China Is on a Quest for the Holy Grail of Meat. Let’s Hope It Succeeds.
China Is on a Quest for the Holy Grail of Meat. Let’s Hope It Succeeds.
China’s push to develop alternative proteins is not a threat to America. It’s good for the planet.
Given their history of selling tainted food to other countries (including poisoned baby food), I wouldn't trust any food innovations to come out of that country until they are proven safe by proper regulators.
Last time China experimented with meat we had to shut down the universe for 2 years so no thanks.
When a country starts investing a lot of resources in a tech area, a very sensible reaction is to view it as an incentive for similar investment. This is the very essence of competition. But when a cultural change goes along with the investment it becomes a threat. They're tryna' take away our burgers and freedom! ...or They're tryna' take away our oil-powered cars and freedom!
To conservatives, who see meat, oil and cars as non-negotiable existential essentials, anything and any idea that suggests giving up, cutting back, or even criticizing any of them is going to make them smear on war paint and light torches. Which is always fun to watch.
I think the biggest issue, especially in parts of the US, is just cultural inertia. It's reallynot hard or.expensive to eat an easy, healthy and tasty vegan or vegetarian diet, but a lot of people, especially men, tie their identity up with eating meat.
I'm lacto-ovo veggie and the number of people who can't fathom that I don't eat meat (in the UK where it's really quite common) is mind boggling.
"What, not even fish?" 🙄 No, mate, if it has a face I won't eat it, but thanks.
People also tie flavours to specific foods. I have a friend who has a north African partner and they tell me often they'd go veggie if it weren't for their partners chicken "which is so much better than ours". No shit, he uses a fuck ton of spice and lemons. If you threw that on some veggies it would be a pretty close flavour experience. I get missing a texture (slow cooked beef? I miss that) but the flavour thing just doesn't add up to me.
A lot of men need to take inspiration from Patrik Baboumian to learn to be strong and kind! Real men are vegans!
It's not just that. At least where I'm from in the deep South there's a lot of associations of class that go along with being vegan or vegetarian. As in, it's generally associated with wealthy, higher class, out of touch people from afar and partaking in that is akin to embodying those traits.
There's also the issue of food being a very important medium for expressing love, friendship, and hospitality, and denying that (even if for valid dietary reasons) is taken as a slap on the face for many. When someone offers you their food, they're offering you their soul.
Don't get me wrong, I think that everyone should try to eat less meat and I care about the environment, but there's definitely gotta be an effort to strip the act and identity of being vegan of those classist associations (whether or not they're true) and get it to be normalized.
Everyone is out of touch.
"Take all this woke vegan food and green EVs with your liberal mindset back to where it belongs; China. Wait, what?"
The Chinese are consuming more meat, and emitting more greenhouse gas, every year. They also want to make a buck selling us green tech and foods that fit with Western dietary fads. Watch what they do, not what they're advertising.
Pretty much. They changed the title to be less inflammatory but not the link preview.
Most intelligent chud
You can go vegan now to cut emissions.
Also, just in case anyone is reading this and thinking they not sure they're ready- you can still:
- Go vegan for set days in the week
- Remove meant and dairy from, say, lunches
- Just eat less meat
Even if you don't go full vegan, you'll still cut emissions by transitioning your diet.
didn't you already try that?
He's not the messiah, he's a very naughty boy!!
