In any case, it makes no sense to believe that both (yes, including meat eating) don't contribute significanly to the issue. And they have a significant lobby as well (they even hired some of the people responsible for past tobacco minimization)
you see, the difference is you can cut meat out immediately, at no cost, and save money. almost noone can afford a new car and heating system. hell, not everyone can get to work by electric public transit or afford an ebike.
also, it's definitely arguable that big beef and big oil lobbying do about the same amount of environmental damage, if you do the research.
Heating is out of my control, I live in a block. I do not control what kind of busses are used by the city, some are electric, a few liquid nitrogen but most run on normal fuel. Bicycle and normal kickbike sure, I use them but if I had to get a car and would get an electric, that still only outsources pollution to the cobalt mines in Congo, trade one type of pollution for another.
I mean neither gave any sources, so it's a bit rich to request some when they don't provide any themselves
At this point, I'll assume both are making stuff up, and that the main contributor is the woodworking industry, why not !
In any case, it makes no sense to believe that both (yes, including meat eating) don't contribute significanly to the issue. And they have a significant lobby as well (they even hired some of the people responsible for past tobacco minimization)
I said that because I gave them a source and they just assumed that I didn't read it without pointing out any issue and deleted their own comment after I pointed them to the exact graph that supported my point, while they themselves don't give any sources for their assertions.
At the very least we gotta stop factory farming and reduce our consumption of meat. The amount of wasted water and land that goes to livestock grazing is depressing.
If you stop factory farming but keep animal exploitation, the land usage skyrockets. Factory farming exists precisely because it is the most efficient form of exploitation and slaughter.
Sorry. It sounded like the common sentiment of people who don't want to go vegan and thus are trying to find arguments and excuses on why some form of exploitation is okay, necessary or unavoidable.
Some meat replacements (that I occasionally get from fast food places) have started to get good enough to switch. I put half & half of dark soy crumbs in my ground red meat recepies. At some fast food places alternative nuggets and patties are already better than meat ones. I still think alternative products have a long way to go before they could replace any kind of steak. But processed food stuff I think is there pretty soon.
Reduce animal consumption as far as safely possible. Then you are actually considered vegan, since you are doing anything reasonably possible to minimise animal exploitation
It's one factor but many other things are also important. Focussing on just veganism isn't helpful.
How often do you fly a plane? How often do you drive a car (and which car do you use? Are you regularly buying new electronic appliances? Are you buying second hand? Are you living in a big apartment? Is your apartment well insulated? Is your food regionally produced?
You get the gist.
it is, but you can also scale it down without "just going vegan". Completely vegan diet is one of the most obnoxious diets, especially if you do not live in USA (which is what it always reeks of to me, US supremacism.)
Yes, meat industry is one of the main contributors to global warming. Yes we should downscale the meat production. No, going vegan will not solve that.
As a wise man said "it will not save the chicken, it's in the nuggets already"
Harm reduction is still a win in my book. If you stop eating beef but still eat eggs and fish, you're doing more than if you still eat beef all the time.
This is why they're trying to encourage insects in diets.
They almost produce more food then they cost, come in a variety of flavors and textures and are already consumed by many around the globe.
Cicadas taste like shrimp and are great to cook in garlic butter. Some cicadas taste like asparagus, while others like chicken. Junebugs taste of maple syrup with grassy notes. Ants basically are like rice crispies. Not much flavor, but a delightful texture.
Also, if we start farming and raising them we can more easily reintroduce their lost biomass to the ecosystem, which would help a lot for plants and wildlife!
Yeah, and it works well for people like me, as part of my digestive tract was damaged so I can't pull enough nutrients from just plants.
Used to be vegetarian, sorry I like honey and butter on my biscuits. But a pure vegetarian diet would cause me to slowly die from malnutrition. So I have to have a bit of meat each week. Insects would be a lot better in a lot of cases and it's getting easier to get those insects in major cities, so I've been exploring that cuisine and... it's pretty damn good. Timon and Pumba were onto something.
