If you’re not one, you know one: the principled eater who refuses anything derived from animals. No meat, no cheese, no eggs. No wool, no leather, no Jimmy Choos. Not even products tested on animals.
How cool is that? Who says no to all these foods, clothes and conveniences out of concern for another species? There are quiet vegans, vocal vegans, and militant vegans, but they all refuse to benefit (at least directly) from the exploitation of animals. In a society where conformity often wins, they are willing to embrace the vegan ideology on principle — come what may.
The vegan movement has a valid point: industrial livestock production is bad for animals, people and planet. It’s easy to agree this extractive system of animal exploitation and environmental destruction has to end.
And, yes, there are outrageous examples of mistreatment of animals in agriculture. Standard practices include cattle feedlots, hog confinements, and chicken barns containing tens of millions of animals standing in their own filth while being medicated and fattened for death. Industry defends its practices as humane and safe, while clandestine video depicts beatings, fighting, disease, and the high stress of animals and workers in crowded confinements. Urine and manure collect in fetid lagoons. Fossil fuel fertilizers and toxic pesticides, used to grow GMO feed, contaminate the surrounding air, land and waters.
If there is one place where the principles of vegans and cowboys overlap, it’s how cattle should begin their lives.
All cattle live the first part of their lives outside on pasture alongside their mothers. Sun, water and air have nurtured the forage, which ruminant livestock convert into body mass and excreta, while keeping the soil and vegetation revitalized. Ranchers and farmers dedicate themselves to keeping livestock healthy, safe from predators, and well fed on grass, hay, silage and the occasional mineral supplement. They vaccinate but almost never need to medicate. Ranchers ensure the grasslands are vital and waterways clean. These are the legendary open spaces we love. If there is one place where the principles of vegans and cowboys overlap, it’s how cattle should begin their lives.
A little-known secret of the ranching community is that many in the livestock business don’t eat much animal meat. This is partly because they know, literally, how the bologna gets made. But more often it is because they cherish their livestock and landscapes and feel honor bound to recuse themselves from eating animals. If they do eat meat, it’s from animals that have never seen squalid poultry barns, hog confinements, or feed lots.
The complex interaction of humans, grasslands and livestock is a fundamental requirement for survival on Earth.
Vegan voices often denounce these industrial livestock practices, but remain oddly quiet about better ways animals are raised. What agriculturists know is that the constant interplay of humans, grasslands and livestock is a fundamental requirement for the Earth to survive. In times past, herds of millions roamed the continents seasonally, eating just enough grass to trigger its regrowth before moving on. Hooves opened the land’s crust, urine and manure imbued it with nutrition to feed the underworld of bugs, microbes and fungi in soil that forms the underlying source of life on the planet. Today, in paddocks of one acre or twenty thousand, smaller herds of livestock ensure our lands receive the same critical environmental cycling — but only when painstakingly cared for by a member of the human herd.
Nevertheless, the call by some vegans to end animal agriculture or re-wild the globe disregards this reality. That’s asking families to abandon their livelihoods, which are derived from soil, animals, water, forests, fences and infrastructure – all within the context of an economic culture built on the right to own and develop private property.
In short, without proper grazing, life and regeneration end. Grassland decays into desert.
But let’s pose the question anyway: what if we humans stop upholding our modern symbiotic role of managing land and livestock? Without the hooves of grazing animals, the land forms a crust and becomes impenetrable to rainfall. Without grazing, grasses do not slough off organic root matter before pushing out new leaves using urine and manure as stimulants. Without grazing, grass withers and oxidizes until the whole plant dies. Without grazing, the living biome of the soil disappears because it has no healthy root systems to draw from. Without grazing, the soil loses organic matter that can absorb large amounts of water in a downpour and release it slowly during drought. Without grazing we lose all our biodiverse wildlife and insects. In short, without proper grazing, life and regeneration end. Grassland decays into desert.The definition of desert is a grassland that has lost its grazing ruminants.
