“Now should be environmental vegetarianism’s big moment. Global warming is the single biggest threat to the health of the planet, and meat consumption plays a bigger role in greenhouse gas emissions than even many environmentalists realize.” – Ben Adler[social_buttons]
This quote above is from an article by Ben Adler in American Prospect, titled “Are Cows Worse Than Cars?”. It really stands out as a reminder of the clearly divided environmental movement. By and large, the movement towards environmental sustainability has just plain ignored the impact that dietary choices have on global warming. Curious, isn’t it?
On the one hand, we can support cleaner energy, buy more efficient cars, and reduce our consumption of products derived from petroleum, and yet with our other hand, eat a burger that has a carbon footprint bigger than most SUVs.
“I think it’s amazing that even the greenest of green liberal environment activists, the vast majority of them tend to consume meat at the same rate as people who think global warming is a hoax. Meat consumption seems to be the last thing that progressive people address in their lifestyle. If I had a nickel for every global warming conference that had roast beef on the menu, I’d be rich.” – Mike Tidwell, director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network
The beef industry is driven largely by corn subsidies (over 5 billion dollars last year alone). If feedlots had to pay the true cost of feeding the cows all of that corn, or if they had to offset all of the fuel and emissions produced from calf to slaughter, most of them would probably have been out of business long ago.
We’ve been bailing out the meat industry with subsidies and price supports for years, and for what? For greenhouse gas emissions that out-pace the levels from cars and other transportation.
Considering the large carbon footprint for animal agriculture, why is it that we’re so adamant about not giving up meat?
“I don’t know of anyone in the environmental community that has taken a stance of ‘we support no meat consumption because of global warming.'” – Tim Greef, League of Conservation Voters
Owning a hybrid vehicle with Sierra Club stickers on the back is way more sexy than cutting the flesh out of our diets.
Until the connection between CO2 emissions, global warming, and our diet is accepted, you can be sure that people will be rolling through the drive-thru for Big Mac, in the biodiesel or hybrid, feeling like they’re really making a difference…
Read the entire article by Ben Adler in American Prospect for more juicy tidbits on dietary choices, climate change, and global warming.
Image: Ken30684 at Flickr under Creative Commons License
Let me see you kill all those innocent animals you put on your plate everyday with your own hands?
Let me see you kill all those innocent animals you put on your plate everyday with your own hands?
Yes, there were millions of buffalo and other huge species roaming the earth before us, but none of them were force fed corn (the cheapest commodity today). Cows do not digest corn and the methane they emit today is a result of their lack of digesting. I believe that if we raised cows humanely and let them eat grass, that the carbon emissions would be much lower. However, methane is not the only way that cows are hurting the environment. It takes 55 acres of rainforest to make a McDonald’s hamburger. Beautiful places such as Costa Rica and Brazil are tearing down their rainforests to raise cattle and ship it back to the US. Raising cows is also extremely inefficient in energy and water (it takes 6000-7000 gallons of water for a single pound of beef).
Lastly, our teeth are NOT designed to eat meat and neither is our body. The average intestines of a carnivore is 6 feet long. The average intestines of a herbivore is 20 feet long (to digest all of the fiber). Ours is 26 feet long! Our teeth are nowhere in comparison to a lion, bear, tiger or any other animal that rips apart meat. So I completely disagree.