Trying to Connect the Dinner Plate to Climate Change

NY Times ^ | August 29, 2007 | CLAUDIA H. DEUTSCH

[neverdem]

EVER since “An Inconvenient Truth,” Al Gore has been the darling of environmentalists, but that movie hardly endeared him to the animal rights folks. According to them, the most inconvenient truth of all is that raising animals for meat contributes more to global warming than all the sport utility vehicles combined.

The biggest animal rights groups do not always overlap in their missions, but now they have coalesced around a message that eating meat is worse for the environment than driving. They and smaller groups have started advertising campaigns that try to equate vegetarianism with curbing greenhouse gases.

Some backlash against this position is inevitable, the groups acknowledge, but they do have scientific ammunition. In late November, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization issued a report stating that the livestock business generates more greenhouse gas emissions than all forms of transportation combined.

When that report came out, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and other groups expected their environmental counterparts to immediately hop on the “Go Veggie!” bandwagon, but that did not happen. “Environmentalists are still pointing their fingers at Hummers and S.U.V.’s when they should be pointing at the dinner plate,” said Matt A. Prescott, manager of vegan campaigns for PETA.

So the animal rights groups are mobilizing on their own. PETA is outfitting a Hummer with a driver in a chicken suit and a vinyl banner proclaiming meat as the top...

--snip--

“You just cannot be a meat-eating environmentalist,” said Mr. Prescott, whose group also plans to send billboard-toting trucks to the Colorado Convention Center in Denver when Mr. Gore lectures there on Oct. 2. The billboards will feature a cartoon image of Mr. Gore eating a drumstick next to the tagline: “Too Chicken to Go Vegetarian? Meat Is the No. 1 Cause of Global Warming.”...

[w1andsodidwe]

Since it takes (just for an example) 1000 gallons of water to produce one pound of meat, I generally ask people whether or not they would prefer to give up family showers for a month or 1 pound of meat a month.

Just what happens to these molecules of H2O that the animal drinks? Do these whackos think that it disappears from earth. I think not.

[shbox]

I can do my part to piss off all these whackos.

Maybe I will drive a Hummer...pulling a camper...to a NASCAR race and grill giant burgers and steaks while I watch the cars race around the track.

Anybody wanna come??????

[shbox]

OK, I understand what you are saying.....now pass the steak sauce.

[KosmicKitty]

Drove the new SUV to Outback Steakhouse last night.

The ribeye was great!!

[KosmicKitty]

augh!! Fat Freddie and the Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers

I’m havng a FLASHBACK!!! :-)

[alwaysconservative]

The water is not just consumed by the animals, it is used throughout the butchering and production process. The water saved by not using it in inefficient livestock production could be used for other many other agricultural needs, landscaping, personal hygiene (Sheryl Crowe and Gwyneth Paltrow excepted), or even making sanitary water available to those who do not have it (which is a WAY bigger global health threat than fictitious global warming!)

Most of the people here reading this article missed the point that Algore is seen as hypocrite EVEN from the enviro-whacko left. That is the good part. The bad part is that these PETA-types are trying to impose their beliefs on others in a classic socialistic manner. The facts of the waste and “costs” of meat production and the livestock industry on our environment and health are real, and are completely within our power to change, IF we choose to do so. Unfortunately, because the left has co-opted the environmental issue for themselves and subverted it to make it political, they turn the facts into comedic fodder.

I think real environmentalism starts with ownership, pride, and capitalism, something the whacko left will never understand.

Okay, (hopefully!) I’m done with being the humorless nag for now. It just rubs me the wrong way when we mock vegetarianism just because it is yet another issue that the whacko left has stolen and subverted. Eating meat (or not) should not be a political statement but a choice for health and happiness, but of course, to them, everything is political.

[Dr. Bogus Pachysandra]

Eggs Ackley!

[Dr. Bogus Pachysandra]

“Soylent Green is people!” It’s the only answer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soylent_Green

[w1andsodidwe]

The water is not just consumed by the animals, it is used throughout the butchering and production process

Just because you use water in any fashion, it does not disappear from the earth. Water is continually recycling. It is a just wrong to pretend that once water is used, it is no longer available to be used on the earth.

