Go Vegetarian - Save the World!

[Skybird]

The desastrous consequences to the environment of producing meat for mass consummation cannot be denied, they are too obvious. That does not only mean the infamous methane-debate, but transportation of cattle, of food to keep it alive in the big cattle farms in the US, falling ground water levels, desertification, etc. Everybody reading even a bit about the matter must come to that conclusion, it cannot be avoided. I talk of mass production of meat on industrial levels, not the local farmer having some animals in the barn to use them for his own family only.

Also, the ammount of kilograms of crop and water needed to produce 1 kilogram of meat is so insanely high that the calcualtion in the long run does not appear to be justifiable in the face of 7 billion people needed to get fed.

Finally, studies of the past 2 years showed a strong link between social class and meat consummation. The higher the social class and the education level, the less meat gets consumed in such families. Meat has become a food for the masses of low educational standard and knowledge, where the meat consumation falls the higher the educational level is. This compares to the link between obesiety and social class/educational standard. Many poor families tend towards becoming obese becasue they lack the knoweldge to stay away from sugared soft drinks and chips and unhealthy fast food.Unfortunately, these unhealthy - I would even say: venomous - foods often are the ones being cheap (because the demand is high and so the prices fall), and so they get consumed by the poor lacking the education to know about their unhealthy nature. and so you have the phenomeneon of so many people living by wellfare - being fat.

I do not go that far to propagate vegetarianism. I have been that for ten years, but then eased by stand a bit becasue occaisonally I simply like a normal old fashioned steak with butter and herbs and salt and pepper and then nothing. I enjoy the taste of it. but These days I eat meat very rarely, it simply is no need of mine. I also feel better when concentrating more on crop. In ancient Rome, there have been several revolts by legionaires if they had meat only for longer periods of time and during wars, but no crop. they felt weakneed if only eating meat. The healthy consequences of eating more crops has been known already back then.

So instead of calling for a zero-meat policy, I would call for a dratsical reduction of meat. Try to keep it at once per week only. and you may find over time that you can live with even lesser opportunities, after some time. I can and I got there without even thinking about it. I have meat once or twice per month.

The problem is that 7 billion people is simply much to much crowds on this panet. Doctors tell you to eat fish regularly. but the fact is that already now, all types of table fish have become rare, one third of them being endangered by extinction. the stocks of fish has been overfished, and very very massively so. We have fished the oceans empty in many places, and if we all would folloow the doctor's calls, it would mean cataclysm for the planet, like it also means cataclysm for the planet if every person on earth would live by Western material standards and every family would get a car and every family would consume as much water like we do over here, and every family would run as many electronic devices in the household as we do.

Our living standards in the first world are simply far too excessive, and we are several billion too many people in the whole world. Too much is too much, there is no workaround to deal with the desastrous consequences. much of our ways we take as granted are not only threatening our own perrsonal health, but are hazardous to the sphere of life on this planet as well.