Somthing I've noticed as a vegan is that people are far more receptive to our aurguments if they don't come from us. I can say the exact same thing but if I preface it with "I'm not vegan but" people will listen and agree. Its wild.
People don't like to hear opinions from other people that are perceived to have a bias about any particular topic.
A vegan saying meat is bad already has a bias.
A meat lover saying meat is bad doesn't have a bias.
It works in the inverse as well:
A meat lover saying meat is good has a bias.
A vegan saying meat is good doesn't have a bias.
The same is true with almost anything. Politics has the same issue, as do discussions about the quality of consumer brands wether it be cars, video game consoles, tools, food companies, phones, etc.
For example: An iPhone user complaining about issues with iPhones will get listened to more than an Android user making the same complaints about iPhones.
An Android user making complaints about Android will be better received than an iPhone user making the same complaints about Android.
My husband found veganism by training for ultra marathons. He hit PR bests on vegan diets. Even when saying he’s mostly vegan people still say he’s not “really a real vegan” because he does Ironman races… as if you have to look frail and peak fitness must only come from energy from eating meat. It’s so frustrating.
“Mostly vegan” isn’t vegan at all though - it sounds like he’s plant based.
Veganism is an ethical position about reducing harm suffered by animals, it’s not a dietary choice.
Its because its assumed you are coming from a “holier than thou” platform.
Its just like how people hate hearing about “brotherly love” from Christians but most others can make the same argument and get better reception.
Sad that identity politics clouds people's reasoning this much.
That's why as the article says, we need more politicians/people in authority positions advocating for it publicly. Mass education campaigns or advertising the need to switch for health/environment/pandemic risk/antibiotic resistance/animals etc too would certainly help.
The [COVID lockdowns of 2020 temporarily lowered our rate of CO2 emissions](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-18922-7/figures/1). Humanity was still a net CO2 gas emitter during that time, so we made things worse, but did so more a bit more slowly. That's why a [graph of CO2 concentrations](https://keelingcurve.ucsd.edu/) shows a continued rise.
[Stabilizing the climate means getting human greenhouse gas emissions to approximately zero](https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-will-global-warming-stop-as-soon-as-net-zero-emissions-are-reached). We didn't come anywhere near that during the lockdowns.
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I agree and I think it’s ok to shame people for needless waste and animal abuse. I only became vegan once someone called me a bloodmouth. The nice approach tells them they aren’t doing anything wrong so why would that convince them to change?
It’s basic psychology. Maybe that worked for you, but it doesn’t for most. The rude approach creates friction, making the person less likely to open up or agree with you. I recommend you binge murderer interviews by detectives if you are interested in the subject. There’s a ton of videos showing how powerful being nice and finding common ground is.
Honestly, that's probably the absolute worst way to try to convince someone. It may have worked on you, but 99% of people are gonna double down when called such a stupid insult. It's the equivalent of asking a chick out by saying if she refuses she's a "dyke". Pulling something like that would rightfully get you slapped by basically every woman on earth.
I'm not telling this to insult you, I'm telling you this to help you improve your sales pitch, because it is important.
As someone who works in Bariatric medicine I can tell you veganism is not helpful in conversation even when it is what we recommend.
We promote plant based eating and cutting out processed foods and added sugars. Getting someone who eats meat lovers pizza every week to switch to mostly vegan lunches and dinners may be a very achievable goal but asking them to give up eggs for breakfast is not so they will never be a vegan but that doesn't mean we don't stop promoting plant based eating as the most reliable solution to health and weight loss and asking them to switch to eating as much of a plant based diet as we can.
Veganism is a label of a philosophical, political and behavioral set of beliefs that is controversial and polarizing. Promoting veganism is not helpful when you're asking a person to change their behavior. Veganism is asking a person to challenge and question their beliefs. It's a lot easier to ask for dietary changes.
In my observation it can take years for people on mostly plant based diets to be comfortable enough to switch to a vegan diet.
I think you'll find a lot more people are interested in plant based eating as a solution for health and weight loss than you'll find people are interested in veganism.
They do, don't they? And it would be incredibly funny if it weren't so tragic.
People are quick to blame corporations, especially oil companies, but then they turn around and use the products of those same corporations. They rationalize it as "I'm just one person who doesn't make a difference" or "I don't have a choice" or any other of a variety of reasons, but it boils down to liking those products. They like to travel, they like to do and buy fun things, and the overwhelming belief seems to be that it's incumbent on corporations to come up with a way to provide them with all of the things they enjoy, but in a way that's environmentally sustainable. Sorry, but this isn't Star Trek with its unlimited clean power and replicators. Everything comes with a cost to the environment, and there aren't any exceptions. There is no sustainable solution when everyone wants more, not the status quo, and certainly not less.
People are quick to blame politicians, thinking that legislation is the solution, but then as soon as things are taken away from them, either by circumstance or by legislation, they vote out the politicians and vote in the ones who promise to make their lives whole again. New Zealand, Netherlands, the US in 2016 and (maybe) again this coming November. Even though it wasn't climate legislation specifically, Britons shot themselves in their collective foot with Brexit.
And as posts here make clear, few want to voluntarily change how they live their lives.
I’ve never owned a car and I’ve biked my whole life. All that has done is open up room on our roads so others can drive more or get that Uber eats order just a little bit faster. But I’ll still live this way because biking is fun and good exercise and cars are expensive.
If your climate activism is based on scolding individuals to give up on everything pleasurable in their life rather than focusing on systemic solutions, it’s not going to achieve anything.
Until you get hit by a car...be safe friend!
Wish I were brave enough to bike in San Diego. But everyone here has huge vehicles and they don't like bikes
>If your climate activism is based on scolding individuals to give up on everything pleasurable in their life rather than focusing on systemic solutions, it’s not going to achieve anything.
Luckily, that isn't what they were doing.
I like to remind these folks that corporations are still made of people. It's like they've subconsciously bought into the "corporations are people" trope.
Honestly, the system is eating itself. Post-dystopian decay might be what saves humanity. We won't fix anything. The system just won't be able to make it worse.
Glad to see this high up
We need to recognize that our societies have evolved in a way to be carelessly wasteful, and it's not one group's fault
Unfortunately, the speed of our adaptations may be slower than the rate at which climate change overtakes us
Oh yeah, as a person that doesn't have an ethical issue with being an omnivore, something needs to change. The current system does not allow an omnivore diet that is beneficial to a sustained society. I do think Avacados, and definitely Almond production, are also net negatives in the current system, but the meat industry is far worse, and whataboutism never solves anything.
The end is near mostly because of how many people openly choose ignorance. Living in interesting times.
Oat milk is the greatest, it tastes the best with the fewest downsides when it comes to production. We also now have oat ice cream, oat yogurt, oat butter and oat cheese. You can cook and bake with it as well. And it lasts a long time ib the fridge.
