Mustachian's and Sustainability

[Aardvark]

There must be a number of Mustachians that have put some serious thought into environmental restoration and social justice. It would be great to hear your thoughts on:
- Taking personal action
- Connecting with other to discuss the topic (online or in person)
- Engaging with the topic in your career
- What questions should we be asking? What should we be talking about more than we are?
- What is a Mustachian approach to sustainability?

If this is being discussed on a different part of the forum please direct me.

[JupiterGreen]

There must be a number of Mustachians that have put some serious thought into environmental restoration and social justice. It would be great to hear your thoughts on:
- Taking personal action
- Connecting with other to discuss the topic (online or in person)
- Engaging with the topic in your career
- What questions should we be asking? What should we be talking about more than we are?
- What is a Mustachian approach to sustainability?

If this is being discussed on a different part of the forum please direct me.

I don't know if this topics is being talked about in another thread, but it certainly is an important one. I'll take on the first point.

- Taking personal action

It seems that much of this comes down to being mindful and that is an essential part of being mustachian with regards to purchases. So one only needs to widen the net so to speak to consider how other actions might be impacting sustainability. For instance, one of the worst things a person can do for the environment is have children (apologies if people bristle at that, but even limiting the number will help). Animal consumption also comes with a large environmental price tag that young people will have to pay. Airplane travel is another biggie, I just saw a post where someone brought this up with regards to international travel. Pete has talked about all of that (at least a little) and I see it discussed here from time to time.

So anyway, this groups strikes me as being aware of these issues, indeed that is why I stuck with reading MMM for the past decade. It has been my experience that other money sites are more about consumption and greed. From my perspective, these points you brought up are a huge part of the "mustachian philosophy". We could always talk about it more thank you for bringing them up.

[uniwelder]

@Zikoris is a great person to talk to. 

The topic generally runs through the forum in the background--- electric cars, solar panels, 'what did you not buy today' thread, where to buy a house thats least susceptible to climate change, bike to work, etc.  There are a lot of people on this forum that forgot or never paid attention to the MMM message that revolves around this, and who think this is a site just about FIRE, but I hope it gets a louder voice.  In particular, when someone asks 1) should I buy a vacation home at the beach, or 2) should I buy a 3,000 sq ft home, or 3) what kind of zero turn radius mower should I get for my 2 acres of lawn, I try to raise my voice and remind them how irresponsible that is.  I'm usually in the minority, however, and most people respond back regarding the finances of the decision or deride me for shooting down their ideas when they can afford it.

[neophyte]

I'd like to see this discussed from an investment perspective too. How can we do some good with our invested money? I've finally gotten to the place where I'm making all my tax advantages accounts and there's enough invested that things are really starting to take off. And now I have extra money.  Mostly I index it and forget it, but I'm starting to try to look into more environmentally friendly ways of investing some of my money. I'm willing to do something that's suboptimal financially if it may have other benefits.

[Fru-Gal]

This has been discussed a ton on multiple threads, but we always need more. I've always felt MMM's goal (like ERE) was environmentalism disguised (very lightly)  as wealth management.

There is nothing more effective we can do as individuals and families than reducing our car dependence (and plane travel). A simple approach is to reduce to one car, and drive it very little. I can confidently say that is possible since we've done it for 15+ years with a family of 4.  Of course even better is no car, which quite a few on this forum have done. While I aspire to it, I'd be a hypocrite to recommend what I haven't done myself. We also use bus, train, light rail, ferry, bike, urban micromobility devices like rental scooters, etc. It's a lot of fun and so much less stressful than driving.

MMM's most briliant advice for bikers is to stop thinking like drivers. Once you map out a bike-optimized route, you realize almost any place in the world is accessible to cyclists. And that's also important because incremental change is the only way this will happen.

[Zikoris]

I think one of the best things you can do if you're a "public Mustachian" is to take advantage of situations where you can push anticonsumption messages. Of course it's great to live eco-friendly on a personal level, but if you can get other people to make changes, it really ramps up the effect dramatically. I know that I've personally introduced a shit ton of people to lower-consumption living over the years, from many different angles - zero waste, veganism, car-free living, etc, and I'm constantly seeing the people around me moving towards better choices in that regard. For me, I get interviewed for various media like once or twice a year and definitely talk a lot about anticonsumption since it's tied deeply into FIRE for me, but even things like participating well on places like Reddit (meaning well-written and informative posts on large subreddits, not shitty memes in a subreddit where everyone already agrees with you) can make a difference - a lot of people send me PMs there thanking me for helpful information, asking questions specific to their own circumstances, etc.

