6 ms·

I know there will be comments saying that individual action is not enough to combat climate change, or that it's too late for that, but when governments are so

I know there will be comments saying that individual action is not enough to combat climate change, or that it's too late for that, but when governments are so slow to act and corporations will only change when their bottom line is at stake, it is left to individuals to take action. Going vegan is simply the right thing to do at this point.

JoeAltmaier 7y ago
Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic?
- jamesgagan 7y ago
  I feel like this attitude is popular because it gives people an excuse to not change their lifestyle.
  - JoeAltmaier 7y ago
    I feel like the other attitude is popular because it gives people an excuse not to exercise real activism - propositions, getting out the vote, public education etc. Just eat a veggie-burger now and then and say "well I tried".
    - mAEStro-paNDa 7y ago
      In addition, it's just not the appropriate or proportional response, considering the contributors [0]. Individual action alone is certainly not enough. Systemic change is crucial. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10/100-fossil-fuel-companies-investors-responsible-71-global-emissions-cdp-study-climate-change https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10...
malvosenior 7y ago
> Going vegan is simply the right thing to do at this point. I'm sorry but no. Your diet is a personal choice and no amount of shaming is going to change that. Do you travel internationally? Own a car? Do any other of a million things that have an impact on the climate but also constitute living your life? It's great to put this information out there but telling people that your choices are "simply the right thing to do at this point" is incredibly condescending and will likely have the opposite impact you want it to have since no one likes to be preached at.
- jamesgagan 7y ago
  I have been actively trying to reduce my ecological footprint because I believe climate change is real. I don't feel it's a matter of "personal choice" at this point. The way we live has a profound impact on the planet, and we all need to try and reduce that impact in any way we can. I realize this is a message people don't want to hear, but I believe they need to hear it. Going vegan and flying less are two of the biggest changes an individual can make.
  - malvosenior 7y ago
    > I don't feel it's a matter of "personal choice" at this point. Unless you're suggesting forcing people by law to be vegan, then it most definitely is a personal choice. > I realize this is a message people don't want to hear, but I believe they need to hear it. It's precisely that attitude that ensures no one will ever listen to what you have to say.
    - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
      Yet your diet isn't solely personal choice. Was it your personal choice to cut down rain forest to raise beef cattle, or palm oil? What about air freighting in fruit and veg that common sense says comes on a ship? No? Your diet is small part personal choice, within the far larger part played by cultural mores and market-led financial choices imposed by producers and supermarkets. You can't escape the part played by billions on advertising, and the choices of restaurants and supermarkets that led to your "personal choice". "The market" is not going to phase out ecologically reckless methods unless people stop buying. Yet how can they when that detail, very intentionally, never appears on the label, and 365 day availability ensures almost no one remembers when things are in season any more? So much for personal choice.
- artimaeis 7y ago
  Isn't there a level of condescension and or proselytizing that always goes on around environmental conversations? Reduce, reuse, recycle - if you do it, good! If you don't, bad! Travel less, don't own anything. How can we frame these sorts of ideals so that people don't feel attacked? There _is_ a climate crisis. At least some level of that crisis is driven by consumer demands. We should be able to advocate a change without people feeling like they're being shamed.
vibrato 7y ago
Destroy your health for virtue points trying to tackle the smallest contributor to global warming, sounds right to me /s
- jamesgagan 7y ago
  All the evidence seems to indicate that the less meat and dairy one eats, the healthier they are. I also used to believe vegans were unhealty until I did some research. As a personal anecdote, I've been vegan for about 4 years now and my health is better than ever.
  - kaitai 7y ago
    As a personal anecdote, vegetarian didn't work for me! Persistent anemia, hair loss, fatigue; adding back some meat just fixed it. Various diets are worth trying -- you never know until you try, and you learn a lot by trying. So for readers out there, try being vegan for a month: you'll learn a lot about what you eat and how to cook and you can observe how you feel. Also worth noting: many traditional cultures embedded food restrictions into calendars and/or religious rules. Being vegan for a while before Easter is more or less a thing in some Christian groups; Ramadan involves fasting as a practice. These cultural practices, combined with the seasons in nature, make me wonder if we were built to be cyclically vegan/omnivore/berry-eater. This may be more sustainable for many.
  - bobajeff 7y ago