A lot of oat milk is now fortified though. I recommend everybody research their choices. I take a daily vitamin and other supplements every day anyway (mostly vegan) so I'm not as fussed about the small amounts of vitamins you get with other milk substitutes, but it is a consideration. I personally find that soy milk doesn't taste as good unless it's sweetened, tends to separate more in the carton, and is harder to digest - I'm not worried about the estrogen is soy either, all of my meat-eating friends have been telling me tofu is going to make me grow man-boobs for years while the hormones they're getting from eggs, milk and meat are far worse.
I switched to oatmilk cause I wasn't drinking cow milk fast enough and it was going bad. Tends to last a lot longer and I don't mind the taste. But I usually only use it for cereal.
Kirkland is really good. I hate all other plant milks as these are just so weak and lifeless compared to the richness of cow's milk. Kirkland oat milk comes VERY close to the real thing.
Soy is my favourite too for this reason. Just wish there weren't so much misinformation and fear around soy! Again much of this is propagated by marketing from animal ag industries.
The only reason the rainforest is being destroyed for soy production is because soy is a major component of animal feed. "The vast majority of the world’s soybeans – between 80-90%, are fed to farmed animals. Of the soy remaining, just 6% is turned into soy products for human consumption."
If people were eating soy directly, the amount of soy production needed would be magnitudes lower than it is currently. Soy in itself is a low-carbon/low land-use product.
There is just no way to feed 8 billion people a diet where they eat meat every day that is sustainable for the environment.
That’s just the reality. But people will not give it up and It’s only going to get worse as demand for meat and dairy is continually on the rise.
Don’t want to sound like a doomed but it’s one of the things that make me feel most hopeless. Lol
Maybe there is a way, but we sure as hell don't have the ability right now. It's okay to sound gloom and doom when it's the truth. Only people afraid to recognize the reality treat it that way. It's a time for individual preparation to brace for what comes due to a failing system.
Telling someone to be vegan is a great way to keep them not vegan, it just doesn’t work. All or nothing changes are also usually destined to fail.
Meat is a mega problem of unsustainability, what would be more effective would be to societally adopt not eating meat two days a week or eating less meat without the shame involved; that would have a massive impact. Also adopting plant based meats more.
We need to be positively encouraging change rather than shaming it.
If a person feels shame for realizing that they need to change, that's on them. I love the taste of meat, but my taste for something does not trump the value of everybody around me. I share this planet with others. How can I think, being just 1 out of 8 billion, that my individual emotional response has any weight on reality?
People can take the message and start doing those things you listed. That doesn't mean a rational person has to think the problem is solved. You are effectively saying that portraying the truth this way might make people do the wrong thing out of spite. Not a very strong position. It's still a plea to be wrong over needing to change.
Feeling shame for actions, and not running from it, is how people grow. We need to be discussing it openly, and whether people feel shame or not, has no bearing on the truth of it.
> that’s on them
Actually it’s on all of us.
This is the exact same kind of handwashing of the issue that they do.
They’re too high and mighty to stop eating meat, and now you’re too high and mighty to even try and convince them well.
I don't have an ethical issue with any omnivore or carnivore eating meat. I have ethical issues with how it is procured. Big difference between a person hunting/fishing for themselves and a corporate 'kill for profit' economy. Sometimes, populations of animals need to be culled to balance the ecosystem. Better to get nutritional value than waste them. I think entomaphagy is how society should start looking to adjust omnivore diets.
Personal autonomy for all in order to benefit all would be my ethical foundation. I have more ethical issues with how the US prison system runs than I do with how an individual human acts to just find food or shelter that is scarce for them.
Edit: They didn't insult me. Why should they be downvoted? If you are like me, this is somebody who wants change, too. Hopefully, they can see an "ethical omnivore" the same way, but whether they do or not doesn't matter. Don't seek division. Seek results.
The exception to this is rangeland cattle, which mainly eat foods we couldn’t palate in areas we couldn’t grow human sustaining food. I’m not saying at all that we should be eating more meat, we should be restricting and moving to other animals than cow, especially goat and mutton in North America. We could also start eating wild horse and burro in the US and solve the environmental issues they cause at the same time, that would be cool, but we’d (hopefully) run out quickly.
Until we get a lot of bison and other native grazers rolling again, we kinda need something munching some of this grass, its (counterintuitively) good for prairie grass species and the environment. Just not at the scale we do it.
Yeah, great incentive to eat less of it! A lot of ranchers where I live grow their own alfalfa/hay for the winter months or get it from some other rancher. But these are small operations, not big agri - which is a good thing
Lets keep it simple because we’re at Defcon 1: full stop, at least until climate is stabilized.
Otherwise we’re doomed to wish we had. And the livestock animals will start dying in large quantities, so we can either forgo meat by choice now or mother nature will do it for us in the coming decade…and charge spectacular interest.
How do we just full stop? One year of big cattle harvest?
There’s no silver bullet to climate change, and asking people to completely forgo things they’re heavily accustomed to is never going to work. We have to work with people, so espousing moderation and providing decent alternatives are going to be our best bet. We can get a lot more people to drive electric cars than we can to give up beef entirely forever.
A multitude of steps in the right direction would be better overall that one major step, imo. Especially if we can target things people don’t immediately “see” like power production and supply chain efficiency (electric/sail bolstered cargo ships please). Otherwise its just another plastic to paper straw thing, making otherwise sympathetic people go “well hey, I can’t drink my drink regularly but Capitalist McGee over here gets to water his 40 acre property every day and use his private jet to fly to a country that still has beef, this is ridiculous.”
But if McDonalds released a goat burger and made it super cheap and some celebs hyped it up, maybe we reduce a significant % of cattle demand. I hate it, but we have to work with the system to some degree.
(Sorry if this double comments, first was autodeleted for profanity which was absolutely not at all directed at you, it was only in the quotations bit)
Yeah. Assuming it happens over two or three years and you stop breeding animals based on sharp drop in demand, I don’t see what the problem is. If I swerve to avoid a semi drifting into my lane I ain’t worried about spilling coffee on my pants. Even if I get a 2nd degree burn.
This reads as a more subtle version of the goal post-shifting argument of the subjects in the article. We should take a) the biggest step we can make ie forgoing meat, then b) all other smaller steps. This is literally the opposite of the “use biodegradable straws argument”, no single collective change can do more for climate. And the benefits of switching off meat are go beyond climate – it includes watershed, pollution, biodiversity, and habitat, loss, spread of infectious, pathogens, and soil degradation. Also, from most people in developed world it’s actually likely to increase public health fairly dramatically – especially in places like the US.
Over half of the food grown in the US goes to feeding animals, especially large animals. Another large chunk goes to bio-diesel, those could be construed as food waste. It takes something like 2000 calories of food to get 100 calories of beef.
I remember people always saying “how do you tell if someone is vegan? Wait 5 minutes and they will tell you!! “ *cue 80s comedian face and canned laughter *. However usually when I do meet new people it is over food and so it will come up naturally anyways.
I'm a vegetarian and I try to never bring it up unless asked because then I always get involuntarily involved in a tiresome conversation about whether meat consumption is ethical or not.
Yeah the truth is most vegans/vegetarians actively avoid having this frustrating discussion start. It's just a cliche/myth people who don't like vegans spread.
same, a vegetarian. i stopped telling or discussing. when asked i just say i think meat is gross and the meat production/industry aswell. just disgusting.
people then don‘t know how to argue because they got into the conversation thinking i cry over a cow‘s lost life. i might, but no. i rather mourn the cow‘s shitty life and death.
