Surfing and Veganism
Stok wrote:mk1 wrote:How's the new religion going Stok - faith still burning strong?
Not a religion in any way or form mate, but yes I'm still happily following a vegan diet.
I can only assume you liken veganism to a religion just so you can incorrectly re-assure yourself it's weird and wrong, and that it's ok for you to continue consuming animals.
Sorry Stok - I shouldn't stir. I kicked off from your response re Kelly's diet to ID as it's something I am really curious of, plus his fitness regime too.
Suffice to say that I do have my reasons for calling it a religion though, and Batfink has touched on it already so I will leave it at that.
One final point - I make a clear delineation between veganism and vegetarianism (and I assume we are discussing the former in this thread unless specifically stated otherwise). In my eyes these two ideologies are not a direct extension from the same moral foundation and I try very hard not to conflate the two.
You were making so much sense until this Stok:
" I just believe that we have moved ourselves out of the natural world. The way we have sucked wild animals into our economy is just horrendous."
The natural world is predation. Predators and prey. Humans have existed in this world for at least a couple of million years. Thats all very well documented. You can observe it yourself in any suburban backyard.
So if you want to move back into the natural world, you take responsibility for your food supply and try and eat what is in your local area. That is the closest thing to the "natural world".
Try and understand the ecology of your local area and what food supply it has. Use history and understand how the indigenous inhabitants lived here for 50 thousand years.
In my case I live in the sub-tropics on the coast. There is abundant marine life which was harvested by the Bundjalung people, including fish, pippies, oysters etc etc . Alot of that food supply is as simple as going down to the coast and catching a fish or digging up a pippy (although that is illegal now). They created fish traps to harvest the mullet run. So simple, so efficient.
There's also abundant bush food, like midgenberries, lilly pilly's etc etc. All of which you can just pick off a tree or bush.
As for sucking wild animals into the food supply. I'm pretty sure you mean domestic animals, which are derived from wild ancestors.
Agriculture of which veganism is reliant on is destructive of natural ecosystems and hence wild animals.
Stok, do you grow any of your own food or are you reliant on agriculture?
I'd like to see 4 million Sydney dwellers all head to the coast looking for pippies, or trample the national park looking for berries, or indeed grow food in their 4 inch backyard. So simple, so efficient eh?
Stok wrote:Who here happily eat's pork?
Have you seen Lucent? It's a 2014 documentary showing footage from Australian piggerys.
I recommend watching - warning, it's not exactly nice viewing:
I am guessing from who I see in the shop that a lot of surfers often have a pork roll with crackle and gravy - bloody great.
A lot of blokes can't even gut a fish, so not sure whats the issue.
happyasS wrote:I'd like to see 4 million Sydney dwellers all head to the coast looking for pippies, or trample the national park looking for berries, or indeed grow food in their 4 inch backyard. So simple, so efficient eh?
Probably not to that extent, but almost anyone living in a coastal place, including Sydney- especially Sydney- can catch their own fish, and access good local food, including ethical animal products.
The choice is not between veganism and factory farming which is what Stok seems to be implying; there's a huge area of conscious food choices in between.
There's also a hell of a lot of urban dwellers who can keep a couple of chooks and grow their own food.
It's not that long ago that was the norm.
freeride76 wrote:There's also a hell of a lot of urban dwellers who can keep a couple of chooks and grow their own food.
It's not that long ago that was the norm.
Too true, our neighbours keep chickens in the Eastern burbs of Sydney, we are often given fresh chicken and Quail eggs. A couple of local front gardens fully planted with vegetables year around - Greeks and Italians seem to be the ones who have this dialled.
Plenty of opportunity to contribute to growing our own food source, we just cant be bothered of the most part or it doesn't quite fall into line with "resort style living"
BTW. what do you vegan/vegetarian people actually eat on a daily basis, just to give us an idea?
For example for breakfast i generally eat either toast or, cereal with milk, occasionally mix it up with muesli with yogurt and fruit and every now and then bacon and eggs as a treat.
