soy....dangerous???

so i've been reading some things about soy, and how it may cause more harm than good. i found quite a few articles when i googled "dangers of soy" so i've stopped eating tofu and drinking soymilk.

http://www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/
http://thyroid.about.com/cs/soyinfo/a/soy.htm
http://www.frot.co.nz/dietnet/basics/soy.htm
http://www.life.ca/nl/101/soy.html

there were a bunch of others but by the time i read the first few i was pretty convinced. does anyone have any thoughts/facts to support this or debunk it?

 

It's just a matter of moderation, like anything else.

Red wine is good for you, but when you drink too much it does more harm than good.

 

Hehe... on the first website there's a quote from a doctor: "Soyfoods are not nutritious. They are drugs".

 

I don't know if I buy into all that or not...
I think anything they study long and hard
enough, they will say is bad for you... It
would be really hard to stay away from
soy now, its in so many things...

 

I try not to eat soy all the time because of the things I've heard. I've heard its good for and bad for you so yeah, in moderation its fine. Just make sure not all of your foods are soy products, its easy to do that being a vegetarian but you'll find it can be easy to get things without soy (like making your own food for instance). So yeah its all good!

How is soy a drug? Hahaha... thats weird

 

i guess i skim too much, i didn't see that part about soy being a drug. thats rediculous. but idk....fruits, veggies and legumes are undoubtedly healthy so i guess i'll just stick to those. soy provides no nutrition that i cant easily get somewhere else.

 

If you are a vegetarian then soy does have nutrition that is not easily found in such high amounts in such a low portion!

 

I think that soy is ok in moderation. From what I have researched I would suggest consuming a maximum of one serving per day. Though I don't eat anywhere near that much, even when my diet is vegan for long stretches.

Also it seems that fermented soy products are much better for you than those that have not been fermented. Unfortunately fermentation takes time, something that does not go well with today's fast paced manufacturing of food. People point out that soy has been used for thousands of years in Asia, but traditionally the soy is fermented. The soy veggie burgers in the supermarkets are not.

As it was pointed out, if you read labels you will find that soy is in almost every processed food in some form or another. Most people don't realize this, even those that are really against eating soy. Ever looked at what oil is used for most general vegetable oils? Yep, it is soybean oil.

I suggest reading this article: http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=george&dbid=154

 

I also try to keep my soy consumption down. I find just as much information advocating it as I do condemning it, so for now I'm content with eating/drinking soy products in moderation.

However, because I tend to be a touch paranoid I DO keep my prepubescent son & daughter away from it! DD gets the very occasional cup of oatmeal with soymilk if I happen to be out of dairy milk at the moment, and DS has tried tofu & soy nuts once or twice. But because I've found far more information concerning soy's effects on children than anything else I do strictly limit their soy.
love,
mom

 

http://www.***********/article/soy/index.htm
http://www.westonaprice.org/soy/index.html
http://www.quantumbalancing.com/news/soy dangers.htm

http://www.***********/2005/feb/26/soy_myths.htm

 

This podcast discusses the issue of soya, and other vegan health related concerns ... http://veganfreakradio.com/index.php?id=104

from what I can recall the conclusion was the soya isn't harmful (unless you have an allergy to it or thyroid problem); and that the research menthods used in studies to suggest otherwise are often inaccurate. Besides people in Asia have been eating plenty of soya for years and overall are quite healthy and fertile.

So I wouldn't worry.

 

I think a large part of the issue in this day and age is the overuse of soy as additive in foods that don't really need it, combined with messed up farming practices, pesticide/herbicide usage and GM. People don't realize that at this point MOST processed or pre-made foods you can get at almost any store have soy products in them - and unless marked as otherwise those are almost certainly from GM crops.

 

once i had tofu in the fridge for longer than 5 days and it turned purple... like bright purple

 

exactly...this is what pisses me off. i dont' want it snuck into my food...i don't want to eat it. but its in everything nowadays. its in soups, tuna, sauces, and whole bunch of other things. luckily, i can find foods without it in it already.

soy in the asian communities was a very small part of there diet. nothing substantial - and the soy they ate is nothing like the products and crap we get shoved into all of the foods we eat today.

 

I support it. I don't think soy is a healthy food. It also has enzymes like trypsin that actually inhibit protein assimilation.

The best form of soy if I were going to consume it would probably be miso but I would still look for a soy-free miso first.

 

A woman I worked with was a vegetarian when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, she went through chemotherapy a couple times and it kept coming back. Finally her doctors told her to avoid soy products because apparently it produces estrogen in your body and that is why she kept having relapses.... Just my 2 cents, but I still drink soy milk and eat tofu... but not a lot of it, maybe 1-2 servings per day if any at all. I think it comes down to the saying "everything in moderation". Anything in excess can be bad for you. You could kill yourself by drinking too much water... although you'd have to drink a heck of a lot.

 

In all fairness, it was only 3-4 posts where people were really gullible.