The Real Reason People Quit the Carnivore Diet @Max German

Watch on YouTube · 2025-09-13 · 31 min

0:00 Hi, as requested I'm gonna be reviewing a video called Why is everyone quitting the carnivore diet by Max German. I can answer that before even watching the video. It's because the carnivore diet is not what carnivorous animals actually eat. It's a man-made diet that humans thought of. and every diet that is man-made every unnatural way of eating is always going to fail eventually some people can last for many years on man-made diets but nobody does them permanently because it's not the way you're naturally supposed to eat but we'll see what he will say

0:52 Oh, it's such a professional, fancy video. I like it.

[video] 0:58 Eating a carnivore diet led to full resolution of my autoimmune condition, eczema, itchy rashes, and asthma that I'd had for my whole life. But after a year and a half, I quit the carnivore diet. Hello, Corey here. In this video, I want to explain to you why I am no longer carnivore. I quit the carnivore diet. I didn't have the energy. I didn't have my libido. My stress shield was kind of disappearing.

1:19 the way he looks it kind of seems like the kind of video a vegan would make

[video] 1:28 where they look at you and say you did it wrong you understand what i mean i just can't do it anymore for several reasons number one just some practical stuff but also some more serious reasons that could impact my health my blood work showed that my ferritin levels were elevated and my copper was a little bit on the lower end and my thyroid while my thyroid numbers were still in range my thyroid still wasn't as optimal as it could be I did straight carnivore for the first few days, but it's hard.

1:57 You know, the more I think about it, the more I think that the carnivore... Yeah, but if a diet seems hard, the way you're eating, how can it be good for you? I don't know what he will come up with now, but if you can't even pull off a diet for a few days, it's just not the way you're supposed to be eating. It's like a cult.

[video] 2:19 In recent times, even...

2:21 Really, I have to agree with him. This fake carnivore diet, which no carnivorous animal has ever been recorded to eat, is pretty much like a cult. It's pretty similar to veganism. It's healthier than veganism, but it's also restrictive eating and nobody can do restrictive eating permanently. The way Paul Celadino eats now is way better, way closer to the way we naturally eat. He even eats some raw muscle meat and organs now and then. He's way better off now.

[video] 3:01 So in this video, we're going to look at what's really going on and answer the question, why is everyone quitting the carnivore diet? Let's get into it. After about a year to a year and a half of a carnivore diet, I'd be...

3:12 This is just dumb. It's a stupid video to make simply because it's the same as making a video asking why is everyone quitting veganism. It's just a man-made way of eating. No human in nature anywhere has ever been recorded to eat like this. Of course, you restrict the way somebody eats, they follow a diet, man-made rules, and then they quit eventually because they cannot stand it anymore.

[video] 3:38 I began to notice issues, probably in my case arising due to electrolyte insufficiency. This led to muscle cramps, I had problems with sleep.

3:46 Yes, that's possible. Yeah, actually pretty likely.

[video] 3:51 I had heart palpitations, fluttering of my heart. I had something called hypnagogic jerks where I would fall asleep but jerk myself awake. I had declining lab values that were important to me, specifically lower total testosterone, higher sex hormone binding globulin, which leads to... Yeah, but we are talking about molecules here, which are not actually measurable.

4:12 It can be an indicator sometimes of something, but I would never take it seriously. Really, don't take blood tests seriously, because at the end of the day you don't even know what you're really testing there. It's just a lot of speculations. It's all based on ideas.

[video] 4:29 We lower free testosterone. And I had the sense that I was cold.

4:32 Free testosterone, total testosterone. It's everything that you cannot actually measure in reality, seeing as it's all molecules which are not observable.

