On Thu, 29 Jul 2004 15:22:36 +0000, rick etter wrote:

>
> "Mike Charlton" > wrote in message
> news
>> Hey Rick. This discussion is turning out pretty long. I've snipped it
>> all in order to reorder things a bit. Hope that's OK. I've also changed
>> the subject line. We seem to be getting off topic, so I'm hoping this
>> will help us remember what we're talking about. Speaking of which...
>>
>> Man, you really seem to be angry. I mean, I think I've treated you
>> with respect.
> ==============================
> LOL Where have I been disrespectful? What I see here is the typical post
> by a vegan that has gotten in over his head and is making the excuse to run.
> You snip out all the info you say you're looking for, run to mommy crying
> that the big bad bully is picking on you, and then claim that the other
> person is closed-minded.

Ha, ha :-). If I really thought you were a bully, I'd be doing something
other than running. I don't respond well to bullies. It's a good thing
I'm not an animal rights activist. To think of some of the things I've
done to some people (who should at least have the rights of other
animals ;-))...

No. As I said, I respect your opinion. You just don't seem to be
interested in having this discussion. All you want to talk about is
how bad vegans are. I fully accept that you've been treated badly by
some vegans. I also fully accept that many vegans are stupid dumb-asses.
But then so are many non-vegans.

I really don't mind one way or another if you are close minded about
adopting veganism. Are you suggesting that you are *open-minded* on the
subject? Are you curious about becoming a vegan? It doesn't seem like
it to me. It seems like you've already made up your mind. :-) (relax
-- it's a joke. I really, seriously don't care that you aren't
vegan). Like I said before, I *respect* your descision. Do whatever you
think is best. It's always better that way. I'm not egotistical enough to
think that my way is right.

It's better that we have people trying different things. In the end, I
feel good allowing history to be the judge. Ideally, people will gravitate
towards the ideas that work best.

Really, that's why I'm not particularly interested in discussing the
theoretical plusses and minuses of any particular system. Let's just
try some stuff out and see what works best. I appreciate people coming
to me and saying, "Hold on, I see a problem here" as you have done.
However, having accepted that problem, let's discuss possible
solutions. I don't really see the point in going on and on and on and
on about how stupid one group of people you talk to are.

> Calling vegan liars is not disrespectful, it's truthful. Right here on
> another thread is an idiot claiming that the UK doesn't allow ANY pesticides
> in organic farming.
> How stupid do you have to be to make, or believe a statement like that?

Ignorance and deceit are two totally separate concepts, generally.
However, if you want to say that someone who holds a mistaken viewpoint
is a "liar", well... OK. I can deal with that definition. It's
just a strange one.

But, perhaps you are labouring under a misaprehention. I don't mind if
you call vegans liars. Everybody lies (or at least stretches the truth
here or there). If we take your definition above, any bonehead statement
that you've ever made in your life makes you a liar. Fair enough.

What I was objecting to was your assumption that I believed certain things,
when in fact you have absolutely no idea what I believe in. The *only*
thing you know about me is that I prefer not to eat meat, that I've
successfully grown food for myself and that I would like to reduce
collateral death in farming. But you seem to want to "educate" me on the
"evils" of veganism. It is very disrespectful to assume I need such
educating. I mean, we aren't even talking about that, are we?

>> As you said in a previous email, it's not really diet that's important
>> here...
> ======================
> Just a note here, don't say email when you mean a usenet posting.

Ok. No problem. Is there any reason that this is a sensitive issue?

> It's everything else as well -- It's climate change due to
>> pollution from transportation. It's loss of habitat/migration routes
>> due to roads and natural gas pipelines. Etc, etc, etc. That's why I
>> think that it's less necessary to discuss what we're eating as opposed
>> to where we're getting it from. Local produce is *really* important.
>> Do you agree?
> ==================
> Yes, and that is part of my point with vegans here. read the recipies that
> they post. They include many imported, exotic fruits and veggies.

I tend to agree that many vegans rely way too much on imported ingredients.
One type of veganism, shoujin riori (a japanese buddhist diet) uses only
local ingredients that are in season. They also use every part of the
food (but I'm not sure whether they eat it eventually, or if composting
is allowed). Bizarrely, they don't eat any aliums. Not sure why.

I'm not sure how realistic that kind of diet is globally. It's difficult
to really tell exactly what they're eating because I my japanese isn't
quite good enough to read much about it. I'm curious how they get by in
the winter, especially in the north.

> We'll just see how open you are to information...


Bring it on :-). This is pretty good stuff. However, it's still focusing
on the *problem*. I mean you and I both agree on the problem (and I'm
sure everyone else in the newsgroup has put us in kill files by now).
What I'm looking for is solutions.

You don't mind if I at least snip the links? There are a lot of them ;-)

<snip>

Totally agree. I've even read most of these before. But thanks for
posting the ones I haven't read. Now what? I don't think it's good
enough to leave it at that and say, "Well, nothing we can do here".

So what are the solutions? So far the only thing I think you've agreed
to is that local produce is important. I don't think you agreed that
smaller farm sizes would help, but I'm not entirely sure why. Also,
you seem to imply from the statement above that organic farming doesn't
help (I'm not sure on that -- I agree it doesn't cure things 100%, but
does it at least make the situation better?)

The self-sufficiency thing is a good idea, but I'm not sure it's scalable.
It's definitely an area I'm looking into, though.

Also, we seem to have abandoned the grass fed meat issue. Did we come
to a conclusion on that? I think we both agreed that it was feasible
to encourage grass fed cattle production (I really don't know what you'd
do for other animals, though), but didn't seem to come up with
any concrete ideas on how to do it. Even though we agreed that grass
fed is easier and cheaper, nobody (at least around here -- I don't know
about where you live) seems to do it. We must be missing something.

> To cover your selfish pleasure of using usenet, and
> maintaining a web page on same, here's are a couple
> dealing with power and communications.
> http://www.clearwater.org/news/powerplants.html
> http://www.towerkill.com/index.html

Well, I think I have some ideas on dealing with power. It's definitely
an issue. I'm of the firm belief that local power generation is
of absolute necessity. Luckily, running a web server doesn't take
up too much power (I don't have a power meter hooked up to my
computer currently, but my entire household uses less than 1000 kWh
per year -- I'm trying to get that down to 2-300 and I have some ideas).
Now, if you have ideas on local power generation that actually
generates more power than it takes to build, I'm all ears. So far I
can't find *any* appropriate solution. It's very frustrating.

If you really want to chastise me on guilty pleasures, you should
pick my obsession with brewing beer. That eats up a *HUGE* amount
of energy. If I could find a way to improve that, I'd be
extremely happy :-)

> No, I had a brother that played in a group called Black Market Pop-Tarts.
>
> They had to eventually drop the -tarts though...

Never heard of them, but it sounds like a cool name :-)

Look, just before I end here I want to say that I'm grateful for the info
you've given me. It's just that it appears you could say so much more if
you weren't spending most of your time ranting about how much you think
vegans are stupid (or evil or whatever). I really *do* respect your
opinion. I don't happen to share it, but who cares? I'm not going to
hold it against you. Let's just move on and talk about something
interesting. I'm going to assume for now that you don't think *I'm*
stupid and evil :-).

Mike