To wonder if veganism really is the answer?

[RubyFruitSunday]

Lots of my friendship circle have transitioned to be vegan/vegetarian recently. I'm not, but we do choose to include very few animal products in our diet and eat a predominantly plant based diet. But sometimes I have a hankering for a steak or some nice cheese and so I indulge. However my friends think this means I'm part of the problem and it should be all or nothing.

I have a few issues with this but I dont know if I'm just clinging to them as justification to keep my animal based treats.

1. Animals eat other animals and we are animals. So I dont think eating meat is morally wrong from this perspective. I do object to factory farming and animals living miserable lives though. But its hard to tell what comes from where sometimes.

2. What would become of the English countryside without farming? I'm guessing a lot of the land currently used to graze animals wouldnt be suitable to grow other foodstuffs so would end up being built up? I'm not sure I like the idea of that either.

I'd love to know others thoughts!

Everyone always talks about food miles on these threads without actually looking at the data. Most emissions from food come from the production, not transport, stage and imported plants are better than animal products from animals raised and killed locally:

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.”

An alien reading this thread to learn about Earth eating habits would think that only vegetarians/vegans eat processed foods or food flown from overseas, while meat-eaters always stick to locally sourced food and cook every meal from scratch

However in my experience meat eaters aren't the ones lecturing all and sundry about the environment and food. The point the poster was making was that some vegans bang on about how their eating choices are better for the environment simply because they aren't eating meat, when often they actually aren't.

I guess a person's motivation for going vegan is the key. Animal welfare, totally get it. A varied diet can be achieved but it does require effort. As far as I can see this will involve products produced from a wide range of environments.

If vegans are also environmentally conscious I imagine it's a bit more complicated.

How do you eat a varied fully nutritional diet from only local produced foods using seasonal products only that is vegan? I'd actually buy a book that shows how to do this, does one exist?

@SquirrelG

An alien reading this thread to learn about Earth eating habits would think that only vegetarians/vegans eat processed foods or food flown from overseas, while meat-eaters always stick to locally sourced food and cook every meal from scratch

However in my experience meat eaters aren't the ones lecturing all and sundry about the environment and food. The point the poster was making was that some vegans bang on about how their eating choices are better for the environment simply because they aren't eating meat, when often they actually aren't.

Rather like women 'bang on' about female rights? Or any other equality rights issue. This is no different. It's about an abuse of power.

I am a proud banger-on-er. Seriously the world needs more people banging on about what's right.

No-one refers to "cow farms". I have never, ever heard the phrase before. If you talked like that around here, the wave of laughter would literally carry on your little gust of superiority so far that you would end up in the sea.

I agree. I'm in NZ and I have never heard anyone say "cow farm" and was a bit taken aback to see it here. People either farm cattle, or they have dairy farms. Cow farm might be something a particularly ignorant city dweller would say, but no-one else would use that term

Rather like women 'bang on' about female rights? Or any other equality rights issue. This is no different. It's about an abuse of power.

I am a proud banger-on-er. Seriously the world needs more people banging on about what's right.

I can't be bothered with people who "bang on" about anything, female rights included. I'm quite capable of making up my own mind on any subject and will not be lectured to about my choices by anyone. Also, what gives you the idea that what you "bang on" about is right - it's only your opinion.

Ahh the shaky moral high ground of new vegan /eco zealots. No doubt it’s hard to see your face over their Chinese manufactured mobiles, Vietnamese clothing, multitude of cheap plastic shite gatherering dust in their homes. Not to mention apples from New Zealand, soy from Chile, grapes from South Africa and beans from Kenya… Sooooo virtuous they aren’t..

The UK and US eat far more meat than most European countries.

@Newgirls you're wrong there (or at least, half wrong, it's true for the US). UK meat consumption (measured per capita) is below the EU average, and is only two-thirds of the US.

@OfstedOffred

I think the diet that is environmentally ideal must be so different country to country.

Would it actually be possible (long term) to eat a nutritionally complete/balanced vegan diet in the UK without resorting to stuff flown in that's been farmed intensively in and in environmentally damaging way (lots of nut and other alternative milks etc).

As you say, what the land is suitable for in different countries has to be considered.

I dont think "we must all be vegan" is the answer.

I think we rely too much on animal products and its great if we can all reduce. But we dont have to be extreme about it.

