Guilt

The Paralysis of Thinking Big

jjacquet — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 15:57:04 +0000

The Paralysis of Thinking Big

Almost every hour I receive some new piece of information that I want to write about on this blog. And yet, as you'll notice, the posts are spotty. The truth is, there is simply too much to criticize. Just consider the oceans this week.

The IWC met to discuss whether to reopen commercial whaling, which, in terms of ethics, is a return to the Middle Ages. Reporters are still calling Daniel Pauly to get him to address the debate (there is no debate) that whales eat all of our seafood (of course they don't; we do). Apparently, the IWC did not reach an agreement so things remain the same. Japan, Iceland and Norway will continue to hunt illegally. Greenland did obtain the right to kill 10 humpback whales per year, claiming they need the food. Can we just package up some extra food for Greenland? Maybe we can redirect some BP clean-up funds for food to whaling nations, since sperm whales (which we've stopped killing directly but haven't managed to stop ruining their lives) and dolphins are among the victims in one of the worst environmental disaster in recent history (although people waste time arguing over that statement's precision). Not that anyone can get too worked up over sperm whales when fishermen are taking their own lives because of the decisions by a clumsy and greedy BP. Yesterday, people all across North America held hands to protest offshore drilling. A friend wondered why they didn't follow up by giving BP the middle finger. The reason: most people are good. But it doesn't take many to ruin it for the rest of us (as Craig Welch points out in Shell Games, his riveting tale of the geoduck fishery, which I already promoted and, this week, so does the Washington Post). Due to a small minority of people, Atlantic bluefin tuna are also probably screwed, because the Gulf is one of the two known spawning grounds for this imperiled giant. And if the oil spill doesn't get the bluefin tuna, the human appetite most surely will, which Paul Greenberg discusses in his heartfelt essay (excerpted from his forthcoming book) in the NYTimes Magazine. As fish like bluefin tuna reach the brink, we can be sure that fishing effort will be redirected to Antarctica, where the Marine Stewardship Council recently certified a krill fishery to the chagrin of conservationists and scientists alike (including me).

That's just this week in the oceans (and I'm sure I missed a bizillion stories). The land is no better, with a commercial highway proposed that would bisect the Serengeti and cut off one of the world's greatest migrations. And never mind the financial crisis, which was so perverse and circular that Wall Street's own analysts don't even understand it (I am still reeling with disgust after reading Michael Lewis' The Big Short). There is just so much information and, furthermore, so many causes. It is hard to come to terms with the idea of information overload (as George Dyson elegantly points out in his short essay on kayaks vs. canoes at The Edge) and hard to admit that there could be some point at which learning and caring too much can become paralyzing.

jjacquet Sun, 06/27/2010 - 11:57

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Guilt

Oceans

Shame

Collective Guilt and Climate Change

jjacquet — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 14:21:52 +0000

Collective Guilt and Climate Change

A new study suggests collective guilt can inspire action, but only if people feel reasonably hopeful that things can get better. The study, based on questionnaires to ~150 undergraduate students, also found that guilt was a more effective emotion in encouraging mitigation behavior than anxiety. The article is titled Collective guilt mediates the effect of beliefs about global warming on willingness to engage in mitigation behavior and is in press at the Journal of Environmental Psychology.

jjacquet Sat, 12/19/2009 - 09:21

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Guilt

No problem here, I'm carrying plenty. These days, every action I take is preceded by an analysis of the consequences for the environment and the planet. I'm doing everything I can to mitigate my impact, sometime under a burden of depression. Will it make a difference? Watching the behavior of some of my fellow Americans around me, I'm doubtful. I don't know how some people live with themselves.

Are students really representative sample of the population?

sounds interesting, but i couldn't find the full .pdf... i agree with romunov, students seem to be the most optimistic (idealistic maybe more fitting...naive?) about global change and sampling strictly undergraduates seems misleading.

"As suspected, people who felt that warming impacts were minor and fixable felt more guilt than people who believed that warming impacts would be severe. They were also more willing to do something about it."

i am more compelled to action through my belief and associated guilt of imminent and severe warming impacts. seeing headlines like "90% of fish stocks gone by 2050," it seems that the media and scientists to a degree work the doomsday angle thoroughly, not just to move units but to entice action.

I don't think the media or some scientists gross distortion of science helps any situation - it makes people worried and worried people aren't good for much except worrying.

Will it make a difference? Watching the behavior of some of my fellow Americans around me, I'm doubtful. I don't know how some people live with themselves.

Have you looked at FEASTARIAN ? For healthy eating and saving the planet have a feast.

By changing the way we think about our food and when we eat it, we can make a real difference.
It is not just buying the right fish, it is making it special and only occasionally [if we eat fish at all].
A Feastarian only eats fish or meat up to a maximum of three times a week.

We are encouraging everyone to take this simple step of eating less meat and fish as an immediate way of making a difference to a sustainable planet.

This is a way of making a positive difference through our choice of foods.

Please have a look at the website www.feastarian.org

It is not just buying the right fish, it is making it special and only occasionally [if we eat fish at all].
A Feastarian only eats fish or meat up to a maximum of three times a week.

Use the Force against the Dark Side of Food

jjacquet — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 15:13:00 +0000

Use the Force against the Dark Side of Food

Remember when food was just food? I don't. But I try to imagine it sometimes. I grew up in the throes of fast food, Halloween candy, and plates of bacon at breakfast buffets only to learn that I was just another victim of the food processing industry. Food issues are fascinating if for no other reason that they instill a constant sense of humility.

It took me traveling to South America to realize that popcorn could be made on a stove rather than in a moist microwaveable package. It's all very embarrassing.

But I am a human and his highly engineered crappy food is designed to appeal to that fallibility. Even our ethics shake under the heavy weight of our marketing friendly appetite. It's no surprise that people would want to do something about the mess of factory farms, overfishing, and trans fats. Enter the ethical food lovers, farmers markets, food co-ops, and organic labeling. Enter, for instance, Jonathan Safran Foer's latest book Eating Animals, which has turned actress Natalie Portman into a vegan activist and is just in time for Thanksgiving. Safran Foer's book also sparked a week-long discussion about ethical eating at the Huffington Post, including Daniel Pauly's piece on our love affair with fish.

With all this information about food, I have been compelled toward ambivalence. On the one hand, the issues are compelling and require large-scale change. On the other hand, the potential obsession about what we put in our bodies can lead to a sophisticated brand of narcissism.

To avoid becoming an eco-douchebag, an individual's convictions about personal consumption and disapproval should really be expressed vertically up the supply chain (to chefs, store managers, and seafood suppliers) rather than simply laterally (consumer-to-consumer reproach). We should not engage only as consumers or peers but as citizens and activists and community members. It should not be about organic food for "me and my body" but for my community, my country, my planet. We should be demanding that things change.

That is why Alice Waters, in addition to being a chef, founded Edible Schoolyard. When Patricia Majluf didn't like that anchovies in Peru were being wasted on fishmeal , she didn't say: anchovies are tasty and I shall eat them. No -- she got the entire country onboard. Imagine if the erudite HuffPolloi teamed up to demand Trader Joe's stop buying unsustainable seafood? We are under siege by the most enticing, least expensive calories of all time and the way to combat them is vertical agitation.

jjacquet Fri, 11/13/2009 - 10:13

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Consumed

Food Systems

Guilt

I don't see any grounds for ambivalence in what you've written. On the one hand, we have issues that any reasonable person can see are compelling and urgent (vast suffering, possible human extinction, etc.). On the other hand, we have the fact that it's annoying to get nagged about stuff ("consumer to consumer reproach").