Snack during the day mostly fruit. (i eat a lot of fruit)
Dinner maybe 70 to 80% of the time Indonesian occasionally other Asian dishes meals with rice 99% of which meat is the main focus, maybe 20-30% of the time we eat the standard old school, Aussie home dishes, spag bol, lasagna, shepards pie, roast beef/lamb/chicken etc 99% of which also have meat as the focus.
Ive eaten some real nice vegetarian food but its mostly been Indian type food or hari krishna food, I've got the odd vegetarian or vegan friend but the only time I've eaten with them is at BBQ's or ofter a surf etc, and they always seem to have trouble like their choice is extremely limited.
Maybe I'm wrong but it always seems its either quick food that doesn't real satisfy or the good stuff needs a lot of preparation time and really needs to be bulked up with carbs to satisfy.
I could never be a vegetarian or vegan but i am not against cutting down on meat, id be happy to have one meal a week without meat as the focus, but the meals i do eat without meat things like Gado gado or soups etc i find very unsatisfying.
So please give me some names or ideas to google.
freeride76 wrote:You were making so much sense until this Stok:
" I just believe that we have moved ourselves out of the natural world. The way we have sucked wild animals into our economy is just horrendous."
The natural world is predation. Predators and prey. Humans have existed in this world for at least a couple of million years. Thats all very well documented. You can observe it yourself in any suburban backyard.
So if you want to move back into the natural world, you take responsibility for your food supply and try and eat what is in your local area. That is the closest thing to the "natural world".
Try and understand the ecology of your local area and what food supply it has. Use history and understand how the indigenous inhabitants lived here for 50 thousand years.In my case I live in the sub-tropics on the coast. There is abundant marine life which was harvested by the Bundjalung people, including fish, pippies, oysters etc etc . Alot of that food supply is as simple as going down to the coast and catching a fish or digging up a pippy (although that is illegal now). They created fish traps to harvest the mullet run. So simple, so efficient.
There's also abundant bush food, like midgenberries, lilly pilly's etc etc. All of which you can just pick off a tree or bush.As for sucking wild animals into the food supply. I'm pretty sure you mean domestic animals, which are derived from wild ancestors.
Agriculture of which veganism is reliant on is destructive of natural ecosystems and hence wild animals.Stok, do you grow any of your own food or are you reliant on agriculture?
Freeride, I meant that we've sucked them into our economy. They're now born, raised and killed from an economic standpoint. Wild caught is better, but still has significant issues when money is involved (such as the problems with prawn trawlers, etc.). It's a horrific thing in reality.
You're a lucky individual with what you have Freeride, and where you live. I actually live in the inner city, in an apartment. I can't really afford to buy a block of land yet (or ever, unless I do some serious commuting), and I can't seem to find reliable employment out of the city. I'd say the world is moving more in my direction (unfortunately), and more and more people will be like this - have to live in an apartment in the city.
So yes, I'm heavily reliant on agriculture. I try to reduce that where I can though.
indo-dreaming wrote:BTW. what do you vegan/vegetarian people actually eat on a daily basis, just to give us an idea?
Average day for me includes muesli and soy/almond milk in the morning, with a sprinkle of seeds (chia, flax or hemp). Today for lunch I had a Bahn Mi (Vietnamese roll) and rice paper roll for lunch - both had tofu in them. For dinner I'll probably cook a curry with brown rice and peas/lentils and a bunch of veggies. Snacks I have nuts and fruit, I've also eat bread, and make smoothies.
My thoughts are the satisfying feelings your talking about ID are mostly psychological. I remember when I first gave up meat I did feel like that for a week, then I was fine.
I was wondering what Stok does when the religious zealots come knocking to run their guilt trips on him but I think that brown rice/lentil curry probably does the trick
Great read this one.
Not sure if its been mentioned and not connected to being a vegan. But the whole talk of sustainability and humans impact in this thread made me think of some pictures that i saw a while back.
Its been 5 years since the Fukushima nuclear disaster. And a photographer went in the exclusion zone and some of the photos are amazing. Nature has truly taken back a lot of the area and in such a short time... i guess you see photos of Chernobyl and the same thing there but have a look.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/picturegalleries/worldnews/11916879/Insi...
