Beyond Meat: Scaling ethical consumerism
4thquadrant.io
4thquadrant.io
Now, perhaps they mean that they productize something which is unachievable by most people at home (few would attempt to make homemade beyondmeat protein for food) and so they are facilitating the consumption of something that otherwise would not get consumed...
Ethical excess clothes, unneeded cosmetics, frivolous throwaway home items, etc., yes sure, I’m sure there are ethical alternatives just as there are “organic” poisons too.
A possible key alternative source of proteins I don’t think merits the label/adjective “consumerist”
That said, mc32, with regards to food and consumption as you’ve put it, and in this specific context-I wonder if “post-consumerism” is a turn of phrase that you would consider apt? Rather than being against the machinations of excess known to be associated with industrial meat production, it seems to be moved beyond, and dispassionate towards “fixing” these machinations in favor of entirely different ethical choices.
Curious to hear your thoughts.
I’m against calling something that’s basic to human sustenance “consumerist”. We might disagree with peoples choices of food or the source of those foods or whether it’s a small farmer or BigAg.
I remain opposed to calling basic foods (contrasted with luxury foods) part of consumerism. Meats and such have been part of human nutrition for quite some time. Unlike clothing (and other things) you don’t typically buy unnecessary excess for the sake of it or to fulfill some non essential need that’s already been met.
As I admit we can reproach people for unwise choices in food but I can’t consider it consumerism (I would allow some narrow exceptions).
However, I think the "meat is bad" sentiment bandied about by this article and Beyond Meat is painfully reductive. It's great for their marketing... for now, at least... but it is also a very divisive statement that will probably end up creating as much opposition as support.
Can't we just let both options exist? Margarine doesn't need a "butter is bad" campaign to stay relevant.
In my experience, most people put a relatively high value on life (especially human), but not an infinite one. Most societies agree that human life must be highly valued; however, I think you will find that many people do not value the lives of livestock so highly. For many, even human life can be traded for something of great enough value. Ultimately, the value of a life is a matter of opinion.
I'm not trying to challenge your opinion here. I just want to remind you that not everyone shares that opinion, and you'll have to convince them before you can use it as justification for declaring "meat is bad".
They are likely to be much healthier than meat (barring some real fun CRISPR gymnastics).
They can taste however you'd want them to taste. Think, Captain America 5 burgers, exclusively at Burger King. It'll taste like the best beefiest burger more so than real beef can. Sauces can help, but the underlying burger still has to hold up.
They're likely to be much cheaper as patents expire and 'store brand' burgers get out there. The competition will drive the price to near the cost of the ingredients, which I think are much cheaper than feeding the animal the ingredients for a few years and then eating the animal.
They're more resilient to shocks in the supply chain compared to animals (mad cow, hurricanes, climate change, etc).
They have a much broader market base than animals due to ethical and religious restrictions.
Barring some medical report that says they give you super-cancer, I think the product is just better suited to the marketplace.
As for the physics of a good burger, a lot of that comes from animal fat, blood, sinew, firm and tender tissues. There are some plant based options that are attempting to replicate the blood component, and ground meat is certaintly a more forgiving medium as far as texture.
Even with the existing meatless market, however, the economics are a tough bet for a lot of people. I tried out a vegan clone of In n out that opened in the neighborhood. At $12, it's 3x the price of a double double, and patty was ok but mostly just tasted like something deep fried. The real sting, and this goes for most vegan and vegetarian food I eat beyond ethnic food, $12 left me feeling hungry. The portions, the taste, and the price all combine into this perfect storm that puts off a lot of meat-eating consumers from taking up vegetarian food more regularly.
To produce it's purported benefits, Beyond Meat needs to adopt the Coca-Cola / Mcdonalds approach - license the tech / brand to local franchisees for local expansion and utilize the local agri sector for raw materials.
Um ok. People who subscribe to this theory can calculate the proper offset and donate to their cause of choice or, you know, moderate their food consumption to adequately reflect their opinions on food production.
I know that there's no way I would want to pay for the ecological effects caused by my lifestyle choices for example. A tax doesn't give me the option to not pay.
My experience for veg/ans matches the article. Substitutes like Beyond Meat and Impossible Burger are almost always a novelty or treat - something you would order out at an omni restaurant, or maybe bring to a cookout where meat eaters were also grilling. It's nice to have as an option but we're used to building our meals around staples like tofu, beans, tempeh, seitan etc.
I hear way more about these newer processed products from meat eaters who think this is what we would eat regularly, or are excited to try them out themselves. After the recent meat shortages and the million pandemic articles about "how to cook beans" I am convinced the actual target market is meat eaters who are looking to build meals around something as close to meat as possible, rather than people who are plant based.