When someone is doing something bad, it's not wrong to point it out to them. Are we supposed to just sit there and watch when we see someone behaving unethically? When someone notices you doing something bad, you're SUPPOSED to feel guilty and ashamed. In that situation, the problem isn't the obnoxious person with the audacity to criticize you instead of "agreeing to disagree" and "respecting your choices." The problem is you, doing something wrong.

Everyone is not supposed to feel good about themselves all the time. That's a myth we're trained to believe so people can sell us things. We aren't children. We're responsible for our moral choices. If you can't eat something and hear about where it came from without feeling uncomfortable, you shouldn't be eating it.

I do remember when food was just food. I remember the huge gardens, the massive efforts at canning and preserving the harvest.

I also remember the slaughter of the pigs, the cows, the chickens, and the deer and elk. I remember the stink of the cellars where potatoes and onion were stored...

And I don't miss those days at all. My mother and father spent a lot of what we now call leisure time growing, raising, hunting, and preserving food for the family.

I have not forgotten the skills I learned in childhood and I have certainly not forgotten my mother's joy at not having to spend most of every day engaged in them. I am striving to pass these skills to my children and grandchildren... as well as other self-reliance tools, but I sincerely hope we never have to go back to subsistence living.

Just because a lot of vegetarians are also obsessively scrupulous about various aspects doesn't mean individual change is worthless. Each person has a ripple effect and we all vote with our dollars. It is possible to eat simply, low on the food chain, much like the majority world does. I've even worked out a system that covers a whole made-at-home-from-scratch diet. Easy, tasty, includes convenient frozen servings, healthy, and very cheap.

Lynn Shwadchuck
http://www.10in10diet.com/

There's such a thing as a Nerds "Rope"? I've seen it all now.

> popcorn could be made on a stove rather than in
> a moist microwaveable package ...

Scary. I was in my 20s before I learned how to make it in a heavy pot on a stove, rather than in a wire basket over an open fire!

I heard someone on NPR last week comment that most of us could cope with most things if we were dropped into the 1950s, or 1920s, or 1890s -- and the greatest changes would be found in the kitchen, where most of us would be utterly at a loss trying to cook as our great-grandparents did.

ENOUGH WITH GOING AFTER TRADER JOES! Whole Foods is ten times worse than Trader Joes - they just played ball with Green Peace's idiotic campaign that is not based on any real evaluation of a companies sustainability - but rather if the company acknowledges Green Peace or not.

I buy farmed raised Pangasius and Striped Bass from Trader Joes and when I go into Whole Foods all I see if their MSC certified Chilean Sea Bass and Atlantic Cod.

In honor of your reference to "Using the Force."

Grocery Store Wars... "We are living in dark times...."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVrIyEu6h_E

The good news is that fifteen years ago, this sort of discussion was hardly taking place. When I used to talk to others about the wonderful world of "Organic" food, I often felt I was an alien from another planet...

Maybe it's growing up on a farm that produced both milk and chicken meat (cows made the milk, not the chickens), but I never had any illusions about where my food was coming from. And I wouldn't become a vegetarian for ethical reasons. Environmental reasons? Maybe. Maaayyybe. Pretty sure we could make meat sustainable, though.

Vegans are just being ridiculous, though. Except maybe in the US. My dad was horrified when he toured a Minnesotan dairy farm.

The challenges we face are multiple, most of them directly caused by our bloated population. Six-plus billion voracious, tool-and-weapons-wielding apex predators scouring the planet daily, demanding to be fed. The scale of it boggles the mind.

No species on earth has ever changed their eating habits in order to save their ecosystem. Until now, if a species overpopulated, it overran it's ecosystem, destroyed it's food sources, and suffered a devastating decline or even extinction.

With technological advances, we've staved off the devastating decline artificially. For a while.

Making the changes is interwtined with the challenges of fighting poverty, educating the impoverished masses, and convincing those with money and power that it isn't just all about struggling to exploit resources and keep the poor out of their awareness.

Getting everybody to stop eating fish, for example, is going to be about as successful a strategy as getting everybody to practice abstinence so they don't get AIDS.

Come one, everyone and do the right thing: stop having sex and stop eating meat and fish! Why won't everyone just see the light and get on board?

I don't think it's that simple.

By facing crises we learn to re-think our approach to living on Earth. When the fish run out, people will find new things to eat. When the money runs out, people will look to other sources such as trading things with their friends to get what they need.

As for the people who are supposed to be helping manage the economy on a grand scale, the Wall Street bankers and their buddies in the White House and on K Street have shown us exactly how much foresight and altruism they have about helping anybody, that is except helping themselves to other people's money and buying places at the most expensive meat and fish consuming exatravaganzas they can finance for themselves.

It's going to get worse, much worse, before it gets better.

Hopefully those of us that make it through the traumatic changes coming will have a post-WWII style moment where we look up out of all the destruction, and say "Gee, we almost just destroyed the whole freaking world. Maybe, just maybe, we don't want to do this again."

That seems to be the moment when people understand they need to change. Not back when they were comfortable enough to ignore all the warning signs.

send a letter to the President and each of your elected officials to urge reform of agricultural policy at www.raiseyourfork.com

Jennifer Jacquet wrote in the O.P.

"We should not engage only as consumers or peers but as citizens and activists and community members. It should not be about organic food for "me and my body" but for my community, my country, my planet. We should be demanding that things change."

I wish consumer, community and citizen activism could make a difference but with one in every six people on the planet going hungry, producers just can't hear you.

Peruvian hipsters adding anchovies to their ceviche out of national pride is a nice gesture but that really does nothing to effect the change you describe.

I am with yogi-one on the fallout from the population bomb and fear the sustainable food utopias people are describing are tenable only in the aftermath of global plague.

I'll temper this deeply depressing post with....Ruhlman's popcorn:

http://blog.ruhlman.com/ruhlmancom/2009/01/popcorn.html

TeÅekkÃ¼rler.BaÅarÄ±lar

Wait until you learn the truth about making applesauce. (It's not rocket science.)

We only have ourselves to blame for our food system. Bad harvests in 1915-16 caused the price of food to skyrocket 20%. Urban voters demanded gov't action. We were importing wheat and beef from Russia. Our entry into WWI increased the need for a reliable, national food supply. Additionally, a national agenda aimed at increasing exports of manufactured goods relied on cheap food to keep labor costs down. Finally, technologies such as refrigeration made the long distance fresh food transportation a realistic option. It's a long road from 1916 to microwaved popcorn, but the line of reasoning hasn't changed. Cheap food is "in the public interest", convenience is something people will pay for (especially when they have two jobs and no time to cook).

We the people were actively involved in creating this system, we're going to have to be equally active changing it.

I always like indignation about the food industry. We do not need the Whole Food "organics", nor do we need the health food industry's food supplements and pills. We need to eat real food that comes from uncompromised soil. Ideally it will be from our own yards but when it cannot, it can be from the farmes who sell their wares at the local market.

Limit the food that comes in a package.

All you "loving" concerned people that talk about how overpopulated the World is need just go ahead and do the right thing...

Kill yourselves now you greedy Eugenics brainwashed fools!

