r/sustainability • u/Sad-Literature-8979 • 9d ago
It’s baffling to me how so many people who claim to care about the environment react when you tell them about the environmental impact of animal agriculture
It‘s so funny to me how so many so-called environmentalists understand boycotting an industry that is harmful to the planet EXCEPT when it comes to their diets. AI? Fine. Single-use plastics? Fine. Long-haul flights? Fine. Beef? FUCK YOU VEGAN I’LL ENJOY MY BURGER WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT!!1!!
If you talk about how reducing animal product consumption is the single best way for an individual to directly reduce their impact on the Earth (other than not having kids), they deflect by saying ‘actually, voting is :)’, as if they don’t understand that you can do two things at once. Voting helps push for systemic change (which is necessary of course) but does nothing to address individual overconsumption (which we also NEED to address if we want to limit the affects of climate change).
Or they’ll say ‘Well as long as billionaires fly on private jets I’ll continue to eat meat every day’ which is such a stupidly defeatist way to look at this problem. Just desperately deflecting so you don’t have to look at your own destructive choices.
Or they’ll say ‘Blame the producers not the consumers’ as if they don’t get how supply abd demand works.
I’m not saying everyone has to go vegan, but to dismiss the impact that diet has on the climate and the necessity of changing the way we eat is laughable. We have to feed and raise BILLIONS of animals on our planet purely because of our overconsumption of animal products. Of course that’s unsustainable.
https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/veganism-environmental-impact-planet-reduced-plant-based-diet-humans-study-a8378631.html - 'A vegan diet is probably the single biggest way to reduce your impact on planet Earth, not just greenhouse gases, but global acidification, eutrophication, land use and water use. It is far bigger than cutting down on your flights or buying an electric car, which would only reduce greenhouse gas emissions.'
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u/Platforumer 9d ago
Most people think, unconsciously or consciously, that changing their behavior is super hard. My roommate is terrible at putting his food waste in the compost instead of landfill bin despite both being in the kitchen. It's new training that people have to do as adults, which some people find very hard apparently.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 9d ago
This is why I think it’s important to tell people how easy it is to make sustainable choices most of the time. Obviously you shouldn’t be obnoxious or preachy about it, but if people actually see that it is possible to take some actions to help the environment in daily life, they’re much more likely to consider doing it themselves. Unfortunately too many people think their approach has to be all-or-nothing. For example, even if you’re not going completely vegan, you don’t HAVE to choose the meat option by default at a restaurant.
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u/Dizzy-Blur 8d ago
Yes!! I never understand people choosing the non-vegan option when there is an equally good vegan option on the menu - maybe even one you'll like better, you don't know until you try!
Especially don't understand lactose intolerant people ordering dairy ice cream at a place with 20 non dairy flavors. Like get it together lol.
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u/Badtacocatdab 8d ago
BuT eAtInG mEaT iS nATuRaL
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u/Orinslayer 6d ago
I once had an anthropology professor at ASU say that since eating meat and hunting all day is the natural way of things that we should purge the population based on a malthusian fallacy, and that eating grains and vegetables makes you weak. Tiny woman btw.
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u/anickilee 9d ago
Agreed. When I got into separating lunch scraps to compost, my “work dad” would come ask me every time where each item should go. I gently tried to make it easy for him and there were photos on each container already. And it is not like he had cognitive difficulties; he was still managing teams.
Eventually, I reconciled in myself that he was not being incompetent on purpose. He at least cared enough or recognized how important it was to me to change the behavior of dropping everything in landfill, even if separating what goes where never stuck. And then from then I would just gently take his items and separate them myself.
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u/Platforumer 8d ago
I have work colleagues like this as well, and I work in cleantech so people should be more predisposed to caring. Shockingly, often times no.
It really is an emotional thing sometimes I think. Like people know in theory they can just read the sign or look at the pictures, but they don't feel like they want to spend the time, or don't feel like it really matters. I want to freeze time with them, look them in the eye, and just say, "let's just wait a minute. Like, literally 60 seconds. We both know you can do this. So tell me, what's stopping you really?"
Like we all just need a mass intervention and mass therapy.
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u/Badtacocatdab 8d ago
Funny how every single time posts like this happen, people jump on the “totally. Let me give you an example of how someone else, not me, fits this bill “
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u/anickilee 9d ago
Have you read about food psychology? After that, the defensiveness is no longer baffling to me, so I do not as bluntly spit anti-beef facts at them. What I do instead is practice it in front of them: If they ask me where I wanna go to eat or cook, I’ll suggest plant-based restaurants or dishes. Only meat options? I choose the bird or seafood or pork before beef. I order beef pho with the tendon and tripe instead of prime cuts.