[video] 4:42 A little bit cold all the time. And when I looked at my labs, my thyroid levels, specifically my total T3 and free T3 were not ideal. Paul blames these issues on the carnivore diet. But I believe they weren't caused by the diet itself. Instead, they were caused by three other factors. Firstly, Paul is a very lean guy. I mean, you can simply look at the bloke. He's got abs, his veins are popping out. Paul clearly has a very low body fat percentage. And on top of that, he serves for hours every day. He lifts, he walks a lot. When you're that lean, you don't have much body fat to pull energy from. People who carry more fat can get away with eating less because they've got plenty of stored fuel.

5:11 Yeah, but it's not as if you need it. I also don't have a lot of body fat. I fuel myself through the food that I eat. That's typically how humans do it in nature, men especially. Women usually have more body fat because they need it. If they are pregnant, when they are breastfeeding, they just need more body fat. But men are typically pretty lean.

[video] 5:38 Paul, he doesn't have that buffer. So if you're training as much and as hard as Paul does, and you're not eating enough, especially not eating enough fat, your body doesn't have much to run on. And that's when you're going to start feeling terrible and experiencing many of these symptoms that Paul talks about. This also explains why he felt very cold. Heating your body up is a very metabolically expensive process, which means it takes a lot of energy to do this. So when you're lean and not eating much, your body will actually reduce its internal temperature in order to burn less total energy. So this was Paul's first issue. He was super lean and he was under eating. Another major issue Paul ran into

6:05 Was he under eating? Did Paul say that he was under eating? Or where is he getting this idea from, I wonder? I guess that he just assumes that it must be like that. Can be the diet, can be veganism, right? That's what a vegan would say. It's never the diet. Unless you feel good, then it's a diet. If somebody on the carnivore diet feels good, oh, it's a diet, 100%. You feel bad, you did it wrong. It's not the diet. No, it can't be. It's impossible because only when you feel good, it's the diet. When you feel bad, it's never the diet. Yeah, that's how it is when you have a cult-like mind.

[video] 6:45 Simply came down to insufficient insulin. When you eat carbs, your blood sugar spikes and a hormone called insulin elevates to bring that blood sugar back down. But insulin does more than just regulate blood sugar. It also helps your kidneys hold on to electrolytes like sodium and potassium. On carnivore, because you're not consuming many carbohydrates, obviously the main driver of insulin isn't carbs. Instead, it's protein. When you eat a meal with protein, some of that protein is converted into glucose, which is sugar. That small rise in blood sugar right there is enough to trigger an insulin response. And that insulin is what helps you retain electrolytes. But here's the problem.

7:12 If you're not eating enough protein, or you are eating... By the way, just so you understand, none of this has ever been proven. These conversions, it cannot even be proven because... We cannot see, especially on a molecular level anyway, what's going on in the body. These are hypotheses, not really. It's actually just purely a belief based on not much. A hypothesis would have to be based on something factual, on some kind of evidence. seeing as this isn't you're really talking about a lot of beliefs of what may be happening in the body nothing that can be measured that should be very clear because we need to understand max's perspective here his perspective is based on a lot of ideas i don't want to call them anything else it's for sure not a theory a theory

8:13 is really based on something factual, something that you can prove. This is very far from a theory.

8:24 I'm just saying this because he shows this graph. People who watch it think, oh, yeah, well, that's how it is. Well, no, actually, it hasn't been proven at all.

[video] 8:34 full little meals spread out across the day instead of having bigger, larger ones, your insulin may never rise enough to do this job of holding onto electrolytes. Without that signal, your kidneys may not retain electrolytes properly. That's when you start getting the exact symptoms that Paul described. Cramps, heart palpitations, poor recovery, and bad sleep. When you watch one of Paul's full day of eating videos, what you see is him having lots of meals spread out across the day. And none of these meals are particularly large. So this right here is another contributing...

8:56 Hmm, that's a pretty large meal. Okay, he works out a lot. If you mean because of that, still, it's a pretty good meal size-wise. And if he wouldn't be working out, that would be a huge meal that could last you for the whole day. Especially if you would replace the muscle meat with organs.

