The humane hoax

[andyswarbs]

In this Vegetarian Society of Hawaii talk Hope Bohanec goes through the concept of humanity in using animals for food. youtube.com/watch?v=NVLNebG...(Not working as expected?)

One comment that I picked up on was that organic animals are often not given even needed medication in order to preserve their organic status and thus premium price. She goes into the subject of "local" foods, how "organic" can be worse for the planet, how a true "free range" might need 5 planet earths to cope with the existing animals, whether fish feel pain and of course much more.

[TheAwfulToad]

So I watched the whole video this time, because I do take an interest in this sort of thing. It helps me figure out certain issues that directly affect the way I grow food. The main issue, depressingly, is wilful ignorance.

She's correct - mostly - about animal mistreatment, and the "Organic" scam. What she describes is absolutely real, although she has picked the worst of the worst to make her point.

Bear in mind that the USA is a bit of an outlier in that the word "Organic" has been co-opted by the USDA, ie., an organisation whose primary purpose is (a) to make Americans fat and ill and (b) to ruin the nation's farmland. That probably isn't in their mission statement, but it's the net effect of their operations. They loathe genuine working-with-nature farmers, and the rules for Organic certification are designed to make true sustainable agriculture all but impossible. A few brave souls are doing it, but it's a Sisyphean task.

Nevertheless, things that are labelled organic, free-range, etc etc are mostly from conventional farms just using a more limited range of chemicals. Same old same old. This is not a sensible farming model. But, again, they're often forced to do things that way by the Law.

Unfortunately Bohanec then goes off on wild flights of fancy in order to justify her belief that there is no such thing as humane meat, not even in theory.

1) "Speciesism" makes me roll my eyes. A chicken is not a cow is not an earthworm is not a human. The idea springs from the same arrogance that drives factory-farming: that we humans can mould nature to be whatever we've decided it should be, in this case that animals should be fluffy, anthropomorphized symbols of innocence onto which we can project our psychological insecurities about death.

2) "We would need five earths to sustain this animal population". Oh please. First, where does she think the foodstuffs come from to sustain those half-acre intensive chicken operations? A chicken eats what a chicken eats, and it has to be grown somewhere. Factor in all the supporting activity, which runs on fossil fuel, and you've got a pretty inefficient operation there.

We can do a rough napkin calculation. We currently have 13 billion hectares under cultivation, globally. Say 1.5ha per person. Well, the annual output of 1.5ha (sustainably managed), varies from 5-80 tonnes of biomass per annum, depending on latitude, rainfall, and plant selection. Let's be conservative: say 10t/ha on average. Of that, 80% is useless to humans: it can be eaten only by microbes, fungi, ruminants, or other animals with specialised digestion. 4000kg is compost. 2000kg is vegetables, or enough for 5-10 people. Another 4000kg, if eaten by (say) pigs, would support 10 animals yielding 600kg of meat per year. The average American currently eats 100kg of meat per year ... so, again, there's enough meat for 5-10 people. It doesn't really matter how complex you make the model; you can introduce cows or chickens, it turns out about the same (although diversity is better). Without any land conversion, we can feed 8 billion people quite comfortably, with animals on pasture, and no stupid "scientific" farming methods.

3) You could not run 13 billion hectares of farmland without harming animals. If you're a vegan, and you eat rice, you are directly responsible for avian deaths in the same direct manner as someone who eats chickens. Most rice is grown with a vast load of pesticides, herbicides, and molluscicides, several of which are toxic to birds. Birds like to eat rice, and they die. In fact the only reason birds don't destroy entire rice crops is that their populations have been decimated by pesticides. If you're a vegan, you're part of the ongoing "silent spring". There are endless examples of this sort of thing, but I won't belabour the point.

When I have time, I'll post a video of farmers doing it properly. I know that won't convince any vegans, but I think it's important to reassure the meat-eaters that there IS such a thing as humane meat. Unfortunately, the farmers I will refer to are occasionally prosecuted or harassed by governments for not toeing the line, and that's a terrible thing.