Yes, it absolutely is different in different places.

I have a good friend that lives in the North, above the tree line by a fair way. Most foods are flown in or barged in at great environmental cost and huge expense, think over 15 pounds for a block of cheese.

The traditional diet there based on the land mainly consists of fish, seal, caribou, birds, and occasionally whale or bear. The amount of plants in the diet is minimal.

@berlinbabylon

An alien reading this thread to learn about Earth eating habits would think that only vegetarians/vegans eat processed foods or food flown from overseas, while meat-eaters always stick to locally sourced food and cook every meal from scratch

no, it's because vegans say that being plant-based is better for the planet, but actually getting dairy milk from the UK (down the road in many cases) is better than getting oat or almond milk from overseas

it's not arguing that people all buy lovely organic milk

Yes, I'm not sure why people don't get this. No one is saying all meat eaters have a sustainable diet. They are saying that being a vegan doesn't mean people have a sustainable diet.

That is it's not the meat eating that's the problem when you get down to brass tacks.

The other thing people don't seem to realize is that when farming is mixed, the different parts work together. If people are going to grow crops, it is often best to rotate them, and if you have a grass rotation with some kind of herbivore on it, it actually enriches the land while also providing food. And avoiding a certain amount of fuel based fertilizer and the need for mechanical application (more fuel.)

That is more efficient in terms of providing fuel for people from the same amount of land than just having a grass rotation.

Animals like pigs and chickens can also make use of agricultural waste, there were whole regions with agricultural economies based on apples, milk, and pork, because the waste from the first two industries were used in the third.

It's when you start layering up these kinds of ecosystem relationships that you get more from the land in a way that is much less damaging to it.

Everyone always talks about food miles on these threads without actually looking at the data. Most emissions from food come from the production, not transport, stage and imported plants are better than animal products from animals raised and killed locally:

This is a very shallow understanding of the idea of eating locally though, it's predicated on factory type agriculture. it also ignores issues around food security and social justice.

@WhistlersandJugglers

People then would have been using the manure from their one cow and hens to fertilise their vegetable patches too so it was a much more closed system.

Plus bone meal from the aforementioned slaughtered pig. Nothing gets wasted.

@MangyInseam well nearly every chicken and pig in the U.K. is being raised in a factory type way:

www.wwf.org.uk/sites/default/files/2017-10/WWF_AppetiteForDestruction_Summary_Report_SignOff.pdf

“Today, protein-rich soy is such an important feed ingredient that the average European consumes approximately 61kg of soy per year, largely indirectly through the animal products that they eat like chicken, pork, salmon, cheese, milk and eggs. In 2010, the British livestock industry needed an area the size of Yorkshire to produce the soy used in feed. And if the global demand for animal products grows as anticipated, it’s estimated that soy production would need to increase by nearly 80% to feed all the animals destined for our plates.”

But food that comes from the bodies of grass fed animals is not the environmental answer either:

www.tabledebates.org/node/12335

This report finds that better management of grass-fed livestock, while worthwhile in and of itself, does not offer a significant solution to climate change as only under very specific conditions can they help sequester carbon. This sequestering of carbon is even then small, time-limited, reversible and substantially outweighed by the greenhouse gas emissions these grazing animals generate. The report concludes that although there can be other benefits to grazing livestock - solving climate change isn’t one of them.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.independent.ie/business/farming/forestry-enviro/blow-for-grass-fed-beef-as-new-report-suggests-its-part-of-the-climate-problem-not-solution-36209259.html

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.

link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-020-02673-x

“Grazing systems emit greenhouse gases, which can, under specific agro-ecological conditions, be partly or entirely offset by soil carbon sequestration. However, any sequestration is time-limited, reversible, and at a global level outweighed by emissions from grazing systems. Thus, grazing systems are globally a net contributor to climate change.”

I've been vegan a long time and I really feel that any steps in the right direction should be encouraged. No such thing as a perfect vegan or a perfect solution.

(I'm moving towards a whole food plant based diet as of course you can be vegan and live on chips and skittles! Certainly not necessarily healthy!)

The animal cruelty is hideous though. What we see in the English farming countryside is animals who are taken huge advantage of (because they can't object). Their babies are removed at a few hours old. Castrated without anaesthetic. They are killed when at a fraction of their natural life- really still babies themselves. It's not lovely at all behind the scenes.

