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KINDNESS TO ANIMALS AND THE PLANET
I
ran across this unattributed statement recently and thought you all might
appreciate it. Did one of you write it?
Achieving ecological
respect and sanity through reducing the amount of meat we eat. -- We have been reawakened to the first two
factors of three aspects of eco-sanity: ; how animals are killed, and how they
live their lives (so eco-kashrut must forbid factory farming, etc); Still
deeper: It is all too clear that the obsession of many people with eating
a great deal of meat is a twin to our addiction to oil and coal as a way to
poison the planet. Huge farms of cows and pigs pour methane - an even
more dangerous global-scorching agent than CO2 - into the atmosphere. And the
obsession with meat forces us into factory farming, to meet the demand.
To heal our earth as well as our own bodies, we must return to our
forebears' diet of eating meat no more than once or twice a week.
ANIMAL RIGHTS, PROTECTION OF ANIMALS
Albert
Schweitzer, Reverence for Life
“The
Problem of Ethics in the Evolution of Human Thought.” Schweitzer delivered this short address in
1952. It is included in Jacques
Feschotte’s Albert Schweitzer, 1955.
I have been unable to find a copy online.
Please share with us if you find it.
“Ethics
is only complete when it exacts compassion towards every living thing.” (Schweitzer in Feschotte, 127). –Dick
FARMAGEDDON: the True Cost of Cheap Meat
Compassion in World Farming
(UK)
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Cruelty to farm
animals demands exposure
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The Washington Post By Editorial Board April 26, 2013
SO GUT-WRENCHING are the images — cows being
shocked, turkeys being stomped, horses being burned with chemicals, piglets kicked like
soccer balls — that the videos recorded by animal rights organizations at
factory farms are almost impossible to watch. That, though, has helped make
them effective tools in the fight against illegal and cruel treatment of farm
animals. It’s alarming that a number of states have bowed to pressure from
agribusiness and enacted laws to criminalize this
useful undercover work.
Other states that are considering following
suit should think twice about whether the best way to deal with the important
issues of how animals are treated and food is produced is to keep U.S.
consumers in the dark. Six states in
the West and Midwest have enacted legislation cracking down on the undercover
videotaping of animal facilities that has been the foundation of investigations
by organizations including the Humane Society of the United States and Mercy
for Animals. So-called ag-gag bills are pending in six other
states, including Pennsylvania and North Carolina.
Some of the measures, the New York Times reported, would
make it illegal to secretly videotape farms, livestock ranches, slaughterhouses
and other food production facilities or to apply for a job at one of them
without reporting an affiliation with an animal rights group. Others, such as
one the Tennessee legislature passed
this month, demand that any video that chronicles possible illegal activity be
handed almost immediately to law enforcement authorities, a seemingly innocuous
requirement that would have the effect of preventing meaningful investigations
documenting patterns of abuse.
Defenders of the legislation say the videos
cast farms and other livestock concerns in a bad light and have caused
financial suffering. They say activists use the footage to raise funds and
advance their cause of getting people to stop eating meat. Those are weak
justifications for extreme legislation that inhibits the rights of employees,
denies vital assistance to law enforcement and tramples First Amendment rights.
Sufficient laws exist to protect property from trespass.
Animal investigations have proved their value.
In 2007 the Humane Society documented unsafe practices at a
California slaughterhouse that resulted in the largest recall of beef in
U.S. history and a new federal policy to prevent downer cows (cows that cannot
stand on their own), at risk for mad cow disease, from entering the food
supply. If not for video footage, prosecutors in Tennessee would not have been
able to take action against workers using illegal methods to improve the gait
of walking horses. The same is true for authorities in North Carolina, who
charged workers at a turkey farm with abuse and neglect of animals.
CO2, GLOBAL WARMING, CLIMATE CHANGE
PETA: Fight Global Warming by Going Vegan
www.peta.org
› Issues › Animals Used for Food
Global warming has
been called humankind’s “greatest challenge” and the world’s gravest
environmental threat. Many conscientious people are trying to help reduce
global warming by driving more fuel-efficient cars and using energy-saving
light bulbs. Although these measures help, science shows thatgoing vegan is one of the most
effective ways to fight global warming. A staggering 51
percent or more of global greenhouse-gas emissions are caused
by animal agriculture, according to a report published by the Worldwatch
Institute. Additionally, a recent United Nations report concluded that a global
shift toward a vegan diet is extremely important in order to combat the worst
effects of climate change.According to the United Nations, raising animals
for food is “one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the
most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global.” In
addition, the official handbook for Live Earth, the anti–climate change
concerts that Al Gore helped organize, says that not eating meat is the “single
most effective thing you can do” to reduce your climate change impact. Carbon
dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide together cause the vast majority of global
warming. Raising animals for food is one of the largest sources of carbon
dioxide and the single largest source of both methane and nitrous-oxide
emissions.