[video] 9:16 factor in regards to paul's issues he wasn't eating enough protein in proper meals to trigger enough insulin and therefore keep his electrolytes balanced the final problem with paul's version of carnivore was that he was incorporating a lot of organ meats in particular liver paul owns a supplement company that sells organ supplements including liver on top of that he was what is he gonna say now how is liver a bad thing what oh my god man

9:38 also regularly eating raw liver and other organs in their natural form yeah that's great in their natural form that's good are you gonna say that it's bad now or what huh i need to listen to it first but this guy i thought kind of understands what's going on now liver is incredibly nutrient dense it's the most nutrient dense food on the planet but here's the thing liver is actually too high in certain nutrients for example cop there's no such thing Firstly, again, we are talking about molecules. In food itself, no proteins, amino acids, vitamins, nothing has ever been observed. As far as we know, factually, liver has no vitamins, no protein, nothing, because in the food itself,

10:29 it cannot even be observed so now he's gonna go on talking about how there's too much of something which actually has never even been proven again you gotta understand his mindset to understand why this video is fallacious as well as vitamin a and with vitamin a unlike many other nutrients which you just flush out if you consume too much of vitamin a is actually fat soluble which means it gets stored in your liver and then builds up over time when vitamin a levels get too high Again, these are ideas, these are beliefs. This cannot be proven, has never been proven, and never will be proven.

[video] 11:01 ...can start affecting your liver and kidneys' ability to keep electrolytes balanced. All of Paul's symptoms...

11:06 Completely made up, just a belief, like talking about Jesus, religions, no difference.

[video] 11:13 ...to do with electrolyte issues are also classic symptoms of vitamin A toxicity. So this right here was Paul's third issue. He was...

11:20 Right. Yeah, sure, man. Uh, but there's no such thing. I made a whole video about it. Link will be in the description. There's absolutely no cases. It's never been reported. There is no such thing as vitamin A toxicity. I'm talking about zero evidence, zero proof, nothing whatsoever. That's what a joke it is. Okay. So it was him being too lean and under eating. I don't know who said that he was under eating, but okay.

11:51 not enough protein, insulin, uh, that he wasn't maybe getting the electrolytes, the minerals second, understand that's a different story. And, uh, because he was cooking the meat. Yeah. You, you lose the water. And maybe you lose a lot of the minerals. Sure. Yeah. But that's just the problem that you have when you cook food. Then just don't cook food.

[video] 12:19 Eating too much liver, which potentially led to vitamin A toxicity. When you look at it all together, Paul's issues weren't caused by the carnivore diet itself. The electrolyte issues, low testosterone, suppressed...

12:29 his only really good point is about the electrolytes and that's if anything if that really was a problem probably then it was because he was eating cooked muscle meat all the time and now he still eats a lot of cooked muscle meat he doesn't cook to me that much but he still cooks it

[video] 12:48 But he also eats a lot of fruits, which have the water and the electrolytes. That's it.

13:00 Who said that he didn't eat enough food, man? Because of the one clip, there was insanely much food. How much food do you eat? Bigger protein meals. Who says that he didn't eat big enough meals? Cut back on liver. Cut back on the best food on earth. What? There's no such thing as vitamin A toxicity, man. You're mixing in...

13:30 religious beliefs essentially, beliefs which cannot be proven, beliefs that are based on nothing, with some stuff which is true. But for the most part it's just empty beliefs that you're talking about here. Let's be real, he was eating a cooked muscle meat diet, no carnivorous animal on this earth. Nobody, no animal eats cooked meat anyway or cooked anything, let alone a cooked muscle meat diet. Firstly, they go for the organs first. And secondly, those organs are raw. It's not a cooked muscle meat diet. It's a raw organ diet that carnivorous animals prefer. Of course, it's not going to work out. Do you see any wolf, lion, anybody cut back on the liver? Because... They get toxicity from it? What are you talking about? Let's just stick to reality, man. This video is getting out of hand.

[video] 14:27 He talked about, but instead he just quit and blamed the carnivore diet. This is the number one factor why I stopped doing the carnivore diet. I simply couldn't eat enough fats and proteins.

