Bye bye MEAT! How will the post-meat future look?
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littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
The act of AI doesn't cause the cows much distress, does it? Bit of discomfort, perhaps, and maybe not even that.
There are plenty of practices to object to in livestock farming. This isn't one of them.
Funky_monks
Neo-Rustic
Youd have to light it for her, but then, I suppose that is the gentlemanly thing to do.Cigarette and a cuddle it is, then.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Funky_monks
Neo-Rustic
He will put his hand up the cows bum to find the cervix by pressing down - he then knows where to place the AI rod (vaginally) to inseminate correctly.
I'm sure if the cow objected to him putting his hand up her bum, shed have moved (which was kind of the point of me posting the video). It'd be hard forcibly impregnating a creature weighing a ton if it didn't want to be.
WouldBe
Dislicksick
WouldBe
Dislicksick
Just shows how clueless some people are. Your problem is you are anthropomorthising the animals. The objective of most living things is to reproduce. You must have heard that rabbits breed like er rabbits?
When a female dog is in heat it will quite happily let all other dogs shag it. Why do you think it would be different for cows, sheep, pigs or any other farm animal?
As an anus is as stretchy as a vagina why do you think that a hand up a cows arse, that is way smaller than a calf, would be any problem for a cow?
And why would an AI device that is a lot smaller still be a problem in a cows vagina?
Some people really need to learn a lot more about animals.
Funky_monks
Neo-Rustic
Just shows how clueless some people are. Your problem is you are anthropomorthising the animals. The objective of most living things is to reproduce. You must have heard that rabbits breed like er rabbits?
When a female dog is in heat it will quite happily let all other dogs shag it. Why do you think it would be different for cows, sheep, pigs or any other farm animal?
As an anus is as stretchy as a vagina why do you think that a hand up a cows arse, that is way smaller than a calf, would be any problem for a cow?
And why would an AI device that is a lot smaller still be a problem in a cows vagina?
Some people really need to learn a lot more about animals.
Exactly, animals that aren't in heat don't stand still to allow themselves to be mounted.
So what object smaller than a baby would you like up your stretchy anus tonight?Just shows how clueless some people are. Your problem is you are anthropomorthising the animals. The objective of most living things is to reproduce. You must have heard that rabbits breed like er rabbits?
When a female dog is in heat it will quite happily let all other dogs shag it. Why do you think it would be different for cows, sheep, pigs or any other farm animal?
As an anus is as stretchy as a vagina why do you think that a hand up a cows arse, that is way smaller than a calf, would be any problem for a cow?
And why would an AI device that is a lot smaller still be a problem in a cows vagina?
Some people really need to learn a lot more about animals.
Funky_monks
Neo-Rustic
Given that it's only cows that are AI'd like that (pigs is a different technique, the catheter "locks" into the sow's cervix by twisting because the tip is corkscrew shaped like a boars penis) and sheep are not routinely AI'd, I'd say the anus doesn't stretch very much because it's reasonably easy to get your arm in there and the cow shows no sign of discomfort.
Cows are quite capable of kicking you if they want to.
Cows are quite capable of kicking you if they want to.
8ball
Decolonise colons!
I guess that corkscrew business means a lot of gyration.
Funky_monks
Neo-Rustic
They can spin the tip, yes - I used to work on a boar stud where semen is collected for AI.
It's done by hand, incidentally (the collection).
WouldBe
Dislicksick
Being gay I can think of lots.
editor
hiraethified
Yet more evidence stacks up of the damage caused to the environment by the meat and dairy industry:
www.theguardian.com
Methane emissions from 15 meat and dairy companies rival those of the EU
Combined emissions from 15 companies equate to more than 80% of EU’s entire methane footprint, study finds
Funky_monks
Neo-Rustic
Methane emitting animals in "emitting methane" shocker.
If we stopped farming cattle and sheep tomorrow, ruminants would still exist.
Indeed, rewilding projects are starting to bring in bison to balance ecosystems - guess what? These are also ruminants.
Wherever you have grasslands and woodlands you are going to have ruminants.