Carbon Dioxide
Burning fossil fuels (such as oil and gasoline) releases carbon
dioxide, the primary gas responsible for global warming. Producing one calorie
from animal protein requires 11 times as much fossil fuel input—releasing 11
times as much carbon dioxide—as does producing a calorie from plant protein.
Feeding massive amounts of grain and water to farmed animals and then killing
them and processing, transporting, and storing their flesh is extremely
energy-intensive. In addition, enormous amounts of carbon dioxide stored in
trees are released during the destruction of vast acres of forest to provide
pastureland and to grow crops for farmed animals. On top of this, animal manure
also releases large quantities of carbon dioxide.
You could exchange your “regular” car for a hybrid Toyota Prius
and, by doing so, prevent about 1 ton of carbon dioxide from entering the
atmosphere each year, but according to the University of Chicago, being vegan
is more effective in the fight against global warming; a vegan is responsible
for the release of approximately 1.5 fewer tons of carbon dioxide into the
atmosphere each year than is a meat-eater.
A German study conducted in 2008 concluded that a meat-eater’s
diet is responsible for more than seven times as much greenhouse gas emissions
as a vegan’s diet. Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the U.N.’s Nobel
Prize–winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (and a vegetarian
himself), urges people to “please eat less meat—meat is a very carbon-intensive
commodity.”
Methane
The billions of chickens, turkeys, pigs, and cows who are crammed into factory farms
each year in the U.S. produce enormous amounts of methane, both during
digestion and from the acres of cesspools filled with feces that they excrete.
Scientists report that every pound of methane is more than 84 times as
effective as carbon dioxide is at trapping heat in our atmosphere. The EPA shows
that animal agriculture is the single largest source of methane emissions in
the U.S.
Nitrous Oxide
Nitrous oxide is about 300 times more potent as a global warming
gas than carbon dioxide. According to the U.N., the meat, egg, and dairy
industries account for a staggering 65 percent of worldwide nitrous oxide
emissions. (Use the N-Calculator to calculate your
nitrogen footprint and to see how you could lower your nitrogen
usage.)
You Can Help Stop
Global Warming!
The most powerful step that we can take as individuals to avert
global warming is to stop eating meat, eggs, and dairy products. Order PETA’a free “Vegetarian/Vegan Starter Kit” and
do your part to start saving the planet and animals today!
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Eat less meat to
prevent climate disaster, study warns
Fertilisers used in growing feed crops for cattle produce the
most potent of the greenhouse gases causing climate change
Eating less meat will help environment, a new study says.
Photograph: Ian Waldie/Getty Images
Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment
correspondent
Friday 13 April 2012 07.56 EDT
Meat eaters in
developed countries will have to eat a lot less meat, cutting consumption by
50%, to avoid the worst consequences of future climate change, new research
warns.
The fertilisers used
in farming are responsible for a significant share of the warming that causes
climate change.
A study published in Environmental Research Letters warns
that drastic changes in food production and at the dinner table are needed by
2050 in order to prevent catastrophic global warming.
It's arguably the most
difficult challenge in dealing with climate change: how to reduce emissions
from food production while still producing enough to feed a global population
projected to reach 9 billion by the middle of this century.
The findings, by Eric
Davidson, director of the Woods Hole Research Centre in Massachusetts, say the
developed world will have to cut fertiliser use by 50% and persuade consumers
in the developed world to stop eating so much meat.
Davidson concedes it's
a hard sell. Meat is a regular part of the diet in the developed world. In
developing economies, such as China and India, meat consumption has risen along
with prosperity.
"I think there
are huge challenges in convincing people in the west to reduce portion sizes or
the frequency of eating meat. That is part of our culture right now," he
said.