I applaud you for taking the slow, steady and sustainable route. More people need to realize it's not "all or nothing"
> Importantly it should be noted that 93% of Beyond Meat’s consumers are in actual fact meat–eaters, not vegetarian or vegans as popularly perceived.
From their website:
> We hope our plant-based meats allow you and your family to eat more, not less,of the traditional dishes you love, while feeling great about the health, sustainability, and animal welfare benefits of plant protein.
Doesn't sound like their value proposition is really built around vegetrains/vegans at all.
you are right - it's not. They care about convincing people to eat less meat because that's where the greatest impact is. Veg's already don't eat meat - this is just a beneficial option that they can choose.
But, I Am Not A Capitalist, so... maybe they'll manage to entrench themselves thru brand recognition or supply chain monopolies.
tl;dr:
* It's potentially safer than meat during the pandemic
* I support any advancements that may enable humanity to phase out killing animals over the long term, such as clean meat (lab-grown meat) and plant-based meat
* It's one of a very small number of high-quality (high-PDCAAS and low-carbohydrate) protein sources that I'm aware of
* Enjoyment-wise, it's a close enough substitute for my taste
* I'm somewhat concerned about it being a heavily processed food as well as reportedly having its pea protein isolate sourced from China, and I wish they would reduce (or eliminate) the canola oil in favor of more coconut oil, but afaict there's nothing obviously terrible in it
This inclusive of hunting and (recreational) fishing? If so how do we do animal population and habitat management?
I should have phrased that as phasing out specifically killing animals for food. I fish myself, and I'm not advocating for any kind of drastic short-term change; over the long term, it's conceivable to me that use cases like recreational fishing could be addressed with AI robot fish and/or highly immersive VR/AR.
Google cache: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:vg6P9j...
Looks like a classic HN hug took it down.
Others bear the cost. This is not ethical.
Most people who choose not to eat meat for the ethical reasons do so based on the foundational belief that killing another conscious animal for food is unethical. "small-scale, grass fed, local producers" do not negate that belief.
- buying mass produced clothes is not ethical: who slaved for pennies to make that shirt?
- having a smart phone is unethical: cheap laborers build the components in arrangements they can’t exit
living in the 1st world is a world of hypocrisy. everything we do is possible because we have built on the backs of those less developed and outsource our costs so our living standard is high.
i accept this, do all the things above, and eat meat
It sounds like your position is "everything in the 1st world has a downside so why bother". It is certainly possible to live in a first world in a more conscious, less impactful way.
Like yes, we're pieces of shit, right. I'm at peace with it as well. Do we really need to drag others down when they try to rise above though?
- if you're driving a car 1 mile each way, consider biking. consider biking one or more days a week, and use your car for the days you need to go on longer trips like for errands.
- buy higher quality clothing from reputable dealers that try to balance out externalities. learn how to repair clothing that fails, or pay someone who specializes in it. bonus opportunity to support a local business and a worthwhile trade/specialty.
- don't upgrade your smartphone every year. Apple iPhones can receive software/security updates for ~5 years.
- try cooking or purchasing a vegetarian meal once a week. try a vegetable you've never tried before. try to find a way to prepare a vegetable you traditionally dislike until you find a way that is palatable to you. (edit to add: try growing some vegetables, even just a basil plant or sprouts on your windowsill)
Going to look back on modern factory farming (the source of the VAST majority of meat eaten in America) as something so abhorrent (Both for the process of it and the external costs) we’ll be embarrassed to tell our grandkids about it. Although as I’ve been downvoted for saying here before, if you’re having kids and grandkids, you’ve already done uncorrectable damage to the environment so go ahead and eat meat or whatever. Doesn’t matter at that point.
I hope (but doubt) that killing animals for food (whether by hunting or smaller-scale farming) will also become completely unacceptable outside of very specific situations.
There’s absolutely no shortage of people who a) will think this is bad advice that doesn’t apply to them because they are very smart, b) just don’t care, c) don’t have access to birth control, d) just really want a kid, etc.
Evolutionarily speaking, not having kids just leaves the planet to those who does.
What they mean is, historically, the majority has not always been correct when it comes to ethical issues. That's different than arguing that majorities have always been wrong.
I do not find fault in that attitude either, to be human is to have emotion, and to feel a sense of belonging. For someone who grew up on barbecue that's hard to reconcile.
However, a rigorous impartial analysis always categories eating meat as not ideal on both moral and ethical grounds. It probably has higher consensus among philosophers than climate change does with climate scientists. The irony is that I doubt all philosophers are vegetarian/vegan, so they themselves are probably the biggest hypocrites (or they have built up some system of ethics where being unethical on this is okay).
