Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health & Columbia U School of Public Health & 27 Public Health Schools Start Meatless Monday Campaign

The direct link to the website for the Meatless Monday campaign is http://www.meatlessmonday.com/

The fact that it’s well known and respected schools of public health that are behind this shows that vegetarianism isn’t just an animal rights issue; it is a health issue as well. If you look at the website you’ll clearly see that the goal is to help people increase their level of health. And, quite simply, eating a meatless diet, even one day a week, will increase your level of health. As they state at their site:

“Our goal is to help reduce meat consumption 15% in order to improve personal health and the health of our planet.”

“Going meatless once a week may reduce your risk of chronic preventable conditions like cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and obesity. It can also help reduce your carbon footprint and save precious resources like fresh water and fossil fuel.”

Here is an excellent video on the project and about the many people who have decided to pledge to go meatless on Mondays.

So check out the site. It also contains recipes and nutritional facts. The direct link to the website for the Meatless Monday campaign is http://www.meatlessmonday.com/

Article:

Here’s an article about the Meatless Monday Campaign

Meatless Mondays: Do Something Good for the Earth and Your Health

http://www.alternet.org/immigration/140978/meatless_mondays:_do_something_good_for_the_earth_and_your_health/

By Kathy Freston, AlterNet. Posted July 6, 2009.

A new campaign is focused on convincing the world not to eat chickens, pigs, and other animals -- just one day per week.

I love a practical solution, especially when it's good all around -- for personal health, the environment, and for living consciously. So when I received an email from Chris Elam, the director of the Meatless Monday campaign -- a project of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the Columbia University School of Public Health, in association with twenty-seven other public health schools -- I was thrilled.

The campaign is focused on convincing the world not to eat chickens, pigs, and other animals -- just one day per week (on Mondays, as you may have guessed).

Since it's sponsored by a slew of public health schools, the campaign was set up to promote health, and since I've already written extensively about the fact that eating meat leads to heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity, and lethargy (for example here), I'll skip extended analysis of these facts, other than to say: When Johns Hopkins, Columbia, the American Dietetic Association, and dozens of other health organizations argue that the less meat you eat, the better off you'll be, it's worth listening to them.

Chris wrote to share the fact that Michael Pollan had just argued in favor of the campaign on Oprah, saying, "[w]e don't realize it when we sit down to eat, but that is our most profound engagement in the rest of nature... To the extent that we push meat a little bit to the side and move vegetables to the center of our diet, we're also going to be a lot healthier..." I wasn't surprised, since Pollan's most recent book calls on all of us to eat "mostly plants," and his new movie (Food, Inc.) offers a stomach-turning look at factory farming and slaughterhouses (I highly recommend it).

As an aside on Food, Inc.: The scene that I found most interesting is the one where Joel Salatin, proprietor of Polyface Farm, was slaughtering chickens and talking a mile-a-minute through the process. He was talking about treating the animals with respect, but in the theater where I saw the film, this scene elicited perhaps the most audible shock of the entire movie because you can actually see the animals being slaughtered (contrast this with the secrecy of factory farms and slaughterhouses -- no one is allowed because, as Paul McCartney likes to say, the process would turn everyone vegetarian). Anyway, this scene seemed to shock a lot of people, even though this is poultry slaughter at its most humane. Actually, the scene reminded me of that Sarah Palin interview that she conducted in front of the turkey slaughter; it's worth remembering that most chickens and turkeys have a far more horrific experience in the factory farms that process more than 98% of the birds we eat.

Chris also wanted to share their new video, in which their scientists tell us that if all Americans switched from eating chickens and pigs to eating beans and grains for just one day per week, that would stop as much global warming as if everyone in the U.S. shifted to ultra-efficient Toyota hybrids (which is the weekly equivalent of using 12 billion fewer gallons of gasoline). Of course I have to point out the obvious: If we all stopped eating animals completely and shifted to vegetarian foods, that would save 84 billion gallons of gas per week (and all the troubles that go with that kind of consumption).

I know that some readers will argue that the issue is not the meat industry, but factory farmed meat. But in fact, environmentally, all meat requires exponentially more resources to produce than eating grains and beans, as eloquently discussed in the Audubon Society's magazine a few months back. And all meat contributes to heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and so on. Some meat may be "less bad," but according to the science, no meat is good.

