The ‘Enormously Complex’ Issue Of The Eco Diet
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Cheri Shankar wrote a short piece for HuffPo that asks, “Can you be a meat-eating environmentalist?”
The article concludes by suggesting that no, meat-eating is so damaging to the environment that any self-proclaimed environmentalist would stop doing it.
For example, she says:
“Animal product consumption destroys rainforests, the rivers, streams and oceans, the air we breathe; it perpetuates world hunger and institutionalizes the suffering and outright misery for billions of animals. And animal feed is grown by intensive farming operations that use massive quantities of pesticides and herbicides. In addition, half of our potable water in the U.S. is used in raising animals for food.”
She cites the authoritative and extensive 2½-year examination conducted by the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production, which recommends that we “replace the inflexible and broken system [to deal with farm waste] that exists today, to protect Americans from the adverse environmental and human health hazards”. The system needs replacement. It’s broken. I don’t see how someone could, in good conscience, financially support a broken system that has “adverse environmental and human health hazards” when they don’t have to.
But apparently vegan Erik Marcus has decided to defend some meat-eating environmentalists by declaring that the problem is “enormously complex” and shouldn’t be reduced to simple and catchy slogans. For example, he says:
“Suppose you follow a vegan diet plus one cheeseburger a year: this clearly makes you a meat eater, but it would be absurd to claim that that one burger has any significant impact on the environment.”
Yeah, Ok, but I’m pretty sure I’ve met that guy. And he calls himself a vegetarian. As much as it irritates me, he identifies as a vegetarian.
In fact, I’ve met a ton of people who eat meat rarely, yet call themselves vegetarian. They’re not technically vegetarian or vegan. But they think they are. They act like they are. They buy products marketed to vegetarians. They attend events held for vegetarians. They pat themselves on the back when vegetarianism is praised. And they’d agree with the statement that “you can’t be a meat-eating environmentalist.”
So, for all practical purposes, Erik is missing the point.
Next, he attacks Shankar on the grounds that “there’s an enormous difference in both resource demands and pollution when you compare red meat to poultry.” He’s right. It’s more environmentally damaging to consume dairy or beef than chicken or eggs. It’s even more true for rabbits. In fact, a number of “environmentalists” are calling for an increase in rabbit-meat consumption along with a decrease in larger animal meat consumption.
But is this really a fair argument?
We all know that when it comes to suffering, calorie-for-calorie the reverse is true: eggs are worse than beef. If you care about animal welfare, it’s better to consume organic, grass-fed beef than chicken. So where does that leave the ethical consumer? Do they have to choose between the environment or animal welfare? Of course not! It’s a false dilemma. The ethical consumer has a far better option: veganism.
But, listen, if you want to eat animals – like rabbits – and call yourself an environmentalist, I’ll let you have your eco label. I won’t say, “You can’t be a meat-eating environmentalist.” But I’ll give you another label: bunny-butcher.*
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*Vegan Soapbox doesn’t allow obscenities, thus bunny-butcher is a placeholder for any and every nasty insult you can think of.
There’s an interesting post over at the Health Journal Club that makes the case that people should just not eat anything that wasn’t a food 100 years ago. Gets rid of the aspartame, bleached GM flour, high fructose corn syrup garbage they try to pass off as food these days. If interested you can read on it here,
http://healthjournalclub.blogspot.com/2010/01/100-year-diet.html
What about the part where he says that no studies have shown that meat production requires more resources than vegetable (as opposed to grain) production. I had never heard that before. Is he wrong?
Jenkins, what he says is actually:
If potatoes count as a vegetable in Marcus’s mind, then I doubt that poultry-rearing is more efficient than potato-farming. Why? Because potatoes can be even more efficient to grow than some grains.
But what about vegetables besides potatoes? It seems to me that he’s saying if we can justify eating vegan foods that are more environmentally destructive than grains (non-potato vegetables? processed vegan ice creams and such?), then we cannot criticize meat from a purely environmental perspective.
Jenkins – Did you read my post above? Because if you did, you’d see that I did not “criticize meat from a purely environmental perspective.”
But what’s the real point here? The point is not about complexities in environmental consumption choices. The point is that as a general principle, it makes sense to criticize specific acts as anti-environment. Saying that “You cannot be a meat-eating environmentalist” is exactly like saying “You cannot be an Hummer-driving environmentalist.” Sure, someone somewhere is driving a Hummer and saving the planet at the same time by carpooling, recycling, and eating a plant-based diet, but generally speaking, Hummer drivers are not environmentalists.
Criticizing Shankar’s article on the basis that some modest meat-eating isn’t all that environmentally damaging is just completely missing the point.
Yeah, I see what you’re saying now. I just thought that was interesting that vegetables could be as resource intensive as meat production. I’d only heard about the grain comparison.
I live on a street which has declared itself (actually, a few residents declared it, not all or even half…) a “green” street, yet they hold meat cooking contests. Nothing like bonding over dead animals which used a ton of resources in their short, tortured, miserable lives.
Being vegan is so easy and beneficial for humans, non-human animals, and the environment. I really don’t understand why it hasn’t become a baseline for environmentalists. In comparison the rain barrels on their houses seem silly, considering all the water that went into the production of their meat and dairy…
As you might guess, I haven’t made any friends since moving here.
Thank you so much for this post and for “getting” my blog! I wrote the Huffington Post blog, “Can you be a Meat Eating Environmentalist” as a short, polite rant in response to my many dear, progressive, politically engaged, self proclaimed environmentalist friends here in Los Angeles who are unable to kick the meat and dairy habit. I was not attempting a scientific, data driven dissertation on where one falls on the environmentalist scale. How a Prius driving, non littering, solar powered home owner, one hamburger a year consumer compares to a bus-taking, garden-growing, yurt-dwelling chicken only eating enviro. Generally speaking, most people eat a fair amount of meat. Enough to drive an industry to produce billions of animals a year for food. So it is easy to conclude that meat eating has a deeply profound effect on the environment.
I also pointed out in the comments section on my blog that going vegan was a practical solution as opposed to taking cars off the road or going off the “grid” because right now, transportation and electricity are what allows society to function. Mass produced alternative energy sources are in the future. Veganism is an action that could instantaneously help reduce pollution and greenhouse gases today.
Glad to have come across The Vegan Soapbox. Will be reading all the time now! Thanks!