[FLBiker]

For us, the emphasis has really been on personal choices.  I've been a long-time bike commuter and a long-time vegetarian.  We buy stuff secondhand whenever possible.  We only own one car, and have a smaller house than many folks in our income bracket (technically 1326 sqft, although it's really more like 1700).  We intentionally moved to an area where we could walk places.  We don't overly climate control our house.  We spend lots of time hiking, sledding, ice skating, etc.  We grow some food, and support local farmers through CSA and farmer's markets.

I used to be a lot more of an activist.  For me, though, this was a constant source of frustration.  Focusing on my own actions has been way better.  If I were to engage in activism / education at this time (as a former teacher) I think I'd focus more on the mindfulness and anti-consumption angles than the straight environmental one.  In other words, the angle that lowering consumption is good for you (both in terms of your happiness and your wallet) rather than focusing on what's good for the planet.

MMM's most briliant advice for bikers is to stop thinking like drivers. Once you map out a bike-optimized route, you realize almost any place in the world is accessible to cyclists. And that's also important because incremental change is the only way this will happen.

I totally agree with this.  I lived as a bike commuter in Tampa for a decade, which is a terrible city for cyclists (in terms of drivers).  I chose where I lived carefully, though, and always had a great route to work.

[Rusted Rose]

Animal consumption also comes with a large environmental price tag that young people will have to pay.

This is a complete myth, and believing it is going to damage the planet further because of what people do with it.

Do you really think that all our ancestors avoided meat because it was "bad" for us? And, speaking of just North America, do you really think that all the bison, deer, sheep, and everything else in the millions contributed to climate degradation? Theyre not there anymore, so people don't realize they once were.

The only reason it looks like animals are bad for the environment is that our species is mismanaging them. Animals belong on the land, period. And we are supposed to eat them.

But some have hoarded and concentrated animals for profit and disrupted the natural way they are supposed to be fed (soy is not what any animals here should be eating. Corn either, actually) and they've removed the good functions of animals from the land. If you take them away, is that a real ecosystem?

The action of animals on land regenerates the soil that monocropping plants and chemical fertilizers and pesticides are killing.

This terribly titled book, for example (https://www.judithdschwartz.com/cows-save-the-planet) has great details on what we should be doing with the land to bring back the soil and climate, though it hasn't much to say about nutrition. I won't bother getting into that part here. Suffice it to say that the narrative on that has been badly co-opted.

I am just so tired of--in fact horrified at--what people believe these days about climate and diet and health, I see things going even more terribly haywire if we stay on that route.

[StashingAway]

Animal consumption also comes with a large environmental price tag that young people will have to pay.

This is a complete myth, and believing it is going to damage the planet further because of what people do with it.

Do you really think that all our ancestors avoided meat because it was "bad" for us? And, speaking of just North America, do you really think that all the bison, deer, sheep, and everything else in the millions contributed to climate degradation? Theyre not there anymore, so people don't realize they once were.

The only reason it looks like animals are bad for the environment is that our species is mismanaging them. Animals belong on the land, period. And we are supposed to eat them.

But some have hoarded and concentrated animals for profit and disrupted the natural way they are supposed to be fed (soy is not what any animals here should be eating. Corn either, actually) and they've removed the good functions of animals from the land. If you take them away, is that a real ecosystem?

The action of animals on land regenerates the soil that monocropping plants and chemical fertilizers and pesticides are killing.

This terribly titled book, for example (https://www.judithdschwartz.com/cows-save-the-planet) has great details on what we should be doing with the land to bring back the soil and climate, though it hasn't much to say about nutrition. I won't bother getting into that part here. Suffice it to say that the narrative on that has been badly co-opted.

I am just so tired of--in fact horrified at--what people believe these days about climate and diet and health, I see things going even more terribly haywire if we stay on that route.

