Source
r/vegan•
booleanlogicgate

I would like to know more about the environmental impact of animal agriculture

Hello, r/vegan! This is my first time posting here. And on reddit in quite a while. I became vegan just a couple of weeks ago, after having been vegetarian for a year, and making the push to vegan has made me, shall we say, a lot more passionate about the reasons behind doing so. Naturally, I want to be a compelling advocate for it.

I have a lot of friends who care about the environment, but no one I know seems to understand how far-ranging the consequences of animal agriculture are. I myself am only vaguely aware - I know it contributes to many, if not all, known environmental issues, but I'm not sure about the mechanisms. I've tried bringing up that animal agriculture is more damaging to the environment than, say, using plastic, but I don't really have any reasons for why that is besides seeing it mentioned in a lot of articles and the sources seem not to be all that well-cited, often enough. I am hoping someone can point me in the direction of reading materials about these issues. I'm particularly interested in knowing how animal agriculture damages the ocean (ocean dead zones, for instance). I'm aware of over-fishing, of course, but it seems like the damage extends way beyond that.

Anything would help! Thanks so much in advance. You guys seem like a cool community, I've been reading posts here for a little while now, and I am excited to learn from you.

EDIT: Thanks to all of you who've replied, I've got a wealth of knowledge to share (to the dismay of all the carnists in my life, probably). I really appreciate you all taking the time to help educate a new vegan!

Posted Jan 16, 2015, 6:16 PM UTC · edited

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vegan_hippie_catvegan•

Check out the documentary cowspiracy. This covers every single environmental issue from animal agriculture from fish to cattle to eggs to dairy to even grass fed farms that are supposedly "environmentally sustainable". This is also one of the best documentaries ever made IMO. The information is very powerful and surprising, even when I knew it was bad. Its a lot worse than you think. Anyways check it out! This documentary inspired my mother in law to go vegan

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Thank you! I will definitely be watching it.

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vegan_hippie_catvegan•

Great! Hope you like it!!

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Agricola86vegan•

UN FAO report on livestock states in clear terms the environmental damage of animal agriculture and how it's worse than transportation for GHG emissions

World Watch report report by former world bank economists who suggest the UN FAO radically underestimated GHG emission from livestock and argue its at least 51% of GHG.

There are other good ones but that's a start and I really suggest watching cowspiracy with them. It's a quick and enjoyable film that covers all the highlights and get them interested in looking into it deeper.

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KerSanvegan•

I highly recommend these two links, OP. These are high-quality sources that are much harder to criticize than more populist pieces like Cowspiracy. Another worthwhile endeavour is to look through the resources made available by the World Bank.

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Thank you! I'm reading through the UN FAO report now, never fear. I'm also working on the side, is all, so it's going to take me a bit of time to get through and I was waiting to respond until I finished it. :)

Edit: I should probably mention that I'm also way more likely to read through a huge, long document than watch a documentary...I'm very sensitive and when I see documentaries I dwell on them for a long time, but reading doesn't bother me so much. And I'm a grad student so really long reports don't daunt me!

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KerSanvegan•

Awesome! Computer Science grad student? Master's or PhD?

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Actually Cognitive Science, but I work in a programming lab making computational networks. Going for PhD, but there are some things about the work that make me kinda not want to finish...we'll see what happens :P

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Thanks very much for these resources. I'm a fair bit of the way into the UN FAO report and it corroborates and elaborates on what I knew so far, which is great. I'll put the info to good use :)

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Agricola86vegan•

Awesome! The thing that always amazes me is just how damning all the info about animal agriculture is. The more one learns about the environmental issues, the moral issues, and the economic problems it sometimes feels too easy to argue against ;)

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Dang, I know! Now I'm just perpetually frustrated by the fact that no one is willing to LOOK at this information. It's so easy to argue against eating meat and yet everyone STILL DOES IT! I just don't understand, it's the most frustrating thing in the world. It's demonstrably wrong on every level and no matter what you tell them they just refuse to see.

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Agricola86vegan•

I feel ya, the frustration is always there. But I stay positive since eating animals is so pointless it has already ran off the cliff and is now standing on air. People can refuse to look down for a while but sooner or later...Splat!

All it takes is just a few more people everywhere and I'm convinced it will change so fast that 100 years from now people will look back and shake their heads it took so long to start :)

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thetimeisnow•

You will need to pay $10 to watch Cowspiracy or find a showing nearby. but here is a short video with the basic facts and they are listed on the page.

http://www.cowspiracy.com/facts/

'Meat the Truth' was released in 2008 and is free to watch along with the resources available on the page.

http://www.meatthetruth.com

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Thank you! Since so many people recommend Cowspiracy, I'll have to see it. That facts page is incredibly alarming.

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Agricola86vegan•

You'll really like it. I sort of knew there must be big influences from animal ag just do to the scope of it but that movie lays out he facts so clearly and powerfully it really make one think.

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im_vegan•

http://www.ncifap.org/ <-- PEW report on industrial farm animal production is one of my favorites.

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Thanks. Read the whole thing until the recommendations section. That was sobering and sad...

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minerva_qwvegan•

I can't speak to the issue as a whole, but I thought this video was pretty eye-opening.

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VeganStartvegan 20+ years•

This blog post really illustrates the land use of animal livestock, which is mind-boggling: http://blog.thevictoriavegan.com/2014/10/humane-meat-its-not-humane-for-nature.html

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Thank you. As someone who ultimately decided to begin the path toward veganism because of my love of wildlife, this is a really refreshing perspective to read - they're right, the vegan movement is too easily characterized by anti-factory farming. Obviously concessions have to be made, but the whole 'how about we don't keep farm animals AT ALL?' angle should really be emphasized more.

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VeganStartvegan 20+ years•

Thanks so much! (I'm actually the author. ;) Really nice to meet someone else who shares this perspective!! It's really sad how wildlife are so often ignored...but in a world where we 'win' animal rights, who's going to benefit from it? Not farm animals, there won't be any. It's everyone else who's left...and we need to do much, much more to protect them now.. high five

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booleanlogicgateOPveganarchist•

Oh, that is really cool! Thanks for sharing your work and well met! You're absolutely right, and given the rate at which wildlife is dying, it's pretty weird that people just refuse to take the long view. But I've long since come to the conclusion that people are just very myopic. The broader the scope of things they're asked to consider, the harder they find it to do so, and the less they care, sadly. But people have always been better at solving acute crises rather than preparing for eventuality :/

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VeganStartvegan 20+ years•

It's easy to see happen - we're shown the suffering of farm animals frequently, and given the impression we're 'helping' them...but it's the long view that really matters!

Yes, too much emergency response, not enough long-term preparation...

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