peteblue
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Family experience. If she believes everything she says she will want to attempt to put it into practice as she won’t always be a feisty 16 year old.....
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Family experience. If she believes everything she says she will want to attempt to put it into practice as she won’t always be a feisty 16 year old.....
Barnfred 55
Player Valuation: £80m
I was watching the Jeremy Vine show this morning and there was yet another piece about how eating meat is having a devastating effect on climate change. This latest one suggested that if you eat steak or red meat twice a week, that has the same effect on climate change as 1500 air miles.
Now I'm not disputing these figures although I do wonder sometimes who actually works these things out. I'm not even questioning the need to affect change to save the planet. I may not be fanatical enough to go on one of these marches, but I am a keen supporter of the likes of renewable energy, the need for new technology to reduce CO2 emissions, reducing plastics, recycling, saving and replenishing the worlds forests and probably, most importantly, controlling the worlds population.
No, my objection to all these headline making reports is WHY do they single out meat eaters for criticism. For instance, there are approximately 10 million cattle in the UK. Only 20% of them are reared for meat. The rest are dairy cattle. Presumably they all burp and fart the same regardless, so surely dairy products are having 4 times the effect on climate change than red meat production. And what about leather goods like shoes, bags, furniture and motor upholstery. Nobody is saying we need to stop production of any of those products What about sheep and pigs?. There are approximately 3 times more sheep than cattle in the UK and the majority of these are reared for their wool. Sheep fart don't they? Should we be banning wool too?
And where do we draw the line?. Horses, dogs, cats.?
Without in any way wanting to dismiss climate change and the need to address this, I just feel that reports such as this are more about bashing meat eaters than anything else.
Now I'm not disputing these figures although I do wonder sometimes who actually works these things out. I'm not even questioning the need to affect change to save the planet. I may not be fanatical enough to go on one of these marches, but I am a keen supporter of the likes of renewable energy, the need for new technology to reduce CO2 emissions, reducing plastics, recycling, saving and replenishing the worlds forests and probably, most importantly, controlling the worlds population.
No, my objection to all these headline making reports is WHY do they single out meat eaters for criticism. For instance, there are approximately 10 million cattle in the UK. Only 20% of them are reared for meat. The rest are dairy cattle. Presumably they all burp and fart the same regardless, so surely dairy products are having 4 times the effect on climate change than red meat production. And what about leather goods like shoes, bags, furniture and motor upholstery. Nobody is saying we need to stop production of any of those products What about sheep and pigs?. There are approximately 3 times more sheep than cattle in the UK and the majority of these are reared for their wool. Sheep fart don't they? Should we be banning wool too?
And where do we draw the line?. Horses, dogs, cats.?
Without in any way wanting to dismiss climate change and the need to address this, I just feel that reports such as this are more about bashing meat eaters than anything else.
I think a large part of the argument against meat is the amount of land that needs to be set aside to grow the food for them to eat. It's not just the farting aspect.
Barnfred 55
Player Valuation: £80m
With respect Bruce, that has absolutely no relevance to my argument. The vast majority of that land is utilised for dairy, woollen and leather products. Not meat production. But meat production is the one that get's ostracised.
great question Barnford, I've no idea what the answer is. All I can think of is that it might be easier to convince people to give up red meat than getting them to give up all dairy. I have no idea what the answer is tho.
dead_soft
Player Valuation: £35m
They don’t single out meat eaters for criticism and I’m sure meat eaters aren’t such sensitive souls this upsets them. They are saying beef consumption contributes to climate change. Which it does. As do other things which are mentioned, as a quick google will show. Beef is also single use, and is flown around the world, often in plastic, and has to be refrigerated, and they are land a resource intensive
orchard
Player Valuation: £60m
Extensive beef is fine, in fact it builds soil and sequesters carbon.
Barnfred 55
Player Valuation: £80m
OK. Lets single out beef. As I said, only 20% of cattle in the UK is reared for meat production. The other 80% are dairy cattle. 90% of UK produced leather comes from cattle, both beef and dairy. So we have a situation where 100% of cattle produce leather, 80% produce dairy products and just 20% produce beef. But it seems as though every week there is a new report on how red meat production is hurting the planet. And I can honestly say that I personally, have never seen any articles saying that we need to drastically reduce dairy consumption to save the planet, or to stop buying leather shoes, bags and furniture. I'm not saying that they don't exist and if you google the subject you'll no doubt find the odd article from some obscure green or animal welfare group. But they don't make headline news or get discussed on daily talk shows.
As regards your comments re use of plastic and refrigeration for beef, surely the same applies to dairy products. And surely the chemicals used in the tanning process are just as harmful to the environment. I could single out sheep, as opposed to cattle, and make pretty much the same argument.
dead_soft
Player Valuation: £35m
There are plenty of articles regarding dairy and leather. Meat generally travels further
Barnfred 55
Player Valuation: £80m
Do you eat meat?
dead_soft
Player Valuation: £35m
Yes I do. Why?
Barnfred 55
Player Valuation: £80m
Because you seem overly keen to try to prove me wrong plus you referred to meat eaters as "them" in your first post. I thought you may have been looking at this from the position of somebody who doesn't eat meat.
When I did a search on "does eating dairy products contribute to climate change" I actually got more references to red meat than I did to dairy. Including 2 articles with the headline "should red meat production be banned". That kind of proves the point I was making.
If eating dairy contributes to climate change let me first say sorry. Secondly, not sorry.
Barnfred 55
Player Valuation: £80m
Yes it does. But you only need to apologise if you eat red meat too apparantly.
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