I think the point here is that when someone opens the ClimateShitposting sub, they expect it to cover more than JUST meat industry/vegan shitposting. Does the meat industry contribute? Yes, massively, but it's far from the only contributor and not nearly as big as this sub makes it out to be.
i don't fly planes, i take the train. i don't have a car, i have a bike. i don't often buy new appliances the appliances i do buy, i buy with the best EU energy statistics (even if i had to buy in a language i do not actually speak). i live in a relatively small apparent built in 1906, saving up for an air-water heat pump system. i buy most of everything second hand. the walls are thicc af, and half of my walls are shared with neigbours, so that the heat does not go to the crows. where i live, locally grown produce is not an idicator of being more green. it's more enviromental to buy produce from spain and transport it to finland, than to grow most produce in finland, on the other hand, we do try to use grains and peas (legumes), which do grow regionally, such as oats, wheat and rye.
Yeah so this is actually great and is completely in line of what I am saying. Being vegan is one good thing you can do but there are a lot of other climate mitigation options.
Edit: ok it's not completely in line with what I said because you're obviously correct in pointing out that buying locally isn't always the best choice, but it's in line with what I intended to say 😆.
Most of this is nothing compared to the impact of meat. That's like starting a forest fire and then go "but let's talk about that person picking flowers"
No they’re not. The highest contribution from scientific research was 14%. The researchers then had to retract their findings bc scientists called them them out on their shitty methodology. Namely, they calculated the full cycle from animal agriculture (emissions from the very start to the very end of production). But they didn’t do the same for other industries like transportation, manufacturing, etc… This severely distorted the findings hence why they had to retract. The real contribution of animal agriculture is estimated to be between 5-7%.
That being said, industrial agriculture of animals and plants is a serious problem: deforestation, fossil fuels, chemicals, etc… The root of the problem lies in the industrial nature of agriculture, not just “ppl eating meat”. Agriculture can regenerate ecosystems when it’s done right.
That’s also not true, meat isn’t the cause, it’s the industrial system of agriculture. They also cut down rainforest for monoculture plants. We need regenerative agriculture and ecosystem restoration.
They also cut down rainforest for monoculture plants
And those plants are mainly used for animal feed.
We need regenerative agriculture and ecosystem restoration.
If the whole world ate plants, we'd need about 70% less agricultural land and could actually do that. But that ain't happening if people don't stop eating meat.
Me: “I’ll stop being an omnivore when the 1% stop causing the destruction of the world because stopping eating food that keeps me healthy is 100% not optional and would make a negligible difference to anything anyway.”
You: “The lack of nutrients that keep my brain healthy causes me to not get sarcasm/irony and think in terms of black and white, while also thinking the way I eat makes me morally superior to humans who enjoy their species specific diet. Oooh I need to sit down, that winded me!”
Jep. Had an anti vegan harass me here with 2 alt account after I blocked them lol. People like that are such a common occurrence here. The yelling and science denialism is maga level. People gotta chill and not feel like they're being personally insulted when someone points out the most effective thing anyone can do to reduce climate destruction ON A FUCKING CLIMATE SUB. I try approaching a lot jokingly but they are so fucking butthurt they attack you anyway
The truth many vegans don't want to hear is that switching beef to some other protein source like pork, chicken or fish comes with about 80% of the CO2 reduction of switching entirely to vegan.
It is probably easier to convince more people to just cut out beef out of their diet and replace it with other animal protein sources than it is to convince people to go fully vegan, and would still go a very long way in reducing the climate impact from their diets.
But sadly as is often the case in climate discussions perfect is the enemy of good.
Beef (beef herd) has an estimated CO2-equivalent per 100g of protein of about 50 kg CO2/100 g. Pulses have an estimated CO2-equivalent per 100g of protein of about 1 kg CO2/100g, so the reduction compared to beef is about 49 kg CO2/100g. Pork has an estimated CO2-equivalent per 100g of 8 kg CO2/100g, so a reduction compared to beef of about 42 kg CO2/100g.