IMO you're missing one huge factor... and that's overall quantity of consumption. Meat used to not be the major component of 3 daily meals like it is for the North American diet. There also used to be fewer people. Those two factors combined... there is absolutely, resolutely, screamingly certainly no way to feed Americans their standard meat based diet from animals raised on the land. Raising on the land is best.. animals are needed as part of the ecosystem... and people could comfortably eat them at 1500AD population levels and dietary meet ratios (as well as whole animal consumption rather than just the juicy muscles). Not accounting for population and diet ratio is bonkers though. Pretending that we can live like our ancestors only makes sense if we actually LIVE like them.

Humans are incredibly flexible with their digestion- it's one of the reasons there are so many dang diets out there... we can eat a LOT of things. We can eat mostly meat or no meat. Some people eat only meat.

Excess animal consumption impacting global warming is extremely far from being a myth. It is grounded in very sound science.

[Syonyk]

There must be a number of Mustachians that have put some serious thought into environmental restoration and social justice.

That's... an interestingly loaded set of terms you pick for a thread nominally on the topic of sustainability.  Do you care to define them more (as relatively few people have responded to anything along those lines), or are you just picking loaded terms for some point or another that you don't care to expand?

"Sustainability" and "environmental restoration" are reasonable enough, though the "restoration" aspect is a bit less common, blending "social justice" into that without further explanation is odd.  They have relatively little to do with each other, at least on the surface, so it would be useful for you to weave together what you care to talk about in more detail, which you've not done.

- Taking personal action

From a sustainability perspective, I built large ground mount solar array, PHEV, though the off-grid office sort of counteracts most of that.  It's an awful lot of solar that doesn't do a whole lot for large parts of the year, though I'm working on getting things lined up so I can charge the car off that system this year instead of off the house system.  The joys of off-grid power systems, sized for winter, overkill in the summer.  I blow off the surplus with compute (BOINC mostly), though putting power into the PHEV is probably more useful.  I'll see how that works.

However, I've been trying to leverage some of my free cashflow into more solar deployments in the area, and am working with someone to develop a bit more of a streamlined process for homeowner-installed DIY ground mount stuff - still has to meet code, get permits, etc, but is radically easier, simpler, and, if we've got anything to say about it, faster than doing roof mount.  I've got a large order of panels on order (100x 72 cell, 60 or 80 of which have buyers at cost) because it's cheaper to get a truck of panels than to buy stuff locally, by far.  I've got the financial resources to be able to do that, so I'm trying to make use of those to increase the amount of local solar deployed.  For the prototype systems, I'm also funding some of the R&D parts involved, because I think there's a niche business that could be made out of it, but dropping a couple grand on steel tubing to play around just isn't that big a cost for me - largely due to my living below my means.  If a few of us get some sustainable cashflow out of it, great, if not, I've helped deploy another 30-40kW of solar in the area.  But given that we tend to have free space out here, I'd like to continue iterating on it and, while not having to be an actual solar installer, assist with a lot of installations where I can legally do the work.  Even if it's not net zero, just popping out 7kW A-frames on 6kW inverters (which can backfeed into a 200A panel without upgrades) would be useful for a lot of people.  I think we can do $1.50/W, maybe less.  If we can get all-in cost down to $1.25/W or less, for people to do it themselves, that's darn nice.  No profit in it at that point, but neither do I actually care that much.

Connecting with other to discuss the topic (online or in person)

Online is pretty well played out.  Lines have been set, drawn, and teams chosen, so I just don't find a lot of value in it anymore.  In person is far more interesting, and that's part of why I want to get solar costs so drastically down for a homeowner install - $4/W ripoffs don't accomplish much but commissions for the salespeople, being able to provide materials and support for a $1.50/W install (these are all pre-tax prices) opens up a lot of options.  If I could find the funding, I'd investigate putting a couple MW on our hill, but I don't have a spare few million right now, or the time to go hunt it down.  But I'd love to see a range of smaller, community solar type installs that are owned by various people in the immediate area (either with financial investment or time investment - the actual electrician requirements for hooking stuff up are fairly small compared to the physical labor requirements for doing an install).

I doubt this would scale well outside the immediate area, but there are plenty of people around here we could keep a few people busy with.  Skip roof mounts, avoid the roof work insurance, and just stamp out cheap ground mounts.  Someone in the area is doing similar things, I've just not found out who yet.  There are a bunch of very similar looking ground mounts I need to track down the company on.

Engaging with the topic in your career

I don't.  Not my area of expertise.  Just hobby projects.  My career earns me the money to have the surplus to be able to do various things like this.

