usernamesAreTricky

joined 2 years ago
[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 week ago

Yes, though that doesn't mean it can't be stopped. That it can be reduced in some countries is a sign we can make progress on it

Much of the global growth is occurring in developing countries right now who often view increased meat consumption as a symbol of wealth and status (in part due to seeing it highly consumed in the west). Changing expectations and consumption in the west can have a ripple effect outward

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 9 points 1 week ago

To an extent, yes it would likely do that. Though on the other hand running into the maximum capacity limitations would not look pretty. Even countries that have a just bit higher grass-fed production than others have a fair number of issues (and still use plenty of supplemental grain)

For instance, in New Zealand, they use a massive amount of synthetic fertilizer on grasslands to try to make it keep up for dairy production

The large footprint for milk in Canterbury indicates just how far the capacity of the environment has been overshot. To maintain that level of production and have healthy water would require either 12 times more rainfall in the region or a 12-fold reduction in cows.

[…]

The “grass-fed” marketing line overlooks the huge amounts of fossil-fuel-derived fertiliser used to make the extra grass that supports New Zealand’s very high animal stock rates.

https://theconversation.com/11-000-litres-of-water-to-make-one-litre-of-milk-new-questions-about-the-freshwater-impact-of-nz-dairy-farming-183806

Or in the UK and Ireland where grass-fed production leads to deforestation and they still need additional grain on top of it

Most of the UK and Ireland’s grass-fed cows and sheep are on land that might otherwise be temperate rainforest – arable crops tend to prefer drier conditions. However, even if there were no livestock grazing in the rainforest zone – and these areas were threatened by other crops instead – livestock would still pose an indirect threat due to their huge land footprint

[…]

Furthermore, most British grass-fed cows are still fed crops on top of their staple grass

https://theconversation.com/livestock-grazing-is-preventing-the-return-of-rainforests-to-the-uk-and-ireland-198014

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 18 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

We should push for large institutional change, but don't ignore individual change either. Problem is how will you get said governments to act if people aren't also stepping up and they expect backlash to acting? The more people expect it to be cheap and highly consumed, the harder it will be for them to act. Moving people away from meat individually makes it easier. Movements that succeed usually have both individual and institutional change

Institutional change that is achievable at the current moment is smaller. There's been some success with things like changing the defaults to be plant-based (which is good and we should continuing to push for that), but cutting subsides is going to be an uphill battle until a larger number of people change their consumption patterns

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Beef production is falling in some countries. For instance in Germany

In 2011, Germans ate 138 pounds of meat each year. Today, it’s 121 pounds — a 12.3 percent decline. And much of that decline took place in the last few years, a time period when grocery sales of plant-based food nearly doubled.

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/23273338/germany-less-meat-plant-based-vegan-vegetarian-flexitarian

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 40 points 1 week ago (5 children)

Unfortunately grass-fed production is no solution. It both does not scale or help reduce emissions

We model a nationwide transition [in the US] from grain- to grass-finishing systems using demographics of present-day beef cattle. In order to produce the same quantity of beef as the present-day system, we find that a nationwide shift to exclusively grass-fed beef would require increasing the national cattle herd from 77 to 100 million cattle, an increase of 30%. We also find that the current pastureland grass resource can support only 27% of the current beef supply (27 million cattle), an amount 30% smaller than prior estimates

[…]

If beef consumption is not reduced and is instead satisfied by greater imports of grass-fed beef, a switch to purely grass-fed systems would likely result in higher environmental costs, including higher overall methane emissions. Thus, only reductions in beef consumption can guarantee reductions in the environmental impact of US food systems.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aad401

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 13 points 1 week ago

It's fundamentally inefficient. The claims of "green" meat production are greenwashing from the industry. The industry would love for you to believe there is a way that they could clean it up. It takes growing tons of crops just for most of that energy to be lost by the creatures moving around, digesting, etc.

Plant-based foods have a significantly smaller footprint on the environment than animal-based foods. Even the least sustainable vegetables and cereals cause less environmental harm than the lowest impact meat and dairy products [9].

https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/14/8/1614/html

Nor is something like grass-fed production a solution when that has even higher emissions due to higher rates of methane production from cows. It also is even higher land demand

We model a nationwide transition [in the US] from grain- to grass-finishing systems using demographics of present-day beef cattle. In order to produce the same quantity of beef as the present-day system, we find that a nationwide shift to exclusively grass-fed beef would require increasing the national cattle herd from 77 to 100 million cattle, an increase of 30%. We also find that the current pastureland grass resource can support only 27% of the current beef supply (27 million cattle), an amount 30% smaller than prior estimates

[…]

If beef consumption is not reduced and is instead satisfied by greater imports of grass-fed beef, a switch to purely grass-fed systems would likely result in higher environmental costs, including higher overall methane emissions. Thus, only reductions in beef consumption can guarantee reductions in the environmental impact of US food systems.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aad401

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 20 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

They really don't understand the structure of the poultry industry. The genetics are controlled by Tysons and Aviagen who breed around 90 to 99% of all chickens in the industry in the US (similarly high globally). Primarily the Cobb 500 and Ross 308 which are both fast growing. They do it this way because the industry wants their super fast growth at the expense of their health

Fast-growing chickens that make up almost all the industry are already known to be at a higher risk of illness and have a worse immune system. They have all kinds of other health issues from difficulty walking to hock burns