Without this, some of the land could be re-wilded and we could see a huge variety of wildlife return. Both plants and animals. I think this would be much more preferable, though I agree there's no perfect solution.

@MargotMoo Great explanation ⭐️.

I also disagree with people stating that the air miles of some vegetables are pretty much worse than eating local meat. As you say, a quick look shows that's not true as environmental impact of meat just is worse, but The other point here is the animals are killed unnecessarily. If people had to look into the eyes of the animal just before it was killed, I think they'd say the avocado which was imported by air is less harmful.

(Especially as considering we are prob all typing these responses on smart phones which I'm pretty sure are terrible for the environment and have parts imported from China via America ).

@berlinbabylon

Unfortunately getting cows milk from down the road isn't better than oat milk or almond milk environmentally. Check out the BBC article on this. Shows clear graphs to show cows milk is worse than all plant milk.

Also cows milk is hideously cruel. I emailed Sainsburys, Tesco and Yeo Valley, all confirmed the newborn calves are permanently removed from their mothers within 24-72 hours after birth.

If you watch the video of that you will see how heartbreaking it is. Happens again year after year as cows are mammals like us, they produce milk not because they are cows, but because they are mammals.
(I used to live in the middle of farming country so have seen much of this first hand 😱😭.)

[quote kikisparks]@MangyInseam well nearly every chicken and pig in the U.K. is being raised in a factory type way:

www.wwf.org.uk/sites/default/files/2017-10/WWF_AppetiteForDestruction_Summary_Report_SignOff.pdf

“Today, protein-rich soy is such an important feed ingredient that the average European consumes approximately 61kg of soy per year, largely indirectly through the animal products that they eat like chicken, pork, salmon, cheese, milk and eggs. In 2010, the British livestock industry needed an area the size of Yorkshire to produce the soy used in feed. And if the global demand for animal products grows as anticipated, it’s estimated that soy production would need to increase by nearly 80% to feed all the animals destined for our plates.”

But food that comes from the bodies of grass fed animals is not the environmental answer either:

www.tabledebates.org/node/12335

This report finds that better management of grass-fed livestock, while worthwhile in and of itself, does not offer a significant solution to climate change as only under very specific conditions can they help sequester carbon. This sequestering of carbon is even then small, time-limited, reversible and substantially outweighed by the greenhouse gas emissions these grazing animals generate. The report concludes that although there can be other benefits to grazing livestock - solving climate change isn’t one of them.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.independent.ie/business/farming/forestry-enviro/blow-for-grass-fed-beef-as-new-report-suggests-its-part-of-the-climate-problem-not-solution-36209259.html

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.

link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-020-02673-x

“Grazing systems emit greenhouse gases, which can, under specific agro-ecological conditions, be partly or entirely offset by soil carbon sequestration. However, any sequestration is time-limited, reversible, and at a global level outweighed by emissions from grazing systems. Thus, grazing systems are globally a net contributor to climate change.”[/quote]
Why would you think eating as much animal product as we do now is ok? No one has suggested that. We know that's not a really a sustainable goal in most climates.

And for that matter if we are assuming people to continue to farm as they do now, eating a vegan diet is also very non-sustainable, barely better than the standard western diet. So you haven't offered an answer.

This is exactly the problem with these kinds of analysis. They basically say, this is shit, and then tell us that we should do this other thing which is also shit.

There is no agriculture that is completely without consequence. How could there be? But the idea is as close to a closed system as possible and that is not a plant only system.

[quote headspin10]@MargotMoo Great explanation ⭐️.

I also disagree with people stating that the air miles of some vegetables are pretty much worse than eating local meat. As you say, a quick look shows that's not true as environmental impact of meat just is worse, but The other point here is the animals are killed unnecessarily. If people had to look into the eyes of the animal just before it was killed, I think they'd say the avocado which was imported by air is less harmful.

(Especially as considering we are prob all typing these responses on smart phones which I'm pretty sure are terrible for the environment and have parts imported from China via America ). [/quote]
Well, I don't know. A great many farmers on small farms eat their animals that they care for and have good relationships with. I keep chickens currently, and while I can't say I spend time staring into their eyes (they'd be quick to try and give me a peck) I'm rather fond of them and try and make sure they can live a natural life, but I also eat them.