[alwaysconservative]

Good point; sorry I missed it the first time around!

[cinives]

Your last statement is true, but ... you forget that vegetarians/vegans invariably try to tell the meat-eating world that their choices are bad, and try to make it a moral issue in a very self-righteous way. When you do that you make it an issue.

I don’t see anywhere in this country where there’s a water shortage threatening the hygiene or drinking ability of any single person OR animal, and I don’t think it’s a better choice to ship water from the US when desalination plants can be built nearer to the needy areas.. Additionally, many of the water-needy areas pollute their own water sources or use water very inefficiently due to the totalitarian regimes in those countries.

Those who want to change behavior should start with freedom.

[goldstategop]

Liberals want us to give SUVs... central air/heated homes and now steaks and hamburgers.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[William Terrell]

Too Chicken to Go Vegetarian? Meat Is the No. 1 Cause of Global Warming.”

It is also the only way to get the complete range of nutrients the body needs. No combination of anything else comes close.

[goldstategop]

Greens = they're red on the inside. Marxism with pagan earth worship dressing.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Question Liberal Authority]

Good thing we killed off all the buffalo, or it would be hotter than heck right now.

[Question Liberal Authority]

Since it takes (just for an example) 1000 gallons of water to produce one pound of meat, I generally ask people whether or not they would prefer to give up family showers for a month or 1 pound of meat a month.

Since 2/3 of the Earth (just for an example) is COMPLETELY COVERED WITH WATER, I generally ask people what the hell difference it makes.

[Trillian]

This comes to mind:
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=sponsor

[Question Liberal Authority]

The water saved by not using it in inefficient livestock production could be used for other many other agricultural needs, landscaping, personal hygiene (Sheryl Crowe and Gwyneth Paltrow excepted), or even making sanitary water available to those who do not have it (which is a WAY bigger global health threat than fictitious global warming!)

Isn't this the equivalent of the "eat your vegetables because kids are starving in India" argument? A cow in Kansas is deprived of water, and somehow a child in Somalia doesn't have filthy slime to drink?

If 1,000 gallons of water create a product worth $2 on the open market, then I draw one of two conclusions:

A) The number is wrong

B) Water isn't really all that expensive.

I think the number is highly skewed by the idea that meat is the only product created by cattle. The primary product generated by cattle is MILK. A dairy cow produces more than 20,000 pounds of milk per year for 8 to 9 years. That's 180,000 pounds of milk. Now, when her milking days are done, she might be turned into 700 pounds of steaks. Plus a pile of leather and gelatin and many thousands of pounds of PLANT FERTILIZER.

So maybe that cow took 700,000 gallons of water in her lifetime. (Actual number is about 25 to 50 gallons per day per cow). You can't just divide 700,000 gallons of water by 700 pounds of meat and say "by golly. That meat sure uses a lot of water."

I'd bet money that it takes just as much water to produce 180,000 pounds of Soy Milk plus 700 pounds of Tofu plus the equivalent pile of Pleather, fake Jell-O and chemical fertilizers.

Have you ever seen a soybean plant? It's like 5% soybeans and 95% other. What do you do with all the soybean husks and leaves and other parts of the plant that people don't eat?

What you COULD do, is FEED IT TO A COW. Then the cow will produce manure which will feed the plant.

You want sustainable living? That's the way human beings have been sustaining themselves for tens of thousands of years.

[Question Liberal Authority]

The facts of the waste and “costs” of meat production and the livestock industry on our environment and health are real, and are completely within our power to change, IF we choose to do so.

WHAT WASTE? There IS no waste in the cattle industry. EVERY dang thing gets used. Just ask a hot dog. When was the last time you saw a barge of unused cattle parts floating in a barge off the coast of New Jersey?

[Leftism is Mentally Deranged]

Now they are going after meat. What have they condemned? SUV’s, incandescent light bulbs, bottled water, diapers, and a lot more. As soon as they get their way eliminating one thing, they go on to the next. They won’t stop until there is no motorized transportation and everyone over 50 is compelled to exit through euthanasia.