14:37 I don't care about this guy. He's on steroids. Who cares what he eats? It doesn't matter anyway. His whole body is drugged up.

[video] 14:46 when all you're eating is meat and animal products your appetite stays very low now there are many reasons for this one is because protein and fat trigger many of your strong satiety hormones another reason is because animal products are extremely nutrient dense meaning your body gets what it needs very fast and doesn't keep you to push eating more in search of these missing nutrients you also avoid carbohydrates which mess with your blood sugar levels and hunger hormones as a result of all of these reasons some people find that on carnival they get

15:05 Again, some stuff which is probably true, let's just say, and then just some completely empty belief mixed in there about carbs, which cannot be proven. Yeah, he's not basing this diet or his life on reality. This whole video is not talking about the reality of how it really is. It's just a bunch of beliefs being thrown out there.

[video] 15:30 Very fast. Like Paul's example, when you're too lean and not eating enough you can run to issues with energy, sleep, electrolytes and even your hormones. In that video Tristan said he couldn't physically eat more, but usually there are a couple of ways around this. For one, perhaps the easiest thing to do is to increase your consumption of dairy. Dairy is much more palatable than animal products like meat, so adding things in like cream, cheese or even yogurt can make it so much easier to get more food in and as a whole increase your overall energy intake.

15:51 But that's again really weird overall, because what is he really saying? He's saying, do this and that, whatever it may be, in this case eat more dairy, to stick to this diet, because you should not leave the diet, but why not? It is cult-like thinking. Why should you not try something else? Why should Paul not try eating fruits or whatever he wants to? That's the weird part. That's why it's so similar to veganism. He makes a video explaining why people quit, but in a way he's also really defending it. He's being pretty defensive about the diet, which shouldn't even be a topic. It shouldn't even be on your mind. Firstly, as I said, you shouldn't be on a diet anyway. But secondly, even if you are, it should not be a dominating thought in your life. It should not take over your life.

16:49 That should never happen. Food is something super important, but just chill and eat what you want to in its natural state. That's only animals, the most appetizing parts are the organs, and then some fruits and honey. But if you want to eat something else, whatever, just don't base your life on it and

[video] 17:14 make videos talking about people who quit this way of eating what does it matter so he quit so he's doing better now whatever he wanted to you quit because you don't like something yeah yeah another option is to mix up the types of animal foods you're eating some people find they can eat much more when it's from say fatty fish while others find they can eat more when it's high fat ground beef by rotating different options you'll often find certain foods your taste buds and body want

17:43 Yeah, but yeah, both are not really appetizing. Farmed salmon anyway. Virgins are really appetizing. Eating liver, spleen, brain, testicles, the pancreas, and so on. And then some oysters and whatever, seafood. Yeah, that's how you switch it up. Switching between different kinds of muscle meat, and then when it's cooked anyway, you don't even taste it, you're eating some... dry pieces of meat, muscle meat. It doesn't even seem like food to your senses when you see it, when you touch it, when you taste it. more which makes it possible to give my point is simply that it's all the same to your senses it feels like it's the same whereas when it comes to raw organs there's a big noticeable difference and then you're really eating different foods when eating cooked muscle meat it's like you're eating the same thing anyway all the time

[video] 18:44 I also do think, however, that part of his decision to quit was influenced by other bodybuilders who believe that carbs are essential for optimal bodybuilding. But I mean, that too is debatable. I mixed in a little fruit. I eat fruit because I find when I don't do that, I did straight carnivore for the first few days. I think like the first eight or nine days. But it's hard. I was slogging through workouts. Just no energy. Yeah.

19:04 Yeah, it's also so dumb to call it strict carnivore. Eating the way carnivorous animals eat would be defined biologically. That's what humans thought of. The biological definition is that you eat 20% raw meat. That's what your diet should be at least made out of. Usually, I suppose it would be more. It depends on what animal you look at, but that's how you define a carnivorous animal. It's not you eating only cooked muscle meat. That doesn't make any sense. That has nothing to do with what carnivorous animals eat. As long as an animal eats at least 20% raw meat, they are considered to be a carnivore.

