I wonder how many green initiatives turns out to be a farce, synthetic meat? Fuel cell? We'll probably hear the same thing for lithium-based EV and wind turbines
While the usage per capita shoots up for the very rich, a huger fraction of CO2 output is from those below them, not exactly the poorest but people in the middle. Per capita doesn't help, you could execute the very rich tomorrow and still have irreversible climate change in 10 years.
It's less the absolute effect and more the feeling of "why should our lives be made significantly less convenient while those with seemingly unlimited wealth and power get to pollute as much as they like?"
If you want regular people to care more about the environment and pollute less, than you should have the rich and powerful lead by example, not push laws that seemingly do nothing while acting as wasteful as ever.
> Per capita doesn't help, you could execute the very rich tomorrow and still have irreversible climate change in 10 years.
The thing is, getting rid of the very rich and their indulgence in climate-devastating actions moves the goalposts/acceptable excuses for the lower classes ("but the rich are doing it too") as well.
It's pretty amazing how the same people who insist on the paper straws in their little plastic bags get so triggered when you mention reducing meat consumption. It's like they just won't survive if they can't have some taste of body parts every single meal.
People who care about plastic waste has better alternatives than paper. Reusable metal straws (the large ones) are superior to both paper and plastic straws, with the only draw side that you got to wash them as any other reusable eating utensils.
The main reason why plastic eating utensils are common is that it reduces the labor costs of serving food, which in turn allow fast food restaurants to charge lower price.
Reusable travel utensils and reusable drinking cups seems to also gained some traction for drivers, an otherwise large consumer of single-use utensils. A bit more work but far superior to paper and plastic in their feel and use.
(I prefer both utensils made from metal and eating meat. Eating meat with plastic utensils is just a terrible experience. Being against plastic has nothing to do with food culture or diet).
This feels like a (paper) straw man - there's probably a lot of overlap between people that intentionally reduce or eliminate meat consumption and also worry about plastic waste/pollution. Similarly there is probably a lot of overlap in terms of people that don't care about either. There are probably some people that worry about plastic waste more than the negative impact of meat consumption, but it's probably one of the smaller sections on that venn diagram.
meat consumption, particularly beef is the easiest way to be healthy and get complete nutrition. veganism is impractical for almost everyone and requires a lot of careful balance of nutritional intake as well as supplementation to stay healthy. For some nutrients, stores in your body are built up and deplete over long periods of time (years). Many classes of diseases completely go away just by eating plenty of meat.
I’m interested in learning what disease beef cures that beans do not provide any nutritional benefits towards solving as well. Or that could not also be supplemented to provide a diet that is equally healthy to beef consumption.
If the costs (environmental, health, or money-wise) are a major factor in your choice of diet, it seems clear that beans provide more for less.
Iron, for one. Beans contain iron but so little of it that you’d have to consume 1.2kg to get your recommended daily intake. Similarly for a lot of other essential minerals.
GP just posted a table showing there is more iron in non-meat sources than in meat sources.
Iron is not an issue for any vegan I know. Spinach, beans, kale, etc are all super loaded with it.
See my other reply on the differences between heme and non-heme iron. You can’t just compare the mg figures listed on those tables. Many vegans and vegetarians test positive for iron deficiency [1].
FWIW the exact same thing is true of protein. Most people just think protein = protein, but it's not. Protein digestibility and amino acid balance vary radically, but tends to be very poor in non-meat sources. There's a table of scores for various foods here. [1] You can find the DIAAS score for most any food with a quick search.
So for example, fava beans are called high protein. 200g of fava beans has 220 calories, 15g protein, and a digestibility of 0.55. 200g of chicken breast has 220 calories, 46g of protein, and a digestibility of 1.08. You're getting about 6x as much protein in the chicken breast there. If somebody wants to maintain a relatively high protein diet, they're simply not going to be able to do that on a vegan/vegetarian diet unless they just start downing endless protein powder shakes.
Tofu e.g. has DIAAS of 0.97 and ~18g protein per 100g (checked the one in my fridge).
If you really need a lot of protein, you can just cook stuff with tvp, that usually has dry 50% protein, but I've seen also seen 75%. You basically hydrate it with water, add a bunch of spices cook, and eat it with whatever else you'd like.
I don't think there is a big difference for the average consumer, consider some processed stuff:
Protein/100g from the products on the rewe online store:
Vegan Nuggets: 9, 11, 3x13, 15, 17
Chicken Nuggets: 2x12, 13, 2x15, 16
Beef Burger: 17, 2x18
Vegan Burger: 10, 13, 2x14, 3x17
Salami: 3x21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26
Vegan Salami: 2x8, 29, 32, 2x33
Reguarding DIAAS, soy and pea protein seem to be the most used and have 0.89 and 0.82 DIAAS respectively.
