Yes exactly. As an individual, recognizing that reducing energy/plastic/whatever use is a drop in the bucket and that systemic change is needed wouldn’t absolve you of all personal responsibility. It is a multifaceted problem and the corporations that deflect responsibilities and greenwash and individuals are both important.
People also refuse to acknowledge there is a network effect at play. Say a person recognizes that overfishing and plastic net pollution is a problem. If that person continues eating fish from entities doing the damage when they have the ability not to, some percentage of the blame lies with that person. A subset of people is so set in avoiding any type of inconvenience to themselves they lash out at any suggestion they could change their personal behavior on anything
All my food comes in plastic. My potatoes come in plastic bags. My lettuce has a plastic label and twist-tie on it. My shredded wheat cereal is in plastic. Even my eggs, which are in cardboard cartons, are put in disposable plastic bins for shipments. As a consumer in my area, the only choice I have that isn’t plastic, is nothing. Consumers cannot make this change. The only people in the market who can change it are the suppliers who decided to put everything in plastic to begin with. This not something we can consume our way out of. It takes either personal accountability on the part of the suppliers, or it takes a government mandate.
This is, in my opinion, a high burden placed on an individual to to always research how every company they interacts with operates.
Unfortunately, as a consumer many ecological decisions are forced on me because corporations aren’t regulated properly. Blaming the consumer to make better choices is asking someone to become intimately familiar with something that they shouldn’t be concerned about, and to stay up to date since corporations change their business practices frequently.
This is something ultimately that needs to end up on governments to regulate businesses, and trying to shift the blame to consumers is quite frankly unfair. And even worse, it’s ineffective and disheartening to them. People can make better choices for themselves and their local environment. But don’t saddle Bob and Sally with saving the planet. It’s an untenable ask.
It’s not simply changing a behavior of an individual, it’s a dramatic shift to their lifestyle. Not in choosing the more ecological option, but asking them to remain interested and vigilant on every decision they make. Picking what fish to buy at the supermarket shouldn’t involve figuring out who caught the fish, googling the company, researching what their fishing practices are, and then figuring out if that is a sustainable practice. It’s not simple or quick, and most people just really want to figure out what everyone in their family will all eat for dinner that night. We can’t expect someone to do a half hour or more of research for every purchase.
This is why government needs to regulate these industries for us. They have the time and knowledge to assess all of that and the power to enforce companies adhere to those practices. We need to help educate people that regulating a business is not the same as regulating their choices or their behavior as an individual. That these sorts of regulations and legislation simply do not, and will not, ever apply to them so that they will encourage their legislators to push for regulation.
How about just asking them to make the obvious choices they don’t have to think about or research as much? As an example, switching to plant based meat alternatives like impossible meat or quorn. Not only are they a 1-to-1 drop in replacement, they also haven’t skyrocketed in price like real meat has, so they might even save money.
Or at least cutting out red meat and replacing it with impossible. That requires very little thought for both environmental, ethical, and health gains.
I doubt you’ll get much traction on that. Meat is delicious. We’ve been eating meat as long as the human race existed and I don’t think there is anything you can say or do that would get the majority of the population to give it up.
While you may consider it a 1 to 1 replacement, and while I’ve no doubt it’s gotten closer to real meat than it was when impossible burgers first came out, I don’t think it’s an identical product and am unlikely to switch. I also may be wrong in this, but as far as I know, it only replaces ground meats and processed meats like burgers and chicken nuggets. It isn’t a product that can replace steaks, roasts, shanks, or ribs. There is nothing I enjoy eating more than a prime rib, and there just isn’t going to be a plant based replacement for that.
This is exactly what I’ve been saying in my other posts. Yes, we need governments to regulate companies to make them do the right thing, but if not farming cattle is the right thing, companies want to sell cattle products, and consumers want to eat cattle products, in what world is the government going to do the right thing? Education and attitude adjustment that acknowledges the need for change is prerequisite for anything to improve.
There is a big difference between abolition/outlawing and regulation. Regulation would be putting into place standards for raising them to minimize impact and restrict the quantity.
Most research I’ve seen regarding minimizing the impact of cattle production were funded by meat producers themselves, and thus have a conflict of interest. Their behavior is not dissimilar to big oil trying to greenwash fossil fuels with ‘clean coal’ or ‘clean natural gas’.