The Regenerative Vegan chooses to recognize and value the critical services provided by both man and beast.
If we accept that we must manage livestock to maintain the ecology of the planet for the sake of all species’ survival, including humans, we also must accept that the humans who do this work deserve to earn a living. Currently, most ranchers and livestock farmers make financial ends meet with off-farm income and by selling calves to feedlots to be fattened and killed. The calf operation is usually a break-even business since the feedlots collude to keep prices low. The dogmatic vegan would likely demand those animals never be killed; they should suffer death by predator or end-of-life disease. The Regenerative Vegan, however, agrees in principle that animals should not be killed, but also recognizes that the families who must care for those animals and the environment must be compensated for their efforts in other ways if the animals are never harvested.
The Regenerative Vegan chooses to recognize and value the critical services provided by both man and beast. Because when two species must exploit each other to survive, it’s really co-dependence.
We can’t eliminate animal agriculture, but we can certainly change how it’s done.
Many vegan activists claim their cause is primarily directed at eliminating cruel treatment of livestock in concentrated feeding facilities and during slaughter. How does this ideology adapt when animals are kept comfortably on pasture their whole lives? If we keep ruminant animals in their natural habitats, they will usually stay healthy and happy without pharmaceuticals, hormone treatments, grain feeding, and concentrated confinement. (Steers still must be castrated to avoid bulls fighting, but this is now done painlessly.) Pasturing cattle on healthy grass is also the least expensive way to provide cattle with their natural diet. It maximizes the animals’ symbiotic relationship with grasslands, soil and water. So, rather than focusing exclusively on ending the system of destructive factory farming, the Regenerative Vegan recognizes and elevates the important role of animals raised on grass — and calls for support of well-managed pastured livestock. We can’t eliminate animal agriculture, but we can certainly change how it’s done.
Ecologically sound management comes at a price. If we want agriculturalists to manage the planet for our collective benefit, then we must pay them in return. If we refuse to buy meat and other products made from their livestock, then we must make up the shortfall by paying them for maintaining those beasts purposefully on the land. Pay for the leases, utilities, water, veterinarian care, fencing, herding, and farm infrastructure…the cost can be calculated for every individual farm. And, yes, these human environmental stewards also deserve good housing, education, health care, communications, access to quality food, and the opportunity to retire comfortably in old age. That’s the true cost of not killing and eating animals. The Regenerative Vegan takes up a calculator to see how much they can contribute to this goal that honors their beliefs.
It is especially troubling that the billions of dollars being invested in synthetic meat under the guise of saving the planet could have actually been invested in saving the planet.
Recently, investors touting the miracle of “synthetic biology” have co-opted vegan and climate change narratives in a self-serving propaganda push. PR campaigns for synthetic meat claim no animals are harmed by their “precision fermentation” techniques which, like a magic trick, seemingly circumvent the negative consequences of raising livestock. The Regenerative Vegan isn’t falling for it.
The process of fermenting genetically mutated micro-organisms is an extension of the extractive industrial agriculture system. It depends on fossil fuels, synthetic fertilizers, toxic pesticides, antibiotics, monoculture GMO corn and grains — and thus externalizes a multitude of damaging consequences to the climate, environment and human health. Synthetic meat cultures commonly incorporate bovine fetal stem cells, which are grown in GMO sugars via fermentation and then attached to a sponge structure that mimics sinew and fat. That investors in this technology tout it as a vegan alternative that supports vegan values is testament to the skill of their paid propagandists. An entire industry is being built by the rich to eliminate the ruminant livestock on which our planetary survival depends. Synthetic meat is a testament to the self-interested myopia of investors who have no interest in the science of global ecology or the common weal. It is especially troubling that the billions of dollars being invested in fake meat under the guise of saving the planet could have actually been invested in saving the planet.
There is nothing “green” about synthetic protein and nothing virtuous about consuming it.