This is probably the place to put this, good read the ideals of vegans and farming is really not that simple.
(from social media)
"I did a post last week about “vegans”. It went a bit viral - it reached 500,000 people. Not bad for sitting on the front deck on my iPhone.
I’ve rightly coped a bit of constructive criticism from some vegans about painting them all as vandals.
There are many vegans quietly chewing on their lettuce, sipping on soy lattes minding their own business.
But for some it’s a chance to shout down and impose their idiotic ideology on others.
To avoid offending the former, I’ll started calling the later, Vegandals.
I’m happy for vegans to eat the food I don’t and I’m happy for them not to eat the meat that I do.
But I can’t cop these vegandals.
They want both their food and mine too!
A vegandal’s first issue is farming, killing and eating animals for food is not only cruel but unnecessary.
A vegandal’s second proposition is that livestock emit a lot of methane and thus are bad for the environment. Livestock also eat crops and drink a lot of water that could be used by humans.
The first reality is that livestock (cows, sheep, goats etc) eat grass (cellulose) and through their highly refined rumens are able to convert that grass into protein.
58% of Australia’s land mass grows grass naturally. It’s not suitable for farming but is highly adaptive to extensive (non intensive) livestock grazing.
Livestock do eat fodder crops on farms and in feedlots. However 86% of this produce is inedible to humans.
Vegandals argue that those inputs could be better put to growing plant based protein.
Putting aside the fact plant based protein tastes like paper and needs a lot of sauce and wine to digest, it is also very hard and expensive to grow in the first instance and even harder to grow to a standard that someone could (or would want) to eat.
You only have to walk into a Coles or Woolworths and see the wonderful fresh produce on display and then walk out the back and see how much is thrown away to work out humans are picky bastards.
You only have to go to a packing shed and see what is thrown away as “seconds” to work out that growing fruit and vegetables is a hard business.
You only have to drive past a crop wilting in the paddock to work our markets and seasonal conditions are fickle.
Simply converting areas used for grazing livestock or used to supply feed for livestock to areas for human consumption isn’t a simple process.
The amount of water, fertiliser, pesticide, investment and management required to produce commercial crops for human consumption is immense.
Crops like chick pea, soya bean and mung beans are also very difficult to grow.
Mung beans aren’t colloquially referred to as “mongrel beans” for better marketing.
Pulse crops are highly water reliant, are highly susceptible to seasonal changes (too hot, too cold), are loved by insects and are thirsty on soil nutrients.
They need even larger amounts of fertiliser, herbicide and insecticides than conventional crops to survive. This is even before you have to harvest them, fumigate them, store, transport and sell them.
Pulse crops are usually grown as rotation crops around other more reliable and consistent crops like cotton, sorghum, wheat, cane or other vegetables.
If the crop comes off, it’s a bonus. If India impose a 40% tariff on imports because we beat them in cricket or won’t give them a coal mine - it’s a bugger. If it fails completely it is ploughed in as fertiliser as it’s a good legume for fixing nitrogen for other crops.
Vegandals also tend to like organic produce. You can grow organic pulse crops but the risks are even higher and more unpredictable.
Organic farming is great but it also needs more plowing (diesel), more soil disturbance (sediment run off) and more water. More ploughing also releases more soil carbon and greater inputs to replace. These inputs are usually replaced by livestock grazing through integrated management systems.
High yield organic produce for human consumption can’t be grown everywhere because not everywhere has enough water or the right climate to produce them.
The problem with pulse crops (or any crop) is they aren’t very flexible. For instance, if it’s dry you can move a cow to paddock with grass, put them on agistment, feed them or put in a feedlot.
You can’t pick up a pulse crop and move to where it has rained. They just die.
Trying to rely solely on plant based protein opens up a really problematic situation - starvation.
So you’ll either need bigger dams (eek), more rainfall or you’ll need more water efficient, pest resistant varieties. These will need some form of GMO or synthetic manipulation.