Researchers have been
paying closer attention in the past few years to the impact of agriculture on
climate change, and the parallel problem of growing enough food for an
expanding population. Some scientists are at work growing artificial meat which
would avoid the fertilisers and manure responsible for climate change.
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Nitrous oxide, released
by fertilisers and animal manure, is the most potent of the greenhouse gases
that cause climate change. The UN's climate body has called for deep cuts to
those emissions.
Growing feed crops,
for cattle and pigs, produces more of those emissions than crops that go
directly into the human food chain. Eating less meat would reduce demand for
fertiliser as well as reduce the amount of manure produced.
Davidson also suggests
changes in current farming practice – such as growing winter ground cover crops
– would help absorb nitrogen and prevent its release into the atmosphere.
In reaching his
conclusion, Davidson draws on figures from the Food and
Agricultural Organisation suggesting the world population will reach 8.9
billion by 2050, and that daily per capita calorie intake will also rise to
3130 calories.
Meat consumption is
also projected to increase sharply to 89kg per person a year in rich countries
and 37kg per person a year in the developing world.
Such a trajectory
would put the world on course to more severe consequences of climate change.
Davidson is not
suggesting people give up meat entirely. "The solution isn't that everyone
needs to become a vegetarian or a vegan. Simply reducing portion sizes and
frequency would go a long way," he said. So would switching
from beef and pork, which have a high carbon foot print, to chicken or fish.
more on this story
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20 Dec 2013861
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26 Oct 200988
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2 Jun 2010126
[NO THEY DO NOT. –DICK]
Less
meat eaten, more planet saved
The
Baltimore Sun, May 20, 2013
A review of 12,000 papers on climate change in the May 15 issue of "Environmental
Research Letters," found that 97 percent of scientists attribute
climate change to human activities. Although we're unlikely to reverse climate
change, we can mitigate its effects by reducing our driving, energy
use,
and meat consumption.
use,
and meat consumption.
Yes, meat consumption. A 2006
U.N. report estimated
that meat consumption accounts for 18 percent of man-made greenhouse gases. A 2009 article in the respected World Watch
magazine suggested that it may be closer to 50 percent.
estimated
that meat consumption accounts for 18 percent of man-made greenhouse gases. A 2009 article in the respected World Watch
magazine suggested that it may be closer to 50 percent.
Contact
State Legislators
Greg Leding gregleding
David Whitaker djwhitaker
Uvalde Lindsey uvalde.lindsey
Recent OMNI
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FEBRUARY
4 2015, LIBERAL/PROGRESSIVE, AFFIRMATIVE GOVERNMENT NEWSLETTER, #2
FEBRUARY 4 2015, WORLD/US POVERTY, ECONOMIC INJUSTICE, NEWSLETTER #3
JANUARY 29 2015, VIOLENCE USA NEWSLETTER #9
JANUARY 26 2015, TORTURE NEWSLETTER # 10, TORTURE, WAR CRIMES LAWLESSNESS
JANUARY 25 2015, ANTI-WAR, ANTI-IMPERIALISM, ANTI-CANT NEWSLETTER #4
JANUARY 19 2015, MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. DAY
JANUARY 17 2015, IRAN NEWSLETTER # 25
JANUARY 16 2015, CUBA NEWSLETTER #4
JANUARY 14 2015, VEGETARIAN ACTION NEWSLETTER #15
JANUARY 12 2015, US DEMOCRACY NEWSLETTER #3
FEBRUARY 4 2015, WORLD/US POVERTY, ECONOMIC INJUSTICE, NEWSLETTER #3
JANUARY 29 2015, VIOLENCE USA NEWSLETTER #9
JANUARY 26 2015, TORTURE NEWSLETTER # 10, TORTURE, WAR CRIMES LAWLESSNESS
JANUARY 25 2015, ANTI-WAR, ANTI-IMPERIALISM, ANTI-CANT NEWSLETTER #4
JANUARY 19 2015, MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. DAY
JANUARY 17 2015, IRAN NEWSLETTER # 25
JANUARY 16 2015, CUBA NEWSLETTER #4
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Contents Vegetarian Action
#15
Nutrition, Health
Dr.
Mercola, Harmful Industrial Meat Production
Animal Protection and
Rights
Dr.
Steve Best
Climate Change
Cowspiracy Video
Dr.
Best, Meat and Rain Forests
END VEGETARIAN
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