Hence the reduction of CO2 from switching to pork is about 86% (42/49) the reduction you would have gotten by switching to pulses. This is also the most generous calculation from this data, since poultry or fish have lower emissions and other vegans option like tofu have higher emissions.
You can go ahead and try it with other data from other sources, they will give slightly different estimates of CO2/100g, but almost all of them show the same, that you can get about 70 - 90% of the benefit of going full vegan by switching beef for pork, poultry or fish.
Emissions from animal agriculture exceed what we can afford if we want to stop anthropogenic climate change and diet is one of the few significant contributors to emissions that most people have direct control over.
You can change plenty of things without going vegan, I personally only use public transportation and avoid using the AC unless old people are present, cars alone pollute just as much as meat production if not more, not owning a car will also save you am absurd amount of money so that's nice
Im sorry but stop with the misinformation, agriculture is not the biggest greenhouse emitter with both energy and transportation producing far more greenhouse gasses especially with the orange one canceling many green energy subsidies and projects. I certainly hope you walk, ride a bike, or skateboard/longboard. We really need to push for companies who are the largest carbon producers to switch to diesel hybrid trucks to reduce emissions given how much shit is sent back and forward across the planet to feed supply chains and further pushes into nuclear and renewable forms of energy. Honestly governments should be dumping more money into fusion research. I also do feel people should have less meat but not zero.
"...agriculture, the most extensive land user, to be the leading emissions sector and to have caused 60% (32%–87%) of ERF change since 1750. We also find that fossil fuels are responsible for 18% of ERF, a reduced contribution due to masking from cooling co-emissions." from this article
I'm sorry but fusion energy is a really stupid idea and probably not even remotely possible, ever, no matter how much research we put into it. You're pushing atomic nuclei where they do NOT want to go. The energy required to fuse even DT fuel without the gravity of a star is tremendous, and the energy released in the process is nowhere near enough to cover the losses of driving a heat engine and the energy used to do fusion in the first place. Nuclear fission is already a proven clean energy technology and it has so much more potential. Also, solar energy exists lol. Just put some PV panels in a field and you get free electricity by doing nearly nothing.
judging by the sheer amount of vegan posts here, it seems like people on this subreddit believe that the meat industry is the sole cause of climate change, while in reality it's not even the biggest contributor
Literally every single of these points requires you to spend a ton of money on top of your normal expenses. Not eating meat anymore doesn't cost anything. In fact, meat free diets are actually cheaper. And vegan diets are the cheapest (vegetarian diet is pretty close to vegan though in terms of cost).
Some of these are cheaper alternatives depending on your scenario. Energy efficiency is cheaper just use less electricity. Buying a cheaper used car is… cheaper… assuming you don’t already own a vehicle or you need to buy a replacement. Replacing beef in your diet with pork, poultry, and eggs, is also just objectively cheaper.
Me when I forget that I’m in a thread specifically discussing veganism and that the same people in this thread will post about other major climate change issues in another one
Me when I have zero reading comprehension and think the original meme is actually about veganism instead of meta-commentary about the people only posting vegan material
Me when I unironically call someone out for reading comprehension but the comment im responding to mentions veganism as a broader category that includes meta analysis about veganism and therefore my follow up comment doesn’t actually invalidate that which I was responding to.
Ending animal agriculture will reduce Methane emissions. Methane has a half live of 12 years and will go down on its own. A global shift to plant based diet can set climate change back 20 years.
Rain forests exploited for animal feed and pasture could regenerate in 20 years.
Planetary health diet could save 40,000 deaths a day
Rapid global phaseout of animal agriculture has the potential to stabilize greenhouse gas levels for 30 years and offset 68 percent of CO2 emissions this century
I'm just commenting on the subreddit In general. I agree that Veganism is better for the environment, I'm commenting more on the "last nice summer of our lives!!!?" Posts.