Some ruminants:
Cows
Sheep
Goats
Deer
Bison
Moose
Elk
Buffalo
Giraffes
Camelids are pseudo ruminants, so will still emit methane.
The methane issue is far more complex than that.
Here's an article that talks about the complexities of methane - Methane facts and information
Those articles are very interestingly worded - yes, the cattle companies emit more methane, but almost worded to suggest they emit more overall - enteric methane makes up a small amount of overall GHG emissions.
If we stopped farming cattle and sheep tomorrow, ruminants would still exist.
Indeed, rewilding projects are starting to bring in bison to balance ecosystems - guess what? These are also ruminants.
Wherever you have grasslands and woodlands you are going to have ruminants.
Some ruminants:
Cows
Sheep
Goats
Deer
Bison
Moose
Elk
Buffalo
Giraffes
Camelids are pseudo ruminants, so will still emit methane.
The methane issue is far more complex than that.
Here's an article that talks about the complexities of methane - Methane facts and information
Those articles are very interestingly worded - yes, the cattle companies emit more methane, but almost worded to suggest they emit more overall - enteric methane makes up a small amount of overall GHG emissions.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
The key measure is the change from before, isn't it? So the problem with burning fossil fuels is that you're releasing new CO2 into the atmosphere, carbon that's been locked away for millions of years, rather than just cycling current carbon as you do when, eg, growing then burning trees.
It is clearly significant that methane levels have gone up so much in the last couple of hundred years, and there's little doubt that we're responsible for most if not all of that increase. But the various contributors may not all be equal in terms of new emissions.
One figure I'd want to know is what proportion of the 40% of human-activity-related methane emission that is attributed to livestock is actually new emission rather than replacing the ruminants that came before. Similarly, how much of the paddy field emission is 'new'? And finally, of course, emissions from oil and gas drilling may only make up 20% of the human-related budget but presumably all of that is 'new'.
What level of emission reduction by humans would take us back to where we were at different points in the past? And which bits of current emissions are easiest to mitigate? Clearly mitigating the effects of rice and meat is hard without changing the demand for rice and meat, but mitigating that 20% from fossil fuel drilling should be the easy bit - it's something we need to stop doing anyway.
It is clearly significant that methane levels have gone up so much in the last couple of hundred years, and there's little doubt that we're responsible for most if not all of that increase. But the various contributors may not all be equal in terms of new emissions.
One figure I'd want to know is what proportion of the 40% of human-activity-related methane emission that is attributed to livestock is actually new emission rather than replacing the ruminants that came before. Similarly, how much of the paddy field emission is 'new'? And finally, of course, emissions from oil and gas drilling may only make up 20% of the human-related budget but presumably all of that is 'new'.
What level of emission reduction by humans would take us back to where we were at different points in the past? And which bits of current emissions are easiest to mitigate? Clearly mitigating the effects of rice and meat is hard without changing the demand for rice and meat, but mitigating that 20% from fossil fuel drilling should be the easy bit - it's something we need to stop doing anyway.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
To add to the above, there also needs to be a sensible discussion about which bits of ruminant farming it is realistic to demand to be changed. US-style intensive feedlot farming is an easy target, while at the other extreme would be the Maasai in East Africa - I would hope nobody would be so crass as to suggest that they are part of the problem.
In between those two extremes would be somewhere like India, which is the world's biggest producer and consumer of dairy. In the case of India, one of the reasons so much dairy is consumed is that hundreds of millions of people there are lacto-vegetarians. Again, considered against a broader background, it's not obvious that the lacto-vegetarians of India should be held responsible for global warming and ordered to change their ways, ways that in many cases are rooted in thousands of years of tradition. (In many parts of India, as in East Africa and Europe, there is a very high incidence of the gene for lifelong lactose-tolerance - it's been selected independently wherever dairy consumption has become a part of the culture.)
This is the weakest point of the the simplistic solutions of the likes of Monbiot. They fail to consider the world as it actually is and the cultures and ways of life of the people in it. People like Monbiot must sound like voices from an alien planet to a Maasai cow herder or an Indian dairy farmer.