If you don't want to die now then maybe you could read about how a Developed Industrialized Nation will automatically lower their birth rates to below replacement level.

Currently the "Western" countries enjoy a 1.3 average birthrate.

It takes at least 2.0 birthrates for stable replacement.

So if you feel that preventing the rest of the World to develop and pull themselves out of starvation is a good thing for the Earth.

You should go hang out with Ted Turner, or Henry Kissinger, or just do Earth a favor and lead by example and just die already.

Ãzellikle son zamanlarÄ±n en popÃ¼ler cilt yenileme Ã¼rÃ¼nÃ¼dÃ¼r. Pembe Maske bir Ã§ok Ã¼nlÃ¼ isim tarafÄ±ndan da yoÄun olarak kullanÄ±lmaktadÄ±r. YÃ¼zdeki kÄ±rÄ±ÅÄ±klÄ±klar, sivilce ve sivilcelerin sebep olduÄu deformasyonlarÄ± gidermede kullanÄ±lan Pembe yÃ¼z maskesi ve inceltici, selÃ¼lit giderici olarak kullanÄ±lan pembe vÃ¼cut maskesi olmak Ã¼zere iki farklÄ± Ã¼rÃ¼n mevcuttur.

Morton on Arts vs. Science [Guilty Planet]

sb admin — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 17:59:15 +0000

Morton on Arts vs. Science [Guilty Planet]

Oliver Morton wrote a delightful book all about photosynthesis called Eating the Sun: How Plants Power the Planet, which I reviewed earlier this year for Search Magazine (R.I.P.) under the title "A Song for the Heartless". One of my favorite passages in the book beautifully explains the difference between art and science:

Discoveries feel determined. They are there to be made, and if one person doesn't, another will. This doesn't lessen the achievement; indeed it can give it spice. The thought that 'this is the way the world is--and I am the first to see it as such' is an intoxicating one. It is not unique to science- a poet may have the same feeling, or a painter- but the scientist who feels this way has the feeling in full measure, because he knows that it is in the nature of science that what he first sees as a truth will, if he is right, eventually be received as such universally. It will change the way the world is seen by everyone. No artistic insight can make this claim so universally. But the other side of this power is that a truth we accept as truly universal loses the need for an author. It becomes part of the way the world is, regardless of who saw it first, and in time the identity of whoever it may have been who first looked out from that particular peak in Darien is lost.

sb admin Wed, 10/28/2009 - 13:59

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No New MPAs? Obama: Don't Do Us Like That

jjacquet — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 22:50:45 +0000

No New MPAs? Obama: Don't Do Us Like That

It's no secret: I voted for Obama. I did a lot more than that. I called the 'Impeach Obama' bluff. I begged him to give up fish, although I don't think he has yet.

I guess giving up seafood can wait. This month, President Obama gave me a harder pill to swallow. As many of you know, the Obama administration announced this month we could expect no additional marine reserves. California is still pushing their reserve designations with their MPAs work campaign, even if recreational fishers are unhappy. Others are rallying support for a National Ocean Policy.

Now I know Obama is a man of the people but there are people out there who put a lot of energy into that world uninhabited by humans--the oceans. Why couldn't some of that $787 billion in stimulus dollars be spent on marine reserves? Better yet, how about an 'ocean tax' on the $20 billion in bonuses those douchebag Wall Street bankers gave themselves amidst an economic crisis where Americans are losing their jobs and their homes (homes many of those institutions haphazardly financed)?

Marine reserves are not only important in a thriving economy. WIth less than 1% of the global ocean protected, the U.S. should be a leader in showing that marine protection can happen in good times and bad. We should not allow the designation of new marine reserves should not wane under this administration. Please, Obama: don't do us like that.

jjacquet Tue, 10/20/2009 - 18:50

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Guilt

Solutions

Wow.

From disenfranchised to disillusioned in less than a year: http://knwd.blogspot.com/2008/11/big-bad-bailouts-revisited.html

I didn't actually think it would happen quite so fast!

Amen on the 'ocean tax' idea. Goldman Sachs can have naming rights, for all I care, of any new MPA they pay to protect. Call it "Goldfinger Reserve" or something, in deference to James Bond being a fan of MPAs...http://www.mapswork.org

Erik, Orion Grassroots Network

Its clear from yesterday's online address that Obama likes big challenges, like health care reform. This is good, because funding the existing marine sanctuary system is probably a bigger challenge than adding new ones.

I understand your sentiment is to protect more habitat, but given the current economic climate, the best way to do that is probably to expand sanctuaries, rather than add new ones. The US National Marine Sanctuary System is chronically underfunded. They need investment and support.

That said, Alaska should not be without a sanctuary. I wish the Administration had not responded flat out like that. More than a few pristine Alaskan bays are currently under threat from development.

I would rather have my tax dollars go to some jellyfish than have it go to Wall Street. It's a much better investment.

Reserves, sanctuaries, MPAs. Maybe its all just semantics.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2009/oct/22/alaska-polar-bea…

The Obama administration â¦ added a layer of protection for polar bear today, setting aside 200,000 square miles of Alaskan coastline and waters as their "critical habitat". The decision would put restrictions on oil and gas drilling along the north coast of Alaska.

"Less than 1% of the global ocean protected"...

Protected from what? The majority of high seas areas are already covered by RFMOs (of varying degrees of effectiveness) or RFMOs are in development. The IMO's Marine Pollution (MARPOL) conventions have done a decent job of reducing oil discharge. When you say we should set aside new areas for protection, what are we setting it aside from? Yes, overfishing is a major issue, but the 2006 Magnuson Act renewal is pointing us in the right path to end overfishing, as evidenced by industry contraction underway in New England.

If we really want to protect America's oceans, we have to find a way to convince land-users to change their practices, not just ocean-users. That means storm water discharge and leaky septic tanks in Puget Sound, concentrated animal feed operations on the Mississippi, and suburban development in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, among many other examples, and for god's sake action on CO2 to deal with ocean acidification.

Fishermen and fishery managers are not without blame, but i'm hesitant to support MPAs for MPAs sake when the more significant problems are upstream and on dry land.

Aquanautix: re: Alaska. Rep. Don Young (R-AK) is a key player who has vowed to block any of the ocean management or MPA type plans now being proposed, including HR 21, recently said of it "You may try to work it through the House, you may have the Speaker help you out, but I'll stop it dead in the Senate, because you're not going to mess with my waters in Alaska, you're not going to mess with my fishermen as you've done in the past," Young added.

Don't sound like good odds.

Erik, Orion Grassroots Network

"Why couldn't some of that $787 billion in stimulus dollars be spent on marine reserves?" Maybe because Obama did not think that would stimulate the economy. Also, we are not spending dollars, we are incurring debt. Finally, in regard to the bankers, I think enema bag would be a more appropriate trope than "douchebag"; but I doubt this to be a proper forum for either term.

I support Obama but please for God's sake open your damn eyes, for the past 8 years the US has created tons of MPAs: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13300363/

hmmm... maybe this is about someone's ego because they shoot down everyone else's ideas for sustainability in favor for there one blanket solution... who could that be?

TeÅekkÃ¼rler.BaÅarÄ±lar.

Guilt and Shame: What's the Difference?

jjacquet — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 08:37:04 +0000

Guilt and Shame: What's the Difference?

A classically held anthropological view is that "shame results from a public exposure of some impropriety or shortcoming whereas guilt results from more private events."