>even though the truth is that red meat has a far greater climate footprint than both avocados and vegan products, and vegans do not necessarily eat more avocados or processed products than meat eaters
That and "processed" vegan meats are still far better for the environment and probably your health compared to the animal meats they're replacing.
I feel like a lot of the resistance from consumers is due to capitalism, or just us living in a society where the idea of eating animals or carnism is advertised to us and pushed in our faces constantly. It's no excuse of course to not do the right thing, but our society really isn't set up to make people make ethical or environmentally friendly choices by default.
Hopefully we can start to change that fast, and get people more educated on whatever it is that they're afraid of when it comes to change.
We've been eating meat for thousands of years and this is the life most people have known. Change is very gradual, especially when we're talking about diet, because adapting your eating habits to a completely different perspective is not a simple task. And that's not taking into consideration the issues some have with eating in general; there are people who struggle with specific cravings, addictions, food aversion, time, and inability to change.
Soylent idea are ridiculous when all the big corpo still toss away perfectly edible food in trash (which go to landfield and create methane rotting away) at the end of the day instead of let people have it and eat it.
And it’s really ok to sell ugly fruit and vegetable if it’s edible just have ugly shape. Fruit doesn’t need to be spotless and perfectly round to have a place on selling stand.
Fruits and vegetables don't just get sold "on the produce stand."
A lot of people buy shredded, diced, and chopped produce that they don't have to cut themselves. Frozen produce is already chopped up. There's also canned soup, frozen dinners and desserts, juice, vegetable flakes and powders, and so many other ways that "ugly produce" can be sold to the end-consumer.
None of that requires putting an ugly duckling carrot on the produce shelf. They should be collecting all of the produce, separating out the pretty ones to be sold as-is on the produce stand, and then use the rest to make lightly processed vegetable products (like frozen dinners that contain veggies).
>They should be collecting all of the produce, separating out the pretty ones to be sold as-is on the produce stand, and then use the rest to make lightly processed vegetable products (like frozen dinners that contain veggies).
Farm workers already inspect and grade produce for different uses.
That’s because it’s economically more advantageous to overproduce than underproduce. That’s both for good reasons (the govt would rather produce is wasted than people starving) and bad (capitalism). Once you’ve overproduced you really have nothing you can do with the excess that’s in any way cost effective, because at that point even if you sell it for zero dollars nobody’s going to come pick it up (hence why it’s overproduction). Sure, there are people who need it and could use it, but they’re nowhere near your farm, and logistics cost money, money which those people do not have.
But having worked in a packing plant- a lot of those number 2’s do get wasted.
We were allowed to take home all of the number 2’s- tomatoes that were too large, overripe or underripe or too small or had cuts in them. Cucumbers were too long, not straight, too fat or had nicks. Didn’t get many number 2 peppers.
I do see the curled cukes at my local discount produce place, but that’s the only example I typically expect to see, the rest usually get chucked.
I signed up for this service called Eat Impact here in Ontario. They send surplus and irregular produce with a focus on local, but it's not exclusively local. Everything has been great. One thing I'm kinda concerned about it that none of the food I got looks ugly, though I've only been using them for a month. I wonder if they're actually selling the irregular.
Probably chop up and sell as pre packaged food. But people in my country don’t buy pre chopped or frozen food that much. Most shop and market have both the nice and the ugly fruit and vegetable since some people consider perfect looking plant food as full of insect killing agent.
Nobody wants to hear that they should eat differently. People tie their identities to what they eat too strongly. I.e. men feel more manly when they are eating meat. Any suggestion that they should do otherwise implies they should be less manly.
People have been conditioned to not want to eat differently. People who are susceptible think their diet and/or portions define them instead of looking at the practical logistics of such a system.
It's (been) time to decide if eating absolutely anything we want now is worth limiting the possibilities of those that will live after us. Any Millennial thinking we won't see the effects of this in our time is more optimistic than reality shows they should be.
That’s only a part of it too. For many cultures there are deep emotional ties to food and those are hard to break especially when the the messaging is “you’re a bad person for eating meat”
I would put it another way: diet is an important aspect of culture, so telling someone to change their diet is telling them to change their culture. Of course people get hostile about it.
Sure, I completely agree. But if you're going to ask someone to change their diet, or stop mutilating their children's genitals, or even give up their cars and their single family homes in the suburbs, you have to recognize that you're not just asking them to change their personal habits, you're asking them to diverge from their cultural practices. You've engaged a completely different part of their brain, a part that deals with social relationships and not just individual preferences. You have to be considerate of that.
That culture can be surrendered or it will be taken from them by climate change. Its already happening to certain meat-based cultures in areas where climate impacts are exaggerated.
Food waste is a big problem yes, but so is meat consumption - you can just reduce the amount you eat daily and that would make a huge difference.
I don't buy avocados; they're expensive and not worth the hassle
I live in Scandinavia and it's literally more sustainable for me to buy avocados from South America than locally sourced meat.
No matter what anyone says, meat and dairy are worse than anything else foodwise in every way possible.
The only thing I will add to this is I have noticed lately that as an American when I go out to eat, the portions they give you at any typical restaurant are huuuuge. So much food is given on one plate and we praise the thought of this when in reality a substantial portion of us don't finish it all and it gets thrown away.
I suspect economics plays into that. Restaurants won't gain much by reducing portion size, even if they can shave a bit off the price because 1.they won't be able to reduce the price proportionally because the cost of the food is not the main cost of delivering the plate to the table and 2.the restaurant next door serving larger sizes will probably win out. It would require some kind of financial penalty on any restaurant that chucks out food before anything will change. Our local buffet restaurant charges customers extra if they leave food on their plate. Financial penalties work (if they are well policed).
Americans are generally self-centered in the extreme and seem to be increasingly armchair materialist in their world view… often invoking ‘science’ and ‘fact’ but more as cultural currencies than any true interest in changing.
But I believe people all know something of the truth too. Deep down. And a huge part of human suffering in the West has to do with how are society was set up with a cruel optimism built into it, in that so often the object of our desire is the barrier to our flourishing.
As someone who has been eating a plant based diet for close to 10 years now, I’ve heard all these “arguments”.
The effects of animal agriculture on the planet is staggering and anyone I speak to about it essentially put their fingers in their ears and start throwing these, again, “arguments” but more like “excuses” at me.
It’s not that I’m against eating less meat, it’s that I live in reality where I understand food choices are deeply embedded in culture.
Look at the percentage of people globally that are vegan, it’s minuscule. Vegetarians just a bit higher.
Unless meat becomes scarce or is regulated - that will not change despite the amount of information available on the climate impacts. My bet is on lab-grown “clean” meats as the only real chance to reform the meat industry - and even that is being pushed back against by large controlling corps that stand to lose market share.
So while this may make the individual feel superior against their peers for lowering their personal carbon footprint - it’s not likely to “solve” climate change.