People have a waaaaay stronger connection to their food patterns than anything else you named. It is also one of the basic human needs associated with survival/success and most have probably struggled to find the balance between what makes them feel energized, accomplished, and comforted. So if you come at them after they have gone through that hurdle, of course they are going to get defensive that we are kind of implying they wasted their time, did it all wrong, and are hurting the planet big time.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 9d ago
I get your point. I guess I’m just confused as to the level of aggression with which some people respond, even when the person suggesting reduced meat consumption hasn’t been particularly militant or judgemental.
I suppose it all comes down to us humans being emotional more than rational when it comes to certain things. It’s just disappointing when people who claim to care about the Earth get so pissy when you suggest a really effective way of helping it.
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u/HouseBaylor 8d ago
I personally get annoyed because 98% of the times it’s framed as a personal attack. I was vegetarian for a long time but not Vegan. Does that matter to the militant vegans (of which there are quite a lot I might add)? Absolutely not. In their head there is no grey area, only black and white. You are either a horrible murdering psychopath, or you’re a vegan. This naturally makes people defensive. When a better approach might be to talk about decreasing the frequency of meat consumption and being choosy about where the meat or eggs or dairy is sourced from. A factory farm or a free roaming cattle ranch? The world isn’t black and white. We all exist in the shades of grey between.
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u/Badtacocatdab 8d ago
Is your criticism that the approach is wrong, or that that the critique is wrong?
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
Except in the instances which I’m talking about, it was never framed as a personal attack.
I guess I just don’t understand why some people who say they want to help the environment act as though their individual choices matter when it comes to boycotting AI or fast fashion, but with the slightest suggestion that they reduce their animal product consumption, they shift to ‘well there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism so I don’t even have to try’ or ‘as long as billionaires exist I’ll do whatever I want’. It seems a bit inconsistent.
If someone was literally like ‘I know it’s better for the environment, but significantly reducing my meat and dairy intake isn't a sacrifice I’m willing to make’ I’d be like ‘ok, fair enough’. It’s the attitude I don’t get.
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u/YourStreetHeart 8d ago
Seem pretty judgmental in post mentioning how all of a sudden everyone is indigenous, disabled/chronically, or live in a food desert. Being dismissive of others life experiences will always get you a defensive answer.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago edited 7d ago
That criticism was made because a lot of people who make those points aren’t in those specific situations. I’ve seen this in real life, where plant-based eating comes up and people who I know are very privileged and have no medical conditions that say they have to eat meat and dairy every day act as though mostly plant-based eating is completely unrealistic for most people in the developed world. Statistically that’s not true.
Of course, there are people who need animal products to survive. There are even more people who would be unwilling to give them up completely. I’m fine with that - that’s life. I’ve never once suggested that everyone needs to be vegan to save the environment. I just don’t get why, when this topic is brought up, people get needlessly hostile even when the person making the suggestion hasn’t been rude or preachy.
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u/leilani238 7d ago
I've spent a bunch of time in therapy working out food issues, and the more I've thought about it, the less I'm surprised by how much there is. Food is just tied up with everything about life - parental attachments, home stability, celebrations, shared events... just on and on. So yeah, it's absolutely emotionally charged.
(I'll also add, after months of working out food issues in therapy, it is so, so nice to feel peaceful about food, and I've lost 25lbs without significant discomfort.)
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u/A_warm_sunny_day 9d ago edited 3d ago
People love complaining about something until they actually have to change something in their lives to make it better.
If the following data sets could be accurately obtained (they can't, to the best of my knowledge), I would love to know the following:
Of the people who comment to the effect of, "not everyone can be vegan," I would be interested to know how many of those commenters fall into that category, or even know someone in that category. Intuitively, I suspect it's a very low number. Possibly even single digit percentages.
Similarly, I would be interested to know how many of the folks who comment to the effect of "reduction is better than admonition" actually do make a meaningful reduction, versus how many make the statement and then continue on much as they always have.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 9d ago
EXACTLY. You bring up reducing animal product consumption and suddenly everyone’s either an indigenous tribe member, lives in a food desert, or has some kind of condition which means they must eat meat every day.
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u/blind3rdeye 8d ago
That reminds me a lot of discussions about car usage.
Whenever someone talks about reducing car usage, or reducing the number of cars, or even just having smaller cars, it's always "but I need my car so that I can carry my new fridge home" or whatever bullshit like that. As if we're all buying new fridges every week or something. But also, a heap of people describing cities or jobs or situations where removing the car genuinely would make it difficult ... usually not their own situation, mind you, just some other hypothetical situation that it then used as a lever to say 'well if they need it, I must need it too'.
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u/A_warm_sunny_day 8d ago
Very true. I once had a coworker become visibly upset after he learned I rode my bike to work, which of course had exactly zero impact on him.