[video] 19:47 And the difference is that carnivores categorize a species for which at least 20% of the energy content of the diet comes from meat. And that's really important because people say humans are not carnivores because we eat things other than meat. Well, that's true, but as long as you're eating 20% of the diet from meat, you are classified as a carnivore. The reason Joe's performance dropped on carnivore, and therefore why he ended up quitting, is very easily explained. Joe simply wasn't fat-adapt. What this means is that on a standard high-carbohydrate diet, your body...

20:16 Yeah, it's again just a bunch of beliefs which cannot be proven. That's all right, whatever. But the thing is also, again, why make a video about Joe Rogan? Who cares? He did a carnivore for eight, nine days. Then he ate fruit because he wanted to. Yeah, because it's not normal to eat only cooked muscle meat. Humans in nature also eat sweet things whenever we can. And even freshly killed animals. you can even taste, are sweetish a little bit because there is still sugar inside. Eating only cooked muscle meat, of course, depletes you. It's visible. What does it matter that he quit it? Who cares? Just move on.

[video] 21:03 runs on carbohydrates for energy now these carbs break down to glucose which is stored in your muscles as glycogen this is the fuel source your muscles primarily use but when you remove carbs like on carnivore your body has to learn to run on fat instead and create its muscle glycogen from fat this process right here is called fat adaption and it takes a while to become fat adapted for most people it takes less than a few weeks to become somewhat fat adapted which is where you start to feel super energized you feel good but for full fat adaption where muscle glycogen replenishment is optimal it can take months joe only did a strict carnivore diet for about a week before he added fruit this right here is nowhere near enough time for the body to fully adapt during this early phase when you first start carnivore your glycogen levels

21:32 It really reminds me of vegans saying that you didn't get used to the fiber yet, which is why you had the pain in your gut and the bloating because it takes months. It's so similar. Who cares anyway if somebody quits the fake carnivore diet or the vegan diet or anything? Let them do what they want to do. Clearly, it felt better to eat the fruits.

[video] 22:00 Let's drop it. which is why some people often feel sluggish or weaker in the gym. But if you push through, your body becomes much more efficient at creating this glycogen on its own. This is where a lot of confusion comes in. People point to studies showing athletes perform better on high carbohydrate diets in comparison to high fat diets. And then they go around saying, well, the science clearly shows you need carbohydrates for optimal performance. But here's the thing, in these studies, they test athletes who have only been

22:19 on a high-fat diet for a short period of time so of course their performance isn't as good they aren't probably fat that's a valid point because people eat a carbohydrate-based diet their whole life seed-based diet for the most part some starches potatoes and then they switch to eating a high-fat diet for

22:45 Even if it was a few months. Okay, after a few months, maybe everybody gets used to it. But after a few weeks, for sure not.

[video] 22:58 as well as this carbs also more palatable even if you're completely full from a massive steak you can very easily eat a bit more fruit bread or something sweet if that's in front of you so as of august 2021 i started incorporating a serving of fruit which not only helped me from under eating but also improved my sleep as i started noticing when i was doing more strict carnivore that i was waking up like two hours before my alarm would go off i also started having more eye twitching from not holding on to my electrolytes And I was also noticing my performance in the gym was getting slowly not as optimal and I when I incorporated a little bit more Carbohydrates I was able to push it more in the gym and have more strength Lily too is very lean and in great shape the light pole because she was generally under eating.

23:31 Yeah Does he mean that women should be going to the gym and working out or what is he saying?

23:42 Being that lean For a woman especially, that cannot be healthy.

[video] 23:46 This video is kind of like an advertisement for eating carbohydrates almost.

24:13 I don't think that it turned out the way he wanted to. I think that if somebody watches this, they will think, oh, so carbohydrates are the solution, actually.

