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People are so cruel - I can’t bear it **animal cruelty** - Title edited by MNHQ

128 replies

bluewanda · 30/12/2020 17:54

I came across this link earlier and am absolutely sickened. How can human beings be so disgustingly cruel? How can these monsters even live with themselves?! Sad

Sorry for the DM link but on the other hand, I’m glad they’re publicising this when other media outlets aren’t.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9082657/amp/Animals-beaten-death-strangled-caged-unflinching-photo-series-showing-suffering.html

OP posts:
Veterinari · 30/12/2020 21:38

[quote bluewanda]@Veterinari is it possible to avoid palm oil completely? I would love to be able to do that.[/quote]
Sadly it's almost impossible Sad
It's suggested to be in around 50% of supermarket products (and yet their vegan ranges aren't 50% of their products - weird!)

There's a lot of reliance on 'certified' palm oil for sustainability but the sadly the reality is that a lot of the schemes are corrupt

www.ethicalconsumer.org/palm-oil/palm-oil-free-list

kikisparks · 30/12/2020 22:40

@PlanDeRaccordement

This Christmas I saw lots of non vegans buying Cadbury selection boxes, quality street, heroes, ferrero rocher etc all containing palm oil. Most vegan chocolate I have found does not contain it.

Most bread contains palm oil and most bread is consumed by non vegans.

There are simply not enough vegans to be driving the increasing use of palm oil and in any event those people I know who try to avoid or limit palm oil are all vegans- the non vegans I know generally don’t think about it.

But additionally there is a school of thought that palm oil is not avoidable as they require only half as much land as other crops to generate a given amount of oil. www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2018/12/palm-oil-products-borneo-africa-environment-impact/

kikisparks · 30/12/2020 22:49

@Frouby a plant based diet is better for the environment as most emissions are generated at the production rather than the transport stage.

citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.511.7351&rep=rep1&type=pdf

“Much of the estimated 35% of global greenhouse-gas emissions deriving from agriculture and land use comes from livestock production. Livestock production—including deforestation for grazing land and soy-feed production, soil carbon loss in grazing lands, the energy used in growing feed-grains and in processing and transporting grains and meat, nitrous oxide releases from the use of nitrogenous fertilisers, and gases from animal manure (especially methane) and enteric fermentation44—accounts for about 18% of global greenhouse-gas emissions (figure 2).42 This estimate consists of around 9% of global emissions of carbon dioxide, plus 35–40% of methane emissions and 65% of nitrous oxide, both of which have much greater near-term warming potential over several ensuing decades than does carbon doxide (although they have shorter half-lives in the atmosphere). Similar estimates exist of the contributions of UK farming, live-stock production, and the food chain overall, to national greenhouse-gas emissions.

Health professionals warn that the use of antibiotics early on in the food chain, with farmers administering drugs to animals to promote growth rather than treat disease, is a particular problem.”

Grass fed animals’ meat/ milk:
www.fcrn.org.uk/sites/default/files/project-files/fcrn_gnc_report.pdf

“But at an aggregate level the emissions generated by these grazing systems still outweigh the removals and even assuming improvements in productivity, they simply cannot supply us with all the animal protein we currently eat. They are even less able to provide us with the quantities of meat and milk that our growing and increasingly more affluent population apparently wants to consume. Significant expansion in overall numbers would cause catastrophic land use change and other environmental damage. This is especially the case if one adopts a very ‘pure’ definition of a grazing system, the sort that grazing advocates tend to portray, where livestock are reared year-round on grass that is not fertilised with mineral fertilisers, receiving no additional nutritional supplementation, and at stocking densities that support environmental goals.”

Local animal products

pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/es702969f

“buying local” could achieve, at maximum, around a 4−5% reduction in GHG emissions due to large sources of both CO2 and non-CO2 emissions in the production of food. Shifting less than 1 day per week’s (i.e., 1/7 of total calories) consumption of red meat and/or dairy to other protein sources or a vegetable-based diet could have the same climate impact as buying all household food from local providers.”

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/10/181023110627.htm

“A new study provides a more comprehensive accounting of the greenhouse gas emissions from EU diets. It shows that meat and dairy products are responsible for the lion's share of greenhouse emissions from the EU diet.”

“The study found that meat and dairy account for more than 75% of the impact from EU diets. That's because meat and dairy production causes not only direct emissions from animal production, but also contributes to deforestation from cropland expansion for feed, which is often produced outside of the EU.”