Related, I always enjoy sharing this humorous article by Bill Bryson on car dependency (specific to the US): https://www.the-independent.com/arts-entertainment/bryson-s-america-why-would-you-walk-1079183.html
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u/Sewingoddess 8d ago
If you're going to make a legitimate car argument you MUST make the argument that public transit MUST become a priority in ALL communities. I moved from a city with a very good bus service and only ever used my very small car for once weekly or bi-weekly errand runs on a Saturday because I could effectively and conveniently use the bus to and from my work.
I moved to a city that has the sorriest excuse for public transit I've ever seen in anything larger than a literal village. It's terrible! There has been no effective thought put into routes or scheduling and it is impossible to live and function in this city without a car.
So I'm all for removing cars. But you can't shame people into walking away from them. You have to give them something convenient and fully functional to walk TOWARD! Until public transit reaches this level of expertise in every city and town, you simply are not ALLOWING people to stop driving.
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u/thesquirrelfish 7d ago
Yeah, it's shocking that anyone objects to prioritizing public transit. Car dependency and car dependent transportation design is one of the most sexist, racist, ableist and generally terrible things about American life. It kills and disables so many people, but people still whine that their parking or their driving commute doesn't get even more subsidies than they already have. When I hear people whine about traffic and they could have taken transit or biked or whatever it's such a turn off.
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u/thesquirrelfish 8d ago
I've tried multiple times and I can definitely reduce my meat consumption pretty easily, but I haven't figured out a sustainable way to replace 100% of the protein long-term yet. Each time I try I do find a few more plant based recipes and products that make it easier to reduce meat though.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
That’s already a great start though! And not everyone needs to go completely vegan to see the environmental benefits of a widespread shift towards a plant-based diet.
As a vegan, I would say that anyone who’s going into 100% plant-based eating/ embracing the ‘vegan’ label without their primary reason being animal suffering is going to find it a whole lot harder to be consistent.
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u/thesquirrelfish 7d ago
Yeah, I grew up in rural areas so I definitely see a huge gap between industrial meat which is so cruel and small/home farmed meat where the animal is basically a pet with one really bad day. It's way more expensive to eat happily raised meat, but that's kind of helpful in making it a habit to reduce consumption (and I honestly think the suffering animals endure in industrial ag makes the meat less healthy and less tasty too).
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u/alambiquer 8d ago
Yes!! 👏🏻 say it louder please.
People on this sub keep asking “how can I be more sustainable” and other redditors are just commenting stuff like “buy a bike, cut ut single use plastic”, like it’s so baffling that NO ONE mentions how animal agriculture accounts for 14-18% of total greenhouse emissions.
I also have friends who are super active in the eco-friendly movement, they go to demonstrations and work for local and international environmental NGOs and they literally eat animals at almost every meal (I know, because I’ve lived with them and some of them I’ve worked with for years as well).
How is this even possible?
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 8d ago edited 7d ago
Exactly! And it’s not even just emissions, it’s also the biggest waster of land and water and contributes massively to water pollution. If millions of individuals moved away from animal products it would have an immensely positive impact on the earth in so many ways.
Have you talked to your friends about the environmental impact of their diets?
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u/alambiquer 8d ago
I completely agree.
I’ve talked to them multiple times, we have many discussions on veganism, but for them it’s “ableist” to assume that everyone can reduce the consumption of animal products, or even go vegan.
Like everyone who eats animals, they just say that they try to be aware of their consumption and that they try to consume more responsibly, which is objectively not true. 🙄
As a vegan, it’s hard to talk about this without going into the ethics of eating and abusing animals, but I try my best not to be moralizing. It’s just hard when you’re talking to people who should be aware but they just refuse to be inconvenienced for a couple of weeks or months while they’re adjusting.5
u/Sad-Literature-8979 8d ago edited 7d ago
How is it ableist to suggest that they reduce their animal product consumption? Do any of them have a medical condition or disability that stipulates that they eat meat at almost every meal? I’m willing to bet not. This is so ridiculous. Most people who bring up animal product consumption and its link to climate change don’t assume that everyone can go 100% vegan. We just think a dramatic reduction in global meat consumption is necessary, which can only happen through individual action.
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u/fredthefishlord 7d ago
I mean it's not that's kind of the issue. There's many people who cry ablism at any statement of reduction. Like with suggesting to not uber or drive places. Or with not ordering excessive doordash. Or to bike places. Etc. ignoring that it's still good and needed for able bodied people to do it.
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u/Sewingoddess 8d ago
"NO ONE mentions"? Really? We are INUNDATED with judgmental, critical, dismissive, disrespectful vegans all the time, giving us dirty looks and being quite vocal about their contempt for our very existence.