And I know that some vegetarians pooh pooh Meatless Monday as not enough. I'm sympathetic to that view, but I think it's unnecessarily strident. For people who think that going totally vegetarian is too challenging, the Meatless Monday campaign offers a gentle entrée into the idea of eating without eating animals. My hope is that people will use the campaign as a stepping stone -- first one meatless day per week, then three, then five, then seven. As we lean into meatless eating -- switching out more and more meat meals for meatless meals -- we end up feeling better, both physically and ethically.

And another point for those who might think that Meatless Monday is not enough: The first family of vegetarianism -- Sir Paul McCartney and his daughters -- recently launched the campaign in the UK. Stella and Mary have been vegetarian since birth, and Paul has been a vegetarian for more than two decades.

For recipes and cooking information, check out the Meatless Monday site. And for tips on making the transition to vegetarian eating, please click here. http://www.meatlessmonday.com/

In Relation to World Vegetarian Week: Top Ten Reasons To Go Vegetarian

A great article that really quickly sums up the benefits of vegetarianism.

I like this quote from Sir Paul McCartney found in the article: "If anyone wants to save the planet, all they have to do is just stop eating meat. That's the single most important thing you could do. It's staggering when you think about it. Vegetarianism takes care of so many things in one shot: ecology, famine, cruelty."

Article:

Top Ten Reasons To Go Vegetarian

http://www.alternet.org/environment/85828/?page=entire

By Bruce Friedrich, AlterNet. Posted May 19, 2008.

It's World Vegetarian Week and here's a few reasons to kick the meat habit.

Gone are the days when vegetarians were served up a plate of iceberg lettuce and a dull-as-dishwater baked potato. With the growing variety of vegetarian faux-meats like bacon and sausages and an ever-expanding variety of vegetarian cookbooks and restaurants, vegetarianism has taken the world by storm.

With World Vegetarian Week here, without further ado, are the Top 10 reasons to give vegetarian eating a try, starting now!

1. Helping Animals Also Helps the Global Poor While there is ample and justified moral indignation about the diversion of 100 million tons of grain for biofuels, more than seven times as much (760 million tons) is fed to farmed animals so that people can eat meat. Is the diversion of crops to our cars a moral issue? Yes, but it's about one-eighth the issue that meat-eating is. Care about global poverty? Try vegetarianism.

2. Eating Meat Supports Cruelty to Animals The green pastures and idyllic barnyard scenes of years past are now distant memories. On today's factory farms, animals are crammed by the thousands into filthy windowless sheds, wire cages, gestation crates, and other confinement systems. These animals will never raise families, root in the soil, build nests, or do anything else that is natural and important to them. They won't even get to feel the warmth of the sun on their backs or breathe fresh air until the day they are loaded onto trucks bound for slaughter.

3. Eating Meat Is Bad for the Environment A recent United Nations report entitled Livestock's Long Shadow concludes that eating meat is "one of the ... most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global." In just one example, eating meat causes almost 40 percent more greenhouse-gas emissions than all the cars, trucks, and planes in the world combined. The report concludes that the meat industry "should be a major policy focus when dealing with problems of land degradation, climate change and air pollution, water shortage and water pollution, and loss of biodiversity."

4. Avoid Bird Flu

The World Health Organization says that if the avian flu virus mutates, it could be caught simply by eating undercooked chicken flesh or eggs, eating food prepared on the same cutting board as infected meat or eggs, or even touching eggshells contaminated with the disease. Other problems with factory farming -- from foot-and-mouth to SARS -- can be avoided with a general shift to a vegetarian diet.

5. If You Wouldn't Eat a Dog, You Shouldn't Eat a Chicken Several recent studies have shown that chickens are bright animals who are able to solve complex problems, demonstrate self-control, and worry about the future. Chickens are smarter than cats and dogs and even do some things that have not yet been seen in mammals other than primates. Dr. Chris Evans, who studies animal behavior and communication at Macquarie University in Australia, says, "As a trick at conferences, I sometimes list these attributes, without mentioning chickens and people think I'm talking about monkeys."

6. Heart Disease: Our Number One Killer Healthy vegetarian diets support a lifetime of good health and provide protection against numerous diseases, including the United States' three biggest killers: heart disease, cancer, and strokes. Drs. Dean Ornish and Caldwell Esselstyn -- two doctors with 100 percent success in preventing and reversing heart disease -- have used a vegan diet to accomplish it, as chronicled most recently in Dr. Esselstyn's Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease, which documents his 100 percent success rate for unclogging people's arteries and reversing heart disease.

