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this post was submitted on 02 Dec 2023
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Whataboutism doesn't super duper help with the problem of meat.
Like just looking at land usage, 80% of agricultural land is used for live stock or growing food for live stock. While only 20% calories come from live stock.
It's just so inefficient use of water and land. Even if every billionaire vanished, we will run out of clean water and good land if population grows and meat consumption doesn't.
Sure, but maybe we could start quantifying the scale of flights to COP28 in terms of hamburgers consumed? I'm tired of the burden to correct for industrial sized pollution being placed on the backs of consumers. Yes. My eating almost no beef over the course of a year helps. I can cut out the 10-12 cheeseburgers I eat. Will my 12 cheeseburgers a year balance a single analyst flight to COP28?
The reason I say it's whataboutism, is because both need to be fixed unrelated to one another.
We need to get the upper class to stop being awful and we also need to get eating habits that are long term sustainable for an ever growing population with a shrinking supply of fresh water, which farming requires a massive share of.
I completely agree on that, and while I'm obviously being a bit snarky, the best pressure we could put on rich people and industries would be to frame this as "we're sacrificing so THEY can live large". So a "hamburger index" isn't necessarily out of order.
It's not "whataboutism" to frame the scale of each contributing aspect of addressing climate change. Cutting a single rich person's private jet flights by a flight a month will continue a LOT more than me cutting my remaining dozen cheeseburgers a year. I'm down to do that if the rich person also is willing to cut those flights though.
If "people are sacrificing their lives so I can be rich" would even remotely affect any one of their actions, we wouldnt be here discussing this. Sadly.
No but you are not alone. 12 cheeseburgers times 8 billion people would balance thousands of COP28s. Thats what its about. Sure, one billionaire pollutes like 100k people, but a million people pollute like 10 billionaires.
Dont get me wrong though, Im definitely not saying big pollutors sholdnt be held responsible. And obviously youre already contributing to the cause.
Oh for sure. 👍 The scale of that would be huge. It was like when Obama asked Americans to get oil changes and tune ups. The media acted like that was silly to ask, but that would have made a noticeable impact. I'm not disputing scale, but I doubt you'll get folks to cut back on beef so long as they see the wealthy aren't sacrificing anything. "Why should i give up MY creator comforts when ONE FLIGHT from a billionaire will undo all my sacrifices for a whole year?" We need some HUGE wealth taxes on the ultra-luxury gear that pollutes the most. THEN I think we can put more pressure on people to cut back on the small luxuries.
but some of that 80% is also growing food for people: most of what crops are fed to livestock are plants or parts of plants that people can't or won't eat. it's a terribly misleading metric.
I would love a statisic and source on that, because my understanding is the vast majority is corn, oats, and soy grown with the intention of being eaten by live stock.
Quick check shows that 80% of soy beans for example is used to feed live stock.
https://www.foodnavigator.com/Article/2023/06/14/soy-animal-feed-s-trail-of-deforestation-what-are-the-solutions#:~:text=However%2C%20only%20about%2020%25%20of,for%20vegetarian%20and%20vegan%20products.
The vast majority of animals products are from animals in factory farms that want bulk and consistent food.
The same soybeans that are fed to livestock are the same soybeans that are pressed for oil. somewhere around 85% of all soybeans in the world are pressed for oil. The by-product of that process is called soy meal or soy cake. that makes up the vast majority of the soy that is fed to animals. only about 7% of soybeans are actually fed directly to animals.
https://ourworldindata.org/images/published/Global-soy-production-to-end-use.png
Okay you got me there! Soy was an awful example.
Oats though 95% are for animal feed though and corn is similar.
I'm not as personally familiar with the corn or oats but I do know that corn isn't just the kernels. we're able to feed the cobs and stocks as silage to livestock. there is way more cobs and stock than there are kernels. it would make sense that more of that would go to livestock than to people.
Most corn grown is a type of corn you don't wanna eat, because it's for live stock or ethanol.
If all animals were fed off of human food waste we wouldn't be having this conversation. We also could only support like 1% of the live stock we do. 1 billion, cows, 1 billion pigs, and 33 billion chickens eat a lot more food than humans just throw away! And almost all of them are in factory farms, meaning they aren't just grazing. They are being brought food.
The reality is the vast majority of factory farms are using farm land dedicated to only feeding animals and no other purpose. Which is such a departure from what we think of as farms.
all beef cattle graze
about half of the land attributed to livestock is grazing/pasture land. of the crop land, almost all of that is also producing plants for some other use. as much corn, for instance, becomes ethanol as is fed to livestock. and livestock are also fed crop seconds or waste from other crops like cottonseed.
Thr vast majority of animals are factory farmed, so the idea that pasture land is feeding any noticable amount of animals is just wrong.
I would love a source for anything you're saying.
The fact that corn is also grown for ethanol in no way changes that more corn is grown for them to eat does it? Like the corn fed to animals cant be used for ethanol. Also what use does feeding them oats accomplish?
All beef cattle graze for about their first year. The only spend the last 4 months or so in a concentrated feeding operation.
How much pasture land is being given to pigs? Or chickens? Oh, none? Because I'm not just talking about cows am I?
My dude, you provide a source for anything you are saying or I'm blocking you as a troll at this point.
You're the one who brought up the 80% of land issue. you should understand what it means. calling me names doesn't change the truth.
you are cherrypicking. the initial claim was about global land use. now you want to look at the chicago metro area.
I haven't lied about anything.
The discussion wasn't about United States agriculture. it was about the agricultural land use across the whole world. You're still cherry picking.
all beef cattle graze for about a year and spend the last 4-6 months on a feed lot. you just don't know what you're talking about.
you don't raise beef cattle. do you know how I know?
you should look up how much pasture land is part of that 80% figure that you quoted.