I have clients who are organic wheat farmers. They were the only organic wheat farmer in Australia to plant and harvest spelt (gluten free) wheat last year. They won’t do it again as it didn’t make enough money for the risk.
On their normal crops they aim for 1 bumper crop in 10. 4 out of 10 to break even and 5 failures. Failure is not producing enough to harvest for human consumption. This is in 25 inch rainfall on deep black soil country.
They only survive because they can offset the failed crops by feeding the stubble off to livestock or selling the lower yield crop as hay (for livestock) or feedlot mix (for livestock). The livestock is the underwriter. Without the livestock there would be no wheat farmer.
The prime hard goes into bread. The remainder into making the sausage.
Admittedly there are some exceptional farmers who produce crops year in year out purely for human consumption. They are rarer than a Greens voter in Barcaldine but they are out there. However the bank only loans them money to plant on the basis that there is a fall back market if the seasons don’t work - that’s livestock markets.
Some of these really exceptional farmers farm without artificial fertiliser, herbicides or pesticides. However the large majority are zero til and rely heavily on artificial inputs to survive.
The risks for a farmer to grow produce at a high enough level for human produce is difficult. Asking them to do it without the back up of livestock is impossible as it is commercially unviable.
If a vegandal is happy with non organic and GMO pulse crops - the fun doesn’t stop there.
The irony is lost on most vegandals when they champion protein crop farmers over livestock producers, when one has to consider the amount of “animals” that are killed through farming. Farmers hate bugs so they spray them. Birds eat bugs. Lizards eat bugs. No bugs no birds and lizards.
Farming paddocks also aren’t great for trees. One, they do damage to tractors when they drive into them and also it’s a pain to change the GPS to get around them.
However, intensively farmed areas are important as they produce our high quality food and fibre. But so is grazing in grasslands and woodlands as an offset.
Pulse crops don’t grow under trees but cows can.
Also, as I’ve said before, to produce 1 kg of tomatoes takes 10 times more inputs than to produce 1 kg of chicken. That’s because a chicken can convert lower quality feed into higher quality protein. A tomato converts water and nutrients into - well a tomato. To get that tomato to a high enough quality so it won’t be thrown in the seconds bin needs higher inputs.
I’m honestly not sure what the conversion of soya bean v meat to protein is. It matters little because no one in their right mind would grow a soya bean crop for human consumption without the fall back to sell their lower quality product for livestock feed.
A soya bean doesn’t exist without a highly refined ruminant.
I know it’s hard for some to see livestock farmed, trucked and slaughtered. But we have to put our big boy and big girl pants on and understand that our food sources - vegetable, fruit, grains and meat are all inter-related and reliant upon each other. One can’t survive without the other.
We also have to understand the complex market dynamics that goes into producing our food and the huge risks our farmers take each day.
Ideas of flipping our entire food production system on its head because it suits your ethical viewpoint might make a cool Uni assignment but it’s not based in any reality or rationality.
I’ve also nominated “vegandal” for the word of the year. Trade marks pending."
............... and of course, I have no vested interests in the food industry, so my comments are totally without bias and are based on accurate up to date research from reputable researchers across the wide variety of specialist areas to which I have referred ......... or maybe not? Who's to know? After all, I am just some random social media entity. Shit, I might not even be human. I might just be an agrobusiness bot.
Blindboy
You obviously didn't read it, i will simplify it for you (below)
It's something im sure we have all not though about much, but it's the reality of farming and makes complete sense. and vegans often just say we can do this and that instead (etc grow crops where beef/lamb is raised) with no knowledge of the reality of farming.
Basically: raising of beef even lamb etc in most of Australia is low risk and a safe bet and banks will back them if needed..
Farming of most vegetable crops is high risk and harder to get backing from banks if needed..
You would have to assume like most things though, his risk also means high reward.
All makes complete sense, many crops rely on a good season to be successful, but even then can become almost worthless if hit by hail storm, extreme heat including hot dry winds), extreme cold, extreme wet conditions, or pest.