7. Cancer: Our Number Two Killer Dr. T. Colin Campbell is one of the world's foremost epidemiological scientists and the director of what The New York Times called "the most comprehensive large study ever undertaken of the relationship between diet and the risk of developing disease." Dr. Campbell's best-selling book, The China Study, is a must-read for anyone who is concerned about cancer. To summarize it, Dr. Campbell states, "No chemical carcinogen is nearly so important in causing human cancer as animal protein."

8. Fitting Into That Itty-Bitty Bikini Vegetarianism is also the ultimate weight-loss diet, since vegetarians are one-third as likely to be obese as meat-eaters are, and vegans are about one-tenth as likely to be obese. Of course, there are overweight vegans, just as there are skinny meat-eaters. But on average, vegans are 10 to 20 percent lighter than meat-eaters. A vegetarian diet is the only diet that has passed peer review and taken weight off and kept it off.

9. Global Peace

Leo Tolstoy claimed that "vegetarianism is the taproot of humanitarianism." His point? For people who wish to sow the seeds of peace, we should be eating as peaceful a diet as possible. Eating meat supports killing animals, for no reason other than humans' acquired taste for animals' flesh. Great humanitarians from Leo Tolstoy and Mahatma Gandhi to Thich Nhat Hanh have argued that a vegetarian diet is the only diet for people who want to make the world a kinder place.

10. The Joy of Veggies

As the growing range of vegetarian cookbooks and restaurants shows, vegetarian foods rock. People report that when they adopt a vegetarian diet, their range of foods explodes from a center-of-the-plate meat item to a range of grains, legumes, fruits, and vegetables that they didn't even know existed.

Sir Paul McCartney sums it all up, "If anyone wants to save the planet, all they have to do is just stop eating meat. That's the single most important thing you could do. It's staggering when you think about it. Vegetarianism takes care of so many things in one shot: ecology, famine, cruelty."

So are you ready to give it a try?

Group Tells President Arroyo of the Philippines the Obvious: Become Vegetarian and Help Solve the Problem of Starvation in the Country

Once again a politician is shown the obvious and they refuse to listen. Unfortunately, in this case, this lack of openness to the truth leads to suffering of people.

Article:

GMA declines animal rights' group invitation to become vegetarian

http://www.philstar.com/index.php?Local%20News
&p=54&type=2&sec=2&aid=200805097

Friday, May 9, 2008 10:02 AM

MANILA (AP)-President Arroyo has declined an animal rights group's invitation to become a vegetarian to help fight hunger in her country, her spokesman today said.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals challenged Mrs. Arroyo in an open letter to shun meat, saying that "adopting a vegetarian diet and publicly advocating the same would do far more than any photo op."

The PETA director for Asia-Pacific, Jason Baker, said that raising animals for food is "condemning people in the Philippines and around the world to starvation." He said food fed to animals is enough to feed half the world.

Mrs. Arroyo was not persuaded to change her diet.

Animal Rights and Eco Action / Environmentalism: One Cannot Exist Without the Other

A great writing. I encourage all to read it and pass it on. Really shows the true connection between the two issues.

Article:

Animal Rights - the Beating Heart of Eco Action

http://www.arkangelweb.org/features/20070919beatingheart.php

A Discussion on How We in the Animal Rights Movement are at the Centre of Political Change
There is an expression, though not one an Animal Rights activist would tend to use, that describes something so large as to evade notice as the “Elephant in the room.” However, there is now an issue so large, so vital, that it might be better described as the very room itself. That issue is of course Climate Change. What started as the relatively innocuous sounding Global Warming is well on the way to acquiring its more rightful status as likely Climate Catastrophe. Over the last few years this issue has gone from being the preserve of a few scientists and commentators, largely dismissed as cranks, to the front page of every newspaper and the top of most political agendas.

More importantly, this realisation has led to the flowering of a new Eco Action movement, committed to Direct Action in defence of the Earth, and against all those who put greed and material self gratification before the common interest and a sustainable future for all. This Summer saw the second annual Climate Camp take place at Heathrow airport, to protest at the exponential increase in aviation, one of the fastest growing causes of human induced Climate Change. It is absolutely vital that this grassroots movement continues to grow and to succeed. For whilst they might pay lip service to the idea of change, there is no real sign as yet of politicians having the courage necessary to take the necessary decisions.
Over the last year I have made a point of becoming more involved in this movement. For we know that even if we in Animal Rights achieve our goal of eliminating the abuse and exploitation of all Animal Lives, the onset of Climate Catastrophe will render this utterly pointless. The potential consequences of such dramatic change to the weather systems of the Earth, beggar belief. The very ability of the Planet to continue to sustain life may well be compromised.In the face of this possibility it is incumbent on those of us in the Animal Rights movement to take this on board and adapt our strategies accordingly.