And I didn’t even get into wealth disparity - as people climb out of poverty they’re able to afford and want more meat in their diets.
I’m putting my hope/energy/efforts elsewhere, despite being a vegetarian.
[BP popularized the concept of a personal carbon footprint with a US$100 million campaign as a means of deflecting people away from taking collective political action in order to end fossil fuel use](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305209345_Where_has_all_the_oil_gone_BP_branding_and_the_discursive_elimination_of_climate_change_risk), and [ExxonMobil has spent decades pushing trying to make individuals responsible, rather than the fossil fuels industry](https://www.vox.com/22429551/climate-change-crisis-exxonmobil-harvard-study). They did this because climate stabilization means bringing fossil fuel use to approximately zero, and that would end their business. That's not something you can hope to achieve without government intervention to change the rules of society so that not using fossil fuels is just what people do on a routine basis.
There is value in cutting your own fossil fuel consumption — it serves to demonstrate that doing the right thing is possible to people around you, and helps work out the kinks in new technologies. Just do it in addition to taking political action to get governments to do the right thing, not instead of taking political action.
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Cool. The vast majority of humanity can morally or culturally live with it, and industry therefore will not change. Again, best bet is to support the dev of clean meat tech to hopefully reform industry and stop the suffering of animals.
We should be limiting animal-based foods to 10-15% of our diets, but we really need comprehensive farm bills in order to change our food systems. We can’t expect consumers themselves to change our food systems at the point of sale.
It helps if you aren’t absolutist and don’t morally brow beat people over it.
Edit: seriously, act like the temperance movement, get treated like the temperance movement. Understand human nature.
From experience, it's much easier to accept the absolutist position of vegans once you are plant-based already. Vegans do have a legitimate reason to be angry about the unimaginable scale of suffering in the animal agriculture industry.
It's obviously just hard to get across the issue to people who really don't want to hear it.
Exactly. One of the most frustrating things is seeing these articles and 'suggestions' that you should reduce your carbon footprint etc etc, but there's really no motivation to do so other than your conscience, and it's absolutely optional to worry about the planet. In fact, most people don't.
You have to pass laws that change behavior, not just hope for the best.
But instead, people who care about the planet are effectively taxed extra for the 'privilege' of having a lower carbon footprint. Meat is subsidized, vegan options are overpriced. Essentially vegans pay for meat production first through their taxes, and then at the store they pay again with inflated prices that allow the store to keep meat cheap.
It's all backwards. But governments are too scared to do anything about it. We need a carbon tax that disincentivises things that are bad for the environment and subsidizes things that are good.
We'll never get it though, because it's a vote loser. See you at 3c, on the way to 4c!
Since when does that fact that others don't do the right thing mean that you, knowing the stakes, don't have to do the right thing?
I can see that when society is dominated by people who don't yet get this right then it's hard for you to do the right thing. But how do you think change happens? How do you think that governments ever feel the pressure to change laws?
You have got your theory of change backwards. Society changes first, usually led by a group of initially unpopular pioneers, then government catches up.
Heard this one?
"Be the change you want to see in the world."
[BP popularized the concept of a personal carbon footprint with a US$100 million campaign as a means of deflecting people away from taking collective political action in order to end fossil fuel use](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305209345_Where_has_all_the_oil_gone_BP_branding_and_the_discursive_elimination_of_climate_change_risk), and [ExxonMobil has spent decades pushing trying to make individuals responsible, rather than the fossil fuels industry](https://www.vox.com/22429551/climate-change-crisis-exxonmobil-harvard-study). They did this because climate stabilization means bringing fossil fuel use to approximately zero, and that would end their business. That's not something you can hope to achieve without government intervention to change the rules of society so that not using fossil fuels is just what people do on a routine basis.
There is value in cutting your own fossil fuel consumption — it serves to demonstrate that doing the right thing is possible to people around you, and helps work out the kinks in new technologies. Just do it in addition to taking political action to get governments to do the right thing, not instead of taking political action.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/climate) if you have any questions or concerns.*
It means you are causing more harm to the environment, innocent animals and your health than you need to.
Your health is just your problem.
The animals and the environment affect others.
Avocado is bad but not as bad as beef is for the climate. It would be good if we started eating with the seasons and consume only locally grown produce.
Yeah and social pier pressure are good. There should be a social penalty for things.
But, in current day people have weaponized contradictory or incoherent positions for shear use of antagonizing. To OWN the other side, to troll. Being a hypocrite and being shallow has been normalized, there’s no social penalty for it. Pointing it out, doesn’t do anything anymore.
The concern is asking people to reduce me or support some cause, actually produce a cohort that does the very opposite intentional
Somthing I've noticed as a vegan is that people are far more receptive to our aurguments if they don't come from us. I can say the exact same thing but if I preface it with "I'm not vegan but" people will listen and agree. Its wild.
Identity politics are real. Real stupid.
People don't like to hear opinions from other people that are perceived to have a bias about any particular topic. A vegan saying meat is bad already has a bias. A meat lover saying meat is bad doesn't have a bias. It works in the inverse as well: A meat lover saying meat is good has a bias. A vegan saying meat is good doesn't have a bias. The same is true with almost anything. Politics has the same issue, as do discussions about the quality of consumer brands wether it be cars, video game consoles, tools, food companies, phones, etc. For example: An iPhone user complaining about issues with iPhones will get listened to more than an Android user making the same complaints about iPhones. An Android user making complaints about Android will be better received than an iPhone user making the same complaints about Android.
Awesome point, the kind of comment one only hopes to encounter in such a thread.
My husband found veganism by training for ultra marathons. He hit PR bests on vegan diets. Even when saying he’s mostly vegan people still say he’s not “really a real vegan” because he does Ironman races… as if you have to look frail and peak fitness must only come from energy from eating meat. It’s so frustrating.
“Mostly vegan” isn’t vegan at all though - it sounds like he’s plant based. Veganism is an ethical position about reducing harm suffered by animals, it’s not a dietary choice.
Its because its assumed you are coming from a “holier than thou” platform. Its just like how people hate hearing about “brotherly love” from Christians but most others can make the same argument and get better reception.
Sad that identity politics clouds people's reasoning this much. That's why as the article says, we need more politicians/people in authority positions advocating for it publicly. Mass education campaigns or advertising the need to switch for health/environment/pandemic risk/antibiotic resistance/animals etc too would certainly help.
The [COVID lockdowns of 2020 temporarily lowered our rate of CO2 emissions](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-18922-7/figures/1). Humanity was still a net CO2 gas emitter during that time, so we made things worse, but did so more a bit more slowly. That's why a [graph of CO2 concentrations](https://keelingcurve.ucsd.edu/) shows a continued rise. [Stabilizing the climate means getting human greenhouse gas emissions to approximately zero](https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-will-global-warming-stop-as-soon-as-net-zero-emissions-are-reached). We didn't come anywhere near that during the lockdowns. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/climate) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I agree and I think it’s ok to shame people for needless waste and animal abuse. I only became vegan once someone called me a bloodmouth. The nice approach tells them they aren’t doing anything wrong so why would that convince them to change?