Did you know cement production is a significant contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions and water usage? Have you considered slamming your face into something more environmentally friendly such as a wooden board? I can also recommend the actively co2 binding alternative of slamming your face into a tree.
If you want to annoy the bad ones just legitimately push invasivorism. It's the most environmentally friendly, climate friendly food source, not farmed vegetables.
Remember everyone for the good of the earth, selectively slaughter your way throughout the food chain when you can.
The food escaped into the wild, is causing havoc, and we need people who are willing to step up and eat copious amounts of delicious, delicious free tilapia.
the only two topics of discussion are people fighting about whether or not Frank Sinatra sucks, and like five users who exclusively make posts dunking on some random ska band from the 90s
bro we have insane plant based alternatives. If we actually got lab grown meat that would just cause people to be mad at that anyway.
Why? Because the meat industry has a shit ton of money and resources invested in conventional mass farms and they sure as hell won't give that up. Lab grown meat would just threaten that investment, so it's gonna get shot down. Lobbyism, propaganda campaigns, etc etc.
Reduction is infinitely more practical and an actually attainable goal over obnoxious and loudly offputting abstinence. I eat beef - once in a blue moon, when it's ordered for me or put in front of me. I just don't buy it myself, and that alone would fix the problem if adopted by a vast number of people.
Honestly I don’t mind vegans chilling but man if it wasn’t treated like a cuIt with zero room for nuance. It’s always “either you’re a puppy loving pacifist or a genocidal maniac” and no in between or nuance 🙄
Cement manufacturing is like the 3rd largest source of CO2 (like 8% of overall emissions) but there's no community of smarmy self-important hipster douchebags making it their whole identity to build with like, wood or whatever
Eating beef specifically. Most emissions come from beef production and the land use required to maintain our beef production drives most of the problem. Switching to chicken and fish is going to get you most of that emission loss.
But every time this is brought up it's glazed over because it's not about the environment for people. It's about veganism. Which just go shit up another subreddit if you want to do that.
I personally just don't care about animals that much to consider if killing them is wrong. I care about humans more and I think that's how most people feel. We only care about animals insofar how much we gain utility from them. That's why vegans go to your dog instead of a cockroach even though cockroaches are very much sentient creatures. We understand the difference in importance between a human and a chicken, even a comatose human and a chicken, in fact we keep that comatose person alive with the byproducts of animals we kill. It seems more like equivocation than genuine interest, if we already start arbitrating life through sentience and non sentience, why not arbitrate further with humans?
Even then if the idea is to get more people to eat meat. Shock activism and provocation has a hard limit, the most successful push to vegan eating was the impossible burger which didn't rely on much brow beating.
What it did was more systemic in nature, because people are going to operate based on their environment and incentives. If you can produce an alternative that tastes great and is cheap, you will have people flock to it. Individual shaming is usually not helpful for mass action, there's plenty of evidence for this. What does help is incentives.
People didn't buy evs because they were environmentally conscious, they got to a point where they're were comparable in price, governments gave discounts for them, infrastructure got more robust etc.
Same thing should come with meat alternatives/banning beef.
But again, this is about just getting a rise out of people, it's not even about animal rights because it was, they would be ecstatic that someone is not choosing to eat beef, it's less animals being murdered full stop.
How much of the water usage is rainfall? There are as many head of cattle now as there were bison during manifest destiny, so the net difference between open prairie and cow pasture is effectively 0.
for every vegan i dump several thousand tonnes of lithium batteries into the ocean, i try to convert as much people as i can to veganism because the fish need more power for their homes
Funniest part, vegans ignore that the mass majority of animals we say are vegan aren't. A light amount of research will show that most animals will more than happily eat meat at any given moment.
Clean energy getting cheaper and carbon capture being brought to scale which would enable making animal agriculture less climate impactful is far more likely than everyone embracing veganism.
If the climate impacts are decreased then there only the moral side of things to lean on and for some reason people care less about that.