    Some evidence seems to suggest that it could negatively affect brain health. (See deficiencies in B12, Iron and Zinc.) I've even read anecdotes of people that have gotten diabetes going all wholefoods vegetarian. My belief is that our biology is complex and specific to each individual to the point where we can't all share the same diet and expect the same effects on our bodies.
    - jniedrauer 7y ago
      > I've even read anecdotes of people that have gotten diabetes going all wholefoods vegetarian. There can be a problem with reducing fat and protein significantly while using carbs for the majority of caloric intake. This can lead to diabetes. But you can do this on an omnivore diet as well.
leekyle333 7y ago
Or maybe you should just eat properly grazed live stock, might be a lot better than going vegan. https://www.ted.com/talks/allan_savory_how_to_green_the_world_s_deserts_and_reverse_climate_change/transcript?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/allan_savory_how_to_green_the_worl...
- jamesgagan 7y ago
  This is discussed in the article: "Some scientists have suggested that grass-finished beef, if managed properly, can be a more sustainable option: As the cattle graze, they stimulate grass to grow deep roots and pull more carbon into the soil, helping to offset the cows’ climate impact. But, on the flip side, grass-finished cattle also take longer to reach slaughter weight, which means they spend more time burping up methane into the atmosphere. Because of this, some studies have suggested that grass-fed beef can actually be worse for the climate over all, though the debate about this continues to rage. For now, it’s hard to say with confidence that grass-fed beef is consistently more climate-friendly than conventional beef."
  - leekyle333 7y ago
    I'd love to see more research on this, I just wonder who would actually do it.
    - passiveincomelg 7y ago
      Links from the article: http://www.futureoffood.ox.ac.uk/grazed-and-confused http://www.futureoffood.ox.ac.uk/grazed-and-confused https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4494320/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4494320/
dalore 7y ago
Giving up our growing space to grow lots of monocultured vegetables will be worse for the climate. The co2 emissions from cows aren't the problem. Factory farming yes is a problem, but if cows are put on grass that grass is a co2 sink and gives off far less. If you grow an acre of soy it's just as bad as it isn't sustainable. Also the fact that being vegan has serious health consequences and animals provide far more nutrition. The answer isn't going vegan at all but to have sustainable farming practices where animals and plants are grown together in a regenerative process. Grass is one of the best crops to grow. It's a great carbon sink, and takes away methane. Builds its own fertility so no need for artificial fertilizers. No management, machines, pesticides etc. Grows everywhere. We just can't eat it. But ruminants (like cows/sheep/etc) can. They have a digestive system for it. They turn grass into meat and milk. Meat and milk that don't need storage until you need to harvest it. It also tastes better. We used to have far loads more bison roaming the earth. But they didn't cause climate change because they ate grass. When you factor in the grass it's a net positive and not a negative like the article claims. These studies like to look at things in a bubble, but the problem is far more complex than that. Converting pasture to arable land to grow more plant based food will make the climate situation worse. You will reduce these carbon/methane sinks. You will need to fertilize and harvest the soil. Fetalization itself reduces the carbon/methane sink capabilities. Eating beef can actually be a very sustainable option. In many cases, pasture-reared beef actually shows a carbon-equivalent net gain when carbon sequestration is taken into account. Edit: Perhaps a comment or 2 would be nice on why people don't agree or why I might be wrong. Happy to read up and learn
- hkyeti 7y ago
  This is disproven by Oxford scientists. Grass fed beef is worse for climate change than CAFO beef. Look it up
  - dalore 7y ago
    I looked up the study, first up it wasn't "Oxford scientists" but a University of Oxford think tank called the Food Climate Research Network. Follow the links, Monsanto has deep connection to the University of Oxford, at least £50 million pounds. UO professors routinely get consulting fees from Monsanto. They even have a Monsanto Senior Research Fellowship position. There is a massive conflict of interest with Monsanto and the University of Oxford. You find this with most food and nutrition science. Since the funding for such sciences comes from the industry, any science that is critical of it's paymasters soon gets silenced. This article outlines a bit more https://medium.com/@johnroulac/oxford-study-attacks-regenerative-ag-monsanto-ally-2986ee9918c4 https://medium.com/@johnroulac/oxford-study-attacks-regenera...
jniedrauer 7y ago
Personally I think that individual action is largely futile. I've also stopped eating meat. I want to be able to look gen Z in the eye when I'm old and say I did everything I could.
- tonyedgecombe 7y ago
  I want to be able to look gen Z in the eye when I'm old and say I did everything I could. Then it won't have been futile.
username223 7y ago
> Going vegan is simply the right thing to do at this point. We're pretty much screwed (but not extinct) at this point no matter what, but going vegan doesn't matter nearly as much as living in a smaller house (i.e. less concrete), or driving and flying less. I mostly avoid beef and dairy, which are the main diet-based causes of global warming, but beyond that it's a rounding error.