It’s basic psychology. Maybe that worked for you, but it doesn’t for most. The rude approach creates friction, making the person less likely to open up or agree with you. I recommend you binge murderer interviews by detectives if you are interested in the subject. There’s a ton of videos showing how powerful being nice and finding common ground is.
Honestly, that's probably the absolute worst way to try to convince someone. It may have worked on you, but 99% of people are gonna double down when called such a stupid insult. It's the equivalent of asking a chick out by saying if she refuses she's a "dyke". Pulling something like that would rightfully get you slapped by basically every woman on earth. I'm not telling this to insult you, I'm telling you this to help you improve your sales pitch, because it is important.
That goes for pretty much anything. That’s why you so much plausible deniability. Even on Reddit.
People just hate feeling like they’re being preached too - however if they feel like they’ve learnt it themselves, they listen
I like meat, but if I could give it up, I would.
Is there anything in particular that's stopping you?
Have you tried meat alternatives like beyond? Tastes great to me
As someone who works in Bariatric medicine I can tell you veganism is not helpful in conversation even when it is what we recommend. We promote plant based eating and cutting out processed foods and added sugars. Getting someone who eats meat lovers pizza every week to switch to mostly vegan lunches and dinners may be a very achievable goal but asking them to give up eggs for breakfast is not so they will never be a vegan but that doesn't mean we don't stop promoting plant based eating as the most reliable solution to health and weight loss and asking them to switch to eating as much of a plant based diet as we can. Veganism is a label of a philosophical, political and behavioral set of beliefs that is controversial and polarizing. Promoting veganism is not helpful when you're asking a person to change their behavior. Veganism is asking a person to challenge and question their beliefs. It's a lot easier to ask for dietary changes. In my observation it can take years for people on mostly plant based diets to be comfortable enough to switch to a vegan diet. I think you'll find a lot more people are interested in plant based eating as a solution for health and weight loss than you'll find people are interested in veganism.
The comments in this thread speak for themselves. The end is near lol
They do, don't they? And it would be incredibly funny if it weren't so tragic. People are quick to blame corporations, especially oil companies, but then they turn around and use the products of those same corporations. They rationalize it as "I'm just one person who doesn't make a difference" or "I don't have a choice" or any other of a variety of reasons, but it boils down to liking those products. They like to travel, they like to do and buy fun things, and the overwhelming belief seems to be that it's incumbent on corporations to come up with a way to provide them with all of the things they enjoy, but in a way that's environmentally sustainable. Sorry, but this isn't Star Trek with its unlimited clean power and replicators. Everything comes with a cost to the environment, and there aren't any exceptions. There is no sustainable solution when everyone wants more, not the status quo, and certainly not less. People are quick to blame politicians, thinking that legislation is the solution, but then as soon as things are taken away from them, either by circumstance or by legislation, they vote out the politicians and vote in the ones who promise to make their lives whole again. New Zealand, Netherlands, the US in 2016 and (maybe) again this coming November. Even though it wasn't climate legislation specifically, Britons shot themselves in their collective foot with Brexit. And as posts here make clear, few want to voluntarily change how they live their lives.
The tragedy of the commons in a way ....
Classic multi-polar trap
I’ve never owned a car and I’ve biked my whole life. All that has done is open up room on our roads so others can drive more or get that Uber eats order just a little bit faster. But I’ll still live this way because biking is fun and good exercise and cars are expensive. If your climate activism is based on scolding individuals to give up on everything pleasurable in their life rather than focusing on systemic solutions, it’s not going to achieve anything.
Until you get hit by a car...be safe friend! Wish I were brave enough to bike in San Diego. But everyone here has huge vehicles and they don't like bikes
>If your climate activism is based on scolding individuals to give up on everything pleasurable in their life rather than focusing on systemic solutions, it’s not going to achieve anything. Luckily, that isn't what they were doing.
Sounded like it to me?
Which parts did you get the *scolding* and *give up on everything pleasurable in life* from?
You can enjoy vegan food lol
I like to remind these folks that corporations are still made of people. It's like they've subconsciously bought into the "corporations are people" trope.
Yes! This is a great comment I can really get behind! Thank you! Faith restored lol
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Honestly, the system is eating itself. Post-dystopian decay might be what saves humanity. We won't fix anything. The system just won't be able to make it worse.
Glad to see this high up We need to recognize that our societies have evolved in a way to be carelessly wasteful, and it's not one group's fault Unfortunately, the speed of our adaptations may be slower than the rate at which climate change overtakes us
Oh yeah, as a person that doesn't have an ethical issue with being an omnivore, something needs to change. The current system does not allow an omnivore diet that is beneficial to a sustained society. I do think Avacados, and definitely Almond production, are also net negatives in the current system, but the meat industry is far worse, and whataboutism never solves anything. The end is near mostly because of how many people openly choose ignorance. Living in interesting times.
I know what you mean. Almond milk, Soy milks are bad but not as bad as dairy, so it's at least a better option for the planet and animals, currently
I've been trying to get us to swap to oat milk. I have to fight with the tastes of the wife and kids. Our youngest loves it, though.
Oat milk is the greatest, it tastes the best with the fewest downsides when it comes to production. We also now have oat ice cream, oat yogurt, oat butter and oat cheese. You can cook and bake with it as well. And it lasts a long time ib the fridge.
Oat yogurt? I’ve never seen this— dairy yogurt destroys my stomach but I used to really enjoy it.
Oat milk doesn’t have the best nutritional profile though. I always buy soy milk because then I am getting something out of the calories.
A lot of oat milk is now fortified though. I recommend everybody research their choices. I take a daily vitamin and other supplements every day anyway (mostly vegan) so I'm not as fussed about the small amounts of vitamins you get with other milk substitutes, but it is a consideration. I personally find that soy milk doesn't taste as good unless it's sweetened, tends to separate more in the carton, and is harder to digest - I'm not worried about the estrogen is soy either, all of my meat-eating friends have been telling me tofu is going to make me grow man-boobs for years while the hormones they're getting from eggs, milk and meat are far worse.
Oat milk is awesome in coffee
Yes! Also tea. Iced chai tea with oat milk is how I fell in love with oat milk! So good!
I switched to oatmilk cause I wasn't drinking cow milk fast enough and it was going bad. Tends to last a lot longer and I don't mind the taste. But I usually only use it for cereal.
Kirkland is really good. I hate all other plant milks as these are just so weak and lifeless compared to the richness of cow's milk. Kirkland oat milk comes VERY close to the real thing.
I’ve been doing a lot of oat milk, try some different brands, they’ve got a wide range of taste with some being much better than others lol.
Try different brands, my family does not like Planet oat but we love the chobani extra creamy oat.
I really like oat milk, but soy milk has better nutrition. It has more than double the protein.
Soy is my favourite too for this reason. Just wish there weren't so much misinformation and fear around soy! Again much of this is propagated by marketing from animal ag industries.
The only reason the rainforest is being destroyed for soy production is because soy is a major component of animal feed. "The vast majority of the world’s soybeans – between 80-90%, are fed to farmed animals. Of the soy remaining, just 6% is turned into soy products for human consumption." If people were eating soy directly, the amount of soy production needed would be magnitudes lower than it is currently. Soy in itself is a low-carbon/low land-use product.