It is my belief that it is not possible to separate that which is truly sustainable from that which is properly ethical. As I like to put it, there can be no Life Rights without Earth Awareness. It is possible to argue, and most politicians would, that Climate Change can be tackled without recourse to fundamental change, both in the way in which we view ourselves, and our relationship to the Earth that is home to us all. However, it is the Earth which is the only properly holistic context in which we can come to informed decisions about the way in which we should live. Politicians would argue that we can continue to found ourselves, and our aspirations, on the politics of permanent economic growth. The lie must be put to the madness of this conceit. Money has never made good motivation, and the evidence of this is now made stark for all to see. We need a new ethic on which to base our idea of what it is we are, and it is we in the Animal Rights movement who can provide that ethic.

Throughout the Summer months, and to a lesser extent the rest of the year, there are an ever increasing number of green gatherings and festivals where people from all backgrounds come together to celebrate and discuss our relationship with the Earth. Some are more overtly political than others, and as Climate Change comes to dominate our thoughts, political activism is bound to seem more relevant than celebration. So what is it that links celebration with political activism, be it Eco Action or Animal Rights? What is it also that is the single most important change an individual can make to their lives in order to reduce their carbon footprint? It is to be Vegan, and it is this which is the indissoluble link between Animal Rights and Eco Action.
For those in the Animal Rights movement it is pretty much unthinkable to be deeply concerned with the equality of all Lives, and yet to kill and eat other animals. Granted, vegetarianism is often a stepping stone on the way to being Vegan, but Vegan is where most people end up as the only rational, reasonable and responsible choice. It is the only ethical way. For those in the Eco Action movement, to be Vegan is coming to be seen as the only sustainable way, given the effect it has on one’s carbon footprint. All food at this year’s Climate Camp was Vegan, as it is at most green or Eco gatherings. So it is that to be ethical is to be sustainable, and to be sustainable is to be ethical. As I presume that all of us who wish to see an ethical and sustainable future believe that it is better to be kind than to be cruel, we are, from our differing starting points, coming to the same conclusions and heading toward the same position. That position must be that it is wrong to exploit any Life, human or otherwise.

Although it would now seem that the many and disparate groups and individuals involved in Eco Action or Animal Rights are, in effect, fighting the same fight, that is not yet the way it appears to those we oppose. To them we either seem, or can be portrayed as, a collection of minor, single issue groups, easily dismissed as anything from cranks to crazed extremists. I know this to be a matter of much frustration and annoyance to the many good and decent people acting in defence of the Earth and all life. I would like to suggest that there is something that we can do about this, which will immeasurably increase our influence, without losing the intensity that a small but committed group can bring to a particular issue.

Why is it that the state so dislikes those groups and individuals who make up the Animal Rights movement, and is now showing the same reaction toward Climate Change campaigners? Why is it that the state brings so many resources to bear against us, and is even prepared to compromise its stated, if not realised, democratic ideals, in order to silence us? Could it just be that in their quieter moments or at least somewhere in their being, that they fear us? Not because we pose a physical threat to them, (after all it is they who are the people of violence, not us, it is they who have the guns and the bombs, and who do not shirk from using them), but because they know that we are right! And in being right we threaten not just their power and wealth, but their very idea of who they are.

Without compromising the integrity of these groups, or of those who prefer to work as individuals, I do feel that we need to operate under a collective, recognisable banner. I say this whilst realising that it is already happening in all except name, and has been for some time. For instance, as someone who has centered themselves in the Animal Rights movement, I chose to work under the banner of Earth First! a name more associated with Eco Action. Earth First! is an idea not an organisation. As such it is available to all of us working toward ethical and sustainable living in whatever field. Evidence of how the movement is operating under this banner can be seen from the self posting website Earth First! Action Reports. This website is ever more widely used by both Eco Action and Animal Rights groups to post details of Actions or for information purposes. I feel it would help to raise the profile and effectiveness of all that we do, to use the Earth First! Name in conjunction with whatever other names we are already using. After all, what better expresses our ethos than to state that what we do, is not done for ourselves, but for the Earth and all Lives. However we choose to operate, as individuals we are all Earth Firsters!