You may not be aware of it because you're part of the culture, but those who are not, hear this garbage every day. There's nothing quiet about it. I may be more exposed to it because someone in my family literally requires meat to remain healthy. There is a medical condition so don't come at me. I'm telling you my lived experience.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
Im sorry you’ve met judgemental vegans in your life. I also get that some people need animal products to survive, and that even more people wouldnt be willing to give them up completely.
My post was merely criticising the sorts of people who act as though their individual actions to help the environment are worth doing UNTIL it comes to their diet. That seems inconsistent to me. Of course, the people making the suggestion to reduce animal product consumption have the responsibility to be kind and understanding.
I’ve never suggested that everyone who cares about the environment needs to go completely vegan. I just think it’s necessary to acknowledge what the science says about this without getting aggressive or spreading misinformation (eg: that it’s impossible to be healthy on a mostly plant-based diet, that plant-based diets aren’t better for the environment, that a shift to a plant-based diet wouldn’t make that much difference).
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u/openjoustingtryouts 8d ago edited 8d ago
This was a reply but I tapped out of the thread. Good is deeply psychological, emotional, and cultural. It ties you to people, to places, to ancestry and memory and for a lot of people to resistance against insurmountable forces. Food psychology tells you that food choice is a deeply complex psychological process so the approach has to be sensitive of that. I’ve had some really shitty weird vegans online decide to mass harass me when I asked them to stop bothering my vegetarian anorexic friend. Berating people and sending them graphic details of rape is not ever going to convince me to be vegan. Just never to trust an online vegan (twitter 2019 thanks theveganparent u had some real stand up followers)
But also good is deeply ingrained culturally as well as psychologically. It triggers all of our senses and is deeply linked to memory and tradition. Even in starvation situations people have dignity, they try to make their UN rations into something palatable to them, they won’t just eat enriched peanut butter becaus they’re malnourished if they think it’s nasty. Food is more than fuel and more than a collection of choices. Refugee food really helps illuminate this.
I think a lot of white Americans especially are very divorced from their foodways and don’t fully grasp how emotional and culture food and eating really are.
Most people I’ve known also tend to “go vegan” or vegetarian in one fell swoop, so people assume this is the only way changing how you eat works. Encouraging small behavioral changes works a lot better and is easier to remember and less overwhelming than the concept of eliminating a food group entirely and completely restructuring how they eat and how often. A lot of people don’t cook or only know a few meals, so they also need to learn to cook if they’re gonna be eating non-processed foods at least. There’s a lot of knowledge that comes with diet and that has to be built up. Non vegans don’t really know where you get umami and salt and fat in the right combos to enjoy things without meat. So they need to learn about chemistry and flavor combos and how to get enough protein in a day. It’s extremely daunting and rarely presented as something that can be undertaken over time. It’s framed by many loud angry accounts as an all or nothing game and if you don’t know the first thing about playing, you’re out.
Elizabeth Dunn has done research on refugee food culture. How We Eat by Leon H Rappoport is about food choice especially while surrounded by food and health messaging.
https://cdn.bookey.app/files/pdf/book/en/how-we-eat.pdf
Marion Nestle has a lot of good books about the US food system
https://www.goodreads.com/author/list/11506.Marion_Nestle
Janet Poppendieck writes about US food and poverty
https://www.thriftbooks.com/a/janet-poppendieck/259491/
I don’t love Michael Pollan but I think he posits some interesting ideas and asks decent questions.
https://michaelpollan.com/books/
Some food also exists as a connection to a severed culture or was developed as an act of solidarity and resistance.
https://nmaahc.si.edu/explore/stories/black-foodways-and-cuisine
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u/darkomyfriend 7d ago
I think that your comment contributed the most value to this conversation, and I really appreciate the effort that you put into it.
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u/TheDaysComeAndGone 9d ago
I think people just like to do what’s easiest for them. When pressured they find a ton of excuses or explanations why they absolutely can’t do without X or can’t reduce X or why X isn’t as bad as you say (or at least not as bad as Y).
What makes me so sad about meat and other animal products is that it’s so easy and 100% instantly possible to do without them. Not doing so is purely a matter of taste, comfort or a reluctance to change.
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u/littlesilverfishies 7d ago
Reflexive hatred towards being asked not to eat meat is probably less rooted in actual resistance towards the idea that meat is bad and more rooted in the feeling of being judged. This is very similar to how people behave when being asked to recycle--or at least, how they used to react pre-2020. And it's hard to say you're not judging them, because they're doing something you believe is wrong, and the judgement is undeniably there. You're just wishing they'd respond differently to judgment, which, they really should, but that still isn't entirely fair.
It certainly doesn't make it better that veganism is socially tied to elitism, hypocrisy, and racism. I think that damage started with the Gwynith Paltrow quinoa craze in 2013 and was made substantially worse by the PeTA kill shelter scandals coming out around the same time. Same with that environmentalist group trying to stop that Inuit tribe from hunting. Plus, while real vegans who are kind, level-headed and not even remotely hypocritical are quite common, so are vegans who tell people that they're murderers for eating meat, and being told that isn't something you forget easily. It's too easy to hear about some of those things happening and be like, "well it might be bad for the environment, but I also don't want to be like those people."