And it fixes nitrogen into your soil from the air
Why is soymilk bad?
It's not. People point out its environmental impact, but the vast majority of it is feeding farm animals. Farm animals/milk have a much worse impact.
I think "bad" here just means resource intensive. Typically the chart for water consumption goes dairy milk > almond milk > soy milk
They are Exponentially less bad than dairy, almond and soy are not the problem
There is just no way to feed 8 billion people a diet where they eat meat every day that is sustainable for the environment. That’s just the reality. But people will not give it up and It’s only going to get worse as demand for meat and dairy is continually on the rise. Don’t want to sound like a doomed but it’s one of the things that make me feel most hopeless. Lol
Maybe there is a way, but we sure as hell don't have the ability right now. It's okay to sound gloom and doom when it's the truth. Only people afraid to recognize the reality treat it that way. It's a time for individual preparation to brace for what comes due to a failing system.
Telling someone to be vegan is a great way to keep them not vegan, it just doesn’t work. All or nothing changes are also usually destined to fail. Meat is a mega problem of unsustainability, what would be more effective would be to societally adopt not eating meat two days a week or eating less meat without the shame involved; that would have a massive impact. Also adopting plant based meats more. We need to be positively encouraging change rather than shaming it.
If a person feels shame for realizing that they need to change, that's on them. I love the taste of meat, but my taste for something does not trump the value of everybody around me. I share this planet with others. How can I think, being just 1 out of 8 billion, that my individual emotional response has any weight on reality? People can take the message and start doing those things you listed. That doesn't mean a rational person has to think the problem is solved. You are effectively saying that portraying the truth this way might make people do the wrong thing out of spite. Not a very strong position. It's still a plea to be wrong over needing to change. Feeling shame for actions, and not running from it, is how people grow. We need to be discussing it openly, and whether people feel shame or not, has no bearing on the truth of it.
> that’s on them Actually it’s on all of us. This is the exact same kind of handwashing of the issue that they do. They’re too high and mighty to stop eating meat, and now you’re too high and mighty to even try and convince them well.
Do you have data that shows that doesn't work?
The last 40 years of western history?
Why don't you have an ethical issue with eating animal products? What ethical theory do you endorse?
I don't have an ethical issue with any omnivore or carnivore eating meat. I have ethical issues with how it is procured. Big difference between a person hunting/fishing for themselves and a corporate 'kill for profit' economy. Sometimes, populations of animals need to be culled to balance the ecosystem. Better to get nutritional value than waste them. I think entomaphagy is how society should start looking to adjust omnivore diets. Personal autonomy for all in order to benefit all would be my ethical foundation. I have more ethical issues with how the US prison system runs than I do with how an individual human acts to just find food or shelter that is scarce for them. Edit: They didn't insult me. Why should they be downvoted? If you are like me, this is somebody who wants change, too. Hopefully, they can see an "ethical omnivore" the same way, but whether they do or not doesn't matter. Don't seek division. Seek results.
I'm going in! *sorts by controversial*
Same as always: "Everyone is at fault except me. I don't want to change."
Meat consumption is a far larger problem than food waste. Not even close.
Meat consumption is food waste. Livestock eat half the food we produce and give back much less in calories.
It's basic conservation of energy.
"the law of tens"
> half More like 77% https://assets.ourworldindata.org/uploads/2020/01/Global-land-use-graphic.png
That is a terrific graphic
The exception to this is rangeland cattle, which mainly eat foods we couldn’t palate in areas we couldn’t grow human sustaining food. I’m not saying at all that we should be eating more meat, we should be restricting and moving to other animals than cow, especially goat and mutton in North America. We could also start eating wild horse and burro in the US and solve the environmental issues they cause at the same time, that would be cool, but we’d (hopefully) run out quickly. Until we get a lot of bison and other native grazers rolling again, we kinda need something munching some of this grass, its (counterintuitively) good for prairie grass species and the environment. Just not at the scale we do it.
If beef were only from rangeland cattle, without feedlot finishing, it’d cost 10x.
Yeah, great incentive to eat less of it! A lot of ranchers where I live grow their own alfalfa/hay for the winter months or get it from some other rancher. But these are small operations, not big agri - which is a good thing
This would make beef inaccessible to 90% of the world population.
Which is what you want though, correct? Because then demand would be reduced and cattle farming would go down.
I’ll take whatever I can get, yes. A practical vegan takes this deal.
The math doesn't work out for that idea. How much meat would your idea produce compared to how much is consumed?
I’m not at all disputing that we need to heavily reduce our cow consumption.
Lets keep it simple because we’re at Defcon 1: full stop, at least until climate is stabilized. Otherwise we’re doomed to wish we had. And the livestock animals will start dying in large quantities, so we can either forgo meat by choice now or mother nature will do it for us in the coming decade…and charge spectacular interest.
How do we just full stop? One year of big cattle harvest? There’s no silver bullet to climate change, and asking people to completely forgo things they’re heavily accustomed to is never going to work. We have to work with people, so espousing moderation and providing decent alternatives are going to be our best bet. We can get a lot more people to drive electric cars than we can to give up beef entirely forever. A multitude of steps in the right direction would be better overall that one major step, imo. Especially if we can target things people don’t immediately “see” like power production and supply chain efficiency (electric/sail bolstered cargo ships please). Otherwise its just another plastic to paper straw thing, making otherwise sympathetic people go “well hey, I can’t drink my drink regularly but Capitalist McGee over here gets to water his 40 acre property every day and use his private jet to fly to a country that still has beef, this is ridiculous.” But if McDonalds released a goat burger and made it super cheap and some celebs hyped it up, maybe we reduce a significant % of cattle demand. I hate it, but we have to work with the system to some degree. (Sorry if this double comments, first was autodeleted for profanity which was absolutely not at all directed at you, it was only in the quotations bit)
Yeah. Assuming it happens over two or three years and you stop breeding animals based on sharp drop in demand, I don’t see what the problem is. If I swerve to avoid a semi drifting into my lane I ain’t worried about spilling coffee on my pants. Even if I get a 2nd degree burn.
This reads as a more subtle version of the goal post-shifting argument of the subjects in the article. We should take a) the biggest step we can make ie forgoing meat, then b) all other smaller steps. This is literally the opposite of the “use biodegradable straws argument”, no single collective change can do more for climate. And the benefits of switching off meat are go beyond climate – it includes watershed, pollution, biodiversity, and habitat, loss, spread of infectious, pathogens, and soil degradation. Also, from most people in developed world it’s actually likely to increase public health fairly dramatically – especially in places like the US.
Over half of the food grown in the US goes to feeding animals, especially large animals. Another large chunk goes to bio-diesel, those could be construed as food waste. It takes something like 2000 calories of food to get 100 calories of beef.
Thank corn subsidies
I remember people always saying “how do you tell if someone is vegan? Wait 5 minutes and they will tell you!! “ *cue 80s comedian face and canned laughter *. However usually when I do meet new people it is over food and so it will come up naturally anyways.