Consider the well-funded and coordinated global propaganda campaigns that support industrial meat and synthetic meat. Both use similar strategies of diversion and distraction. Industrial meat focuses on the few months that cattle are grazed on pastures, and racks up impressive statistics on the ecological benefits of their supply chain. Industrial meat forgets to talk about what happens after those grass-fed calves are sold to feedlots, including the economically inequitable, chemical-dependent cropping system that grows the gain to fatten the animals. Nor the heavy use of pharmaceuticals, the fetid manure lagoons polluting air, water and land. Nor the capitulation of rural economies, mistreatment of workers and dismantling of communities.
This is how groups like the Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef and Good Food Institute claim to be models of sustainability. They simply won’t acknowledge or talk about the damage their hidden practices cause.
Similarly, the global campaign for synthetic protein wants us to believe the ingredients used to manufacture its products magically appear in their fermentation vats. Apparently, those ingredients don’t come from planet Earth at all. The strategists for the campaign want us to ignore all of the destruction caused by the extractive methods used to grow the sugars needed to feed the ferments. They overlook the creation and release of novel living organisms and artificially mutated genetic traits which have never before existed in the environment or food supply. They coax us to overlook the use of important antibiotics they use to ensure unwanted microorganisms don’t grow in their ferments and cultures – and how this practice contributes to antibiotic resistance. They wave off layer on layer of worker abuse and the concentration of extracted wealth among their rich benefactors. They fail to mention the thousands of patents and lawsuits they use to control natural genetics for commercial gain so that others cannot benefit from them. Finally, they even claim that since no animals are used, there is no cruelty, greenhouse gas release, or carbon footprint.
Let’s stop commingling all kinds of livestock husbandry as if they are the same – and stop believing the false claims about synthetic meat.
Knowing the ugly truth behind the beautiful lie of synthetic meat, the Regenerative Vegan rejects it outright. Plenty of healthy and sustainable meat and protein substitutes are actually made from plants. There is nothing “green” about synthetic protein and nothing virtuous about consuming it.
Where does that leave the Regenerative Vegan? Well, they can return to a true plant-based diet instead of eating foods grown in chemical plants. You can eat well and nutritiously on produce, fruit, nuts, tubers, pulses and whole grains. All of these products may have their own shortcomings, but they can be a legitimate, sustainable, animal-cruelty-free, climate-friendly alternative to animal or synthetic meat and milk.
A key claim of this Campaign of Confusion is that industrial and synthetic meat production mitigates global warming. However, the catch-all claim that cattle are net contributors to atmospheric carbon dioxide is dangerously outdated. Optimally managed livestock can sequester over three kilos of carbon for every kilo of meat produced. If you compost the whole animal at death, rather than consumer its carcass, the amount of carbon returned to soil is even higher. That 3:1 ratio is net of burps, farts, manure, urine, and all the rest. It depends on 100% lifetime pastured feeding in symbiosis with grass and soil. It requires rotating grazing animals through different paddocks, supporting biodiverse grasses, and never introducing synthetic fertilizers and toxic pesticides. Nevertheless, it can be done.
The industrial meat system (whether culminating in feedlots or fermentation vats) contributes untold amounts of carbon to the atmosphere. From fossil fuel extraction to production of synthetic fertilizers and toxic pesticides, to regular tilling of topsoil and lack of effective cover crops, the industrial system that grows feed for hogs, cattle and poultry (and ethanol) is massively disruptive to the climate. Not to mention that it has consumed half of America’s topsoil after just 100 years and it creates pervasive air and water pollution. It’s the definition of unsustainable.
The vegan campaign to end the livestock production problem ignores the pastured livestock solution ( while worshiping synthetic meat) because it is single-mindedly looking for reasons to end the use of all animals in agriculture. Let’s stop commingling all kinds of livestock husbandry as if they are the same – and stop believing the false claims about synthetic meat.
The Regenerative Vegan differentiates between these very different livestock systems. One is destructive, one is regenerative. They raise their voice in support of the latter. They put their third system — synthetic meat — out of mind. They don’t have to consume any part of the regeneratively managed animals, but they know they depend on those animals for survival nonetheless.