In between those two extremes would be somewhere like India, which is the world's biggest producer and consumer of dairy. In the case of India, one of the reasons so much dairy is consumed is that hundreds of millions of people there are lacto-vegetarians. Again, considered against a broader background, it's not obvious that the lacto-vegetarians of India should be held responsible for global warming and ordered to change their ways, ways that in many cases are rooted in thousands of years of tradition. (In many parts of India, as in East Africa and Europe, there is a very high incidence of the gene for lifelong lactose-tolerance - it's been selected independently wherever dairy consumption has become a part of the culture.)
This is the weakest point of the the simplistic solutions of the likes of Monbiot. They fail to consider the world as it actually is and the cultures and ways of life of the people in it. People like Monbiot must sound like voices from an alien planet to a Maasai cow herder or an Indian dairy farmer.
Funky_monks
Neo-Rustic
Well, quite - they estimate that 40 million bison in the USA alone were killed in the 19th century, so much so that it caused a mini ice age.
Add to that the decline of the European bison, buffaloes Giraffes etc on the African savannah.
Ruminants, grasslands and rumination have been on the earth for millions of years.
Farming less ruminants would only be significant if they were not then replaced by wild ruminants, and we have no idea what the impact on grassland ecosystems would be.
It's a good way to distract ourselves from fossil fuels though I guess.
Funky_monks
Neo-Rustic
It's colonialism - imagined wildernesses by urban, wealthy northern Europeans/North Americans, completely ignoring rural populations, rendering them "unnatural" in their native landscape.
The intellectual groundwork is being laid here too, for a new Highland clearances for massive "carbon offset" tree planting excercises.
Once a year I lose myself in the Hebrides to walk and think – before going back to the life I love
Look at the language here - how many times the author only considers himself and how the inhabitants of the Western Isles are completely airbrushed from the landscape. Reading it, you'd think nobody lived there.
Karl Masks
Birds Angel Delight
The problem with this is that it doesn't really tell us anything.Yet more evidence stacks up of the damage caused to the environment by the meat and dairy industry:
Methane emissions from 15 meat and dairy companies rival those of the EU
Combined emissions from 15 companies equate to more than 80% of EU’s entire methane footprint, study finds
It sounds shocking: some corporate titans emit more than some countries. But what does that actually mean in real terms?
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
This is my concern. The extraction and burning of fossil fuels is the major issue here. It is more important than everything else put together, but you wouldn't guess that sometimes. Fundamentally, this is the 'new' greenhouse gas contribution that has driven the changes in the planet's climate.
Using the US as the exemplar of how the rich world needs to change its ways, their own government's figures make it crystal clear what the problem is.
Where greenhouse gases come from - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)
Without wishing to sound like I'm in denial about methane, it is clear that there is an additional agenda among many who are currently jumping on it as a major problem. Overwhelmingly, these are people who want to see livestock farming ended for other reasons. I'd rather they were honest about that and stuck to the real reason they want it ended, which has nothing to do with greenhouse gases.
editor
hiraethified
It means people should eat fewer meat and dairy products and factory farming should be ended.
You did read the article, yes?
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
tbf I don't have such a problem with city-types talking like that. Living in a city, I also appreciate the idea of 'getting away'. When I was a kid, I used to take myself away to places where I couldn't see any person or building. Of course I was still inside a landscape shaped by human activity, but I had a need to feel that I was away from it somehow.
But yes, in doing that we need to acknowledge what we're doing, that it's a romantic and largely false idea, and that we city-types are not the whole world.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Which people?
editor
hiraethified
As many people as practically possible.
Karl Masks
Birds Angel Delight
Yes it provided no information.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Indian lacto-vegetarians not so much, then. Dairy is a very important part of their diet, not to mention their culture.
I agree strongly with Funky Monks on this particular point - any one-size-fits-all pronouncement is going to sound an awful lot like neocolonialism. Cos that's what it is. And worse than that, it is a list of demands on those who are not the problem from those who are the problem. Why the fuck should poor Indians change their diets because the rich world has failed to address its addiction to fossil fuels?
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