Discuss: The Only Way to Have a Cow

I don’t think P. Moss actually read the article. McKibben’s proposal here would mainly involve a change by producers, not consumers. Getting all consumers to voluntarily choose leaner and more expensive grassfed meat won’t happen, but if the producers simply become unable to continue the practicing the feedlot system, for any number of reasons, including skyrocketing prices and reduced availability of cheap, grain based feedstock, regulations on runoff pollution to protect groundwater, etc etc—then consumers won’t have any choice in the matter. Consumption is a passive activity, and consumers have very little actual power, other than choosing to consume something or not. But if the thing they want to consume just plain isn’t available, or isn’t available at a price they can afford, then consumers are completely impotent.

For the past 15 years or so I have been involved fighting against the adverse impacts of CAFOs, industrial dairies, livestock concentration camps, open pit livestock mines.  They aren’t good for air, for land, for water, for people and certainly not for animals.  They are not agri-culture, which implies some connection between the land, the people and the animal.  They are plain and simple about exploitation.  Industrial beef or dairy it is much the same, the only difference the milk cow gets mined of its milk for a few years before being turned into hamburger.

I once asked a neighbor, a small dairy owner, what the life expectancy of a Holstein cow should be.  He said, “They used to live 12 to 15 years, but that was before we changed the diet.  Now they live 4 - 5 years.”  Great diet, eh?

The diet along with the intense concentration of the animals created a serious odor and waste problem.  Too many animals concentrated in too small and area and fed an unnatural diet creates lots of problems.  Government looks away, doesn’t address the issues of cumulative impact.

Starting energy education classes I write 2 billion, 6 billion and 9 billion out across the top of the white board.  Those are the human population numbers when I was a kid, now and when the current kids are my age.  Cumulative impact, how does the planet support all the wants, what more the needs of that many people?

There are certainly lots of aspects to the issue.  So much for a chicken in every pot or a steak on every plate.

At almost 64, I’ve been a vegetarian for a bit better than half my life.  I’ve also been a yogi and do a fair piece of manual labor.  I am finding that though I am very active, I need to eat less and less.  We do have choices and we best be making some good ones soon.

I have no tolerance for sport killing, but I do respect those that chose to eat meat, that hunt in a spiritual and respectful way.  Seems far better to eat an animal that lived a good life than one that spent its life or most of it in a livestock concentration camp.

i’m finally getting to this article and feel relief at its common sense approach.  the dinosaurs disappeared because they were too big to sustain life.  the industrial approach to livestock creates something that is also too big to sustain life.  there’s another issue in relation to meat.  some people have no choice about eating it.  their bodies may not handle vegetable proteins well enough for health.  they may be allergic to things like milk products, eggs, soy, etc.  or there may be substances in specific kinds of meat that they need that they cannot make inside themselves and cannot get any other way.  i’m one of those kinds of people, and i’ve seen the fate of others like me who lived in a country where their families saw eating meat and eggs as shameful.  can you imagine the life of a highly moral mother who had to hide in the garage with a kind, low-class servant to eat an egg or a small bowl of stew because her health demanded it and to keep this as secret as a heroine addiction?  i do wish the food nazis would get off their high horses and work towards a saner way to include me and those like me, as well as those who simply don’t agree with them.  a bigot is a bigot no matter what the stripe.

This article does make sense. If the price of meat reflected the harm done the environment, feed-lot beef would probably not be cheaper than grass-fed. I believe it’s feeding cows a diet they cannot digest that is the insult to the cow, not eating them. And taking no responsibility for the run-off is an insult to the earth. I found the farm in Michael Pollan’s book a delight to read about.

“And the fact that the product of this exercise “tastes good” sounds pretty lame as an excuse.”—- I disagree. That right there is what makes it all worth it. The problem with this solution is that it’s completely inefficient. When push comes to shove, it all comes down to market forces. Consumers want beef, lots of it, and they want it cheap. While your points about the impact on the environment are well received, they’re unfortunately irrelevant. The market will not willingly tolerate increasing the price of beef (which is, of course, what’ll happen if we turn away from factory farming and move towards these green methods) regardless of its impact on the environment. The environment is just going to have to step up and take another one for the team.

The problem is there is only so much elasticity in the eco-system.  We have probably maxed out the immune system and now the dis-ease of dis-connect will take its toll.

It is the old law of karma, we will reap what we have sown and we haven’t sown well.

A local farm supplies us with grass-fed lamb, chicken, pork and beef in a meat CSA once a month.  This has been our solution, as a few of us in the family thrive with some meat in our diet.

On another note: Another local farm is losing 25% of its crops each year to deer (this is in Boston!, who have no natural predators around here. By law the farmers cannot kill the deer! How bizarre—selling a few venison steaks alongside the beets and arugula would be good for farmer, consumer, and ecosystem.

Meat has its place.

Where did you get the statistic that one billion people are herders?

I can believe it (and imagine some of the “herds” are small), but I’m wondering who would measure this.