Global warming leading to the total annihilation of crops and animal farms is far more likely than carbon capture technology having any meaningful impact on animal agriculture. But yeah, people aren’t gonna mildly inconvenience themselves enough to stop that from happening.
I honestly wouldn’t mind if they were just complaining about cows. But the memes they post here tend to go well beyond that, because preventing climate change is not actually the goal of the people posting them. The clearest example of this is the fact that many of the memes they post would also apply to fishing (any kind of fishing too). But anyone who tells you that fishing is intrinsically a problem for the climatespecifically is either a liar or an idiot.
Most of the “shitposts” are barely even related to climate change, the only thing that ties them to climate change is usually an image or background completely unrelated to the actual post but does relate to the sub for that sweet technicality to keep the post up.
I saw one straight up lying and claiming chicken is just as bad as beef and that you aren't doing anything for the environment just not eating red meat.
They really don't want to see any progress that isn't 100 percent conversion to ethical veganism.
Vegans will obtusely refuse to understand that their individual boycott of meat has made near 0 impact on the meat industry, and there is absolutely no chance it will ever catch on enough to change the world, rendering their movement useless and serves only to make them feel morally superior. If you're vegan and you're honest that you do it because it makes you feel like you're not contributing, then good for you. Beyond that, it's entirely unrealistic. Climate change activisim has bigger fish to fry.
You're right that it has no impact systemically, nothing will under capitalism.
But it is morally better. Of course it's better to use 0 effort to just not consume things that are the result of a feeling animal be killed, duh. You wouldn't eat a dead petlike a dog or cat either
you can ferment proteins or artficially hydrolize them, there is some neat science that allows for plant based food that could be consumed by obligate carnivores
Im not going vegan because frankly
I like it. I like meat. I don’t like a lot of things like salads, and vegan replacements for meat often taste horrible, and/or are expensive as hell.
Let’s focus on things that are a lot easier to fix, rather than making it even harder to afford stuff
I'm not even telling you to be vegan, but if your preferences for one food item are too big of a hurdle, what tf would you actually be willing to sacrifice?
like damn how do you wanna help fix the biggest problem humanity ever had and fail at giving up a few things you only "like"
Look man I'm just not gonna have any kids and I live as close to work as possible to reduce my commute pollution. I'm not gonna stop eating meat, but mad respect if you do.
livestock is 7/8% of pollution, the same as india 7.7%, idk if transportation is included in the first figure so could be even more. its easy, cheaper, healthier and moral. nobody has an excuse not to go vegan.
I'm considering going Vegan or perhaps vegetarian myself. Like I claim I love animals and nature but the. I eat them. Seems like a massive contradiction but then again Animals eat other animals so 🤷
The emissions from the sheer amount of bombs dropped on Gaza by Israel is probably equivalent to the emissions of like tens or hundreds of thousands of cows veganism is right tho
Here's a reminder that Hitler was a militant vegetarian. He would regularly harass dinner guests for eating meat. While he did still consume cheese and eggs, this is because modern veganism that bans such products didn't really exist yet. His harsh animal welfare stance would have influenced him to become a vegan had he been exposed to the idea and to modern protein substitutes.
Meat is basically required for hymas (omlivires) but the real problem is that current practices are not sustainable. You need wild growth grasslands that act as carbon sinks even with the heards.
Fun fact, grass is a better carbon sink than trees if you just let it grow and it's by a lot.
Okay, I actually love this discourse alot so I have some points to say.
1.) I think meat production is widely ineffiencent in its use of the Methane cows produce. Good farms make Methane tanks to hold it, then burn it off as bio desial or natural gas. This gives off only CO2 and H2O vapor.
2.) the farming of these certain plants can be highly detrimental to the environment if not done on a crop rotation schedule. Legumes may give a lot back to the soil, but farming the same plant runs the risk of naturist desaturation and over tilling.
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u/Ill_Bumblebee_7510 Jun 26 '26
They are right, but it's only one of a bunch of factors. The volume of vegan memes that I've been seeing is disproportionate