfe owns the only copy. And he uses it to crush ants to add to his green smoothies!!!

Hello, I know this is 4 years after this discussion is being held but I'd like to know which audio tape you heard the interview you said you heard about the issue of David Wolfe Plagiarizing an entire book. Please leave the name year month and time frame of the interview and I will try to find it.
Please send the information to my email joellewander@hotmail.com if you read this very much later after i posted it.

When in Fl this one guy read the ingrediants on on of his suplement bottles. One of them was something like essence of ants, So when we werent looking he went and got a jar of fire ants and ate them. He got very sick and we thought he might die.

Whaaa? Don't understand your post. Are you saying that some guy saw ants on a supplement so DW got some fire ants and ate them?

I don't follow the logic. How does one thing lead to another?

My understanding is that DW does eat ants as a "raw" source
of protein. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if that
was true since this guy has been touting so many different
(and purportedly) miraculous, and supposedly "raw," things
for years.

One day it's seawater, the next day it's his olives, the next
day it's his chocolate, then his cashews, and so on and
so forth. There's always some new discovery that eventually
gives way to an even "better" discovery. It really isn't
much different, philosophically, from the so-called miracle
drugs of the Medical Establishment. There's always something
new to take our minds off the previous, supposed miracle...

Steve
[www.meetup.com]
[www.rawgosia.com]

Which ants taste good? Just asking How about termites? Grasshoppers? I have to review the diet of chimps.

Veggiemel Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Um...anyone hear of this kind of thing?
I didn't know David Wolfe went out of his way to
eat Ants. I've heard him say that if Ants get into his Honey,
he doesn't bother to fish them out, but just eats them along
with the Honey.....WY

La veronique
Yes the guy saw ants as one ingrediant on supplement bottle so he figured they must be good. He collected a jar of them and ate them live. How does that kind of thing happen - total stupidity.

From David Wolfe website and twitter

[twitter.com]

In case you are wondering: For the last 20 years, I have eaten no meat, fish, or fowl. Not vegan or vegetarian: I live without killing.


As for the ants I heard him say he does not go out of his way to kill ants or insects but if some get in his honey and they die he just blends them into his smoothies.

I know if flies go into my drinks I usually fish them out, sometimes I find dead insects in my drink of water that I've left overnight, but it doesn't occur to me to eat them.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/11/2010 07:57AM by Ariel55.

That settles it for me that David Wolfe is not a purposeful ant eater.

> La veronique
> Yes the guy saw ants as one ingrediant on
> supplement bottle so he figured they must be good.
> He collected a jar of them and ate them live. How
> does that kind of thing happen - total stupidity.

It sounds like the guy who ate the fire ants wasn't David Wolfe, but someone else who had read some ingredients on a supplement bottle...

I wonder how termites get their B12... I mean termites have hind guts and that must be where the B12 producing bacteria live who digest the cellulose they eat. I wonder if they can absorb B12 from that far down in their digestive tract, or if they get their B12 from eating, say, other bugs.

I'll eat a spotty grape or apple but not a visible insect.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/11/2010 09:28AM by loeve.