"I love you mom and appreciate your concern but your sources are shit and I promise I'm going to be just fine."

I got the cholesterol talk after I told my grandma I eat 4 eggs a day. I love her but there's no way in hell I'm gonna stop eating eggs or red meat. Instead of trying to reason with her, I shrugged and changed the subject. It's a tough situation for you because while your mother is genuinely concerned for your health and well-being, she's probably incredibly ignorant when it comes to what is healthy nutrition for the human body. All you can do is tell her how great you feel (I'm just assuming)... go prep that sirloin steak dinner for you both afterwards.

I've not been able to find the study he refers to yet, but I believe that particular study categorised red meat with processed meat. Given that organic grass fed beef couldn't be much further removed from processed meat I think the study was pretty meaningless.

Anyway, I have a link to it somehwere, I'll keep looking!

That study didn't differentiate between processed meats and fresh meats. There is a lot of evidence pointing to processed meats as the culprit in these studies. Nitrate and nitrites (which are found in most processed meats) are known carcinogens.

Also, that article, while critical of the theories behind the paleo-ness of the diet was not actually particularly critical of diet itself. The author seemed to be agreeing with most of the dietary principles at the end of the article and didn't discourage eating meat so long as it was pastured/grass fed.

I ate about that much meat per day as that when I was a little five year old girl. Everyday. Plus lots (lots!) of full fat cheese and milk for my afternoon tea, and sometimes before bed as well. You're OK.

But you really should eat a lot more vegetables, specially leafy greens.

I think everyone here knows it's not true, but you're probably not going to convince her that the government experts, university researchers, talk show hosts, late night comedians, magazine writers, TV people, and her doctor are all wrong about the same thing in the same way. You're one voice up against a multitude that shouts the conventional wisdom every day. Until a person takes the red pill by her own choice, arguing against all that just makes you look like a crackpot.

So you could try another tack: assume what she believes is true, but baffle her with statistics. According to the Interwebs, the chance of a man developing colon cancer in his lifetime is about 5%. That's the average, so if you assume that people with bad diets and good diets are spread fairly evenly on either side of that number, and a bacon-and-steak diet gives you 5 times the chance that a fish-chicken-veggies diet does, that would mean the best diet would give you a chance of 1.65%, and the worst would give you 8.25%. (Yes, I'm shamelessly oversimplifying the math, and it would depend on the standard deviation and the shape of the curve, etc. This is just back-of-the-napkin stuff to make a point.)

So, even if that worst-case scenario were true, would it be worth basically giving up red meat for the rest of your life except for a treat a few times a year, to reduce your chance of colon cancer from 1-in-12 to 1-in-60? Also, about 2/3 of colon cancer patients survive beyond the 5-year point, so if you look at just fatalities, it's more like the difference between .55% and 2.75%, or 1-in-182 versus 1-in-36. Also, the median age for developing colon cancer is 70, which means half of the cases happen beyond that age, near the average life expectancy anyway, and very few cases occur before age 50. Even if a meatless diet protected against it, you'll have time to adjust later. (I'm assuming here that you're not near 50, since you need to justify your eating habits to your mother.)

Presumably, you'd also have to adopt the rest of the typical red-meatless man's lifestyle, since we don't know how much of this is correlation with other aspects of that. So you'd not only have to give up meat and other "bad" foods like butter and salt, but you'd also have to start wearing cardigans, watch a lot of Alan Alda movies, get one of those "This is what a feminist looks like" t-shirts, and call your pet dog or cat your "companion animal." I'm just not sure the extra years would be worth it.

Like most health scares (and other scares), even if it's true, it's not that significant. It's the difference between a small chance and a somewhat smaller chance. If you went through life dodging everything that had a 1-in-36 chance of hurting you someday, you'd be paralyzed.

She's stuck on conventional wisdom. If she can send you an article, you can send her one back:
http://www.gnolls.org/1141/eat-like-a-predator-not-like-prey-paleo-in-six-easy-steps-a-motivational-guide/

Mom is doing what moms are programmed to do: imagine their sons as permanently 6 years old. I have no idea how old you are, but you don't sound or look like 6. You can't dissuade mom's claim on your identity, but you can, and should, be yourself. This means eating what you want to. (Unless, of course, you are still living at Mom's house, in which case, if she's supporting you, eat what she serves for heaven's sake.) Assuming you're on your own: Don't spend a lot of time arguing with Mom for arguing with whatever your independent food choices represent (to Mom). Her sending you that article is her way, one of her ways, of letting you know she loves you, and that you need her to surivive. You once needed her for that, but no more. But she doesn't know that, so it's up to you to play the compassion card. Find ways to let her know you love her back, and move on with everything that moves, touches, and inspires you, in your truest life.

Good point Dorado!