[Nomaden]

I often read about global warming campaigns on the net, proposing that factory farming and meat industry in general contribute the most to global warming. Is that just a hype or should we really stop eating meat to help the environment?

[alygirl]

I don't think we should stop eating meat to help the environment I think we should start treating the animals like they were meant to be treated. For example having cows and chickens actually running around and grazing instead of cooped up in a cage their whole live.

[Bella]

I'm sure it makes its contribution to the problem just like any other commercial industry. I've been a vegetarian for a very long time and I never used to care what other people ate, but I find myself more and more wishing that our culture would stop looking to meat as the star of their meals.

[millie]

Well maybe this would be a good reason to go ahead and hunt our caps each season and process the animals ourselves and freeze the meats. I won't stop eating meat but we could have more dear and other critters.

[bryon]

I think it's all hype. If anything adds to the greenhouse effect in this case, it would be the industrialization of the whole farming operation. Not the fact that we eat red meat.

[millie]

Can we sue mother earth for the melting of the ice caps? Haha, I don't think we caused it but we do seem to be speeding it up. What about chem trails/geo-engineering. What do u think about that?

[tipsandtricks]

It is a simple energy pyramid issue. If you eat meat you are essentially allowing 10 times (as an approximation) as much carbon dioxide into the air as when you eat a vegetarian diet.

[Hyacinth]

Meat-eaters can certainly still be environmentally conscious. Many of the problems caused by modern agriculture are the result of the extreme concentration of animals - in other words, simply spreading livestock out over a suitably large area of land would eliminate much of the environmental damage caused by modern farming.

[cero]

I am not a huge meat eater to start with, mostly chicken more so than beef or anything else. A little seafood but that is about it. I wonder in say 20 years where we will be though?

[Meeva]

Originally Posted by bryon

I think it's all hype. If anything adds to the greenhouse effect in this case, it would be the industrialization of the whole farming operation. Not the fact that we eat red meat.

I agree with you to some extent. The problem is that to produce a pound of meat takes much more natural resources (water, gas, etc.) than to produce a pound of grains which can be directly consumed by humans.