Friday, December 15, 2006

Vegetarians Are Smarter. So Say Vegetarians.

A new study out indicates that vegetarians may average up to 5 points higher on IQ tests than non-vegetarians. The study tracked 8000 volunteers aged 10 who were given IQ tests. They were later interviewed at the age of 30 to determine how many of them became vegetarians. The study concluded that those kids who had a higher IQ score at age ten were more likely to become vegetarians than those who had a lower IQ, and were more likely to have college degrees. Uhhh-DUHHH-uhhhhhH! Where the hell do you think they discovered the vegetarian lifestyle? College, that’s where! The only thing this proves is that people who travel in high-brow circles are more likely to be exposed to, and become converted to, vegetarian principals than those who don’t. I think everyone with any sense at all understood this without having to be told by some high-falutin’ study.
The only interesting news out of this study is the fact that vegans – people who don’t eat any animal based foods whatsoever – averaged 5 points lower than average.All of this reminds me of a different kind of test related to these issues, in this case a blind taste test. Up until a few years ago, McDonald’s had the best tasting fries, and most everyone agreed about this, including vegetarians and vegans. I’ve known both vegetarians and vegans who loved McDonald’s fries. Granted, this is anecdotal, but stay with me here. McDonalds had the best fires, until it was revealed that one of the ingredients that McDonald’s added to their fries was natural beef flavorings. They were in fact sued for this by several Hindu families for not revealing this to the public. Cows are sacred to Hindus, and by eating McDonald’s fries, they had unintentionally violated one of the tenants of their religion. McDonald’s responded by removing these flavorings from their fries, and the flavor suffered. It’s now considered a truism that McDonald’s HAD the best fries. In other words, beef flavorings make fries taste good. Why? Because beef tastes good.
So let’s recap: vegetarians are smarter than meat-eaters, but meat-eaters are smarter than vegans. And all of them agree that beef is good. Even if they refuse to admit it. Or, to quote noted meat philosopher Dennis Leary, “Not eating meat is a decision, eating meat is an instinct.”
So all you vegetarians and vegans out there, go ahead and have a burger, it’s on me. You can do it, because Dennis and I say you can.

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