Extinction Rebellion and Farming

[willie waver]

I've been at the Sustainable Food Trust event on Climate Change and Net-zero 2040 over the past few days and as part of it got to meet Gail Bradbrook one of the co-founders of Extinction Rebellion (XR) which was an absolute pleasure to be honest. Her views on farming is that it is part of the solution to solving climate change - although they have called for net-zero carbon by 2025. She also spoke about undering that livestock farming doesn;t conflict with this goal and actually sees how it helps.

So that is all good.

She also asked for farmers to join them on the next porotest. To show we are doing our part in being net-zero and consumers and other industry need to do their part too. Things like it costs approx 8kg of CO2 to fly 1kg of food around the world.

But then I read this:

https://www.plantbasednews.org/post/extinction-rebellion-meets-vegan-groups-disrupting-animal-ag



Gail has said the following:

So question is - how can extinction rebellion ask for the support of farmers and target them at the same time? Seems to be a massive lack of underdstanding in their membership of which I bet a lot (more than the national average) are vegan.

whats she going to do about human over population? disrupting a few maternity wards would do more to save the planet than the animal industry . bet she and her hypocrite pals don't have the bottle to tackle the real problem

 

[delilah]

Just a point of interest:

XR have a massive conflict at the leadership level with one group advocating one course of action only to be contradicted by the other faction.

Bit like farming sectors come to think of it

XR isn't the environmental movement, more accurately it is the latest in a series of high profile but ultimately short lived environmental initiatives.
At the turn of the century we had Local Agenda 21, which came out of the Rio Earth summit. More recently has come the Transition Town movement, there have been others. They are all great in as much as they get that decades latest recruits to the green agenda enthused, but they generally don't stay the course.

Real progress will only be made by shutting @Guy Smith ,Tony Juniper and Craig Bennett in a room and not letting them out until they have produced a joint statement on their commitment to work together in promoting a vibrant, innovative and profitable UK agriculture as our best hope of addressing climate change.

 

[Tarw Coch]

XR isn't the environmental movement, more accurately it is the latest in a series of high profile but ultimately short lived environmental initiatives.
At the turn of the century we had Local Agenda 21, which came out of the Rio Earth summit. More recently has come the Transition Town movement, there have been others. They are all great in as much as they get that decades latest recruits to the green agenda enthused, but they generally don't stay the course.

Real progress will only be made by shutting @Guy Smith ,Tony Juniper and Craig Bennett in a room and not letting them out until they have produced a joint statement on their commitment to work together in promoting a vibrant, innovative and profitable UK agriculture as our best hope of addressing climate change.

You’ll also need to shut Bojo and his chums in that room because if you don’t they’ll import cheap food from anywhere and undermine anything agreed.
It’s not the green Lobby farmers need to be afraid of, it’s being undermined by imports not up to the same standards.

 

[delilah]

You’ll also need to shut Bojo and his chums in that room because if you don’t they’ll import cheap food from anywhere and undermine anything agreed.
It’s not the green Lobby farmers need to be afraid of, it’s being undermined by imports not up to the same standards.

I think that reinforces my point. On its own UK agriculture will struggle with PM Johnson, as will the green movement. Whereas I would actually back an alliance of the two to be his match.
Faced with a united front that combines Tory voting heartland farmers with an environmental movement that has more members than all political parties put together, Government will take the prudent approach and give its backing to home production as a way of combating climate change. Green box ticked for Bojo.

 

[Shep]

whats she going to do about human over population? disrupting a few maternity wards would do more to save the planet than the animal industry . bet she and her hypocrite pals don't have the bottle to tackle the real problem

It's not maternity wards that need disruption, they need to be hiding in the bushes or under beds waiting to disrupt any couples about to get frisky.

 

[Exfarmer]

Hope this works
dot get too excited Chris
https://www.plantbasednews.org/post...k4GzTRuHL5EWdtTr0X0BYYpa6q0mIqXBJrjcheFNlkBPg

 

[Beowulf]

Well, if we are serious about " saving the planet ", air travel will have to end. Transporting goods and produce from one side of the planet to the other will have to end. Consumerism will have to end. And that's that.

You might be right in regards to your last statement, but it's irrelevant.

What we are facing in the not too distant future is essentially the same situation we faced 20 years ago with the rumoured destruction of the Ozone layer.

No matter how many scare stories appeared on the 6 O'clock News it didn't really change the behaviour of the public. People were concerned about it, but not enough to change their behaviour. Instead, consumers were bypassed and it was up to industry to absorb the cost of change.

