The Ecological Benefits of Vegetarianism

I have played with being a vegetarian several times in my life, and have usually gone back because I just haven't taken the time to eat healthily enough and end up losing weight or getting deficiencies. But after watching a 30 Days episode about animal rights, I decided to go back, and have been consistent now for a while. I do feel healthier, and have discovered quite a few good vegetarian options.

Animal rights aside (since, as Joseph Campbell says, life lives on lives, and vegetarians are just eating something that can't run away), there are powerful ecological reasons to be a vegetarian. This article from The Green Lantern at Slate Magazine mentions a study that determined that the switch from carnivore to vegetarian is the equivalent in terms of environmental impact of trading in a Chevy Suburban for a Toyota Camry. Being a vegan is a bit more ecologically friendly, but I still haven't done that, because protein is more difficult to find without cheese, etc., and soy ice cream just doesn't taste as good. But here's another article about the ecological difference between dairy milk and soy milk, and I've definitely made that switch, since in some ways I like soy milk better.

I've never been a missionary, since I don't believe in converting others, but I do think the information is fairly compelling and worth spreading.

Our Brilliant Government

Amazing. This story is about how supplies intended for Katrina and
Rita victims were estimated at $85 million actually just cost $18.5
million and many of the supplies arrived at all, since they just sat
in a big warehouse in Texas. Yay Government competence.

Climate Change Challenge

In case you didn't see it, here's Al Gore's speech challenging us to go to non-carbon-based, renewable energy sources in the next ten years, equivalent to Kennedy's challenge to get to the moon within a decade, which of course America accomplished ahead of schedule. All of the technology is available now, but the political willpower is not. I think this is one of the most urgent (and blatantly obvious) issues of our day. If you agree, you can sign the petition and find out how to do more at the We Can Solve It website.

No matter what your political persuasion, and no matter whether you actually believe in global warming or not, these proposals make absolute sense. Getting rid of carbon-based fuel will also restore clean air and water, and cut the funding off from terrorists who get their money from oil-rich countries. Other than economics, I can't see any reason not to do this. And as Gore points out, it also makes economic sense.

As a teacher in a new home, I can't afford this right now, but if anyone else who lives in Virginia is interested, you can opt to get your power from renewable sources through Dominion. It costs about 5 cents per kilowatt hour more right now, and your power can come from a combination of wind and solar, or from methane recollection over landfills. Here's the site for changing over if you think you can afford it. It doesn't actually change where you get your electricity, but Dominion then purchases the amount of power you use each month from a renewable resource supplier, so it effectively works out though not actually. I'll certainly be doing that as soon as we can afford it. And for those of you in NC, here is there FAQ for Green Power down there.

Here's the video of his speech - quite clear, enormously compelling, and really worth watching. One of my favorite quotations: "We should tax what we burn, not what we earn."




In case you are interested, here's an editorial from the NY Times about the speech. My favorite passage:

When exactly was it that the U.S. became a can’t-do society? It wasn’t at the very beginning when 13 ragamuffin colonies went to war against the world’s mightiest empire. It wasn’t during World War II when Japan and Nazi Germany had to be fought simultaneously. It wasn’t in the postwar period that gave us the Marshall Plan and a robust G.I. Bill and the interstate highway system and the space program and the civil rights movement and the women’s movement and the greatest society the world had ever known.

When was it?

Now we can’t even lift New Orleans off its knees.

Again, the website to join the campaign is wecansolveit.org. And here is a link of action steps you can take.

Electricity from Garbage

I thought this was an interesting article about a technology that would allow us to use garbage to create electricity - with very little byproduct. It would create about as much carbon dioxide as natural gas does, but it gets rid of many tons of garbage a day, converting it into energy and into a slag that can be used for asphalt. It looks like an intriguing technology, and one I hope more places will try. Apparently, New Orleans is looking into it.

More on 411

Here is a video that details 3 more free information services for cell phones (no iPhone necessary). You can get answers to anything that Google could find an answer for on Cha-Cha, get 411 information from Google (similar to the texting service, but voice activate), or send text messages on Jott. Check out the video. Pretty useful stuff.

Human Mirror

Some people from my old theater department are in charge of Improv Everywhere. They do cool and fun stunts - their latest is a Human Mirror on the subway, where they found 16 pairs of identical twins to ride all together in a subway car. Check it out here.

Their complete mission list is here - all worth watching. My favorite is Anton Chekhov.

Here's the video of the Human Mirror, but be sure to check their website too.

Anonymous

Maybe you have heard about this - I didn't know anything about it until I saw it tonight. Anonymous is a group that is organizing a series of protests against Scientology. Their PR is pretty intense - a computerized voice with pictures of clouds and cities. Here's one of the videos they released.



They have been called domestic terrorists, most notably by a KTTV Fox 11 News report, and were accused of quite a few things, from the serious (bomb threats) to the fairly serious (hacking into MySpace pages and posting gay porn) to the ludicrous (trying to spoil the ending of Harry Potter before it was published). You can see where the fear would come from in the video above, as well as the fact that many of the protesters for their mass demonstration on Feburary 10th wore the masks used in V for Vendetta. But they also released this video with the rules for their protest, which seems like a pretty excellent list, including respect for police and private property and acting sensibly so as not to taint or distort the message by doing dumb things.



That video is also done in a sort of scary way, but it did make me more interested in researching their particular grievances. I had not known anything about Lisa McPherson, or James Hester. Lisa McPherson was a Scientologist who died under unusual circumstances, though the court findings were inconclusive. Certainly, any large organization is going to have suicides or unusual deaths, and from an outside perspective, there's no way to verify whether the church had anything to do with it, or whether those who died would have died anyway. So I'm not at all sure how I feel about either group, but I do find it all pretty fascinating.

The group also made headlines for outing a sexual predator - Chris Forcand - before he was able to do any damage. They got him to proposition them, and then reported him to the police, who then arrested him. The police reported that it was the first time an "Internet vigilant group" had ever helped with the arrest of an internet predator.