Responding to Vegan Myths Part 2

     A popular misconception in the non-vegan world is that soy will give men feminine characteristics. I have no clue where this myth originated, but it has become a very common thing on social media that has started different terms and phrases such as "soy boy."
    Soy is a phytoestrogen meaning they are natural estrogen producers, but they have nothing to do with the endocrine or reproductive systems. In other words, it is plant estrogen, and just like mammalian estrogen cannot affect plants, plant estrogen cannot affect mammals. Phytoestrogens are found in all types of plants such as rice, wheat, and even apples and carrots. The hype comes from soy products because soy is very high in phytoestrogen. Many posts have gone around saying that soy is scary because it gives men breasts. I would just like to say that if soy caused you to have larger breasts, it would be the most money-making industry in the world, and lots of females would be all over that trend and they are not because it does not do those types of things to the body. 

    On the contrary, we should be worried about cow's milk. Cows are mammals just like us, therefore, we are able to process the estrogen in cow's milk. Naturally, cow's milk is made to make baby cows go from being 90 pounds to over 1,000 pounds. It has been thought for years that the hormones in cow's milk make us weigh more as well as kickstarting female maturation at a young age. I feel like we should be more worried about a mammal's estrogen and its effect on humans than a plant's estrogen that has no correlation to the human's natural estrogen cycles.