'Climate Emergency': They're Coming For Your Pets
'Environmentalists' have had their beady green eyes on your pet dogs and cats for years but they're stepping up the assault now ahead of COP26 and also as they joyously surf the wave of economic and social destruction created by the fake 'Covid crisis', insisting that we must #buildbackbetter and #buildbackgreener. That process of 'building back' is to include dispensing with pets apparently, because their carbon pawprint is way too high and unacceptable to the High Priests of the Climate Action movement. This is very much an issue close to my heart, having currently two rescue German Shepherds and having spent more than half a lifetime in the company of animals, mainly rescue dogs, so I'll try not to descend into incoherent ranting and keep to the facts, difficult as it is to resist the urge to verbally abuse these misanthropic, dog-hating, cat-hating freaks. You see, there I go already!
On GMB this morning, they invited Donnachadh McCarthy on to talk about the need to eradicate pets from the face of the planet in order to save wild animals from extinction and the environment from degradation:
'Donna', you may - or may not - recall is, according to his Twitter profile:
"Co-founder Stop Killing Cyclists. Author "The Prostitute State - How Britain's Democracy Was Bought". Eco-auditor. Eco-columnist for Independent."
He's also followed by Richard Betts, senior 'climate scientist' at the UK Meteorological Office, now a prominent advocate of Extinction Rebellion activists' tactics and an apologist for the mythical 'climate crisis'. I have no idea if Betts supports the gradual eradication of pets and dogs in order to 'save the planet' but the company kept by 'climate scientists' in their effort to convince us all that there is in fact a scientifically demonstrable 'climate emergency' is increasingly dubious of late.
In the video here, reproduced in The Sun newspaper, credit must be given to Susannah Reid who calls out 'Donna' on this issue, rightly pointing out that we, as human beings, also have a carbon footprint and, if we're going to start getting rid of our pets by 'not replacing them' as loved family members, then when do we start getting rid of our kids - and ourselves? It's one thing giving up an inanimate object like a car - as adored and as absolutely necessary as affordable personal transport is for millions of people - but it's quite another thing to give up what most people consider a loved family member, albeit that they have four paws and a waggy tail. When Susannah points out that she 'puts her kids and her pets before the planet', Donna finds this 'shocking'. He actually thinks that addressing the so called 'extinction crisis' is more important than our allegiance to our companion animals and our own children - who, in his eyes, are just useless, superfluous creators of excess carbon and thus shoud be gradually eliminated, i.e don't breed and don't have pets. This is a cold, callous, deeply misanthropic and cruel perspective which is sadly more and more typical of these neo Malthusian climate crisis freaks who think that the final solution to imminent man-made Thermageddon is drastic depopulation, not just of human beings, but their 'useless eater' companion animals as well.
Donna says that a Biosciences Journal study published in 2019 demonstrates that "the state of the carbon emissions from the average dog is equivalent to two household's electricity emissions for a year". What does this even mean? The study he mentions is probably this one: 'The Ecological Paw Print of Companion Dogs and Cats'. As far as I can see, it mentions nothing about household electricity emissions. It compares the GHG emissions and "ecological paw print" (EPP) of cats and dogs in Japan, the Netherlands and China. This is what it says:
Meat-based diets require more energy and water and, therefore, have far greater environmental impacts than plant-based diets (Pimentel and Pimentel 2003, Reijnders and Soret 2003, Wirsenius et al. 2010, Okin 2017). For example, in China, commercial pet dry food has higher percentages of animal meat products than human foods. Therefore, the dietary EPP and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of companion dogs relying on commercial dry food was found to be much higher than the dogs relying on human leftover foods (Su et al. 2018b). If we look at differences between countries—assuming all companion dogs and cats eat commercial dry food—then the dietary EPP of all companion dogs and cats in China equals the dietary EF of between 70 million and 245 million Chinese people, in terms of homemade food (Su et al. 2018b). The carbon emissions resulting from the food consumption of these animals are equivalent to the emissions generated by the food consumption of between 34 million and 107 million Chinese people (Su et al. 2018b). Meanwhile, in Japan, companion dogs and cats may consume between 3.6% and 15.6% of the food eaten by Japanese people, and through their consumption, Japanese companions release between 2.5 million and 10.7 million tons of GHG per year (Su and Martens 2018).
The authors estimate the annual EPP in hectares (first column) and annual GHG emission in tons (second column) for the average sized dog (10-20kg), for dogs fed exclusively on dry kibble, as follows:
According to the Independent the average middle class family of four emits about 0.75 tons annually from electricity usage. Two families therefore emit 1.5 tons, which is indeed the same as the upper estimate of GHG emissions for a dog in China or Holland, but nearly twice the upper estimate for dogs in Japan. If we take the lower estimate, then the average dog uses less than half of just one family's electricity in China and Holland and one sixth of a family's average electricity emissions in Japan, therefore one twelth of two families' emissions. So Donna's assertion that your average pooch is the carbon criminal equivalent of two average families using electricity is stretching the truth somewhat, especially as your 'average dog' is probably not fed exclusively on a diet of industrially manufactured kibble.
But of course it stands to reason that dogs, being mainly carnivores, will be fed largely on a diet of animal protein and will therefore have an annual carbon footprint if that meat is produced commercially. Just as human beings eating meat (or even vegans) have a non negligible carbon footprint. Is this a valid excuse to abolish the age old human practice of keeping companion animals, especially canine companion animals? Because, you can be sure, it will never be enough. Once all the cats and dogs are gone, they'll be coming for your children, demanding that you only have two, then one, then stop breeding. They'll demand that you never eat meat again, then they'll demand that you remove yourself completely from the gene pool in order to reduce your personal carbon footprint to zero. It will be the only way to prevent the 'climate emergency'.
But back to dogs. What did dogs ever do for the human race? In response, it'll be like the Monty Python sketch 'What have the Romans ever done for us?'
The answers will be, throughout 40,000 years of co-evolving with domesticated wolves:
/ They helped us hunt wild prey
/ They gave us protection.
/ They gave us unconditional love
/ They protected our houses and our herd animals
/ They boosted our natural immunity via exposure to pathogens and by raising our oxytocin levels
/ By demanding walkies, they made us fitter and healthier, in mind and in body
/ Working in law enforcement and the military, they have apprehended criminals, kept us all safer and saved countless human lives
/ They have been the eyes and ears of disabled people and safe-guarded ill people by warning of e.g. imminent epileptic seizures
I could go on. The environmentalists want 'rid of them'. The new breed of 'environmentalists' actually want rid of humanity as well. They are the ultimate misanthropists who would love to see the 'virus' that is humanity wiped out, along with every single one of their domesticated agricultural and companion animals. Net Zero = Net Zero human race. Only when 'we' are all gone will the planet be happy again. Of course, 'they' (the neo-Malthusian Greens) will be the last to vacate, because they have to oversee the cull, naturally.