Above all, support farmers and ranchers who use regenerative practices that protect animals, people, and planet.
Regenerative vegans don’t value only animals, food and climate. Regeneration Veganism also feels compassion for land, families, towns, and workers — the whole fabric of society. Animal advocates have understood this dynamic for years: if we want to manage livestock humanely, we have to fix the entire system from the ground up. In fact, the biggest supporters of localized small-scale slaughterhouses are advocates for compassionate treatment of farm animals. Smaller scale meatpacking plants are part of their communities, offer good jobs, and can take mature livestock for processing on behalf of producers — ensuring the value they created contributes to a prosperous local economy. Localized packing and marketing allow animals to mature on pasture under natural conditions until the last (but worst) day of their lives.
There could be a million US farmers and ranchers are bringing up cattle, hogs and chickens in ways specifically designed to rebuild soil, sequester carbon, keep water clean and abundant, and make an honest living – but there aren’t. Regenerative producers don’t have access to slaughter, processing, and markets for their animals. The county level facilities and markets on which these families depend have been systematically bought out or regulated out of existence. Instead, the system demands these producers surrender their calves to one of a few hundred large feedlots at a breakeven price, where chicks live for a few weeks under artificial light, and where pigs on concrete floors don’t last a year. The feedlots, slaughterhouses and retailers take nearly all the profit for themselves by paying breakeven prices at the farm gate but posting premium prices for retail shoppers. The $20-a-pound rib-eye typically comes off a steer purchased for one dollar a pound.
Here’s the catch with regenerative pastured livestock: big retailers won’t buy their meat because it’s too expensive due to the true cost of growing it. Retailers are happy to import cheap foreign meat and can legally label it “Product of USA”, forcing domestic producers to match unrealistic pricing. Regenerative producers must depend on direct sales to consumers, but few urban eaters make the effort to buy it. The Regenerative Vegan calls the shot: I don’t eat meat, but if you do, you should support local slaughter and buy direct from producers. Above all, support farmers and ranchers who use regenerative practices that protect animals, people, and planet.
We celebrate the Regenerative Vegan for making the effort to understand planetary ecology and animal welfare in all its complexity.
We celebrate the Regenerative Vegan for making the effort to understand planetary ecology and animal welfare in all its complexity. The Regenerative Vegan sees that not all livestock husbandry is bad, only the extractive kind. While humans do exploit these animals, the animals in turn can live out their lives dependent on us. Humans and the planet need managed beasts, whether we eat them or not. Pastured livestock is better. Feedlot beef is out of the question. Synthetic meat is a lie. The Regenerative Vegan consider what price they are willing to pay the stewards of land and livestock for their services. And, in the end, The Regenerative Vegan recognizes that all things decline and die, and that death, seen or unseen, in the wild or the slaughterhouse, is never magnificent. We should focus instead on quality of life.
A Manifesto for the Regenerative Vegan:
1. Acknowledge and understand our dependence on pastured livestock to regenerate the global ecology.
2. Carefully differentiate between unethical extractive livestock production versus humane and environmentally responsible farming and ranching. Don’t get fooled by synthetic meat.
3. Ally with farmers/ranchers whose core values around the treatment of animals align with yours. Help them circumvent the feedlot system. Acknowledge the value of their methods. Help them find markets for responsible meat.
4. Recognize ethical livestock management by paying for the support of animals who will not be killed for meat. Pay the farmer and rancher a fair price for this service.
5. Accept that all beings die. Whether hit with a stun gun, euthanized with drugs, taken slowly by age and disease, or killed by predators, all things return to the earth. Not harvesting livestock means a different form of death, not the end of death. Build an ideology, alliances and strategies that recognize this reality.
For a primer on the role of livestock in soil health, see “Grassland Ecology 101 for Vegans and Synthetic Meat Marketers at “https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/grassland-ecology-101-vegans-synthetic-meat-marketers-alan-lewis/
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