As a visible and tangible demonstration of how Eco Action and Animal Rights are coming together as an Earth First! Movement, the following suggestion has been made. For organisational purposes, the Climate Camp, both in its planning and for the actual event, is made up of a number of neighbourhoods representing different regions. Animal Rights, however, in its various groups and individuals, is a nationwide movement. We feel, therefore that it would show our understanding of the vital importance of Eco Action, and our solidarity with those already involved, to have an Animal Rights neighbourhood at next year’s Climate Camp. Having met a number of people involved in the planning and implementation of this year’s Camp, I am hoping to put forward this suggestion as soon as appropriate, and to help with the necessary planning. In this way, it will become increasingly obvious to those in power who seek only to protect vested financial interest, no matter what the real cost, that they are facing serious opposition. Cogent, coherent and organised opposition working, by way of consensus based non hierarchical systems, toward properly ethical and truly sustainable solutions to the problems we face. We who have decided to care, who have chosen to change, will not sit idly back and watch the Earth and all life being ground into money. As a movement our numbers will grow, and so must the Actions that we take. The future depends on it.
Written by Matt Clowes

To see more of Matt’s writing go to: http://www.earthfirstmanifesto.org/

The Case Made Once Again for the Positive Environmental Effects of Vegetarianism

It’s been made clear once again: undeniably, vegetarianism is the number one act for attempting to address the environmental problems of today.

Article:

Nuggets and Hummers and fish sticks, oh my!

http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/9/17/16200/7809

PETA VP argues vegetarianism is the best way to help the planet
Posted by Grist at 11:35 AM on 18 Sep 2007

This is a guest essay from Bruce Friedrich, vice president for campaigns at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). It was written in response to Alex Roth's essay "PETA's dogma is all bark and no bite." Friedrich has been an environmental activist for more than 20 years.

In 1987, I read Diet for a Small Planet by Frances Moore Lappé and -- primarily for human rights and environmental reasons -- went vegan. Two decades later, I still believe that -- even leaving aside all the animal welfare issues -- a vegan diet is the only reasonable diet for people in the developed world who care about the environment or global poverty.

Over the past 20 years, the environmental argument against growing crops to be fed to animals -- so that humans can eat the animals -- has grown substantially. Just this past November, the environmental problems associated with eating chickens, pigs, and other animals were the subject of a 408-page United Nations scientific report titled Livestock's Long Shadow.

The U.N. report found that the meat industry contributes to "problems of land degradation, climate change and air pollution, water shortage and water pollution, and loss of biodiversity." The report concludes that the meat industry is "one of the ... most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global."

Eating Meat Is the No. 1 Consumer Cause of Global Warming

Al Gore, Leonardo DiCaprio, and others have brought the possibility of global cataclysm into sharp relief. What they have not been talking about, however, is the fact that all cars, trucks, planes, and other types of transportation combined account for about 13 percent of global warming emissions, whereas raising chickens, pigs, cattle, and other animals contributes to 18 percent, according to U.N. scientists. Yes, eating animal products contributes to global warming 40 percent more than all SUVs, 18-wheelers, jumbo jets, and other types of travel combined.

Al and Leo might not be talking about the connection between meat and global warming, but the Live Earth concert that Al inspired is: The recently published Live Earth Global Warming Survival Handbook recommends, "Don't be a chicken. Stop being a pig. And don't have a cow. Be the first on your block to cut back on meat." The Handbook further explains that "refusing meat" is "the single most effective thing you can do to reduce your carbon footprint" [emphasis in original].

And Environmental Defense, on its website, notes, "If every American skipped one meal of chicken per week and substituted vegetables and grains ... the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more than half a million cars off of U.S. roads." Imagine if we stopped eating animal products altogether.

Eating Meat Wastes Resources

If I lie in bed and never get up, I will burn almost 2,500 calories each day; that is what's required to keep my body alive. The same physiological reality applies to all animals: The vast majority of the calories consumed by a chicken, a pig, a cow, or another animal goes into keeping that animal alive, and once you add to that the calories required to create the parts of the animal that we don't eat (e.g., bones, feathers, and blood), you find that it takes more than 10 times as many calories of feed given to an animal to get one calorie back in the form of edible fat or muscle. In other words, it's exponentially more efficient to eat grains, soy, or oats directly rather than feed them to farmed animals so that humans can eat those animals. It's like tossing more than 10 plates of spaghetti into the trash for every one plate you eat.