What questions should we be asking? What should we be talking about more than we are?

Trash generated is a good one.  People should cancel their trash service and haul their own, it's a great motivator to bring a lot less crap into the house, and find ways to reduce/reuse before recycling/trash.  Reusing a box for shipping, or giving it to someone who will, is a lot better than recycling it.  Same goes for repairing things before replacing them.  Some of the threads around here are pretty stupid on that front.

- What is a Mustachian approach to sustainability?

It will vary depending on the people and the area.  But I think finding ways to use the available cashflow freed up to have a local impact is worth a good bit.

Or maybe I just have aspirations of being the local solar panel oligarch or something.

[Sandia]

I'd like to see this discussed from an investment perspective too. How can we do some good with our invested money? I've finally gotten to the place where I'm making all my tax advantages accounts and there's enough invested that things are really starting to take off. And now I have extra money.  Mostly I index it and forget it, but I'm starting to try to look into more environmentally friendly ways of investing some of my money. I'm willing to do something that's suboptimal financially if it may have other benefits.

Hi Neophyte, this is an aspect that really interests me, too, and we've taken some steps. Vanguard has some "ethical" index fund options (at least in Australia), which avoid certain industries (like non-renewable energy, weapons, and vices), which are certainly not perfect but seems better than nothing and are easy to switch to. Our retirement accounts are also in what the company claims are sustainable/environmental funds that earn pretty much the same as the usual index (or better), but I haven't investigated those too deeply yet because it's much harder to switch. We also chose the bank for our mortgage because it explicitly promises that all of its investments avoid the fossil fuels, weapons, and vices, and they actively invest in green energy (plus they actually had almost the lowest rate I could find at he time, lower than the big four banks in Australia).

One thing that strikes me is that at least for Vanguard, those ethical funds are comprised mostly of tech (eg Apple), then banks, and real estate, which at least aren't like, gas-powered rocket launchers, but aren't really paragons of pure green virtue. I guess up to now I've making a trade-off for ease of working towards FI rather than only investing in genuinely sustainable options, but that's something I'd like to look into better towards going forward.

Seems like the only way to do this is to find particular projects to invest in, I guess like on the scale of Syonyk's solar oligarchy (which sounds really cool). Has anyone else done something like that?

This also reminds of the thread recently from the couple who "accidentally" FI'ed because they'd invested in Tesla early on because of their sustainable values.

[Syonyk]

Seems like the only way to do this is to find particular projects to invest in, I guess like on the scale of Syonyk's solar oligarchy (which sounds really cool). Has anyone else done something like that?

The problem there is that I've no interest in turning a profit.  At least for a long while, and if I do, it'll be a small one, mostly consumed by whatever equipment I have to buy to make large bulk orders.  I intend to drive down the cost of installs... but a return on financial investment isn't anything I'm looking for here.

[neophyte]

One thing that strikes me is that at least for Vanguard, those ethical funds are comprised mostly of tech (eg Apple), then banks, and real estate, which at least aren't like, gas-powered rocket launchers, but aren't really paragons of pure green virtue. I guess up to now I've making a trade-off for ease of working towards FI rather than only investing in genuinely sustainable options, but that's something I'd like to look into better towards going forward.

I have the same complaint about Vanguard's ESG funds. They seem like they sort of just took the easy route, removed fossil fuels and guns, and went with whatever was left. However, what's left isn't necessarily anything I actively want to invest in or promote. I may get some, just because my brokerage account is at Vanguard and it's easy, but what I'd really like to see would be a renewable energy fund or something in that vein.  I think Fidelity may have one, but don't quote me on that.

Because of the lack of anything at Vanguard, I started looking into ETFs and I did pick up a couple focusing on solar and wind power. I've got some money sitting around that I need to invest and I may throw a couple thousand more at those, just because.

[StashingAway]

One thing that strikes me is that at least for Vanguard, those ethical funds are comprised mostly of tech (eg Apple), then banks, and real estate, which at least aren't like, gas-powered rocket launchers, but aren't really paragons of pure green virtue. I guess up to now I've making a trade-off for ease of working towards FI rather than only investing in genuinely sustainable options, but that's something I'd like to look into better towards going forward.

