I can see why grains and sugar are not healthy because of all the carbs and antinutrients in grains , but why is dairy also excluded so stricly in paleo diets. This is the reason why I couldnt do paleo , atleast not for a long time. Not even butter is allowed! why??
As babies we eat nothing but milk for the first months , so is milk from other mammals really so different and somehow hazardous?

Are you a calf?

I've been compiling stuff about dairy here: http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthread.php?t=353663
Read up!

Personally I think many of us find a path in paleo that improves our health. It doesn't necessarily mean 100% strict adherance every day. Even Loren Cordain says striving for about 85% is pretty good.

If you haven't read one of the Paleo books, you might want to. It might help you understand the reasons why grains and dairy are avoided.

For me, dairy products have consequences I am now aware of, only because I gave it up for awhile. Otherwise I might have though having zits, constipation, muscle spasms and sinus issues were merely part of my burden to bear in life.

As Nancy said.. No Mammal drinks milk after weaning, except humans and those animals humans introduce it to (i.e. cats) and even then it's not their own!! It is very hazardous to our health, which is why such a large proportion of humans have an intolerance or allergy to lactose. I find myself to be much more prone to my triggers (with Asthma) if I eat dairy, and haven't needed my preventative or reliever since cutting out dairy.

The majority of humans don't drink milk after weaning either, just the ones who live in countries with Dairy Lobbies.

I wonder what's so special about the Masai that cow milk is such a big part of their traditional diet. Maybe we should try to persuade them that milk is really a " very dangerous" food ?

Do you think that traditional diets that include dairy would be better without it? Just curious. Weren't a lot of the traditional cultures that Weston Price studied and found impressive on health/longevity grounds into milk and dairy.

I mean human beings have been following migrating herds of mammals for their milk supply for eons. Is it so unlikely that most humans have absolutely no problem with dairy?

Of course, Just doing a quick search of dairy in this forum it is a brave soul who would argue its benefits.

No doubt some individuals are intolerant of all sorts of foods, even meat. But I wonder if dairy just gets such a bad rap in paleo circles because the people who are personally intolerant gravitate here?

The Masai are an anomaly and probably turned to dairy when there was nothing else available (and too few cows to eat). Also, their cows are not overbred and full of hormones & corn, so they are probably not as dangerous as western cows.

Well are they an anomaly? Even in Africa, there are plenty of traditionally dairy consuming cultures. The Laps, Mongols, and pretty well any culture who have anything to do with goats (or the local variants of them, eg. Llamas, Alpacas) also spring to mind. The human opposable thumb is so well designed for milking (not to mention any other task that requires gripping/squeezing ). And if we could hunt a large mammal them it wouldn't take long to work out that squeezing its udder yielded a pretty nutrient dense, very palatable food.

And genetically, leaving the lactase producing machinery turned on into adulthood is not that complicated a change to select for.

I think everyone has this mind set that if we've been doing it for a couple thousand years in part of the world then it must be terrific, so few people really scrutinize it and take it for granted that we were somehow "meant" to drink milk. Those who do look into and publish about it aren't taken seriously just like we've seen with people who publish about low carb.

But do most people have no problem with dairy? I would be willing to wager that "most people" don't even drink dairy. Most of Asia doesn't, I think quite large parts of Africa don't. It wasn't the custom in S. America or N. America until Europeans were on the scene. It is definitely a euro-centric thing and defining "most people" as our Western civilization leaves out a whole lot of other folks.

Do dairy if you want. But for me, I know it is harmful. It makes me hurt, it makes me zitty and makes me cart around a box of tissues wherever I go. I wouldn't have realized that if I hadn't given it up for awhile. I would have thought that those symptoms were a normal part of life.

I understand completely Nancy. As I said, I'm sure some individuals are intolerant, and why consume something that causes you distress?

The Masai are not paleolithic. Herding is not a paleolithic activity.

I am pretty sure (I'll have to re-look it up again) that there is no civilization that has been drinking milk/consuming dairy since Paleolithic times. That means that no civilization has been consuming dairy for the required time of evolution. I did not gravitate to Paleolithic WOE because of a dairy intolerance.. I wasn't even aware of my intolerance until after I eliminated the dairy and then had a lapse of weakness. I came to Paleo WOE because of the wheat intolerance I have.

Exactly. For me it was a synergistic experience, I wanted to try Paleo and the more I gave up dairy and grains, the better I felt, and the more I understood the evolutionary principles behind it.

I was just reading more about gluten and found this short article about gluten as the cause of flatulence. In it, the doctor recounts that a nursing infant had gas. The mother gave up gluten while still nursing. The baby's gas disappeared. The implication is: when you drink milk, you are getting gluten from the milk provider's diet.

raw cow milk makes me sick the reason i went all paleo but...


raw donkey milk does absolutely amazing things to my body and mind... by far the most potent food i have ever consumed... i drink about a quart of donkey milk a day now.

http://www.nutraingredients.com/new...y-immune-system

Yeah, gluten is passed to babies in their mother's milk. There's a pubmed article about that.

Gluten gives me massive farts. I used to call chocolate chip cookies "fart bombs" because of their effect on me.