I concur with the anthropological notion that shame is the more public emotion (and also, that shame is likely a more primitive emotion that served adaptive functions in early developmental stages) and that is the definition that I will adhere to on this blog. In other words, the shame I will refer to is closely related to embarrassment (which distinctly depends on social disapproval, although embarrassment is often related to more trivial transgressions while shame is related to more serious failures). But I am interested in wider opinions.

In the 1990s, psychologists tried to test these assumptions empirically by subjecting 182 undergraduates with intense questionnaires (it should be noted that 3/4 of their subjects were female). In this study*, researchers found that shame and guilt both occurred most often in social contexts but that "solitary" shame and guilt experiences were also not uncommon.

However, the researchers did find:

When feeling shame, people felt more intensely scrutinized by others, and they focused more on others' thoughts (as opposed to their own thoughts) about themselves than they did when they were feeling guilt.

Consider people who urinate on the street. If caught, they would probably feel something closer to shame than guilt (ditto for the dog-owners who don't pick up after their pets or for litterbugs or for politicians caught rendezvousing with mistresses) . We are going to explore some case studies and talk about the benefits and dangers of shaming techniques. I hope you join in the discussion.

*Flicker, L. and D. Barlow. 1996. Are shame, guilt, and embarrassment distinct emotions? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 70: 1256-1269.

jjacquet Fri, 10/02/2009 - 04:37

Tags

Guilt

Shame

In the language of recovery (Alcoholics Anonymous and related organizations) shame includes a sense of worthlessness or self-loathing. Guilt is the recognition that someone has done something wrong, may need to atone for their act, and should change their behavior.

Surely the difference is whatever the dictionary you grew up with defines it to be?

In some societies, for example, they are distinguished by being associated with different people: the guilt belongs to the woman who rejects an arranged marriage, and the shame to her family. Since it is hard for any Western to even imagine what that particular kind of shame feels like when it's inside your head, it's say the mistake is probably to use either word as if it objectively describes a universal emotion.

It seems that the question could be very useful esp. when studying motivated behavior. But I can't imagine subjects being able to describe the difference between a shame or guilt experience accurately in terms of their own subjective experience. They could know whether the inducement was personal recognition of - or social exposure of some transgression - and answer accordingly (the definitional case). But I suspect that since being asked to describe their experience and knowing that someone would be able to see their answer even without being able to connect it to them personally could easily have an effect on their response. i.e. what could have been a personal guilt response could become a shame response to some extent just because the question and answer is inherently a public transaction. (I can't imagine anyone being able to objectively analyze their private feelings and accurately distinguish between the two outside the context of the emotion causing event.) Can you?

Since I don't have easy access to the paper I'll order it through my public library and see if they overcame this somehow. But as Ian points out, different cultures learn to attach these two emotions to very different behavior and so that seems to argue for neither being innate and therefore even objectively accurate answers would be largely the result of socialization. This is a very interesting topic. Thanks

I wonder how much psychology we think we know would change if so much of it weren't based on undergrad subjects.

I wonder how much psychology we think we know would change if so much of it weren't based on undergrad subjects.

Agreed; especially since it's usually undergrad psych majors. My friend often complains about how a few tend to always second-guess the experiments.

Here are both clearly defined, I think that the confusion arises because both are in charge of a social function, but notice there are different one.

Guilt: understood as a social phenomenon that happens between people as much as it happens inside them. Guilt appears to arise from interpersonal transactions and vary with interpersonal context. In particular, guilt patterns appear to be most common, and most consistent in the context of communal relationships, which are characterized by expectations of mutual concern. Guilt serves various relationship-enhancing functions, including motivating people to treat partners well avoid transgressions and redistributing emotional distress.

Shame: located primarily as a social emotion, with a normative function of monitoring social bonds between people - rather than, as it is usually framed, as a 'self-conscious', 'negative' and 'pathological'emotion. This reframing of the healthier experience highlights the function of shame in building and strengthening relationships.

For more info about this check:http://singyourownlullaby.blogspot.com/2009/07/emotions.html and also read the comments they are fantastic

On trains in England there was a sign about riding without a ticket. Said if you got caught, people would look at you. Being from Texas, I did not get their point.

TeÅekkÃ¼rler.BaÅarÄ±lar.

The Guilty Language of Offsets

jjacquet — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 09:03:35 +0000

The Guilty Language of Offsets

In NewScientist today, there is a little article that describes the different types of carbon offsets you can purchase. It's not too informative and I much prefer articles with a little more of a critical eye, such as this 2007 piece in BusinessWeek or this piece from the NYTimes blog on confusing carbon labels. (By the way, be sure to check out the UK offset parody Cheat Neutral).

Truth is, I have been bored by carbon offsets for ages (ever since I did my master's related to carbon trading--back in 2002, when they were still calling it 'carbon sequestration' and the concept had not yet burgeoned into the fancier 'offset market' and the neocon eco-manifesto designed to fleece sensitive yuppies it is today; my then supervisor at Cornell, Duane Chapman, used to joke around about a "Logs in Space" program to sequester carbon). Stocking stuffer or not, carbon offsets just aren't that interesting.

What I do find fascinating is the guilty language associated with offsets, which was prominent in the NewScientist article. From the lede:

If you are serious about reducing your emissions, opt for a staycation rather than jetting off on an exotic holiday. But if you must fly or indulge in other carbon-intensive activities, carbon offsetters now promise redemption.

Redemption! And here is another guilt-laden title from the climatebiz blog: San Francisco Int'l Airport Letting Fliers Relieve Guilt with Carbon Offsets. Here is Offset away our guilt and here is Pearl Jam Offsets Their Tour: Rock out Guilt-Free or, a personal favorite from the Economist, Carbon offsets: Sins of emission, wherein offsets are compared to the sale of Catholic indulgences:

Just as Luther criticised indulgences, critics of offsetting argue that the ability to buy retrospective forgiveness for sins of emission is no substitute for not sinning in the first place.

What is it about offsets specifically that lends them to guilt-laden language? Is it that they can be so aptly compared to indulgences? Why, for instance, is that kind of language never used for drinking bottled water or having three or more children?

*Sept. 23 update: Apparently, for the climate change meeting this week in New York, the U.N. offset its carbon emissions "by directing money to a power project in rural Andhra Pradesh, India, through which agricultural leftovers like rice husks and sunflower stalks are turned into electricity for the local grid." Social responsibility or greenwashing? You decide.

jjacquet Tue, 09/22/2009 - 05:03

Tags

Climate

Consumed

Guilt

Psychology of Conservation

The curious thing is that the logic behind carbon offsets is at least somewhat sound (at least in a "don't do any more damage" diet Coke and Big Mac kind of way), but the way people think of them as a free pass to pollute strikes me as an invitation to offset inflation.

I find the idea of buying carbon offsets -- and selling them -- to be fundamentally dishonest, and I think I'm not alone.

I came to this view as part of a family that owns timberland. We were being inundated a few years ago with pleas to sell our "offsets".

While we may have more than our fair share of offsets, that does not give us permission to spend them by being wasteful, nor does that give others the right to buy them to make them "feel" better about their wastefulness.

It's being compared to indulgences because it is exactly like them. All it does is maintain the status quo... no reduction in the carbon footprint is required, just as no reduction in sin was required. The responsibility is merely being distributed in a more "equal" manner.