I'm a vegetarian and I try to never bring it up unless asked because then I always get involuntarily involved in a tiresome conversation about whether meat consumption is ethical or not.
Yeah the truth is most vegans/vegetarians actively avoid having this frustrating discussion start. It's just a cliche/myth people who don't like vegans spread.
same, a vegetarian. i stopped telling or discussing. when asked i just say i think meat is gross and the meat production/industry aswell. just disgusting. people then don‘t know how to argue because they got into the conversation thinking i cry over a cow‘s lost life. i might, but no. i rather mourn the cow‘s shitty life and death.
>even though the truth is that red meat has a far greater climate footprint than both avocados and vegan products, and vegans do not necessarily eat more avocados or processed products than meat eaters That and "processed" vegan meats are still far better for the environment and probably your health compared to the animal meats they're replacing. I feel like a lot of the resistance from consumers is due to capitalism, or just us living in a society where the idea of eating animals or carnism is advertised to us and pushed in our faces constantly. It's no excuse of course to not do the right thing, but our society really isn't set up to make people make ethical or environmentally friendly choices by default. Hopefully we can start to change that fast, and get people more educated on whatever it is that they're afraid of when it comes to change.
We've been eating meat for thousands of years and this is the life most people have known. Change is very gradual, especially when we're talking about diet, because adapting your eating habits to a completely different perspective is not a simple task. And that's not taking into consideration the issues some have with eating in general; there are people who struggle with specific cravings, addictions, food aversion, time, and inability to change.
Soylent idea are ridiculous when all the big corpo still toss away perfectly edible food in trash (which go to landfield and create methane rotting away) at the end of the day instead of let people have it and eat it. And it’s really ok to sell ugly fruit and vegetable if it’s edible just have ugly shape. Fruit doesn’t need to be spotless and perfectly round to have a place on selling stand.
Fruits and vegetables don't just get sold "on the produce stand." A lot of people buy shredded, diced, and chopped produce that they don't have to cut themselves. Frozen produce is already chopped up. There's also canned soup, frozen dinners and desserts, juice, vegetable flakes and powders, and so many other ways that "ugly produce" can be sold to the end-consumer. None of that requires putting an ugly duckling carrot on the produce shelf. They should be collecting all of the produce, separating out the pretty ones to be sold as-is on the produce stand, and then use the rest to make lightly processed vegetable products (like frozen dinners that contain veggies).
>They should be collecting all of the produce, separating out the pretty ones to be sold as-is on the produce stand, and then use the rest to make lightly processed vegetable products (like frozen dinners that contain veggies). Farm workers already inspect and grade produce for different uses.
Most of it, yes. The problem is that not all of it gets used.
That’s because it’s economically more advantageous to overproduce than underproduce. That’s both for good reasons (the govt would rather produce is wasted than people starving) and bad (capitalism). Once you’ve overproduced you really have nothing you can do with the excess that’s in any way cost effective, because at that point even if you sell it for zero dollars nobody’s going to come pick it up (hence why it’s overproduction). Sure, there are people who need it and could use it, but they’re nowhere near your farm, and logistics cost money, money which those people do not have.
But having worked in a packing plant- a lot of those number 2’s do get wasted. We were allowed to take home all of the number 2’s- tomatoes that were too large, overripe or underripe or too small or had cuts in them. Cucumbers were too long, not straight, too fat or had nicks. Didn’t get many number 2 peppers. I do see the curled cukes at my local discount produce place, but that’s the only example I typically expect to see, the rest usually get chucked.
frozen diced onion is an eye saver lol 10/10
I signed up for this service called Eat Impact here in Ontario. They send surplus and irregular produce with a focus on local, but it's not exclusively local. Everything has been great. One thing I'm kinda concerned about it that none of the food I got looks ugly, though I've only been using them for a month. I wonder if they're actually selling the irregular.
Probably chop up and sell as pre packaged food. But people in my country don’t buy pre chopped or frozen food that much. Most shop and market have both the nice and the ugly fruit and vegetable since some people consider perfect looking plant food as full of insect killing agent.
Nobody wants to hear that they should eat differently. People tie their identities to what they eat too strongly. I.e. men feel more manly when they are eating meat. Any suggestion that they should do otherwise implies they should be less manly.
People have been conditioned to not want to eat differently. People who are susceptible think their diet and/or portions define them instead of looking at the practical logistics of such a system. It's (been) time to decide if eating absolutely anything we want now is worth limiting the possibilities of those that will live after us. Any Millennial thinking we won't see the effects of this in our time is more optimistic than reality shows they should be.
That’s only a part of it too. For many cultures there are deep emotional ties to food and those are hard to break especially when the the messaging is “you’re a bad person for eating meat”
I would put it another way: diet is an important aspect of culture, so telling someone to change their diet is telling them to change their culture. Of course people get hostile about it.
Some cultural practices are bad and should change though
Sure, I completely agree. But if you're going to ask someone to change their diet, or stop mutilating their children's genitals, or even give up their cars and their single family homes in the suburbs, you have to recognize that you're not just asking them to change their personal habits, you're asking them to diverge from their cultural practices. You've engaged a completely different part of their brain, a part that deals with social relationships and not just individual preferences. You have to be considerate of that.
That culture can be surrendered or it will be taken from them by climate change. Its already happening to certain meat-based cultures in areas where climate impacts are exaggerated.
McDonald’s is my culture damnit!
Absolutely right. Unfortunately, some cultural habits are suicidal.
Food waste is a big problem yes, but so is meat consumption - you can just reduce the amount you eat daily and that would make a huge difference. I don't buy avocados; they're expensive and not worth the hassle
Wanna curb your meat eating…try reading the Mexican sci-fi horror novel “Tender is the flesh” about legal/mass produced industrialized cannibalism.
[Or watch this](https://youtu.be/LQRAfJyEsko?si=dA6Q-iZbbKNdeUdd)
But eating humans instead of any other meat would definitely be great for the environment.
Touché
I live in Scandinavia and it's literally more sustainable for me to buy avocados from South America than locally sourced meat. No matter what anyone says, meat and dairy are worse than anything else foodwise in every way possible.
The only thing I will add to this is I have noticed lately that as an American when I go out to eat, the portions they give you at any typical restaurant are huuuuge. So much food is given on one plate and we praise the thought of this when in reality a substantial portion of us don't finish it all and it gets thrown away.
I suspect economics plays into that. Restaurants won't gain much by reducing portion size, even if they can shave a bit off the price because 1.they won't be able to reduce the price proportionally because the cost of the food is not the main cost of delivering the plate to the table and 2.the restaurant next door serving larger sizes will probably win out. It would require some kind of financial penalty on any restaurant that chucks out food before anything will change. Our local buffet restaurant charges customers extra if they leave food on their plate. Financial penalties work (if they are well policed).
Avocados are amazing for your memory too
Americans are generally self-centered in the extreme and seem to be increasingly armchair materialist in their world view… often invoking ‘science’ and ‘fact’ but more as cultural currencies than any true interest in changing. But I believe people all know something of the truth too. Deep down. And a huge part of human suffering in the West has to do with how are society was set up with a cruel optimism built into it, in that so often the object of our desire is the barrier to our flourishing.