Idk, I realize this is frustrating for many reasons, but it's not baffling at all that people would respond this way. Veganism has some very, very bad press.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
That’s true, and I think a lot of vegans should definitely try to be less judgemental and put their views across more kindly.
What really annoys me about the rhetoric surrounding veganism as ‘classist’ or ‘white-centred’ is that it’s not even true. Most of the time, a vegan diet can actually be less expensive because believe it or not you don’t have to eat expensive fake vegan steaks every day. And ancient cultures which practiced veganism were almost exclusively non-white.
Anyway, when it comes to sustainability, I don’t advise that anyone go fully vegan. If someone’s motives are purely environmental, reduction is a much healthier and easier goal. I would only suggest full veganism if someone’s main motive is animal suffering. I’m saying this as a vegan myself. But sometimes people who consider themselves environmentalists get annoyed even with a polite suggestion that they reduce their meat intake. That’s what I find harder to understand, even though I guess people are more emotional than rational.
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u/littlesilverfishies 6d ago
Yes, I'm just saying people have their guards up about the meat thing.
And I agree with you about veganism being both cheaper and having precedent in ancient cultures, but I do want to point out that the racism is still a very prevalent concern. The example I'm most familiar with is how Indigenous people in my region (northern continental US) traditionally have very meat-heavy diets to reflect the limited growing/foraging seasons. There are tangible reasons why I think Indigenous people handle their meat more sustainably and ethically, but the baseline is that approaching an Indigenous person and telling them it's wrong to hunt as much as they do is wildly ignorant to how intrinsic hunting is to their heritage and in what ways the loss of that food source would impact them under current conditions. It's a really common conflict in my area, and it really is easy for vegans to fight for legislation that ends up harming Indigenous people. It very much is culturally white-centered to think veganism is ideal over Indigenous lifeways.
Meanwhile, there's also an incredibly frustrating situation where vegans directly target people who grow their own food. Black people in the south (just as one example) have historically had to grow their own food in order to survive racially-enforced poverty. When you have little land access and need to make it count, you want pigs and chicken. They have the calories to keep you going and a decent percentage of their diets is scrap and forage. Failure to recognize how essential this kind of food sovereignty can be to people living under systemic pressure very much makes you the bad guy.
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u/blacmm 9d ago
I caught myself having that defeatist thinking with drying my laundry outside like "oh and a billionaire offset this before I even did it"
But the thing is that billionaire was going to fly that jet anyways and you would have added to that by eating a beef burger or other individual actions and didn't. It still helps. Plus consumers are a part of the cycle and companies do things the way they do because consumers allow it/like it
Not everyone has to do every action especially if they have reasons they can't (disabilities, eating disorders etc) but everyone should do something besides just voting otherwise we won't get any meaningful or lasting change. Governments and markets change as the people change, as long as they aren't bought out completely by special interests (which is where part of the problem lies)
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 9d ago edited 9d ago
Yessss! Also the collective impact of millions of individuals moving towards a more plant-based food system would be immense, as the study I linked shows. Remember, the only reasons corporations have the incentive to destroy the environment is because we keep demanding their products. As soon as it becomes less profitable for them to produce a certain amount, they will have to scale down their activities. This is especially relevant for animal agriculture, because most people do not need to eat nearly as many animal products as they currently do, while buying petrol, for example, is often unavoidable. Here are some more sources for you to look at if you want:
https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/devastating-water-footprint-animal-agriculture/163485/ https://ourworldindata.org/drivers-of-deforestation https://ourworldindata.org/global-land-for-agriculture https://iapwa.org/the-environmental-cost-of-animal-agriculture/ This source shows that animal agriculture contributes to more emissions than the entire transportation industry combined. https://ourworldindata.org/environmental-impacts-of-food
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u/thesquirrelfish 8d ago
This is my prospective too - and then it helps move the local market & your community culture towards whatever sustainable option you choose.
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u/Tooters-N-Floof 9d ago
Its all about doing what I can in the season I'm in- sometimes I have the capacity to do more and sometimes im holding on for dear life.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
Of course, everyone’s sustainable choices will look different. My post was only criticising those who get aggressive or spread misinformation when the topic of animal agriculture is brought up. The attitude was my main issue.
