I would just make sure your dairy is grassfed. It has quite a few more nutrients and is almost a different food. CLA, for example, is chemoprotective and inhibits IGF-1, but you won't find it in conventional dairy. Nutritionism has its flaws though, so I won't go listing all the nutritional differences. I think grassfed dairy is a much superior product and can be a part of a healthy diet if so desired. CAFO dairy should probably be limited, particularly if you're looking for optimal health.

I dropped all dairy but cream and butter January 2011 (I have MS) and haven't had any for over 30 days. I feel great, and won't be going back on the moo. I have a different reason than many in that I have a problem that may be made worse with dairy, so I have slowly eliminated it while moving from Primal to Paleo in my diet. I now use coconut oil/milk instead of dairy, and use way more bacon grease too.

I was just remarking to my wife that I did get a bit phlegm-y after having Greek yogurt or cream, so maybe that was a sign to quit.

Again, I think each person is a special case, so what works for me may not work for you.

Dairy is good for making small cows grow into big cows.

It does a very similar thing for humans, by increasing the rate of growth that cells divide. Which is fine as long as all cells being divided are healthy, if a not so healthy cell (cancer/etc) gets divided rapidly it can be a bad thing.

So dairy doesn't cause cancer but it can make it grow faster.

Without dairy and your cells divide at a normal pace, your body normally stops that bad cells from dividing.

Now with that being said if you consume a low amount of dairy, you have the body composition you want then should you really take dairy out? Maybe... I do not operate well on dairy doesn't work with me, if i could drink it there is a good chance I still would.

Not from me. Raw milk cheeses work well in my diet. I would not drink modern milk, the ultra pastur stuff, but if you can her raw milk or good milk from Natural by Nature, use it. Just don't drink glass after glass. And Butter is a GREAT food.

Dairy could be a problem if you have an autoimmune condition. I have Sjogren's and my hands used to go numb overnight. After I stopped eating dairy (I was only eating sour cream and Greek yogurt and heavy cream), my hands don't go numb anymore. I brought sour cream back for a few days, and sure enough, it returned.

Your mileage may vary if you don't have an autoimmune issue. I believe heavy cream and butter and Greek yougurt and sour cream are okay for most people. But I would avoid pasteurized milk, definitely, and for sure any kind of skim milk.

I would think that the only really convincing argument against eating dairy is if you cannot tolerate it, due to either the lactose, or casein. One of the main things with eating dairy, is that the dairy should come from pastured cows, with raw pastured dairy being ideal. Otherwise, you’ll be taking in a lot of the bad stuff (omega-6’s, low nutrient density) associated with conventional farming. One issue I had with dairy is that it was too easy to eat too much lactose, which gets broken down into glucose and galactose, which can cause insulin spikes and an elevated blood glucose level. This caused me problems in weight gain/loss (gained fat, couldn’t lose the fat I had), but it would also cause blood sugar crashes due to blood sugar spiking.

I enjoy my fair share of butter, although I get organic pastured butter, which has all the good fat from grass-fed dairy. I tend to tolerate dairy quite well, although I’ve decided that I’ll only include raw, pastured dairy in my diet, so until I find a good dairy source, all I eat is pastured organic butter.

I’d suggest only eating pastured raw dairy, with eating conventional dairy in little to no amounts, since it’s just not that good.

And where is everyone getting the whole “dairy causes increased cell division” thing?

The arguments against dairy have always seemed a lot weaker than the arguments against grains/refined carbs, and tend to centre around the "quite a few people have a borderline intolerance" point.

My wife is going to try without dairy for a while as she suffers from eczema. She was also clearly sensitive to wheat as her IBS symptoms cleared up overnight when stopped eating grains. My gut is apparently more robust and I never got those symptoms with wheat, and have no problems eating dairy. For the joy I get out of full fat yoghurt, occasional bits of cheese and a splash of milk in my tea and coffee, cutting out dairy just isn't worth it for me.

As Dr. Briffa says, "life gets in the way sometimes". Obsessing over details seems far more un-paleo than the minor differences/preferences between primal eaters. One of the best things about paleo eating for me is really enjoying food again without worrying/feeling guilty etc.

I've been adding lots of milk lately. Feeling good with it, and no weight gain. Also eat lots of cheese and sometimes yogurt and kefir. Cream is great.

Yum yum yum!

It's a nice safe way to get sat fats, protein with without too much sugar. The insulinogenic thing is negligeable (hand-wringing hysteria aside).

Raw dairy is best. Butter is one of the most nutrient packed foods there is containing all the hard to get fat soluble vitamins , minerals, conjugated linoleic acid (protects against breast cancer), arachadonic acid, omega 3 fatty acids in grass fed butter (and omega 6 in a good ratio to the 3s). Certainly you get a lot of these nutrients from animal fats too but why eliminate another good source considering all the less nutritious foods out there including vegetables. No homogenized or ultrapasturized dairy...try to get raw, grass-fed with the enzymes available. I drink around a quart and a half of cream a week and love every drop.

I say listen to your body. Try different combinations of no dairy, only butter and cream, full dairy, raw cheese etc. for a few weeks each and keep a log of how you feel, your energy levels, your stamina etc. If you notice no difference in your health, then maybe there isn't any reason to deprive yourself of a little dairy as an occasional treat. I believe moderation is definitely in order, but I love butter and I do fine with a little dairy. I buy most of my meat, eggs and dairy directly from local producers. If you want to find grassfed dairy (cow or goat) or raw milk and cheese products, try visiting your local farmers' market or extension office and ask if they know anyone who produces grassfed dairy products. You might also look into the dairy farmers' association in your state and see if you can find any grassfed or raw dairy producers. There's a guy in my town who used to bring raw milk fresh to your doorstep two days a week until three years ago when a tornado destroyed his farm. MAN, I miss that!!!

I definitely eat my fair share of pastured butter, ghee, raw cheese, wish I could get my hands on some raw milk, and I LOVE heavy cream.

Just be careful and make sure you buy cream WITHOUT carageenan. It's in the Organic Pastures brand and whole lot of other ones. I always make sure my cream only has cream in it. Yum!

As far as cell division goes...I'm a pretty robust healthy guy and I lift heavy weights (just started a Stronglifts 5x5 regimen, and I love it). I find that when I include dairy in my recovery process (whey, cream, whole milk, etc) I recover much much faster and build more muscle.

Some papers: http://bit.ly/fAaeKO and http://bit.ly/i3VfKb

Assuming you buy into gluten being bad due to being difficult to digest:

Dairy is mostly casein.

Structure of casein is very similar to gluten (as an aside yeast is worse than both of those actually) so it is also relatively difficult to digest. This is why body builders take it to get a steady input of protein into their bodies, as the hard to digest also makes it slow. Many gluten elimination diets also eliminate casein for this reason (Not that there is anything to suggest gluten/casein free helps autism if you actually do an honest double blind trial).

But I've got nothing if you eat wheat too.