I have the same complaint about Vanguard's ESG funds. They seem like they sort of just took the easy route, removed fossil fuels and guns, and went with whatever was left. However, what's left isn't necessarily anything I actively want to invest in or promote. I may get some, just because my brokerage account is at Vanguard and it's easy, but what I'd really like to see would be a renewable energy fund or something in that vein.  I think Fidelity may have one, but don't quote me on that.

Because of the lack of anything at Vanguard, I started looking into ETFs and I did pick up a couple focusing on solar and wind power. I've got some money sitting around that I need to invest and I may throw a couple thousand more at those, just because.

Part of the issue is that many companies are both: GE is a world class manufacturer of windmills... and gas turbines. So are they green or do they support fossil fuels? Many oil companies are the same way. Also, most of the funds by default exclude nuclear... which to me seems like they just picked default political bins of "ethics" and didn't put any critical thought into it. The easy route, like you said.

[Anon-E-Mouze]

The only reason it looks like animals are bad for the environment is that our species is mismanaging them. Animals belong on the land, period. And we are supposed to eat them.

Factually, you are wrong. Humans are omnivores, not obligate carnivores. That means that although we can eat animals, we don't have to eat animals in order to survive and thrive. We are humans, not cats.

We do not need to use animals to survive and thrive, and therefore, any decision we make (as a society and on an individual basis) to so involves questions of utility and ethics.

We live in a society that has socialized us to believe that using animals is normal, useful and pleasurable. We are also living in a world where the large-scale exploitation of animals is incredibly damaging to the environment (e.g. deforestation, methane generation from industrialized cow exploitation) and presents significant health threats to humans (the rise of antibiotic resistance, pandemics triggered by animal agriculture - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2020/sep/15/covid-farm-animals-and-pandemics-diseases-that-changed-the-world - just to name a couple of risks).

So, it might still be commonplace to exploit animals but, increasingly, the negative externalities of animal exploitation are rapidly lowering the "utility" score for animal use.

And then there's the ethical issue. Fundamentally, since it isn't practically necessary for most people to eat or wear animal products, and eating or wearing animal products directly causes sentient beings to suffer, it is unethical to use an animal-derived product if a vegan option is a practicable alternative. In other words, each time you choose to consume an animal-derived product (whether it's food, clothing, cosmetics, furniture or otherwise) where it's practically unnecessary to do so, you are expressing the belief that it's okay for somebody to suffer and die in order for your convenience, pleasure or traditions.

If we stopped exploiting animals, animals wouldn't disappear from the earth. There would still be cows (and other animals) on the land and in the water. There just would be a lot fewer of the species we've been historically breeding, exploiting and murdering (like cows, pigs, chickens and fish) - and correspondingly more room for wild animals to thrive.

A few of notes here:
(1) Vegans do not avoid animal products entirely because we know it's impossible to do so. We avoid them whenever it's practicable to do so.
(2) Also, I'm well aware that for some people, some aspects of a vegan lifestyle aren't practicable. For example, if you have health conditions that make it difficult for you get all the nutrients you need from a vegan diet, then of course it makes sense to adjust your diet to accommodate what your body needs. But that doesn't mean you need to wear leather, silk and wool.
(3) There are a few micronutrients that are harder, but not impossible, to get enough of on a vegan diet (e.g. Vitamin B-12) but this is easily addressed by supplements.

Although I wish it would happen, I don't expect everyone to go vegan. But everyone can make decisions that reduce their contributions to the systems that cause animals to suffer and be murdered and that contribute to the environmental and health risks associated with animal exploitation.

[conrad__9]

The only reason it looks like animals are bad for the environment is that our species is mismanaging them. Animals belong on the land, period. And we are supposed to eat them.

Factually, you are wrong. Humans are omnivores, not obligate carnivores. That means that although we can eat animals, we don't have to eat animals in order to survive and thrive. We are humans, not cats.

We do not need to use animals to survive and thrive, and therefore, any decision we make (as a society and on an individual basis) to so involves questions of utility and ethics.

We live in a society that has socialized us to believe that using animals is normal, useful and pleasurable. We are also living in a world where the large-scale exploitation of animals is incredibly damaging to the environment (e.g. deforestation, methane generation from industrialized cow exploitation) and presents significant health threats to humans (the rise of antibiotic resistance, pandemics triggered by animal agriculture - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2020/sep/15/covid-farm-animals-and-pandemics-diseases-that-changed-the-world - just to name a couple of risks).

