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Comment by malvosenior | Hacker News Reader

The vast majority of people in the US eat meat regularly and feed it to their children. There is no way this is going to stop in one generation. There are also plenty of cultures that have meat as their staple. Can you imagine telling Mexicans to eat vegetarian tacos for instance? That simply will never happen, it's too ingrained into culture (and too delicious!).

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Smoking cigarettes and cigars was also once considered a delicious and ingrained part of many cultures. It is now clear that processed and red meats cause bowel cancer, and the environmental impacts they pose are also becoming more and more clear. Just like smoking ended in a generation I can definitely see people rejecting these products in the near future. Cultures change all the time.

I don’t agree. Diet is an integral part of one’s culture. Smoking cigarettes is a needless vice mostly pushed by marketing. I think you’re greatly underestimating how important food is to some cultures. I suggest you have a conversation about this with someone from a meat eating culture. It will give you more perspective on the staying power of meat.

I think you're under-estimating the grip tobacco had on society. Smoking was very common. Between the 1940s and 1980s over 40% of the population smoked. https://trends.collegeboard.org/education-pays/figures-table...

We used to give cigarettes out in Red Cross parcels. https://www.loc.gov/resource/anrc.08956/

I know it was very popular, but 1940 was not that long ago. We're comparing it to eating meat which humans have been doing for at least tens of thousands of years. You also need to eat something, while some cultures smoke more than others, no one needs to smoke to survive.

Not necessarily cigars/cigarettes, but tobacco has also played an important role in some cultures. I doubt Native Americans were using tobacco, sometimes for ceremonial and religious purposes, due to marketing

>Just like smoking ended in a generation

It did? Where? In what world?

Here in America, which has much lower smoking rates than many other developed nations and has indeed lowered the smoking rate a lot since ~50 years ago, there's tons of young people taking up smoking and "vaping". A bunch of my tech coworkers do.

I’m Mexican and can confirm meat isn’t going anywhere. I can’t even imagine Mexico City without it. Not only does everyone eat meat but most people make a living selling it. There are taco carts on every corner.

It’s also a huge part of family life. These dishes have been passed down through the generations and it’s actually moderately offensive to suggest that it’s not socially acceptable to eat what my family has been eating for as far back as anyone can remember. I know my children are growing up learning to love all of the dishes their family cooks and enjoys together.

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