Instead of telling people they had to avoid deodorant and accept they would smell like a prehistoric cave man, government told the manufacturers to solve the problem and they came up with CFC-free aerosol propellants.

Instead of insisting that people buy cars in bare metal or plastic the industry came up with water-based paints etc.

No government, of any nation, is going to tell the electorate (the people who allow them to govern) that their way of life will have to change dramatically, at least not until it REALLY does have to change. Until then industry will have to bear the brunt, because businesses aren't on the electoral roll.

 

[Daniel]

Extinction rebellion are a gang of crazed economic terrorists and farming should not damage its reputation by engaging with them.

Why so many farmers are tweeting so enthusiastically about climate change on Twitter as if they have even the faintest clue what they are on about is beyond me, its almost like they've spotted the latest bandwagon to clamber aboard to boost their follower numbers. The climate alarmists are never going to be your friends, or compromise with you, it will always be you dancing to their tune as they blame you for everything, remove all the tools in your toolbox, be they chemical or mechanical, and relentlessly tax you to fund whatever stupid initiative they've dreamt up this week.

The sight of politicians kowtowing to the idiocy that the grievously manipulated Greta Thunberg spouts on behalf of her masters is frankly, ridiculous.

Sensible leadership does not involve knee jerk reactions to false claims of climate collapse. It involves studying things calmly and rationally, looking at what the UK has done so far (which is an enormous amount, not that you'd think it from the output of the Guardian and the BBC), it involves weighing up the harm caused to the poorest by implementing £1.5 trillion best guess initiatives like 'net zero'. And let's face it, it's always the poor that pay, the middle class Extinction Rebellion gang will still be flying off to their Tuscan Villas this summer, and they still will in years to come, regardless of how heavily they tax air fares and fossil fuels. The great unwashed who scrimp and save for a week in Marbella wont be going though, because they will be broke when they realise their electricity tariff has been hiked yet again to fund some rich landowners lucrative AD plant.

It's a massive scam, designed to raise taxes, fund an environment industry earning the middle classes billions of dollars, aided and abetted by scientists who know if they were to publish anything remotely sceptical of man made climate change then they will have their project funding withdrawn. Publish some scaremongering and they will have all the funding they could ever want.

The way to help the environment is as simple as it ever was. Waste not, want not.

We don't need Leonardo DiCaprio, Al Gore, Emma Thomspon, any other half-wit celebrity or ambitious politician to fly their private jet to Davos to lecture us peasants, they can get their own house in order.

And someone, please get poor Greta Thunberg some psychiatric help, clearly she has no responsible adult to turn to.

 

[Top Tip.]

Extinction rebellion are a gang of crazed economic terrorists and farming should not damage its reputation by engaging with them.

Why so many farmers are tweeting so enthusiastically about climate change on Twitter as if they have even the faintest clue what they are on about is beyond me, its almost like they've spotted the latest bandwagon to clamber aboard to boost their follower numbers. The climate alarmists are never going to be your friends, or compromise with you, it will always be you dancing to their tune as they blame you for everything, remove all the tools in your toolbox, be they chemical or mechanical, and relentlessly tax you to fund whatever stupid initiative they've dreamt up this week.

The sight of politicians kowtowing to the idiocy that the grievously manipulated Greta Thunberg spouts on behalf of her masters is frankly, ridiculous.

Sensible leadership does not involve knee jerk reactions to false claims of climate collapse. It involves studying things calmly and rationally, looking at what the UK has done so far (which is an enormous amount, not that you'd think it from the output of the Guardian and the BBC), it involves weighing up the harm caused to the poorest by implementing £1.5 trillion best guess initiatives like 'net zero'. And let's face it, it's always the poor that pay, the middle class Extinction Rebellion gang will still be flying off to their Tuscan Villas this summer, and they still will in years to come, regardless of how heavily they tax air fares and fossil fuels. The great unwashed who scrimp and save for a week in Marbella wont be going though, because they will be broke when they realise their electricity tariff has been hiked yet again to fund some rich landowners lucrative AD plant.

It's a massive scam, designed to raise taxes, fund an environment industry earning the middle classes billions of dollars, aided and abetted by scientists who know if they were to publish anything remotely sceptical of man made climate change then they will have their project funding withdrawn. Publish some scaremongering and they will have all the funding they could ever want.

The way to help the environment is as simple as it ever was. Waste not, want not.