[video] 24:22 Oh, salt. Yeah, for electrolytes?

24:40 You know that salt is extremely toxic. Simply take a teaspoon of salt and put it in your mouth. You know what will happen. But kind of a recommendation is that, strange, percent of the time people on carnival who have electrolyte issues are typically people with sodium issues so essentially from august 2021 to why does he say that why only sodium you think that overloading yourself with unnatural sodium chloride It's gonna fix your electrolyte problems? How would that work exactly?

[video] 25:25 A possible explanation of Lily's scalp issues could be the dairy that she was consuming. A lot of store-bought dairy is put through a process called pasteurization, which is where it is heated to high temperatures in order to stay shelf-stable for longer. However, this process can damage the proteins in dairy, as they are very sensitive to heat, which for some people can trigger allergy-like...

25:39 is meat not sensitive to heat why does it turn brown and black when you cook it burn it responses such as a rash now in this video we've looked at why i believe these people ran to same with meat you're consuming something unnatural foreign to your body of course choose on carnivore and what they could do to fix them but there is still one common trend amongst all of these people they're still on very meaty Another problem with pasteurized dairy, and that's going to be most dairy obviously in most countries, in most stores, is that there's going to be fake vitamins in those dairy products. And those are of course toxins.

[video] 26:21 Okay, at least we can agree on that, yeah.

[video] 26:44 Here I break down exactly why it's so important for all humans to eat a meat based carnivorous diet.

26:48 All right, at least his main message is correct. Of course, humans should be eating animal based. It's very important for your health. Except that I don't agree that we should be eating a fake carnivore diet based on cooked muscle meat. And as you can see, this diet is based on essentially religious beliefs, just some beliefs which cannot even be proven. You can't base something that's going to impact your health

27:25 on something such as religious beliefs, claims, ideas which you cannot prove, of course it's gonna go wrong then. Let's stick to reality and actual facts. Almost nobody does that. And when we do that, we know that in its natural state, a human being can only, for the most part, eat animals and then some fruits.

27:54 depends on the climate and the season what kind of fruits you would even be able to find and most fruits would be mostly made out of the skin the shell and the seeds but there would be some fruit flesh also inside which oftentimes is edible sometimes it's also not there's a lot of toxic acidic bitter fruits also out there but it's very apparent which ones you're not supposed to be eating but my main point is that of course we would be eating animals and we would go for the organs in their raw state first a lot of these carnivore people somehow believe that humans

28:40 came into this existence with fire and with pots and everything and we just cooked always. No, realistically in many climates it's not even an option. You hunt down an animal, It's raining. You just eat it, of course. You cut it open and eat the warm meat right away. You take out the liver and you eat it. It's warm, it's fresh, it's perfect. Because it's natural. Everything that's natural is perfect. That's the way you're supposed to be eating it. This cooked muscle meat diet is always going to be a diet. We'll see how long it lasts. That people hop on and hop off. Because it's a man-made diet, as I said. Man-made diets are not sustainable because it's man-made ways of eating. Human beings themselves thought of these diets.

29:36 You're following human rules when you eat a vegan diet, a Mediterranean diet or a so-called carnivore diet. Whereas in reality you should only be listening to your intuition. And your intuition tells you exactly what you can eat in its natural raw state. And you know that there is only the option of eating animals and some fruits and honey also. That would be not as common in most places, but... Now and then it would be possible. Of course, we also don't know exactly how nature used to look like, how our surroundings were back in the day. I'm sure that in some climates there were a lot of animals of all kinds all around you. Rodents, herbivorous animals, carnivorous.

30:36 All animals are kind of omnivorous when you really look at them. Birds, maybe all kinds of fruit trees in many places. You also gotta remember that our surroundings, the environment is very different compared to the way it used to be. But still, the truth is still the same. When it comes down to eating, what you can eat in its natural state, It's going to be animals that you're going to be eating for the most part. Thanks for watching.