And that's just the pure "calories in, calories out" equation. When you factor in everything else, the situation gets much worse. Think about the extra stages of production that are required to get dead chickens, pigs, or other animals from the farm to the table:

1. Grow more than 10 times as much corn, grain, and soy (with all the required tilling, irrigation, crop dusters, and so on), as would be required if we ate the plants directly.
2. Transport -- in gas-guzzling, pollution-spewing 18-wheelers -- all that grain and soy to feed manufacturers.
3. Operate the feed mill (again, using massive amounts of resources).
4. Truck the feed to the factory farms.
5. Operate the factory farms.
6. Truck the animals many miles to slaughterhouses.
7. Operate the slaughterhouses.
8. Truck the meat to processing plants.
9. Operate the meat processing plants.
10. Truck the meat to grocery stores (in refrigerated trucks).
11. Keep the meat in refrigerators or freezers at the stores.

With every stage comes massive amounts of extra energy usage -- and with that comes heavy pollution and massive amounts of greenhouse gases, of course. Obviously, vegan foods require some of these stages, too, but vegan foods cut out the factory farms, the slaughterhouses, and multiple stages of heavily polluting tractor-trailer trucks, as well as all the resources (and pollution) involved in each of those stages. And as was already noted, vegan foods require less than one-tenth as many calories from crops, since they are turned directly into food rather than funneled through animals first.

Eating Meat Wastes and Pollutes Water

All food requires water, but animal foods are exponentially more wasteful of water than vegan foods are. Enormous quantities of water are used to irrigate the corn, soy, and oat fields that are dedicated to feeding farmed animals -- and massive amounts of water are used in factory farms and slaughterhouses. According to the National Audubon Society, raising animals for food requires about as much water as all other water uses combined. Environmental author John Robbins estimates that it takes about 300 gallons of water to feed a vegan for a day, four times as much water to feed an ovo-lacto vegetarian, and about 14 times as much water to feed a meat-eater.

Raising animals for food is also a water-polluting process. According to a report prepared by U.S. Senate researchers, animals raised for food in the U.S. produce 86,000 pounds of excrement per second -- that's 130 times more than the amount of excrement that the entire human population of the U.S. produces! Farmed animals' excrement is more concentrated than human excrement, and is often contaminated with herbicides, pesticides, toxic chemicals, hormones, antibiotics, and other harmful substances. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the runoff from factory farms pollutes our rivers and lakes more than all other industrial sources combined.

Eating Meat Destroys the Rain Forest

The World Bank recently reported that 90 percent of all Amazon rainforest land cleared since 1970 is used for meat production. It's not just that we're destroying the rainforest to make grazing land for cows -- we're also destroying it to grow feed for them and other animals. Last year, Greenpeace targeted KFC for the destruction of rainforests because the Amazon is being razed to grow feed for chickens that end up in KFC's buckets. Of course, the rainforest is being used to grow feed for other chickens, pigs, and cows, too (i.e., KFC isn't the only culprit).

What About Eating Fish?
Anyone who reads the news knows that commercial fishing fleets are plundering the oceans and destroying sensitive aquatic ecosystems at an incomprehensible rate. One super-trawler is the length of a football field, and can take in 800,000 pounds of fish in a single netting. These trawlers scrape along the ocean floor, clear-cutting coral reefs and everything else in their path. Hydraulic dredges scoop up huge chunks of the ocean floor to sift out scallops, clams, and oysters. Most of what the fishing fleets pull in isn't even eaten by human beings; half is fed to animals raised for food, and about 30 million tons each year are just tossed back into the ocean, dead, with disastrous and irreversible consequences for the natural biological balance.

Then there is aquaculture (fish farming), which is increasing at a rate of more than 10 percent annually. Aquaculture is even worse than commercial fishing because, for starters, it takes about four pounds of wild-caught fish to reap just one pound of farmed fish, which eat fish caught by commercial trawlers. Farmed fish are often raised in the same water that wild fish swim in, but fish farmers dump antibiotics into the water and use genetic breeding to create "Frankenstein fish." The antibiotics contaminate the oceans and seas, and the genetically engineered fish sometimes escape and breed with wild fish, throwing delicate aquatic balances off-kilter. Researchers at the University of Stockholm demonstrated that the horrible environmental impact of fish farms can extend to an area 50,000 times larger than the farm itself.

