When you mosey around on environmentally conscious websites there is usually a list of things that you as an individual can do to protect the environment. These lists usually include things like turning off your lights, taking shorter showers, and biking instead of driving. Maybe you decide to do these things. You feel good about helping the environment, but you can live in total darkness, never bathe or use a car, and you will have done absolutely nothing (on the grand scale of things) to help the environment.
The truth is that the government, and more specifically the meat packing industry, donates large sums of money to these seemingly environmentally conscious organizations. You might be asking why meat and agriculture would have anything to do with the environment. If you take a closer look, the meat packing industry is actually very similar to the NRA. Both are extraordinarily wealthy organizations that have a LOT of governmental support and sway on the federal and state levels. Both corporations depend their support from the government, however unlike the NRA many people do not know the full virulence of the meat packing industry.
What every nonprofit environmentally conscious website won't tell you is that the number one cause of environmental destruction is agriculture. I have compiled a list of exactly what most environmentalist organizations won't tell you on their websites.
1. Livestock operations on land have created more than 500 nitrogen flooded dead zones around the world in our oceans.
2. Cows require exponentially more resources than humans. According to this graph they need 135 billion lbs of food and 45 billion gallons of water, compared to 21 billion pounds of food and 3.2 billion gallons of water, for just one cow in their lifetime.
3. In Brazil, Dorothy Stang, a nun and environmental activist made it her life's work to protect the Amazon rain forest. One night, she was walking home and was gunned down by a hired gunman from the Meat Agriculture Industry.
5. According to the FBI, the number one domestic terrorist threat is environmental and animal rights activists.
6. Half of the US is made for farming beef. If we switched over to grass fed beef, we would need all of the US, Half of Canada, Central America and well into South America just to feed the United States' demand of meat. Most of that landed isn’t suited to graze livestock. We would have to convert all mountain range to grassland, clear ancient forests and national parks for grazing and demolish every city. Grass fed is even more unsustainable than farmed and industrialized beef.
7. Cows produce 150 billion gallons of Methane per day. 130 times more waste than the entire human population. Cows require 20 tons of grain per week (per cow) which adds up to 250 cows.
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9. Human population is growing and in the neolithic times humans were free to kill whatever deer or wild moose they wanted to. Unfortunately, the population has increased tremendously. In 1812, there were 1 billion people in the world. In 1912, there were 1.5 billion people, and as of 2012, there are 7 BILLION PEOPLE ON THE PLANET. We cannot continue eating meat at this rate.
The only real action that you can take is veganism. According to the author of The Omnivore's Dilemma you cannot truly claim to care about the environment unless you are vegan. Not only will you be helping the environmentally exponentially more than merely taking shorter showers, but you are making a conscious choice to be healthier and not participate the abuse of rights in the meat packing industry. Amid the the flurry of social activism and political turmoil (cough Brexit), environmental activism often gets brushed under the bed of mainstream political discussion. Humans have caused more destruction to the environment in their little blip of history than ANY other species has. I will leave you with this quote.
Do what you can do as well as you can do every day of your life and you will die one of the happiest individuals that ever lived.
