I've been saying this (and pissing people off) for years: if you eat a meat-based diet then deal's off - just shut your yap about being an enviromentalist. You do NOT need to eat meat. It's a choice, just like the car you drive or how many lights are on in your house.

Yeah, you'd piss me off too with that arrogant, self-righteous crap.

I think that the thing that most ardent advocates of vegetarianism/veganism for the environment's sake completely (and foolishly) ignore is that food is an intrinsic part of culture. If you're dedicated to doing everything that you can to reduce your impact on your environment, it's a great thing to completely switch over to tofu or tempura or algae or soylent green or whatever. Knock yourself out.

But what would we really be giving up with a large-scale switch over to a completely plant-based diet? Our recipes, the food we enjoy, is no less important to our cultures than language or any other tradition. I'm not one to defend the cheeseburger as a daily meal, but why cast stones at a family that enjoys a turkey at Thanksgiving? Why look down upon anyone that would want to enjoy BBQ chicken or roast duck from an old recipe handed down from one's grandmother? And why would anyone suggest that eating meat as part of a local diet would be any worse than eating a plant-based diet consisting of apples from New Zealand, strawberries from Chile, and other foods shipped in from across the world?

Furthermore, there are (pardon the pun) bigger fish to fry. Eliminating one plane trip that some household would take to Europe for vacation, for example, *completely* overpowers any change to diet. (About five tons per round trip!) Reducing our household electricity use in half? Same effect. And this is nothing when compared to the changes that could be made if many of our industrial (including agro-industrial) processes and commercial operations are fundamentally restructured.

So... change the structure of the underlying systems. Work to make things local and/or sustainable in food production. Try to make wise choices in food selection. Reduce waste. And yes, reduce meat consumption! (Who really needs to eat a large steak for every meal, anyway?) But looking down upon anyone because of their food choices? Idiotic. It's cutting your nose off to spite your face, and a demonstration of class-based environmental elitism at its worst. It alienates most of the people that are needed to actually make an effective change, without actually making a large change in environmental impacts.

And in the end, that kind of arrogance does *nothing* to save the planet.

This is the article I've been agitating for for months! Ever since http://www.liveearth.org sent out a "Go veg" admonition with a link to the PETA website, I have been on their case to explain further exactly what the hell they're talking about and what small things I can do, short of going completely vegan (which is NOT an option for my 3-year-old), to help the environment. For example, if I start substituting ground turkey for ground beef in some of my recipes, am I heading in the right direction? I've asked Liveearth, I've asked 11th Hour, I've asked "the Lantern" over at Slate--no one seemed to want to run this story. Were they afraid of PETA demonstrators showing up at their offices in chicken suits?

I actually read that UN/FAO report on livestock, which is easy enough to find on line, and ended up somewhat confused, but generally of the opinion that beef cattle is about the worst for the environment, among the various types of livestock. It noted that poultry consume grubs and insects that would otherwise be consuming your fruits and veggies (thus reducing the need for chemical pest control), and the fact that goats graze on things we can't eat, in areas where we can't grow anything else (like rocky hillsides). Also, livestock is a vital emergency food source for people in developing nations, particularly in years of crop failure. Earlier posters are correct that the underlying problem here is overpopulation.

I'm not so sure I would agree, based on my reading of the UN report, that dairy consumption is as bad as beef. The US dairy industry sounds like it has its act together more so than the beef industry, and has learned to breed cattle that are giving more milk for less feed (I met a woman at a Maryland county fair who said her cow was producing 16 gallons a day). I'd love to see a third world development program that involved sharing these superior breeds of dairy cattle with third world farmers who are currently raising less efficient breeds (and possibly razing the rain forest in order to do so).

I also still really don't understand where pork fits into the picture.

However, one thing we probably all *could* do relatively easily is reduce our beef consumption (which would be beneficial to our own health), and purchase our meats at farmer's markets from local producers who raise their livestock humanely and farm sustainably. The fact that these meats are usually considerably more expensive than at the supermarket is, in my mind, a good thing, since that provides us with a financial disincentive to doing what we should be doing anyway, which is making the consumption of beef a "special occasion" dish, not an everyday item.

I'm wary of the other letter writers hitting the claxon about over-population. Not mind you, that I have kids (I don't, nor do I want any), nor that I don't agree that over population is a serious issue. But I don't like the rhetoric, nor the insinuation that human beings are a "cancer". The reality is, across the developed world. birth rates ARE slowing down, that every country where the status of women is improved, that contraception and abortion rights are allowed, shows a marked decrease in children, and a marked increase in the quality of life for not only the parents but the children as well.

If you want to see population rates go down the single most effective way is to give control of reproduction back to those whom it should have never left; women. Get involved with your local Planned Parenthood, distribute condoms or literature about, and most importantly, don't tolerate misogyny and sexism in your day to day life. Is it any wonder that a country rife with serious issues of domestic abuse, rape, and income/job inequality is also the only one that isn't showing signs of declining birth rate.