The irony here is if it really is true that we are seeing more extreme weather events, then this type of farming also becomes less viable and the areas where many crops can be grown will fall into smaller geographical range.
Just calling out assertion without evidence.
Ok......
Still going with the vegan thing Stok?
Yeah coming up to 4 years now.
Interesting piece there ID. Tend to agree with Blindboy, not in the sense that what you've posted is wrong (a lot of it makes sense), just that there are so many factors at play socially, economically and politically that you could frame this a thousand ways with only a minor piece of bias here or there (somewhere in the information chain) - and no one would ever know.
My thoughts are the market will drive what the market will want. And whilst there is limits to what we can physically do with our land, I'm sure the above will have some flexibility if we have say 50 or 60% of our population vego, instead of the 10% (or whatever it is) now.
I'm sure the Swellnet good ol' boys would be down with this kinda natural green diet.
Indos right regarding land use. My family were first fleet sheep farmers who established a farm out near Bathurst. It was tough country and pretty rocky, not good for cropping except for a few areas on the several thousand acres. They went for it and for 5 or 6 generations they worked hard improved the land and raised thousands of sheep which in turn produced wool for your Ugboots and jumpers and clothes and food for millions of people. I used to love going there on holidays and sleeping in the shearers quarters and watching the guys make their living providing our wool. They had some cattle too but not many and a nice orchard on one of the few fertile pieces of land behind the hand cut sandstone house. All the sheep would eventually be killed its true but I'm telling you that while they were living they had a good life and were loved by my family, some even so spoiled they were winning prizes in the Easter show. Isn't it better to have lived a short happy life than to never have lived at all.
It’s not all happy living. The Australian standard for treating flyblown on sheep is to grab a lamb while it’s nice and young, slit its skin around its tail and rip it off. Works apparently. It’s a business so it’s done nice and quick, without pain relief, and then let out to deal with it on the paddock. I also have connections to a sheep farm. In saying that, lamb cutlets are still my favourite meal, but I am aware Stock that you are in the right here. I’ve been slowly moving away from it all for all your original posts reasons. I only drink cow boob now if that’s all that’s available, and how good are vege filled rice paper rolls. There’s no denying the health benefits, the difference is felt within hours, and within weeks you are paddling easier thanks to shedding that extra fat. The health & environmental aspects are non debatable, they are simple facts. Our conditioning is all that clouds our thought process on this issue
I thought standard for quite some time was now rubber rings for docking and castration.
And not for treating flyblown sheep but as a preventive measure.
Over the last decade or so there has been a lot of research on animal consciousness. The results show that we have, very conveniently, under-estimated them in numerous ways. The results of this work, which includes the recent discovery of mirror neurons in rats, suggests very strongly that mammals and probably other vertebrates, not only experience physical pain as we do but also suffer similar psychological distress. Our current treatment of animals makes no allowance for this. Even if you want to argue the sustainability issue, this should give you reason to reduce your consumption of animal products.
Do you really need science to tell you that animals have feelings and experience pain ?
"The health & environmental aspects are non debatable"
Actually that is debatable, veganism is an extreme diet, and like all diets especially extreme, come with risk.
Yeah sure if you are well educated about what your body needs and food combinations etc most people can be healthy on a vegan diet.
But if you cut meat and meat products and just think you can eat whatever you like long term you can easily get all kinds of protein deficiencies and health problems.
-Higher risk of osteoporosis
-higher risk of lack of Omega 3 (higher risk of depression)
-Higher risk of lack of Iron (heme iron due to harder to absorb from plants)
-Higher risk of lack of Zinc (harder to absorb)
-High intake of legumes can cause intestinal permeability
-To much carbohydrates (higher risk of liver disease and blood sugar problems)
-Higher risk group to develop eating disorders.
As most know B12 is the hardest vitamin to get on a vegan diet and generally vegans need to take supplements (not exactly natural) lack of B12 is a serious health problem that can lead to irreversible damage https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/vitamin-b12-deficiency-can-be-sneaky...
Vegetarians avoid some of these problems
And flextarians (eat minimal meat and meat products and minimal processed foods) are easily the most healthy and avoid the above issues, but also get the benefits associated with vegan/vegetarian diets like lower risk of heart disease.