So far, there is no way to continue the current scale of meat production, especially red meat, while keeping global warming from getting worse at the expense of billions of impoverished in areas where global warming will hit hardest. Even ignoring the green house gas emissions it requires, it also has an unchangeable requirement for extreme water usage, which is incompatible with a world rapidly approaching peak water.
The only viable option would be to reduce the production of meat to such a degree that only the rich would be able to afford it at all (as demand will not decrease with lowered production). It is genuinely impossible to legislate that reality, as the voter base does not want meat to become like caviar, a spice for the rich, even if it means saving civilization.
That legislation would only be possible under an authoritarian dictatorship, and even then, that dictatorship would be risking an open rebellion, but with enough willing guns, they could force it through.
The problem is, living under a dictatorship is absolute hell in itself, and it would be far more preferable for the population to willingly reduce their meat consumption on their own. That is why ultimately consumers making the choice themselves at the supermarket would be the most ideal scenario.
I desperately hope people eventually make that choice, as I can’t help but feel like the dude in the Newsroom, or Don’t look up, where people will perhaps even acknowledge things are bad, but be unwilling to sacrifice any aspect of their current luxuries or lifestyle whatsoever (which is somewhat ironic, considering our media for over a century glorifies self sacrifice to save others).
As a fellow life long heavy meat eater with a picky palate, I can attest that impossible ground meat is genuinely indistinguishable from animal ground beef. If you were served a dish containing it without being told it wasn’t animal meat, I think you would be hard pressed to pick up on it.
I have tried many, many alternatives, including TVP, Soy curls, beyond beef, etc. They all had an off flavor that I found unappealing unless heavily masked. Impossible’s current formulation has none of those drawbacks, and requires no recipe modifications to obtain perfect results. They do have a steak-bite now, which is also extremely good, but they do not make a full sized steak product. For that, you could try Meati, which is made from mushroom, and is also very good in my experience.
Meat is delicious. We’ve been eating meat as long as the human race existed and I don’t think there is anything you can say or do that would get the majority of the population to give it up. I don’t think it’s an identical product and am unlikely to switch. There is nothing I enjoy eating more than a prime rib, and there just isn’t going to be a plant based replacement for that.
I’m probably not saying anything here you don’t already know, but I still want to emphasize that unless the earth becomes rapidly depopulated by an insane amount on a timescale that would require genocide to achieve, the reality is that the quantity of meat we farm to make it affordable for average people is simply incompatible with a live-able biosphere.
The meat of it is, we realistically cannot prioritize the pleasurable minute flavor or texture of a particular foodstuff if doing so results in the destruction of organized human civilization as we know it, along with the extinction of tens of thousands of species and plants.
If we as a species reject a low-emission plant based alternative that is 95% similar to the the planet destroying and horrifically unethical animal based product purely to get that last 5% of the experience, then… Those people are choosing death in the same way a smoker chooses to smoke, but instead of just killing themselves, they doom their children and the rest of humanity with them.
We have to be willing to make concessions to survive the future we have made for ourselves. Animal meat unfortunately must be one of the concessions.
You’re 100% correct. And it’s dismaying that people that agree change is needed will still buckle down and say they’re unwilling to change. How do we proceed if people that recognize the problems refuse to adapt in ways required to solve them?
I agree on regulation. There is an interaction here you have to acknowledge though. Again I’ll use the example of overfishing. When scientists have recommendations to government about fishing regulations, invariably, the government will take the number scientists say is the limit above which ecological damage will occur, and a number that fishers say they want to fish, and choose a number in between. Convincing individuals to support these initiatives (that will force them to change their habits when the upstream dependency of those habits changes) is the same education that would convince them to change their habits in the first place.
I also must insist that you’re misrepresenting my opinion. I don’t expect every individual to research everything they interact with as you insist. I merely ask that they do the best they can, instead of sticking their head in the sand as too many do currently. I would never fault ignorance, but I will fault willful denial.
Market forces are there, sure. There is no denying that having a demand leads to these practices. But regulators who are compromising between sustainability and corporate interests, aren’t truly regulating. Regulators need to have hard stances on these things and it should be up to the corporations to deal with the limits. Consumers are going to have to deal with products having seasons again, limited availability, or higher prices. The system will stabilize, but it’s going to end up there anyway as the climate changes or resources get depleted.
And I apologize. I didn’t mean to misrepresent your opinion. I ended up on a bit of a rant there that was only sparked by a notion in your opinion.
People only need to do the best they can, for them, in whatever situation they are in. I get frustrated with the messaging that corporations push that it’s up to us as individuals to be responsible and prevent climate change or save the planet when it’s our collective responsibility as a society through government regulation.