Well, I think if by purchasing an offset, something happened that otherwise would not happen, then there is some benefit, no? If a group of trees is already growing, then selling their 'offset' is clearly of no value, but if by purchasing an offset a group of trees is planted (or protected from being cut down) then there will be a real reduction in atmospheric carbon.

I've always favored a straight tax on waste. This of course is not as attractive because no one really stands to profit from this (except the government, I suppose...).

Any updates or inside scoop on straight taxing waste? I've read a lot of great ideas and theory...have yet to see a tangible offering.

I absolutely love your blog. Funny as hell, insightful, sharp as a tack. Great work.

Carbon offsets=zero carbon reduction+money for environmental extortionists. Makes no sense but lots of cents. Only a fool would pay it and only a simpleton will believe it. Al Gore!

TeÅekkÃ¼rler.BaÅarÄ±lar.

Guilt-Free Fish a Flop

jjacquet — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 15:08:49 +0000

Guilt-Free Fish a Flop

A lot of people who don't want to feel guilty about eating seafood will look for the MSC logo. The MSC (or Marine Stewardship Council) supposedly certifies sustainable fisheries. They aim to reward good fisheries management by providing access to niche markets (the same markets concerned with their bread slicers) and the lure of higher profits (although this hasn't seemed to happen so far). Four recent events reveal the fishiness of MSC-certification -- a process many fisheries scientists supported at its inception but now doubt.

1) Certified wasted fish

Daniel Pauly and I have an article out today at the Vancouver-based Tyee on why the proposed MSC-certification of Peruvian anchovy is a bad idea. Whether or not the fish is caught sustainably is beside the point. The real issue, in this case, is what is done with the fish after they are caught--and, in the case of the anchovy, these tasty little fish are turned into fishmeal to feed factory-farmed fish or pigs and chickens (animals that shouldn't be eating fish to begin with). It's like certifying wood as sustainable and then turning it into mulch.

2) A sustainable fishery shut down?

Next up, our old friend pollock--a fish that makes its way into the McDonald's Filet-o-Fish and a fish that dons the MSC seal of approval. However, according to this recent article in the Economist, the pollock fishery is also in dire Bering straits. Friends at Greenpeace (who never approved of the MSC-certification due to the fact that the certification ignored ecosystem effects, such as how much pollock sea lions in the area need for food) heard that pollock stock assessments are so low that under the fishery rules, the pollock fishery should be shut down for next season. If one of the best managed or most heavily managed fisheries in the world shuts down, what does that say for management? And what does it say for the MSC?

3) An ugly fish with an ugly fate

Hoki is another fish that makes its way into the McDonald's Filet-o-Fish and this fishery off of New Zealand was certified by the MSC in 2001. You can read all about its demise in the New York Times article out last week. Environmental groups have always been concerned about the high levels of accidentally caught sharks and rays, but now it seems that the hoki themselves are in trouble. The hoki stock is in decline and the quota has decreased by two-thirds. If a fishery is in trouble and managers lower the quota, the MSC would say that's a good sign--management is responding to a fishery in trouble. But a fishery in trouble is a bad sign for marine ecology and for the premise of sustainability.

4) Pacific hake doesn't make the grade

Pacific hake is another popular fish for pulverized products like fish patties and fish sticks (see a pattern yet?). It is also up for MSC-certification. Oceana and the Monterey Bay Aquarium have co-authored a 50-page objection to the certification on several grounds. To quote the Oceans letter: "The Pacific hake fishery is being managed closer to the edge of disaster than sustainability." The two groups argue management does not take ecosystem effects into account (like the fact that sea lion feed on lots of hake). Estimates of stock status indicate that the stock is now at the lowest spawning biomass ever observed and is projected to decline further in the next three years under current harvest management.

These examples show how the MSC certification process has been co-opted by industry. But there is some good news: they also show that there is pressure to certify fisheries due to a heartening desire from consumers to have sustainable fish.

The problem is, most fisheries simply aren't sustainable under their current management practices. Putting a logo on them doesn't change that even if consumers might feel less guilt at dinnertime. Fisheries are broken and the MSC is broken as a result. We need to fix them both. And fast.

jjacquet Mon, 09/14/2009 - 11:08

Tags

Apologies if this is a bit off-topic, but I followed the link in the sidebar for the jellyfish burger pic. Are there any sustainability standards or things I should be looking for when I buy jellyfish? I wouldn't put it on a burger, but it's lovely in salads.

Fisheries are broken and the MSC is broken as a result

Hailing from the Monterrey bay myself, and being an avid fish eater (mainly in the form of sushi and shashimi) along with begin a marine biology student - I have to say it is quite scary to see the state of the current fisheries. I try to limit the fish I eat and follow the recommendation on what types of fish are the most sustainable, but it always seems to be the tastiest fish are the most in danger. I fear it is too late...

I fully understand the MSC argument that the fisheries they certify are not perfect but that MSC is a useful "carrot" to get them to improve - However, slapping the MSC logo on products and telling consumers that these are already sustainable fisheries now and not fisheries working towards future sustainability is just plain WRONG!

atheists caused 911 - treat them accordingly

you have forfeit your life

http://www.sotoman.info/freethinking/index.php?topic=1198.0

"whether or not the fish are caught sustainably is besides the point". Hmmm -- what then is the point of sustainability? Is it to impose narrow judgement values on the ulitmate use of fish or is it to promote harvest levels that provide fish now and into the future. What if 0.5 lb of anchovies produced 1 lb of cultured fish? Would that make it sustainable?

I couldn't agree more with your assessment of the MSC as co-opted by industry. Our organization has been trying to get them to reconsider certifying the Ross Sea toothfish and Antarctic krill fisheries but they won't even listen to the scientists who peer review their reports. It really seems that once they consider certifying a fishery, they find reasons that it lives up to their standards, rather than putting the burden of proof on the fishery.

Red, the point of sustainability is to ensure resource availability indefinitely. With many fish stocks in trouble, it is certainly not sustainable to increasingly turn relatively plentiful fish like anchovies into fishmeal to be used on polluting fish farms when we could be using them to feed people. We absolutely should consider whether such practices are the best possible uses of our resources when we consider their overall sustainability.

Fishmeal Guilt Free (and highly sustainable grass fed) Protein:

Rabbit Burger.
Goat Stew.
Sheep Sausage.
Yak T-bone.
Buffalo Jerky.

Maybe some educational consumer ad campaigns need to be developed and collaborated upon for the fishmeal free protein industry (and the economic salvation of the sustainable fishing industry...).

Marketing is such an interesting arena when introducing sustainable, and or alien product concepts to new cultures. Studying how coffee was introduced into the Japanese tea drinking culture is mind bending, and at first thought to be entirely impossible. Yet, with proper marketing...

Imagine for example in the year 2025, introducing an altruistic sustainable fish free animal protein product in a parallel science fiction universe on the planet Asmu, called: Kentucky Fried Rabbit. Which of course, we would probably not be able to be call this product K.F.R., due to potential legal concerns on Asmu about trademark infringements, so instead we would call it, Texas Fried Rabbit. Then there might be a potential barrage of offended Texans and Animal Rights concerns if such entities existed on Asmu, so then the name would have to be changed again to Martian Prepared Lagomorpha, or âMPLâ for short. Which is even better, because MPL further alleviates any potential emotional discomforts in the partaking of eating cooked animal parts. It is just cleaner this way, trust the experts, clowns are excellent distancing mediums for introducing new emerging markets to carnivore diets on Asmu.