IMHO the problem with vegans especially the radical protestors and terrorism style attacks on farms is, they generally turn people off their cause by how they go about things.
If they were to say, hey we believe a vegan diet is best, but understand most people are always going to eat meat, but if you guys are going to eat meat, can we work at ways to provide better animal welfare practise then i think much more people would listen and they would achieve much more fir animal wealth fare.
“Yeah sure if you are well educated about what your body needs and food combinations etc most people can be healthy on a vegan diet”
Of course. Only talking about doing it right. Diet has taken up half of my families discussions since the late 80s. Easily the biggest topic, having been brought up in a very health conscious family.
Amazing that people will focus on potential dietary hazards amongst health conscious vegans whilst 3/4 of the population are meat hoovering obese fucks whose diet is lucky to contain a single piece of fruit each year.
And that’s a toffee apple.
Cut out chicken and eggs (unless you keep your own) for an easy change that has a big impact on animal welfare.
I'd say it's highly debatable as well.
Our family is 100% self sufficient in fish protein and almost the same with eggs from our hens.
I thought about going vegan a couple of years ago and tried to calculate how I would replace those healthy, local and very bio-available sources of protein, minerals, Omega 3 fatty acids and micro-nutrients.
Replacing those sources of animal protein with plant protein would require a whole lot more land under cultivation - clearing habitat currently occupied by other plants and animals and displacing them, killing them.
Thats if I did it myself.
Otherwise, it's utilising agriculture; buying it from a shop/farmers market etc etc.
Be very hard to argue that the lowest ecological footprint isn't cleaving as closely as possible to how the aboriginal people lived off the land- eating local animal and plant sources.
Take the animal protein sources out and survival becomes much harder for vast swathes of the planets population. Go to the Solomons, or Papua New Guinea or Indonesia, or Fiji or Vanuatu to use our nearest neighbours as examples and tell them they can't keep chickens anymore, or eat fish, or pig.
Veganism in that light, seems less environmental saviour than another rich western indulgence, an example of moral superiority.
Morally speaking animals feel pain, have sentience. But all the research tells us plants don't want to die either. They communicate, try and repel predators etc etc.
We privilege sentience because it's like us but why should a rat or a sheep be given higher moral consideration than a thousand year old tree?
That seems to me to be the ultimate example of human moral arrogance.
The web of life is so complex and so interrelated it's hard to see why one form should be privileged over another. Speciesism is an undeniable part of humanity no matter what your diet.
As far as health goes, how would you determine the diet of any animal species? By observing it in the wild ands seeing what it eats, or by making a priori assumptions based on morality over what it should be eating?
By that logic every single human society on Earth has been omnivorous.
Simple facts are that animal proteins are far more easily bioavailable than plant proteins.
I can go catch a bonito or tailor and if I like cut a piece off and eat it raw without a worry in the world.
I can't go pull a lentil or another legume off a bush and eat it. Thats toxic. They need to soaked, processed, cooked.
Modern post industrial people, especially in western nations have completely lost touch with food and I see veganism as accentuating that trend.
It removes people from the food webs that human beings have evolved with over millennia. That sustain us on every level.
"IMHO the problem with vegans especially the radical protestors and terrorism style attacks on farms"
Terrorism style attacks..............
Jesus christ...... You REALLY do listen to Alan Jones a bit too much.
It's funny how conservatives are losing their minds, "calling out" vegan protesters, likening them to terrorists. Such a shame these same loop heads didn't call out white supremacist actions and rallies in Australia over the last 15 years with the same verve.
veganism is very big overseas. we haven't seen anything yet here.
there are without doubt some very poor players in the meat industry in australia. but the government won't take action against even the most egregrious assholes.
Very big overseas in western industrialised countries.
In India and China the trend is the opposite. Increased meat consumption.
oh yeah, so highly relevant. australia mirrors chinese and indian social and cultural changes.
Probably the reverse but also relevant because highest numbers of immigrants into Australia are now Indian and Chinese.