The kind of sentiment you are expressing tends to come from people who live in cities, in my experience.

There is a real romatisization of the lives of "free" wild animals that goes on it seems to me, which allows people to believe they are living wonderful lives in the wild before succumbing to a peaceful old age. This is simply not the case. The majority of wild animals have quite a short life. Many die before reaching adulthood, and many have a fairly short adulthood. The maximum age animals reach in places like zoos are rarely achieved in the wild, with rare exceptions for animals like elephants. Most of the deaths are not nice, there are really two options - fast and brutal (being killed and eaten or a massive accident), or slow and awful (disease, injury, starvation, exposure.)

@MangyInseam

Yeah, I know there is no perfect solution. I grew up in the middle of nowhere in Devon, surrounded by farms, with a sheep farm next door. I agree that lots of people who live in cities are detached from farming life, but the realities aren't nice. I don't disagree that farmers care for their animals, but ultimately they send them to be killed unnecessarily for their own gain (money).

'Nature red in tooth and claw' is of course true, but modern animal farming methods are by and large both hideous and unnecessary. Nature is cruel but what we do as humans when we use animals for our own ends is much worse. (Also much worse for the environment.)

I recently saw a program where they contrasted beef burgers and vegan burgers. And the beef burger won on nutritional grounds as the vegan "beef" was so processed and has much higher fat to try to get the mouthful right.

@GettingStuffed

I recently saw a program where they contrasted beef burgers and vegan burgers. And the beef burger won on nutritional grounds as the vegan "beef" was so processed and has much higher fat to try to get the mouthful right.

Well yes but it isn't made of the flesh of a dead animal, just like any diet its fine for vegans to eat processed food as part of a balanced diet. Just as if someone ate salty, carcinogenic bacon and sausages every day it'd be unhealthy, so is eating some vegan subs. I eat meat but the lack of comprehension from some on why someone might prefer to eat vegan foods, and finds it weird for some reason unless they eat an absolutely perfect diet its an argument to eat rotting corpse.

Veganism is a luxury belief system. It's something that's only available to the wealthiest group of people in the world. (By which I mean westerners, who aren't necessarily rich by western standards but certainly are compared to most of the world.) And it's largely utter bollox that involves eating tonnes of highly processed food that's nutritionally lacking, not actually particularly environmentally friendly and utterly unsustainable if all 7bln of us somehow had the financial means to eat that way.

I am someone who knows I can never risk a vegan diet. I have a strong family history of pernicious anaemia and a vegan, or even vegetarian, diet would be incredibly dangerous for me. Dairy and eggs (along with fruit and vegetables) are essentially my staple foods, though I eat at least a portion of basic carbs and meat/foul/fish every day. I can't honestly fully convey how day to day amazing I feel. I'm in my 40s, athletically fit, have easy access to ultra endurance at high intensity, have muscle definition that you can see through most of my clothes, have excellent end range strength (ie healthy flexibility). And I'm still improving, getting faster, stronger, more flexible rather than slowing down despite my age. Despite my low body fat levels, I still have a full face, clear skin, shiny hair, great teeth and strong nails.

Conversely pretty much all vegans I know are deeply unhealthy. Either very under weight or skinny fat, ie desperately lacking in muscle. Poor hair, dull skin, often clearly somewhat anaemic. Which isn't to say that all meat and dairy eaters are healthy, we know most people aren't. But the idea that a vegan diet is inherently healthy is such utter bollox. It asks us to deny the obvious evidence that we can plainly see. Very few vegan people are fit, strong and healthy. Some are, but that takes enormous amounts of planning and the vast majority just don't do that.

Couldn't agree with you more @trancepants

What I find hilarious is vegans describing their diet as natural. It's the most unnatural diet around. Fake meat made in a factory, fake cheese made in a factory, tropical fruit flown all around the world. Endless supplements and man made foods

@Comedycook
That's like saying all meat eaters are healthy! There are a kaleidoscope of vegan diets. From chips and skittles to whole food plant based, beans, pulses, tonnes of veg and seeds which you can easily research is one of the healthiest diets out there.

@trancepants Your first paragraph is completely wrong. There are vast swathes of the world who eat a mostly vegan diet with occasional meat or fish, when they can get it. These are some of the poorest communities.

Many vegans eat processed food- processed food is not great whether meat or vegan. Many vegans dong touch the stuff.