An Asmu ad could sound like this (with of course a pounding techno bass beat rap in the back ground, as food images are assimilated better with music): âYum Yo, lets go down and bucket up, man up on MPL. Fish free. Dude. Yum Yo. Chill yo worry on the empty sea. MPL, so ocean fish be free. Man up Yo...â [Soft robotic synth gender neutral voice over: âMan Up Foods brought to you by Foods For Our Future, because we donât want you to be hungry...â].

âMan Up Foods! Foods for our Future!â (Of course we then Â© Copyright, and Reserve All Rights to all this stuff on the Planet Asmu...)

I am still working on the thumbnails and copy for inter-galactic Venus vegetable and soy based burger ad campaigns...

Marketing is such an interesting arena when introducing sustainable, and or alien product concepts to new cultures.

I can only imagine where the link on v-pills would take me.

By the way... WWF (creators of MSC) are now funding and developing a version for aquaculture (ASC) so expect to see "sustainable" farmed raised salmon in the near future next to the "sustainable" chilean sea bass in Whole Foods.

We should probably lay off the wild fishery for a generation, and streamline our fish farming tech. People have been farming fish for thousands of years. It's about time we brought it up to date; to find the fishery equivalent of hydroponic farming; eco friendly, safe seafood. Nature needs a rest! I used to eat swordfish once a week. Now I hate to watch the TV shows where they kill these majestic fish, knowing that they are steadily killing them all off. They should limit the fishery to hand tools; drop long lining and nets altogether, and allow sword and tuna fishing only by harpoon and single hook and lines. Fishing will stop sooner or later, when we run out. Best to stop for a while BEFORE the stocks deplete below the tipping point.

Claire - don't you think people would eat those anchovies if they could? Apparently there is no market for them as they would surely command a higher price as human food than animal feed. Why couldn't their "highest and best use" be to produce fish that humans do eat assuming the anchovies are harvested sustainably (not overfished or overfishing occuring).
I am begining to think there are two definition of sustainability- one that is used to speak negatively about almost all fishing and one that understands overfishing and minimizing environmental effects of fishing.

David Ebert - I guess you missed the stock assessemnt that shows swordfish are fully recovered from the overfishing that occurred some years ago. In fact they are now underfished in US waters-- there are not enough fishermen left to catch the US quota.

Red -
You're right about their being 2 definitions one is the adjective that is used loosely by the public and businesses for maintaining a healthy supply of something and the other is MSY which is the inflection point of the population growth curve that is used to determine how much fish to take. Unfortunately fishing a stock down to MSY has been shown to be ineffective at keeping it "sustainable". Regardless of the stock status of Swordfish, we should not be using long-line gear to catch them because of the baycatch of sharks, birds, turtles, and marine mammals.

From NMFS NOAA in regards to the swordfish fishery: "This means that annual mortality and serious injury of certain marine mammal stocks in this fishery are greater than or equal to 50% of the Potential Biological Removal level (the maximum number of animals, not including natural mortalities, that may be removed from a marine mammal stock while allowing it to be at sustainable levels)."

Jennifer,

Included in your concerns should also be the Gulf of California, Mexico Sardine Fishery which is due for assessment next week- another fishery where about 85% of that catch is also devoted to fishmeal for animal consumption:

http://www.msc.org/track-a-fishery/in-assessment/pacific/gulf-of-califo…

I think you're trying to put too many ethical issues under the sustainable fish banner when you criticize the anchovy fishery assessment by MSC. http://blogfishx.blogspot.com/2009/09/ethically-correct-fish-and-fishin…

Jennifer,

This is the first time I have commented on your blog, I usually read it and agree wholeheartedly with the interesting things that you write here, but this time I have to disagree.

There are a number of issues which you have omitted in your article on the MSC, perhaps one of the major ones is that the NZ hoki fishery has actually started to show signs of recovery (http://www.thefishsite.com/fishnews/10039/good-news-for-new-zealands-ho…). Whether this is because of MSC certification or not could be debated, but they have made a number of positive changes in this fishery since being certified which it is unlikely that they would have made in the absence of the MSC conditions.

You can also argue about whether using anchovies for fishmeal is sensible or not (I don't think it is), but this really has nothing to do with whether it is sustainable or not, and therefore has nothing to do with the MSC.

The real problem I have is that you haven't got any suggestions for how else we should go about improving fisheries. It is true that the MSC is cheating a bit when it certifies fish as 'sustainable' (it should say "working towards sustainability", but the marketing guys would struggle to get it off the ground). But the truth is that there is really nothing else that has come close to implementing change in global fisheries.

Sadly not everyone shares your passion for saving the world and fisheries have got into the mess they're in precisely because of the fact that humans are not long-term thinkers. Writing impassioned pleas asking people to stop eating fish is not the solution to global overfishing, maybe the MSC isn't either but it's doing a lot more than anyone else is.

jd,

I only have a brief moment and could put "pen to paper" in a more comprehensive fashion a little later if required, however I wanted to quickly address your contention that what the fishmeal is used for "has nothing to do with" whether it is sustainable or not- it all depends on what you consider to be the context ("definition" if you will) of what sustainability actually means...

if world population continues to increase and the demand for meat fed on fishmeal increases accordingly, the demand on the fishery will be that much greater, therefore I would argue that sustainability absolutely has to do with the projected future of and future demands that could be made upon any given species or fishery.

In the case of Peru, as articulated in the September 14th Tyee article Something's Fishy about this Eco-Stamp of Approval, half of Peru's 15 million population live under conditions of critical poverty and a quater of infants are malnourished. One could easily argue that a significant portion of the five to ten million tonnes of anchovies caught in that fishery each year (a large percentage of which are sold cheaply to the Norwegian-owned salmon farms in Chile that consume more fish than they produce) could alleviate those conditions and in the grand scheme of things (perhaps even as in some parts of Europe, elevating the anchovy to a valuable food for humans) be seen as more sustainable than simply the population dynamics of the species itself in that region or if it is "well managed". Add to this the recent collaboration with Wal-Mart, and there comes a subtle shift from certifying "good" fisheries to certifying "big" fisheries...

I believe that fies in the face of any form of "eco-certification" and therefore MSC certification should be challenged in terms of what really is sustainable practice.

Mark,
MSC is supposed to be ISEAL compliant (International SOCIAL and environmental accreditation) so ethical issues do and should apply to the MSC label in this case.

If you are concerned about the social implications of MSC, you should be outraged at the development and funding of ASC:

A coalition of groups condemned WWF's move to establish the ASC. "We see the ASC as yet another attempt by a Big International NGO to formulate some ill-conceived plan to remedy the problems of unsustainable industrial shrimp farming. These kinds of remedies do not involve the local communities and grassroots movements in the process of defining steps to be taken, and therefore exclude those peoples most affected by the industryâs ongoing assaults as readily evidenced in such locations as Lampung, Indonesia or Muisne, Ecuador, in Khulna, Bangladesh or Choluteca, Honduras," wrote Alfredo Quarto, from the Mangrove Action Project, USA; Natasha Ahmad from the Asia Solidarity Against Industrial Aquaculture (ASIA), Bangladesh; Abdoulaye DiamÃ© from the African Mangrove Network; Juan Jose Lopez from the RedManglar Internacional, Colombia; and Maurizio Farhan Ferrari from the Forest Peoples Programme, UK.[3]

Jim - in regards to posts 14 & 15. MSY is the starting point. We now have Optimum Yield which is supposed to take into account uncertainty and "other factors" in determining the total alowable catch. I think most people familiar with the problems of MSY agree that it is very risky to try to fish right up to MSY. The question is how far down from MSY do you go and what all should you take into consideration in making that very arbitray decision.