I come from a country where even if you're not vegetarian, your dose of meat is a few pieces of chicken once a week. It was very straightforward for me to choose vegetarianism and even then I struggled with it. I have nothing but respect for someone from rural Texas who chooses to be vegetarian though; that is just infinitely harder.
Strategically Replacing meat with certain veggies and legumes for example can get you that protein and carb kick but also are a great source of fiber while being easier to digest. Depending on your personal diet choices you might find a bag of beans not only costs less but can get you the same amount of carbs and proteins per serving across multiple servings than a single serving cut of meat.
Some beans for your thoughts ;)
Here's another question: Imagine the entire Earth is actually a factory farm for aliens. Every time someone dies, their body is actually secretly used for alien food. Would you want Earth to cease to exist?
Or perhaps a closer analogy, imagine super-powerful aliens take over Earth and terraform Mars and Venus, which they use as human farms. Maybe 30 billion humans live on Earth, Mars, and Venus, leading full lives with everything provided to them that a human wants, but killed at 18 years of age.
Alien human-rights activists wish to stop the humans from breeding, and let the population fall to several thousand. They will devote the planets to instead growing Alien Corn.
Do you want this to happen?
We have evolved and flourished with agriculture and so we don’t have to consume meat unless the agricultural produce has gone way down.
I also think the general argument is how animals are treated with so many horrific videos out there which are just torture in my opinion and not a clean kill.
If someone is doing a clean kill without the animal suffering and making sure it’s living in good conditions, that’s a right step in many ways.
https://www.instagram.com/slowdownfarmstead/
or
Driving down I5 seeing the Harris Ranch finishing lot is pretty awful. The ways chickens are housed here in Chinatown is also awful...
I think in my ideal world we have a balance between humans and animals so that such intensive techniques are not necessary.
Lions must eat meat to survive. We can choose not to eat meat and still survive. That's a morally relevant distinction. If you are arguing that because meat-eating is natural then it must be moral, I would direct you to the appeal to nature fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_nature
> Here's another question: Imagine the entire Earth is actually a factory farm for aliens. Every time someone dies, their body is actually secretly used for alien food. Would you want Earth to cease to exist?
No, but I fail to see how this runs counter to the moral claim that humans eating meat is bad. The correct analogy to your hypothetical would be to imagine that all animals live their full lives and are only consumed upon their death. It would not be morally wrong to eat them then.
> Or perhaps a closer analogy, imagine super-powerful aliens take over Earth and terraform Mars and Venus, which they use as human farms. Maybe 30 billion humans live on Earth, Mars, and Venus, leading full lives with everything provided to them that a human wants, but killed at 18 years of age. Alien human-rights activists wish to stop the humans from breeding, and let the population fall to several thousand. They will devote the planets to instead growing Alien Corn.
This analogy is not close at all. Animals do not lead full lives with everything provided to them that they could want. The vast majority of farmed animals live horrific lives that are not worth living and are killed very young. Chickens, for example, are artificially grown to reach a large size very quickly and then slaughtered shortly after.
The correct analogy to this hypothetical would be a so-called "humane" or "ethical" farm where the animals are free to live in a close-to-natural environment before being slaughtered. I would agree that that is much better than factory farms, and perhaps even morally acceptable if the animals' lives are worth living and they would not have existed otherwise. But, this is not how most farmed animals live. Not even close.
When you make up a reason for someone to believe something, sure it's easy to argue against it. Many people balk at finding eating meat unethical because it simply isn't. There is no consistent system of ethics that finds it unethical.
Deciding that some forms of life are "conscious" and should be protected and other forms of life are not is completely arbitrary. Living things consume other living things to survive. Surviving is not unethical, or if it is your system of ethics is self-defeating and will lead to your own extinction, which makes it useless.
[1] By and large, over-privileged people who've never done anything useful in their lives. It's easy to preach to people about what they should eat when you've always had plenty of food.
My question usually is: "Your interpretation of 'plant consciousness' and consciousness in general aside - do you personally see no difference between a flower and a cow?"
Or are you saying that what society deems ethical (regardless of what actually is, in fact, ethical) tends to align with actions that are good for people?
Our best guess is that plants do not experience suffering in the same way that animals do.
Of course the discussion should be around the conditions that livestock spend their time living in because animals obviously are "happier" when living in natural conditions, but as far as I am aware animals do not have any preference on when or how they die (as long as it is not painful and drawn out).
Basically: you're starting a fight. Don't.
My understanding is that most livestock are raised in small pens, never get to go outside, and are physically debilitated in one way or another. In what would amount to animal cruelty if they were pets. I'd love to see statistics on the matter, though no one involved is incentivized to share information so I doubt there's much to find.
Merely eating meat is one thing; participating in the factory farming system that produces the meat you find at the grocery store is quite another.