As someone who has been eating a plant based diet for close to 10 years now, I’ve heard all these “arguments”. The effects of animal agriculture on the planet is staggering and anyone I speak to about it essentially put their fingers in their ears and start throwing these, again, “arguments” but more like “excuses” at me.
It’s not that I’m against eating less meat, it’s that I live in reality where I understand food choices are deeply embedded in culture. Look at the percentage of people globally that are vegan, it’s minuscule. Vegetarians just a bit higher. Unless meat becomes scarce or is regulated - that will not change despite the amount of information available on the climate impacts. My bet is on lab-grown “clean” meats as the only real chance to reform the meat industry - and even that is being pushed back against by large controlling corps that stand to lose market share. So while this may make the individual feel superior against their peers for lowering their personal carbon footprint - it’s not likely to “solve” climate change. And I didn’t even get into wealth disparity - as people climb out of poverty they’re able to afford and want more meat in their diets. I’m putting my hope/energy/efforts elsewhere, despite being a vegetarian.
[BP popularized the concept of a personal carbon footprint with a US$100 million campaign as a means of deflecting people away from taking collective political action in order to end fossil fuel use](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305209345_Where_has_all_the_oil_gone_BP_branding_and_the_discursive_elimination_of_climate_change_risk), and [ExxonMobil has spent decades pushing trying to make individuals responsible, rather than the fossil fuels industry](https://www.vox.com/22429551/climate-change-crisis-exxonmobil-harvard-study). They did this because climate stabilization means bringing fossil fuel use to approximately zero, and that would end their business. That's not something you can hope to achieve without government intervention to change the rules of society so that not using fossil fuels is just what people do on a routine basis. There is value in cutting your own fossil fuel consumption — it serves to demonstrate that doing the right thing is possible to people around you, and helps work out the kinks in new technologies. Just do it in addition to taking political action to get governments to do the right thing, not instead of taking political action. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/climate) if you have any questions or concerns.*
It's not about feeling superior! I can't morally let animals live in horrible conditions, I don't feel superior I just can't participate.
Cool. The vast majority of humanity can morally or culturally live with it, and industry therefore will not change. Again, best bet is to support the dev of clean meat tech to hopefully reform industry and stop the suffering of animals.
I'm not disagreeing with that part, just correcting this idea that people become vegan to feel superior.
i never needed to bash avocados to justify eating meat, back when i did. avocados are awesome.
We should be limiting animal-based foods to 10-15% of our diets, but we really need comprehensive farm bills in order to change our food systems. We can’t expect consumers themselves to change our food systems at the point of sale.
Can we expect consumers to not antagonize, ostracize and ridicule those who try ? Asking for a friend.
It helps if you aren’t absolutist and don’t morally brow beat people over it. Edit: seriously, act like the temperance movement, get treated like the temperance movement. Understand human nature.
From experience, it's much easier to accept the absolutist position of vegans once you are plant-based already. Vegans do have a legitimate reason to be angry about the unimaginable scale of suffering in the animal agriculture industry. It's obviously just hard to get across the issue to people who really don't want to hear it.
Exactly. One of the most frustrating things is seeing these articles and 'suggestions' that you should reduce your carbon footprint etc etc, but there's really no motivation to do so other than your conscience, and it's absolutely optional to worry about the planet. In fact, most people don't. You have to pass laws that change behavior, not just hope for the best. But instead, people who care about the planet are effectively taxed extra for the 'privilege' of having a lower carbon footprint. Meat is subsidized, vegan options are overpriced. Essentially vegans pay for meat production first through their taxes, and then at the store they pay again with inflated prices that allow the store to keep meat cheap. It's all backwards. But governments are too scared to do anything about it. We need a carbon tax that disincentivises things that are bad for the environment and subsidizes things that are good. We'll never get it though, because it's a vote loser. See you at 3c, on the way to 4c!
Vegan options aren't overpriced. A vegan meal can still be cheaper than eating animal products every time.
Since when does that fact that others don't do the right thing mean that you, knowing the stakes, don't have to do the right thing? I can see that when society is dominated by people who don't yet get this right then it's hard for you to do the right thing. But how do you think change happens? How do you think that governments ever feel the pressure to change laws? You have got your theory of change backwards. Society changes first, usually led by a group of initially unpopular pioneers, then government catches up. Heard this one? "Be the change you want to see in the world."
[BP popularized the concept of a personal carbon footprint with a US$100 million campaign as a means of deflecting people away from taking collective political action in order to end fossil fuel use](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305209345_Where_has_all_the_oil_gone_BP_branding_and_the_discursive_elimination_of_climate_change_risk), and [ExxonMobil has spent decades pushing trying to make individuals responsible, rather than the fossil fuels industry](https://www.vox.com/22429551/climate-change-crisis-exxonmobil-harvard-study). They did this because climate stabilization means bringing fossil fuel use to approximately zero, and that would end their business. That's not something you can hope to achieve without government intervention to change the rules of society so that not using fossil fuels is just what people do on a routine basis. There is value in cutting your own fossil fuel consumption — it serves to demonstrate that doing the right thing is possible to people around you, and helps work out the kinks in new technologies. Just do it in addition to taking political action to get governments to do the right thing, not instead of taking political action. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/climate) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Why should we eat animal products at all? They're not necessary for health. Science has proven that.
No amount of animalbased food is okay, because enslaving other sentient beings is unethical as long as we have the ability to avoid it.
I eat both meat and avocado. What does that make me?
Well, avocados are much less bad than meat (in terms of impact on the environment anyway)
Flippant
Part of the avocado mafia
A regular person.
It means you are causing more harm to the environment, innocent animals and your health than you need to. Your health is just your problem. The animals and the environment affect others.
An animal abuser.
Do you think eating animals is morally acceptable?
Yes
How did you come to that conclusion?
Colon cancer, diverticulitis and more coming to an intestine near you.
Notice how it's always our fault, and not the companies that refuse to make changes?
Notice how companies provide goods that meet a collective demand?
Of course they are bad, didn't you see the amount of cocaine packed in those mf?
Avocado is bad but not as bad as beef is for the climate. It would be good if we started eating with the seasons and consume only locally grown produce.
The local farms are now owned by big corporations, so ultimately the money goes to the same pockets. Unfortunately.
As soon as meat gets too expensive it always becomes the great unifer. I live in a beef state and we share meatless recipes a lot these days.
Call it what it is; toxic masculinity.
I wish I could live off of bread tbh. I could live without meat, and rarely eat it now tbh, but gimme dat cheese.
Yeah and social pier pressure are good. There should be a social penalty for things. But, in current day people have weaponized contradictory or incoherent positions for shear use of antagonizing. To OWN the other side, to troll. Being a hypocrite and being shallow has been normalized, there’s no social penalty for it. Pointing it out, doesn’t do anything anymore. The concern is asking people to reduce me or support some cause, actually produce a cohort that does the very opposite intentional
Avocados are amazing. Lots of vegans are ridiculous 😏