Posted on 08/10/2009 10:55:34 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
One of the persistent, shallow global food myths is that the world could feed more people if we gave up eating meat. Ezra Klein wrote another misguided column about this--"The Meat of the Problem"--in the Washington Post of July 29. Klein cites as his authority a naive "study" by the kids at Carnegie-Mellon University.
Klein asserts, "It is more energy efficient to grow grain and feed it to people than it is to grow grain and turn it into feed that we give to calves until they become adults that we then slaughter to feed to people."
No, Mr. Klein, it isn't. Either your kids haven't done their homework, or they deliberately set out to promote vegetarian diets.
Point One: Our biggest source of livestock feed is . . . (drum-roll) . . . grass! Humans can't get nourishment from it, but huge tracts of the earth's land are too dry, too steep or too rocky for grain. We let cows and calves harvest sparse crops of grass from massive tracts of the American Great Plains, Canadian Prairie Provinces, the Australian Outback, New Zealand, the sandy steppes of Hungary, and huge tracts of Khazakstan--to name but a few grasslands.
Point Two: If these grassy areas aren't grazed by animals, the dry grass will ultimately be struck by lightning, ignite, and release fiery clouds of CO2!
Point Three: Livestock happily and constructively eat lots of other stuff that humans can't or won't consume, including millions of tons of peanut hulls, citrus pulp, molasses, feather meal, wheat bran, meat and bone meal from slaughter plants, corn gluten meal, and on down a long list. Without livestock, you have no more food for humans, but a huge waste disposal problem.(continued)
(Excerpt) Read more at rightwingnews.com ...
Yes, please stop eating meat. I’d like the price of Prime Rib Eye steaks to come down.
I mean, to combat global warming of course.
Mmmm, global warming.
What about the idiocy of growing grain to fuel cars?
Want to be really “efficient”?
Reduce mankind’s numbers by introducing the public to tasty Soylent Green.
Vegetables are what food eats!
A child needs red meat protein when growing up, not bullsh-t.
Regarding meat, it is hard to carry genetic modification too far because the animal will die. They want you to eat more genetically modified vegetables. Disgusting, pass the juicy steak.
Seriously, was this “study” given ANY critical thought at all at CMU? Do they realize that they’re seriously proposing that people raise and eat hay?
Or we could ditch this whole global warming thing and stop diverting corn and sugar crops to ethanol production.
So, are wild carnivores going veggie?
Only if it means disposing of the 'meatheads'....
My doc just told me I should try the NEANDERTHIN eating plan....and I am.....as I was always craving protein...NO LONGER craving it....looking better than ever....always full. Grains can make humans SICK (and fat)!
Yeah, but where can I get fresh dinosaur or mastodon meat in my neighborhood?
I'll settle for pterodactyl.
Humans are omnivores, we eat anything, if it can be digested we will have a go at it. To say that we will eat only plant resources goes against basic human nature. Forcing people to act against the way we are wired doesn’t work. This is kin to the same lame thinking as radical communism.
Vegetarians are much more easier to mold and bend to a government’s whims. They are more dull and less rebellious.
There is a reason some of the brutal regimes in the past outlawed meat eating for the peons.
Yup. my tagline.
Actually, you’ve hit on EXACTLY what the agenda is for the elitists.
They don’t like the idea that everyone can eat meat every day.
They want to be even more “privileged” than they are by denying the peons some of the “luxuries” that only the elites should enjoy.
All liberalism consistently wants is CONTROL over everyone. Truly, liberalism is a mental disease.
Rumor has it that Barney Frank flew in a tirade upon hearing about this..
And Richard Simmons put on a frankfurter costume..
He covers it! Read the article.
“If you really want to help people, stop wasting corn on ethanol and soybean oil in biodiesel. We’ll need to double the world’s output of food and feed in the next 40 years just to meet the food needs of 9 billion people and their pets. Biofuels are a trivial waste of good land.”
Back in the 1980s, my [Catholic] college held a 24 hour fast to benefit Oxfam, a charity that tries to alleviate global hunger. I remember back then being informed by that program that we should eat less meat, because crop land should be used instead to feed humans. I was very idealistic about this and tried to take it in good faith. Then, I got to law school and learned about real property, and the concept of the “highest and best use” of the land. There are some places where grazing really is the highest and best use. So, three-cheers for grass-fed cattle, and the steaks they become.
Also, a friend of mine took the message so seriously that she became a vegetarian. Until she became anemic. She bowed to necessity and started eating meat again, occasionally.
The best reason for eating meat came from my second grade teacher: we are omnivores. Our bodies can use meat for nourishment. And we’re built like omnivores. Our eyes point forward like a predator, for example, not out to either side like prey.
If we don’t get mad at bears for being omnivores, I don’t see why we should condemn the human species, either. Many would say we are no higher than bears (though I disagree), but certainly we shouldn’t be any lower.
Time for lunch!
Beer & wine at the same setting?, I’ll have to try that.
Last time I had water in glasses like that it was half chlorine.
Eat preprocessed, concentrated veggies every meal...it's the deliciously simple way to get balanced protein, PLUS other essential nutrients every day!
(This message brought to you by PETA: People Eating Tasty Animals>)
If God hadn't meant for us to eat animals, he wouldn't have made them out of meat!
“I didn’t claw my way to the top of the food chain just to eat vegetables.”
Rudy’s BBQ - Texas!
Genesis 9:3
Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.
I love salmon. Getting a decent hamburger in NYC is difficult. The average one will make you sick as often as not. I don’t think I’ll ever eat a Rueben again, after the one that was on special at Lex and E90.
Honestly I just can’t imagine any wine with barbecue. It just seems unnatural.
Some years ago I was eating Thanksgiving dinner at a friend's house when the topic turned to vegetarianism (don't ask me how). My friends step-son, eighteen years old, started talking, and he had heard that humans only started eating meat about ten thousand years ago because of a huge famine. There was not enough non-meat available, so humans had to resort to eating meat he stated.
I just about spit the turkey out of my mouth when I heard that. I asked him where he had obtained that bit of info. He didn't know for sure. I told him humans had probably been eating meat for millions of years. He didn't look like he wanted to believe me, but if he believed that nonsense about humans only eating meat for the last ten thousand years, then he had probably heard a lot of vegeatarian propagand i.e. lies.
My wife has Celiac also. It’s the pits for her.
No kidding, the price of beef has gone through the roof... Doesn't matter cause I'd pay $20/lb. if it came to it.
I think liberals should not only stop eating meat but they should also quit eating plants. After all, plants have feelings too.
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