I didn't write that title. I hired a headline writer to come up with it, who thought I'd get more readers with something inflammatory. My editor told me to tone it down so I redacted a word. Readers will have to guess what it is. All three of us plus my two proof-readers knew it wasn't true, but we went with it regardless because controversial headlines get more clicks.
Readers of previous posts have probably discerned that I believe that not only does eating meat not shrink your ****, but that there is no problem with meat, so long as it is ethically raised in a sustainable manner. While there is close to 100% consensus among researchers on the reality of human-caused climate change, there is no consensus in the scientific community on the effect of livestock on climate change.
How can this be? Nearly every article written about climate change these days mentions the immense contribution of animal agriculture to the destruction of the planet, with formerly respected journalist George Monbiot going as far as blaming cows for the coming apocalypse. Lowering your meat consumption is touted as the single most effective personal lifestyle change that an individual can make to reduce GHG emissions.
Like my headline, there isn't a grain of truth to it. Or rather, as with the best propaganda, it contains many facts, cherry-picked to form a compelling narrative. I had previously attempted several times to write this post, intending to include all sorts of facts to back up my claims. But I got too depressed, feeling like a fart in a windstorm. The science is out there for people who care to look. For most, the endless repetition of the "facts" make them true. If you need convincing of this, watch Fox News for a while to see how the process works. Then argue with a Trump supporter.
Since facts and statistics don't work to change minds, I'll tell you a story instead:
For thousands of years, until their near extirpation by Europeans, 60 million American bison munched, stomped, and belched their way across the High Plains. Across the globe, vast herds of ruminants were doing the same. Elk, deer, antelope, yak, buffalo, giraffe, and dozens of other species and their precursors roamed grasslands in search of the tastiest green stuff. They turned tough plant matter inedible to humans into nutrient-dense food, providing carnivores, and eventually people with healthy, life-sustaining protein. The amount of methane they produced was astounding and yet there was no climate crisis. They weren't planet-destroying, they were biosphere-building.
They were integral parts of an elegant cycle that combined air, sunlight, and water to form life. Their amazing guts were engineering wonders using specially evolved bacteria to break down cellulose to extract energy, then deposit high quality shit (countless tons of it) that in turn fed innumerable invertebrates and soil bacteria that in turn fed grass. In areas without enough rainfall to sustain forests, they made possible an incredible diversity of life, and provided enormous capacity for what we modern humans call carbon sequestration.
Then humans messed it all up. They killed off lots of ruminants, they divided land up with fences, and they plowed up the rich soil to grow row crops. Eventually they invented chemical fertilizers and pesticides, which had become necessary because the natural fertility of the land was declining, and because insect pests were becoming a huge problem. These synthetic inputs killed off most soil life, degrading it further.
Humans domesticated cattle and in the American West, drove them here and there in order to fatten them quickly and then get them to population centers. They eventually figured out that confining them in great masses at the ends of their lives was the easiest way to make the most money. This was mainly because there was a lot of cheap corn to be had, because the government took taxpayer money and gave it to farmers to plow up more ground to grow more corn.
Some humans made lots of money, but the situation wasn't ideal. Cattle suffered because they were forced to live like sardines in a can, standing in their own poop. They got sick a lot and needed antibiotics to stay alive. Their manure was kept in big pits and gave off lots of methane, which couldn't be recycled since the cattle had been removed from the carbon cycle that wild ruminants had once been part of. The nitrogen cycle was affected too, since all that rich manure wasn't spread around to feed other creatures. The water cycle was also doing poorly: There were more floods, topsoil was being washed away, and algal blooms were killing aquatic life.
Despite these woes the cattle didn't complain, or so the humans believed. But that was only because humans couldn't speak cow, and could only hear the lowing and mooing of the confined cows. Like enslaved Africans in the American South singing spirituals with a hidden message about escape to freedom, the cows' lowing was actually full of meaning. Though they knew that for them escape would only come in one form, they sang their song with the hope that domesticated livestock of all types, and the endless work humans had put in over centuries to develop breeds to match their needs and climates, would survive and benefit all creatures. Here is the story they sang:
"We miss the grass that we ate when we were young and carefree. We miss the ability to move freely across the land. We are grateful for the food we are given, because we are hungry. But it is a poor food, the dried up meal that is left after humans take the oil for frying, and the sugar for sweet syrup. We are like afterthoughts, a waste disposal system, a place to get rid of the most useless part of the harvest, and wring a little bit more profit from it. We eat that which humans cannot, as we always have, but instead of being praised as we were when humans used us to turn grass into protein, we are now blamed for many ills.
We're blamed for destroying that which our ancestors helped to create, and for climate change that threatens the planet.
There's a new plan to get rid of us altogether, and replace us with factories where a few humans will create protein using great stainless steel vats, and plastic tubes, and vast quantities of electricity. Great sums of money will be made by the humans who control the patents to this process, and an important step toward control of the food supply will be taken. This is heralded as a great disruption of the status quo, a welcome evolution of human culture as people move away from exploitation of other species. We know better. It's just the latest development in the quest for dominion, another step toward bringing Mother Nature to heel. Even fully domesticated animals like us are too are too wild for this new vision, and need to gotten rid of. When we go--if we go, for our fate is not yet sealed--humans might only then understand what it is that they have lost. Meanwhile we sing our song, and eat their waste, and dream of grass."
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