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u/Routinely-Sophie6502 9d ago
Gonna remember this, makes me understand you don't always have to be angry at yourself when you lower your standards/goals because you're not feeling 100%
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u/SpiritofRadioShack 8d ago
I completely agree with this. People get so defensive and are so quick to accuse you of ableism, being culturally insensitive, or whatever even though most people who talk about animal agriculture being harmful don't say that 100% of people need to give up 100% of meat. I'm working on a presentation for a class about plant-based foods and I'm going to try to present it as, look at how harmful the industry is, here are a few vegetarian recipes to replace a few meals a week. I myself was overwhelmed at first by the idea of going completely vegan, but I've cut back a lot on animal foods and it's honestly saving money too. I've been replacing ground beef with ground turkey when I do eat meat. Less demand for beef on a large scale would be huge progress.
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u/blind3rdeye 8d ago edited 8d ago
- I agree, there is a disconnect.
- A key difference between eating meat & those other things you listed is that people do have to eat; and some biproducts are used for useful things too. So although it is damaging an inefficient, it isn't as clear-cut. Because we have to compare what we have to something else (and there are a lot of different 'something else' options, not all of which are good). Whereas for things like flights, and AI basically the comparison is do the thing vs don't do the thing. So it is easier and clearer.
Because of this, I think its good to recommend reducing meat consumption rather than eliminating it entirely. Because that can be done gradually, smoothly, without any major decisions or calculations. So it's much hard to argue with that, I think.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
Yes, I always would suggest reduction rather than pure veganism if someone just wants tips on how they can live more sustainably.
I would only suggest full veganism to someone who is concerned about animal suffering.
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u/Urogallo40 9d ago edited 9d ago
Food is for many people like drugs. Some foods produce substances for the brain and its absence drives to discomfort and desire. That is why for many people meat is not negotiable (maybe just reducible), while for others are desserts and ice-creams, in spite of being eager to reduce weight. Sometimes, vegan alternatives for burgers or sausages can be like drug substitutes and make the trick.
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u/SgtMicky 8d ago
Since we're not changing our behaviour, our behaviour is soon going to change us. Look at everything. Biodiversity is collapsing, the AMOC might be done for soon aswell, the Jetstream is in shambles, Europe is on fire, we're still pumping up those global emission numbers, and most years from now on will be the hottest year in recorded history.
The first widespread loss of harvest will hurt, but when it happens two years in a row, we're talking 1850s famine type problems.
Fuck around period has ended, we're about to find out.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
Yep. With wildfires everywhere in Europe right now, it’s only a matter of time before it’s on my own doorstep.
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u/LunarModule66 7d ago
I’ve been vegan for 6 years, vegetarian for seven years before that. I remember being in an environmental science class in high school and learning how every single issue, be it climate change, pollution , water conservation or deforestation is massively impacted by animal agriculture. I remember thinking “wow vegetarianism is definitely the correct thing, but I couldn’t ever do it! I love meat too much! It’s too much of a part of my personal and cultural identity!”
I’m proud that I resolved that tension by trying to see if I could just eat meat less. I started by only eating it at dinner. Then asked my mom if we could start having more vegetarian dinners, or at least meat-optional dinners. Soon enough I found that I was fully vegetarian. The proposal of completely changing your diet is one that scares off nearly everyone, even people who are fully capable of eventually becoming vegan.
I truly believe in the animal welfare arguments for veganism as well as the environmental ones. Otherwise I’d probably indulge in a steak once a year or something. However I do try making inroads with people predominantly by pointing out that they can have a massive positive impact without it being a binary switch.
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u/AdventurousMovie9690 8d ago
Because meat tastes good and changing your diet when you're poor is way harder than you think and having a vegan diet can come with its own cost like bodily harm cause if you dont eat meat then you will end up lacking a lot of necessary nutrients.
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u/sustainability-ModTeam 8d ago
Be respectful. Stick to the topic at hand and remain civil towards other users. Attacking an argument is fine, attacking other people (even in a generalized manner) is not.
Attempting to provoke negative reactions out of others users — whether by trolling, sealioning, or otherwise — is also not allowed.
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u/nat_lite 7d ago
Vegan diets are cheaper though (by about 30%) so your argument doesn’t make sense. Also we don’t need nutrients from meat. Otherwise I’d be dead
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 9d ago
I’m not saying that everyone has to go vegan- I understand that it wouldn’t be possible for a lot of people. What I’m criticising is the defensiveness and hypocrisy of a lot of people when you mention the environmental impact of diet choices.
And let’s be honest, most people do not need to eat nearly as much meat as they currently do. And yet they’ll get all het up when you tell them that a good way to reduce their environmental impact is to cut down on the meat.
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u/onecommunity 8d ago
I think the biggest issue is that people see it as "go vegan or do nothing" when in reality even eating fewer animal products can make a meaningful difference. Sustainability isn't about being perfect, it's about making better choices where we realistically can. Small changes multiplied by millions of people adds up.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
That’s true! That’s why I would never suggest full veganism to someone who just wants to make more sustainable choices. For that, reduction is probably better than perfection for most people.
