Food Fight!

Veganism is gaining popularity; the Vegan Society estimates that 600,000 people in Great Britain have now adopted the lifestyle. There is serious consumer clout in this growing ethical army; according to research, the global market for vegan foods is expected to reach a value of $24.3 billion by 2026.

As a former vegan of twelve years, I thought I would use this month (commonly referred to as Veganuary) to take a look at one of the most popular documentaries on the subject and see if it could potentially sway me. After all, vegan food has improved significantly in the last decade.

Keen to cash in on the latest trend in cruelty-free diets, The Game Changers is one of the 41 vegan documentaries you can currently watch online. The problem is that it is riddled with inaccuracies, cherry-picked data, and a very loose, almost cynical, definition of a key term. Watching the show, I couldn't help but notice the words “vegan” and “vegetarian” had been replaced with the relatively innocuous-sounding phrase “plant-based.” I feel that by using this definition, the directors—which include none other than Arnold Schwarzenegger—are attempting to shift attention from the ethical side of the argument to one focusing more on the diet's health appeal. After all, if people feel they are being guilt-shamed through a moral lecture, they will quickly lose interest. Saying this, the documentary does have a core demographic in mind.

The Game Changers is unmistakably aimed at young men, specifically, strong alpha-male types who enjoy eating meat, fighting, and being tough. The presenter is a man called James Wilks, an ex-UFC fighter who is curious about how past warriors coped in such a violent environment where strength was essential. In the documentary, he is seen researching Roman gladiators, learning that they ate a predominantly plant-based diet—though not to improve their athletic performance.

Rather, they were doing it to get fat. This was done for survival; it turns out that Hollywood lied to you. In reality, the lean, six-pack-adorned Gladiator of the movies would have had a very short life. Gladiators gained weight through the consumption of energy-dense carbohydrates. As paleopathologist Dr. Grossschmidt explains, “Gladiators needed subcutaneous fat. A fat cushion protects you from cut wounds and shields nerves and blood vessels in a fight.”

Wilks’ attention then shifts to modern strong men, notably weightlifter Patrik Baboumian. He asks rhetorically, “How could one of the world's strongest men be so powerful, eating only plants?” By comparing such a huge, muscular man to your average seven stone vegan wandering the aisles of Holland and Barrett, you can't help but ask if the documentary is omitting something. The former world's strongest man, ‘The Mountain’, consumes way over 10,000 calories a day. Are we to assume Patrik got to his size by subsisting on beans and rice alone?

He doesn't. It turns out he supplements his training regimen to a large extent: protein powder, zinc, and omega-3 oil. All these can be derived from a healthy, balanced diet.

A balanced diet is one that includes all foods so that we can maximise our ability to derive all the nutrients and vitamins we need. If a vegan, or “plant-based” diet was as healthy as Wilks claims, why would so many health food stores stock the vitamins many vegans miss out on, such as B12, calcium, and omega-3?

But by far the most bizarre claim the documentary makes is that a plant-based diet can boost a man's erectile strength. Again, this is not true. The cited experiment involved feeding three college athletes meat and taking a “measurement,” and then repeating the same thing the next day but with vegan food. The result was a ten percent increase in the strength of their erections. However, this is hardly conclusive evidence; these participants were only vegan for 24 hours, and there was no attempt to control for variables such as medical history, sleep, or genetic predispositions. As Dr. Seth Cohen, a urologist at NYU Langone Health, notes, “There really isn't any good data to say that a vegan diet will improve your erections.”

The documentary is clearly focused on gaining the attention of the stereotypical macho male. Eating meat has long been associated with masculinity, and our cultural fabric is deeply woven with a connection between meat and traditional masculine traits. However, we now live in an era of identity politics. Men are said to exhibit “toxic” masculinity, and when the censorious left declares “words are violence,” what chance does meat have in the 21st Century?

According to CNN, The Game Changers is “changing the script on plant-based diets.” However, the definition of “plant-based” is vague, allowing the producers to present data from non-vegan sources, such as omnivores, in a way that supports their narrative. My main issue with this documentary is Wilks himself. By refusing to consider any alternative perspectives, he creates a situation that is portrayed as right vs. wrong or good vs. bad, leaving no room for nuance or reasoned debate; like all ideologues, he fails to recognise the complexity of the issue.

The reason I am no longer a vegan is because I realised it was taking a toll on my health. I have no problem with freedom of choice; if you want to go vegan, go for it. It just didn't work for me. My rationale was not philosophical; it was aesthetic. As a twenty-something, I was a big fatty and wanted to lose weight. It started well and I ended up losing six and a half stone. The problem was, I couldn't get it back. Even with a healthy diet, I was anaemic, gaunt, and dizzy all the time. A few months after I reintroduced meat, dairy, and fish into my diet, I started to feel better. If you want to go vegan, I suggest you consult a qualified medical professional; I followed a bunch of crusty, anarcho-punks, and it messed me up.