So, it might still be commonplace to exploit animals but, increasingly, the negative externalities of animal exploitation are rapidly lowering the "utility" score for animal use.

And then there's the ethical issue. Fundamentally, since it isn't practically necessary for most people to eat or wear animal products, and eating or wearing animal products directly causes sentient beings to suffer, it is unethical to use an animal-derived product if a vegan option is a practicable alternative. In other words, each time you choose to consume an animal-derived product (whether it's food, clothing, cosmetics, furniture or otherwise) where it's practically unnecessary to do so, you are expressing the belief that it's okay for somebody to suffer and die in order for your convenience, pleasure or traditions.

If we stopped exploiting animals, animals wouldn't disappear from the earth. There would still be cows (and other animals) on the land and in the water. There just would be a lot fewer of the species we've been historically breeding, exploiting and murdering (like cows, pigs, chickens and fish) - and correspondingly more room for wild animals to thrive.

A few of notes here:
(1) Vegans do not avoid animal products entirely because we know it's impossible to do so. We avoid them whenever it's practicable to do so.
(2) Also, I'm well aware that for some people, some aspects of a vegan lifestyle aren't practicable. For example, if you have health conditions that make it difficult for you get all the nutrients you need from a vegan diet, then of course it makes sense to adjust your diet to accommodate what your body needs. But that doesn't mean you need to wear leather, silk and wool.
(3) There are a few micronutrients that are harder, but not impossible, to get enough of on a vegan diet (e.g. Vitamin B-12) but this is easily addressed by supplements.

Although I wish it would happen, I don't expect everyone to go vegan. But everyone can make decisions that reduce their contributions to the systems that cause animals to suffer and be murdered and that contribute to the environmental and health risks associated with animal exploitation.

I’ve waited a long time to see more pro-vegan posts on this forum, and wanted to commend you for posting in a non-confrontational but upfront way. Whenever most people see the “v word” they recoil. I wish there was more discussion from your last post. Just wanted to drop by and let you know I’m vegan too. It’s only been 2.5 years but it has been life changing to live according to one’s values. I hope to see MMM and others in this community dig a bit deeper and challenge themselves as to why they think it’s not a moral imperative to be vegan at this point.

[mozar]

I’m not a vegan but I support them! I can’t be for nutritional reasons but I’ve reduced my animal intake by 90%. I’m not against eating animals but I do think animal consumption should go back to being a luxury good. Taking a life should be expensive.
Something I’m working on is that my co-op has bonds in gas and oil and they are about to expire. So we want to introduce a bylaw saying that we won’t buy oil and gas bonds again.

[joe189man]

i could be way more sustainable, maybe this thread will help. i completely agree with @Rusted Rose eating animals isnt the problem. People are the problem

[Rusted Rose]

i could be way more sustainable, maybe this thread will help. i completely agree with @Rusted Rose eating animals isnt the problem. People are the problem

Oops, forgot about this thread for a bit. Thanks for waking the monster? Haha.

My esteemed colleagues here have misinterpreted what I said while on their vegan crusade. (1) I never said we were obligate carnivores, but I do say that we are not herbivores. And just because we Can eat only plants doesn't mean that we Should. It's a real theory that we pulled ahead of apes BECAUSE we ate meat and used fire.

When I said we're supposed to eat animals, I didn't say that was the ONLY thing. Animals eat other animals, that's natural. And, like those predators, we benefit from other animals' processing of plant energy that we can't directly.

(2) Those who have ideas about the immorality of eating animals like to say how "culturally" we've been encouraged to eat meat--I don't know where that idea came from--but the moral judgment about it is ENTIRELY cultural and very, very recent. Are you seriously going to maintain that we're supposed to sit around and chew leaves all day like apes with our completely different digestive system, or eat like our ancestors who celebrated the nutrient density of meat that gave all of us the advanced brains we now enjoy?

I could say more but since this thread is about sustainability, I'm saying that we need real data about it, not moralizing mythology that is just incorrect and really nothing but politics.

There are too many people on the planet already, and too many systems that have misdirected and overused our resources. We don't actually know how sustainable meat is or isn't, because we aren't DOING it right at this time. The systems we currently have are problematic as hell, but the solution in my view isn't just dialing them back (or out entirely) with no substantial change to the system, and then dialing up less optimal fodder.

