The hysterics in the global warming crowd want us to give up everything that makes modern life prosperous and worth living. We are to give up having more than one, or at most, two children. We are to give up dogs and cats. We are to give up flying–except Al Gore. We are to give up driving cars, other than tiny unsafe vehicles. We are to stop importing food from poor countries around the world. We are to give up air conditioning. We are to give up most forms of obtaining energy–oil drilling, coal mining, oil shale, etc–to save the polar bears that are increasing in number, while alternatives won’t have the ability now to make up the difference for decades. And now, the UN head hysteric wants us to give meat to save the planet. From the story:
People will need to turn vegetarian if the world is to conquer climate change, according to a leading authority on global warming. In an interview with The Times, Lord Stern of Brentford said: “Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world’s resources. A vegetarian diet is better.” Direct emissions of methane from cows and pigs is a significant source of greenhouse gases. Methane is 23 times more powerful than carbon dioxide as a global warming gas. Lord Stern, the author of the influential 2006 Stern Review on the cost of tackling global warming, said that a successful deal at the Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December would lead to soaring costs for meat and other foods that generate large quantities of greenhouse gases.
These people don’t give a fig about the poor. Moreover, they want to make most of us less prosperous by mechanisms that they, however, will be able to avoid because these things never stop the elite from living extravagantly. (I recall a sumptuous UN hunger conference being reported about in S. Africa, with lobster and all the trimmings served less than three miles from people who were hungry.) And there is no way that President Obama would give up his hamburger runs.
I have an idea for these ideological nihilists that can be expressed in three simple words. No, make it five: Go. Away. Leave. Us. Alone.
October 26th, 2009 | 9:37 pm
“These people don’t give a fig about the poor.”
Wes, I’ve been pretty snotty toward your anti-Obama stuff, so I will give you props here: You absolutely nailed this one. The whole vegan/vegetarian/animal rights crowd has a huge undercurrent of snobbery.
Every time somebody tells me it “doesn’t cost that much more” to go organic, or vegan, or cage free, or whatever, I apply the “single mother with two teenage boys” test. Would the extra cost of the item make a significant dent in a just-scraping-by budget? And is there a demonstrable improvement in nutrition? Not to mention, will the kids eat the tofurkey anyway?
It always seems that these folks either don’t have kids, or they just have kids so they have someone who doesn’t have the option of telling them to take their ideology down the street.
October 26th, 2009 | 9:39 pm
Padraig: Disagreement isn’t snotty. You’re cool.
October 26th, 2009 | 11:24 pm
“The whole vegan/vegetarian/animal rights crowd has a huge undercurrent of snobbery.”
This isn’t the vegan/vegetarian/animal rights crowd. (I’m in there somewheres.) This isn’t even the mainstream environmental crowd. This is the global warming group that has hijacked environmentalism.
October 27th, 2009 | 1:04 am
~Congratulations Lord Stern. It’s good to see some sense coming out of the media. Let’s face it, obesity rates are out of control, hundreds of thousand of hectares of forests are being cleared for cattle grazing. Livestock clearly affects greenhouse gas emissions as per the UN’s FAO report, ‘Livestock’s long shadow’. Everyone would benefit from eating less meat – especially the unhealthy and the obese. I can’t wait for meat prices to sky-rocket so people finally realise the true costs of their diet.
October 27th, 2009 | 1:16 am
Jonte: Obesity isn’t caused by meat, but by processed sugar and overeating.
The price of plant agriculture will rise too, you know. Think of all the gas and diesel to run the tractors and combines, and the trucks to haul it to market. Musn’t have that!
October 27th, 2009 | 1:17 am
Vegetarianism, on moral principles, is an attack upon Christianity. Jesus killed to eat. He killed fish and grilled them. He apparently ate slaughtered animals as a part of feasts, as well as drank wine. To argue for vegetarianism is to argue that there is a mode of life that is superior to Jesus’s. The problem this creates for Christians is obvious: it claims that through vegetarianism folks can be better than the Saviour of the World. Nope, don’t think so.
It is one thing to argue for the kind treatment of livestock and poultry and even fish and their swift butchering. Of course that is required. But it is something else indeed to say that they should not be slain and eaten at all. The five thousand weren’t strengthened by being fed bread and soy rolls.
But the problem is that it looks like that Copenhagen treaty will be signed, and as it promotes vegetarianism it will also fuel the culture’s anti-Christian fires.
October 27th, 2009 | 2:45 am
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Tim Ness, Doris Sampson. Doris Sampson said: Radical Environmentalism: Make Food Prices Rise to Save the Planet … http://bit.ly/1zNdb0 [...]
October 27th, 2009 | 7:25 am
As you mentioned in the article, we all have to give up flying except for Al Gore.
This whole global warming nonsense is just more of an attempt to further divide the class systems. The rich can continue to get away with their carbon-spewing lifestyles because they can afford to buy their way out of it. It’s the middle and lower classes that are penalized most by any legislation purported to be about saving the planet.
