To say that being a vegan is no better for the environment than being a meat eater?

[OnlyInYourDreams]

Unless you eat only home grown, locally sourced products?

Obviously some people are vegan because they don’t like the idea of using any kind of animal products. But all too often people say that they’re vegan because “it’s better for the environment when this is categorically not the case.

Lots of fruit/veg have to be imported which is actually worse for the environment because it involves pumping man-made substances into the environment.

Products like almond milk are terrible for the environment because e.g. it takes 1600l of water to produce 1l of almond milk. Coca-Cola is practically a green product in comparison…

If people want to be vegan, why not just say you want to be vegan. Coming up with reasons such as “it’s better for the environment” which are just rubbish and laughable is only going to increase the amount of people who don’t take vegans seriously.

How would you trace ‘any ill health

If a child decided to become vegan (or refused to eat meat) because of what they were taught at school and then became malnourished as a result, the school should be held accountable.

Schools should not be interfering with nutritional advice.

I'm happy to encourage fellow vegans to go for blood tests.
Of course, you won't take my husband and my perfect bloods (which we've had done a few times) to mean anything.
Fancy thinking veganism was the most dangerous thing teen girls face.
If it's indeed genetics, then being vegan will not be the most important factor and doesn't need you rallying against it.
I take it you don't think the NHS is misleading? Only they don't think veganism is dangerous and their pages on booze and drugs by contrast are fairly robust.

something as dangerous as vegetable soup

Of course I have no problem with children eating a healthy vegan meal.

I object to the indoctrination bit though.

@mustlovegin

How would you trace ‘any ill health

If a child decided to become vegan (or refused to eat meat) because of what they were taught at school and then became malnourished as a result, the school should be held accountable.

Schools should not be interfering with nutritional advice.

That didn’t answer my question - how would you trace it back to their lunch options not being meat laden? Schools teach nutritional advice, it’s part of the curriculum.

@mustlovegin

something as dangerous as vegetable soup

Of course I have no problem with children eating a healthy vegan meal.

I object to the indoctrination bit though.

What indoctrination? The one you invented at the idea of them having vegan lunch options three times per week?

@mustlovegin

How would you trace ‘any ill health

If a child decided to become vegan (or refused to eat meat) because of what they were taught at school and then became malnourished as a result, the school should be held accountable.

Schools should not be interfering with nutritional advice.

And also, following this logic, anyone who eats a high fat, high protein, high carb, high salt diet can also trace any ill health back to what they were taught at school.

People tried to indoctrinate me to eat meat as a child. There's a whole massive system set up to allow people to eat certain animals and have others as pets. I don't think a few accidentally vegan meals are going to indoctrinate anybody.

I take it you don't think the NHS is misleading

I respect the NHS and I think they do a great job. But there is no universal consensus that a vegan diet is appropriate for every individual, no. And advice changes all the time, anyway. You can ask different doctors (world-wide if you like) and you will get different opinions.

In my case, I have to go with blood results. That's all the proof I need.

And again, it's evident many people thrive on a vegan diet, and that's fine. But I'm not ok with the cult-like behaviour and evangelisation attempts. It's dangerous.

By the way the healthy living plate has been updated to include plant based sources of calcium etc.

www.nhs.uk/live-well/eat-well/vegetarian-and-vegan-diets-q-and-a/

Knock yourself out.

www.bhf.org.uk/informationsupport/support/healthy-living/healthy-eating/healthy-eating-toolkit/eatwell-plate

The horror.

@mustlovegin

I take it you don't think the NHS is misleading

I respect the NHS and I think they do a great job. But there is no universal consensus that a vegan diet is appropriate for every individual, no. And advice changes all the time, anyway. You can ask different doctors (world-wide if you like) and you will get different opinions.

In my case, I have to go with blood results. That's all the proof I need.

And again, it's evident many people thrive on a vegan diet, and that's fine. But I'm not ok with the cult-like behaviour and evangelisation attempts. It's dangerous.

What cult-like behaviour? What evangelisation? It’s a very short time ago people were pushing reformed turkey through the bars of the school playground so their kids didn’t have to eat a carrot, let’s not pretend vegans are the only ones with their share of evangelists.

And even At. Jamie Oliver does a few vegan recipes.
Clearly not as dangerous as turkey twizzlers.

We're a cult of two. I guess our false idols are lava cakes, Whitstable Bay and marmite.

@vimtosogood

Always ignored is the amount of carbon grass fields capture. It's estimated to be 1-2 tonnes per acre per year. An acre is not a large area. Meat is also more nutritious than plant matter and our bodies can better digest it. YABU to argue with vegans though. They won't listen. 86% of them go back to eating correctly within a year anyway.

😂😂😂 lunatic

Isn't it interesting how most of the meat defenders on here are only using examples of beef or occasionally lamb in the UK in their arguments, and ignoring

1. other much more commonly consumed products like chicken and pork
2. global farming practice (the environment has no borders)
3. The methane emissions of ruminants

As with politics or any perspectives, always do your research to backup your perspectives, as it then helps you to make an accurate and informed perspectives on why you prefer x over y ect

@nanbread, chicken and pork production can be a welfare nightmare, and the sources of feed need to be looked at, but they generally have a lower carbon footprint than beef and lamb.