[conrad__9]

i could be way more sustainable, maybe this thread will help. i completely agree with @Rusted Rose eating animals isnt the problem. People are the problem

People eating animals is a sustainability issue (in addition to a moral one :))

My esteemed colleagues here have misinterpreted what I said while on their vegan crusade. (1) I never said we were obligate carnivores, but I do say that we are not herbivores. And just because we Can eat only plants doesn't mean that we Should. It's a real theory that we pulled ahead of apes BECAUSE we ate meat and used fire.

Why does what our ancestors had to do thousands of years ago matter today?

When I said we're supposed to eat animals, I didn't say that was the ONLY thing. Animals eat other animals, that's natural.

Whether or not something is natural doesn't justify eating animals for most people today. AC is not natural. The internet is not natural. Murder in the wild between animals is natural. Also, I am going to take a wild guess that the way humans consume meat is not how animals in the wild consume meat (ripping it apart, eating uncooked, etc.).

And, like those predators, we benefit from other animals' processing of plant energy that we can't directly.

No, the raising and slaughtering of cows, chickens, and pigs is massively inefficient when we can get all required nutrients from plants. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5466942/)

(2) Those who have ideas about the immorality of eating animals like to say how "culturally" we've been encouraged to eat meat--I don't know where that idea came from--but the moral judgment about it is ENTIRELY cultural and very, very recent.

Today's dominant culture accepts the mass killing of animals. Advertising is dominated fast food. The culture is undoubtedly pro-meat. "Moral judgement" about meat goes back hundreds of years, but yes it's become more mainstream recently. What's the problem with that? Like most historic issues there is a time when an action is widely accepted and not questioned, then there's a shift when its questioned, and another shift when its culturally and sometimes legally unacceptable, i.e. gay marriage, slavery, etc.

Are you seriously going to maintain that we're supposed to sit around and chew leaves all day like apes with our completely different digestive system, or eat like our ancestors who celebrated the nutrient density of meat that gave all of us the advanced brains we now enjoy?

The leaves comment is funny. Learning how to cook with plants instead of three kinds of meat has greatly increased my enjoyment of food. There are endless blogs on making delicious vegan food.
 

I could say more but since this thread is about sustainability, I'm saying that we need real data about it, not moralizing mythology that is just incorrect and really nothing but politics.

Great! Here's some data.
Greenhouse gas emissions across supply chain: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/food-emissions-supply-chain?country=Beef+%28beef+herd%29~Cheese~Poultry+Meat~Milk~Eggs~Rice~Pig+Meat~Peas~Bananas~Wheat+%26+Rye~Fish+%28farmed%29~Lamb+%26+Mutton~Beef+%28dairy+herd%29~Shrimps+%28farmed%29~Tofu~Maize
Reducing food’s environmental impacts through producers and consumers: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aaq0216

We don't live in a political vacuum. In fact politics plays an important role in this discussion because government subsidies encourage this intensive, unsustainable animal agriculture, so part of shifting to a more sustainable diet is challenging today's culture and politics around eating animals.

Absent such political change, you have three chances each day to reduce suffering and to reduce the demand of animal products that are not sustainable and cause immense suffering. Please consider it :)

[StashingAway]

My esteemed colleagues here have misinterpreted what I said while on their vegan crusade. (1) I never said we were obligate carnivores, but I do say that we are not herbivores. And just because we Can eat only plants doesn't mean that we Should. It's a real theory that we pulled ahead of apes BECAUSE we ate meat and used fire.

It's a theory, of course, but not a Scientific Theory, in which the majority of the scientific community upholds it as the most likely answer. But that's just me being a pendantic, it detracts from the main point.

Let's go with it: As a species, we may have developed technology (fire) to allow us to make a big leap in the animal kingdom; allowing us to make meat more digestible so that we could consume many more calories and thus have spare calories and nutrients for "thinking", which is a resource most animals aren't blessed with. Chicken or the egg here, but our brains grew quite quickly in a short geological period of time. Why do we have to put a stake in human progress there? It gives us many insights to where we came from, as do studying tribal cultures to understand human psychology more.