October 27th, 2009 | 10:33 am
bmmg39: “This isn’t the vegan/vegetarian/animal rights crowd. (I’m in there somewheres.) This isn’t even the mainstream environmental crowd. This is the global warming group that has hijacked environmentalism.”
Gotta split some hairs with you on this one. The radical AR’s and radical environmentalists are pretty much the same small group of people as far as I can tell. I don’t really think Al Gore deserves to be put in that category.
The radicals have used the strategy of trying to take over legitimate lefty outfits. The Sierra Club has had to fight off both AR and environmental extremist factions. (Sierra Club also had to fight off a bizarre takeover attempt by right-wing anti-immigration folks.) Some SPCA groups and local Humane Societies have been taken over by AR folks, usually to their detriment and to the detriment of the animals.
There’s plenty of middle ground on global warming, and I’m in there somewhere. Basically I’m not sure that humans are causing the glaciers to melt, but I don’t think it makes much sense to hold a blowtorch up to the glacier either. I don’t see the radical environmentalists pushing me any further than that.
October 27th, 2009 | 10:43 am
There is a vast difference between conserving the environment we live in, and the hysteria of humans causing global warming (AGW).
Having spent much time looking into this AGW, the hysterics arguments fall apart when shown the last 8-9 years of global temps have flattened or dropped, while sea ice is at near record high levels. More like an attempt to get more grant $’s, to fuel more hysteria.
October 27th, 2009 | 10:59 am
Wesley:
Does milord eat a vegetarian diet? I bet he doesn’t and neither do the other vegan hysterics. There’s a lord of the manor attitude that’s always turned me off.
The strident histrionics really irks me because milord callously disregards that meat is the best source of protein; plants don’t have any
xavier
October 27th, 2009 | 11:50 am
Mike Linton: “Vegetarianism, on moral principles, is an attack upon Christianity.”
I like Jesus. I like vegetarianism. You’re acting with the standard persecution complex right now, much like those who begin writing angry letters when the greeter at the computer store wishes them “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.” Try to relax.
padraig: “The radical AR’s and radical environmentalists are pretty much the same small group of people as far as I can tell.”
Not really, as we learn from this blog. The most recent example is some members of the global-warming crowd telling us we can have pets only if we eat them after they die.
October 27th, 2009 | 1:48 pm
I saw a comment on The Corner saying he wasn’t. But these people at the top never live what they preach.
October 27th, 2009 | 4:01 pm
bmmg39: “Not really, as we learn from this blog. The most recent example is some members of the global-warming crowd telling us we can have pets only if we eat them after they die.”
Well, you’re making my point that the global-warming crowd isn’t the same as the radical environmentalists and AR’s. Hard-core AR’s are opposed to pet ownership, calling it slavery. (Groups like PETA backed off that stand because calling pet owners slave masters tended to cut into their contribution base.) And I don’t think the Earth Firsters are out there eating their dogs.
I think the difference is that the global warming people see that as their main cause. The AR’s and radical environmentalists use global warming as a wedge issue to push their more extreme agendas.
October 28th, 2009 | 9:49 am
Talk about hysterics!!? Wesley thinks that giving up meat and that third car would make life “not worth living”. He must not have much of a life!
Meat consumption is wasteful of resources including water and land, not to mention secondary waste like the increased medical costs associated with eating a meat-based diet. We’d all be better off giving it up!
There are entire cultures representing millions of people who have lived and thrived for centuries without meat, which is enough evidence that humans do not “need” it to satisy their taste buds or to survive and thrive. wesley should try and tell the Indian people
that their lives are not worth living! What a joke!
In fact, the evidence weighs heavily in the other direction: the hazards of a meat and dairy diet and the benefits of a vegan diet are well known in the medical and scientific community. Health, animal cruelty, and environmental issues could be alleviated if everyone ate a vegan diet.
* U.N. scientists have determined that raising animals for food generates more greenhouse-gas emissions than all the cars, SUVs, trucks, and planes in the world combined.
* Researchers at the University of Chicago determined that switching to a vegan diet is more effective in countering climate change than switching from a standard car to a Toyota Prius.
* According to Environmental Defense, if every American substituted vegetarian foods for chicken at just one meal per week, the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more than a half-million cars off U.S. roads.
And it’s just plain barbaric to breed, confine, and slaughter animals for food. Give up meat and dairy for your health, for the animals, and for the environment!
October 28th, 2009 | 12:12 pm
Geez Patty, I didn’t think there was such a thing as vegan Kool-aid, and apparently you’ve been drinking it by the gallon!
All your points are standard vegangelical/animal rights talking points. I’m not going to refute them, that’s been done plenty elsewhere. I’ll just say that human (and animal) welfare depends on us cultivating and generating our food from a wide variety of food sources. Veganism greatly restricts the variety of food sources. That’s the problem.
For instance, suppose you live in a prairie ecosystem (like me). Vast amounts of grasses around that humans cannot digest. Yet if livestock eats that grass, it’s converted into meat & dairy that humans can very easily digest. We have made a non-food source, the grasses, into a food source. That’s what vegans want us to give up.