Eating Meat Supports Cruelty

Caring for the environment means protecting all of our planet's inhabitants, not just the human ones. Chickens, pigs, turkeys, fish, and cows are intelligent, social animals who feel pain, just as humans, dogs, and cats do. Chickens and pigs do better on animal behavior cognition tests than dogs or cats, and are interesting individuals in the same way. Fish form strong social bonds, and some even use tools. Yet these animals suffer extreme pain and deprivation in today's factory farms. Chickens have their sensitive beaks cut off with a hot blade, pigs have their tails chopped off and their teeth removed with pliers, and cattle and pigs are castrated -- all without any pain relief. The animals are crowded together and given steady doses of hormones and antibiotics in order to make them grow so quickly that their hearts and limbs often cannot keep up, causing crippling and heart attacks. At the slaughterhouse, they are hung upside-down and bled to death, often while they are still conscious.

What About Eating Meat That Isn't From Factory-Farmed Animals?

Is meat better if it doesn't come from factory-farmed animals? Of course, but its production still wastes resources and pollutes the environment. Shouldn't we environmentalists challenge ourselves to do the best we can, not just to make choices that are a bit less bad?

The U.N. report looks at meat at a global level and indicts the inefficiency and waste that are inherent in meat production. No matter where meat comes from, raising animals for food will require that exponentially more calories be fed to animals than they can produce in their flesh, and it will require all those extra stages of CO2-intensive production as well. Only grass-fed cows eat food from land that could not otherwise be used to grow food for human beings, and even grass-fed cows require much more water and create much more pollution than vegan foods do.

Conclusion

The case against eating animal products is ironclad; it's not a new argument, and it goes way beyond just global warming. Animals will not grow or produce flesh, milk, or eggs without food and water; they won't do it without producing excrement; and the stages of meat, dairy, and egg production will always cause pollution and be resource-intensive.

If the past is any guide, this essay will generate much hand-wringing from my meat-eating environmentalist colleagues and, sadly, some anger. They will prefer half-measures (e.g., meat that is "not as bad" as other meat). They may accuse PETA of being judgmental -- simply for presenting the evidence. They will make various arguments that are beside the point. They will ignore the overwhelming argument against eating animal products and try to find a loophole. Some will just call the argument absurd, presenting no evidence at all.

But as Leonardo DiCaprio has noted, this is the 11th hour for the environment. Where something as basic as eating animals is concerned, the choice could not be any clearer: Every time we sit down to eat, we can choose to eat a product that is, according to U.N. scientists, "one of the ... most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global," or we can choose vegan -- and preferably organic -- foods. It's bad for the environment to eat animals. It's time to stop looking for loopholes.

Considering the proven health benefits of a vegetarian diet -- the American Dietetic Association states that vegetarians have a reduced risk of obesity, heart disease, and various types of cancer --- there's no need or excuse to eat chickens, pigs, eggs, and other animal products. And vegan foods are available everywhere and taste great; as with all foods -- vegan or not -- you just need to find the ones you like.

You can find out more at GoVeg.com and get great-tasting recipes, meal plans, cookbook recommendations, and more at VegCooking.com.

For story: Nuggets and Hummers and fish sticks, oh my!
15 Comments | Post a Comment
Don't Taser Me, Bro'


Eating meat is not the problem.

Eating a lot of putrified animal particle board that parades as meat is the problem.

Hunting a wild boar once every two weeks in Tuscany is living.

Wolfing down Presto! burgers is suicide.

Let's separate the wheat from the chafe -- and please, PETA, don't taser me!

John Bailo
Sutext:
by jabailo at 12:14 PM on 18 Sep 2007

John

What does that have to do with the issue? How much wild boar have you hunted this year?

by Matt G at 12:20 PM on 18 Sep 2007

I wonder what prompted this article?

Read "damage control."

The ad says, "Meat is the #1 Cause of Global Warming," which some fool pointed out is not true ("Uh, he doesn't have any clothes on.."), so here they try to do damage control by rewording it to say "Eating Meat Is the No. 1 Consumer Cause of Global Warming" which unfortunately is even less true. Power generation, industrial processes, and just about every other source of CO2 is paid for by consumers.


The divisive stance they have taken is a dead end strategy. They refuse to simply acknowledge that eating less meat, and less environmentally destructive forms of it is an adequate goal. That is because their real agenda is animal rights. They have jumped on the global warming environment bandwagon to promote their cause. They insist that you become one of them. They have a clearly defined group of people, Vegans and Vegetarians. There does not appear to be any other group allowed. That is why I created the 50-percent Vegan group of which I am a proud member. I also formally challenge Bruce to a carbon footprint pissing contest!

I'll work on a formal rebuttal if I have time. Gawd.