Asia may be far more relevant to our future than what happens in UK/Europe or North America.
We get our beef and chicken LOCALLY. Yes, it costs more. But knowing the chook had a decent organic life, scratching around outside means something to me. They also taste WAAAY better.
Secondly , Asparagus is out of season. But you can buy it. It gets flown in from the northern hemisphere. There's currently Californian asparagus on sale.
Now......... How much carbon is my organic chook from my local chook guy on the limestone coast responsible for? Well there's me driving to get it - 15 minutes of petrol
Me cooking it..... 90 minutes of an oven on.
The vegan cooking the asparagus pie - the fertiliser, the pesticide, The truck taking it to the wholesaler in North Cal - 1 hour diesel fuel. The refrigeration container to be flown to Australia - power AND fridge gas, the petrol taking it to the airport, the jet fuel and dead birds at the airport, the truck ride from Sydney airport to Coles distribution, the fridge truck drive to South Australia.
That's a fair whack of carbon for some vegan to eat asparagus pie and to scoff at my chicken with spuds and tommies out of my vege patch.
“Also, as I’ve said before, to produce 1 kg of tomatoes takes 10 times more inputs than to produce 1 kg of chicken. “ From Indo’s post.
Who dreams up this bullshit ?
"The results of this work, which includes the recent discovery of mirror neurons in rats, suggests very strongly that mammals and probably other vertebrates, not only experience physical pain as we do but also suffer similar psychological distress."
Most interesting what Jordan peterson has hsd to say about this.
All should check it out....or not....you know, because it's Jordan peterson....
You realise that your two ridiculous click bait articles contradict each other ,don’t you ?
And you realise that your articles demonisation of the concept of “ blood and soil “ is a direct attack on the premise of indigenous exceptionalism and ties to country don’t you ?
And you linked organic farms and reforestation programs to Nazism. Seriously.
But, but......Charlottesville ! The Third Reich !
Muppet.
"...Secondly , Asparagus is out of season. But you can buy it. It gets flown in from the northern hemisphere. There's currently Californian asparagus on sale.
Now......... How much carbon is my organic chook from my local chook guy on the limestone coast responsible for? Well there's me driving to get it - 15 minutes of petrol
Me cooking it..... 90 minutes of an oven on.
The vegan cooking the asparagus pie - the fertiliser, the pesticide, The truck taking it to the wholesaler in North Cal - 1 hour diesel fuel. The refrigeration container to be flown to Australia - power AND fridge gas, the petrol taking it to the airport, the jet fuel and dead birds at the airport, the truck ride from Sydney airport to Coles distribution, the fridge truck drive to South Australia.
That's a fair whack of carbon for some vegan to eat asparagus pie and to scoff at my chicken with spuds and tommies out of my vege patch."
Exactly!
Absolutely!
Absofuckenlutely exactly!
And another absofuckenlutely exactly!
"...Amazing that people will focus on potential dietary hazards amongst health conscious vegans whilst 3/4 of the population are meat hoovering obese fucks whose diet is lucky to contain a single piece of fruit each year.
And that’s a toffee apple."
Asparagus makes wee smell funny.
re. my sheepdog quote above, the left of politics (whatever that is....see andym) should just give up on all their cockamany bullshit, idealism, and general ridiculousness, and just focus on introducing carbon miles right across the board.
I don't know if they're introduced or enforced it in the UK, but some there talk a lot about them. This is where they count the carbon it 'costs' to produce/present food. Counting the tractors, fertilisers, transport etc. everything that sheepdog points out in his post.
When I say across the board, this should include all products, ALL! currently made and shipped in our failing globalisation experiment.
The whole kit and caboodle, cars, food, clothes, i phones, everything! By doing this they would address some of the unfairness currently enjoyed by countries like china in our so called 'free trade' world. It would address many environmental 'externalities' currently not considered in producing goods. It would address climate change concerns without the right crying 'big tax', 'new tax', 'another tax' 'more taxes', blah blah blah....whenever anybody tries to address anything. Yes it would be '...a big new tax on everything' but it would be simple, the right of politics likes simple!