“”People tend to think that consuming locally will be the solution to climate change, but it turns out that the type of product we eat is much more important for the overall impact," says IIASA researcher Hugo Valin, a study coauthor and Sandström's YSSP advisor. "Europeans are culturally attached to meat and dairy product consumption.”

science.sciencemag.org/content/360/6392/987

“Today, and probably into the future, dietary change can deliver environmental benefits on a scale not achievable by producers. Moving from current diets to a diet that excludes animal products (table S13) (35) has transformative potential, reducing food’s land use by 3.1 (2.8 to 3.3) billion ha (a 76% reduction), including a 19% reduction in arable land; food’s GHG emissions by 6.6 (5.5 to 7.4) billion metric tons of CO2eq (a 49% reduction); acidification by 50% (45 to 54%); eutrophication by 49% (37 to 56%); and scarcity-weighted freshwater withdrawals by 19% (−5 to 32%) for a 2010 reference year.”

We can still buy plant based and mostly local though- should be able to get most of these grown in the U.K.:

Kale, mushrooms, strawberries, pears, apples, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, onions, leeks, potatoes, turnips, carrots, wheat, barley, oats, rapeseed oil, peas, beans, sugar beet, celery, celeriac, artichokes, spinach, tomatoes, spring onions, squash, broccoli, parsnips, radishes, water cress, rhubarb, cucumber, asparagus, beetroot, cauliflower, lettuce, berries, shallots, garlic, sweetcorn, pumpkins, loads of herbs and more.

bluewanda · 30/12/2020 22:54

We can still buy plant based and mostly local though- should be able to get most of these grown in the U.K.:

Kale, mushrooms, strawberries, pears, apples, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, onions, leeks, potatoes, turnips, carrots, wheat, barley, oats, rapeseed oil, peas, beans, sugar beet, celery, celeriac, artichokes, spinach, tomatoes, spring onions, squash, broccoli, parsnips, radishes, water cress, rhubarb, cucumber, asparagus, beetroot, cauliflower, lettuce, berries, shallots, garlic, sweetcorn, pumpkins, loads of herbs and more.

Great list!

OP posts:
Miljea · 30/12/2020 22:56

@Frouby

I'm glad we've left the EU, some of those photos, the dairy farm in poland and the pig ones from finland are disgusting. You kind of expect it from China et al, but not the EU which are supposed to set better standards.

I'm not vegan or even vegetarian but try to eat and buy ethically, you don't have to be vegan to support animal welfare.

Good luck with the idea our ethical standards in meat farming will be higher than the EU's...

Frouby · 30/12/2020 23:09

@kikisparks thank you, that's great and very helpful. Much more helpful and informative than being ranted at anyway.

bluewanda · 30/12/2020 23:13

Good luck with the idea our ethical standards in meat farming will be higher than the EU's...

Actually I read somewhere that leaving the EU means we will no longer be required to transport livestock on long and distressing journeys over the Channel. So that is one positive!

OP posts:
bluewanda · 30/12/2020 23:16

Here’s a link - such a shame poultry aren’t included but it’s a good start:

www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/03/uk-to-become-first-country-in-europe-to-ban-live-animal-exports

OP posts:
Veterinari · 30/12/2020 23:32

[quote Frouby]@kikisparks thank you, that's great and very helpful. Much more helpful and informative than being ranted at anyway.[/quote]
Yep. Cos god forbid you should have to go to any effort to correct your unfounded ill informed opinions

Frouby · 31/12/2020 00:03

@Veterinari, have a drink or something, it's Christmas. Wine

kikisparks · 31/12/2020 07:42

@bluewanda the live exports thing sounds good but at the end of the day these are thinking, feeling beings who are still going to have their short lives ended violently. We export a lot of male calves from the dairy industry after they are taken away from their mum so we can have their milk. Their bodies aren’t the kind that are valuable to rear and sell off in parts in the U.K. so they are sent elsewhere to be killed. Many other calves are shot at birth. Being shot at birth is, to be fair, probably “kinder” than being sent for live export, but it’s still pretty horrific to kill a baby because their breast milk tastes nice turned into cheese. The calves who were formerly exported will probably have this fate now, whilst Spain, Italy and Morocco will presumably breed more animals to kill to plug the gap left by less exports.