If you’d like the historical perspective on how humans developed our food sources as we spread from Africa, I highly recommend the book “Before the Dawn” by Nicholas Wade. It is apolitical and shows why some populations do the meat/dairy thing and some do not.
http://www.amazon.com/Before-Dawn-Recovering-History-Ancestors/dp/014303832X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256746204&sr=1-1
October 28th, 2009 | 1:14 pm
I think the most dangerous food is meat as it destroys humanity and leads to wars and destroys all ultimately.
Obesity & Magic Pill :
I personally recognize that wheat is a far better diet than meat on the ground it normally exits body with ease and rapidity, and we are well aware that our heath depends upon smooth metabolism and blood stream associated with the immune system and how important our daily workout is, as well.
I still think the critical conditions mostly come from breach of our immune system, and the food that stays long in the body is more likely to become a source where germs, bacterias, viruses and the like multiply.
Sounds outlandish, but wheat might be a principal “clean and healthy” food that has led western society to the most decent culture of all.
Disadvantages of meat consumption :
1. The food that stays long in the body looks more likely to become a source where germs, bacterias and the like multiply, which even gives birth to critical conditions involving prostate cancer.
2. The consumption of meat proved lethal as earlier this year, the expansive, long-term release concluded about a third of more than 500,000 Americans aged 50-70 with this behavior tends to wind up with premature fatality caused by cancer, hypertension and more.
3. The in-take of pork raises risks of catching swine flue and its mutation, costing around the initially estimated $2trillion dollars word-wide and endangering recovery,
(( Genes included in the new swine flu have been circulating undetected in pigs for at least a decade, according to researchers who have sequenced the genomes of more than 50 samples of the virus. The findings suggest that in the future, pig populations will need to be monitored more closely for emerging influenza viruses, reported a team led by Rebecca Garten of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in a report released by the journal Science.))
Still, media downplay this fact out of small thinking to protect meat industry.
4. All but media influenced by meat industry blame calorie for overweight or obesity rather than fat, I still think Fat equals Fat by definition and common sense.
5. Hot dogs are often associated with food-borne illness. Though other food items carry listeria , FDA (Food and Drug Administration) studies have shown a high level of the harmful bacteria on hot dogs, processed meat and ready-to-eat meat products. And consuming hot dogs and other processed meats increases the risk of cancer
The class-action consumer fraud lawsuit underway in New Jersey is based on a report from the American Institute for Cancer Research.
Its findings included this fact: Consuming one 50-gram serving of processed meat (about the amount in one hot dog) every day increases the risk of colorectal cancer, on average, by 21 percent.
Nitrites, used to keep hot dogs fresh, are the main culprit, according to the suit.
While nitrites are commonly found in many green vegetables, especially spinach, celery and green lettuce, the consumption of vegetables appears to be effective in reducing the risk of cancer. Because these vegetables also contain Vitamin C and D, which serve to inhibit the formation of carcinogenic compounds, they actually reduce your cancer risk.
6. Two thirds of Americans are overweight or obese, which branch into so many different kinds of diseases, excess body fat increases risk for numerous cancers, costing up to $147 billion a year.
7. America needs to put focus on a sustainable energy industry to become a lead exporter, in place of a fast food business where the overall loss outstrips gain more than known, from my stance.
Provided the average temperature is getting higher, accordingly all forms of germs, bacterias, viruses, and influenza etc are more likely to multiply.
Some skeptics say the warning against hazards of climate change is overstated, but judging from more frequent and widespread outbreaks of e. coli, salmonella, and bird, swine flu cases endangering human lives and economic recovery seriously, some prompt measures need to be taken, I guess.
Also, Breathing toxic chemicals in the outdoor air exposes all Americans to a lifetime cancer risk at least 10 times greater than the level considered acceptable under federal law, shows new data released by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Thank You !
October 28th, 2009 | 4:19 pm
hsr601: “I think the most dangerous food is meat as it destroys humanity and leads to wars and destroys all ultimately.”
OK, you lost this argument before you even starting cutting and pasting your propaganda points.
Humanity has NOT, as near as I can tell, been destroyed. Wars are fought for a lot of reasons, mostly territory (which is very directly related to all food production, not just meat). If you were talking about oil instead of meat I might be in agreement with you.
I’m not going to address your specific points, other than to say that your information about H1N1 is dangerously inaccurate. Check the CDC’s web site if you want information that hasn’t been warped for ideological purposes.
Also, your points about food-borne illness are particularly distorted. The most likely way to get a food-borne illness is to eat raw food of any kind:
http://www.healthday.com/Article.asp?AID=631699
See hot dogs on that list anywhere?
Humanity’s biggest problem is not to drown in the byproducts of our own success. Moderation is called for, but radical reduction of our food sources is not. Our omnivorism is critical to our success as a species.
October 29th, 2009 | 10:04 am
No responses. Must have been “Vegan Drop-In Day.”
October 29th, 2009 | 6:41 pm
I do not get how vegans can say eating meat in general is unhealthy.
Sure, if you eat hamburgers and pizza all the time you’re probably going to get fat and unhealthy, but if a vegan just eats candied apples and oreos all day they will be unhealthy too.
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