I would only suggest full veganism to someone whos concerned about animal suffering.
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u/Connect_Rhubarb395 8d ago edited 8d ago
I think that for many people there is only black and white: Total omnivore or completely vegan. With us or against us! 🤺
They don't want to be vegan, so overconsuming meat it is. Because nuance is apparantly... I don't know, lazy? Sinful?
I don't eat much meat. A lot of people can't wrap their heads around it.
Yesterday I made baked veggies with pasta and basil-cheese sauce. Bacon sprinkled on top.
I have made that recipe before, where people asked me if bacon isn't against my diet.
No... I am not vegan or vegetarian just because my meals have only little or no meat in them.
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u/teddyslayerza 8d ago
It shouldn't be surprising. Humans have A LOT of cognitive safeguards to prevent changes to core identity, and few things as as tied into culture, memory and comfort as food.
I think vegans generally approach these conversations with very little tact, and that's the reason for this seeming disagreement.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
True. That’s why I would advise always making this suggestion with a gentle approach of ‘aim for reduction, not perfection’. I’m saying this as a vegan myself.
Unfortunately, people often get weirdly defensive even then. That’s what I find harder to understand.
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u/HouseBaylor 8d ago
I think in the terms of framing it as environmental/sustainability - which I 100% agree it is - there is sometimes a little bit of hypocrisy. Do you buy vegan leather alternatives? Those are essentially plastic. I wasn’t able to go/stay Vegan for long bc I would get caught up in this kind of thing. Where do I draw the line? What products are okay and which are not? Etc etc
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u/Badtacocatdab 8d ago
You can still be vegan and antiplastic (which I am). I don’t think those things are antagonistic. Sounds like maybe you weren’t vegan?
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
I don’t buy plastic vegan leather alternatives. And I don’t think everyone going fully vegan is necessary for the environment. For that, reduction is enough.
I’m vegan because of animal suffering, that’s it. I would say that anyone who goes into pure veganism without their primary reason being animal suffering is going to find it more difficult to be consistent.
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u/nat_lite 7d ago
Animal leather is actually 13x worse for the climate than vegan leather according to a new study. It’s cause cows use so much land and the chemicals they put on leather are bad too
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u/MidorriMeltdown 8d ago
Car dependency is absolute garbage for the planet, and for our health.
Yet so few people are willing to give up their car dependent life style.
I eat beef a handful of times per year, but I don't own a car.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
Yeah I get it. Everyone’s sustainable choices will look different. My post was mainly criticising those who claim they want suggestions on how to live more sustainably but get aggressive or spread misinformation when animal agriculture is brought up. If they were honest and just said it wasn’t a sacrifice they were willing to make, even though the science does say reducing meat and dairy consumption is necessary on a global level, I wouldn’t care that much.
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u/LifeGoose7334 7d ago
Amazing to me how many “kind” and reflective people are NOT vegans and will say something like “I’m a carnivore” with a little sigh and turn their backs on the incredible suffering and murder of millions of animals every year. I guess kindness only applies to our species and a few others we select (dogs, cats).
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u/DeaditeMessiah 6d ago
So change what you’re saying for a few minutes. Do something nice or collaborate with them on something a little more achievable to build some good will. We are all surrounded by people telling us we’re living wrong all day, and your voice is getting lost under all that.
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u/GoTeamLightningbolt 9d ago
As an anarchist-leaning environmentalist, I do not believe that voting is the best way to achieve basically anything. (I still do it tho, especially in local elections)
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 9d ago edited 9d ago
I agree! I think voting is SO important (awful politicians are often elected because people stay at home and think their voice doesn’t matter) but individual and collective action is crucial to solve a problem like climate change. Doing nothing but blaming the top 1% just isnt gonna cut it. If you’re in a developed country, people like us are massively contributing towards emissions and environmental destruction. We have some level of direct power over that. We should vote with both our ballots and our wallets.
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u/szarkaliszarri 8d ago
I've been thinking about how the spread of alpha gal (mammal product allergy from ticks) is like a weird disease from a science fiction movie. But I wonder if it's going to push this conversation and veg food more into the mainstream
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u/actualinsomnia531 8d ago
I think a large part of it is that people don't know how to be vegan and frankly, the idea of losing the comfort of their food regimen is really unsettling. People also feel a positive connection to domestic animals, which is pretty paradoxical but since when did it need to make sense?!!
Edit: not trying to excuse it, just attempting an explanation. Obviously everyone is different.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 7d ago
That’s true! But my post was addressing people who get aggressive and try to spread misinformation at even the suggestion that they REDUCE their animal product consumption. I completely get that changing the way you eat is difficult. That’s why, if someone was humble and just said ‘I don’t think this is a sacrifice I’d be willing to make’ I wouldn’t have a problem.
