Vegan

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I found these paragraphs, about killing invasive rats on small islands to protect local seabirds, particularly thought-provoking:

For my own part, I wish the killing of those rats and mice were at least accompanied by a sense of what environmental ethicist Chelsea Batavia and ecologist Arian Wallach, a prominent compassionate conservationist who was Lundgren’s Ph.D. adviser, called “the moral residue of conservation.” It’s not the rodents’ fault that humans so heedlessly moved their ancestors around the globe; their appetite for seabird chicks would, if expressed by an acceptably native animal, be treated as an inevitable part of nature. To kill them, even for noble purposes, is to take innocent lives. “Conservationists should be emotionally responsive to the ethical terrain they traverse,” argued Batavia and Wallach in the journal Conservation Biology. “Feelings of grief are commensurate with acts of harm. Apathy or indifference is not.”

In all my years of reading and writing about the killing of invasive species, I’ve yet to encounter an expression of grief. To Batavia and Wallach, this is troubling because those feelings “act as tethers to abiding notions of what is good and of value in the world.” To turn them off—­Lundgren recalled a colleague who cried after euthanizing a native bird with a broken wing but killed nonnative birds with barely a change in expression—­risks harming something important in ourselves. Callousness can only be maintained at the cost of compassion.

Lundgren agreed with this. A casual attitude toward killing introduced species, he added, also made it easy to avoid less tractable but equally important problems, such as the overfishing that is now starving many seabirds. Moreover, even on islands, the impacts of nonnative species could be nuanced: An analysis of 300 Mediterranean islands containing both seabirds and invasive rats found that rats limited the abundance of only one seabird species, something the researchers called “an amazing conservation paradox.”

“We don’t give any credit to evolution,” Lundgren said. Perhaps, over time, newly introduced and long-­native species would surprise us with their ability to coexist. Perhaps in many places they already were coexisting—­but the ease of killing so-­called invasives, and the habits of mind that reinforced, made it hard to see. I fell asleep to such thoughts beneath a starscape that, in the dry desert air and the absence of human habitation for miles in every direction, was as clear as any I’d ever seen.

Plant-based proteins produce, on average, 70 times less greenhouse gas emissions than an equivalent amount of beef, and use more than 150 times less land [1], making them a significantly more climate friendly choice. [...] The benefits of a transition to a plant-based food system are not only environmental, with research from The Vegan Society earlier this year finding that every one million people who switch to a vegan diet would generate an estimated £121 million of health care cost savings [2].

The society’s manifesto asks policy makers to follow the lead of countries such as Denmark and South Korea, who are taking advantage of the opportunities presented by plant-based diets with clear plans to boost the plant-based industry and begin the transition away from animal agriculture.

In order for the UK to follow suit, the manifesto outlines clear steps that the future government can take to support a plant-based transition. These steps include recognising the need to promote plant-based diets and food as crucial to meet net zero targets, supporting animal farmers in a transition to plant-based crop farming and setting a target to reduce meat and dairy consumption by 70% by 2030.

We’ve seen lots of progress towards plant-based alternatives and the United Kingdom is well placed to lead the world in the growth of the plant-based food and drink sector. More people than ever are open to changing their diets, but we need change on a bigger scale, so there is an urgent need for political leadership on this issue.”

I got some bloodwork done recently and in the words of my physician my results were great. This news has put me in a good, affirming, and reflective mood about the journey so far.

Going vegan seemed like a big deal at first, when I considered it before taking the plunge (I was already vegetarian) and afterwards when learning to socialize around food with non-vegans, but after a couple years it's just become what I do. And it's not a big deal to me that my diet isn't the norm. I do live in a big cosmopolitan city, which definitely makes being vegan easier.

It took me a couple years before I clued into supplementing. PSA: If you're vegan, you should take a B12 supplement of some form. Supplementing other things isn't as important.

Just about my only frustration is the greater cost of prepared goods and sweets, which I privately dub the ‘vegan tax’ lol. Vegan donuts or ice cream are twice or thrice the price of their equivalents. That kind of thing. It add ups if you have a sweet tooth like me :P, although maybe the added financial cost has some health-related benefits related to number of donuts consumed per year, etc.