Yes exactly. As an individual, recognizing that reducing energy/plastic/whatever use is a drop in the bucket and that systemic change is needed wouldn’t absolve you of all personal responsibility. It is a multifaceted problem and the corporations that deflect responsibilities and greenwash and individuals are both important.
People also refuse to acknowledge there is a network effect at play. Say a person recognizes that overfishing and plastic net pollution is a problem. If that person continues eating fish from entities doing the damage when they have the ability not to, some percentage of the blame lies with that person. A subset of people is so set in avoiding any type of inconvenience to themselves they lash out at any suggestion they could change their personal behavior on anything
All my food comes in plastic. My potatoes come in plastic bags. My lettuce has a plastic label and twist-tie on it. My shredded wheat cereal is in plastic. Even my eggs, which are in cardboard cartons, are put in disposable plastic bins for shipments. As a consumer in my area, the only choice I have that isn’t plastic, is nothing. Consumers cannot make this change. The only people in the market who can change it are the suppliers who decided to put everything in plastic to begin with. This not something we can consume our way out of. It takes either personal accountability on the part of the suppliers, or it takes a government mandate.
None of this is in conflict with what I said.
This is, in my opinion, a high burden placed on an individual to to always research how every company they interacts with operates.
Unfortunately, as a consumer many ecological decisions are forced on me because corporations aren’t regulated properly. Blaming the consumer to make better choices is asking someone to become intimately familiar with something that they shouldn’t be concerned about, and to stay up to date since corporations change their business practices frequently.
This is something ultimately that needs to end up on governments to regulate businesses, and trying to shift the blame to consumers is quite frankly unfair. And even worse, it’s ineffective and disheartening to them. People can make better choices for themselves and their local environment. But don’t saddle Bob and Sally with saving the planet. It’s an untenable ask.
It’s not simply changing a behavior of an individual, it’s a dramatic shift to their lifestyle. Not in choosing the more ecological option, but asking them to remain interested and vigilant on every decision they make. Picking what fish to buy at the supermarket shouldn’t involve figuring out who caught the fish, googling the company, researching what their fishing practices are, and then figuring out if that is a sustainable practice. It’s not simple or quick, and most people just really want to figure out what everyone in their family will all eat for dinner that night. We can’t expect someone to do a half hour or more of research for every purchase.
This is why government needs to regulate these industries for us. They have the time and knowledge to assess all of that and the power to enforce companies adhere to those practices. We need to help educate people that regulating a business is not the same as regulating their choices or their behavior as an individual. That these sorts of regulations and legislation simply do not, and will not, ever apply to them so that they will encourage their legislators to push for regulation.
How about just asking them to make the obvious choices they don’t have to think about or research as much? As an example, switching to plant based meat alternatives like impossible meat or quorn. Not only are they a 1-to-1 drop in replacement, they also haven’t skyrocketed in price like real meat has, so they might even save money.
Or at least cutting out red meat and replacing it with impossible. That requires very little thought for both environmental, ethical, and health gains.
I doubt you’ll get much traction on that. Meat is delicious. We’ve been eating meat as long as the human race existed and I don’t think there is anything you can say or do that would get the majority of the population to give it up.
While you may consider it a 1 to 1 replacement, and while I’ve no doubt it’s gotten closer to real meat than it was when impossible burgers first came out, I don’t think it’s an identical product and am unlikely to switch. I also may be wrong in this, but as far as I know, it only replaces ground meats and processed meats like burgers and chicken nuggets. It isn’t a product that can replace steaks, roasts, shanks, or ribs. There is nothing I enjoy eating more than a prime rib, and there just isn’t going to be a plant based replacement for that.
This is exactly what I’ve been saying in my other posts. Yes, we need governments to regulate companies to make them do the right thing, but if not farming cattle is the right thing, companies want to sell cattle products, and consumers want to eat cattle products, in what world is the government going to do the right thing? Education and attitude adjustment that acknowledges the need for change is prerequisite for anything to improve.
There is a big difference between abolition/outlawing and regulation. Regulation would be putting into place standards for raising them to minimize impact and restrict the quantity.
This is nitpicking. All of the same points apply to reduction of quantity as they do abolition.
Most research I’ve seen regarding minimizing the impact of cattle production were funded by meat producers themselves, and thus have a conflict of interest. Their behavior is not dissimilar to big oil trying to greenwash fossil fuels with ‘clean coal’ or ‘clean natural gas’.