JoeAltmaier 7y ago

Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic?

jamesgagan 7y ago
I feel like this attitude is popular because it gives people an excuse to not change their lifestyle.
- JoeAltmaier 7y ago
  I feel like the other attitude is popular because it gives people an excuse not to exercise real activism - propositions, getting out the vote, public education etc. Just eat a veggie-burger now and then and say "well I tried".
  - mAEStro-paNDa 7y ago
    In addition, it's just not the appropriate or proportional response, considering the contributors [0]. Individual action alone is certainly not enough. Systemic change is crucial. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10/100-fossil-fuel-companies-investors-responsible-71-global-emissions-cdp-study-climate-change https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10...

malvosenior 7y ago

> Going vegan is simply the right thing to do at this point. I'm sorry but no. Your diet is a personal choice and no amount of shaming is going to change that. Do you travel internationally? Own a car? Do any other of a million things that have an impact on the climate but also constitute living your life? It's great to put this information out there but telling people that your choices are "simply the right thing to do at this point" is incredibly condescending and will likely have the opposite impact you want it to have since no one likes to be preached at.

jamesgagan 7y ago
I have been actively trying to reduce my ecological footprint because I believe climate change is real. I don't feel it's a matter of "personal choice" at this point. The way we live has a profound impact on the planet, and we all need to try and reduce that impact in any way we can. I realize this is a message people don't want to hear, but I believe they need to hear it. Going vegan and flying less are two of the biggest changes an individual can make.
- malvosenior 7y ago
  > I don't feel it's a matter of "personal choice" at this point. Unless you're suggesting forcing people by law to be vegan, then it most definitely is a personal choice. > I realize this is a message people don't want to hear, but I believe they need to hear it. It's precisely that attitude that ensures no one will ever listen to what you have to say.
  - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
    Yet your diet isn't solely personal choice. Was it your personal choice to cut down rain forest to raise beef cattle, or palm oil? What about air freighting in fruit and veg that common sense says comes on a ship? No? Your diet is small part personal choice, within the far larger part played by cultural mores and market-led financial choices imposed by producers and supermarkets. You can't escape the part played by billions on advertising, and the choices of restaurants and supermarkets that led to your "personal choice". "The market" is not going to phase out ecologically reckless methods unless people stop buying. Yet how can they when that detail, very intentionally, never appears on the label, and 365 day availability ensures almost no one remembers when things are in season any more? So much for personal choice.
artimaeis 7y ago
Isn't there a level of condescension and or proselytizing that always goes on around environmental conversations? Reduce, reuse, recycle - if you do it, good! If you don't, bad! Travel less, don't own anything. How can we frame these sorts of ideals so that people don't feel attacked? There _is_ a climate crisis. At least some level of that crisis is driven by consumer demands. We should be able to advocate a change without people feeling like they're being shamed.

vibrato 7y ago

Destroy your health for virtue points trying to tackle the smallest contributor to global warming, sounds right to me /s

jamesgagan 7y ago
All the evidence seems to indicate that the less meat and dairy one eats, the healthier they are. I also used to believe vegans were unhealty until I did some research. As a personal anecdote, I've been vegan for about 4 years now and my health is better than ever.
- kaitai 7y ago
  As a personal anecdote, vegetarian didn't work for me! Persistent anemia, hair loss, fatigue; adding back some meat just fixed it. Various diets are worth trying -- you never know until you try, and you learn a lot by trying. So for readers out there, try being vegan for a month: you'll learn a lot about what you eat and how to cook and you can observe how you feel. Also worth noting: many traditional cultures embedded food restrictions into calendars and/or religious rules. Being vegan for a while before Easter is more or less a thing in some Christian groups; Ramadan involves fasting as a practice. These cultural practices, combined with the seasons in nature, make me wonder if we were built to be cyclically vegan/omnivore/berry-eater. This may be more sustainable for many.
- bobajeff 7y ago
  Some evidence seems to suggest that it could negatively affect brain health. (See deficiencies in B12, Iron and Zinc.) I've even read anecdotes of people that have gotten diabetes going all wholefoods vegetarian. My belief is that our biology is complex and specific to each individual to the point where we can't all share the same diet and expect the same effects on our bodies.
  - jniedrauer 7y ago
    > I've even read anecdotes of people that have gotten diabetes going all wholefoods vegetarian. There can be a problem with reducing fat and protein significantly while using carbs for the majority of caloric intake. This can lead to diabetes. But you can do this on an omnivore diet as well.