We don't need Leonardo DiCaprio, Al Gore, Emma Thomspon, any other half-wit celebrity or ambitious politician to fly their private jet to Davos to lecture us peasants, they can get their own house in order.

And someone, please get poor Greta Thunberg some psychiatric help, clearly she has no responsible adult to turn to.

Brilliant.

 

[Muddyroads]

Some interesting points, but I’m surprised that nobody has picked up on the op stating that we’re going to be targeted by a bunch of eco-terrorists towards the end of the year. Anything we as an industry can do to prevent, preempt or prepare for this should surely be considered?

 

[FonterraFarmer]

Well, if we are serious about " saving the planet ", air travel will have to end. Transporting goods and produce from one side of the planet to the other will have to end. Consumerism will have to end. And that's that.

Not necessarily, wasn't that long ago that ships transported goods by ships that sailed, no reason why that couldn't happen again or sail with assistance from renewable energy sources.

 

[FonterraFarmer]

Well, if we are serious about " saving the planet ", air travel will have to end. Transporting goods and produce from one side of the planet to the other will have to end. Consumerism will have to end. And that's that.

And no more Land Rovers exported!!!

 

[delilah]

Hope this works
dot get too excited Chris
https://www.plantbasednews.org/post...k4GzTRuHL5EWdtTr0X0BYYpa6q0mIqXBJrjcheFNlkBPg

The list of organisations at the bottom is revealing, for who isn't there more than who is, which reinforces my point about who UK ag should be engaging with.

Notwithstanding that, I think the lady from XR should most definitely join this thread to debate the points.

 

[delilah]

Some interesting points, but I’m surprised that nobody has picked up on the op stating that we’re going to be targeted by a bunch of eco-terrorists towards the end of the year. Anything we as an industry can do to prevent, preempt or prepare for this should surely be considered?

I think you have just identified the timeframe within which UK agriculture needs to present a united front with the mainstream environmental movement.

 

[melted welly]

And no more Land Rovers exported!!!

Are you suggesting that in order to save the planet, we will all need to drive Land Rovers? That is a scary prospect!

 

[Formatted]

Who is she? What is her mandate (ie who voted for her) ? Who does she represent? What relevant qualifications does she have?

If she's just a 21st Century loudmouth/social media wannabee, who's just spouting her personal, unevidenced, unscientific views, she needs to be treated with as much respect as any nobody trying to be somebody.

She managed to attract enough people in London to close Parliament square, the stock exchange and a bridge for several days. She is a 21st leader; which means you don't have to have qualifications or be voted for (look at Tommy Robinson). Social media has lowered the barrier to entry to be a leader, generally for the worse, but don't underestimate someone likes this influence and power over a group of people.

Social media leaders are the new trade unions

 

[Daniel]

She managed to attract enough people in London to close Parliament square, the stock exchange and a bridge for several days. She is a 21st leader; which means you don't have to have qualifications or be voted for (look at Tommy Robinson). Social media has lowered the barrier to entry to be a leader, generally for the worse, but don't underestimate someone likes this influence and power over a group of people.

Social media leaders are the new trade unions

But who is brave enough to oppose this rubbish and say that just because you're 16 it doesn't mean you're right about everything. Indeed you're probably not right about anything, so pipe down and do some learning.

Clearly not our elected politicians, or our 'industry leaders'.

 

[Clive]

But who is brave enough to oppose this rubbish and say that just because you're 16 it doesn't mean you're right about everything. Indeed you're probably not right about anything, so pipe down and do some learning.

Clearly not our elected politicians, or our 'industry leaders'.

Your missing his point - a LOT of people agree with her and she has simply stepped up to lead them

You clearly don’t but that doesn’t make you right and them wrong, it just means you see things differently

 

[Daniel]

Your missing his point - a LOT of people agree with her

You clearly don’t but that doesn’t make you right and them wrong, it just means you see things differently

So there is no such thing as fact, just feelings and emotions based on the rantings of a teenager who needs a hug and adults who care?

Edit to say: I haven't missed his point, I want to know why noone in the public sphere is gently but firmly opposing the scaremongering if Extinction Rebellion and pointing out what measures are being taken.

Ag Twitter is falling into the same trap, it's become a race as to which farmer can virtue signal the hardest.

 

[CharcoalWally]

So there is no such thing as fact, just feelings and emotions based on the rantings of a teenager who needs a hug and adults who care?

It's 2019, and feelings and emotions are the new facts. We might not like it, but we have to deal with it.