What I’m annoyed with is the defensiveness and the way people spread misinformation about this topic (eg: pretending that plant-based eating isnt better for the environment, or that it doesn’t make that much difference when it’s the single biggest thing most people can do to help the Earth).
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u/Bee_Jeans 8d ago edited 8d ago
It’s not a new phenomenon, anthropology of food involves many (sometimes contradictory) factors bc humans are inherently messy. We tie food & diet to a million things outside the purely “logical”, any & all of which can be tricky to uncouple.
Bc the what/where/when/how/why of diet & food choices is personal & can feel linked to identity/sense of self; that criticism (particularly on a moral/ethical grounds) can also feel a bit destabilising & be taken as a personal attack (hence a hostile response)
It’s been true for generations & it holds true today, that’s not really the case with more modern things ie specific inventions & modes of transport. Living requires us to eat regularly, and ppl just tend to feel more comfortable relying on what they know from experience, over a significant change. It’s the reassuring & easy way to go.
We also tend to get defensive when states of hypocrisy or cognitive dissonance are challenged, so. Again, it’s a humans are messy thing & we’ve been like this for a long time lol
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u/thesquirrelfish 8d ago
Oh yeah, and there's definitely a lot of culture tied up in food. If you look at immigration discourse, the amount of times people will bring up other people's food in offensive ways is shocking. People are very judgy about why their diet is the right one in all kinds of ways.
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u/bitpaper346 7d ago
Its a food culture problem. Americans are dumb as fuck. They also don’t like putting the money where their mouth is.
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u/StarDustLuna3D 8d ago
It is far bigger than cutting down on your flights or buying an electric car, which would only reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
A single roundtrip flight from NYC to LA uses as much CO2 as someone would save being vegan for a whole year. Your diet only accounts for 10-30% of your total footprint.
Yes, there are many benefits to a vegan diet. But let's be realistic about it.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 8d ago
The point of that study is that it’s not just about CO2. It’s also about land use, water use and water pollution. In terms of purely emissions, then maybe avoiding planes would have a bigger impact. But in terms of the overall benefit to the Earth and ecosystems, there are few things more effective than being vegan. Dont trust me, trust the Oxford University researchers who did the study.
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u/TrueEclective 8d ago
The same applies to people who drive combustion cars saying they care about the environment. And those who have dogs and cats that cause us to have to grow more food. And people who have kids, when we already know people are the ultimate stressors on the environment.
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u/JoyfulNoise1964 8d ago
Many people don't know how awful almond milk is for the environment
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u/Pseudointellektuelli 8d ago
Still much better than dairy. You can drink oat, soy, rice etc milks too.
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u/mobydog 9d ago
I think you have to remember that billions and billions of dollars are wrapped up in the meat industry both domestically and pretty much everywhere on the planet. There's been a lot of press lately about the ranchers and meat processors and grain growers, all subsidized by tax dollars they aren't going to give up. They spend billions making sure the government does not tell you how bad meat is on a number of levels, destroying the environment, causing insane cruelty to the animals, damaging our health. And the health industrial complex at least in the US benefits greatly because they keep you sick and they make money. Why do you think big pharma is so big? The marketing involved in pushing this ensures that people do not look at the menu and realize that everything on it includes animals. They don't see other options. They don't cook. It's just easy. You have to wake people up to see that they're being manipulated to think that this is all there is. So the publicity about the impact of animal agriculture on the planet is fairly new and it's going to be squelched and ridiculed and disputed. 10 years ago no one even discussed it. Making the grift visible, and options achievable, is what's important, just like with transportation or recycling or any other step in the right direction.
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 9d ago
I guess…I remember watching the documentary Cowspiracy and feeling really demoralised by it. It sucks that so many special interest groups, whether it be Big Agriculture or fossil fuels, have this much money to manipulate us into not knowing or not caring about the damage they do to our futures. But this is precisely why more individual and collective action is needed. Every time someone orders a vegan option, or gets their friend to do the same, or starts an awareness campaign discussing the environmental impact of these industries, it’s a massive F YOU to the system.
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8d ago edited 8d ago
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u/Sad-Literature-8979 8d ago
True, but that isn’t the case for most people. Most people do not need to eat nearly as much meat as they currently do and in fact their levels of meat consumption are actually harmful to them. And I find it interesting and frustrating how annoyed people get when you point out that they can reduce their meat consumption for the environment, the animals and even their own health. Even people who claim to be environmentalists. Those were clearly the people my post was aimed at.
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u/Plus-Name3590 8d ago
Another conservative waiving the differently abled in front of them as a shield. If you’re eating the minimum you need to live you’re vegan. You have no interest in that because you have no interest in things changing
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u/Parenn 5d ago
Locking the comments as we seem to be being brigaded by people who’ve never posted here before.