If you stick to eating British (and probably most northern European - similar farming systems) beef and lamb, you will be eating meat with a much lower carbon footprint than the international average for those meats. As the vegans in this thread keep telling us, doing a little is better than doing nothing.

And I have not ignored methane at all: the 'carbon footprint' of meat is usually worked out on the basis of greenhouse gas equivalents, which include methane. There is a lot of argument about how to account for methane, because although it is a very potent warming gas, it cycles through the atmosphere within about 12 years.

[quote GrumpyMiddleAgedWoman]@nanbread, chicken and pork production can be a welfare nightmare, and the sources of feed need to be looked at, but they generally have a lower carbon footprint than beef and lamb.

If you stick to eating British (and probably most northern European - similar farming systems) beef and lamb, you will be eating meat with a much lower carbon footprint than the international average for those meats. As the vegans in this thread keep telling us, doing a little is better than doing nothing.

And I have not ignored methane at all: the 'carbon footprint' of meat is usually worked out on the basis of greenhouse gas equivalents, which include methane. There is a lot of argument about how to account for methane, because although it is a very potent warming gas, it cycles through the atmosphere within about 12 years.[/quote]
Again though, that’s not how the majority of us eat meat in the UK. Most of us are eating chicken (imported) five times a week and buying the absolute cheapest cut possible.

If you stick to eating British (and probably most northern European - similar farming systems) beef and lamb

I wonder if there is enough produced like this for everyone to eat like this.
Or would the inevitable welfare standards dip as they tried to keep up with demand?

Eating meat might be bad for the environment.

But eating meat is bad for humans in general
Think of how many more illnesses and cancers meat eaters get compared to vegans and vegetarians

@nanbread they are essential to arable farming too though. Their manure is an essential organic fertiliser. It really isn’t so easy to extract livestock farming and arable farming. If you are looking at emissions, chickens and pork convert their feed much more efficiently that sheep or cows in comparison to the meat provided.

A lot of your food (nearly all organic) will have been fertilised with manure or fish blood and bone meal. The last farm I managed had contracts with weetabix, the land was fertilised with chicken muck from the farm one mile down the road.

Just focusing on carbon emissions is a simplistic way of looking at things. Surely people can agree that, there are necessary benefits to livestock farming. It’s estimated that most arable farmed land only has 50 years of fertility left. Introducing livestock rotations reverses those numbers.

Globally there is unethical farming practices which I have no point denied. I’ve repeatedly said people should eat British meat. I only ever eat British meat, 95% of the time it is organic. I truly don’t think people know the implications of advocating for all livestock farming to end. You’ll end up with vast swathes of land covered in plastic like Almeria where I’d bet you get most of your food from.

I'm not quite sure what's being argued for here: are you and nanbread bothered about carbon (in which case, poultry is better) or biodiversity (in which case British beef and lamb are better) or welfare (beef and lamb win again, unless you buy free range)? Or you (as I suspect you are) arguing for no meat at all, even using extensive and sustainable systems which are good for biodiversity?

@mustlovegin

the school i work in does a vegan monday in the canteen now so everyone eats vegan that day. I think over time it will be only one day offering meat and one day fish and 3 days vegan

If a school needs to do this in order to keep costs down, logistics, simplicity, fair enough.

I would have a massive issue though if schools tried to convince children (or parents, for that matter) that veganism is healthier. They would be completely irresponsible and overstepping their remit (and should be held accountable for any ill health suffered by children -at the time or in the future- as a result) It would be akin to religious or political indoctrination. Utterly inappropriate.

Of course it would be utterly inappropriate for schools to educate pupils on what healthy eating looks like and they should instead serve turkey twizzelers and pizza everyday.

@GrumpyMiddleAgedWoman

I'm not quite sure what's being argued for here: are you and nanbread bothered about carbon (in which case, poultry is better) or biodiversity (in which case British beef and lamb are better) or welfare (beef and lamb win again, unless you buy free range)? Or you (as I suspect you are) arguing for no meat at all, even using extensive and sustainable systems which are good for biodiversity?

Is this addressed to me?

I’m not vegan, or even vegetarian, as I said above. What I’d like to see is a massive reduction in the sheer amount of meat and dairy consumed in (and imported to) the UK. The land can still be held with cattle, it’s just not slaughtered/overbred/inseminated at anything like what it is just now. I’d love people to be able to shop locally without price hikes, I’d love allotments to become a normal way to produce food instead of for hobbyists (I’m one of them).

I’d also love to see government taking a stand on industrial weedkillers and plastic use by supermarkets. I’d have artificial grass banned tomorrow. There are a million things I’d love to see changed.

But more than any of that, I’d love to see a reduction in the number of people who say ‘oh you don’t eat meat but you have a CAR?!’ because it’s just such a shit argument.