So far, there is no way to continue the current scale of meat production, especially red meat, while keeping global warming from getting worse at the expense of billions of impoverished in areas where global warming will hit hardest. Even ignoring the green house gas emissions it requires, it also has an unchangeable requirement for extreme water usage, which is incompatible with a world rapidly approaching peak water.
The only viable option would be to reduce the production of meat to such a degree that only the rich would be able to afford it at all (as demand will not decrease with lowered production). It is genuinely impossible to legislate that reality, as the voter base does not want meat to become like caviar, a spice for the rich, even if it means saving civilization.
That legislation would only be possible under an authoritarian dictatorship, and even then, that dictatorship would be risking an open rebellion, but with enough willing guns, they could force it through.
The problem is, living under a dictatorship is absolute hell in itself, and it would be far more preferable for the population to willingly reduce their meat consumption on their own. That is why ultimately consumers making the choice themselves at the supermarket would be the most ideal scenario.
I desperately hope people eventually make that choice, as I can’t help but feel like the dude in the Newsroom, or Don’t look up, where people will perhaps even acknowledge things are bad, but be unwilling to sacrifice any aspect of their current luxuries or lifestyle whatsoever (which is somewhat ironic, considering our media for over a century glorifies self sacrifice to save others).
As a fellow life long heavy meat eater with a picky palate, I can attest that impossible ground meat is genuinely indistinguishable from animal ground beef. If you were served a dish containing it without being told it wasn’t animal meat, I think you would be hard pressed to pick up on it.
I have tried many, many alternatives, including TVP, Soy curls, beyond beef, etc. They all had an off flavor that I found unappealing unless heavily masked. Impossible’s current formulation has none of those drawbacks, and requires no recipe modifications to obtain perfect results. They do have a steak-bite now, which is also extremely good, but they do not make a full sized steak product. For that, you could try Meati, which is made from mushroom, and is also very good in my experience.
I’m probably not saying anything here you don’t already know, but I still want to emphasize that unless the earth becomes rapidly depopulated by an insane amount on a timescale that would require genocide to achieve, the reality is that the quantity of meat we farm to make it affordable for average people is simply incompatible with a live-able biosphere.
The meat of it is, we realistically cannot prioritize the pleasurable minute flavor or texture of a particular foodstuff if doing so results in the destruction of organized human civilization as we know it, along with the extinction of tens of thousands of species and plants.
If we as a species reject a low-emission plant based alternative that is 95% similar to the the planet destroying and horrifically unethical animal based product purely to get that last 5% of the experience, then… Those people are choosing death in the same way a smoker chooses to smoke, but instead of just killing themselves, they doom their children and the rest of humanity with them.
We have to be willing to make concessions to survive the future we have made for ourselves. Animal meat unfortunately must be one of the concessions.
You’re 100% correct. And it’s dismaying that people that agree change is needed will still buckle down and say they’re unwilling to change. How do we proceed if people that recognize the problems refuse to adapt in ways required to solve them?
I agree on regulation. There is an interaction here you have to acknowledge though. Again I’ll use the example of overfishing. When scientists have recommendations to government about fishing regulations, invariably, the government will take the number scientists say is the limit above which ecological damage will occur, and a number that fishers say they want to fish, and choose a number in between. Convincing individuals to support these initiatives (that will force them to change their habits when the upstream dependency of those habits changes) is the same education that would convince them to change their habits in the first place.
I also must insist that you’re misrepresenting my opinion. I don’t expect every individual to research everything they interact with as you insist. I merely ask that they do the best they can, instead of sticking their head in the sand as too many do currently. I would never fault ignorance, but I will fault willful denial.
Market forces are there, sure. There is no denying that having a demand leads to these practices. But regulators who are compromising between sustainability and corporate interests, aren’t truly regulating. Regulators need to have hard stances on these things and it should be up to the corporations to deal with the limits. Consumers are going to have to deal with products having seasons again, limited availability, or higher prices. The system will stabilize, but it’s going to end up there anyway as the climate changes or resources get depleted.
And I apologize. I didn’t mean to misrepresent your opinion. I ended up on a bit of a rant there that was only sparked by a notion in your opinion.
People only need to do the best they can, for them, in whatever situation they are in. I get frustrated with the messaging that corporations push that it’s up to us as individuals to be responsible and prevent climate change or save the planet when it’s our collective responsibility as a society through government regulation.