Assuming that NOAA has good data on the marine mamals in question and that the 50% benchmark is meaningul in the life history of those particular mamals, then you have a good point. Unfortunatley your original post seemed to denounce fishing for swordfish based on the harvest of swordfish themselves(implying overfishing) and not these other issues.

Red -
Swordfish stocks are at 99% MSY...

Jim/Red,

What are your opinions on the high percentage of females caught as a result of longline fishing?

My understanding is that as with other billfish, the females tend to be bigger and as such are targeted disproportionately both commercially and for trophy, and because they do not mature until they are about 5 years old (as opposed to 3 years for males) that there is therefore a high probability that they are caught before they've even matured enough to spawn.

(Although I haven't specifically compiled the data, anecdotally I have heard concerns raised on disproportionate and premature female catch with regard to striped bass, shad, menhaden, alewife herring, etc.)

More on Giving Up Seafood...

jjacquet — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 08:25:18 +0000

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Food Systems

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Seafood

I support your position, Jennifer. Every successful movement begins with someone like you -- someone inside. I also assert that it's good for people to practice compassion in their food choices: we become better people when we practice being better people. As for arguments that fishing supports families and that some must eat fish because of limited choices, the fact is that if we who can choose to not eat fish make that choice, then those who depend on fishing for an income will be less threatened by loss of the resource, and those who depend on fish for food will be better provided. Clearly, not eating fish is the correct choice now for those who have that choice.

I wish you a long life and great success.

Regards,
Kevin Parcell
http://sunmoney.org

I'm more of a "top down" guy. Lateral pressure usually doesn't work. You have to convince the governments to start thinking sustainably. Including those supersonic fast growing "3rd world" countries who have more mouths to feed than there are mouths to be fed.

It seems like you have a critical difference in opinion as compared with numerous, large, NGOs with staffs full of scientists that have created lists of sustainable or unsustainable fisheries. If there are truly no sustainable fisheries, in the sense that any fishery will have some negative impact on the ecosystem then you must be correct in your personal solution. However, terrestrial food production negatively effects marine ecosystems as well (Especially chicken production - in the Chesapeake Bay watershed). So shall we just stop eating?

Maybe I am cynical about this position because I can't see how it would make inroads in changing the current destructive way the seafood industry operates. Can you explain how if this movement took off across the world, what you would expect to see happen?

You will take my smoked salmon away from me why you pry it from my cold, dead hands.

Hoki, caught of the West Coast of New Zealand, is a well managed stock. Exported to USA, dont know what name is used there. They strip out a line of oily flesh because consumers like white flesh. I am guessing that this contains Omega 3 DHA, ironically. Possibly used as animal feed, possibly dumped. I suggested to a Fisheries chap that NZ should start a DHA capsule industry, but caps are down to 7c, so profit might be difficult. It could be labelled "Southern ocean clean" since I am told that DHA capsules currently come from Norway.
Oddly, the big fishing boats attract Southern Bluefin Tuna. A dozen or so near the nets. These are not caught commercially, it seems. "Sports" fishermen come out 50km in small boats and catch tuna on rods. 4 hours "fight". I ate some, pecular, salty, red, soft, not a delight.
NZ oceans may be the last place you can catch big fish for "sport" I am ambivalen about the morality of hookng wild beasts in the mouth and dragging them about.

The real problem with the "fishing supports families" argument is that most of the world's fisheries are being grossly over-fished, and soon, they won't support anything at all. Those people being supported by fishing are on a sinking ship.

Hey Giordano - Hoki is usually renamed white roughy or whitefish over here and this is one of the things I don not understand about MSC - how does a bottom trawl fishery get certified as sustainable?

So... if we can sustainably harvest whales, why shouldn't we? How do army ants in the deep jungles not count as wildlife?

I think one has a responsibillity as a scientist not to be ruled by emotions in giving advice about ones field.

"EATING SEAFOOD IS NOT THAT HEALTHY":

Well, seafood is healthy food and we have done it for thousands of years. It gives us a lot of good fat-acids.

"EATING SEAFOOD HAS NEGATIVE ECOLOGICAL CONSEQUENCES."

Well, it depends on how you mean. I really don't see the problem with people who like to have a shrimp sandwich or shrimpsallad. Yes of course we should not overfish the oceans, but with seafood you include everything, and that statement is not supported by data.
"MOST IMPORTANT: TO EAT SEAFOOD IS TO EAT THE PLANET'S LAST REMAINING WILDLIFE."

This would be the emotional argument I guess. Many people regularly eat moose, dear, and other game meat that can only be considered non-threatened and clearly wild. Exactly what do you mean with that Seafood is the last remaining wildlife. There are plenty of wild plants and animals on the earth, although the numbers are declining.

I like this blog otherwise though, but I am generally worried about that scientistst can ruin the credibillity of other scientists by using their profession to advocate ideas that are not supported by data.

What about organic US Farmed catfish? A fish that isn't seafood?

1. Everything we do has negative ecological consequences. The logical and biological extension of your argument is "stop living."

2. Ocean fishes and invertebrates are NOT the planet's last remaining wildlife. You've just lost any remaining credibility you might have had. What a completely inane statement. There's all kinds of wildlife, everywhere, even in urban areas. And we even eat some of it - deer, rabbits, squirrels, waterfowl, and freshwater fishes.

You are entitled to your personal views, which I happen to agree with and applaud you for. I just wish you would stop using your Science Merit Badge to make the case because you are damaging science in the process. Just as the Bush Admin distorted science to make bad policy, so are you. But you are just coming from the opposite direction. You happen to be a marine biologist, but your argument is not a scientific one, and your use of science to back up your emotional PR campaign is really distressing.

NO SCIENTIST SHOULD EVER MAKE THE BASIS OF THE ARGUMENT "BECAUSE I AM A REALLY SMART PERSON WITH A PH.D AND I SAID SO."

This discussion seems akin to one I have been having about the importance of reducing one's personal greenhouse gas emissions:

http://www.sindark.com/2009/06/11/resistance-versus-abstinence-in-respo…

In the end, I think it is important to set an example. That being said, people really committed to an issue can accomplish far more by pressing for institutional changet than they can by simply reducing their personal impact.

Jennifer is NOT making the basis of the argument "Because I am a really smart person with a Ph.d and I said so". She is TELLING THE TRUTH. We should give up seafood NOW - it's the planet Earth that is at stake here. We are destroying our ONLY HOME, and no one but Jennifer and a few other intelligent human beings seem to care. Stop eating seafood so we don't end up destroying our only home - is that really too much too ask?

You know there are real problems when even Japan says we're overfishing for Blue-Fin Tuna. NPR covered the issue last night. They estimate there might be 3-4 years left before the population can no longer sustain itself.

We should stop eating beef and poultry too then, poor chickens.
Also, I believe that Omega 3 comes with great health benefits, not just preventing a couple of diseases.
Having said that I could live without eating fish or sea food , not a big fan : )

How about eating lower on the food chain? This avoids buildup of mercury and other nasties. I don't see any problem with my addiction to canned sardines, herring, and other smaller schooling fishes. There's very little by-catch with them, either.