I've never thought about going back, as in eating animal products again. I do do a couple non-vegan things for cost reasons at the moment, like I buy jeans from Winners that have the leather patches on the rear that jeans are seemingly are obligated to bear. My cosmetics and bathroom products are probably not all vegan, although many are. I recently learned that my water-based sexual lubricant probably isn't vegan due to glycerin. That's a new frontier of learning for me :)

In the last couple years I’ve started only using the term vegan with other vegans, as a shorthand, or when I want to refer to the underlying philosophy. In everyday conversation I use "plant-based", as I don't want non-vegans to feel judged, because I think many feel judged simply by hearing the word regardless of my intent, and I ultimately think their feeling judged is counterproductive.

I think going vegan changed me a little in ways I didn't expect, like it generally made me a more critical thinking, conscientious, and compassionate person over time. If I could have cloned myself before I went vegan and compared two versions of me - with and without being vegan the last 8 years – I think the vegan me would score higher on a measure of anti-racism or anti-ableism or egalitarianism, know more about greenwashing, and be more critical of the effects of capitalism – just as examples. That’s just a guess. And I might be confusing cause and effect. As I understand it now, veganism is more central to my identity and worldview than practically anything.

To celebrate my veganniversary I think I might try to make my first vegan pizza! I’ve had delicious vegan pizzas before with vegan cheese, nooch, slices of potato, and pesto as a base versus tomato sauce. Other toppings as well, but I highlight those as I think they combine cheesiness, creaminess, and saltiness to approximate traditional pizza cheesiness quite desirably. Time for me to try making it on my own!

Thanks for listening to my rambles. Feel free to chime in with your own!

In short, this is a proposal for an abolition of compulsory work for all beings. It involves rewilding at least 75% of the Earth with guidance from local and Indigenous communities, and ensuring that the remainder of the planet “abolish[es] the wage system, and live[s] in harmony with the Earth” as proposed by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) (2021).

From "Hey Beatnik! This is The Farm Book" - a visitor's guide from a commune in Tennessee in the 70s.

cross-posted from: https://lemmus.org/post/6039150

Sarah's Scribbles by Sarah Andersen, June 29 2024.

If anyone has a better idea for a title, this one’s a little iffy…

I found a new yogurt flavor (alpro lemon-lime) that tastes just like key lime pie to me. I’d like to make it into an actual pie, but it’s a bit too runny.

I’d prefer to avoid cooking the yogurt, so I figured corn starch, flour, and tapioca would all be out. I could do chia seeds, but I don’t necessarily want that texture.

Any ideas?

I live in a vast rural area in the central valley of California. Here, people are fanatical carnivores. There is very little vegan food and I live very far from where most of it is available and don't drive for many reasons many of them environmental. Getting there would require riding a bike in the heat most of the year and people here hate bicyclists. Delivery like doordash is really expensive and only the same two dashers will take my vegan order I've noticed.

Has anyone found any useful tips for this basic kind of situation that I'm driving at?

In this episode we film more habitat destruction in South Texas, this time for the purposes of grazing cattle in a desert.

Echinocereus enneacanthus, Coryphantha macromeris runyonii, Ancistrocactus scheeri and others are prevented from being destroyed in this act of senseless bulldozing. Ecotourism possibilities abound here due to the presence of numerous rare birds and cactus species and an abundance of winter texans that would happily pay to see and protect this land, but ranching and cattle are the convention here, and human beings rarely break with convention unless forced to by unforeseen circumstances which are sure to arrrive to the region, eventually.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/16526178

Scientists and environmental organizations around the world urge a shift toward plant-based foods as one of the most impactful actions we can take to reduce climate destruction and improve our health.

That’s why we created the Climate-Friendly Food Guide to provide more details, recipes, tips, and resources.

There's a PDF version there too.

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Via Reddit

Sounds like a cool new Lemmy instance.