The only way I can see to truly change things is to stop paying for violence. I know a farmer who ran a small local farmstead. She reared and killed goats, sheep, chickens, pigs, geese and cows. She believed in being “humane” but found that even the “best” methods of castration and tail docking, debudding and sheep shearing and dipping were painful and traumatising. She found a connection with each animal noting that, just like dogs and cats, they each had a distinct personality, their own thoughts and feelings, and an enjoyment for and desire to live, and they formed connections and friendships and showed distress when their children and friends were taken away. The years of killing them (or listening to the pigs squeal as her husband killed them) or sending them to slaughter took its toll, she gave up the farm and has now been vegan for years.

You can do it, I’m very happy to offer help here or by PM. I also recommend signing up here: challenge22.com/ where you will get recipes, meal plans, dieticians advice and more.

I felt such a weight off me after I went vegan, knowing I was doing the least harm to animals.

kikisparks · 31/12/2020 07:46

@covidaintacrime @Kaliorphic I appreciate that judging is probably not going to convince anyone to go vegan and I endeavour not to do it (after all, I wasn’t vegan once, so I can only judge if I also judge myself) but what would be the thing that would convince you to go vegan?

Kaliorphic · 31/12/2020 09:51

but what would be the thing that would convince you to go vegan

If there was nothing else available to eat. Wink

Seriously, I was vegetarian for 35 years. Probably for around 10 years of that time I was vegan. These days I just eat food that I want to eat. I don't need or want convincing to do anything. I make my own choices.

As an aside, i know the thing that puts me off is pushy over emotional people. I remember when I had already decided years ago to make the transition into being vegan, and a friend of a friend who was a militant vegan sought to persuade me anyway. Tbh she was so bloody irritating that it made me want to shove a whole cow into my mouth. And if she had that effect on someone who had already decided, then I'm sure you can imagine the effect that approach had on people who did actually eat meat. People will only be persuaded if they are already open to being vegan in the first place. But absolutely guaranteed that the militant approach won't get many willing takers.

kikisparks · 31/12/2020 10:13

I hear that a lot, and it’s just not something I can identify with as personally I don’t care how judgemental or rude or annoying others are, it’s not going to make me start hurting more animals. Maybe that comes across as “militant” whatever that means but I’m just sharing my perspective and I can understand why people get emotional over animal cruelty. I don’t care how other vegans act, we aren’t all the same, and if someone is irritating then as far as I’m concerned an innocent cow shouldn’t be punished for that.

But you can’t guarantee any approach won’t get any willing takers, you can only speak to your own experience. For example, I find Joey Carbstrong quite off putting and he probably wouldn’t have convinced me to go vegan but I know many, many people who have been convinced by him. I think saying that you won’t be convinced by a militant approach also doesn’t really mean anything when you won’t be convinced by any approach- on the other hand if someone said “this approach wouldn’t convince me, but a different approach might” then that’s a very helpful observation.

Kaliorphic · 31/12/2020 10:39

Well you asked for my opinion Kiki and I took the time out to give it to you. But so sorry that my opinion wasn't helpful to you. Good luck with your quest to change people's eating habits. Because quite frankly, you're going to need it.
Happy new year.

PlanDeRaccordement · 31/12/2020 11:32

Unfortunately there is a serious methodological flaw in the all studies comparing plant versus omnivore diets. The flaw is that they view the animals life as “livestock production” and so add up all the water, food, land land the animal needs to live and add up its carbon footprint from birth to slaughter. The same is then done for plants, from seed to harvest.
The problem is that the vegan calculations then exclude the existence of all animals. These animals are not left to live a full natural life. They are wiped out. All of them. The vegan calculation is based on there only being humans + plants on the planet. No cows, no pigs, no sheep, etc.
But according to the vegan philosophy, these animals would still exist and need food, water, land and have a carbon footprint. The vegan philosophy is to peacefully co-exist with these animals without harming of eating them.
So a true calculation of vegan lifestyle would be to calculate water, food, land and carbon footprint of humans + plants + animals that live longer because they are not slaughtered.

PlanDeRaccordement · 31/12/2020 11:38

Then on a side point, the vegan lifestyle includes alternatives to biodegradable eco-friendly animal byproducts such as leather, fur and feathers. Unfortunately, all these vegan alternatives are made from plastic- vegan leather, fake fur, and poly-fill all are made from plastic and not just any plastic but the type of plastics that constantly shed billions of microplastics into the environment, polluting our water courses and the ocean. Microplastics are the #1 pollutant we are fighting to day and have been shown to cause cancer and early painful death in millions of animals/fish within the entire food chain up to and now including humans.
Again, going vegan doesn’t mean you cause no suffering or death to animals. You still do. It’s not a simple cut and dry choice.

kikisparks · 31/12/2020 12:15

@PlanDeRaccordement no the farmed animals wouldn’t exist any more. We’d stop breeding them. Right now farmers control the amount of animals to be bred, fed and killed based on demand- it’s a financial consideration. As gradually the demand for animal products falls less will be bred. Hence all of the environmental benefits.

