[Bounty Paid!] Go to Wall St in Front of N.Y. Stock Exchange

[BitterTea]

I'd say it's more difficult in a first world country.  Fresh fruits and vegetables are harder to come by in a country where the only farmers who can make a living are giant corporations who get paid by the government per acre of farmland.  It's fucking retarded that the US subsidizes corn prices for the entire world while family farmers need to work a full time job in addition to tending their land.

I have to disagree. In the U.S. (mostly thanks to cheap oil), we can get fruits and vegetables grown all over the world. In poorer countries (most likely to include the U.S. soon), the only available produce is that which is grown locally. I can only assume that this makes it more difficult to consume the nutrients that would otherwise be received from meat.

[FooDSt4mP]

I'd say it's more difficult in a first world country.  Fresh fruits and vegetables are harder to come by in a country where the only farmers who can make a living are giant corporations who get paid by the government per acre of farmland.  It's fucking retarded that the US subsidizes corn prices for the entire world while family farmers need to work a full time job in addition to tending their land.

I have to disagree. In the U.S. (mostly thanks to cheap oil), we can get fruits and vegetables grown all over the world. In poorer countries (most likely to include the U.S. soon), the only available produce is that which is grown locally. I can only assume that this makes it more difficult to consume the nutrients that would otherwise be received from meat.

Right, they can only get what is grown locally, which is how you get fresh food.  U.S. food is not fresh, it is processed in ways that reduce nutrient content, and it increases poverty in the areas we buy it from since it drives up local food prices.  You can grow your own, but due to property taxes and limitations on selling fresh produce, it is tremendously difficult for a family farmer to make a living off the land.  This to me is a big problem.  We have already lost a lot of the skills involved in food cultivation, and when we do fall into the "poorer countries" category, as you seem to think we will and I can definitely see as a possibilty, we won't have the infrastructure to feed ourselves.

[theymos]

First-word nations seem to be feeding themselves just fine.

[Bimmerhead]

Wow talk about veering off topic, must be time for a Goodwin intervention.  Of course everyone knows that Hiter was a vegetarian. 

It does seem that a lack of nourishment isn't really the problem today though, it's over nourishment.  Last year more people tied of obesity than of starvation.

Where are all those population-control advocates who said in the 1970s we were going to run out of food (and oil)?  Oh yeah, they forgot about technology and the free market.  They usually do.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

billions of people on this planet are vegetarian

[citation needed]

Were you serious or that was some kind of sarcasm ?

http://www.hinduonnet.com/2006/08/14/stories/2006081403771200.htm

40% of india, unless you count eggs as meat, than it's 31%.


http://www.google.com/search?q=population%20of%20india shows 1.155 billion, so 358 - 462 million in India alone.  Billions might be an exaggeration, but it's probably not too far from 1 billion.

Not too far from 1 billion is very far from "billions". So my point stands.
There is not so much vegetarians in the world as one would think.

Also, check out the wikipedia article. A lot of vegetarians don't eat meat from financial reasons, not ideological.

So there is even less "true" vegetarians out there.

[FooDSt4mP]

Not too far from 1 billion is very far from "billions". So my point stands.

Agreed, I admitted it was an exaggeration.

Also, check out the wikipedia article. A lot of vegetarians don't eat meat from financial reasons, not ideological.

So there is even less "true" vegetarians out there.

Irrelevant to my point, which was we don't need meat to survive.

First-word nations seem to be feeding themselves just fine.

Absolutely, but we aren't growing it, we're importing it.  The hypothetical situation being discussed was the dollar tanking.  If that happened, we wouldn't be able to afford the imports because of the cost of transportation.  Sure we would have plenty of corn, but most other foodstuffs would have huge price jumps.

[The Script]

WTF?  What happened to the super-sexy (according to Bruce) underwear model generating publicity for Bitcoin?  All the sudden everyone is talking about vegetarianism....