There are endless claims about soy; everyone run away because "It's bad for the environment," "It messes with your estrogen levels," and "It's a GMO" oh no!! With all of this information circulating, it's no surprise that most people like to blame soy. But, there are a lot of contradictions and ignorance when it comes to these hesitations and sorry to break it to you, but soy should be the least of your worries.

First of all, many of the sources who release this information are owned by...wait for it...the meat industry! Wow, no surprise there, right? Of course, the meat industry wants to use soy as a scare tactic because it is one of the main meat and dairy alternatives and they want you to stay away from all forms of it....because the "nutrition" that they serve up is much better for you.

Now, I'll admit that not all soy is particularly good for you. Of course, consumers should try to avoid processed soy and GMO's...but then this should apply to all foods, not just soy. We have to be careful with processed anything nowadays.

To those who are completely against soy, but still eat livestock, you're still indirectly consuming soy because it is one of the main animal feed for livestock. Huh, so the same companies and organizations that preach about how soy is supposedly so bad for you are feeding it to their livestock which will eventually end up on your plate....logical. This is related to the environmental issue as well; "isn't soy responsible for deforestation?" Well, yes it does account for a pretty worrisome amount of deforestation, but it's important to keep in mind that the reason it accounts for such a high portion of Amazon destruction which is that 80% of soy grown is used as a feed crop for farm animals. So, I would just drop that argument already.

As for the whole "soy contains estrogen deal," it's just not true. Interestingly enough, this seems to be one of the most common beliefs about soy. Soy contains phytoestrogen...key prefix: phyto. These are plant based hormones and are different from estrogen found in animals and humans. Ironically, what DOES contain loads of estrogen is...drum roll please....cow's milk!!!

I'm not here to preach that all forms of soy are good for you because like I said before, some of it IS processed and I totally understand why people stay away from that...but organic soy milk, tofu, and edamame won't kill you. For those who still see soy as the culprit, you should probably be eliminating the majority of the rest of your diet then as well.

One of the vital lessons I learned while coming to these realizations is to always question who releases information like this and to support independent thinkers.