Also all vegan alternatives are not made from plastic, there are a lot of eco friendly alternatives. Again most plastics are used by non vegans.

It seems like you’re trying to make veganism sound bad but coming up with things like the vegan philosophy would involve just letting farmed animals loose to breed, or that vegans cause most palm oil production or that vegans cause most plastic production seems to just be made up based on no research.

Not all vegans will be super eco friendly but anecdotally, which I know isn’t proof, the people I know who are zero waste, reducing plastic etc are all vegans.

kikisparks · 31/12/2020 12:20

I would add that if you care about micro plastics or palm oil, which are very admirable causes to advocate on, surely the way to make change is not by encouraging people not to go vegan, it’s by encouraging people, whether they are vegan or not, to not buy palm oil (if indeed that’s actually a solution- see national geographic article earlier) and not to buy items with micro plastics.

bluewanda · 31/12/2020 12:24

Thanks @kikisparks for your reply.

I’m sure veganism isn’t perfect in terms of negative environmental impact and animal cruelty, but it’s got to be a hell of a lot better than eating meat.

OP posts:
kikisparks · 31/12/2020 12:26

Thanks Kaliorphic it’s not about changing eating habits but reducing violence towards animals and I’ll keep trying for them.

kikisparks · 31/12/2020 12:27

@bluewanda definitely! Nothing is perfect but we can only try our best Smile

Pellewsmate · 31/12/2020 12:46

For those of you who like meat and milk, certain companies are more ethical than others and are trying their best in terms of animal health and environmental impact.
news.arlafoods.co.uk/news/arla-calls-for-industry-to-help-support-dairy-farmers-ensure-every-calf-has-a-value
www.arla.com/company/news-and-press/2019/pressrelease/arla-foods-aims-for-carbon-net-zero-dairy-2845602/

Veterinari · 31/12/2020 16:26

@PlanDeRaccordement

Unfortunately there is a serious methodological flaw in the all studies comparing plant versus omnivore diets. The flaw is that they view the animals life as “livestock production” and so add up all the water, food, land land the animal needs to live and add up its carbon footprint from birth to slaughter. The same is then done for plants, from seed to harvest. The problem is that the vegan calculations then exclude the existence of all animals. These animals are not left to live a full natural life. They are wiped out. All of them. The vegan calculation is based on there only being humans + plants on the planet. No cows, no pigs, no sheep, etc. But according to the vegan philosophy, these animals would still exist and need food, water, land and have a carbon footprint. The vegan philosophy is to peacefully co-exist with these animals without harming of eating them. So a true calculation of vegan lifestyle would be to calculate water, food, land and carbon footprint of humans + plants + animals that live longer because they are not slaughtered.
You mean according to your bias and assumption Grin

This has already been answered multiple times. Might be worth actually reading and processing some of the information already given. Or if you genuinely want to make a point, why not provide some actual evidence to show you have an informed opinion rather than one based on 'fluff' and 'marketing'.

It's interesting isn't it that the vegans are the ones engaging in rationale science based debate whilst their attackers are resorting to 'because I said so...' as 'evidence'

Sparrowfeeder · 31/12/2020 18:07

@bluewanda

This is why I am a vegan, this is why I have never eaten meat or fish in my life and also why I will only ever have rescue pets. I judge everyone who is not like this. There is so much suffering caused by humans that I cannot bear it.

@Sparrowfeeder not even as a baby/young child? Were your parents vegetarians as well then? I really admire you for it by the way.

Hi, thanks, yes I’ve been veggie since conception (38 now). My mum went veggie when she was late teens, back in the 60s. I am forever grateful she raised me as such (I always had a choice to eat meat but I knew what it was and never wanted to). Growing up in the 80s I got people eyeing me up surprised that I looked healthy and shocked e.g. when I beat loads of kids running at sports day. It is much more normal now thankfully. I appreciate it is easier for me as I never developed a taste for animal based foods but I did give up my beloved cheddar cheese and I survived to tell the tale Grin
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