leekyle333 7y ago

Or maybe you should just eat properly grazed live stock, might be a lot better than going vegan. https://www.ted.com/talks/allan_savory_how_to_green_the_world_s_deserts_and_reverse_climate_change/transcript?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/allan_savory_how_to_green_the_worl...

jamesgagan 7y ago
This is discussed in the article: "Some scientists have suggested that grass-finished beef, if managed properly, can be a more sustainable option: As the cattle graze, they stimulate grass to grow deep roots and pull more carbon into the soil, helping to offset the cows’ climate impact. But, on the flip side, grass-finished cattle also take longer to reach slaughter weight, which means they spend more time burping up methane into the atmosphere. Because of this, some studies have suggested that grass-fed beef can actually be worse for the climate over all, though the debate about this continues to rage. For now, it’s hard to say with confidence that grass-fed beef is consistently more climate-friendly than conventional beef."
- leekyle333 7y ago
  I'd love to see more research on this, I just wonder who would actually do it.
  - passiveincomelg 7y ago
    Links from the article: http://www.futureoffood.ox.ac.uk/grazed-and-confused http://www.futureoffood.ox.ac.uk/grazed-and-confused https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4494320/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4494320/

dalore 7y ago

Giving up our growing space to grow lots of monocultured vegetables will be worse for the climate. The co2 emissions from cows aren't the problem. Factory farming yes is a problem, but if cows are put on grass that grass is a co2 sink and gives off far less. If you grow an acre of soy it's just as bad as it isn't sustainable. Also the fact that being vegan has serious health consequences and animals provide far more nutrition. The answer isn't going vegan at all but to have sustainable farming practices where animals and plants are grown together in a regenerative process. Grass is one of the best crops to grow. It's a great carbon sink, and takes away methane. Builds its own fertility so no need for artificial fertilizers. No management, machines, pesticides etc. Grows everywhere. We just can't eat it. But ruminants (like cows/sheep/etc) can. They have a digestive system for it. They turn grass into meat and milk. Meat and milk that don't need storage until you need to harvest it. It also tastes better. We used to have far loads more bison roaming the earth. But they didn't cause climate change because they ate grass. When you factor in the grass it's a net positive and not a negative like the article claims. These studies like to look at things in a bubble, but the problem is far more complex than that. Converting pasture to arable land to grow more plant based food will make the climate situation worse. You will reduce these carbon/methane sinks. You will need to fertilize and harvest the soil. Fetalization itself reduces the carbon/methane sink capabilities. Eating beef can actually be a very sustainable option. In many cases, pasture-reared beef actually shows a carbon-equivalent net gain when carbon sequestration is taken into account. Edit: Perhaps a comment or 2 would be nice on why people don't agree or why I might be wrong. Happy to read up and learn

hkyeti 7y ago
This is disproven by Oxford scientists. Grass fed beef is worse for climate change than CAFO beef. Look it up
- dalore 7y ago
  I looked up the study, first up it wasn't "Oxford scientists" but a University of Oxford think tank called the Food Climate Research Network. Follow the links, Monsanto has deep connection to the University of Oxford, at least £50 million pounds. UO professors routinely get consulting fees from Monsanto. They even have a Monsanto Senior Research Fellowship position. There is a massive conflict of interest with Monsanto and the University of Oxford. You find this with most food and nutrition science. Since the funding for such sciences comes from the industry, any science that is critical of it's paymasters soon gets silenced. This article outlines a bit more https://medium.com/@johnroulac/oxford-study-attacks-regenerative-ag-monsanto-ally-2986ee9918c4 https://medium.com/@johnroulac/oxford-study-attacks-regenera...

jniedrauer 7y ago

Personally I think that individual action is largely futile. I've also stopped eating meat. I want to be able to look gen Z in the eye when I'm old and say I did everything I could.

tonyedgecombe 7y ago
I want to be able to look gen Z in the eye when I'm old and say I did everything I could. Then it won't have been futile.

username223 7y ago

> Going vegan is simply the right thing to do at this point. We're pretty much screwed (but not extinct) at this point no matter what, but going vegan doesn't matter nearly as much as living in a smaller house (i.e. less concrete), or driving and flying less. I mostly avoid beef and dairy, which are the main diet-based causes of global warming, but beyond that it's a rounding error.