And importantly, it would encourage manufacturing in the place of purchase, here and abroad, addressing job shortages, need for migrant workers, unfair work pratices, and allow places like australia to actually have a manufacturing industry in case the shit does hit the fan.
It won't stop international trade or globalisation, but it would make it somewhat sustainable, enviromentally and socially, which should have been factored into the plan decades ago.
Manufacturing miles on food, clothes, goods, services, everything. Addresses many issues, cuts out shit loads of red tape and bureaucracy, evens the playing field, address environmental concerns (beyond the church of climate change!!!)
Simple, fair and effective!
Less bureaucracy, reduce tarriffs and all sorts of other unfair measures the right hates, reduce red tape.
Shut the right up in their tracks. And restore some credibility to the left.
Do it now, the world can't wait, physically, mentally, cohesively.
"You realise that your two ridiculous click bait articles contradict each other ,don’t you?"
Hahahaha. NFSS!
Oh, and here's Curly the 'champion' galloper again.
Forget Winx.
Hang on...
Up the straight round the 2.25 minute mark
Just putting ideas out there factobum....
You got any?
Anything?
Anything all ?!?!!!!
@freeride.....ahh...sorry about that..that was meant to be a question.
as you note, we have a lot of chinese and indian students (and lately i've noticed a lot from nepal), many using education to emigrate. so was wondering if they will influence things in australia.
i was really surprised last year when in the US and canada --veganism is everywhere. it's mainstream. i couldn't believe it. and the burger chains couldn't keep their meatless burger patties in stock over the summer. i guess it will reach similar levels here.
@Bargearse - "The Golden Retriever"... near pissed myself
Heavenly Father forgive me for I have sinned...
100% freeride76 agree with pretty much all your post.
On the growing demand for red meat from China, India, Indonesia and other developing countries...it's mostly to due to the fast developing middle classes of these countries.
100% agree on the vegan thing being a western luxury too, although developing countries lower classes dont eat much red meat due to affordability and the real poor eat less meat due to cost in cities etc.
In country areas, villages etc meat and meat products is very important, chicken and eggs and if you look at coastal communities in remote areas of Indonesia (say Mentawais, Telos etc) fish is such an important part of the diet, they basically eat fish, seafood, sago, rice and then much smaller amounts of vegetables like water spinach or root vegetables and fruit.
But often if they dont catch fish to eat, it's just rice and sago to eat.
In some areas they actually eat very little fruit and vegetables because many dont grow them and much of what is available to buy is from mainland Sumatra and is expensive due to transport cost.
I think surfers, by their nature, are generally pretty in tune with the environment - more so than the general public.
We regularly get to fully immerse ourselves in the raw, unforgiving ocean, sometimes that ocean may be hours away from civilisation. We get to see sides of the ocean many don't, and all surfers feel somewhat connected to it.
Surfers are usually concerned about climate change, dwindling natural resources, excessive human population increase, exploitation of sea animals (Bali Dolphins, Seaworld etc), Tuna cages (Victor Harbor) and shark diving - hell even general littering (I've never seen a true surfer litter).
So I thought I’d put it out there – is anyone on this forum vegan? If not, have you ever considered it?
Living a vegan lifestyle is pretty much as close as you can get to being sustainable in our modern society. Aside from the health and serious and significant ethical reasons to become vegan (and there are so, so many of ethical reasons available), sustainability is a huge one. Human demand for seafood is straight out killing our oceans. Livestock is also killing them – directly through creating ‘ocean dead zones’ near farmland and indirectly through agriculture’s massive carbon footprint.
As a lifelong surfer, and only a recent vegan (6 months) I encourage you to watch this, and consider if you want to continue being a part of one of the most destructive ways of life the earth has ever seen.
p.s. I became vegan only for sustainable and ethical reasons – I actually don’t think eating meat is necessarily wrong, and I do believe in the food chain and apex predators – But the way humans consume is not what I would consider part of the food chain. We’re not an apex predator – we’re a destructive bacteria.