I'm completely and utterly for the value of personal solutions - which, after all, only remain personal to the extent that you are unable to use your personal commitment to influence others. I don't disagree with your general assessments, I think you are absolutely right.

I do find myself wondering, though, if the "last remaining wildlife" thing enriches your case. It is, of course, not accurate - and people eat wild creatures all the time, and in a moral and philosophical sense, I'm not convinced that there's a compelling case against wild meat as such (as opposed, say, to endangered wild meat or overhunted wild meat) - indeed many species that overoccupy a niche after predators are removed would make a good source of calories for people - everyone in cities should eat pigeon ;-).

I'm also not clear why the moral argument against the domestication of fish - I'm not sure that fish could be fully domesticated in a true and reciprocal sense, but Chinese grass carp, for example, have been kept reasonably sustainably in cohabitation with humans for a very long time.

None of this undermines your most basic message, which I agree with - I just don't quite grasp your emphasis on these points and would be interested in hearing more.

Sharon

Food Is All the Rage: Why Not Be Outrageous?

jjacquet — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 16:14:28 +0000

Food Is All the Rage: Why Not Be Outrageous?

Because food issues are "one of the most interesting social movements afoot right now", I thought I would continue the discussion over whether we should give up eating seafood just a bit longer and point out the recent post at Animal Planet asking if we should boycott seafood altogether? Why is giving up seafood so unpalatable (other than for the obvious reason that some people find it delicious)? I am sure some people would find manatee meat tasty, too. Does that mean we should eat them to extinction?

jjacquet Tue, 06/16/2009 - 12:14

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Consumed

Food Systems

Guilt

Some seafood is quite sustainably harvested. And adds to the local economy. Come down to Corpus Christi, and I'll introduce you to some shrimpers. They -- well, not the ones you meet, but their work heirs -- will be pulling shrimp from the gulf long after you and I are gone. Why should we want to eliminate that?

I have been considering giving up fish also. It seems that everything is: mercury-laden; unsustainable; polluting (fish farms); kills marine mammals, sea turtles, etc, at an unacceptable rate; or has an unacceptable by-catch.

If Ben Stein says wild-caught, Alaska salmon are safe and have none of the above problems, I believe him, but I can't get it here on the East Coast.

Tom
of the Sweetwater Sea

The solution isn't to stop eating fish. The solution is to develop sustainable fish farming.

I'm highly sympathetic to your argument but there are a couple things I'm still wondering about:

Why focus on a personal boycott, rather than on lobbying for reduced catches, more sustainable farming, and better labeling?
What about all the people outside the English-speaking world who depend on fish and fishing? How does a movement based around boycott take them into account?
Agricultural runoff does plenty to hurt the ocean- doesn't focusing on boycott tend to ignore other impacts like this?
Also, what about freshwater fish? Equally bad?

For the record I'm one of those "vegetarians" who eats fish maybe once a month. Usually freshwater. So I'm not opposed to the idea of a boycott-- essentially that's what I do with meat (and fish Monteray Bay tells me is unsustainable). But I don't think its as effective as lobbying for better practices.

Jennifer, I applaud your efforts. I think that giving up fish is a lot easier than giving up meat. The reason I ate seafood was that I thought the Omega3 fat was good for my health and brain function. You can get it through flax seeds and other plant based foods.

Fish contain unsaturated fatty acids, which, when substituted for saturated fatty acids such as those in meat, may lower your cholesterol. But the main beneficial nutrient appears to be omega-3 fatty acids in fatty fish. Omega-3 fatty acids are a type of unsaturated fatty acid that's thought to reduce inflammation throughout the body.

Omega-3 fatty acids are also believed to improve learning ability in children, decrease triglycerides, lower blood pressure, reduce blood clotting, enhance immune function and improve arthritis symptoms. Consuming one to two servings a week of fish, particularly fish that's rich in omega-3 fatty acids, appears to reduce the risk of heart disease, particularly sudden cardiac death.

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/omega-3/HB00087

Thanks for mentioning my Animal PLanet blog post. I must admit my kids and my boyfriend and I had a serious giggle over the PETA Sea Kittens campaign. I am personally not against eating meat, if it's sustainable. I completely respect all vegans and vegetarians and have on occasion been one myself less for the animal rights aspect than the environmental aspect of food production. I love all the various perspectives out there, and enjoy a good discussion over it. There was a recent article I saw on Huffington Post about a study showing early hominids were not meat eaters but vegetarians that was quite interesting.

I'm far more concerned with starving humans in Asia and Africa, than I am with fish. The future of my species is more important to me.

We've got 7 billion hungry humans on this planet. It's modern agriculture and modern fishing and modern delivery systems that keeps them alive. That population would be unsustainable with the kind of 19th century small-scale agriculture and fishing you're imagining. You would be sentencing them to death by starvation.

Take your "Give up fish, give up meat, etc." to Africa or North Korea where they're reduced to eating tree bark, and see what kind of a response you get.

If you want to argue that the human population of Earth should be reduced, you might have an argument. But to worry about fish when human beings--real human beings--are starving in North Korea, Africa, etc., seems like a middle-class guilt trip for neurotic Westerners.

Not interested.
Deal with HUMAN starvation sometime.

sinz54,

I think Jennifer is talking more about the American diet and how we consume more seafood than is sustainable. If Asia and Africa are so dependent on seafood what are they going do when it's gone? In the US, seafood really is a luxury we could live without or at least consume less of. Our unsustainable levels of meat, fish and poultry intake needs to be addressed as soon as possible.

Jennifer - please name one single species of fish of shellfish that is now extinct because of human consumption.

sinz54 - I agree with your view to a point. I think we should only be consuming seafood caught or raised in the US because it is managed well under the Magnusen Stevenson Act. If we just stopped importing seafood from all over the world where there is limited to no management or regulations then it would solve most of the problem in terms of our own consumption of seafood. There are many well managed stocks of fish in the US and even some that were historically overfished and have rebounded after management actions. We need our own government to regulate the seafood industry better and to continue to manage our own fish stocks sustainably. If people do not have a connection to the oceans through what they eat, then they won't care about whats happening out there.

Sorry for posting 3 comments in a row, but I just love this blog... I just quickly wanted to use the example of the collapse of West coast salmon stocks. People who like to eat and fish for these salmon are the ones trying to save them. Agriculture and dams have destroyed the salmon stocks - NOT the recreational fishery for them. So maybe we shouldn't eat produce from California instead of not eating fish.

Dear Sinz54

It's this concept of viewing humans as separate from the rest of life that got us where we are today - the health of our species is intimately linked to the health of the planet. If we care about the 1 billion who have little other choice other than to eat fish, perhaps we could consider shifting to one many other choices of food we have.

Take a closer look at the work of Jennifer and her collegues at www.seaaroundus.org. Even better, watch the End of the Line movie. It's about not just about making fisheries sustainable it's also about making them FAIR.

Have a look at where all the European fisheries shifted to when their stocks ran out - West Africa, Pacific... Where do we get the fish to feed farmed salmon so we can have liberal lashings of smoked salmon? Places like Peru, where their children are suffering malnutrition. In poorer countries with fish resources, the people depend on fish for their food & livihoods but get little return from the sale of fishing rights to wealthy countries. They can only watch while industrial fleets suck up the last of their fish...