The methods of mass killing on disease detection are also quite cruel too I should add, but this administration don't seem to be too concerned about that. Look up ventilation shutdown and foam depopulation if you want more info on that

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 week ago

The damage can still be reduced. It's not binary even if we're not in great shape. Every 0.1C matters. Our policy decisions still matter. Just because we're likely to miss earlier targets doesn't mean there isn't a difference between something like 2.2C and 3C

This whole sentiment that "it's over" is one large emitters actively promote to try to stop people from acting. Don't play into their hands. Doomerism is wielded as a tool to demobilize people. Powerful people want you not to act for a reason - because they fear we can still make progress

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 168 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (7 children)

Current trajectory estimates are more like +2.5C to +3C by 2100 based on existing policy. We've actually managed to move the trajectory downward even though we obviously have a lot to go. Every little bit counts. It is far less binary than this overly simplistic tweet is suggesting

Excessive claims like this end up demotivating people and make them want to give up when we can reduce the damage each time we move our trajectory down by 0.1C

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 4 points 2 weeks ago

If the filibuster is removed, it is also possible to get through with 50+VP as tie breaker or 51. The filibuster being removed is not as unlikely as you may think since Republicans right now are getting closer and closer towards defacto removing the filibuster. There currently are narrow ways around the filibuster (reconsideration is one big one) that are supposed to have a bunch of limitations, but they are testing the waters in ignoring violations of those limitations. The senate parliamentarian is the one who makes rulings about if something violates their clauses, but their opinion can be ignored by a strict majority via the "nuclear option"

A month ago, Republicans used the nuclear option to ignore the senate parliamentarian ruling that the Congressional Review Act would not allow them to skip the filibuster to remove California's EPA waivers (see here).

As I write this Republicans are currently trying to play another different a different trick about some of the stuff in the Big Beautiful Bill. Dems have been challenging a bunch of provisions and getting the parliamentarian to most of the time rule they are in violation of the Byrd rule. But they are also trying to challenge the whole bill as violating the Byrd rule's limit that a bill passed via reconsecration cannot increase the deficit over a ten-year period. Republicans are playing an accounting trick to claim it doesn't. They know the parliamentarian is unlikely to agree with them, so they are currently trying to prevent dems from even being able to ask the parliamentarian about it

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 18 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Yep, and even larger can be overcome too. If you look AOC's 2018 primary upset, she was outspent by over 10x

Insane outspending can be overcome. Obviously it makes the fight harder, but money is not everything

[–] usernamesAreTricky@lemmy.ml 46 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

Because they massively outspent Zohran in the primary and still lost. Vote because you can still overcome this. They want us to give up and think we can't. Don't do their dirty work for them

 

If U.S. Border Patrol plans to carry out any more operations in Central California like the Kern County raid in January, it will be barred from making any arrests unless they have a warrant or suspect a person might flee before they obtain one, a federal judge ruled Tuesday.

 

The USDA’s Food & Safety Inspection Service found that 20 percent of the samples under this label tested positive for antibiotics, raising questions about how widespread mislabeling is in the U.S. commercial beef supply. These findings were announced last August, but the names of the companies which tested positive for antibiotics were not made publicly available until recently

[...]

“This strongly suggests that the US antibiotic-free beef supply is deeply contaminated and deeply deceptive to American consumers,” Andrew deCoriolis, the executive director of Farm Forward tells Sentient.

[....]

It’s been estimated that 70 percent of medically-important antibiotics sold in the U.S. — those used to treat human infections — are used to produce meat, dairy and other animal-sourced products

[...]

The World Health Organization calls antimicrobial resistance “one of the top global public health and development threats,” responsible for millions of deaths every year. The problem is only going to get worse, according to public health experts. The misuse and overuse of antibiotics — both in humans and farm animals (who often receive the same antibiotics) — leads bacteria to develop more resistant genes that then fail to respond to the medically necessary use of these drugs

 

Call your house reps & senators and tell them to vote against any attempt to repeal prop 12

 

On day 1 of the 2nd term, Trump signed an executive order that asked for a report due 90 days in on additional actions on the southern border. It specifically asked them to write if they thought the Insurrection Act should be invoked.

They aren't going to recommend invoking it. If you heard people concerned about April 20th, this was the report they were talking about

Keep the pressure up. They're starting to feel the pushback. Join the nationwide protests tomorrow April 19th

 

Note: Holds don't block confirmation, they just make it take way more floor time which slows it down a lot. Without republican votes, they can't be blocked just made more painful to do

 

TLDR: Mike Johnson hates proxy voting in congress. Some republican wanted to allow new parents to be able to use proxy voting. One of them is trying to force a vote on it

Mike Johnson tried changing the rules to not allow that, but 9 republicans joined dems to block his attempt. He's pissed about it and canceling tons of votes because of it

 

Note this is not an indefinite block, just a pain for Republicans. They can't permanently block anything without republican votes, but they can at least drag it out

Senators have the power to invoke a hold on a presidential nominee, a maneuver that can slow or stall consideration of a nominee for days or weeks. Precious Senate floor time is often needed to overcome holds on presidential nominees.

Hopping we see more of this following Booker's 25hr filibuster

 

Musk poured a ton of money, time, and energy into this race

In particular, the race was seen as a test of Musk’s political sway, as his super PAC, America PAC, alone spent more than $12 million to support Schimel. He also traveled to Wisconsin the Sunday before the election, where he handed out $1 million checks to voters who had signed his petition against “activist judges.”

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