But now we have the technology and understanding to do that further. We could keep eating meat, and we could also force all women to give un-medicated birth. Or, we could use our industrial agriculture machine to give us all the nutrients we need for a measurably lower environmental impact and allow for cecarean sections if needed? Our ancestors did the best with the tools they had, why shouldn't we?

We don't actually know how sustainable meat is or isn't, because we aren't DOING it right at this time. The systems we currently have are problematic as hell, but the solution in my view isn't just dialing them back (or out entirely) with no substantial change to the system, and then dialing up less optimal fodder

I'm not sure I understand this line. Can you expand on it?

[Rusted Rose]

My esteemed colleagues here have misinterpreted what I said while on their vegan crusade. (1) I never said we were obligate carnivores, but I do say that we are not herbivores. And just because we Can eat only plants doesn't mean that we Should. It's a real theory that we pulled ahead of apes BECAUSE we ate meat and used fire.

The previous poster needs a longer response than this one so I'll have to get to that when I have more time.

Meanwhile:

It's a theory, of course, but not a Scientific Theory, in which the majority of the scientific community upholds it as the most likely answer. But that's just me being a pendantic, it detracts from the main point.

Yeah, I am well aware of the difference between the two, and I was not implying that it was a Theory.

But this comment has the effect of implying that what I said is less credible even though I never intended that meaning.

Let's go with it: As a species, we may have developed technology (fire) to allow us to make a big leap in the animal kingdom; allowing us to make meat more digestible so that we could consume many more calories and thus have spare calories and nutrients for "thinking", which is a resource most animals aren't blessed with. Chicken or the egg here, but our brains grew quite quickly in a short geological period of time. Why do we have to put a stake in human progress there? It gives us many insights to where we came from, as do studying tribal cultures to understand human psychology more.

I don't get it. Who is putting a stake in it there? My point was that our bodies evolved to run on different fuels than apes' bodies, so how do people not see a potential problem with dialing ourselves back to ape-level fuel?

A book I'm going to refer to in my longer reply to the previous post has some points about how diet has improved or degenerated the human body over time, and it's not at ALL like we get to point X and then just stay there if we don't maintain how we got there. THAT is thinking we're putting a stake in our development and believing that reducing the quality of the input isn't going to put us in a clawback situation.

Guess what, it does.

But now we have the technology and understanding to do that further. We could keep eating meat, and we could also force all women to give un-medicated birth. Or, we could use our industrial agriculture machine to give us all the nutrients we need for a measurably lower environmental impact and allow for cecarean sections if needed? Our ancestors did the best with the tools they had, why shouldn't we?

All forms of progress are not equivalent. That is a straw man argument.

I didn't say we need to get rid of all forward movement. I do say that nutrition is not amenable to the same "logic" as all other progress. The biology of fueling the body is largely what it is, and we can be in denial of the way it works by trying to push it around to suit the whims of what appears "better" to someone.

The industrial agriculture system cannot give us the nutrients the way it is currently being done. Our foods are losing nutrients at a shocking pace. Measurably lower environmental impact? Not one bit. It is killing the planet.

Again I refer you to the stupidly titled Cows Save the Planet book, which has a lot of detail on what industrial agriculture has gotten very wrong--and what we can do to steer the ship back onto course.

We don't actually know how sustainable meat is or isn't, because we aren't DOING it right at this time. The systems we currently have are problematic as hell, but the solution in my view isn't just dialing them back (or out entirely) with no substantial change to the system, and then dialing up less optimal fodder

I'm not sure I understand this line. Can you expand on it?

If I understand your question, I mean that we have derailed the gentlest, most ecologically sound ways of growing plants and animals for just enough generations that we are out of touch with them by and large, so we really have no idea what is actually sustainable. Our current systems are not.

I am ALL for reworking things so that we don't have industrial CAFOs or chicken houses, fake meat, depleted soil, drought, and so on. But the HOW of raising meat animals that is so problematic today needs to be *separated* from the fact that they have a rightful role in our healthiest, most appropriate diet.

The question is NOT "How do we stop eating our most nutritious food and settle for substitutes" but "How do we rearrange things so that we get what we need and heal the planet at the same time"--while also not ignoring the question of our own population.

It always sounds to me like there's a no-questions-asked acceptance that we're just going to make more people all the time, and pushing to arrange our food systems to feed *even more* growth in human quantity while the quality of food (and life) takes a hit. I guess that's acceptable to most.