In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

“…[Meat] Generates More Greenhouse Gases than All the Cars, Trucks, And [Planes] In the World Combined,” Group Calls For Tax Breaks for Vegetarians

Citing the Fact That “…Raising Animals for Food Generates More Greenhouse Gases than All the Cars, Trucks, And [Planes] In the World Combined,” Group Calls For Tax Breaks for Vegetarians

It only makes sense. It’s pure logic.

Article:

PETA seeks tax breaks for vegetarians

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/peta-seeks-tax-
breaks-for-vegetarians-2007-05-31.html

By Ilan Wurman
May 31, 2007
Citing the need to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is calling on congressional leaders to give vegetarians a tax break.

In a letter sent Wednesday to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), PETA President Ingrid Newkirk stated, “[V]egetarians are responsible for far fewer greenhouse-gas emissions and other kinds of environmental degradation than meat-eaters.”

The letter added that vegetarians should receive a tax break “just as people who purchase a hybrid vehicle enjoy a tax break.”

Asked how the government would certify that taxpayers are vegetarian, PETA spokesman Matt Prescott said, “I imagine that a system could be adopted whereby taxpayers could show receipts for food purchases and/or sign an affidavit attesting … that they are vegetarian. If Congress is seriously interested about rewarding people for reducing their carbon emissions, then it could develop a system to verify that people are vegetarian.”

Congressional leaders, however, have not shown any indication of pursuing such a tax break.

The PETA letter draws on research conducted at the University of Chicago and a U.N. report. According to the letter, anyone switching to a hybrid car will lessen the emissions of carbon dioxide by only one ton per year, while anyone forgoing their love of meat will spare the environment one and a half tons per year.

Citing the U.N. report, Newkirk wrote, “[S]cientists determined that raising animals for food generates more greenhouse gases than all the cars, trucks, and [planes] in the world combined.”

“Although most Americans can’t afford to pay upward of $20,000 for a new hybrid car,” the letter continues, “everyone can go vegetarian.”

Newkirk added, “Anyone who buys a hybrid in order to cut down on their contribution to global warming and uses it to drive to the supermarket to buy chicken, steaks, and milk should face up to the fact that there’s no such thing as a meat-eating environmentalist.”

Group Reminds Al Gore that Switching to Vegetarianism Has Greater Effect on Global Warming than Does Driving a Hybrid Car

Excellent and real points. I’ll let the following quotes speak for themselves. Notice how the facts come from the United Nations and the University of Chicago. So, any chance at branding them biased would be off:

“In its recent report “Livestock’s Long Shadow—Environmental Issues and Options,” the United Nations determined that raising animals for food generates more greenhouse gases than all the cars and trucks in the world combined.

Researchers at the University of Chicago have determined that switching to a vegan diet is more effective in countering global warming than switching from a standard American car to a Toyota Prius.

PETA also reminds Gore that his critics love to question whether he practices what he preaches and suggests that by going vegetarian, he could cut down on his contribution to global warming and silence his critics at the same time.”

Article:

PETA plea to Al Gore

http://people.monstersandcritics.com/news/
article_1274083.php/PETA_plea_to_Al_Gore

Former Vice President Al Gore poses for photos after "An Inconvenient Truth" won the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature (UPI Photo/Phil McCarten)

By Stone Martindale Mar 7, 2007, 16:13 GMT

PETA claims that according to U.N., animals raised as food stock create more greenhouse gas then all the vehicles combined. They have penned a letter to Al Gore asking him to step away from the meat.

PETA issued a public letter to former vice president Al Gore explaining to him that the best way to combat the threat of global warming is to go vegan, and they offered to cook him faux “fried chicken” as an introduction to meat-free meals.

In its letter, PETA points out that Gore’s Oscar winning documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth" that outlines the potentially catastrophic effects of global warming has failed to address the fact that the meat industry is the largest contributor to greenhouse-gas emissions.

In the letter, PETA points out the following:

The effect that our meat addiction is having on the climate is truly staggering. In fact, in its recent report “Livestock’s Long Shadow—Environmental Issues and Options,” the United Nations determined that raising animals for food generates more greenhouse gases than all the cars and trucks in the world combined.

Researchers at the University of Chicago have determined that switching to a vegan diet is more effective in countering global warming than switching from a standard American car to a Toyota Prius.

PETA also reminds Gore that his critics love to question whether he practices what he preaches and suggests that by going vegetarian, he could cut down on his contribution to global warming and silence his critics at the same time.

“The single best thing that any of us can do to for our health, for animals, and for the environment is to go vegetarian,” says PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk. “The best and easiest way for Mr. Gore to show his critics that he’s truly committed to fighting global warming is to kick his meat habit immediately.”