George Monbiot on veganism vs. meat eating (again)

[Second Summer]

[...]Once, after I had been unnecessarily rude about vegans and their state of health (prompted no doubt by my own failure), I was invited to test my views in an unconventional debate with a vegan cage fighter. It was a kind invitation, but unfortunately I had a subsequent engagement.

In 2010, after reading a fascinating book by Simon Fairlie, a fair part of which was devoted to attacking my views, I wrote a column in which I maintained that I'd been wrong to claim that veganism is the only ethical response to what is arguably the world's most urgent social justice issue. Diverting to livestock grain that could have fed human beings, I'd argued, is grotesque when 800 million go hungry.

Fairlie does not dispute this, and provides plenty of examples of the madness of the current livestock production system. But he points out that plenty of meat can be produced from feed that humans cannot eat, by sustaining pigs on waste and grazing cattle and sheep where crops can't grow. I was swayed by his argument. But now I find myself becoming unswayed. In the spirit of unceasing self-flagellation I think I might have been wrong about being wrong.
[...]

Full article: Why I'm eating my words on veganism – again (by George Monbiot, theguardian.com, 27. Nov. 2013)

An interesting read - good to see that Monbiot is coming to his senses again.

 

[Nightshade]

Too bad he couldn't be bothered to actually research the issues he was on about before he posted any of his original opinions. He sounds like a terrible journalist...he didn't research veganism very thoroughly so, when he attempted a vegan diet, he apparently did it all wrong and then blamed the diet for his failure. He didn't research livestock production until he was writing a book and subsequently discovered that the happy cow myth was just that but, in the meantime, he had climbed onto his pro-meat soapbox and gave the livestock industry enough ammunition to keep on torturing hundreds of thousands of innocent animals. And he didn't do his homework on why the megafarm industries would never be bothered to sterilize waste since it's cheaper and easier for them to just let people starve. Yeah...someone give this moron an ICFJ award.

 

[Trinity]

I find some of Monbiots stuff really interesting, so it is indeed great to see that he's seeing the subject of being vegan more clearly...
Thanks for sharing.

 

[prioritarian]

It does seem like acceptance of the need for a more vegan diet is increasing. Even Pollan said nice things about fake meat recently.