This depends on dietary preferences. I prefer not to touch processed stuff, vegan or not, because that also introduces a million other new health issues and variables. For instance even with something as simple as pea protein you're looking at countless viable issues depending on exactly how it was processed. There's an entire paper on it here. [1] That paper is painfully unreadable and I link to it only to emphasize the complexities involved in processing food.
My issue is pretty simple. A quick look around the world today, compared to how things were not that long ago, shows we're probably not only moving way too fast in terms of changing what we consume, but we also seem to be going very much in the wrong direction. So my main focus in diet is sticking with what worked in the past.
Vegetable sources of iron are called non-heme iron, in contrast to meat which is heme iron. Heme iron is readily absorbed and used by the body whereas non-heme iron is not [1]. Note that this applies to humans, not other animals. Cows are far better at absorbing these nutrients from plant sources than we are.
Iron is a nutrient, not a disease. The grandparent comment mentioned a disease that beef consumption cures that non-beef protein sources such as beans do not.
Beans have a very imbalanced amino acid profile. Protein is a category, not something specific. You need enough of every amino acid. Beef already has the correct ratio of for you. Beans do not, and also have worse absorption of what amino acids they do have. So you need to eat much, much more of them to get the same nutrition you get with some lean meat, which can also often lead to weight gain due to excess carbohydrate absorption.
The only way to get a balance on a vegetable only diet involves mixing different veggies and supplements in order to try to level the ratio of amino acids and vitamins you get. It's very complicated and honestly is difficult to get right consistently even if you know what you're doing, the average person will not be able to do this right and will get sick.
If everyone is pushed onto that kind of diet most people will do it wrong, and a lot of people will get sick as is already very common in people who try veganism. I would argue you need to have significantly above average intelligence to do it right. So at the moment a healthy large population requires a lot of meat.
I didn't say "disease" i said class of diseases, there are a lot. lysine deficiency, osteoporosis, some kinds of arthritis on the amino acid end. And then there's the vitamins that beef always has, which wipes out a huge class of vitamin deficiencies... it's hard to understate how important meat is... reducing meat consumption is a very, very bad idea for public health.
I am not a model of health but I really only eat meat 3-4 meals a week.
It doesn’t seem to make much of difference. I understand that a healthy diet requires a wide variety of nutrients and so on but it’s interesting that allegedly even just reducing meat consumption (and really specifically beef) is so detrimental.
I am skeptical that people who consume less meat are so much worse off and would really need some recommendations on some reading to begin to understand that. I know my health hasn’t changed much but my grocery bill being cut in half by just not buying meat is pretty nice.
I think that it's important to differentiate between a meat heavy diet, a diet that includes meat, lacto ovo vegetarianism, and veganism.
A shift from a meat heavy diet to a diet with a more balanced mix of foods should probably be the focus both from a health and environmental standpoint. On the other hand, full veganism probably isn't practical for most people in current American society. It would be great if we could also make it easier for people to choose a lacto ovo vegetarian diet in America.
In terms of health, the biggest focus should be on reducing calorie intake and increasing saturation levels. It is listed as the #1 priority of the World Health Organization, and there is an argument to be made that its even mentioned three times in their top 5 recommendations.
Eat less. Eat less fat. Eat less sugars. The remaining recommendations are to eat enough vitamins/fibers, and to eat less salt.
From an environmental standpoint we should focus on bio diversity and sustainability which sadly very few of current food cultures fulfill. Increased use of shell fish and seaweed. Increase use of bio diverse farming. Reduced use of artificial fertilizers and chemical pesticides. Reduced use of fresh water. Increased hunting of invasive species. Increased use of grazing animals in nature reserves and area needing clearing (power lines and so on). Increased use of small scale farming and food waste management. Meat definitively has a role here but not in the mono-culture way that current industry meat production do it.
I think it's important to keep in mind that calorie requirements vary dramatically based on lifestyle and goals; however, too many calories definitely seems to be the most common problem in the developed world.
Well, we're omnivorous animals leaning on the side of carnivore, sure enough, but we're also thinking animals.
As such, it's all very well to give a nod to our animal nature, but why stick to easy? Particularly as far as nutrition is concerned, humans could be doing so much better than we are.
I blame capitalism ;) or at least the exploit of it that involves being able to sell sugar water to animals until they choke and die. This is where we start to run into the failure of natural consumption to produce good outcomes, and have to jump up a level and start asking what a good outcome would represent.
Absolutely no reason to avoid doing this with meat consumption. I thrive on stir-fried chicken and rice and an egg in the morning and gummy vites and too much coffee, but there's no reason I couldn't do something else. I mean, I already supplement…
